London Local Authorities Bill [Lords]

Exactly. To go back to the example given by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg), somebody who sees the authorised officer with a bowler hat and heads off in the opposite direction might be regarded as intentionally obstructing the officer. Who knows? If we are going to create new offences, it is important that they should be very tightly drawn so that they can be clearly understood. The offence in the Bill is wide and vague and therefore oppressive and that is why I find it particularly offensive. I was amazed to see the wide terms in which clause 20 has been drafted. Without taking up too much of the House's time, it is worth spelling out exactly what it says. It states:"““Where an offence under this Act committed by a body corporate is proved to have been committed with the consent””," we can understand that,"““or connivance of, or to be attributable to any neglect on the part of, a director””," again, we can understand the reference to a director,"““manager, secretary or other similar officer of the body corporate or any person who was purporting to act in any such capacity, he, as well as the body corporate, shall be guilty of the offence.””" Subsection (2) states:"““Where the affairs of the body corporate are managed by its members, subsection (1) above shall apply to the acts and defaults of a member in connection with his functions of management as if he were a director of the body corporate.””" If the clause was the result of a competition among law students to see who could draft the most unreasonably wide new criminal sanctions against corporate bodies, the person who drafted this would probably get a capital alpha. It is drawn so widely and so unreasonably that, I would submit, it cannot have been analysed properly. I cannot believe that the promoters of the Bill really want the clause to be in the condition it is in at the moment.