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Terrorist Asset-Freezing (Temporary Provisions) Bill

My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 11. These are my last two amendments in Committee. The first amendment provides that the licence to be given by the Treasury will ensure that the reasonable domestic needs of the designated person and his family can be met. Since I tabled the amendment, I have seen the Statement made by the Minister on 5 February, and published afterwards, which deals at some length with the licence regime as it has been applied and as the Government will continue to apply it, and which gives assurances that in addition to the basic expenses listed—the basic humanitarian needs which I was amused to see included, at the top of the list, taxes; taxes might be a humanitarian matter to some, but they might not be so regarded by the designated person—other expenses will be allowed. The wording of my amendment was taken direct from the Insolvency Act. It seemed to me that there were parallels between this situation and bankruptcy, where the bankrupt is allowed enough leeway and enough income to ensure that his reasonable domestic provisions can be met. The Minister’s Statement talks of taking an approach so that designated persons have access to their income and other property in so far as it can be arranged, "““without giving rise to risk of terrorist finance””." It seemed to me that that was something of a circular argument. The Statement also says that the controls are those, "““necessary to protect against terrorist finance risks.””—[Official Report, 5/2/10; col. WS36-37.]" However, as that is the basis for the designation and for the very heart of the order, I am not quite clear about its purpose within the licensing arrangements. One needs to start at the other end—not the fact of the designation, but protection for the families in particular. My main concern is that there is no legislative minimum and no possibility of challenge. That is why I have tabled this amendment. I tabled the second amendment, on legal representation, because I was shocked to discover that financial contributions to legal proceedings, or indeed to representation for a designated person in proceedings, are in themselves offences. I understand that the role of the Justices in the recent Supreme Court case was to act as intervener, because that was all that they could do. It seems to me to be a basic provision that legal services should be allowed to be available. I beg to move Amendment 10.