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Serious Crime Bill [HL]

My Lords, I read from the report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights: "““The House of Lords Constitution Committee in its report on this Bill had grave concerns as to whether the Bill as currently drafted is compatible with the constitutional principle of the rule of law and legal certainty, because of the lack of clarity about both the circumstances in which SCPOs might be made and their ambit when they are made””." We then say: "““For the reasons we have summarised above, we have very similar concerns about whether the power to interfere with various human rights by imposing a SCPO is sufficiently defined in law to satisfy the requirement of legal certainty which is also a fundamental feature of human rights law, including the ECHR””. " Further on, the report says that, "““the Bill should be amended … to remove the power of the court in clause 2(2)(b) to treat an offence as if it were specified in the Schedule of offences to which the Act applies because the court considers it to be sufficiently serious””." We must do that. I think that there is somethingin Alice in Wonderland about the mad Queen saying, ““If what I say is right, it’s right””—I cannot quite remember the exact quote, and if I had had timeto look it up I would relish repeating it to your Lordships.