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Terrorism Bill

moved Amendment No. 41:"Page 4, line 27, at end insert—" ““(e)   that the publication to which the conduct related was received by a library in consequence of its obligations under the British Library Act 1972 (c. 54) or the Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003 (c. 28)”” The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I am delighted that the amendment has survived our procedure. The amendment is small but very important. I am very surprised that the Government have not embraced it. To put it very straightforwardly, its purpose is to exempt the British Library and the deposit libraries from the curtilage of the Bill. It is extremely important that that is done. The British Library is a modern heritage. Therefore, in many ways it is a very important part of this country’s future. Two very clear duties are laid on it. One is that it is a library of record, which means that every publisher, writer, and so on, in the country, has to deposit with the British Library every publication. In that sense, it is rather like the Library of Congress in the United States. It makes it one of the great libraries of the world. Under the provision of the Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003, that still holds good. However, the British Library Act 1972, which was passed before the British Library was built, but was planned, laid a very clear responsibility on the library to promote knowledge and education, the pursuit of truth, freedom of expression and many other highly desirable things. It must be very clear from the discussions that have taken place in the House today and in Committee that there is considerable doubt about the responsibility of a library such as the British Library in terms of this legislation. It was made fairly clear by the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick, that she is not clear what responsibilities rest on university academics and librarians. The British Library is in exactly the same position. It took legal advice before, it must be said, the noble Baroness moved the major changes that are a part of bringing in the concept of intent. However, at that stage—to be honest, it was not much affected by intent—the legal advice was that the British Library might well find itself in very great difficulties with this Bill. It might find that people were up before prosecutors because they were alleged, in some way, to be instigating or encouraging terrorism. In Committee, this matter was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, who is the chairman of the British Library. Pursuant to having a very strong wish not to seem to seek special privileges for the British Library, he went along with the terminology at that time on the grounds that there might be a rogue librarian in the British Library and such a person should not be protected from the normal exigencies of the law. However, the word ““person”” can be interpreted both as an individual person and in the corporate sense as comprising a corporate person. On the basis of advice that he has received on the British Library being a corporate person, the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, has specifically asked me to say that he presses very strongly for the amendment that I am now moving because he believes that as a corporate person, the British Library and the deposit libraries, which include the national libraries of Scotland and Wales, should be exempted from the Bill. His reasons are that being under the Bill could be a major obstruction to the development of those libraries. I am not sure whether all noble Lords are aware of the extent to which the British Library has been at the centre of the building up of a global network, which is increasingly influential and increasingly highly recognised in many parts of the world, not least in the part of the world that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Winchester is so closely associated with in Africa and in other parts of the Anglican communion. It would be devastating if the British Library were to find itself stopped in its tracks in developing this network of extraordinary education and information facilities as a result of an incomprehension or misunderstanding of the purport of this Bill. I frankly thought that, by this time, the Government would have adopted the amendment and would have made it quite plain that, while the provision could not protect individuals, it would protect the corporate persona of the British Library and the deposit libraries. I cannot put this too strongly: it can only be in the interests of this country that we encourage this development of the knowledge economy and knowledge society as a substantial part of where our future lies. I think that all of us recognise the astonishing contribution that the United Kingdom has made to the world of higher academic studies, research and scientific study. For all those reasons therefore—and I had thought that I was pushing at an open door—I hope that the Government will carefully consider the matter before Third Reading. I am not about to press this amendment to a Division. If they thought about it, it would be clear that they could exempt these libraries from the purport of the Bill and everyone would applaud them for doing so. I speak to this amendment as strongly as I possibly can because the damage that will be done to the United Kingdom if we do not make such an exemption will be profound. Beyond the United Kingdom, the damage that will be done to the whole network of knowledge throughout the world will not be enhanced in any way by encumbering it with a Bill of this kind. I beg to move.