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Police and Justice Bill

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Harris, has advanced a carefully crafted argument, as he always does on these occasions. Indeed, he has done so so skilfully that he has begun to make me feel rather bad about what I am about to say. If he can take anything away from this discussion, which we have had in two or three stages of the Bill, it is that, I am afraid. I am rather drawn to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, because we often have this strange debate about ““shall”” meaning ““must””. One can get into difficulty if someone ““must”” have regard to representations made, particularly if there is a challenge. I shall repeat much of what I said on Report. We are bringing the appointment of the vice-chairman of the Metropolitan Police Authority into line with the way in which the vice-chairmen of other Greater London Authority functional bodies, such as Transport for London and the London development agencies, are appointed. As I think has been said in the past, the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority appoints its own vice-chairman from among its members. Our primary reason for enabling the Mayor to appoint the vice-chairman of the Metropolitan Police Authority is that the vice-chairman can act as chairman in his absence. It is therefore logical for the chairman and the vice-chairman to be appointed in the same way. I expect, however, that members of the Metropolitan Police Authority will want to make—indeed, are very likely to make—representations about the appointment of vice-chairmen to the Mayor. I have little doubt that any Mayor, and not simply our current incumbent, would be foolish indeed if they did not ““have regard to”” those representations when making the appointment. I understand the principle of what my noble friend Lord Harris is seeking to achieve, but I do not think that an amendment is required to achieve it. In any event, members of the authority do not need a particular statutory power to make the quality and nature of representations that they have. In part because of the argument that the noble Baroness has begun to advance about the terminology, I think that there may be an unintended or hidden consequence in making such a power. I assure my noble friend that members will be free to make the representations that they have always been able to make. That is the best way to achieve the outcome that he seeks and, although the logic may have been tortuous in the past, I think that our point is the right one and that the arrangement is best left as it is. For those reasons, I hope that, although he has made his arguments well, he will feel able to withdraw his amendment.