Lord Keen of Elie (Con)

My Lords, I am obliged to the Ministers for their engagement on this issue. However, we should bear in mind that our statutory provisions are designed to address powers and not intentions. It is certainly questionable whether we should be enacting provisions which we consider will never be used. They are on the statute book and they are available for use. I am obliged to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, for outlining the issues here. The language he used was indicative of the reservations we all have with regard to this course of action: “unfortunate”, “inconsistent” and “a slight improvement”. It is not a ringing endorsement of anyone’s legislation. The Government’s stance on the relationship between the Executive and the judiciary remains demonstrably unclear and uncertain. On the one hand, they repeat that sentencing is a matter for our independent judiciary—I quote the Ministers. We did not support the original Clauses 18 and 19 as drafted, but nor do we support these amendments, as they appear to simply illustrate the Government’s internal inconsistency with regard to the Sentencing Council. These amendments simply add more confusion to the puzzled stance the Government have towards the Sentencing Council. On Report, the Government have now implemented amendments to reduce the degree to which their own Bill reduces the Sentencing Council’s independence. But do the Government retain any idea of how independent they would like the Sentencing Council to be?