My Lords, I support the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Faulks. I also echo his remarks about Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, for many years my noble friend in this House and on the golf course. His wisdom and contribution have been tremendous. The very powerful article he wrote in the Daily Telegraph last week could have been the speech he would have made today.
I want to add two things. One is about public administration and the other is about the implications of not accepting this amendment.
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As regards public administration, your Lordships will be well aware that it is the convention in British statute that powers are conferred upon Secretaries of State. They are not conferred upon departments of state. It has been very long accepted that the powers devolved upon a Secretary of State are administered by the department. Now, in the case of the powers under the Detention of Terrorists (Northern Ireland) Order 1972, there was a little more precision. An internment order was to be signed by the Secretary of State, a Minister of State or an Under-Secretary. There was some definition. In the case of Mr Adams, the order was signed by the Minister of State—quite properly and consistent with the order. As I understand the appeal by Mr Adams and the judgment of the Supreme Court, what was said was that although the correct procedure was followed, the Secretary of State had not given this matter his personal attention. But if every power that was conferred by statute on a Secretary of State required in each individual case the Secretary of State’s personal attention, administration and government would be utterly impossible.
That is the danger of this judgment of the Supreme Court. The consequences of it could be very considerable because others could follow the example. They could make appeals against orders which they feel have disadvantaged them in some way and ask for compensation because similarly it could not be established that the Secretary of State had given it his personal attention. We must maintain the Carltona principle, which has been accepted for so many years and has been thrown into doubt by this judgment of the Supreme Court.
The other point I want to make is as a taxpayer. We accept that there are cases when the taxpayer has to provide compensation for something that has been done wrong—but for an injustice. That has happened in the Windrush case, for example. But in the case of the detention of Mr Adams, nobody suggests that this was an injustice. All that happened was that the Supreme Court found that it was a procedural error. Those are not circumstances where a Government who are, quite
rightly, very careful about how they spend public money should be providing compensation. Indeed, the Government did decline to provide compensation to Mr Adams. Mr Adams took it through the courts and the Supreme Court made this very extraordinary ruling.
There could be other consequences of it. Others who were detained under the Detention of Terrorists (Northern Ireland) Order 1972 could similarly follow Mr Adams and seek compensation, and there could be other matters where claimants could say that the Secretary of State did not give his personal attention to it. There could be no end of claims for compensation. That would be, in my view, an appalling use of taxpayers’ money. The Government will be perfectly correct if they accept this amendment to protect the taxpayer against it.
For these two reasons, this is a very important amendment, and I am glad to hear that the Government are now sympathetic to its purpose.