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Coroners and Justice Bill

My Lords, I will speak briefly to the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, as I have added my name to it. He has spoken to it most ably, and therefore brevity is certainly the order of the day. This is not a new issue. We debated it during the passage of the then Criminal Evidence (Witness Anonymity) Bill last year. In Committee, we considered a similar amendment seeking to achieve broadly the same thing—namely, for a court that is considering an application for a witness anonymity order to be able to appoint a special, independent counsel to deal with the evidence surrounding such an application. We are more than content with the terms of the amendment, and add our support. Since it looks as though the noble Lord, Lord Bach, himself will be answering on this occasion, perhaps he will be able to assist me with the questions that I was asking earlier about commencement, which also apply to this section. We are now considering Chapter 2 of Part 3. When is commencement likely to come into force under Clause 171?