Baroness Bowles of Berkhamsted (LD)

My Lords, I wanted to speak on this issue of privilege. I have considered it before in another context and I find that, at times, I am a little bit antipodean in my view of it, in that the Privy Council narrowing down of what it applies to is inconvenient. But we do not need to go into all that; the issue here is simply, as the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, said, about truth and honesty. Basically, if you are knowingly misleading then there should be consequences. Why should the consequences be any less in this House than elsewhere? This is not something that I have consulted colleagues on at all, and I apologise that I was not present at Second Reading as I did not think that there were things that would interest me. But this issue is quite straightforward: if you deliberately mislead then you should face the same consequences as everybody else. It may not be that the perfect solution has been drafted by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, but we should continue to discuss whether we should have that or something else to bring back on Report, because it is unsatisfactory for it to be treated like other, what I would call more minor misdemeanours. I do not think I need to say any more, but I want to investigate this further. I have a question for the Minister that I do not know the answer to. If somebody tweets what goes on in this House, what is the privilege situation on that? Is it counted as a recitation and therefore, privilege does not apply; or, because it is the proceedings of this House, does it constitute something that is privileged? Because you can disseminate something that is said in this place and it can go viral, if it is misleading, you have to take that amplification into consideration.