Another voice

Criminal trespass

Auberon Waugh

Irather suspected that Mr Fagan might be doing us all a good turn when he strolled into the Queen's bedroom in Buck- ingham Palace wishing to discuss his family difficulties. As I pointed out in the Sunday Telegraph at the time, he drew attention in the most vivid and dramatic way to an extraordinary gap in the English criminal law, whereby anybody was entitled to stroll into anybody's bedroom (so long as he had not forced his entry and was not carrying an offensive weapon or burglar's equipment) and could jolly well stay there until an en- forcement order was obtained on a county court application to get him out.

That this gap in the law remained for so long may be attributed to an Englishman's traditional respect for private property, now swept away in the great Shirley Williams revolution, but I suspect a dif- ferent cause. The Queen of soccer hooligans was not responsible for Mr Fagan, who was obviously a free-ranging loony of the sort who has always been around — although I dare say that com- prehensive education had something to do with the inability of the police to keep him out. The reason we managed for so long without a law of criminal trespass was not deference but ignorance. The criminal classes assumed that such a law existed. Now, thanks to the ceaseless activities of such organisation as the National Council for Civil Liberties, not to mention the close relations which seem to exist between criminals and police, they know that it does not. None of us is entirely safe from return- ing home and finding the door locked against us by an occupying force of drug- gies, Women against Rape or 'homeless' school-leavers.

Last week, 19 months after Mr Fagan's brave initiative, I found myself sitting in the House of Lords for the Second Reading of my noble brother-in-law's Criminal Trespass Bill. The Government has ac- cepted it and given it time in the Commons, so it seems as likely as not to reach the statute book. As befits a Bill coming from the Lords, it is uncontroversial and self- effacing almost to the point of extinction. We will not be permitted to shoot the brutes, or even threaten them with an Of- fensive weapon. It applies only to buildings (or caravans) used as a residence — not to shops, factories, agricultural land or even private gardens, where they may still wander or squat to their hearts' content. The maximum penalty is three months,

with or without a fine.

Obviously, it is a Bill which will be welcomed by most householders and their wives. So far as I could detect any motive to the objections raised by the Labour peer Lord Mishcon — who urged that only the Queen and senior politicians might be entitl- ed to such protection — I imagine it must have derived from some residual Labour antipathy to the idea of private property, although the Bill also covers council hous- ing and, arguably, those picturesque out- side lavatories where many Labour voters spend so much of their time.

My noble brother-in-law, the Earl of Onslow, whose name appears on the description of the Bill, seemed deeply shocked by Lord Mishcon's apparent wish to extend privilege. 'I happen to believe that the law is for me, for the Queen, for the postman or whoever it may be, and that it should be the same for all,' he cried.

As I listened to him pilgering on manfully — 'It is for us to have the law for everybody in this country and not for special privileged people' — an explanation occurred to me for the fact the House of Lords had never dared introduce such a measure before, even in the days of the great Lord Chancellor Lord Eldon about whom Shelley wrote: `Hisbig tears, for he wept full well, Turned to mill-stones as they fell And the little children who

Round his feet played to and fro Thinking every tear a gem

Had their brains knocked out by them.'

The reason, I suspect, is that the House of Lords is an altogether more ecclesiastical place than the House of Commons, and sees its privileges in a more religious light. The word 'trespass' has particular connota- tions for the English Christian ever since Tyndale's mistranslation of St Matthew's version of the Lord's Prayer in 1526, in- corporated in the Book of Common Prayer by Cramer. Matthew (vi 9-12) sug- gests we should ask God to forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors; Luke (xi 2-4) suggests we should ask Him to forgive us our sins: 'for we also forgive everyone that is indebted to us.'

Obviously it is a far more radical idea, and much less practicable, that we should automatically write off all debts as soon as they are incurred, than that we should turn a blind eye to the occasional uninvited villein, churl or greasy mechanic sauntering

4 commerce, let alone the stock market, would collapse under this arrangement and one may doubt whether even the House of Lords would survive for long. I am convinc- ed is this linguistic accident Prayer in its antique usage — which ex- word 'trespass' survives in the Lord s plainBut this scarcely explains why thtehr:11- s why their Lordships, history, have not been disposed to mons, with no semi-educated bishops in at- tendance, have never passed such a law' Eldon the Orifice may be no relation to the great Lord Eldon, but if he and his cohort, of law-and-order enthusiasts are prepar° to subject the entire population to rand?

anal ni al Inspections for fear we may be carrYnig Illegal radio transmitters in our huttos, they should jump at the opportunity in create a new punishable offence in a popular cause.

In fact there was a Member of the House of Commons who wanted to bring in at rather tougher Criminal Trespass Act, but the Government's business managers deeinn ed they would prefer this milder this is the Lords. My explanation for thist:f the sorhbre one that politicians in Pnvi,,f have really very little time for the rights " private property among ordinary citizens' The entire history of the House of c°1110 mons may be seen as an extended attack s the rights of private property. This is riot, of oneone might imagine, because the cause ne private property is an unpopular °,.,riee' although Labour politicians might conv'-„f themselves that it is. In fact the cause lot private property is an extremely Prinnse one, as the Conservatives recogni whenever they come to draft their electl7 manifestoes. It, has always been the pity popularity of attacks on private prop which has deterred the government 0'.-05 d. ay from indulging its natural i ‘,1 n_lincauo al

in the matter, rather than any rearguard action from the Lords. Gt31.0.

Times, asked why Calke Abbey sn°`-nroc-

private. p to ment is deeply antagonistic to

perty, and will never lose an opportunnY to attack it whenever public opinion seeins_,e approve, for the good reason that property, and the territorial integrity of 11,T, home, provide, with the subversive farrly the only effective limits to its own Pnvined;# Last Sunday Lord VaizeY, in the sold he saved by the State, since it contains here is Wally nothing but junk. Of course theiiby no good reason why it should be savorhy the State, but there is even less reason the the State should take it away fro Harpur-Crewes by demanding £8 Owl," the capital taxes for which there is n°` The faintest glimmer of justification. Nigel the greatest trespasser of all has alwaYs be central government; it is against the Grif- Lawsons, Leon Brittans and Eldon n;005 fithses, as much as against the Tony 120 he and Arthur Scargills, that we sh O counting our cartridges and sharp scythes.enit ng our

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