---

Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

I am in a bit of a muddle about how this operates in practice. Presumably the magistrates have to know before the chap goes to serve the warrant whether it ought to be withdrawn or suspended on the basis of the person being vulnerable, so that somehow or other one has to go to subsection (4) before one comes to subsection (1) and the court has to decide. The court is the only person who can decide whether the person is vulnerable. Then we come to the definition clause referring to ““vulnerability””. I am distressed to see that it includes the elderly, which would include most of your Lordships, with the qualification that they could not be reasonably expected to act on their own behalf—which I would not say applied to many of your Lordships. Then there is another problem: pregnant mothers. This is all very difficult; you have somehow to discover at what time the mother was pregnant and whether that affects her ability to act on her own behalf. And why should unemployed persons be unable to act on their own behalf just because they are unemployed? The whole set-up, involving the person concerned having to be brought back to court, is very difficult. As I understand the Minister, that is what would happen in any event. The court decides, under extant procedure, on the basis of any reason; not just these reasons—there is no exclusion clause. What is the necessity to codify this situation, which is really a matter of common sense from the magistrates on the facts of each case?