My Lords, this has been a consistent theme ever since the Joint Committee’s report. It was reported on by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, and the Digital and Communications Committee, chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, has rightly taken up the issue. Seeing some movement from the Minister, particularly on Clause 29 and specifically in terms of Amendments 134 to 137, is very welcome and consistent with some of the concerns that have been raised by noble Lords.
There are still questions to answer about Amendment 138, which my noble friend has raised. I have also signed the amendments to Clause 38 because I think the timetabling is extremely welcome. However, like other noble Lords, I believe we need to have Amendments 139, 140, 144 and 145 in place, as proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston. The phrase “infinite ping-pong” makes us all sink in gloom, in current circumstances—it is a very powerful phrase. I think the Minister really
does have to come back with something better; I hope he will give us that assurance, and that his discussions with the noble Baroness Stowell will bear further fruit.
I may not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, about the Clause 39 issues, but I am glad he raised issues relating to Clause 159. It is notable that of all the recommendations by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, the Government accepted four out of five but did not accept the one related to what is now Clause 159. I have deliberately de-grouped the questions of whether Clauses 158 and 159 should stand part of the Bill, so I am going to pose a few questions which I hope, when we get to the second group which contains my clause stand part proposition, the Minister will be able to tell me effortlessly what he is going to do. This will prevent me from putting down further amendments on those clauses, because it seems to me that the Government are being extraordinarily inconsistent in terms of how they are dealing with Clauses 158 and 159 compared with how they have amended Clause 39.
For instance, Clause 158 allows the Secretary of State to issue a direction to Ofcom, where the Secretary of State has reasonable grounds for believing that there is a threat to public health and safety or national security, and they can direct Ofcom to set objectives in how they use their media-literacy powers in Section 11 of the Communications Act for a specific period to address the threat, and make Ofcom issue a public-statement notice. That is rather extraordinary. I will not go into great detail at this stage, and I hope the Minister can avoid me having to make a long speech further down the track, but the Government should not be in a position to be able to direct a media regulator on a matter of content. For instance, the Secretary of State has no powers over Ofcom on the content of broadcast regulation—indeed, they have limited powers to direct over radio spectrum and wires—and there is no provision for parliamentary involvement, although I accept that the Secretary of State must publish reasons for the direction. There is also the general question of whether the threshold is high enough to justify this kind of interference. So Clause 158 is not good news at all. It raises a number of questions which I hope the Minister will start to answer today, and maybe we can avoid a great debate further down the track.
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Then, of course, we have Clause 159. I think the noble Lord, Lord Moylan is correct. It does not have nearly enough parliamentary input into this, as the DPRRC itself said. It allows the Secretary of State to issue “have regard” guidance to Ofcom about Ofcom’s exercise of functions under the Act, research it might carry out, the use of its powers from the Communications Act, and how Ofcom uses its media literacy powers in the Communications Act across the Bill.
The point of principle involved here is that the Secretary of State should not interfere with the independence of the communications regulator—in particular, not in its day-to-day operation. There are a number of questions there, particularly on why the Government absolutely resisted what the DPRRC had to say. This is unusual, as normally the Government
make a better fist of it in responding than I think they did on this occasion, but I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say.