London Local Authorities Bill [Lords]

It was Winston Churchill who said that he had often had to eat his words and had found it a very good diet. I am very much in the same position now: I am dutifully eating my words in relation to the earlier answer I gave, because that is exactly the problem that we might have. People might get those badges, which I described earlier, and of which I am sure the House would like to be reminded:"““A Portcullis chained and ensigned of a Mural Crown between on the dexter side a united Rose and on the sinister side a Lily both stalked and leaved all Or.””" But perhaps instead of having them ““all Or”” we should have them ““all Argent””. Then we would know that they were not the real thing, and it would allow us to sell them and raise a bit of money without allowing anybody to go around impersonating one of those officers. My hon. Friend's point is of serious importance: one would have to have a uniform that could not be easily replicated, but if one could make a little money on the side by selling something similar that would be beneficial. One thinks of cricket teams that do so. Somerset county cricket club sells its shirts, which are extraordinarily popular. I do not wear them myself, but with younger people they are very popular and a good way of raising money and keeping ticket prices down, so perhaps one would get some benefit from that, as tourists came along and decided to buy imitations rather than the real thing. One can buy imitation policeman's helmets, which have plastic insignia on them and little plastic silver things on top, and that does not confuse too many people. My four-year-old enjoys wearing one, and he has never been arrested for impersonating an officer, although he is actually under the age of criminal responsibility so he cannot be arrested anyway. He cannot even be got by one of these council officers, because he has not worked out how to sell a car on the internet, although if he sold mine I would not be unduly delighted. I have proposed adding ““in uniform””, and if we look at some of the other parts of clauses 14 and 15, we find that for consistency I have proposed making sure that we have ““magistrates”” as well. I do not wish to repeat myself unduly, but the point is one worth making, and I have always thought, ““If it is a good point, make it again and again and perhaps one day somebody will listen,”” because we need orders from magistrates to ensure that the measure is proper, valid, just, right and observes—respects—the historic rights that we have had for so many centuries. I want to move on at quite some speed, because there are any number of people who are looking forward to speaking on this great subject and have tabled amendments—many more than I have. Indeed, the Bill's sponsor has proposed some of his own amendments, which people will want to debate at considerable length, so I turn to amendments 56 and 57 to clause 16. Earlier in the clause I suggest that an object's disposal be subject to an order by ““A magistrate””, but these proposed changes would just tie down the councils on costs, amending clause 16(3) so that it stated that the council may recover its ““reasonable”” costs, rather than any costs. When councils take enforcement action, they should not do so as a profit centre. Although, strictly speaking, they would not be allowed to do so, it is amazing how people wangle their way around the rules. We know that from parking tickets, which started as a means of stopping congestion. Suddenly, we discover that councils are using them to build up their bank reserves because they are not getting the money that they want from other sources in this age of austerity, such as from central Government. A little bit extra from parking fines is very helpful. That is particularly iniquitous. Let us therefore put in the word ““reasonable”” and tie the councils down. I cannot really see why they would object, if they have no sinister motive. I am sure that they have no sinister motive because otherwise we would have spotted it earlier and thrown out the Bill on Second Reading. Clause 16 should therefore read ““reasonable costs””. When a seizure takes place and what is seized is sold, under amendment 57 any excess money would go back to the person and the fine would not exceed the value of what has been confiscated. Again, it is unfair to penalise people twice for the same thing: once for a minor offence is more than enough, and twice—to go on and on and repeat it again and again—seems to me to be fundamentally unfair. We should therefore put in some limits. The whole thread of my amendments is to protect the legitimate individual, and perhaps even the slightly spivvy individual who wanders between the right and the wrong side of the law. When he is on the right side of the law, he has rights too. Just because somebody has been a bit spivvy once does not mean that all his rights should be suspended, destroyed, eroded or removed. Even that fellow Mr Qatada was let out of prison when there was no reasonable prospect of deporting him. Even the nastiest people have some rights. People who have been selling a few things on an illegal stall must surely be protected, if they are having their livelihood taken away, from having their utensils taken away and an unreasonable fine served upon them as well. It is important to maintain the great, historic liberties. That brings me to clause 18. I really will be coming to an end quite soon. This is not my proposal, but it is in this group and I think that it is particularly sensible. Amendment 35 suggests getting rid of clause 18 altogether. One might say that we should get rid of the whole Bill, but that may come a little later, on Third Reading. Clause 18 will apply a fine at level 3 for people who obstruct one of the council officers. The reason that I have taken objection to that, do take objection to it and will continue to take objection to it is that one does not know who the officer is. One cannot be certain that somebody genuinely is an officer of the council. One may be fooled. As a general principle, the law must be clear. If some foolish person steals a policeman's helmet on boat race night, as we all know Bertie Wooster did, he knows that when he is brought up before the beak, he is being charged fairly and justly. If instead of pinching a policeman's helmet, Bertie Wooster had met one of these authorised officers, who said that he thought his Widgeon Seven was for sale on the internet, Mr Wooster might have said, ““Who are you? How I do know that you have any authority to tell me not to sell my Widgeon Seven on the internet?”” For the sake of clarity, the internet was not invented when Mr Bertie Wooster was driving the Widgeon Seven, which was some decades ago. However, I do not think that that invalidates the argument. It is an example of what could happen. It might not be Mr Wooster with a Widgeon Seven; it might be any one of our constituents who happens to be in London with a Ford or Renault, if people buy French cars. They simply might not know whether the person who tries to give them a ticket is an authorised officer. Any true-born English person, and probably any Welsh person or Scots person, would be very affronted if some busybody came up to them saying, ““I'm giving you a fine,”” unless they could be certain who that person really was and that they had a legitimate authority. This proposal is even more pernicious because people coming to London will not know that rules in London are different to those where they come from. My constituents who come to London will find these peculiar officers bouncing out at them from around corners saying, ““We're giving you a fine.”” My constituents will definitely take no notice of that. They will say, ““I don't give a fig for your fine.”” They will then be done under clause 18 and receive a fine not exceeding level 3 for saying that they do not give a fig for a fine. I think that a man from Somerset should be allowed to say that to somebody unless he knows clearly that that person is who he pretends to be and has a uniform to prove it. We have discussed what the uniforms should be and what coats of arms could be on them. It happens that there are coats of arms for every borough of London, so they could each have their own uniform. Earlier, we talked only about Westminster. That is why I did not regale the House with the arms of all the boroughs of London. I thought it would be interesting to do so and I may be able to do so on another occasion. That leaves me with my final amendment. Amendment 58 relates to clause 19 on the proof of resolution, which is outrageous. The whole thing is outrageous, but amendment 58 would put right a particular outrage. All the cards are stacked in favour of the bureaucrat. If the bureaucrat gets something wrong, he gets off scot free. If the bureaucrat does not send something out, it is presumed that he has sent it out. However, if poor Mr Jones who is selling his car on the high street gets a ticket, the car is taken off him by an authorised officer without the approval of a magistrate and without anything being proved. This law, this rotten law, this dreadful, mean little Bill for some of the London boroughs, is an attack on freedom that builds up the bureaucrat and enables him to do all sorts of things without any protection for the individual. The bureaucrat can take one's car, seize one's goods, sell one's goods and send one a notice with only 14 days to do anything about it. If that bureaucrat makes a bureaucratic mistake, he is scot free and it is assumed that he got everything right, because he is such a wonderful and clever bureaucrat. This party came into government to protect the freedoms of the British subject. That was in our manifesto. The Lib Dems have been just as sound on the freedoms of the British subject since the Liberal party was founded. What on earth are we doing passing these nasty little clauses into law? They deal with a problem that is of insufficient scale to warrant this loading of the dice in favour of the state to oppress and do down the freedom-loving Briton.