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Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill

Do I understand the Minister to say that the evidence given by a witness could not be challenged by the person against whom the order is made? Surely that is an immediate breach of Article 6 of the convention covering fair trial. How can that be? In any event, perhaps I may make this point. The Minister said that the purpose of the order may be to protect the offender himself. That does not appear in the Bill. The court has to be satisfied that the conditions in subsection (2) are met, the second of which is that he has, "““acted in such a way as to make it necessary to make a violent offender order for the purpose of protecting the public””." It has nothing to do with protecting him. So what does the court have to be satisfied about? It has to be satisfied about action; about what he has done. The only way in which they can be satisfied about action—what he has done—is on the basis of evidence, and the evidence must surely be capable of being challenged by the person against whom the order is made, otherwise an appearance in an adversarial hearing, as the noble Lord said, is meaningless. Then the court has to be satisfied that it is necessary to make the order and that the purpose of making the order is to protect the public, again using the wide expression that I have already criticised. I totally support the amendments that have been moved by the noble Earl and supported all round the Committee. I am sure that we will be discussing this matter further.