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Counter-Terrorism Bill

My Lords, I have been in favour of the introduction of intercept evidence for the purpose of convicting criminals for so long that my natural inclination is to vote for the amendment; indeed, that is why I voted in favour of it at Third Reading. Of course we are not dealing with criminal proceedings here, but the considerations are very similar. I can see the argument that we should wait for the coroners Bill to come to us, and the argument, perhaps even more relevant, that we should wait for the final report of the privy counsellors who are dealing with the question of intercept evidence. On the other hand, strong arguments have been put forward to deal with this particular case now. The reason given by the House of Commons for disagreeing with the Lords amendment is not altogether satisfactory; it is simply that, "““sensitive material should not be disclosed to members of the public””." But the coroner, when he is a High Court judge, is hardly to be regarded for that purpose as a member of the public—nor, indeed, is counsel to the coroner. The only problem remains the reference in the amendment to ““other interested persons””. That might well be said to go too wide, but it is dealt with in the final sub-paragraph of the amendment, which says that if the High Court judge has doubts about such a person, the material should be released to him in a redacted form, which would save the sensitivity of the information, and if it cannot be released to him in a redacted form it will not be released to him at all. For those reasons the amendment deserves our support.