Member

I listened carefully, as I always do, to what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, said about why this has to be a Private Member’s Bill. However, a Government choosing to take this issue forward would not require that Government to take a formal position for or against the principle but, rather, to have a commitment to work with parliamentarians on both sides of the argument to produce a Bill that, in due course, could be sent to a Joint Committee for pre-legislative scrutiny—as suggested by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, if I may respectfully endorse that—and then introduced to Parliament and subject to a free vote on the Bill itself.