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Terrorism Bill

My Lords, I am more than grateful to the noble Lord for that response. Obviously he is right that the Bill increases the penalty to a maximum of five years in national security cases, which is what the Bill is about. I still think that the amendment raises a serious point that, as the noble Lord said, goes beyond this Bill. I ask the noble Lord to do something for me, although I hope he will appreciate that there is no urgency because it does not relate to the Bill. Perhaps he or the Minister could write to me setting out the maximum penalties for some of the other offences that I mentioned—for example, paedophilia and so on, which has been in the news of late. Is the maximum always two years? If so, does that not create cases where, in relation to some offences, it is in the interests of some people to refuse to assist the police and to refuse to help with de-encryption, because they know that the maximum penalty that they are likely to receive is two years for refusing to help with de-encryption rather than something much worse further on? Having said that, I am grateful to the Government for the fact that on this occasion they have increased the penalty to five years in cases of national security. As the noble Lord put it, the new subsection (5B) of what I suppose will be the new Section 53 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act spells out what a ““national security case”” means. I hope that the noble Lord has got that. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. Clause 17 [Commission of offences abroad]: [Amendment No. 63 not moved.]