Baroness Brinton (LD)

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, has explained, her Amendment 8 seeks to ensure that there is absolute clarity about the responsibility of the person at the top of an authority. Her reference to the Kerslake review was helpful, not just to the case for her amendment but for once again reminding your Lordships’ Committee about the lengths to which people will go to misbehave in public office. We have talked about that in many of the groups this evening; we must have a mechanism to protect the truth and make sure that it comes out. I have tabled Amendment 25, which is also signed by my noble friend Lady Hamwee. This amendment would also ensure that a chief executive officer would be liable if they fail to comply with the duty under the Bill, either because they intend for their failure to impede the inquiry or because they are reckless. That personal responsibility on a chief officer or a chief executive of a public authority is equally important in many of the larger cases we have talked about today. The Bill is very strongly moving forward towards holding senior leadership and public bodies to account. However, if one thinks about the Post Office Horizon inquiry and investigation, it is clear that not just the leaders but the entire management team felt that it was appropriate to focus on the good name of the organisation and not to ask the difficult questions most people ask when they are on boards, whether they are public or private company boards. I am very grateful for the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Roe of West Wickham, in the last group about how important telling the truth is, because it will protect the organisation and the people in it. And it changes the culture, which is the big thing. You cannot legislate to change culture, but you can have carrots and sticks, and this amendment is both. The stick is there because, at the end of the day, if a chief executive fails, on behalf of the organisation, to understand what is going on, they can be held accountable. But the carrot is the good examples of organisations where information flows and people are not afraid to speak. They probably do not even need whistleblowers in those organisations because the culture is such that decisions are made and people come forward at whatever level to say, “I am concerned about that”. That is all I want to say on this, except that it is not just about Post Office Horizon. With practically every inquiry that we have discussed today there have been failings at the most senior level in the organisations, including sometimes, I am afraid, in government, and that is why we need either this amendment or Amendment 8 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti.