Serious Crime Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 12: 12: Clause 2 , page 2, line 25, leave out paragraph (c) The noble Baroness said: In moving the amendment, I shall speak also to the other amendments in the group. Their purpose is to challenge the Government’s definition of involvement in serious crime, as set out in Clause 2. I shall seek to be briefer than I would otherwise have been, given the debates on some of the issues regarding intent that have already taken place, not only in the previous group of amendments, but earlier this afternoon. It would be helpful to have a discrete answer from the Minister on the issue of intent, particularly because of the warning, or advanced notice, that we have had from the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, that he feels strongly about the previous group of amendments and may take radical action on Report. My amendments would restrict the use of serious crime prevention orders to situations in which a person had either committed a serious offence or facilitated the commission of such an offence. Clause 2 differentiates between ““involved”” in serious crime and ““involvement””. The distinction is drawn because the first part of the test in Clause 1(1)(a) is concerned with the person who is ““involved”” in serious crime in England and Wales or elsewhere, whereas the second part of the test in Clause 1(1)(b), to which the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, referred, is concerned with future involvement in serious crime in England and Wales only. Our amendments ask whether involvement in serious crime requires a degree of intent on the part of the person being made subject to an order. My noble friend Lord Lucas said he was not concerned about whether the person had committed a serious crime and he had assumed from our discussions that those involved indeed had done so. The clauses show us that an order can be imposed upon somebody who has never committed a serious offence and never facilitated the commission of a serious offence by somebody else but who is judged somehow to have behaved in such a way that it was likely to make it easier for somebody else to commit a serious offence even if that serious offence were never subsequently committed. That vagueness in Clause 2 seems objectionable at first sight and it would be useful to have a settled answer from the Minister today on that. There is no requirement that a person must intentionally participate in criminal activity so in theory innocent people could have an order imposed upon them. The Minister has said that will not happen. It is not that it cannot happen necessarily, but it will not happen. We will not catch businesses which are acting in an innocent way; we are looking at those that have as a matter of practice either looked the other way—so there is an intent in that they have ignored what is going on and therefore they are not caring about public safety—or they have already been warned by the law enforcement agencies about their activity: ““This is the kind of criminal activity we know is going on. We believe it is linked with the way in which you run your business, for example because you have created false compartments for what you consider to be innocent purposes but they are being misused. We know this is happening. Stop it or change your behaviour and do something else””. If the person ignores all that and carries on, in a sense there is intent. It might sound very reasonable to say that these people have been given the opportunity to amend their behaviour, therefore why not now do something else to stop them? But is it reasonable to make them subject to an order, given all the issues raised in Clause 4, or is there another way to address their behaviour? Other noble Lords have felt constrained by not being able to give examples of behaviour because they listened to the briefing last night. I was not there but I still feel constrained because I have seen a note of the briefing so I am going to be very careful which examples I use as well. A high-street computer retailer could sell a computer to a person who uses it to run a human trafficking syndicate. An order could presumably be imposed upon a person who runs a shop selling fishing tackle because that tackle could be used to poach salmon illegally and that is treated as a serious crime in Schedule 1. The Minister will say that the person has still been behaving in such a way that there is some kind of complicity. The fact that somebody is acting innocently but might find themselves within the remit of an order was recognised by the Home Office in the consultation that preceded the publication of this Bill. The Home Office gave an example of a situation in which a serious crime prevention order might be imposed. They gave the example of a company that makes the concealed compartments to which I have already referred, purportedly to allow drivers to hide their valuables when they are on long journeys so that they can secure them when they leave the cab, but of course these compartments could be used to store drugs. That is on page 10 of the consultation paper. The consultation paper points out that making the compartments is not in itself illegal—of course not—but it goes on to say that the order could impose a requirement on the business to notify law enforcement officers of the details of all such compartments and its customers. So despite the reassurances of the noble Baroness that people who have been taking proper measures will not be made subject to an order, an example is given in the consultation paper where somebody who is not complicit, who has not looked the other way and who has not turned down opportunities by the police to amend their behaviour, could still be made subject to an order. That is the direct implication of what the consultation paper says, which is why there has been concern outwith and within this House. A further concern is about what is proportionate in the way one treats businesses—my noble friend Lord Lucas rightly brought that to our attention. The Minister said that there will not be criminalisation. Others have said that if an order was made, at least there would be publicity and that could have an adverse effect on the business. The consultation paper specifically says that an alternative might be that part of the order might provide that the business should notify law enforcement officers of the details of their customers and all the compartments. That requires the provision of a lot of bureaucratic work by the company which seems to be a substitute for industry regulation and one wonders why the Government have decided against industry regulation—with a light touch, I hope, because we on these Benches are not in favour of undue and unfair regulation on business—in favour of the panoply of orders that are before us. I beg to move.