It is a marginally lower hurdle, but as I understand it—and the Minister will confirm—the choice of words was not an arbitrary matter but the result of a very wide consultation among the professionals concerned in order to reach a test that was sufficient to establish gravity but not so high that the scourge of anti-social behaviour could not be prevented.
In its briefing on this part of the Bill, the Law Society made the point that if injunctions are used in the case of noise nuisance, as an alternative to possession proceedings, they can result in the person or family staying in their home but with restrictions on their conduct, rather than the much more drastic step of eviction. Although an IPNA can be obtained on the balance of probabilities, with or without the amendment, the criminal standard must be satisfied before any breach can be established: that is, beyond reasonable doubt. I respectfully suggest that this provides an extra safeguard, so that this will not result in people being deprived of their liberty inappropriately.
I am also concerned about how coherent Amendment 1 is. It requires “harassment, alarm or distress”—a quasi-criminal test—with the exception, which was not in the original amendment in Committee, of a housing provider or local authority in a similar housing management position. In the case of social housing, the hurdle to be surmounted appears to be lower, so there is a two-tier test for anti-social behaviour, depending on whether you are a private tenant or are in social housing, where an injunction is much more easily obtained. That is hardly a satisfactory distinction, and I wonder how enthusiastic the party is about such a classification.
I do not know, of course, how the party opposite—or at least its Front Bench—regards this amendment. It will be borne in mind that MPs on all sides in the House of Commons were at pains to stress what a scourge anti-social behaviour is to their constituents,
and that there ought to be substantial and sensible powers to prevent it. Indeed, the shadow Home Secretary said generally of the powers in the Bill that she thought they were too weak.
We are all passionately in favour of freedom of speech, freedom of association—