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Terrorism Bill

My Lords, I follow what has just been said by the noble Lords, Lord Judd and Lord Rees-Mogg, because I think all noble Lords welcome the Government’s move on Clause 2 and want to help the Government in any way we can in picking their way through the extremely difficult conflict between freedom of expression and the need to protect ourselves sensibly against terrorism. However, may I echo what the noble Lord, Lord Judd, said about recklessness? I will add another thought to the reasons why what that would catch is still, I am afraid, somewhat unclear. In a letter sent on 3 January to a number of people who expressed concern about this Bill, particularly among the universities, the Minister of State at the Home Office, Hazel Blears, said:"““As with obscene publications, libraries must act with due care in handling such publications and restricting access to them as they deem proper, in order that proper academic research is possible””—" and I emphasise this next phrase—"““whilst not allowing impressionable people to see such publications””." With great respect to the Minister of State, who is able and competent, it is almost impossible to see how to interpret that under the general header of recklessness. Is it ““reckless”” if a library or university teacher behaves without, as in Mrs Blears’ expression, ““due care””? In almost any university in the land, by definition there are almost bound to be ““impressionable people””. At their best, that is exactly what students are. How, then, could a conscientious university teacher or librarian meet, at one and the same time, the rather more narrow explanation of recklessness that the Minister has so helpfully given us here and the implications of Hazel Blears’ letter? With the best will in the world—and I wish the Government well in getting this Bill as right as we can—I simply cannot see how one can meet both requirements at the same time. They do not seem fully compatible. Although this is an extremely important issue, I will not detain the House long. However, I will go back for a moment to what is called the chilling effect. In some cases, the concept of recklessness can be defined in terms of negligence—a failure to take the action that one might in order to meet this Bill’s requirements. Once into that, questions are raised about whether, for example, the librarian or academic teacher should attempt to screen his or her students, and we get into the area of whether he or she should have to operate self-censorship in order to avoid any possibility of being found guilty of recklessness. With great respect to the defences laid out, they still leave open the very troubling possibility that a number of people from these two professional groups would find themselves being accused of recklessness and having to defend themselves. Frankly, that is completely unjust to those professions and, even if they are eventually found to be innocent, it is bound to leave a whiff of criminality behind. The Liberal Democrats have the greatest willingness to behave responsibly because we have all at one time or another, either personally or generally, encountered the terrible consequences of terrorism. We will try if we can, during Report, to make the whole issue of recklessness as precise as possible. In that I echo the questions of my noble friend Lord Goodhart and the noble Lords, Lord Rees-Mogg and Lord Judd. I conclude by saying that, given the letter from the Minister of State at the Home Office, any help that the Minister can give us, whether via amendments or explanation to the House on how she would narrow and limit the concept of recklessness, would be extremely helpful. There is also the importance of being able to respond in good faith to the letter that my noble friend quoted from the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, which indeed throws some doubt on whether, even with the amendments, we have met the requirements in the European convention or in the Council of Europe’s covenant.