My Lords, my congratulations go to all three noble maidens this evening—if I can describe them that way. It is a privilege to address the gracious Speech of a Government who must, if they are to restore faith in politics, foster a better understanding of and commitment to the rule of law, whose reach no one, including the most powerful, is above and whose protection no one, especially the most vulnerable, is below.

This was eloquently promised by my noble and learned friend the new Attorney-General yesterday, but history suggests that, in the practical reality of justice, home affairs and foreign affairs, our “rule of law” values are most seriously tested. I welcome the Bills and hope that they will include not just new laws but a great deal of repeal. I know that all noble Lords will want carefully to examine the devil and the virtue in the detail, as well as the resources that must follow for vital services that have been underfunded for so long, but, in a difficult fiscal landscape, I also look forward to a significant shift in vision, rhetoric and approach—especially in relation to our courts, police, lawyers and other relevant professionals, including parliamentarians and all those whom they must serve.

Let our judges, whether domestic or international, no longer be hobbled and hectored. When, inevitably, government loses occasional cases, as with matches, let us please respect the referees. The European Court of Human Rights is no more foreign for being situated in Strasbourg than is the United Nations for being in New York and Geneva—or, dare I say it, than is D-day for marking historic British and Allied landings in Normandy.

Let us restore discretions too often obliterated by an overcrowded statute book to the appropriate decision-makers, in compliance with both the international and domestic rule of law.

Notwithstanding the vital importance of dealing far more effectively with people smuggling, casework and responsibility sharing with our neighbours, let there be no more deliberate demonisation of asylum seekers and refugees. They, like other desperate people, are not “illegal”. The new Government would be wise to abandon dehumanising language and lengthy incarceration, alongside snake-oil statutes.

Police chiefs’ diagnosis of a “national emergency” in violence against women is both a scandal and a priority, as is ensuring that social media empires take more direct responsibility for incitement and indoctrination on the platforms they monetise. If chief constables continue to request new powers to discipline errant officers, surely these should finally be provided. The development and deployment of AI and facial recognition technology in policing must, like conventional police powers, be regulated by statute. Equally, let there be an end to seeking cheap political capital via ministerial interference in independent public order operations, with endless Home Office press releases and summonses to chiefs to hear the Riot Act read at No. 10.

Let the continuing injustices of IPP and joint enterprise be ended. Attention is needed in legal aid and crumbling court infrastructure after years of disastrous cuts. When most people lack timely access to justice when facing the loss of their liberty, home, child, livelihood or safe environment, the rule of law becomes mere fairy tale.

There is so much more, but I end with my best wishes to the new Ministers. May my noble and learned friend Lord Hermer, a highly distinguished attorney, reinspire the Government Legal Service, of which I am a proud alum. May my noble friend Lord Hanson and his colleagues ensure that the Home Office is no longer nicknamed “North Korea” by beleaguered public servants. May my new noble friend Lord Timpson bring the spirit of rehabilitation, with which his family name is so synonymous on the high street, to the darkest recesses of the prison system—a failing prison system unworthy of an ambitious, wealthy and compassionate United Kingdom.