I move amendment 5 in the name of the Deputy Minister. The question is that amendment 5 be agreed. Does any Member object? [Objection.] We have an objection, so I'll take a vote. All those in favour of amendment 5, please show. All those against. So, there voted four in favour, two against, and amendment 5 is agreed. Deputy Minister, do you want to move to a vote on amendment 6?
Yes.
I move amendment 6, then, in the name of the Deputy Minister. The question is that amendment 6 be agreed. Does any Member object? Amendment 6 is therefore agreed. This takes us, then, to the fifth and final group, which relates to commencement. The lead amendment in the group is amendment 9 in the name of Suzy Davies. And I call Suzy Davies to move amendment 9 and to speak to the amendment and the other amendments in the group.
Thank you very much, Chair. Amendment 9 is actually consequential on amendment 10 passing, but it's the lead amendment in the group, so I'll move it to begin the debate. Minister, I'm speaking here now to amendments 10 and 15 specifically. You've said repeatedly, and I believe you, that you do not wish to criminalise parents but just to stop them physically punishing their children. You could have chosen to try and achieve this through awareness raising and civil enforcement, but by choosing to remove the defence to a criminal act you have entered the arena of criminal law, where the logical consequence is opening parents up to liability—not necessarily getting prosecuted, but liability to prosecution, not just liability to civil sanctions. I'm sure you'd prefer parents not to be prosecuted, but that decision does not and cannot lie with you. You, like us, have no agency in this, because the powers and the duties of the police and the Crown Prosecution Service sit outside our competence. You cannot and we cannot, by law or otherwise, instruct either of them in the delivery of your policy intention of not criminalising parents. You've acknowledged to this committee and the Constitutional and Legislative Affairs Committee that revised CPS charging guidance and any other guidance on, for example, out-of-court disposals, are key to delivering your policy objectives. You'll remember how concerned this committee was when we learned that your advisory group—the strategic implementation group, is it—was only in the early stages of discussing what these guidelines might look like. So, you're actually asking us to pass law when we have no control over how parents might be punished for smacking their children—no control of the regard given to the relevance of force, the frequency of the offence, any prior conviction, any prior reporting, not even the views of the child in how they might be sentenced, or thresholds that would be appropriate for cautions and other out-of-court disposals; no guidance to the police on thresholds for arrest, let alone charging. And you argue that the rights of the child are what matter, and I agree with you here, but everybody, adult or child, has a right to natural justice and proportionate remedy or censure, and you are in no position to offer us any comfort on these matters at this stage. Now, CLAC recommended that any revised guidance be made available to AMs before Stage 3. I anticipate that that's unlikely, and I hope I'm wrong, but that's why Janet and I have tabled amendments 10 and 15, which prevent you bringing section 1 into force until that CPS guidance has been fully updated to take into account the change in the law and until pathways away from prosecution have been devised and agreed. That reflects our recommendation 4, this committee's recommendation, as well as CLAC's recommendation 1. It gives your strategic implementation board time to consider how it can get around the other fundamentally worrying issue of the effect of recording reports of apparent physical punishment, even if those reports ultimately prove unfounded. And you have not addressed these in your own amendments. I have to say, Minister, I think these points are so serious that I would have liked to have tabled amendments preventing you seeking Royal Assent for this Bill until the Assembly has seen drafts of the range of official guidance needed for the police and CPS. I'd have sought a Report Stage, if I could, so that we could consider that evidence. But I'm therefore asking you to support the amendments we have tabled, 10 and 15, so that we can bring some damage limitation to a process that you ultimately cannot control once this Bill has passed. Now, I know you've got the numbers to pass this Bill, whether you accept amendments or not, but I just hope you can see the danger in pushing forward with a Bill that changes a person's relationship with the criminal law when you have no legal control over the consequences of that, and you're inviting this Assembly to fall into the same trap. I therefore urge the Assembly to avoid this recklessness by supporting these two amendments.