My Lords, I too did not speak at Second Reading. Unlike the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, who is no longer in his place, it was not because I was doing other things in the Lords but because I had not read the Bill. The fact that I have now looked at it brings me to the Committee today. Before I speak, I declare an interest both as a board member of the ABI, although that is not relevant to this amendment, and as a member of the Labour Party. The reason is that I speak to Amendment 68, to which I have added my name.
We will come to Part 3 later but the definition of “foreign power” in respect of Part 3, as spelled out in Clause 81(1), is in Clause 30. Clause 30(1)(e) covers political parties in government, or members of political parties that are in government. Schedule 14 exempts these, or at least the political parties in government, from the Clause 69 requirement to register. However, on a reading of it, it sounds as though that covers only foreign parties in government and not others. Therefore, I am not certain whether the Clause 14 exemption covers political parties in opposition. If it does not, political parties in opposition in other countries are covered as foreign powers.
I confess that some of the noble and learned Lords who have just left have been extremely helpful in giving me advice on this; in case your Lordships think that these are all my own words, I have had the benefit of extremely good advice on this. It sounds as though the exemption in Schedule 14 is only for the governing parties themselves and not necessarily for individuals of those parties or for those acting on behalf of political parties. It also appears that the exemption covers only registration and influencing, and probably not the activities of overseas political parties, even those from friendly states, such as Five Eyes states, with which of course we do a lot of business. So I think that those parties come under Clauses 65 and 66, according to the definition.
I hope the Minister will have enormous clarity when he spells this out in his reply, and I also hope that either the noble Lord, Lord Marks, or the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, will speak on this and can clarify it more than I can. It is interesting whether, if an overseas party—the US Democrats, for example—organised a dinner here, perhaps at Labour Party conference, that would need to be reported, and indeed with the threat of criminal proceedings if it was not. Would any of those political parties coming over here and having meetings with any of us count as activities and would they have to be reported within 10 days, and so on?
We also do a lot of joint working, in our case with the German SPD; we work on environment and trade, and a lot of other issues, and sometimes we buy them lunch—occasionally they buy us lunch. Is that covered
by what would have to be declared? Similarly, would we have to report meetings, perhaps with MEPs from across the European Union when they were over here, or is it only those from non-governing parties? Therefore, if we have a mixed group of MEPs coming here, would those from governing parties be exempt but not those in opposition?
If the Minister thinks he is fairly junior down the pecking order, I think I am the tea lady who brings in the tea to barristers, so I hope he will be able to clarify all of this and that it is just me who is confused. However, as my noble friend Lord Hacking said earlier, this legislation should be easy to read. It does not just have to be right in what we want it to say; it is incredibly important that anyone who could be affected by it can pick it up. I am not a lawyer but I am pretty involved in politics, and if I can read it and not understand a word of it—I may be at the stupid end —I doubt that anyone else will be able to.
Part of the reason for the next issue is that there has not been any pre-legislative scrutiny on this Bill, which would have clarified some of this; nor has there been any consultation on these issues. If there are going to be a lot of reports, particularly on political parties in opposition coming over here, we risk having such an enormous number of reports that they become meaningless. If all these activities get reported, the actual dodgy ones, if you like, may be hidden in plain sight.
I know that, either in giving evidence somewhere or in writing, Edward Lucas looked at the case of anti-money laundering. He showed that there are 3,000 reports of anti-money laundering a day; quite a lot of them probably come from your Lordships’ House since we are all PEPs and must be reported on. However, it means that, if you start getting that number of reports, they are meaningless because you cannot see the wood for the trees.
6.30 pm
Later on—probably in the next day of Committee—we will come on to how all this will affect business, academics and investors. My concentration today is on friendly political parties from friendly states and the possible attempt to criminalise any work that they do on influencing decision-makers. If I have read it correctly, the Bill refers not simply to decision-makers in government but to their ability to try to influence a political party. In the case of the Labour Party—I am sure that other parties can speak for themselves—we are a member of international party groupings; for example, we are a member of the Party of European Socialists. Needless to say, when we have elections for a new president or general secretary, we are lobbied by overseas parties about who we should vote for. I hope the Minister is going to clarify that there is no way in which that attempt to influence a political party could possibly be covered, because my reading of the Bill is that it is close to it.
If the Government’s intention in all this is to get at the Chinese Communist Party, would it not be easier for them either to say that or to put in “political parties identified by government under a statutory instrument”? This would capture political parties, be
they the French Socialists, the American Democrats or whatever the equivalents of the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative Party are. There is also an underlying problem behind this. It seems to me that the Bill implies that all foreign political parties, which I believe are essential to democracy, are somehow suspect. The tone of the way in which that part of the Bill is written is dangerous and unedifying.
Can the Minister clarify what exactly the Government’s position is? If governing parties are foreign parties as defined in Clause 30(1)(e) but are exempt from both the requirements to register under Schedule 14 and the prohibition on carrying out unregistered political influence activities, does that exemption apply to individual party members—including committees and sub-committees of parties—or entities associated with the party? We could have coming here a policy group that is associated with a party that could be active here. Since the obligation to register applies not to the foreign principal but to the person directed by them, are the exemptions sufficient to cover them?
Then there is the issue of parties that are not in government. On good advice from somebody who is present in the House at the moment, they seem to be in a worse position because they are foreign principals under Clause 67 and are not exempted under the foreign powers exemption. It therefore looks as if any communication that they direct to an MP, a Member of the Scottish Parliament, a Member of the Welsh Assembly or a Peer for the purpose of influencing them would have to be registered—again, possibly on pain of criminal prosecution. Can the Minister make a distinction on whether overseas parties in opposition may be caught by this measure? How would he define them? At the moment, is America a Democrat country or a Republican country? The Republicans control the House, but there is a Democrat in the White House. Which one counts as a governing party if, as we read it, parties in government are exempted but those in opposition are not? Who runs America at the moment? Is this really what the Government want to do?
Also, could an individual be required under Clause 72(2) to provide to the Government information about any arrangements made? What safeguards against political abuse are there for provisions relating to providing confidential communication? It seems to me that this clause on political parties—indeed, trying to cover them in an important Bill about national security—is completely out of line with what I think is the Bill’s intention.