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Coroners and Justice Bill

My Lords, I oppose the amendment. As the Minister said, this is the fourth time that we have discussed this issue. In July, the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, was successful in gaining the support of a majority of your Lordships. It is before us again tonight because the Government, I am glad to say, opposes it, and this opposition has been supported in the other place. As I recall, a majority of your Lordships supported the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, on 9 July, believing that the amendment safeguarded the right to freedom of speech. An argument on these lines has been advanced by the noble Lord, Lord Dear, in an article in The House Magazine. In support, the noble Lord quotes Lord Justice Sedley in a judgment in 1999. The judge then ruled: "““Free speech includes not only the inoffensive, but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative—provided it does not tend to provoke violence””." The qualification ““provided it does not tend to provoke violence”” is very important. Those who spoke in support of the amendment last time emphasised that they were not homophobic and did not condone homophobic violence. I, of course, accept that those assurances were given in good faith. We know that there are countries where fundamentalist religions are powerful and it is quite usual there for clerics to advise their followers to attack homosexual people, often in the most gruesome and horrific way. Frequently death awaits those whose sexual orientation becomes known and is disapproved of. We, of course, have established a more humane and tolerant society, of which we are all proud. I am pleased with the way in which, over the years, we have established equal rights so that it is now unlawful to discriminate against people on grounds of their sexual orientation, and we now have provision for civil partnerships. But that is the law—culture is sometimes different. Sadly, much of our society is quite violent, and there has recently been a growth in violence directed at gay and lesbian people. Some of the worst cases get reported; others are not. Quite a lot of bullying goes on, particularly in schools. There is also bullying by gangs on some of our streets. No doubt the individual who sought to remonstrate with someone who was shouting obscenities at him, believing him to be gay, thought that he was exercising his right of free speech, but he was immediately surrounded, beaten up badly and later died in hospital. The police are treating that as a homophobic crime. No one supporting the amendment would support such activity, but words matter, and that is particularly the case when they appear in legislation. They help to change how people look at the world around them. Some groups, whether for cultural or religious reasons, simply do not like gay or lesbian people or what they do. They want to be able to say so—yes—but that does not include the right to bully, harass or threaten. The wording of the amendment opens the door to people who want to feel that they have a right to question relationships that are perfectly legal and do not harm anyone, and they can then go on to make threats with impunity. On the last occasion when we had a debate on this matter in this House, I said that we did not want a society in which gay and lesbian people were afraid to go out at night for fear of an attack. There has been an increase in the number and violence of homophobic attacks. We must ensure that this is not one of the unlooked-for results of legislation passed in your Lordships' House. I urge noble Lords to support the Government’s position on this and oppose the amendment.