My Lords, I hope that my amendments live up to that. I speak also to Amendments 22QU and 22QV, and Amendments 56ZBA and 56ZBB. These amendments are all about fixed-penalty notices for failure to comply, in the case of the first pair of amendments with a community protection order, and in the second pair of amendments with a public spaces protection order. The Bill allows 14 days to pay the fixed penalty, which may be reduced in amount it if is paid within a shorter period; I imagine that it is anticipated that that would be seven days. It seems to me that 14 days is a very short period. I am not in this amendment seeking to argue the merits or
otherwise of either of the orders but we do not want them to come into disrepute through there being difficulties in their application. Some people go away on holidays, not realising that a notice may have become payable, because they might not actually have been handed it. There are a number of reasons why 14 days for payment is in many areas regarded as on the short side.
My amendments would provide in both cases a period of 28 days with a discount if payment is made, say, within 14 days—or, at any rate, an earlier period—which is comparable with penalties under the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988. Amendment 22QV, also to Clause 49, would replace a certificate being one that,
“purports to be signed by or on behalf of the chief finance officer of the local authority”,
with one that is simply “signed on behalf of”. I will probably be told that this is language used in many other Acts of Parliament, but it seemed to me a curious provision. More importantly, however, there would be no scope for challenge to it if the local authority got its procedures wrong. I have therefore tabled the amendment not as a frivolous matter but as a serious one. I beg to move.