---

Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Bill [HL]

When speaking to Amendment No. 56, the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, referred to the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Laming. I am prompted to rise by a handwritten note that he passed to me, in which he stated that he regretted that he had to leave as he has reservations about Amendment No. 56. He is not concerned on the basis that he is worried about matters which could be brought before the IBB maliciously, but he is concerned about giving too wide an opportunity for people to challenge the decisions. He is concerned that once you open the matter up to a finding of fact, every decision would be likely to go through that process, and that would clog up the arrangements. It seems to me that in looking at issues of fact, behaviour and potential harm, a distinction needs to be made regarding the sources and nature of that material. If, for example, a finding of fact concerns a disciplinary hearing within a local authority or by an employer, there are mechanisms by which that decision can be reviewed and the findings of fact can be dealt with. Circumstances where there is a concern which may lead to a barring decision are more complicated. Those are precisely the circumstances where it is not a case of a finding of fact but of a matter of judgment. That seems to me to be the issue that we need to address, rather than creating an appeals process which revolves round spurious issues of fact as opposed to a judgment on whether someone presents a risk of harming a child or vulnerable adult. Before she decides whether or not to withdraw the amendments, it would be helpful if the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, recognised that there is a distinction between those cases where there has already been an opportunity to review the matters of fact and those cases which involve a series of professional opinions about the risk of harm. It seems to me that there needs to be different channels for dealing with them. Where there has already been an opportunity to review a finding of fact, you could dangerously clog up the system rehearing cases regarding which, in some instances, considerable time may have elapsed since they were last reviewed. If it is a matter of reviewing the professional judgments and hearing conflicting judgments, then surely the tribunal should not be about hearing matters of fact but about finding ways in which the representations on different interpretations of professional behaviour can be looked at. I suspect that the forum of an appeals process would not be the best way of dealing with that.