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Bribery Bill [HL]

I think that there is a question about where proportionality comes in. We are trying to define an offence, and as my noble friend explained, and as the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, knows well without explanation from anyone else, prosecution requires demonstration that there is evidence that there has been a breach of the statute. Public policy questions then arise about whether it should be prosecuted. I can see that proportionality may come in at the stage of applying the public policy. However, we are here considering whether it is a crime, and that is anterior to, and more basic than, any question of proportionality. It is a question of what, as a matter of policy, this country decides. As I am not completely sat down—the noble Lord has reactivated me, as it were—I want to give another example that occurs to me. I have seen something of this kind in the past. If you are waiting in a queue to get through a canal, and if you are willing to be—what should I say?—generous to the people who are operating it, you are likely to be through sooner. Indeed, if you do not achieve some degree of co-operation with them in handing out some easement—or back-hander, to use my noble friend’s expression—you will be waiting a long time to get through. It is a question of priorities, and the priority of getting through the canal may not be particularly efficiently or fully explained. But as a matter of fact, that is what happens; unless and until the pourboire appears, you will be waiting in the port anterior to the canal for some time.