---

Protection of Freedoms Bill

I would like to say very briefly how much I support this amendment. The noble Baroness, Lady Blackstone, asked the Minister expressly whether he had looked at the Scottish and Irish legislation. I would bring his attention to the American situation, because we followed America in introducing a Freedom of Information Act and we also regard that country as being foremost in terms of publications and citations in scientific and social science research. We follow America in many senses, but it has specific legislation that has guidelines providing the constraints that we are looking for. It seems sensible to have an exemption, as in the Scottish model that we can follow, which has over the past few years been satisfactory. It would be easy to follow, and it picks up all the reservations that those of us had who spoke in favour of the amendments proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill. It picks up a lot of the points made by those amendments and puts them neatly into one clause. I support the amendment and hope that the Minister and his advisers are looking at the models in other countries.