Grand Committee
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Arrangement of Business
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The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Geddes) (Con)
My Lords, I start with the customary announcement that, if there is a Division in the Chamber—I think that it is singularly unlikely—while we are sitting, this Committee will adjourn as soon as the Division Bells are rung and resume after 10 minutes.
English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill
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Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I rise to oppose Clause 57 and Schedule 26 and express my deep concern about the way in which the Government are pushing through local government reorganisation under the banner of devolution. Local government reorganisation is not new. It can and does happen but, where it does, it should happen by consent. Councils already have routes to propose mergers and restructuring where they believe it is right for their area.
What is different here is the scale and direction of travel. This feels rushed, top-down and imposed. It runs directly counter to the notion of devolution and the stated purpose of this Bill. I do not accept that the creation of new strategic authorities requires, as some kind of quid pro quo, the rapid abolition or forced merger of existing authorities. One size does not fit all. I have some experience of unitary authorities and recognise that they can work well, but that does not justify imposing them everywhere regardless of local circumstances, identity or consent.
Crucially, there is no strong evidence to support the argument that these changes will save money or improve service delivery. Larger councils are not automatically cheaper or more efficient to run. At a time when local government is already under extreme financial pressure, it is extraordinary that Ministers are pursuing structural upheaval rather than addressing the underlying problem of chronic underfunding. Local authorities are still grappling with the consequences of austerity. Councils across the country face serious and growing funding gaps and services are already stretched to breaking point. Before imposing disruptive reorganisations, the Government should fix that.
There are also serious risks to community identity and representation. Evidence from councillors on the ground suggests that these proposals could result in arbitrarily drawn, very large authorities with little sense of place or shared identity. Many towns with long histories and strong civic cultures—places that people care deeply about—are at risk of being effectively wiped off the local government map. It is important because democracy is about not just administrative efficiency but connection, accountability and trust. There is clear evidence that size matters for democratic engagement. Increasing population size and geographic scale risks reducing electoral turnout and lowering participation in local decision-making. We already have far too few elected representatives compared with many comparable countries. These proposals will significantly reduce the number of councillors overall, further thinning out representation at precisely the moment when communities are facing increasing pressures and greater complexity.
I am particularly concerned about the impact on casework and local advice. Councillors play a vital role as accessible, familiar faces in their communities, helping people navigate failing systems, resolve problems and get support in times of crisis. Many already work far beyond what their allowances reflect, often with limited support. When I was a councillor in Southwark, I could not do any gardening in my front garden because people would come up to me and tell me about their awful problems with black mould—clearly more important than my daffodils—so going into my garden was sometimes a challenge.
Schedule 26 risks abolishing whole tiers of representation almost overnight. That will inevitably lead to spikes in casework and confusion about where people turn for help. Local advice centres are already under immense strain, having lost staff and volunteers, while demand continues to rise. I see no evidence that the Government have seriously considered how this reorganisation will affect advice provision or where that additional pressure will land.
I do not agree that having services under one roof will make things simpler for residents. It might sound true in principle, but transitions of this scale are not frictionless. Removing thousands of local representatives at once is a disruption, and disruption without consent carries real democratic costs. Schedule 26 concentrates power in the hands of the Secretary of State, allowing directions to be issued, boundaries to be changed and authorities to be abolished with little or no local say. For all these reasons, I believe that Clause 57 and Schedule 26 represent a huge step in the wrong direction.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
My Lords, my Amendment 196EC to Schedule 26 fairly sets out some of my concerns, which, having listened to the noble Baroness, I am sure are shared by others in the Room. I tabled it in part to probe how Ministers will determine the new pattern of unitary councils. I appreciate that, by and large, they will be shaped by the submissions being made by current local authorities to the department, but my concern is that there is little thought or discussion about the size, shape or culture of the new councils.
The Government’s White Paper, published in December 2024, was clear that unitary councils should have
“a population of 500,000 or more”.
It argued that this would be
“the right size to achieve efficiencies, improve capacity and withstand financial shocks”.
The White Paper also said that
“reorganisation should not delay devolution and plans for both should be complementary”.
The Government have sensibly delayed the election of a number of the combined mayoral authorities and slowed the process down. Until the last general election, the pace of devolution was rather more measured, which was wise. Understandably, the new Government want to get a move on with their major reforms. At the same time, we will be asking the combined mayoral authorities and the new unitary councils to deliver much of the Government’s growth agenda and their political priorities in education, housing, childcare, nursery provision and so on. Quite right, too: they are the vehicles for a lot of those things, in particular transport. But the idea that these new and very powerful institutions will be capable of delivering new policies and plans while simultaneously creating themselves is something of a stretch. When Brighton and Hove City Council was set up back in 1997, we wisely gave ourselves two and a half years of preparation, including one year as a shadow authority. None of these structures will have that luxury.
It is well known that I favour unitary councils and have long argued for them, but they have to be well grounded to work and, to be well grounded, they have to be based on recognisable boundaries that have a clear relationship with local geography and a sense of community. My authority, Brighton and Hove, is constrained by the downs and, for that matter, it makes sense. It is a place, and place-making, as the Government say clearly in the White Paper, is of great importance not just to government but, more importantly, to communities. Make the unitaries too big and start tying urban and rural districts together and you lose that. You also lose the sense of community identity.
In the past, when unitary authorities were established, many place names were lost. I go back to 1974: who knew that Sefton was Southport and Bootle, or that Kirklees subsumed places such as Huddersfield, Dewsbury and Batley? Kirklees is the name of a hall on an estate, some of which is, I think, in the neighbouring borough of Calderdale. My point here is that place-making and community building, which are surely part of the stuff of local government, rely on the ability to be readily identified so that people can understand who is responsible for what and in whose name. Abolishing a lot of the place names, as the last local government review did in 1974, risks depriving people of that ready point of identity, which would be unfortunate and wrong.
Currently, looking at the size of authorities, we have few that fit the 500,000-plus margin—just nine: Birmingham, Cornwall, Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford, Manchester, County Durham, Wiltshire and Buckinghamshire. It is an open question as to whether their size makes them more efficient; it is possible that it makes them more remote. The more remote they are, the more citizens feel left behind and left out, and less engaged and able to influence local decision-making.
For that reason, my amendment seeks to ensure that, in making a direction on the future pattern of local councils in a given area, the Secretary of State must have regard to local geography, because of its influence on travel and community relations; the sense of identity that the new authorities will take on in terms of places and communities; and whether it is wise simply to glue together urban and rural areas for administrative convenience. Additionally, the environmental and financial sustainability of a council area, and its proposed size, have to be considered.
The White Paper seemed to assume the bigger the better and that savings would flow. I am less convinced. If I look back to the unitarisation of Berkshire in 1998, for example, when the council was broken up into six unitaries, all then had to find directors of social services, education, environment and highways. A similar impact will be felt with the unitarisation that takes place under combined mayoral authorities.
I suspect most councils have stripped out excessive costs over the past 15 years and most will have come from back-office mergers. There may be savings in the administration of council tax as larger council tax areas come into view, but the integration of many district council systems into new unitary council tax collections will certainly come at a cost.
To conclude, I have a number of questions for the Minister. Can she confirm that a fixed size for unitaries—the 500,000 figure—has been dropped? Do the Government have a number in mind? Will the Secretary of State be mindful of ensuring that mergers respect the need to have identifiable boundaries that respect urban and rural differences and the historical bases of councils, to enable place-making and help with community resilience? Can we be assured that resources will be in place to ensure a seamless transition from the current pattern of districts into larger unitaries?
What steps will the Government take to guarantee a level of democracy that makes councils accessible to local electors and residents? The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, made the point that councillors already work hard. The White Paper confirmed that the number of councillors would reduce—that is pretty obvious, really—but can we be assured that councillors will be sufficient in number, and well enough resourced and supported, to represent the inevitably larger communities that they will be part of?
I do not oppose unitaries; in fact, I am rather keen on them. I do not oppose devolution, but it has to be done at a pace, and in a style and manner, that works for local communities to ensure that democracy, demography and community identity are preserved, because place-making should be at the heart of the changes. We all need to be assured that that will be the case.
Viscount Trenchard (Con)
My Lords, I add my voice in support of the noble Lord, Lord Bassam. Everything he said makes a great deal of sense. It is hugely important to consider the identity of the authorities being created in terms of their communities and place-making. I am also tempted to support the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, in her opposition to Clause 57 standing part, because it makes no sense to introduce this additional tier of local government at the same time as supposedly simplifying it by reducing two tiers to a single tier. To do this at the same time is likely to result in more costs, endless local government arguments and unhappiness.
Lord Fuller (Con)
My Lords, uncharacteristically, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, and the noble Lord, Lord Bassam.
Clause 57 and Schedule 26 should play no part in the Bill because the claim that larger units of local government are more cost-effective has been thoroughly debunked. We will just end up with larger, more expensive units that deny the pattern of life that people live. The 500,000 argument was comprehensively debunked by the Blair Government in 2006 with a seminal document that is still available on their website. More recently, the claim that this current round of unitisation will save money was initially made by the County Councils Network, citing evidence dating from 2020. Last year, the people who wrote the report said, “Actually, we made a mistake and there are no more savings to be had”. The savings that were promulgated in 2020 had already been made.
Bigger is no longer better. A forced reorganisation across the entirety of this country is likely to crystallise at least £1 billion-worth of unaccounted for pension strain costs for those who would be entitled to retire on a full pension up to 10 years early, having been forced out on grounds of efficiency. There is special meaning to those words. However, those billion pounds or so have not been taken into account, and it is local people who will pick up the tab. Through the Bill, we will end up with more expensive additional layers to have mayors who can raise taxes on things for which they are not even responsible.
I do not intend to relitigate the arguments I made on Monday, but there is no clarity on where the new town and parish councils will sit. This is unfinished business that we will need to revisit on Report. We must ask: is there even capacity in national government, let alone local government, for this reorganisation at a time when councils should be in the van of building homes, growing the economy and picking up the pieces for those who have fallen on hard times?
I ought to alight for a moment on the consequences of council tax equalisation in a territory, none of which has been considered at all. I am a veteran of several rounds of local government reorganisation over many years. In the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007, there were some statutory tests, including on value for money, equity between areas and consistency of electoral quotient. There needs to be a broad cross-section of support, but none of this is included in the Bill. The requirement for consent has been abandoned—this is something that is going to be done to people.
Last night I was at a dinner in London and people told me how, 20 years ago, they travelled from all parts of the country to go to Norwich to celebrate their octocentenary; it was 800 years. Among them were lord mayors, honorary aldermen, the sheriffs and the reeves. The Bill is silent on how this important civic part of our nation is to be treated. In an unthinking reorganisation, the civic life of our nation will be vandalised. In future, there will be no more trips to Norwich, or anywhere else for that matter, for those people who are part of the social grease of the way our nation works.
I have heard it said that this will make local government simpler and more straightforward. As we have learned over many days in Committee, however, it will cost more, there will be plenty more expensive layers and there will be more complication. Last week we discovered for the first time that, among the 40 fire authorities in this country, there will be 10 different structural arrangements. What a missed opportunity this is. Rather than reorganising the deckchairs in local government, perhaps we could do something about simplification. But no: there will be less accountability and it will be more impenetrable.
Ultimately, families, businesses and the economy outside the M25 will suffer while London and the mets get to sit this one out. There is no equity there at all. People will be paying more for less, having powers taken further away from them. Nobody wants it.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, I feel bound to remind the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, that the Bill is a Labour continuation of a local government reorganisation started under the Conservatives. This is very much the Michael Gove—now the noble Lord, Lord Gove—view of how England should be governed, with mayors as the key element and large units imposed regardless of place.
I have done my politics in Yorkshire over the years. I think the imposition of a single unitary council, against the preferences of almost all local authority members in North Yorkshire—except York, because York was, by and large, a contest between Liberal Democrats and Labour—was a crucial example of ignoring place-making in everything else.
When I do my politics in Bradford, I am conscious that it is a large unitary authority and I see good councillors struggling to represent their wards, and councillors who are not so good leaving their wards pretty much unrepresented. I support very strongly everything that the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, said about the importance of place, and of recognising that different areas require different patterns. I also regret the tendency of successive Governments to go in for restructuring when they are not sure what else to do, the unlikelihood that this will lead to better government and, sadly, the likelihood that it will leave more people across England feeling unrepresented and ignored.
I was very struck by a letter I saw this morning from the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Fire Safety, Building and Democracy. That seems to me to place the importance given to democracy in the appropriate place according to the Bill. This is supposed to be a democratic Government and a democratic country. All politics is local. The figures on public trust that I see every year show that the public trust Westminster less than they trust local government. Weakening local government is a very bad idea but, unfortunately, that is what the Bill is all about.
Lord Mawson (CB)
My Lords, size really does matter. Big is not necessarily beautiful. I am a practitioner, as many know, looking up the telescope from place-making projects we are working on across the country, I declare my interest as such. I am a voice, I suppose, from the charitable and voluntary sector and the social enterprise sector. As I said, I am looking up the telescope into these impenetrable large structures, trying to deliver place-making projects on the ground.
My experience over many years and today confirms what the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, is saying: he is correct and we need to be very careful about these matters. My colleagues and I have been working with one county council leader on place-making projects for the past eight years within a large structure. He is an excellent, capable leader, but it was virtually impossible, even with his support, to get this beast to dance to an innovation tune on place-making in his county. It was like swimming through treacle, even though all the politics was in the right place to do it. I found that this structure was too large to have any sense of place or to have any relationships with people on the ground, where it really matters. If future place-making is about bringing people together, people and relationships are crucial.
In practice, this restructuring is already halting many place-making projects in challenging communities in the north of England, as staff look for new jobs. My colleagues and I see and experience it every day. The Government have a right to restructure, but they need to listen very carefully to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, and those of us working on the ground: the practical details really matter.
The country is in danger of coming to a halt. We need to get interested in practice on the ground and what works in detail. At the moment, practitioners feel ignored. We want to help, but there needs to be a dialogue and real interest in what works on the ground in local communities.
Lord Shipley (LD)
My Lords, I thank all those who have spoken, in particular my noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire, who made a number of important points about all three of the suggestions before us. I thought the point from the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, was extremely well made: this is about place-making and what happens on the ground. A top-down approach is building the other way around.
I will be very brief. This is a devolution Bill, yet it prescribes what can happen on the ground. I have said that at least half a dozen times in Committee, but I will repeat it again because it deserves to be repeated. I want to give the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, some extra support, because there is an issue with size, as the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, pointed out.
I understand that we have an appropriate figure for the size of a unitary authority of some 500,000, but I counsel the Government against using population size as the basis for a calculation. I can remember, a few years ago, when the Minister was the noble Lord, Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth, having a conversation about the ideal size for Buckinghamshire and Bournemouth in Dorset. I remember being told that, in Buckinghamshire, the ideal size needed to be 350,000, but I was urging a figure of around 300,000. I am quite happy to be wrong about that but, if the Government are moving towards a figure of 500,000, they will have to justify it. The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, rightly made the point that you need to consider natural geography, the identity of the authorities and so on. He put it extremely well.
I hope that the Minister will tell us that the Government will consider the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Bassam. I am sure the noble Lord would not mind them adding to it and improving it with new things, but it should form the basis for a consideration of what the ideal unitary size is, which may of course be different in different places. It is for local people to say whether they prefer a model of 500,000, fewer than that or whatever; otherwise, this process will be too top-down.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, I will be brief in closing, but very clear about the position of the Official Opposition on this group. After many hours of debate, one point should now be beyond doubt: devolution cannot be delivered by compulsion. If the Government persist in reserving sweeping powers to direct and impose local government reorganisation from the centre, the Bill will continue to fall very short of its stated purpose.
We have heard many views, mostly negative, from noble Lords today, but I have been there. In 2007, under a Labour Government, I took my then council to a unitary. I was not very popular, but it was our decision: we planned it and we asked for it. It has been a great success; it is more efficient and more local. I will talk more about that in future groups today.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and my noble friend Lord Bassam of Brighton for addressing the local government reorganisation measures in the Bill. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, for speaking on behalf of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett.
The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, opposes Clause 57 and Schedule 26 standing part of the Bill. Reorganisation is a crucial part of the Government’s mission to fix the foundations of local government, creating unitary councils that can be sustainable for the future and deliver the high-quality services that all residents deserve. The Bill amends the existing legislation to enable the Secretary of State to direct areas to submit proposals to reorganise.
We are committed to working in partnership with local areas and are already doing so on this current round of reorganisation. All two-tier areas that were invited in February 2025 have now submitted proposals for reorganisation, which have either been consulted on or are now subject to consultation, because they acknowledge that the status quo is not feasible or sustainable. Therefore, this power would only ever be used in the future, where areas had failed to make progress following an invitation.
The new merging provisions enable existing unitary councils that believe structural change will be beneficial to submit proposals for reorganisation. This aligns the process for reorganising single-tier areas with the current process for reorganising two-tier areas. With devolution and local government reorganisation progressing concurrently across the country, mechanisms are needed to ensure that these reforms work in harmony.
The ability to convert a combined county authority into a combined authority is a common-sense and necessary measure. Without it, there would be no streamlined route to ensure that the existing combined and combined county authorities remain intact once their constituent authorities implement reorganisation. The ability to abolish a combined authority or a combined county authority could be used only in very limited situations. It ensures that, if a reorganisation proposal would render a strategic authority obsolete, the proposal can be implemented and the strategic authority abolished as necessary. Any such proposal requiring the use of the abolition power would need to consider how it would impact future devolution in the area, as the Government’s reorganisation criteria set out. This ensures that these areas will not be left without a viable pathway to devolution.
The noble Baroness mentioned the Government’s approach to funding. This week we publish the local government finance settlement, which has restructured local government funding to ensure that the areas that need it get the most funding. We have put more than £5.6 billion of new grant funding over the next three years into local government. We know that unitarisation can unlock significant savings. Unitary councils reduce duplication, cut waste, improve services and give better value. Of course, exact savings from each proposal will vary from place to place, depending on the proposals implemented.
The noble Baroness also mentioned casework. I take her point and I know the bit about growing daffodils out in the garden—I still often get stopped when I am doing my garden and I am not even a councillor now. Casework support varies from council to council, but it is perfectly possible to provide support for casework at any level of local government. I know that many councils do this extremely well—I hope that those that are not so good will learn from the best.
I turn to Amendment 196EC, tabled by my noble friend Lord Bassam. I shall correct myself, because I did not thank all noble Lords who spoke in the debate, as I should have done at the beginning, so my apologies. My noble friend’s amendment seeks to introduce criteria that the Secretary of State must consider when taking a decision on the merger of existing unitary councils. The new merging provisions set out in this Bill enable existing unitary councils that believe structural change will be beneficial to submit proposals for reorganisation. This aligns the process for reorganising single-tier areas with the current process for reorganising two-tier areas.
I reassure my noble friend that having regard to the size, geography, public services and local identity of an area is already embedded in our approach and decision-making when it comes to reorganisation. This is demonstrated by the statutory guidance that we have issued to areas that have been invited to prepare proposals for local government reorganisation.
My noble friend mentioned the size of areas. I point out that the invitation letter to two-tier areas in February made it very clear that the aim for new councils to have a population of 500,000 or more is a guiding principle. Instead of presenting a top-down solution for each area, our starting point is to support and empower local leaders and respect their knowledge, expertise and insight. This approach is in line with the new partnership between government and local government. In discussions with individual councils, with parliamentarians and in interviews given throughout the process, the Government have further reinforced that position to aid the local discussions. I have seen a huge variation in the proposals that have come forward in terms of size. People have taken that as guidance and taken it very seriously. Yesterday, we had a debate on the new authority that has been set up, Cumbria, which has a population of much less than 500,000, because that was appropriate for that area.
Furthermore, the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007 already requires that the Secretary of State may invite or direct a relevant principal authority to make a proposal for the merger of single tiers of local government only where it would be in
“the interests of effective and convenient local government”.
The 2007 Act also requires that affected local areas must be consulted before a proposal for local government reorganisation can be implemented. This gives local residents the opportunity to voice their opinions on the criteria outlined by the noble Lord in his amendment.
Next to my council is a council called North Hertfordshire, which includes four towns. The noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, will know these towns very well—Hitchin, Letchworth, Baldock and Royston. These places have not ceased to exist because their council is called North Herts. The noble Baroness mentioned Wiltshire, which I know she feels was greatly strengthened by the introduction of unitary government. Wiltshire has survived in spite of its unitary status and I am sure that Hertfordshire will equally survive long into the future, no matter what happens with local government.
My noble friend’s questions can all be answered by the criteria that local authorities have been asked to respond to as part of the invitation process, including issues of local identity and cultural and historic importance. Although I appreciate the spirit in which my noble friend has tabled this amendment, it is the Government’s view that placing further legislative conditions on the merger of unitary councils would be duplicative and unnecessary. For these reasons, I hope that noble Lords feel able not to press their amendments.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
I thank the Minister for her answer. I know she has huge experience of local democracy and councils, but there is quite a lot of experience in this Room as well. If noble Lords from the Conservative Party are agreeing with the noble Lord over there, I think there might be a problem. I just hope the Minister can perhaps think about some of the things that we have said and that we are concerned about. The Government are doing quite a lot of good things, but they are very bad at telling us about them, and that is part of the problems that they face at the moment. I will not come back on all these things. My concerns are still very much there, so this might come back later.
Lord Bassam of Brighton
“(3A) Before issuing an invitation or direction the Secretary of State must consider—(a) the natural geography of the proposed local areas being merged,(b) the identity of the authorities in terms of communities and place making,(c) the balance between the rural, urban and suburban mass of the proposed authorities,(d) the financial and environmental sustainability of the proposed authorities, and(e) the size of proposed authorities in relation to the creation of local democratic structures.”
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
I thank my noble friend for her response to my amendment. It is worth the Government thinking a bit more about whether it would be appropriate to put in the Bill something that reflects the guidance. I am grateful to all noble Lords who supported what I said. If we are to get reorganisation right, this is an opportunity to put some guarantees in place to do exactly that.
Lord Blunkett (Lab)
I am putting the proposition that Clause 59 and Schedule 27 should not stand part of the Bill. I was very grateful to my noble friend and her colleagues last September for the modest amendments they moved to what was then Clause 57 in the Commons —Amendments 152 and 153. They at least gave some credence to the Long Title of the Bill, which includes the words “community empowerment”. It is quite hard to believe those words when you are disempowering the people you are talking about.
I am absolutely certain that there will be excellent high-quality expertise in the department and people who know a great deal about local government, as well as my noble friend. However, when I went into the Cabinet in 1997, I found that that no one above grade 7 in the Department for Education and Employment had ever had anything to do with education. Not one single person had taught in a school, college or university, or had been an administrator of education. We had to do something rapidly about that. If you do not know how local government works, it is not surprising that you get technocratic tidiness. There is nothing worse than bureaucratic tidiness, where people are told what to do when you talk to them about empowerment. I feel that this is a philosophical issue.
I have always tried to be a communitarian. I often failed in education—we were in such a hurry to transform the life chances of children that we were very top-down. However, I have kept in touch with Robert Putnam at Harvard and I still believe that we should build our democratic structures from the bottom up. It is the only way in which we will counterweight globalisation—and, by the way, disillusionment and disgust with democracy. Once people feel that they have some small power, they start to learn how to use it—I realise that that is a dangerous thing.
This afternoon, I propose that enforcing a particular model of democratic process—of course it must be democratic, open and transparent, and have probity and fiduciary duties—is completely contrary to the intention of the Bill and, I would have thought, that of my noble friend. So, I am putting my neck on the block this afternoon just to say: please stop it.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
I very much support the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, in opposing Clause 59. As an opponent of centralised control of all sorts, I feel that, if we are talking about democracy, it really ought to mean what it says. Centralised control of any sort is, for me, not democracy.
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (LD)
My Lords, I apologise that I was not able to speak at Second Reading but I want to speak to the proposition from the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, to abolish Clause 59 and Schedule 27. I do this as someone who has lived in Sheffield and who still represents the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, on the council. We were actually on different sides of the argument when that referendum was held in May 2021, when 90,000 people—65% of those who voted in Sheffield—voted to change from the strong leader model. The Liberal Democrats brought that in during the Blair years, because that is what we were told to do.
I find it ironic that we are discussing the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill but we are now dictating the governance arrangements that communities will have. I really do not see how you can stack that up. If communities want to move away from a governance arrangement, as the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, said, that can be a simple vote in council or it could be the route that the It’s Our City! community organisation took in Sheffield, which was to collect 25,000 signatures and trigger a referendum. I normally say to councillors that if communities are collecting 20,000-odd signatures, it is best to change your mind, otherwise you are going to get the vote that we had in Sheffield.
I urge the Minister to realise that if you can get the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, and me on the same page, having for many years thrown rocks at each other in Sheffield, you seriously need to listen. Although you might favour the strong leader model, if you genuinely believe in community empowerment then let the people decide. If they ultimately want a leader-and-cabinet model, they will vote for it and support it through their local councils. Let us not have this top-down diktat. That is why, on these rare occasions, noble Lords can find me and the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, on the same page.
Lord Shipley (LD)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Mohammed of Tinsley for speaking. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, in particular. I strongly support the stand part notices on Clause 59 and Schedule 27. The reason has been explained. This is a devolution Bill about community empowerment, but the Government are removing the right of local people to decide for themselves what system of governance they want.
We have this devolution Bill, but the Government decide the form of local governance and say that there will not be a committee system. Where are we now? We are in Parliament, operating as a Committee. I have spoken on this issue many times in recent years. The reason why I believe that we should encourage committee systems is that they decentralise power but, more importantly, they enable scrutiny to take place at the point of decision-making. All too often, scrutiny in local government takes place after the decision. We will debate this further on our eighth day in Committee but I think that this is a fundamental right. I just want to keep the right of a community to create the structure that it wants. That right lies in the Localism Act 2011.
I very much hope that we will come back to this issue on Report. However, there are rumours that we may not get a Report stage and may end up in wash-up prior to Prorogation, because there are not many weeks left. We have a further day in Committee on 5 March and we have to leave an interval to reach Report. Can the Minister tell us whether we are going to have a Report stage? Also, if we are going to have a Report stage, I hope very much that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, will bring this back, because that would give us the power to say to the Government, “You have to think again on this issue. Do not tell local people in all local authorities what model they are required to adopt”.
In the Explanatory Notes, there are explanations for why the Government are undertaking this, but, frankly, they are spurious. They claim that there is evidence, but I do not know what the evidence is. In the end, why do we not just trust local people to make decisions? Otherwise, 56 million people in England will continue to be run out of London and Whitehall.
Lord Jamieson (Con)
My Lords, I wish to continue what seems to be an emerging consensus and a Sheffield love-in. The noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, was the leader in Sheffield when I was at Sheffield University and I will always be grateful for the 10p bus rides that I was able to take.
As we have discussed, these amendments concern the committee system. Let us be frank: this is a devolution Bill. I reiterate yet again that this side of the Committee and these Benches believe in democracy and in devolution. If you believe in those two things, this is about allowing and empowering local communities to decide what is best for them.
I was leader of Central Bedfordshire and operated under the strong-leader model, which worked well for Central Bedfordshire. I am sure it will work well in many other places but, if local communities believe that the committee system is best for them, they should be given that opportunity. Does the Minister believe in devolution and local democracy and will she allow local communities to decide the governance model that best meets their needs?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Blunkett and the other noble Lords who have contributed to this debate. I turn first to my noble friend’s intention to oppose the clause and Schedule 27 standing part of the Bill.
This clause and the related schedule will bring further consistency to local authority governance arrangements across England. As your Lordships may know, the Government still have a strong preference for executive models of governance. We believe, and I believe because I have operated in both, that the leader-and-cabinet model, already operated by over 80% of councils, provides a clearer and more easily understood governance structure and can support more efficient decision-making.
To answer the question from the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, there are several individual examples that highlight the challenges of the committee system. When Cheshire East switched to the committee system in 2021, an LGA corporate peer challenge found that its structure was large and meeting-intensive, with six policy committees and nine sub-committees, involving 78 out of 82 councillors. Co-ordination across individual committees is a persistent challenge. The same peer challenge for Cheshire East flagged the siloed nature of the council, with poor joint working across departments, contributing towards challenges of service delivery and communication.
Several councils that have tried committees have later reverted to the leader-and-cabinet model, for example Brighton and Hove in 2024. This is wasteful of both time and resources. With collective decision-making spread across multiple committees, it is not always clear who is in charge. Councils that return to the leader-and-cabinet model, such as Newark and Sherwood District Council and Nottinghamshire County Council, have judged it to be more transparent, agile and accountable.
At the same time, we recognise the genuinely held concerns of those councils that have adopted the committee system following a public referendum or a council resolution. That is important and I take seriously the words of noble Lords who have raised that. The Government’s amendments made in the other place to these provisions were intended to allow some councils that have recently adopted the committee system, following either a council resolution or a public referendum, to continue operating that governance model until the end of their moratorium period. At that point, the local authority will be required to undertake and publish a review of whether it should move to the leader-and-cabinet executive model or retain its committee system. The Government believe that this approach strikes the right balance between encouraging a more consistent governance model for local authorities across England and respecting local democratic mandates and voter expectations where councils are currently operating a committee system and are within their current moratorium periods. With these points in mind, I invite my noble friend to support these measures.
I turn to the government amendments in this group. As I have set out, the Government introduced an amendment in the other place to allow certain councils operating the committee system to continue to do so where they were within their statutory moratorium periods. The Government are now bringing forward additional amendments to clarify the circumstances in which a local authority’s committee system may be protected from the requirement to adopt the leader-and-cabinet executive model. This will mean that the protection period applies only where the council has previously adopted the committee system following either a council resolution or a public referendum and is within its statutory moratorium period at the point this provision is commenced.
The amendments clarify that the prior resolution to change governance must be made under Part 1A of the 2000 Act. This will ensure that the Bill strikes the right balance between encouraging a more consistent local authority governance model across England and respecting more recent local democratic mandates and voter expectations. It will also reduce disruption where councils are operating a committee system within their statutory moratorium period.
Lord Blunkett (Lab)
I thank my noble friend for that response. I shall of course not press my amendment at this stage. I cannot promise the Liberal Democrats what I shall do when we reach Report, not least since—as I said in a meeting a couple of days ago—I am a critical friend working very hard on the friend bit rather than the critical bit, and I will continue to be so.
I have only one further remark to make; I think it will be well worth my noble friend taking this back to the Secretary of State. Sadly, from my point of view, from May, there will be a large number of local authorities that will have possibly five substantive representations of political parties. In those circumstances, the cabinet form of government will be extremely difficult. With just three big groups in Sheffield, the only way that the current leadership of the council has been able to make it work effectively is by sharing the committee system. I think we should bear that in mind as we move towards a very turbulent time in local government.
Member’s explanatory statement
The Local Government Act 2000 does not provide for a local authority to pass a resolution to retain the Committee system and so this provision does not need to deal with such a resolution.
Member’s explanatory statement
This would make clear that a resolution to change to the committee system must be provided for by Part 1A of the Local Government Act 2000.
Member’s explanatory statement
This would make clear that a resolution to change to the committee system must be provided for by Part 1A of the Local Government Act 2000.
Member’s explanatory statement
The Local Government Act 2000 does not provide for a local authority to pass a resolution to retain the Committee system and so this provision does not need to deal with such a resolution.
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friends Lord Black of Brentwood and Lady Stowell of Beeston, as well as the noble Lord, Lord Storey, for their support on this amendment. My noble friend Lady Stowell will unfortunately be unable to speak as she is in a meeting of another committee of your Lordships’ House.
Amendment 202 would leave out paragraph 6 of Schedule 27, which amends the Local Government Act 2000. In so doing, it would protect existing requirements for local authorities to publish the resolutions that they make in local newspapers as public notices.
Local newspapers remain a crucial source of information for people across our country. Indeed, the local news sector reaches approximately 42 million people. For many residents, these publications are not simply a preferred medium but their primary and most trusted means of receiving local news and democratic information. In many cases, were it not for these local newspapers, the information would simply not be accessible.
For the Government to cut people off from this information, particularly at a time when they seek to reorganise local government in so many swathes of our country, would leave many local residents in the dark. As councils undergo significant structural change, the Government should surely be encouraging local authorities to go to even greater lengths to inform people of changes to governance structures and much more.
There is a misconception that these dry technical notices are tucked away in the back of the paper. Far from it; they are often accompanied with news articles and commentary by journalists, encouraging further scrutiny of local decisions. In an age of social media and clickbait, where what news we read is determined by foreign technology platforms and their obscure algorithms, local journalism acts as an increasingly important safeguard against misinformation and general ignorance.
Independent research suggests that 80% of adults in the UK trust the news and information that they see in their local newspapers far higher than the figure for most national and international media. This level of trust is not easily replicated and should not be taken for granted. Local democracy and local journalism operate in a symbiotic relationship, which I think we would be wise to maintain.
Whereas the current requirements ensure consistency across the country, making the change that the Government have proposed in this Bill—that is, allowing local authorities to publicise governance changes in a “manner they think appropriate”—will allow some decisions to be publicised less than others and receive less public scrutiny. It will mean that residents in one local authority area may be kept more informed than those in another, creating an inequality of access to information based purely on geography.
Local authorities should not be allowed to shy away from local residents and voters. At a time when the Government are permitting many of them to hide away from the ballot box, it is even more important that they be held to account in the public forum.
Furthermore, the Government are already committed to reviewing statutory notices in their forthcoming local media strategy. To legislate on public notices now, before we have the findings of that review, would surely be premature. I think it would be irresponsible of the Government to have us consider these proposals before we are all equipped with the facts.
I urge the Minister to reconsider the approach that the Government are taking in this way, at least until we have the further evidence to inform the best way forward. I beg to move.
Lord Black of Brentwood (Con)
My Lords, I support Amendment 202 in the name of my noble friend Lord Parkinson, to which I have added my name. I apologise that I was unable to take part in the Second Reading debate. This is a very important issue for our local media and I am most grateful to my noble friend for bringing it forward for debate. I declare my interests as deputy chairman of the Telegraph Media Group and chairman of the News Media Association. My noble friend powerfully made the arguments in favour of the case for removing these provisions of the Bill, so I want to emphasise only a few points.
Inevitably, the first concerns the financial sustainability of the local press. Whenever we debate media issues there is consistently strong support across the House for our local media and appreciation of the vital role that it plays in local democracy, scrutinising those in positions of power in local authorities and holding local politicians to account. But investigative local journalism of this sort is expensive, and it is becoming harder and harder for local publishers to support it, not just because of the structural changes in the media market but because of the continuing encroachment of the BBC into local news.
Revenues and, therefore, investment are under huge pressure. The publication of public notices is, in a highly visible way in local newspapers, aided by the Public Notice Portal as a one-stop shop—a digital database for all public notices. It is one of the remaining and vital sources of revenues for the local press, and it is crucial that it is preserved. Removing the obligation will place a massive question mark over the sustainability of local news. The Government and, indeed, Parliament cannot will the ends of a free press and local democratic scrutiny without also willing the means.
Secondly, it must be of great concern to us all that, as my noble friend has set out, at a time of significant structural change in local government—the biggest in a generation—which we have heard so much about this afternoon, we should have maximum transparency about the activities of local authorities and those in charge of them. Giving local authorities the power to flag important issues simply as they see fit hands them a wide-ranging ability to keep decisions secret, in many cases, by shielding them from large swathes of the public who still rely on published local media for information.
Local media has a vital role to play in ensuring that public notices are translated into lay language by local journalists writing about them in a way that is accessible and easily understood by local electors. As my noble friend said, if you remove the obligation to publish notices in print, you remove the incentive and ability of reporters to help the public understand and scrutinise them. That cannot be right at a time of such upheaval in local government.
Finally, although the vast majority of noble Lords in this place are able to access news online, we must recognise that not all citizens are equipped with digital access or knowledge. Age UK estimates that there are around 2.4 million digitally-excluded older people—that is nearly one in five of that section of society—who have very limited use of the internet, many using it less than once a month if at all. Yet local services and the decisions of local authorities are hugely important to them, perhaps more so than any other group in the population. They rely on their printed local paper for such news and information, and we should not be excluding them from that ability to have a say in the democratic process.
The Prime Minister says that his Government
“will always be on the side of pensioners”.
Let him prove it in deeds as well as words. I hope that the Grand Committee will support this amendment.
Lord Storey (LD)
My Lords, I have added my name to this amendment. Good local government and community empowerment need a strong local media to shine a light on the council chamber, to offer scrutiny, and to encourage communities. However, over the past 20 years, we have seen the gradual decline of local news and media. I look at my own city of Liverpool: 20 years ago, there was a morning newspaper, the Daily Post, and in the evening, the Liverpool Echo. There was a very strong BBC local radio station, Radio Merseyside, and there was a local commercial station, Radio City.
Since that time, we have seen BBC local radio cut a considerable number of jobs and commercial radio become syndicated, with jobs going to London and being lost in Liverpool. The answer from the commercial radio sector—it even changed the name—is to provide news on the hour, which is often from London, as well. We have lost that link with the community. There are very few occasions when any investigative journalism is taking place, and it can be hugely important to the well-being of the city of Liverpool.
Sadly, the elected mayor was recently arrested and charged and commissioners were sent in. None of that would have happened if a very small digital news provider had actually done an investigation and seen what was happening. For the good of local government, and because of the importance of community empowerment, we need a strong local media. Do not take my word for it; your Lordships have had two Select Committees that looked at local news, both of which said, “Yes, we need to keep and protect local journalism and local news, and these are some of the ways we can do it”.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, because I had forgotten about this and it is really important. I hope the Government will take note, because it is also about saving local jobs, often in very poor communities. I hope the Government realise that we need a strong, robust local media to support local government, to shine a light on it and to celebrate what is happening there.
Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I enter this debate to support the three previous speakers. I declare an interest as the chair of the Independent Press Standards Organisation, which regulates almost all local media. In that capacity, I have had the opportunity to visit a large number of regional newspapers, to talk to those who work on them, and to try to understand their circulation and advertising problems, and the difficulty they have surviving. Their financial model is very difficult.
I visited one quite well-known newspaper—I am not prepared to identify it—which used to have 50 people working on it. That newspaper is now put together by five people. It is a considerable challenge for newspapers to provide news and do the sort of investigative journalism that the noble Lord, Lord Storey, was talking about.
This amendment would take away the opportunity for journalists to follow up on public notices, which can give rise to interesting news and proper scrutiny. It is not just a formality. The Bill talks about ways that the local authority might think are appropriate to publicise these things, but I ask the Minister what precisely is envisaged. As noble Lords have said and the House has recognised, there is still a considerable appetite for local news. There are lots of people of a certain age who are digitally challenged—I think that is the euphemism used—who like local newspapers and think they are important. They even like them to be delivered to them personally, which can be quite a challenge for local newspapers.
If this is considered some form of subsidy, I respectfully ask: so what? It is a subsidy that is important in view of the role that newspapers play. I cannot believe that the Government really intend to damage local newspapers in the way that this provision will. I ask the Government to think again about this. It may have come about by accident to promote digitalisation, but the collateral damage will be very considerable.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
My Lords, I shall not speak for long. I was looking around the Room, trying to add up how many former local leaders there are, and I got to five or maybe six. We probably all had one thing in common: our generation of politicians was extraordinarily reliant on our local paper to broadcast our successes and failures and, more importantly, to hold local institutions to account.
When I first became a councillor in Brighton, in 1983, my local paper had three editions a day. It had a circulation of 120,000. It had arts, health, local government and crime sections, with a general list of reporters, all different specialists, who worked from the city centre. The paper was also given different opt-outs for Worthing, Hastings and Crawley. There was an extensive newspaper network, and it was complemented by three radio stations, two of which were commercial, and two TV stations. Brighton and Hove had a degree of news saturation.
That meant that the spotlight was placed on us as local politicians in a way that was sometimes aggressive, but more often than not benign, because they believed in reporting the facts. As a local politician sitting on a committee—including as leader of the council, which I was towards the middle end of the 1980s—if I could see the journalist’s pen twitch in the corner of the room, taking a note, I thought I had scored a good hit politically, and invariably I had. I am sure many politicians were reliant on people such as Adam Trimingham, our local reporter, for broadcasting their political views and making sure that people knew what the local authority was about.
This amendment is a practical one. It would be a shame if local authorities were not obliged to publish notices in the way they have historically. The decline and death of local news is a great sadness, because people are less well informed about what has been going on in their name. The noble Lord, Lord Storey, talked about investigative journalism; that is as important at a local level as it is at a national one. Our society is poorer without it, so anything we can do through local government to help strengthen local news is very important. I am sure local authorities themselves are worried about that, because it is part of their population’s decline in knowledge and understanding of the democratic process. I hope the Minister can offer us some comfort and encouragement, and perhaps say that we should do more to stimulate local news services. This is one practical measure that the Government should actively consider.
Lord Lucas (Con)
My Lords, the Minister will not be surprised to know that I very much support what other noble Lords have said, given that I promoted amendments to her previous Bill on this subject. It seems to me immensely important that notices should come to the notice of people. I know what my local council would do, if faced with this clause: it would publish either nothing or as little and as obscurely as it could. Its practice is to try to ensure that people do not know what it is up to.
It is entirely undesirable that local councils should have this direction in paragraph 6(3) of Schedule 27, without any rules as to how they should apply it. If we are to keep this clause, at the very least councils should be given an objective; for example, that they should publish it in a way that will lead to the widest readership over the widest spread of the community. In other words, they should know what they are trying to achieve, and they should have something through which to justify their actual performance against what they are supposed to do. I also ask that the publication be, at least in part, in IPSO-regulated spaces, to make sure that what is getting out is of quality.
As noble Lords will remember from the previous Bill, we need to get rid of the 19th-century definition of “newspaper”. There is a much broader section of local news enterprises. As the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, knows, because we are very close neighbours, the level of local news that we get now is very degenerated; the level of investigation, rather than just reprinting material they are given, is really very low. However, in that gap, little local enterprises are springing up. They are often not yet of a sufficient size to afford a print run, but they are getting out there and doing the investigative work. They ought, in the right circumstances, to be supported. I urge the Government to change the definition —if we keep newspapers, that is. If we do not, as the schedule proposes, and we broaden the discretion of local government, we must make it clear what it has to achieve rather than allowing it to achieve nothing.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, I support the principles behind this amendment in the name of my noble friend Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, which has attracted widespread interest from both within and without your Lordships’ House.
At its heart lies a simple question: how do we ensure that the public continue to have clear, independent and accessible routes to information about the decisions made by their local authorities? For a long time, local newspapers have played a vital role in this. Our local journalists are there not only to report news; they scrutinise local decision-making, as we have heard, and act as guardians of local democracy. They are often the only regular observers of the workings of local government. In many parts of the country, it is only local journalists who regularly attend council meetings, who probe and challenge, and who ensure that decisions are brought to the attention of residents.
As the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, said, all of us here who have been in local government have been at the end of the pen of many journalists—sometimes in a positive way, but often in a negative way. Local newspapers have always been the starting point for many young journalists who have gone on to be better and more successful journalists. As a local council leader, it is always interesting to watch that progression. I have always been pleased to give as much support as possible to local journalists learning their trade.
The requirement for councils to place statutory notices in local newspapers has long been one of the practical mechanisms that enable this transparency and accountability. It ensures that important matters handled by local authorities reach their residents where they are most likely to see them. Crucially, they reach residents through an independent medium—not one controlled by the authority. That independence is a safeguard we should not discard lightly, even in part.
It is true that the local media landscape is changing. Many local news organisations now operate both in print and online or only online, and audiences increasingly access their news digitally. However, as we have heard, the answer to such change cannot simply be to remove this duty—altogether, in some instances—and, in extremis, to see people rely solely on council websites. Many residents seldom visit council websites, as we all know. Some find them difficult to navigate. They are not used to being widely used as a source of day-to-day information on their local authorities. If statutory notices are placed only there, this would be not modernisation but invisibility. There is evidently concern, as reflected in the broad support for this amendment, that the Government’s current proposal would weaken transparency rather than strengthen it.
I listened with interest to the compelling cases in this debate, and I cannot help but wonder whether there is another way. If this policy requires updating, modernising or broadening, why do we not consider doing precisely that? Rather than the Government removing the requirement completely, allowing publication
“in such manner as the local authority thinks appropriate”,
would they consider expanding its scope instead? It could be broadened to include reputable independent local news websites, trusted digital publishers and recognised social media channels, operated by established local news providers. I defer to those who know the industry better than I do, but would this not reflect the realities of contemporary media consumption while preserving the more core democratic principle that notices should be published through independent and accessible outlets?
Above all, we must avoid a future in which councils become the sole gatekeepers of information that should be publicly available, easily accessed and subject to external scrutiny. The partnerships between councils and local media remain essential to the health of our local democracy, and we consider that any move to weaken that would be a big mistake. For these reasons, I believe that the principle of the amendment deserves serious consideration and I hope the Government will reconsider their approach.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, Amendment 202, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, seeks to maintain the current requirement to publish governance changes—it is only governance changes—in local newspapers. I thank all noble Lords who spoke in this debate. There are clearly strongly held views around the Committee.
We have just had two powerful debates about empowering local councils and councillors. We seem to have changed our minds in this regard. The Bill does not prevent local authorities publishing a notice in a local newspaper, should they wish to. Instead, it empowers councils to decide the most appropriate and effective method of notifying their local communities of any changes to the governance model. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, that I appreciate all his points, but local government is not responsible for the problems of local newspapers; there are many issues affecting them. We all value them immensely, but it is not just local government that is causing those issues.
The Bill’s provision updates the current statutory requirement. It shifts the focus from—
Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)
The noble Baroness maybe somewhat misunderstood what I said. I actually asked her—this is part of the provision in the Bill—what she thought the local authority would think appropriate for the way the information is published. That is a matter for the Government rather than for local newspapers.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
It is, and this part of the Bill suggests that it is for local government to decide the most effective way to communicate these governance changes to its residents.
The Bill gives councils the flexibility to publish notices of governance change in whatever manner they consider most appropriate for their local circumstances. That may still include local printed newspapers, where they continue to play an important role in our local communities, but it also enables councils to use other channels—such as digital and online newspapers, council websites, and any other local community platforms—to help set out the governance changes. Crucially, the provision does not prevent authorities continuing to use local newspapers if they consider that the best way to reach their residents; it simply allows them to exercise their judgment in choosing the most suitable communication method for their area.
The noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, in moving the amendment, took me back to my very first Select Committee appearance as a local government leader, on exactly this issue. Substantial costs are incurred. I am talking not just about governance arrangements but for the breadth of local government statutory notices. It was around £28 million in the last year we have figures for, and some estimates suggest that it may be a great deal higher than that, so a lot of cost is involved.
In practice, this issue of governance arrangements will affect very few councils. More than 80% of councils already operate the leader-and-cabinet model of governance; the majority of the remaining councils will undergo reorganisation and the new councils will automatically adopt the leader-and-cabinet model. This is a proportionate and practical reform for the small number that may need to change their governance arrangements.
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to all those who have spoken in this debate. My noble friend Lord Black mentioned the disproportionate impact that this will have on older residents. Of course, age is a protected characteristic under the Equality Act, and I wonder whether the Government have carried out a public sector equality duty impact assessment on this proposed change.
My noble friend and others mentioned the challenging business environment in which many local news organisations operate. The Minister is right that local government is not directly responsible for that, but it will be responsible if, through this Bill, the symbiotic relationship between local councils and local newspapers is severed in the way that is proposed.
I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook for the constructive suggestions that she put forward. I hope the Minister will look at them in a cool light after Committee and see whether there is a way of allowing local authorities to choose a variety of ways to publicise these decisions while also supporting these vital organs, which, as my noble friend said, are often the only independent eyes and ears in the public gallery scrutinising local authorities on behalf of the people who are being served.
The Minister was right that a cost would be necessarily incurred in this proposal, but the Government are looking at a media literacy programme and citizenship education, particularly for the new teenage voters whom they want to enfranchise, and we have here a tried, tested and truly independent way in which to shed light on democratic decisions that are taken. I hope the Minister will consider this further as we move to Report. For now, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
“(2A) In making regulations under subsection (2), it is the general duty of the Secretary of State to ensure that such regulations promote the role, involvement, and authority of locally elected councils in the governance of neighbourhood areas.(2B) It is also the general duty of the Secretary of State, in making regulations under subsection (2), to encourage local decision-making as close as practicable to the neighbourhoods affected.”
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, my amendment and the others in this group all stem from a degree of unease, in particular about Clause 60 but also generally about the ethos of this Bill towards local democracy, local representation and local participation. Clause 60 talks about
“appropriate arrangements to secure the effective governance of any area”.
It says nothing about elections or representation. Subsection (3)(d) talks about
“the purpose of ensuring local engagement with the neighbourhood”,
but there is nothing here about local councils. I am not a conspiracy theorist, but I am uneasy about the whole Bill’s approach to democratic engagement and participation.
I know that many within our governing elite think that elections are a cost and we should reduce their number or frequency. I am very conscious that Dominic Cummings made his reputation by campaigning against regional government in the north-east because it would cost money and there would be more politicians—and the fewer politicians, the better. However, the fewer politicians you have, the more authoritarians you end up with.
Among my criticisms of the Bill are that it does not define its terms very clearly. “Local”, “neighbourhood” and “community” are used to cover a great variety of things. I recall that Norwich has been described as a “parish council”—a city as a parish council—but there are all sorts of confusions there. “Effective governance” itself needs a good deal more explanation than we have.
I am a liberal. I believe in democracy which has local, political and popular engagement, and I believe in active citizens. I support votes at 16, which the Government are about to produce in the elections Bill —I have just been told that it will be published within the next month—in order to encourage the engagement of young people in public life, starting with voting. However, if we are going to think that one through, they have to have some way of being engaged.
We know what has happened to our structures of local government over the last 70 years. I grew up in a country which had urban district councils, rural district councils, county boroughs and a great many more local authorities. Not surprisingly, political parties were all larger. The core of your local Conservative association was your local councillors and those who worked with them; it was similar with the core of your local Labour Party, and so on and so forth. No wonder political parties have shrunk in numbers and more and more citizens feel disengaged from politics, because less politics goes on at the local level. To repeat what I said earlier, the statement that all politics starts with local politics is a fundamental thing about democracy. City self-government is, after all, the basis of civilisation —that is what “civilisation” means—and if we are depriving Oxford, Cambridge, Harrogate and Norwich of self-government, we are really getting into trouble.
I think the Government think that local government is about delivery, delivery is best done by direction from the centre and you do not want too many local authorities to get in the way. I understand Clause 60 as saying that, in some cases, non-elected neighbourhood groups are better and easier to work with than elected representation. Perhaps the Minister will reassure us on that. I hope I have misunderstood, but I may not have done.
I am a democrat and a liberal, and I therefore want to see an active democracy from the local to the national level in the UK. This Bill seems, on the whole, to make democracy weaker, and Clause 60 is the most dubious clause of all. I beg to move.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
My Lords, I have Amendment 206 in this group. I guess it is fishing in a similar pool to that of the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, but with a more explicit purpose.
With the increased size of local authorities that we are going to get, we will have cities becoming parishes. At the moment, I think the largest parish form of council is Northampton, which has a population of about 130,000. I do not know what the outcome of the local government reorganisation will be, but quite a large number of towns and cities that have a substantial population will have their powers reduced to that of parish and town councils. My guess is that there will be an expansion in parishing in those areas because people will want to make up the democratic deficit.
However, my point in this amendment is to try to ensure that, where neighbourhood areas are identified as being important—as, for instance, with the Pride in Place programme—the parishes, whether town or city-style parishes, are at least represented. As the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, correctly argued, they are a form of elected democracy and are there to represent their local community. While we all celebrate and work with people who are from neighbourhood organisations, they do not have the same standing in their community because they have not been directly elected by local residents. What I am therefore trying to achieve with this amendment is that, at least where neighbourhood areas are identified and a governance body is established for a neighbourhood area, parish and town councils should have a stake in that organisation. That is what my amendment seeks.
Lord Lansley (Con)
My Lords, I have a number of amendments in this group and will speak to them in turn, but I just begin by saying that I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Bassam. His Amendment 206 and my Amendment 207 are complementary, and in a sense, ask the same question: if one is creating effective neighbourhood governance, does one do it by incorporating town and parish councils into some structure or by investing town and parish councils, as far as possible, with functions and responsibilities themselves? That is where I think our amendments are complementary and could in practice be adopted in one direction in some places and in another direction in others. I accept that this is not our job in this clause, which seems to be the only clause that does not get its own schedule. I would want to have a schedule attached to this clause that set out in intense detail how this would be done because it would vary from place to place.
I was listening to the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, earlier; I did not interrupt, but the Long Title has no interpreted legal force. It is called the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, and that is a means of citation, but the Long Title does not mention community empowerment. In effect, you can look at what the Bill is called but then you look at the Long Title and it just makes provision about various forms of authorities. It does not actually say that the purpose of the Bill is to devolve power or to empower communities. It is our job to ensure that the Bill really does that. Clause 60 ought to be about community empowerment, which is where my Amendment 208 comes from. In so far as there should be guidance to local authorities on how they go about creating effective neighbourhood governance, it should be geared towards empowering and engaging local communities. It is not necessarily the case that that would happen.
I live in Suffolk. My noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook and I were both at the same meeting where the intention—it may be intention in many places—is to create neighbourhood governance. This is, in essence, the elected members of the unitary authorities forming a committee for an area. I do not say that that is irrelevant to this purpose, but it is not the same thing as town and parish councils, which have their own identity, their own powers, their own connections and relationships with all the people who live in that precise area. I come back to the word “identity” because, as all noble Lords understand, political identity is very important in how one creates political and organisational governance structures. The starting point for government structures should be: what is one’s political identity? As it happens, in Suffolk, most people probably identify with their town or parish. That is where they start from. My proposition is terribly simple, which is that towns and parish councils should be, wherever possible, strengthened and their functions maintained or enhanced by this process of local authorities creating effective neighbourhood governance.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, might I ask the noble Lord a question about which areas are not parishes? My strong impression is that the unparished areas in Britain are, by and large, poorer inner-city areas —those areas that are most disengaged and disillusioned with politics. If that is the case, it ought to concern us, but I have not yet managed to get full evidence of it.
Lord Lansley (Con)
I am sure the noble Lord is absolutely right about that. The interesting thing is that, just because an area is urban, it does not mean that it does not have parishes. London, one of the biggest cities in Europe, is very often called a city of villages. That they are called parishes is normal in urban areas as much as it is in country areas. “Parish” is not a rural concept; it is a well-established historical concept, wherever you happen to live. Extending parishes across the country would be an admirable way of extending neighbourhood governance.
Lord Lucas (Con)
My Lords, could I take advantage of my noble friend’s expertise again? How are unitary councils included under Clause 60(5)? It lists only counties, districts and London boroughs, so I am not clear how the clause applies to unitary councils.
Lord Lansley (Con)
I think the Minister might wish to refer to that, if necessary. My understanding is that, just because an authority is unitary, it does not mean it stops being a county or a district. You could have single foundation counties and districts, in theory.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I will speak on Amendment 209 in the name of my noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. I am not going to mention parishes; it is too controversial. In my village, the parish council is incredibly important. It sets up a litter pick, once a month, which I do every month and it is wonderful. I love walking out in front of cars in the village that are going too fast and just stopping them with my little stick. There is not much rubbish left anymore.
The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, used a very good word for what this side of the Room is experiencing: unease. Sometimes it goes a little bit beyond that, as well.
This amendment seeks to strengthen Clause 60 by setting clear minimum standards for meaningful community participation in neighbourhood governance. The Bill repeatedly speaks in the language of devolution, empowerment and bringing decision-making closer to communities but, to do that, you must make sure that people are genuinely involved in shaping decisions, rather than just being consulted once it has all been fixed.
As the Bill stands, it requires only that “appropriate arrangements” are made for local engagement. That phrase is far too vague, and that vagueness risks exactly the sort of weak or inconsistent participation that has undermined public trust for years. Without minimum standards, engagement can easily become technically compliant but practically meaningless. Meaningful participation requires more than consultation; it requires deliberation, and spaces where people can learn, discuss, challenge and contribute to shaping outcomes. That is why the amendment refers to
“deliberative processes such as citizens’ panels, assemblies, or community conversations”.
In my village, we have community conversations on the street, on a regular basis—and very healthy it is too.
These approaches are well established, increasingly used by councils and effective at engaging people who would not normally take part in formal consultations. The amendment also rightly emphasises inclusion; there is a danger that engagement exercises are dominated by those with the time, confidence and resources to respond. Communities are affected most by decisions, and those who are already underrepresented in policy-making are precisely the voices that are hardest to hear and most important to include. That probably counts double for inner-city parishes or areas.
Transparency is equally important. People need to be able to see how their input has influenced decisions. When communities are asked for their views but see no visible impact, trust is eroded. We need to report on how engagement has shaped plans and outcomes.
The amendment also recognises that meaningful participation needs support. The Minister has said that there is a lot of money going into local councils. I very much hope that it is enough to do exactly this sort of participation and engagement, because asking councils to deliver deeper participation without providing the means to do so risks setting them up to fail.
I do not think that existing powers and future regulations will be sufficient. Although flexibility matters, flexibility without standards leads to inequality. Minimum standards prove a floor, not a ceiling. They ensure that all communities can expect a basic level of involvement. There are excellent examples of councils doing this well; the purpose of the amendment is to ensure that such good practice becomes the norm, not the exception.
The Earl of Lytton (CB)
My Lords, Amendment 209A in this group is in my name. I express my regret that I was unable to speak at Second Reading, for which I apologise. This is my first intervention on this Bill. I have interests to declare: I am a former president, and now a vice-president, of the National Association of Local Councils, and I am a current joint president of the West Sussex Association of Local Councils. I am very grateful to NALC for its help in drafting Amendment 209A.
I stepped straight into the controversial sector that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, suggested she would keep well clear of. I have very much in mind the comments made by the noble Lords, Lord Blunkett and Lord Shipley, in our debates on the earlier groups in connection with Clause 59 and Schedule 27. I also relate 100% to the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, in his introduction to this group, as well as those from the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. I support the other amendments in this group, which are on the same theme as mine.
I wish to comment on a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, about the extent of parishing. I cannot give him an answer, but if I tell him that East Sussex and West Sussex are almost completely parished but Surrey is at a much lower percentage then that will indicate to him that it can be a bit of a patchwork. Up and down the country, there are reckoned to be about 10,000 parish and town councils, so there are a lot of them around; there are also a lot of elected members. Noble Lords have raised other things about parishes, but I will pass on them.
I share a concern with noble Lords. If we have a combined county authority for a population of 500,000, say, and the borough and district structure then disappears because of that, where the relevant area or part of it is unparished—this is often in urban areas, though it is not always—what represents the community? As the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, said, that bit is uniquely well placed to deal with those local issues that have the most immediate impact on the electorate. It is usually—almost always—a community of geographical interest, as well as other types of interest.
My amendment seeks clarification of the Government’s intentions here; as we have already heard from the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, and others, they look a bit opaque and need clarification. In particular, my amendment tries to make sure that any arrangements that are put in place pursuant to the Bill, once it is enacted, do not impinge on the existing parish structures or impede their formation.
I will expand further by asking what the Government envisage the specification template or other structural characteristics might be to respond best to the needs of community. Here I am not stressing size. The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, referred to the council in Northampton. We always used to say that the biggest town council in the country was Weston-super-Mare, but I may be a bit out of date. It was considerably larger than some of the other principal authorities; they come in all shapes and sizes.
The point here is to ask: will community representation be some form of hand-me-down process through the principal authority, and will it be dependent on that authority for its finance, appointment of members, functions and so on? Will it just leave it to some ad hoc or perhaps business-related organisation to fill the void? Or will it have legal status, defined structure and powers, direct democratic accountability, financial accountability and autonomy through a precept, and the opportunity to move to a general power of competence, with rules of conduct, procedure, an accountable officer and so on? If that is what the template looks like, it looks very much like a parish council in structure. Let us not get too hung up about what the precise name should be, because what I am concerned about is the form. The democratic and financial accountability and its governance are what matter here, rather than size or other factors.
Lord Lucas (Con)
My Lords, I declare an interest in that I live in the middle of this problem: Eastbourne and Hastings have district councils and no parishes, so when we go unitary, we will be without any form of local structure.
Will the Minister publish the draft regulations before we get to Report? We are supposed to see plans for Sussex going unitary sometime in March or April. It will be enormous. We are at the moment undergoing a consultation process on whether we have a town council or a succession of parishes, or whether we look to the unitary model and have a local structure that embraces the whole of Eastbourne. The borough of Eastbourne has grown enormously beyond its boundaries. If we want to be seen as a big community, we need those big boundaries. We want to be a whole town, thank you very much. If we are to be parishes, we will still need to understand what we will interact with at the unitary neighbourhood panel or structure—whatever it is going to be. For us, this is an enormously important bit of knowledge. We are being asked to decide things at the moment, but we are not being told what the most important factor is: how will the unitary structure these things?
The Earl of Lytton (CB)
In my view, a process of parishing does not consist of the dividing up of a borough—if I can call it that—such as Eastbourne into a load of little bits and pieces. That may be the way in which it is being presented because of the electoral ward structure that pertains at the moment but, as I said, there are some very large town councils—Weston-super-Mare is one and I am sure that there are others—that have very significant populations. The question is: what best forms community in the area concerned? I suggest to the noble Lord, for whose continued and creditable battling for Eastbourne I have the highest regard, that he should perhaps look into that and see whether a form of parishing to create a town council would not be a better way forward.
Lord Lucas (Con)
I can understand that, but how does a big town council for 100,000 or so people actually work within a unitary of half a million people, given that the town council will have the powers of a parish only and most of the decisions will be taken by the unitary? The important structure at the level of the town will not be the town council, with its rather artificially constrained boundaries, but the local unitary neighbourhood—whatever it calls itself—with the rather expanded boundaries, and the budget, and responsibility for all the things that we want to happen, which the town council will not have any of. If we are looking at parishes, we do not want them on ward boundaries. Ward boundaries have grown to fit the needs of the Electoral Commission. If we are having parishes, we want them to represent communities, which we do not have with our ward boundaries.
Lord Lansley (Con)
I have been looking at the clause and I come back to the fact that the local authorities in question are clearly not strategic authorities; the point is that they are the unitaries. I do not know about Sussex, but in Suffolk, for example, the unitaries may end up being districts or the county but, either way, they will be comprised within the local authorities that would have to undertake this job. Bear in mind that Clause 60 does at least enable functions to be conferred on this neighbourhood structure, so if one were to establish a town council in Eastbourne, the unitary in question—let us say it was a county—could seek to confer functions on that town council.
Lord Lucas (Con)
Yes, but the town council will be on our current boundaries, presumably, whereas to work with the last 30 years of building and development we really ought to incorporate all those large areas of housing and commerce that Wealden has stuck on our boundaries rather than elsewhere. Understanding how the Government intend to proceed on this is relevant to the decisions that we are being asked to take now. I very much agree with what other noble Lords have said. Representation is important, as are the concepts of parish and local identity. We would like to take what will be a rather challenging decision in the full light of knowing what the alternatives open to us really are.
Lord Fuller (Con)
My Lords, this has been a really important debate because it has emphasised and demonstrated the muddle that is in the Bill: the vacuum that will be created following the local government reorganisation process. How is it that Clause 60 cannot even bring itself to mention the town and parish councils that have formed the bedrock of our society?
I know it is inconvenient to have those pesky politicians interfering in that administrative competence: why do we want delegates and deputies at that lowest level? I can understand why the dead hand of Marsham Street has written Clause 60 as it has, but it is not good enough, because it does not have the golden thread of legitimacy that comes only with elections or democratic accountability. We are not seeing authoritative governance, but authoritarian governance; we will be leaving it to local authorities to impose relationships in some smaller parts of their territory without any regard or requirement for democratic legitimacy.
We have had an interesting discussion. The number bandied around was that 20% of places are unparished. It is not equally spread throughout the nation but, by and large, the historic county boroughs have not been parished because they have been billing authorities and districts in their own right. Areas such as King’s Lynn —a proud Hanseatic town—are currently going through a consultation to form their own parish so that there is not a vacuum. I am very attracted to Amendments 207 and 210, and especially Amendment 209A from the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, because they would prevent a vacuum. Nature abhors a vacuum, but there will be one unless we have these absolute requirements here.
In our discussion about parishes, there was some confusion over what we might call ecclesiastical parishes —those parts of a town with a parish church—but we have not really got to constituted, incorporated parishes that are part of a parish council. It is important that our nomenclature is straightened out. I will talk about civil parishes as opposed to ecclesiastical ones.
There are already multiple arrangements. In my electoral ward, the two parishes of Alpington and Yelverton are inconveniently at both ends of the alphabet but have come together to form a community council—a joint parish council with warding for periodic elections. A minimum number of councillors from Alpington and a minimum number from Yelverton must come together as part of that. Put together, about 400 or 500 people live in those two parishes. Where is the equivalence between Alpington and Yelverton working together and Weston-super-Mare? We are trying to shoehorn this. The Bill should be clear.
In the previous session on the Bill on Monday, I ploughed a lonely furrow as I tried to make some sort of size distinction between these smaller parishes and the larger towns. I was on my own; had that debate been held today, I feel I might have got more support. Nevertheless, we must make sure that we end up with properly constituted, incorporated bodies to govern these smaller bits. Just establishing a joint committee or sub-committee of the new body that sits above it will not be any good, exactly because of the library point that was made so well.
The Bill is deficient because none of this texture is explained or laid out. There is just a muddle, with no legitimacy. This must be brought back on Report with significantly more flesh on the bones and I encourage the Minister to do so. I am not sure whether even Stevenage is parished; it was certainly a new town. That is a whole new class of authority that we may need to look at in this regard. We must try to bring together all those bits from my noble friend Lord Lansley, the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, and others to bring some order to this. Otherwise, it will be disorderly.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
I apologise for intervening, but it is not just about legitimacy—it is also that local areas occasionally want to pay for local amenities that the large unitary does not want to pay for. Shipley, in which Saltaire is based, now has a town council because Bradford decided that it could not afford to pay for public toilets. Ilkley had its own town council so it could do it, and the other tourist destination, Haworth, has a Brontë museum, which pays for its own toilets. Saltaire is a world heritage site, but it had no money to pay for its toilets, so we had to form Shipley Town Council to reopen an absolutely essential part of our local community and economic area. That is a new tension that we have; for libraries and other things, we need some degree of fundraising power for local activities.
Lord Fuller (Con)
I did not want to come back, but I shall, to amplify my noble friend’s point—I think that I can call him my noble friend in this regard. The incorporation point is really important, because elsewhere in this Bill there are provisions for the community infrastructure levy to be passed down to neighbourhood areas. These bodies need to have a bank account and governance; they need to have representation and must have legitimacy. The Bill is silent on that and deficient in that regard. We must move forward, or we will just end up in a muddle.
Lord Shipley (LD)
My Lords, what a helpful discussion we have had about this group of amendments. The noble Lord, Lord Fuller, has rightly called this clause a muddle and said that we need to come back to it on Report with some flesh on it, because there is absolutely no detail here.
As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, said in relation to Sussex, there is no local structure for when it goes unitary. That strikes me as fundamental. Clause 60 says nothing about town and parish councils. We have had a whole set of amendments trying to address this problem, but it should have been addressed before we got to Committee. It must be addressed by the time we get to Report.
I think that we have understood now what the problem is. My noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire said at the start, in introducing this group, that he had an unease about Clause 60, which he called a “most dubious clause”—how right and prescient he has turned out to be. The noble Lord, Lord Fuller, complained that he had said a number of things on Monday about the muddle, gap or vacuum that there is. I raised this matter, and I am happy to agree that that is the case, but on day 1 in Committee, I talked about the importance of local authorities devolving power to town and parish councils—to lower tiers. At every level there should be a statutory requirement on all the bodies to devolve power to a lower level, wherever there was a case for so doing. The Government did not support that, but I remind them of that debate on and the amendment to Clause 1, as it would help to get them off the hook with this very poorly drafted Clause 60.
On a final point, as my noble friend Lord Wallace of Saltaire said, there is a confusion in terms in the Bill between local, neighbourhood and community—the three words I think he used—to which I add “area”, because we get that as well. The words start to become interchangeable because nobody is quite sure what they mean. They are not properly defined in the Bill. They ought to be, but the difficulty we have is that the Government do not quite know how to define them. The solution to the problem is to change Clause 60 to include, as part of the local government structure, town and parish councils, then to insist that areas of competence should be devolved to the lowest level possible for the management of that service.
I hope that the Minister is taking very seriously that we must have something much more substantial on Report.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, London does have a parish. It was set up in 2014 after a local referendum, and it is Queen’s Park—just so your Lordships know. There is nothing at all to stop the greatest city becoming parished.
I agree with many noble Lords that Clause 60 is a muddle. While it places a duty on local authorities to make appropriate arrangements for effective governance, it does not say whether that effective governance should be elected or non-elected. It also says that the Secretary of State would have powers through regulations to define neighbourhood areas and to specify the parameters of what arrangements may be considered appropriate. I find that very odd. I do not know which Secretary of State would understand the neighbourhoods of my now county of Norfolk, let alone the whole of England. However, we welcome efforts to bring decision-making closer to the communities that it affects. From previously setting up unitaries, it has been very clear that it is important to set up some more local organisations, but we need much more clarity on what they should be.
Neighbourhood committees or area committees—whatever they are called—are not the same as elected town or parish councils. They are unelected and in the control of and usually paid for by the unitary authority. I have experienced these committees and they work very well. They are probably needed for a bigger unitary authority, but they are no substitute for elected councils, such as town and parish councils. In fact, one of the strengths of neighbourhood or area committees is the inclusion of those local town and parish councils, so that all issues will be discussed locally by everybody concerned. Town and parish councils, because they are elected, are required to look at local plans and neighbourhood plans, and even at the budgets of the councils, to give a local perspective on those big issues for the unitary authorities. In that spirit, I welcome the intention behind Amendment 205, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, which seeks to strengthen the role and authority of locally elected councils and affirms the principle that neighbourhood governance must be rooted in democratic legitimacy and local accountability.
Amendments 206, 207, 208, 209A and 210, tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Bassam of Brighton and Lord Lansley, and the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, are important because they quite rightly seek, in different but complementary ways, to enhance and secure the role of town and parish councils within this emerging framework of what the Government are calling neighbourhood governance. We all know, from long experience and evidence on the ground, that genuine community empowerment through elected town and parish councils is central to effective neighbourhood governance. The noble Earl, Lord Lytton, is absolutely right that town and parish councils are a way for the larger authorities to test what is going on right down on the ground.
Parish and town councils are often the most immediate and accessible tier of democratic representation. They are closest to the lived experience of local people, they understand local priorities and they are often best placed to translate national policy ambitions into practical, locally sensitive action. I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, will think that that is a good thing for them to do.
Building on that point, I would be grateful if the Minister would therefore clarify how the Government see the roles of parish and town councils evolving within the wider framework of neighbourhood governance in this Bill. It is interesting that the Minister’s responses so far have been far from encouraging to town and parish councils. Why not encourage new unitary authorities to look at setting up more town and parish councils in their areas? That could go into a change to Clause 60.
In particular, can the Minister say how the Government intend to ensure that town and parish councils are meaningfully involved in the decision-making that affects their communities? That happens now, but will it continue to happen? Finally, can she confirm how the Government will ensure that any move towards greater neighbourhood governance will be underpinned by clear lines of democratic accountability, so that locally elected parish councils are empowered to deliver more as we, hopefully, get more of them and they are embedded?
Throughout our consideration of this Bill, we have spoken at length about the importance of parish councils in general terms. In the specific context of Clause 60, that importance becomes even more pronounced. If neighbourhood governance is to be effective, it cannot be imposed from above. It has to grow from what we have already in large parts of this country, which could be created elsewhere.
We are therefore clear in our commitment to continuing the central role of town and parish councils in providing effective neighbourhood governance. That brings continuity, it brings local trust and it brings democratic legitimacy. Town and parish councils provide an institutional memory and a community connection that, as we have heard from other noble Lords, transient structures simply cannot replicate without democracy.
In closing, while we must ensure that the framework set out in Clause 60 retains sufficient flexibility to reflect the diversity of local circumstances, that flexibility should not come at the expense of democratic clarity and local voice. The amendments in this group speak to that balance, we believe. They remind us that effective neighbourhood governance is about trust in local institutions, trust in elected representatives and trust in communities themselves; it does not come top-down from government.
Lord Fuller (Con)
I would like to make a point before my noble friend sits down. In her opening remarks, she spoke about the experience that she has had in local government. She talked powerfully about the important role that parish councils and the like can play, and I agree, but I had expected her to say what success does not look like. I have been on the receiving end of self-appointed pressure groups with an axe to grind and of transient social media campaigns. If we are not careful, an aggressive reading of Clause 60 could see us sleepwalk into legitimising transient organisations with crony co-option. We have all seen what that looks like. This is what we have to be careful about. I know that my noble friend has had experience of that to her cost. It is important that, going forward, we safeguard against the mistake being made again.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
In any local democracy, you will get that happening. That is right: people should get together to lobby, to make sure that their local representatives understand what they want and what they do not want. However, when you have town and parish councils, they have the legitimacy because they have been through the electorate. Also, if what they are saying is not what the local community want to hear, the electorate can get rid of them at the ballot box.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Bassam, the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Lansley, the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, for their amendments on neighbourhood governance.
Before I speak to the amendments, let me say that I was very sorry to hear that the noble Earl has given notice of his intention to retire from the House at the end of March. I hope to have an opportunity to thank him more formally, but I thank him now for his huge contributions to all four of the Bills in which I have been closely involved in your Lordships’ House; he has made a significant contribution, and I just want to use this opportunity to say that.
Before I respond to the individual amendments, I reiterate that the Government strongly value the role of town and parish councils in driving forward the priorities of their communities and delivering effective local services. They are close to the communities they serve, know their communities’ needs, can champion the priorities of local people and can design the right services that work for their places. Interestingly, when we were discussing the SI on the new authorities in Cumbria and Cheshire yesterday, it was interesting to see that, in Cumbria—forgive me if I am quoting this figure wrong, as it is from memory—there are 296 parish councils. I know that it is quite a rural area, but I thought that a significant number; I believe that there were also more than 100 of them in Cheshire.
The Earl of Lytton (CB)
I thank the Minister for her kind remarks about me. It has been a pleasure to work with her and with predecessor Ministers from her department and their various Bill teams over a very large number of years. This is not the time for me to make a valedictory speech, or anything even approaching it, or for me otherwise to bore the Grand Committee. However, depending on the scheduling of the Bill’s next stages—and because I do not disappear until the end of March—there may be a bit of wiggle room for me to come back and have another go at some of these amendments.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
I am very pleased to hear that. The noble Lord, Lord Wallace, asked me earlier whether the Bill will go to Report, and I confirm that is the case. I hope that the noble Earl will still be here to participate on Report, and we look forward to his contributions. He has a great deal of knowledge and experience of the property sector and many other areas related to all of the issues we have debated on this and other Bills. I particularly valued his expertise on property safety and his knowledge of construction when debated the Planning and Infrastructure Bill. I am very grateful to him.
Lord Lucas (Con)
My Lords, I entirely agree with that. Do the Minister and the noble Earl realise that the last place in the UK named Lytton—spelled with a “y”—is in Stevenage?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
It is actually in Knebworth, north Hertfordshire, but I take the noble Lord’s point.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, my unease has not been lessened by the Minister’s answers, and I suspect that others will feel the same way.
The Minister says that they do not want to impose a single model. I thought that this Bill was about imposing a single model on the governance of England. It was certainly made clear by the Conservative Government —let us accept that this is a Conservative model that which the Labour Government are introducing—that, unless east Yorkshire and North Yorkshire accepted the mayoral model, they would not get the deal for which they were asking. There is a large question there.
When I heard the Minister say that the role that town and parish councils play in neighbourhood governance is recognised, I want to know who else is playing a role and how important the town and parish councils’ role might be. Will it be marginal or major? We do not know what the other bits of neighbourhood governance are intended to do. I am happy to hear that the Government want town and parish councils to continue to play an important and valuable role, but I think more of us want to ensure that they play a significant and leading role in local democracy. At the moment, Clause 60 does not provide us with that reassurance. For the time being, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment, but this is something to which we will want to come back if and when we manage to reach Report.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, I will speak to the notice that Clause 61 and Schedule 28 do not stand part of the Bill. These remove the changes being made to some local election voting systems. I will also speak to my Amendment 216, which seeks to limit the Government’s power to delay local elections.
Clause 61 states that Schedule 28 makes provision for the use of the supplementary vote system in elections of mayors and police and crime commissioners. When choosing our leaders, it is important that our voting systems are easy to understand and trusted. First past the post is exactly that. It is simple, it is familiar and it gives everyone confidence that the person with the most votes wins, straightforwardly and transparently.
Lord Pack (LD)
My Lords, I will speak particularly to Amendments 211 and 212 in this group, which are in my name and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock.
On the return to this vexed question of election postponements and cancellations, as we have covered that several times already on various previous occasions—I am sure we will again in future—I will take a slightly different tack this time and focus partly on the future. I also hope, perhaps overoptimistically, that the Minister feels that these amendments are actually helpful.
Thinking about the future first, there are very clear, sad and worrying lessons from countries all around the world about how quickly democracies can become fragmented and undermined. The responsible reaction we all should have to that is to be determined to embed democratic norms as deeply and firmly as we can. That does not guarantee their future protection but it will certainly make life more likely to be successful, whether for our future selves or our successors, if we have to defend democracy. I hope we all agree on the clear principle of embedding the idea that democracy should not just be an easy thing to postpone or cancel.
However, at the moment, unfortunately, it is just a little bit too easy for elections to be postponed or cancelled. The two amendments in my name set out a very clear route, as indeed do other amendments in this group, by which we could more firmly protect our democracy against future strains.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, rightly pointed out, there are several different approaches that one could potentially take to this. I certainly acknowledge the merit of the approach taken in some of the other amendments regarding both ensuring that the 2007 and 2011 Acts referred to in them are properly catered for and, indeed, the interesting idea of the one-year limit that is present in one of those amendments.
My concern, though, with those alternative approaches —I will certainly listen carefully and with interest to noble Lords who contribute to the rest of this debate—is that those alternative approaches rest, in the end, on the willingness of Parliament to vote down secondary legislation. In the end, that is the prime safeguard in them. It is obviously a matter for another day or occasion to debate the merits of the deeply held, principled position that I know many in both the Labour and Conservative groups here take—I do not share it but I appreciate it—that the main opposition party in the House of Lords should not vote for a fatal amendment to a statutory instrument.
The problem is, whatever one thinks are the rights or wrongs of that principle, that that essentially means that any safeguard that is based on the idea that the Government have to put a statutory instrument or secondary legislation in some form to Parliament is of very little use. In the end, when push comes to shove, whatever the principal opposition party is in the Lords, it will say, “As a matter of principle, we aren’t going to vote it down”. It is a safeguard that, when needed, will not keep us very safe.
I said that I was going to be optimistic and try to persuade the Minister that these amendments are a helpful measure. I say that because I am absolutely sure that, in good faith, the Government never set out to say that some councillors who are elected for a four-year term of office should stay in office—as it will turn out under their plans—for seven years. I am sure that was not the original intention, but it is unfortunately the position that we have stumbled into through a sequence of events. That is a very significant and, outside of wartime, unprecedented extension to the term of office of councillors. We have ended up in this unprecedented and frankly unsatisfactory position because some of those councillors who have had their four-year term extended to seven years are in power, running councils, and they are being given three extra years in power without the public getting a say on that.
As I said, I appreciate that that is the result of a sequence of circumstances, and in that sense it seems that the Government have stumbled into a series of events. Whether through the mechanisms set out by the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, or through mine, the advantage of making it a little harder for the Government to cancel elections in the future is that it would protect Governments from stumbling into a similar sequence of events again. So I hope we will hear some movement from the Minister in due course on this issue.
But of course, like any good Liberal Democrat, I cannot resist the opportunity to talk a little about the merits of different voting systems, so I will refer briefly to Amendment 213, although the ticking clock protects noble Lords from a William Gladstone-type speech about the relative merits of different voting systems, tempting though that may be. Although it is obviously no surprise, I am sure, for the Minister to hear me say that I certainly prefer the supplementary vote to first past the post, it is a real shame that the Government do not intend at the moment to go a step further and introduce the alternative vote. The big weakness of the supplementary vote is that you have to correctly second-guess the two parties that will be in the final round so that you can cast your second preference vote in a way that will be counted.
I will briefly make reference to the research by the Make Votes Matter coalition that was carried out a couple of years ago and which encompassed 217 different elections conducted by the supplementary vote in the UK. It found that only 46% of the second preferences that people expressed actually ended up being counted in the final run-off round. Over half of all second preferences correctly filled in on the ballot paper none the less got discarded because they were for candidates who did not make it into the second round. That is quite a flaw in the supplementary vote. It is a system essentially designed for a world in which it is pretty clear who the two main parties, or the two main candidates, in an election will be. However good or bad it may be, we are certainly not in a situation where that is the norm in our politics any more, so I very much hope the Minister will consider the merits of the alternative vote.
On Amendment 214, I simply observe that, in Scotland, the single transferable vote is used for council elections and is pretty popular with not only many members of the Labour Party but indeed many members of the Conservative Party there. If it works well in Scotland, as it does, perhaps we should be able to have it in England as well.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, I will not talk about different voting systems; I cannot think of anything more boring—I am so sorry. Actually, lots of things are more boring. I could not agree less with the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, about the value of first past the post. It is a thoroughly discredited system and its time is over. What we see again and again is that we have a completely unrepresentative Government, as we do at the moment: they have a huge majority on a small proportion of the vote, and the Conservatives should be thinking more about how they can get back into power—obviously, I do not particularly want that.
Under first past the post, councillors elected often bear little resemblance to how people actually vote. Large numbers of residents can turn out, cast their ballots in good faith and still see their views go completely unrepresented. That leaves too many people feeling that local government is something done to them rather them with them, and proportional representation offers a way out of that. My noble friend Lady Bennett of Manor Castle’s Amendment 215, and Amendment 214 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, would allow a shift towards a voting system that would reflect the diversity of political opinion in our communities and reward candidates who can build broad support, rather than those who simply scrape through on a minority of the vote. It would open the door to councils that would look more like the places they serve, politically and socially, and that really matters, especially at a time when councils are becoming larger, more remote and more powerful.
As the noble Lord said earlier, in Scotland local government elections have used the single transferable vote for nearly two decades. In Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, STV is well understood and widely trusted. In Wales, councils are now able to choose it for themselves. Of course, we have proportional representation in London for the London Assembly.
I have been elected under PR and under first past the post. Quite honestly, it did not feel very different, but a completely different view could be spoken and presented much more forcefully when we had more people elected under proportional representation. Voters in those countries manage perfectly well with a system that allows them to rank candidates in order of preference. The result is representation built on consent and co-operation rather than tribalism. This will be much more important as we move towards much larger councils and combined authorities. If power is to be devolved upwards, representation must be strengthened downwards.
Lord Fuller (Con)
My Lords, I will speak to my Amendments 216A, 216B and 216C. I also associate myself with most of the other amendments, certainly the ones in the names of my noble friends. The noble Lord, Lord Pack, in Amendments 211 and 212 proposes a sort of ban. I do not agree with this, but we do need to allow for emergencies, so I agree with the thrust of what he is trying to say.
I agree with my noble friends about the importance of not cancelling elections for LGR, but this does not take into account the funny business around cancelling mayoral or PCC elections or council polls when LGR is not the reason. My amendments are therefore drawn more widely than those of my noble friends Lady Scott and Lord Jamieson.
There has not been a revolution here for about 350 years. Your Lordships might say that this is because the British are a placid race, but they can easily be stirred. The reason the rule of law has been sustained for so long is that we are a democratic country. We sit in this House, in a building that is the cradle of democracy and mother of Parliaments. The people of this nation go to the ballot box to select those who are to represent them in pursuance of a stronger economy, better lives, robust defence and all those other things that the state provides. That consent lasts until the next election, at which point those elected are either replaced or re-elected.
I know that this is obvious, but it needs to be said because the Government have forgotten it. The democratic principle is the cornerstone of our society and our civility. It safeguards the boundaries between the state and the individual. It takes something pretty important to disturb that delicate equilibrium, such as national emergencies. The foot and mouth epidemic and Covid were two cases in point, when elections were delayed for proper purposes.
But this time last year, elections were cancelled. Last March, we had a debate and the Minister made it quite clear that the 12-month cancellation was strictly a one-off. Back then, LGR was nothing more than an outside possibility. No detailed plans had been submitted, there had been no consultation and it was not clear what type of reconfiguration might be proposed. Surrey thought it was getting a mayor until it was not, and London was most definitely in until it was not. It was all just nods and winks. Local government reorganisation was no more certain then than saying now that the Prime Minister will be in place until the next elections—which would have been in May, until they were cancelled.
I am not saying that the Minister misled the House last March, but events have shown that she did not have the authority to give the reassurances that she did. She certainly did not advance the ridiculous notion that decisions to cancel elections should be made by those who are already elected and have the most to lose. Had she explained that process back in March, she would have been laughed out of the Chamber, but that is her Government’s position today.
I have been a councillor for many years. I can tell noble Lords that you do not go into local government for the money but, once you are in, the money can be pretty handy, so asking those people whether they ought to stay on is both a conflict of interest and a moral hazard. Part of the justification for the delay was that economic growth was the number one priority. Mayors were to be the conduit through which growth would be delivered. Those elections have been delayed by two years, which says all you need to know about the commitment to growth. The mayoral angle is why I prefer my amendments over those of my colleagues, because I have amendments that would not just go for local elections but mayoral and PCC elections.
I am sure that the Minister will want to say that three elections were cancelled in Yorkshire, Somerset and Cumbria in 2021, and therefore there is precedent, but I do not accept that for a moment. The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, will be reassured that I argued forcefully with the Minister that, in the case of Yorkshire, putting Skipton, Selby and Scarborough in the same so-called local authority was crazy. But at least, by that moment, although I disagreed with the outcome, orders had been laid and proposals had been made and consulted on. There was certainty about the creation of local government reorganisation when the elections were cancelled—and, in any event, it was only a single year’s delay. None of that relates to today’s situation. It is dishonest to draw some equivalence between the circumstances in 2021 and those of today. That is why the law needs to be changed to stop the abuse.
Those who want to dodge democracy have advanced quite a few bogus reasons. The county councils talk about capacity issues, forgetting that it is the district councils that run the elections in the shires. They said that it was all rather expensive—but democracy has its price, and the money has already been salted away, accrued and set aside. So that argument holds no water. I have heard it said that staff are busy with other things, but running elections is a specialist task and the electoral registration officers tend to focus on that alone. They are not the people who are engaged in LGR and consultation on the big strategic matters with other authorities, including matters such as disposal of assets. All these arguments are bogus when measured against the fact that free and fair elections should be operated separately from those standing in them, which is one of the fundamental separations of duties and one for which the Electoral Commission, among other bodies, was established.
In an earlier group we discussed local government reorganisation. One problem is that the public have not been offered a chance to express an opinion on LGR, just in case the electors do not share the same view. My noble friend Lord Pickles told me in 2008, “If you don’t trust the folks, don’t go into politics”. He was right, but that does not suit a Government with a tin ear for democracy and the value of civic history. Democracy is being denied in councils; it has already been denied in the mayoral elections. While the Government are signalling that the police and crime commissioners are on their way out into the sunset, my amendments would at least require that the strongest possible relationship between the state and individual is not to result in a reckoning, because society has been abused by these proposals.
My proposal is that only the super-affirmative process can be used when you might want to cancel elections. I cannot think of reasons why you might want to do that in future but, if it was so, this would ensure that there was a two-step process whereby permission must first be sought to enter secondary legislation and then only by the affirmative method would it be separately approved by resolutions laid before both Houses. In any event, any resolution to cancel an election should be made no less than three months before the date of publication of the election, because it is important for parties and individuals to have enough time to prepare a manifesto, select candidates, raise funds and address all the practical matters that need to be taken care of. My amendments would ensure that the preparation could take place effectively, allowing voters to mark their choices clearly on the ballot.
It is not just that it is the right thing; it is wrong that confidence in elections has been undermined. That infects, contaminates and taints democratic structures and processes. Democracy is the underpinning of our society, the stability of our nation and the integrity of all we hold dear. Here is the paradox: this evening, in this Room, the unelected Chamber is standing up for the elected rights of the population. I am not going to go on about Schedule 28 and the funny business against first past the post, but by this debate, noble Lords are being seen to be on the side of the people. Those who would reform your Lordships’ House can see what a slippery slope would happen if we are shoved out of the way: more cancellation of elections. What an irony that would be. The law should be changed so that elections cannot be cancelled for ministerial convenience, except in the most extreme and robust cases of national emergency, such as Covid or foot and mouth, but not local government reorganisation.
Lord Lucas (Con)
My Lords, Amendment 216D seeks to deal with a consequence of the correct and necessary but sad development that councillors and those standing for council seats and in other elections are allowed to hide where they live. It has become necessary. I am sad about it, but it has meant that in these elections it is extraordinarily difficult for an elector to contact people who are standing for election. There is no way of getting messages to them if they are not part of a mainstream party. Even where they are from a mainstream party, you send the message in and it sticks with that party’s central office and does not get out to the candidate because the candidate is allowed to have only the authorised views of the party. I would like to restore that connection between voters and candidates by making sure that there is a way in which voters can contact candidates and hopefully receive replies from them.
Baroness O’Neill of Bexley (Con)
My Lords, I rise in support of Amendment 216D tabled my noble friend Lord Lucas about candidates’ addresses. Over my 28 years as a councillor, I have been proud to have my address on the ballot paper, not least because for the majority of that time I either lived in my own ward or it was at the end of my road. People could know that I have not got daffodils—I certainly have not got green fingers—but people had no problem in speaking to me or knocking on my door.
I always thought it was a good thing to have your address published, but over that period of 28 years, technology, the internet and keyboard warriors have changed my view. Like many others, I have had death threats. To a certain extent, you take that on the chin and you say that it is part of the job. The absolute worst situation I got in was when one of these idiots decided to say they were going to firebomb my home. I have three little girls living next door to me. The hardest thing I ever had to do was speak to their parents and say not that I felt threatened but “watch out”. Three little lives were potentially at risk because of one of these idiot keyboard warriors.
Frankly, that is why people are considering whether they want to stand for election, and I believe that is one of the reasons why people do not want their address on the ballot paper. That means you move to the situation about how people can contact you. We know that the electoral returning officer has to have an address to show that there is a proper qualification. You also have to have an agent who has an address, so is there an opportunity for that address to be used by the returning officer to take away the need for a person’s personal address to be given at any time in future? There are some parties that do not believe in imprints, but most of us do. There are addresses there, so there is an opportunity for contact, but I support the amendment.
Lord Hayward (Con)
My Lords, I apologise for not participating at Second Reading and speaking on this occasion, but the circumstances between Second Reading and now have changed very substantially. I intend to concentrate on the amendments relating to delayed elections.
Before I do so, may I make an observation? I shall go no further at this stage than making it clear to the noble Lord, Lord Pack, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and others that I do not support their proposals in relation to changing the voting systems. Although I know that they pursue this matter on a point of principle, I warn them that, under the current political circumstances, trying to change the electoral systems will be portrayed by one political party in particular as denying it the opportunity to be represented on councils. I make that observation in passing.
Like the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, I support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, in principle. I have tried to make contact with the Association of Electoral Administrators to establish its view on this but, unfortunately, its excellent chief executive, Peter Stanyon, who is normally enormously helpful on such matters, is currently off in ill health. So I could not get any clarification, but I am sure that, in broad principle, it would want to follow what this amendment is pursuing.
I turn now to the nub of this whole issue, which is the delay in elections. I first spoke on electoral matters in the other House in 1984. I voted against the then Conservative Government on a three-line Whip—I was one of the first new boys to do so—because I believed that the Government were, in the process of abolishing the GLC via the paving Bill, interfering with democracy. Looking back on that proposed Bill, I still take that view and am pleased that I voted against the Government on that occasion. It is interesting that the Government dropped the specific proposal against which I voted after the House of Lords passed its opposition to that same clause by a majority.
Since that time, I have never given consideration to the possibility of deferring elections for up to seven years. If somebody had suggested to me that that was going to happen in this democratic country, I would have said that they were positively insane. The history of the last few weeks has really called into question my faith in the legislation that we have on our democratic process. On 18 November, the Minister’s response to me and others was that the intention of the Government was to hold the elections as identified in full. We received the same response on 8 December.
On 18 December, the day we went into recess, the Government issued a letter to 63 councils asking whether they wished to defer the elections. Please do not tell me, or other Members of this House or the other, that no consideration was given on 18 November or during the five weeks that followed—or even on the night of 17 December—to the fact that there might be delays in elections, because nobody will believe you, I am afraid. It is a question of competence and honesty in relation to the processes. I have come to the conclusion that, sadly, we are witnessing a serious erosion of our democratic principles in this country by silence at different stages.
I do not mind which amendment we adopt, in what form, but we have to ensure that, as a democratic country, which I believe the United Kingdom to be, we are never again in the position where a Government announce their actions in the way that they have, with the result—as the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, and others have said—that people who have a vested interest in not facing re-election are taking the decisions on those elections. I despair of what I have witnessed over the last few weeks. I ask the Government to be more honest and open throughout, because it is not acceptable that I find myself, for the first time in 40 years of reviewing elections, seriously questioning whether a Government can interfere with elections when they really should not.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, I will speak a little about the proposals to change to a supplementary vote. I have some memories of how this came to be, since I was involved between 1996 and 1998 in some of the discussions between the Liberal Democrats and the then Labour Government about voting systems. The Labour Cabinet was divided on the subject; Jack Straw was one of the strongest opponents of any change in the electoral system and the most he was prepared to accept was the sort of bastard form of half way towards an alternative vote, which is the supplementary vote. It is neither one thing nor the other.
Now that we are in a multiparty system, we have to face up to the implications of where we are. For most of the last year, we have had five parties in England getting between 10% and 30% of the vote and no party getting over 30% of the vote. The elected Mayor of the West of England received 25% of the vote to become mayor. I think the record for the lowest percentage of the vote won by a winning candidate happened in a Cornish local by-election, in which the Liberal candidate was victorious with 19.5% of the vote in a six-party contest.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
We need to recognise where we are. If we want mayors to have public acceptance and credibility, they had better not be elected on less than a quarter of the vote. If we have a five-party system, the opinion polls—my nerdy noble friend here does his best to educate me about public opinion polls and I therefore follow them in some detail—show that if you look at second preferences for Reform, Conservative or Liberal Democrat voters, they are very diverse, and one cannot guarantee that votes will easily transfer from one party to another definite party. Jack Straw was prepared to accept the supplementary vote in the belief that, in London elections, the Liberal Democrats were more likely on the whole to vote Labour as their second preference than the Conservatives, and therefore it was acceptable. The supplementary vote is half way to where we need to go but it is neither one nor the other.
I simply say to the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, that the old argument that the English people would not understand something more complicated than first past the post is for the past. The Irish understand a more complicated voting system very well, as do the Scots. The idea that the English education system is so poor that our voters will not understand simply does not begin to stand up.
If mayors are going to be key elements in devolution, we need to face up to a system that will provide us with the assurance that mayors will be elected in such a way as to gain the acceptance and credibility they need to have their posts. The current first past the post system does not guarantee that nor does the supplementary vote system. The Government need to recognise that that is where we are.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I will begin by addressing the amendments in this group concerning voting systems.
The noble Baroness, Lady Scott, opposes Clause 61 and Schedule 28 standing part of the Bill. These provisions will reinstate the supplementary vote system for the elections of mayors and police and crime commissioners. This was the voting system in place when these roles were first introduced. The Government recognise that the voting system used to elect our representatives sits at the heart of our democracy and is of fundamental importance, which has been reflected in today’s debates.
Given the large population that each regional mayor represents—far exceeding that of Members of Parliament —and that they act individually rather than collectively as part of a council or parliament, the Government believe that mayors should have a broad base of support among their electors. We believe that the supplementary vote system, which is a preferential voting system, will achieve this and is appropriate for electing candidates to single-person executive positions, such as mayors. The supplementary vote helps to increase the local electorate’s voice, as voters may choose a first and second choice candidate. It requires the winning candidate to receive the majority of votes counted, which ensures a broader mandate from the people they are representing.
Currently, mayors are elected using the first past the post system. We recognise that that system, while not perfect, has its merits: it is a well-understood system that provides a direct relationship between a Member of Parliament or a councillor and the local constituency or ward. Therefore, we believe that first past the post is appropriate for elections where there are a number of seats to be filled, such as in councils and parliaments, as the likelihood is that candidates representing a range of views and parties will be elected. However, this clearly does not apply when electing someone to a single-person executive position, as is the case for mayors and police and crime commissioners. Therefore, we believe that the supplementary vote is the right system for electing mayors, which is why the Bill reverts the voting system back to the supplementary vote.
Amendment 213, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, and spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Pack, seeks to introduce the alternative vote system for the election of mayors. While I agree that mayors should be elected using a preferential voting system, the Government believe that the supplementary vote system is the right preferential voting system for electing mayors. The supplementary vote was the voting system implemented on the introduction of mayoral and police and crime commissioner elections, which was in place until 2022, when the voting system changed to first past the post. We are reinstating the voting system that was originally used for these elections, which will be familiar to many voters. I note that, when the public were asked for their view on the alternative vote system, albeit in relation to UK parliamentary elections, they did not support the move to the alternative vote system. In the referendum held in 2011, 67.9% of voters rejected this proposal. The alternative vote system is not in use in any polls in the UK.
Amendments 214 and 215, tabled by the noble Baronesses, Lady Pinnock and Lady Bennett, would allow for the introduction of a proportional representation voting system for local authority elections. The Government have no plans to change the electoral system for local council elections in England. As I have already laid out, the first past the post system is a clear way of electing representatives to a council and provides for a direct relationship between a councillor and their ward. Therefore, for local council elections, the Government believe that first past the post remains the most appropriate system.
I turn now to the amendments that concern the timings of elections. We will of course have a debate on this on 23 February, the first day back after the Recess—I hope we all come back refreshed. Before I speak to the specific amendments, I remind your Lordships that the Government have embarked on the most significant programme of council reorganisation in England in 50 years. We are determined to streamline local government for the remaining one-third of people who still live under the two-tier system. It is in this unprecedented context that the decisions to postpone certain council elections for one year have been taken.
Our view is that it is time for bold action on both local government reorganisation and devolution, but we recognise that reorganisation is resource intensive at all levels, political and administrative, within a council. We have listened to those councils that have told us that postponing their elections this May will release vital capacity to deliver reorganisation effectively. It will also avoid the cost and distraction of elections to councils which are likely to be abolished shortly.
I reiterate that the Government’s position is that elections should go ahead unless there is strong justification otherwise. To respond to the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, that is the sentence I have always used when I have talked about elections. The Secretary of State recently announced that the high bar we set for taking a decision to postpone has been reached in a number of councils. The legislation to implement these decisions was laid in Parliament on 5 February.
Lord Hayward (Con)
Between 8 and 18 December, was there no consideration whatever of the possibility of delaying the elections? If that is the case, what changed between 8 and 18 December that resulted in the letters going to the 63 councils?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
I have already outlined to the noble Lord that the sentence I used, whenever we discussed this and whenever I was asked, was that elections would not be cancelled unless there were substantial reasons for doing so. Local authorities made those representations, which is why the decision was taken.
Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)
My Lords, when we ask these questions, the Minister always talks about the complexity of these changes, but what I do not quite understand is that, in 2009, the then Labour Government changed nine groups of authorities to unitaries without any of this sudden change to local elections. Only six are affected now, and the last lot will be 14, so I do not know why this reorganisation is causing complexity that others, done by a Labour Government, did not in the past.
I will address the contributions on my Amendment 216 and the related Amendments 211 and 212 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Pack. I thank noble Lords for their contributions, particularly my noble friend Lord Hayward, who gave a strong explanation of why some amendments to the rules affecting local elections are so urgently required. There is clearly deep unease across the House—not just in this Committee—about the length and frequency of election delays arising from the Government’s local authority restructuring. The Government have set out their reasons for resisting this amendment, but my underlying concerns remain. Prolonged postponement of local elections, for any reason short of genuine emergency, risks weakening democracy and the bond between our local councillors and the communities they serve.
My amendment does not seek to obstruct reorganisation or to prevent the short practical delays that can sometimes be necessary; it proposes only a clear and reasonable boundary. Democratic mandates should not be extended for more than one year as a consequence of changes under this Bill. That reflects long-standing practice, the guidance of the Electoral Commission and the public’s expectation that those in elected office are answerable to the electorate at regular intervals.
As I have said, I have some concerns about the drafting of the related Amendments 211 and 212 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Pack, not least because they cover only the 2000 Act, not the 2007 Act. However, I hope we might be able to get together and work constructively on this shared interest before Report. Whatever view one takes on the amendments themselves, I hope the Government will reflect seriously and carefully on the strength of feeling expressed today. We should protect the integrity and predictability of our local democratic processes with great care.
On a similar note, I listened with interest to the suggestions made by my noble friend Lord Fuller on his Amendments 216A, 216B and 216C, which seek to deliver full parliamentary scrutiny of proposals to cancel local, mayoral, and police and crime commissioner elections. Any electoral change has significant practical consequences for voters, candidates, authorities and political parties. Although my amendment would go further, it makes sense that any change still occurring should be subject to full parliamentary scrutiny. Proper consideration should provide transparency, accountability and a clear timetable, allowing everyone involved in the electoral process to plan with certainty. That would certainly be better than the mess we face now.
I now turn to the amendments addressing changes to our voting systems. I thank noble Lords who spoke in support of Clause 61 and Schedule 28 not standing part of the Bill. I have nothing to add to my opening remarks, which covered the reasons that I disagree with Amendments 213 and 214, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, and Amendment 215, which propose the introduction of AV or PR voting systems. I will not repeat those arguments.
Last but not least, I will speak to Amendment 216D in the name of my noble friend Lord Lucas. Making sure that our local elections and their candidates more transparent and accessible to voters—by ensuring that every candidate provides a clear, convenient and free way for electors to contact them—can only be a good thing for democracy. As things currently work, it can often be quite difficult for residents to ask their local candidates questions or seek clarification on their views before casting their votes. By requiring returning officers to publish contact details, and by ensuring that candidates are given a designated address for correspondence, communications between candidates and the communities they hope to represent could be strengthened and facilitated. At the same time, candidates can be protected from some of the terrible things that we heard about from my noble friend Lady O’Neill. I am sure that we will return to this on Report.
“Local authorities: meetings(1) The Secretary of State may by regulations establish arrangements where, in circumstances specified in those regulations, a meeting of a local authority is not limited to a meeting of persons who are all present in the same place.(2) Circumstances specified may include circumstances affecting—(a) individual councillors, such as illness or disability, or(b) a council as a whole, such as adverse weather or flooding.(3) Regulations under this section are subject to affirmative resolution procedure.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to ensure that local authorities can hold council meetings online, for example if travelling to the council chamber was made difficult by heavy snowfall or flooding.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I shall speak to Amendment 218. I look forward to hearing the noble Lord, Lord Pack, and others speaking to Amendments 219 and 220.
In responding on an earlier group, the Minister referred to the number of civil parishes in Cumbria. I would like to place on the record that, in North Yorkshire, there are 729 civil parishes, of which 662 are parish or town councils. It is probably one of the largest, if not the largest, county in the country, covering 8,037 square kilometres. That is on the North York Moors website; unfortunately, it does not give it in square miles.
Against that backdrop, I hope the Government will look favourably on a plea that local authorities should be able to meet on the same basis that we in this House meet, which is that, if you are attending a committee, you can attend remotely in hybrid form. For some reason that is beyond me, we are not extending that possibility to local authorities. Given the fact that North Yorkshire is possibly the most rural and sparsely populated county, I would like to give an example based on it. If a councillor is to attend council meetings in Northallerton, where the North Yorkshire Council—a combined authority, against my better judgment—now meets, on a good day that will take one and a half hours going one way, given that the roads are highly congested and, at this time of year, often quite dangerous with fog, snow, ice and other such challenges. On a bad day, it could take a lot longer.
Lord Pack (LD)
My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 219 and 220. As the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, has indicated, they attempt to achieve something very similar to Amendment 218 but go a bit more broadly. All three of the amendments in this group get at the idea that it is reasonable—in some carefully defined and carefully protected circumstances—for councillors to be able to participate in council business even though they are not able to be physically present.
One of the reasons for putting forward these two amendments is, frankly, a bit of embarrassment. Both Houses of Parliament, in their own way, allow some degree of remote or proxy participation. Although every noble Lord is undoubtedly very special, are noble Lords and Members of the other place really so special that, while it is okay for us to be able to do that, oh my goodness, we must not let councillors do it? Frankly, it is a little embarrassing that, although we understand that these powers need to be carefully protected and defined, we say that this is okay for ourselves, yet, so far, we do not allow councillors the same thing.
This is also a matter of pragmatism. Through the experience of the House of Lords, through the experience of the other place, through the experience of councils in lockdown and through the experience of councils in the UK but outside of England, we have a lot of accumulated knowledge and experience of how measures such as those set out in the amendments in this group work. The answer is that they have worked well. They have worked successfully. They are good ways of dealing with, for example, some of the challenges of geography and weather that the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, mentioned earlier. They are good ways of dealing with some of the challenges around increasing participation in politics and the diversity of our elected representatives.
These are not just my views. The Government helpfully carried out a thorough consultation last year, asking for views on remote attendance and proxy voting in local authorities. Just as I did in the case of my earlier amendment on cattle grids, I will quote approvingly from the Government’s words—with more success, I hope, than I had on that amendment.
In the consultation, question 2 asked:
“Do you agree with the broad principle of granting local authorities powers to allow remote attendance at formal meetings?”
A resounding 86% said “yes” in response to that. Similarly, question 8 in that consultation asked:
“Do you think legislative change to allow councillors to attend local authority meetings remotely should or should not be considered for the following reasons?”
Reason number one was:
“Councils would be more resilient in the event of local or national emergencies”;
91% agreed with that. This was another option given:
“It would likely increase the diversity of people willing and able to stand for election in their local area”;
79% of people agreed with that.
The government consultation rightly concluded that, in the Government’s own words:
“The government is of the view that in-person authority meetings remain vital for local democracy”—
I agree—
“but that hybrid and remote attendance, and proxy voting, will enable local authorities in England to develop more modern, accessible and flexible working practices”.
The Government went on to say:
“We have carefully considered arguments for and against remote attendance and proxy voting, and we plan to legislate to support permanent provision in relation to both policies, when parliamentary time allows”.
Having raised this at Second Reading and listened carefully to what the Minister said in response, the puzzle for me is that we have in front of us a piece of legislation that would enable exactly those conclusions from the Government’s consultation to be implemented. The Government say that they need parliamentary time to do this; well, the parliamentary time is immediately in front of us.
The Government like talking about how they are taking action on many issues at pace. Here is the opportunity to act at a swift pace on the results of that consultation from last year. I very much hope that, when we hear the Minister’s response, even if we do not get my most optimistic outcome—a straightforward, “We agree to these amendments”—we will at least get to unpick this mystery a little. Why, when the consultation and the Government’s own conclusions were so clearly in favour, and other arguments so clearly stack up in favour, are the Government not taking the opportunity of the Bill in front of us to proceed at pace and implement what they themselves have said they wish to do?
Lord Fuller (Con)
My Lords, like many others, I had a leading position as a councillor during Covid. The Minister and I corresponded on many calls. Remote working worked well during Covid, but there were some famous failures. Some councillors fell asleep live on YouTube—not in my council, I hasten to add. Others went to the toilet, got undressed or got out of the shower. Children bumbled in. There was that famous meeting where a woman had no authority but managed to cut the other chap out; I cannot remember her name, but we all know the one. So, yes, it can work, and there are safeguards.
I completely disagree with proxy voting, so I have no truck with Amendment 219. However, I am broadly sympathetic with Amendments 218 and 220, which are trying to ask how we can participate remotely, although I find it difficult to support them as they are currently constructed.
This is complicated. There are different types of meeting, and each has different consequences. There is the full council meeting, in which everyone gets together. It is important that everyone gets together to cast their vote as a council rather than as a set of individuals sitting at home—in their underpants, let us say. There are executive meetings and cabinet meetings. They are really important, and people want to see them; there are rights of attendance, and people will want to lobby. There are scrutiny meetings, but that is not an executive function. Then there are policy-formation committees, which are not for decision-making but are part of scrutiny. So we have the distinction between what are and are not decision-making committees. Then there are quasi-judicial meetings, such as those on planning or licensing; in-person attendance is really important for those. None of this fine-grained texture is in the amendments but, if they are to progress, it should be.
Local government is becoming more complicated. There is certainly a need to travel more, particularly in the larger authorities such as North Yorkshire. The answer to that is not to have something quite as big as North Yorkshire, but we are where we are. There are going to be more combined meetings under these combined county authorities. There are also more trading companies involved in local authorities now. They are at arm’s length from the council—they may be owned by the council but they are not of the council—and we have to take them into consideration, too. There are significantly more partnerships, some of which are joint committees of more than one council. We would have to work out, if two councils came together and one had the freedom to do online meetings and the other did not, how that would mesh in joint committees, of which we are seeing a lot more. We have development corporations as well. There is a lot of public money there, so will they be meeting in private or in public?
We have to sort out some of the ground rules. It is not quite as simple as the noble Lord, Lord Pack, and my noble friend Lady McIntosh said. I am interested in taking this forward, but it will need a lot more work before Report before any of it could really be considered a realistic proposal, rather than just a good idea for probing.
Lord Jamieson (Con)
My Lords, I have listened carefully to this debate and wish to speak briefly on this group of amendments. They address fundamental questions about how local democracy is conducted, how local councillors discharge their duties and how we maintain the integrity of local decision-making. These amendments are well intentioned—we have certainly heard about the difficulties that there can be in arriving at meetings, particularly where significant distances are involved—but I fear that they do not sit easily with the principles of genuine devolution and open, accountable, transparent government where you can see where the decision is being made.
Amendment 218 in the name of my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering and Amendment 220, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Pack, would allow for remote meetings or remote participation in meetings. A cornerstone of our democratic life is the principle that significant decisions should be taken in person and in public, where elected representatives can be directly observed, challenged and held to account, and where the debate is in the room. During the pandemic, remote arrangements became an unavoidable necessity, yet many of us witnessed—my noble friend Lord Fuller alluded to some of the issues we saw—how public engagement was diminished, the debate became thinner and the essential character of our democratic exchanges was damaged.
I do not believe that we should return to arrangements that bring back that distance, both literally and figuratively and in terms of participation, between elected representatives and the people they serve. The default expectation of democratic office ought to remain that in decision-making councillors come together, face to face, to deliberate in the public view. Any move to the contrary, even in limited circumstances, would, I fear, be a slippery slope.
Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Wilson of Sedgefield)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, and the noble Lord, Lord Pack, for their amendments relating to council meetings.
First, on Amendment 218, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, for raising this important issue, which she has rightly highlighted on numerous occasions in the House. I know that north Yorkshire, where she lives, is a large rural area, and I sympathise with her views on Sutton Bank. I live near there, just off the A19, and it is very steep; it is hard getting up there at the best of times, let alone in the middle of a snowstorm.
The Government have been clear in their ambition to reset the relationship between central and local government, building a genuine partnership that delivers better outcomes for the communities we all serve. A key part of that partnership is giving councils the tools to modernise democratic engagement and make elected roles more accessible. In-person debate and public engagement remain at the heart of local democracy, but we also recognise that circumstances can make physical attendance difficult. That is why local authorities should have a choice whether to meet in person, online, or in a hybrid format.
Local authorities vary in size, location, responsibility and make-up, and we want to ensure that they can develop appropriately responsive policies. We would therefore not want to prescribe the conditions to which this policy would apply. We reaffirm our position as set out in our consultation response last year, and I repeat it today. We remain committed to bringing forward legislation, when parliamentary time allows, to deliver this flexibility in a way that is robust, inclusive, and properly scrutinised.
Likewise, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Pack, for his amendment on the issue of allowing councillors to participate in local authority meetings remotely. Noble Lords may be aware of the High Court judgment in 2021 that confirmed that local authority meetings, to which that case applies, must be in person and take place at a single, specified geographical location. This amendment would allow for councillors to join a meeting virtually, by video call for example, but only if the meeting was still happening in a physical room. It would not allow meetings to be completely remote. As I set out on the previous amendment, we are committed to giving local authorities the choice about how they hold their meetings. We would therefore not want to restrict any changes to just enabling hybrid meetings. Again, we remain committed to bringing forward legislation, when parliamentary time allows, to deliver this important flexibility for local authorities. While I am grateful to the noble Lord for the open and flexible way in which he has drafted his amendment, I must ask him to withdraw it at this time.
I turn now to the other amendment in this group in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Pack, which would give the Secretary of State a power to allow members to vote by proxy at local authority meetings. In person debate and public participation remain fundamental to local democracy. However, we recognise that personal circumstances can, at times, make physical attendance difficult and create challenges for the continuity of local authority business. That is why we sought views through public consultation and, in response, confirmed our intention to plan to legislate in order to introduce arrangements that would enable proxy voting at local authority meetings. Such arrangements would support more diverse and inclusive local government while preserving the certainty and flexibility that local authorities need to set proxy voting arrangements which reflect local circumstances.
In the meantime, therefore, and where appropriate, substitute or pairing arrangements remain available. These arrangements continue to offer support to councillors during periods of absence while ensuring that the electorate are represented. Any arrangements to enable proxy voting at local authority meetings must strike a careful balance between maintaining transparency and accountability and modernising arrangements to support more diverse and inclusive local democracy. The noble Lord’s proposal for wide ranging central government powers to mandate and adjust proxy voting arrangements would mean Whitehall deciding operational details that are best decided at a local level. We have no desire to micromanage local authorities, as that would run counter to our approach to devolution.
For these reasons, I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to everyone who has spoken in this short debate. I do not know which slippery slope my noble friend Lord Jamieson was referring to, but he did not address the issue raised by me and the noble Lord, Lord Pack. If it is good enough for committees in both Houses that we meet in hybrid form, I fail to see why we cannot extend the same courtesy to local authority meetings in certain circumstances.
I am going to make a suggestion to the Minister that may not curry much favour in this Committee. If his Government were minded to delay the King’s Speech, there would be legislative time available, and the Government could then bring forward the proposals. If I have understood him correctly as saying that he is in favour of local councils having the opportunity to meet online in a hybrid format as well as in person, but not just now, that is extremely disappointing, obviously, given the contents and results of some of the responses to the consultation; I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Pack, for sharing them. Some 86% and 91% of respondents were in favour, which shows that they are crying out for this. My noble friend Lord Fuller argued forcefully in favour of why these amendments are needed. Councils were able to meet in hybrid form and online in certain circumstances during Covid; if it was good enough for Covid, it should be good enough for the rest of the year.
I reserve the right to return to this theme on a future occasion but, for the moment, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)
My Lords, with my other hat on, as the Whip, I just want to say that the next group is pretty long. We may not finish it by 9.15 pm so we may end up having to split the group. We may get to the single amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Banner, but I cannot guarantee that. I am in noble Lords’ hands, but we have to stop at 9.15 pm.
Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)
We are definitely finishing at that time. If we can get through this big group, we will, I hope, be able to do the eighth group, but we must finish at 9.15 pm.
Lord Lucas
“Funding for buying assets of community valueThe Secretary of State may, in conjunction with the National Lottery or otherwise, make funds available for the purchase of assets of community value.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment is proposed in order to ensure that there is a dedicated source or sources of funding, to enable this part of the Bill to function well.
Lord Lucas (Con)
My Lords, Amendment 222A just picks up the Government on the disappearance of the funds that the last Government made available to support the community right to buy. I very much hope that the Government will in time reverse that decision, because it made a huge difference to the effectiveness of this provision. It was not that the Government paid the whole of it, but it made the base from which the community could raise the money, particularly if the community was not one of the richest in the world. It was a really important initiative and an important part of what to my mind is a really important clause underpinning the relationship between the community and the space that it occupies. I very much hope that in time the Government will come back to the position as we used to have it. I have seen it do an awful lot of good.
I will also speak to Amendments 235 and 235ZA in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, because she is unable to be here. First, Amendment 235 essentially says that the planning uplift should be ignored. That is a really important part of the relationship here. If you do not ignore the value uplift that comes with hope value, you make it absolutely impossible for the community to purchase the land. A charity, beyond anything else, is not allowed to buy land above its value, and the value to the charity is the land without hope, so that closes off a substantial route for buying assets of community value.
Secondly, the hope value belongs to the community. It is not something that is generated by the owner; it is something that is generated by the community, which might wish to give at some future time permission to do something else on that land. It is not appropriate that that should be appropriated by the owner. We need the value at which these transactions are done to be the value without hope value.
Thirdly, we need to do something to make it possible to deal with sporting fields. I am sure that the noble Baroness is aware of the trials that Udney Park has dealt with over the last 10 years, with a succession of developers blocking the continued use of that space as a sporting facility and its transfer into community ownership. It would be really helpful under those circumstances if it was possible for the local authority to intervene and use its compulsory acquisition powers to ensure transfer. I beg to move.
The Earl of Clancarty (CB)
My Lords, I have a number of amendments in this group relating to assets of cultural value and I am grateful for the support of my noble friend Lord Freyberg.
Between them, the amendments do just two things. First, Amendment 233 tells us more precisely what cultural interests are by giving specific examples of assets such as music venues, theatres, rehearsal spaces and so on. I take on board the concerns that the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, expressed in the previous debate, about the use of “culture” or “cultural”, and indeed the phrase “cultural interest” could on the face of it mean a number of different things. I suggest that there are three ways of addressing this. You can strictly define the term; you can use associated words to help lock down the meaning of the term, such as in the phrase “arts, culture and heritage”; or you can give specific examples, which is what I have done here.
Baroness Freeman of Steventon (CB)
My Lords, my Amendment 225 is supported by my noble friend Lord Freyberg and many outside this Room, including the Wildlife Trusts. Similar amendments were tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, which the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, will speak to in a moment.
When the Government first talked about the community right to buy scheme, we heard of empowering communities to create new parks and green spaces by helping them purchase and restore derelict land and green space of community value. This was in line with the Government’s definition of “sustainable development”, or the so-called three pillars: the economy, society and the environment. One of those—the specific facility of the right to buy derelict land or green spaces for their environmental value—has slipped out of the wording in the Bill. In the other place, the Minister responded to queries on this by saying that
“environmental assets will be captured within assets of community value … We will set this out in guidance, as we share the determination that environmental assets are captured within the provision”.—[Official Report, Commons, 25/11/25; cols. 323-24.]
However, I do not think that is strong enough. We can see that through the way that the current right to bid, which this schedule seeks to update, has been interpreted. Looking into this—I have spent more time than I expected reading legal judgments—it seems clear that the current drafting of proposed new Section 86B, outlining what land can be determined to be of community value, is very close to the section of the Localism Act 2011 that it replaces, and hence is likely to fall into the same issues when it comes to green spaces that do not include an official community hub or organised activities. I do not think the guidance will be strong enough to overcome those issues.
I know that I do not need to use up your Lordships’ time, particularly at this time of night, by extolling the benefits of green spaces that go well beyond direct economics or narrow social value. This is not just about official sports playing fields; any field can be a place for play. Green spaces can act as important areas of flood mitigation or as filters for air, noise and water pollution. They can be harbours for wildlife that are important to people. They can be buffers and screens between one urban area and another, giving a sense of community—small patches of green that act as spaces where people can plant microforests.
Pride in place is as much about green spaces as it is about built heritage and culture. There is plenty of research showing this, as we have spoken about at length on other Bills, but it is not so easy to put the benefits of communal green spaces into an argument about economics or social value, especially given the need to demonstrate that these benefits are non-ancillary. Adding the explicit reference to environmental benefits to this Bill could allow communities to unlock everything that the Government envisage, and help communities to support the Government in achieving targets such as 30 by 30, which are currently looking very hard to get to. There are plenty of communities keen to look after a local field, river or piece of woodland—even a small strip of green or a verge—and plenty of private or philanthropic money that is available specifically for that purpose, which the country is otherwise missing out on the opportunity to use.
Of course, I recognise that the Government do not want to allow any blockers to their housebuilding plans, so there is an extra line in my amendment to exclude land that has already been earmarked for development in local plans. I can see that the exact wording of this schedule needs to be thought out very carefully to encourage what we want to encourage, and not open the door wide to use outside the envisaged scope. But I gather that what I am proposing works currently in Scotland, so I very much hope that the Minister will give a positive response to this amendment—in line with the Government’s stated determination that this schedule should encompass environmental assets—and bring forward a government amendment on Report.
Baroness Coffey (Con)
My Lords, I have tabled in this group Amendments 222D to 222F, 225A, 230A, 232A, 232B, 234ZA and 234B, and the Schedule 29 stand part notice. I do not want to say that I am against Schedule 29, but it is only by doing a stand part notice that I can get a sense from the Minister of what is really happening with that schedule.
I will start briefly with the other amendments. There is a lot of merit in them. My noble friend mentions going back to the community ownership fund in Amendment 222A. When I was an MP, I helped a community to buy the Racehorse pub in Westhall. I also facilitated or supported the purchase of somewhere called Holton Pits, which is really an environmental area that receives funding. It goes beyond the Pride in Place which is being used for certain communities around the country.
I will jump quickly to Amendment 234B, which is a bit of a cherry on the top. One of the ways to avoid taxpayers having to keep paying for this—although it is a good use of money in terms of building communities—is that one power a council has is that it can take action against the owner or landlord of particular buildings, or a land area, in order to clean them up. I am suggesting—this may go a bit too far, but it is worth considering—that the council has to inspect any asset of community value every five years and then apply a notice if it is derelict or in decline. The reason why it being in decline matters is that one of my concerns is that there is an element here of almost running down an asset of community value in some way, so that it almost starts to be rendered pretty useless or very difficult to recover, and that is not appropriate.
Let me give the example of a council that was concerned about a former theatre and sports hall. It had been closed to the community by the private owners and had become a real mess, with broken windows and so on. Initially, the council resisted designating it as an asset of community value, and then, ultimately, it was one of the ones that got demolished.
That brings me back to Amendment 222D—yes, Minister, it is back—which would remove the automatic right, or the permitted development right, for assets of community value. There is only a handful of cases where this does not apply. On Report of the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, it was very gracious of the Government to concede that this had merit and that they would consult on it. I have not seen any sign of consultation. Another reason given was that it was not usual to amend statutory instruments in primary legislation. Well, the Government are doing that regularly in their Bills, and it is happening in this Bill in Clause 45, so I will not accept that as an excuse any longer.
I want to understand what is going on with Schedule 29. It looks more or less like Section 87 of the Localism Act 2011, which is more or less being ripped out and replaced with new Section 86A. A lot of it is similar, and there are a lot of improvements. I may have misunderstood what it is trying to do when I tabled some of my amendments—I think I messed up on Amendment 222F in particular. More broadly, what is so wrong with Section 87 of the original Act that it needs almost ripping out and replacing in full?
There are a couple of things that give me a particular cause for concern, and they are addressed in my Amendments 232A and 232B. On page 297 of the Bill, subsections (4) and (5) of new Section 86B seem to give the Secretary of State powers to override, and to stop something becoming an asset of community value when a local council is determined that it should be. I am trying to understand that. That is certainly not in Section 87 of the Localism Act. There are elements that strengthen the legislation, including the provision on making the first bid, as opposed to just being ranked alongside others and having a stopgap of six months—this extends it to 12 months. But too often, well-meaning civil servants, giving advice to their Ministers, who know that they are supposed to build 1.5 million homes by the end of this Parliament, sometimes see designations as a way to block housing. It worries me that we are heading in this direction and that, despite a lot of this being good, we end up going the wrong way.
I turn now to the issues to do with sports in Amendment 234ZA. I have particularly picked on this because the original Safety of Sports Grounds Act 1975, which is referred to in the Bill, has this definition:
“‘sports ground’ means any place where sports or other competitive activities take place in the open air”—
so far, so good, but it continues—
“and where accommodation has been provided for spectators, consisting of artificial structures or of natural structures artificially modified for the purpose”.
I anticipate that a lot of this is really about local football clubs and rugby clubs that have stands or similar, as opposed to the many more sports fields around the country that do not. Communities could erect one, or the owners, under the permitted development rights, could demolish one, therefore removing it, technically, from protection under this provision, which will be for life. I am concerned that we are not covering that. I anticipate that the Minister will say, “Well, that’s provided for under the NPPF”, but I think this needs to go further.
I have also tabled Amendment 222E. If we are getting rid of the five-year limit for sports grounds, why not do it for all assets of community value? There is no point in having an arbitrary differentiation.
I have a question for the Minister. I have not been able to work out when Clause 63 and Schedule 9 will commence. It is not mentioned specifically in Clause 92, so I do not know whether it comes under subsection (1)(c) or subsection (7)—whether it will be on the day the Bill passes or whether it will be by regulations.
Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)
My Lords, what an exciting group this is. I support Amendments 223A, 224A, 226 and 228, which address a significant and surprising gap in the way that community assets are defined in law. I very much hope we can correct this before the next stage. Before I begin properly, I thank Tom Chance, chief executive of the National Community Land Trust Network, who supports this aim and has helped with this work.
At present, the legal definition of “assets of community value” recognises social interests. The Bill adds economic interests, but still leaves out environmental interests entirely. Why has that been left out? I would like to hear an answer to that question, because it is absolutely incomprehensible. Across England, communities are coming together to take ownership of land and buildings not just to save a pub or run a shop but to protect and improve green space, reduce pollution, grow food locally and make neighbourhoods healthier. Planning law, national policy and development frameworks all work on a simple, widely accepted principle that social, economic and environmental goals belong together, yet assets of community value remain stuck with a narrower definition that no longer reflects that reality.
The Government’s response so far has been to say that environmental benefits will be dealt with through statutory guidance, but guidance is not the same as law. When communities are trying to raise finance, persuade landowners or make a credible case to a local authority, being able to point to a clear statutory definition can really matter. Plus, leaving environmental interests outside the legal framework will weaken communities’ hands at precisely the moment we should be strengthening them. We know this from practice.
In Scotland, communities have successfully used a sustainable development approach to acquire land and assets by demonstrating combined social, economic and environmental benefits. A recent example is the Poets’ Neuk project in St Andrews, where the environmental case was integral to the community’s success. Without it, the project would have been far harder to justify. It is also important to be clear about what these amendments are not doing. They will not create a new or separate category of assets. They recognise that environmental outcomes are already part of what communities are trying to achieve when they take ownership, whether that is retrofitting a community centre, restoring a neglected green space or supporting community food growing in both urban and rural areas.
I should also say a word about Amendment 225, which comes from a similar place and reflects a shared concern about how environmental value is treated in the Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Freeman, presented it clearly. I am concerned that there are some practical reasons why it would not quite achieve what many communities are looking for. As it stands, it would make a change in only one part of the legislation, which would leave the overall definition of assets of community value uneven and potentially confusing in practice. I very much hope that we can work together to perhaps agree a way forward that will satisfy us both. We need councils to exercise judgment, rather than apply a blanket rule that removes local discretion and narrows opportunities.
That is why these amendments take a different route. They would, however, bring environmental interests properly into legal definition, align assets of community value with established development principles, and reflect how communities work in practice, pursuing social, economic and environmental goals together. If this Bill is truly about devolution and community power, it should trust communities with that integrated approach. These amendments would help ensure the law supports rather than constrains the positive role that communities want to play. I urge the Government to support them.
Baroness Boycott (CB)
My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 239. I support all the amendments that have just been talked about—it is vital that communities can buy land. However, I am, in a way, offering up a “get out of jail free” card to the Government with this amendment.
This time last week, we were standing here asking about allotments. I understand the Government’s and local authorities’ problems with allotments, in that once they are designated then they cannot be undone. I see that that can be problematic. In fact, in London, the only allotments that have been ripped up so far were for the Olympic park, so I know that they have a great status. However, if you go for growing spaces and meanwhile leases, all we are asking for in this amendment is that local authorities are able and willing to publish a list of the spaces available.
That is what we did when we ran the Capital Growth project in London. We achieved 200 acres of this city which are now growing vegetables, inspiring communities and holding people together. One of the many things that happened in the duration of the project was that it was used as a research base by City University to look at good routes to get the long-term unemployed back into work. It was found that community gardening hit the nail on the head in many different ways: it taught patience, because you cannot just put a seed in the ground and expect a result tomorrow; it taught how to have respect for other people; and it taught how to work in a group and in a community. Extraordinary results were found. We were praised by the police, local doctors and local communities. We set targets of 60 spaces per borough—and we made it.
It was very simple. A meanwhile lease, designed with the help of the London water board, meant that, after five years, the local authority could claim the space back if a builder wanted to put up a house. In fact, this rarely happened. What happened was that strange little corners and odd little spots, as has been seen with the Incredible Edible campaign all over Britain, suddenly became something important and respected, that put colour, life, community and cohesion back on to the world’s streets—basically, for no money, on behalf of the Government. It takes just a small effort, with an enormous return.
I have put this amendment forward so many times. It is about time for it, given the strength of all the other amendments and the strength of feeing we have heard from so many people from all around the House so many times. Why not? What has the Minister got against this?
Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)
My Lords, I support Amendment 239, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott. I will be brief, given the stage of the evening we are at. She gave me a good lead line there in talking about Incredible Edible. A friend of mine founded that movement, which does what this amendment would enable more widely—namely, help identify and release temporary land currently unwanted by local authorities to local community groups to grow their own food, with all the benefits that the noble Baroness pointed out.
The two elements of this are: first, that there needs to be a list of temporarily unused land; and, secondly, that community groups interested in growing food need to be prompted. The most important thing is that there is a simple, low-risk standard contract for a meanwhile use lease. In many cases, landowners and local authorities were nervous about the risks of taking on a temporary use lease and surrounded it with lots of complicated legal negotiation, which meant that community groups fell out of the loop. I very much support the noble Baroness in this.
Incredible edible is an incredible organisation, and it has grown to more than 100 groups across the country. This proposition would avoid it having to be argued every time by every single community group, and would produce a standard way forward that makes it much simpler. I support the noble Baroness in that.
Baroness Boycott (CB)
I just want to intervene on what the noble Baroness was saying about the importance of councils being able to take it up, by just making a quick reference to one of our most innovative gardens, which was on the new King’s Cross site. It was in skips. Every time the development there moved around, we picked up the skips and moved the garden. It can be done that simply.
Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)
I finish by saying that I also support the amendments so ably put forward by the noble Baronesses, Lady Freeman and Lady Bennett, about bringing forward the third leg of the three-legged stool that is supposed to be sustainability. It is difficult to sit on a two-legged stool; why is the environment missing when the economic and social elements are there?
Lord Freyberg (CB)
My Lords, I speak in support of all nine amendments in the name of the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, to which I have added my name. They do two things, and are both modest in scope and significant in effect.
First, Amendment 233 gives a practical definition to the phrase “cultural interests” by setting out clear and familiar examples, such as we heard, including
“music venues, recording studios, theatres, rehearsal spaces, visual artists’ studios and other creative spaces”.
As it stands, the term “cultural interests” is vague and open to interpretation, as the noble Earl said. This amendment would remove that ambiguity, provide certainty for local authorities when making listing decisions and reflect the lived reality of how culture is made and sustained at a local level.
Secondly, the remaining amendments address a question of status. At present, cultural assets sit awkwardly beneath the heading of social assets and are implicitly treated as being of lesser importance than sporting assets. Yet within the Department for Culture, Media and Sport itself, culture and sport are regarded as equal partners. The Bill as drafted sends the opposite message by inserting “cultural” alongside “economic” throughout the relevant provisions of Schedule 29. These amendments would place cultural assets on an equal footing with sporting assets, reflecting their shared significance to community life, local identity and local economies.
If we accept that principle—that assets of genuine value to communities deserve explicit recognition and protection—the same logic would extend beyond culture. That is why I support Amendment 225, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Freeman of Steventon, to which I have also added my name, and why I am sympathetic to the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, which pursue the same objective for environmental assets. These amendments would extend the community right to buy to include assets that further the environmental well-being of local communities, alongside the economic and social benefits, provided that the land is not, as we have heard, allocated for other purposes in the local development plan.
Environmental assets may not host performances or exhibitions, but they are no less vital to the identity and well-being of a place. I am thinking of the green fields that provide breathing space between developments, the woodland that offers respite from urban density, the riverside walk that connects neighbourhoods or the community orchard that brings residents together across generations. These are the lungs and ligaments of our communities. If a theatre deserves protection as a community asset, so too does the green space that gives a neighbourhood its character and its calm.
I am also sympathetic to the probing amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, which ask important questions about the robustness of the designation framework itself. Should recent use, as well as current use, be considered when determining whether an asset qualifies? Is the automatic expiry of listings after five years appropriate, or does it leave valued assets vulnerable? Should buildings designated as assets of community value be protected from permitted development and demolition? These are sensible and searching questions. If we are to take community empowerment seriously, we must ensure that the criteria for designation are broad enough to capture what communities value and that the protections, once granted, are robust enough to be meaningful. Yet even the best definitions and the strongest protections will achieve little without the means to act.
Baroness Pidgeon (LD)
My Lords, this has been a very interesting group and discussion. I will raise a couple of points. Amendment 235, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, would remove the hope value from playing fields when being sold under the community right-to-buy process, enabling community groups to buy the land without paying an inflated price—something we very much support.
I am cautiously supportive of Amendment 235ZA in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey. My slight concern is that it says that the relevant local authority “must” use its power to acquire compulsorily the relevant asset of community value. I am not sure that that would be right. The authority could be required to do so—it should be a power—but I am not sure that it “must” be forced to do so.
I wanted to put on record our thoughts on those two amendments. It has been a very interesting discussion, and I look forward to the Minister’s response.
House of Lords
Renters’ Rights Act: Implementation
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Lord Jamieson
To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure landlords, tenants and local authorities are prepared for each phase of the implementation of the Renters’ Rights Act 2025, including funding allocated; and what plans they have for communicating changes ahead of the tenancy reforms this spring.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)
My Lords, we have given the sector a clear timeline for reform in our implementation road map. Ahead of phase 1 of implementation in May, we have already published guidance for landlords and local councils, and launched our communications campaign using social and main- stream media and partners to raise awareness. We have also allocated £18.2 million in new burdens funding to local councils in 2025-26, alongside funding for the justice system and Shelter’s expert housing advice line.
Lord Jamieson (Con)
My Lords, I declare my interest as a councillor in central Bedfordshire. I thank the Minister for her response. Unfortunately, landlords are voting with their feet, exiting the market in ever higher numbers: 93,000 in 2025 and a forecast 110,000 this year, according to the Black & White Bridging report. The English Private Landlord Survey reports that 31% of landlords are looking to reduce their portfolio and 16% to exit completely. Can the Minister explain how this helps those desperately looking for a home to rent?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
We know that landlords need time ahead of the implementation to make sure they are compliant with the reforms, and that is why we have published a full package of landlord guidance on GOV.UK to support the first phase of the Renters’ Rights Act on 1 May this year, including a draft written statement of terms so landlords know what information must be included in new tenancy agreements.
We continue to work constructively with the landlord sector. Officials recently spoke to over 1,000 landlords and letting agents at a webinar organised by Rightmove and attended the National Residential Landlords Association conference to speak directly to landlords impacted by the reforms.
Lord Carter of Haslemere (CB)
My Lords, the Master of the Rolls, who oversees the efficiency of our civil justice system, recently said that the Act creates an incentive for tenants to appeal every increase in rent to the First-tier Tribunal because, even if the appeal fails, the increase in rent will not be backdated. Ministers have said that they will intervene if the tribunal becomes “overwhelmed”, but, in response to a Written Question, they said they did not hold data on the average time the tribunal takes to process rent appeal cases. So how will the Minister assess whether the tribunal has become “overwhelmed”, so as to prevent the whole system falling into chaos, with longer and longer delays in the tribunal?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
We are working very closely with the judiciary and the Ministry of Justice. We had lots of discussion about this during the passage of the Bill. We want to ensure that the First-tier Tribunal has the capacity to deal with any increase in cases as a result of the rent increase changes. In the Property Chamber, work is progressing to increase capacity, as well as reviewing resource and working practices in readiness for that increase in demand. To ensure long-term sustainability, we have concluded that there is a case for the use of an alternative body or mechanism to make initial rent determinations, and we are continuing to work with partners across government to develop a rent determination function as quickly as possible. Hopefully, that process will take some of the pressure from the First-tier Tribunal.
Lord Harper (Con)
My Lords, first of all, before I ask my question to the Minister, I congratulate the Government Chief Whip on continuing, on the excellent daily list, to refer to “His Majesty’s Government”, and on having no truck with the nonsense rebranding of “the UK Government”. Long may it continue.
I ask the Minister in His Majesty’s Government: does she think the changes in the Renters’ Rights Act are going to lead to more houses being available for rent or fewer?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
It will lead to better conditions for renters and will remove some of the barriers that stop people renting, as well as barriers that can prevent renters maintaining a tenancy. We have banned rental bidding, levelling the playing field for renters; landlords will no longer be able to encourage prospective renters to stretch themselves beyond their means; they cannot discriminate against the prospective renter because they are on benefits or have children; and rent increases will be limited to once a year at market rate, with tenants able to challenge unfair rent increases at First-tier Tribunal.
The work we have done with landlords and with tenant bodies—we have worked with both, through the whole passage of the Bill—means that we have a fair system that rewards good landlords and tenants but makes sure that bad landlords are held to account for the bad practices they have had in place.
Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)
We have plenty of time. We will hear from the Lib Dem Benches, then the Labour Benches.
Baroness Thornhill (LD)
My Lords, tenants are a group of people close to my heart. They have been promised that the Renters’ Rights Act will transform their security and will do so from 1 May this year. They will be relying on local authorities to enforce those rights. But I say to the Minister that there is still no evidence from government that local authorities have the staffing or capacity to use effectively the new powers in the Act that they gained at the back end of last year. So I ask the Minister: what confidence can the House have that on 1 May, tenants will not once again be left with protections only on paper that they cannot realistically enforce? Without that data, how do the Government know that the new burdens funding, designed to support enforcement activity, is actually sufficient?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
I was with a group of over 300 councillors at the weekend, mainly council leaders and other councillors, who were very pleased to see the Renters’ Rights Act coming into force on 1 May. The noble Baroness is quite right to say that local councils will play a crucial role in making sure that this Act actually works on the ground. To help councils build enforcement capacity, we have provided new burdens funding for 2025-26 and a further funding allocation for 2026-27, which will be confirmed early this year. We have also funded the Operation Jigsaw network to deliver bespoke training on the Act, so that councils understand their new responsibilities. Detailed guidance covering the enforcement measures, like the new investigatory powers, has already been published.
Lord Spellar (Lab)
My Lords, has it not been the case over recent years that many young couples have been outbid by private landlords for properties and therefore have been forced to rent and denied the opportunity of owner occupation? If these properties are now being put on the market and are available for couples, should we not be welcoming that, as they will then have a real chance to have a home of their own?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
We want to improve all parts of the sector and make sure that home buying is available for young people, as well as making the rental market fairer for them. I had a big round table last week with a group from across the sector —agents, conveyancers, the legal profession, financial services and developers—to see what we can do to make it both a faster and more accessible process for young people to be able to realise the dream, which many of us were able to realise, of buying their own home.
Lord Carrington (CB)
My Lords, I declare my interest in the private rented sector in Buckinghamshire and Lincolnshire.
The Minister refers to the Renters’ Rights Act as producing better conditions in the private rented sector. Surely, this very much depends on the ongoing consultation on the home energy model methodology for assessing existing dwellings and producing new energy performance certificate metrics. I gather that this will conclude at the end of March. Will the Government commit to publishing their response and detailed guidance within six months of this date, so that landlords can have the clarity and confidence to prepare and budget for the necessary improvements?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
If the noble Lord is referring to the minimum energy efficiency standards implementation, we have published our response to the consultation on those standards in the private rented sector. We have listened to the voices from across that sector. The response confirmed our decision to set new regulations in the private rented sector for landlords to meet EPC C or equivalent by 1 October 2030 for all tenancies unless a valid exemption applies. The consultation also confirmed that landlords will not be required to spend more than £10,000 per property. Exemptions will last for 10 years.
Lord Watts (Lab)
It is nice to see that my fan club is still here. Has not the present crisis been caused by the Tory Government selling off social housing? This has led to a shortage of housing and also pushed up benefits, costing billions of pounds to the taxpayer.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My noble friend puts his finger on one cause of the housing crisis: there are many. Not building enough homes was a fundamental cause as well. We have taken steps already to address some of the issues around right to buy and to make sure that councils get the funding back for houses that they sell under right to buy. We are consulting on the other steps and will bring something forward later in the year. The Renters’ Rights Act was the biggest package of reforms to the private rented sector in nearly 40 years. It will improve the sector for 11 million private renters and 2.3 million landlords in England.
New Homes Target
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Lord Goodman of Wycombe
To ask His Majesty’s Government what recent progress they have made towards delivering 1.5 million new homes by the end of this Parliament.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)
My Lords, an estimated 309,600 net additional homes have been built in this Parliament, but we recognise the need to push further. We are driving progress through bold planning reforms, including the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025, and a record £39 billion investment in social and affordable housebuilding. Investment in construction skills, our £16 billion national housing bank, rapid transformation of the building safety regulator—under the leadership of my noble friend Lord Roe—and initiatives such as the new homes accelerator programme will remove barriers and ensure that we build the homes we need.
Lord Goodman of Wycombe (Con)
I am grateful to the Minister for that Answer. Up to 100,000 new homes could be built were the Government to scrap the old, outdated EU-era nutrient neutrality regulations. Will the Government bring in new regulations to protect the environment, and scrap these old ones which are helping to deny young people and families the homes they desperately need?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
New measures were introduced in the Planning and Infrastructure Act to make sure that we deal effectively with nutrient neutrality. We have had to do this without causing the impact on housebuilding that had been done under the previous Government. We have taken the steps needed. We have the nature restoration fund. Developers can work as part of this to make sure that they are able to deliver the homes and meet the needs of the environment at the same time.
Lord Sahota (Lab)
My Lords, in order to deliver these homes, local authorities need to co-operate with the Government, particularly in preparing local plans, allocating land, speeding up planning decisions, working with developers and communities, and so on. Are local authorities co-operating with the Government to deliver these 1.5 million homes in this Parliament?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
As I stated, I remind my noble friend that we see our partnership with local authorities as critical to delivering the housing numbers we need. The Planning and Infrastructure Act that we passed last year will accelerate housebuilding while preserving important environmental protections, making sure that we get the consenting process sped up and a more strategic approach to nature recovery, and improving certainty in the decision-making and planning system. We have supported local authority planning capacity with the funding and training that are needed. We are working together with our partners in local authorities to make sure that we get this moving as quickly as possible.
Lord Naseby (Con)
My Lords, the Minister mentioned that local authorities are vital to the production of homes. She is right, but how is it that the Labour-controlled Greater London Authority has produced only a third of what it had as a target? Do the Government understand that a large number of young people want to own their own homes? Where is the help-to-buy scheme? By all means, have a Labour help-to-buy scheme, different from the Conservative one. Surely, those two points would enable us to provide some decent housing for people who are desperate to have a home of their own.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
We have introduced a whole package of support, working with our colleagues in London to make sure that they are supported and helped to get building the homes they need.
In the previous Question, perhaps the noble Lord heard me say that I am working very closely with a whole partnership of people from across the sector on developing the support that young people need to get into home ownership, including on a new ISA that will help with this and making sure that the whole industry is focused on freeing up the system so that it is possible for young people to buy homes. It was good to hear, when I spoke to the sector last week, that both Lloyds and Santander have brought in very low-start mortgage packages. That was just last week. I am very pleased to see that, and I hope that will help some of our young people get out of high-cost renting and enable them to buy their own property.
Lord Best (CB)
My Lords, the 1.5 million new homes target is only part of the big housing jigsaw. It is about quality as well as quantity and regeneration as well as new build. All this is meant to come together in the Government’s long-term national housing strategy. This was due out about a year ago. I ask the Minister: when we will see the national housing strategy?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
I am grateful to the noble Lord for his patience on the long-term housing strategy. We will be publishing that in the first quarter of this year.
Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)
It is the turn of the Lib Dem Benches.
Baroness Thornhill (LD)
My Lords, obviously, the noble Lord was not quick enough today.
Research by Crisis and the National Housing Federation found that we need to build 90,000 social homes a year to tackle the current homelessness situation. We know that councils are spending around £2.8 billion a year on temporary accommodation. I ask the Minister: will the Government commit to a specific target for social housing within their overall 1.5 million homes target, alongside a detailed pathway to deliver these homes? We all know that that end of the housing market is the real logjam in the housing crisis.
Picking up on what the noble Lord said with regard to London, will the Government commit to looking again at their disappointing decision to slash the proportion of social homes required for all new developments in London?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
The target for the £39 billion spend that we have is that 60% of that will be social housing. The whole amount will be spent on social and affordable housing. That is the most money that has been invested in social and affordable housing for a very long time, and I am very proud of that record.
In relation to the noble Baroness’s question on London, having discussed this extensively with London councils, the important thing is to get housebuilding moving in London. London authorities will decide the percentage of social housing. We are working closely with them on that.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)
We will hear from the Labour Benches, then the Conservative Benches.
Baroness Winterton of Doncaster (Lab)
My Lords, my noble friend the Minister has outlined very clearly what a great opportunity this target is, for not only local jobs but local training schemes and use of local materials in building the houses. She mentioned local authorities, but what discussions are being held with developers and housebuilders to ensure that they commit to using local labour, putting on proper training schemes and using local materials whenever they can?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
It is very important that as we go through this process of building more homes, we also create the jobs to go alongside that. We have been working very closely with the sector and particularly with the developer skills group to make sure that we invest in skills as we go along this path of building. It has been very supportive, to the extent of investing £140 million in skills alongside the skills funding that the Government have put in. It is very much committed to this. We welcome the Home Builders Federation statement in July 2024 looking to rapidly increase the pace at which homes are built, deliver the high-quality affordable homes that the country needs and provide the skilled jobs that we know we need to deliver that.
Lord Jamieson (Con)
My Lords, as the Minister said earlier, only a little over 300,000 additional homes have been delivered in the first 18 months of this Government. Given their target of 1.5 million homes, they will have to deliver at the rate of 342,000 homes a year. Previously, in response to my noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook, the Minister said that they would achieve this by speeding up existing planning permissions. Given that housing starts continue to run at well below the average rate under the previous Conservative Government, can the Minister say when this will happen?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
It ill behoves the Government who caused the housing crisis to be pressing us on this. We have already taken very significant steps, which I have outlined, to move this forward. We updated the National Planning Policy Framework. It is early yet to see an impact from those changes. We expect to see the effects feeding through into a higher number of homes being granted permission later in the year. However, new figures show that already we are seeing some green shoots of recovery, with a 29% increase in housing starts compared with 2024. It will take time to turn the tide after decades of underinvestment and a failure to build the homes and infrastructure that we needed to keep up with demand. We expect housebuilding to ramp up, particularly in the later years of the Parliament, as our reforms take effect. We will continue on our mission to deliver those 1.5 million homes.
Lord Birt (CB)
My Lords, I return to the question of social housing. Since 1990, the UK’s population has grown by around 20%—an additional 12 million people. In that same period, our stock of social housing has not grown but contracted by nearly 10%. We now have fewer than 400,000 units of social housing than in 1990. Precisely how many additional units of social housing do the Government expect to have by 2030?
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
The Government are committed to the biggest increase in social and affordable housing in a generation. That £39 billion social and affordable housing programme I spoke about will combine the best elements of previous programmes with new design elements to make sure that we maximise the delivery that we want to see, enabling providers to build the types of homes that the country needs. The ambition is to deliver around 300,000 homes with at least 60% social rent. We have also provided long-term income stability for social housing providers with a 10-year rent settlement, which will help to give them the stability and confidence they need to invest even further in funding for social housing. It is a comprehensive policy package. We want a simpler, more transparent system and are driving forward. We know that social housing is important.
Electric Vehicles: Transition
Baroness Pidgeon
To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the UK’s transition to electric vehicles.
Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Blake of Leeds) (Lab)
My Lords, the UK is a global leader in the transition to zero-emission vehicles, with the largest EV market share of any major European economy in 2025. The Government are committed to working with manufacturers, charge point operators and fleets to ensure that the transition is a success. We are investing £7.5 billion over the next decade to help drivers to make the switch.
Baroness Pidgeon (LD)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her Answer. An early review of the zero-emission vehicle mandate took place in 2024, but manufacturers really need certainty now, given that they are investing heavily in decarbonisation. Will the Government give manufacturers the clear assurance that they are committed to a transition to electric vehicles and cancel the proposed further review of the mandate in 2027?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The ZEV mandate is the largest carbon-saving measure across government, providing policy stability and regulatory certainty, and is an essential driver of investment and consumer confidence. It is the Government’s long-standing commitment to have a review of the ZEV mandate. It will commence later this year and will be published in 2027. It is absolutely crucial that we have confidence across the system to make sure that we move forward successfully.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, the Minister will be aware that there is resistance among those living in rural communities to switching from petrol and diesel vehicles to electric vehicles. What was the rationale behind introducing pay per mile? What assessment has been made of the impact that it will have in rural areas? Will the Government postpone it until after 2030 to ensure that more people will purchase EVs in rural areas?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The Government take very seriously the issue of rural communities and recognise that car transport is essential to people’s mobility. It is essential that we move forward with coming up with a fair system. That will be the basis for all our conversations and decisions in order to make this equitable as we go forward over the years.
Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I declare an interest as a driver of an electric car. Has there been any increase in accidents involving pedestrians due to the silent nature of these vehicles?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
I do not have those statistics to hand, but I will do my very best to get them to the noble Lord.
Baroness Kramer (LD)
My Lords, where do the Government now stand on cutting VAT on public charging of EVs from 20% to 5% to match home charging? Are we at risk of the costs of operating an EV making it an unviable choice for anyone without a driveway?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
It is important to recognise that any decisions about VAT on all these measures will be a matter for the Treasury, which will, obviously, be looking at all the impacts of any policy change as we go forward.
Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Con)
My Lords, I refer to my interests as the director of the Global Warming Policy Foundation. Figures show that UK car production has reduced to its lowest level since the 1950s, yet a Chinese EV manufacturer has now eclipsed every other global manufacturer of motor vehicles. Does the Minister regard that as a success?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The most important thing we have to do is work with the manufacturers in this country. The decision under the previous Government to change the target sent a wave of uncertainty through manufacturers. It is absolutely critical that we keep that certainty and have clarity. We are fully committed to the manufacturing industry and base in this country. Of course, we are having conversations with China, as per the Prime Minister’s recent visit, and there are so many positives to come from these conversations. We look forward to the industry moving forward to full strength.
Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)
My Lords, the Question refers to electric vehicles, and anyone in our cities and towns will have seen the increasing prevalence of electric-powered cycles and scooters, often driven extremely dangerously by people who are not wearing helmets, and in many cases dumped, where they are available for hire, all over the place. Can my noble friend the Minister enlighten us as to what consideration has been given to requiring that all vehicles of this nature be properly labelled and identified so that, if people break the law, it is possible to trace them? If it is a hired vehicle, you would presumably have a credit card connection that you could follow up in order to apply a penalty.
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
My noble friend raises some crucial points. When I go home, I have to tell people that, in going around London, one of the most dangerous exercises is crossing the road because of the fear of unregulated cycles coming through. We have had many debates on this. I do not have a definite direction for my noble friend, but I know that he will maintain a strong interest in this area and will make sure that, as we move forward, we take everyone with us to achieve better results.
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
Going back to rural areas and the electric vehicle charging infrastructure, is the Minister aware that, if you have a drive, you will have to dig it up to put new cabling in because older housing stock is not capable of taking the new power? In rural areas, 5G is intermittent or non-existent, so the charge point does not speak to the internet and therefore the smart meter. To add to that, it is not smart enough to log on to the house’s domestic wifi, so the box is not able to communicate with the app. Rural infrastructure is not good enough to go along with the Government’s noble aims.
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
I have a feeling that the noble Lord might be speaking from experience given the depth of his knowledge. I met my neighbour—not that we live in a particularly rural area—who had these issues. That is why the Government are investing so significantly into the whole area of charging. One of the issues that really aggrieves me, living in a city such as Leeds where we have a lot of terraced houses, is that back-to-back houses do not have the potential for a garage. But that is why I really welcome the £25 million specifically going into that work. We know this is challenging and we know that there are a whole variety of different circumstances, but with proper consultation and engagement through local authorities in our local areas, I think we can move forward.
Lord Birt (CB)
My Lords, I readily acknowledge that the EV charging network in the UK is growing very rapidly, but none the less there are issues. Some parts of the UK are significantly underserved: public charge points are often not sited close to where people live; grid connections can be unavailable; some motorway service areas lack rapid charges. Given the strategic importance of the move to EVs, do the Government not need an organisational focus to bring real coherence to the development of our national EV charging infrastructure?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The noble Lord hits on a very important point, but I emphasise to the House just how seriously the Government are taking this point. We have 88,000 public charge points in the UK and 920,000 domestic charge points, and all motorway service stations have them—I take the noble Lord’s point about rapid charging. That is why the Government are investing £400 million in the local electric vehicle infrastructure fund and are working with local authorities, which are in a position to look at the coverage in their areas, to co-ordinate with providers and make sure that we get the coverage that is required.
Lord Moylan (Con)
My Lords, I come back to the question asked by my noble friend Lord Mackinlay. It is not just that the volume of motor manufacturing in this country is starting to collapse, but profits are as well. Meanwhile, we see our fine British motor manufacturing industry being substituted by Chinese imports. How does this fit with the Government’s growth strategy, which the Prime Minister says is his top priority?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The Government have the £4 billion DRIVE35 programme supporting investment in zero-emission vehicle manufacturing R&D and the supply chain in the UK. We are working across the whole system looking at where gigafactories are located and, most importantly, working closely with the sector. I point out that we have an industrial strategy; I think that is a big advantage on where we were when we came into government.
Smart Motorways
Lord Harries of Pentregarth
To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the post opening project evaluations of smart motorways in relation to (1) safety, and (2) value for money.
Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Blake of Leeds) (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, for his Question. I assure him that safety is our top priority. While National Highways reports show that smart motorways are meeting or exceeding safety objectives in all but one upgrade, we know that people need to feel safe as well as be safe. That is why National Highways invested some £900 million to improve safety and educate drivers. The reports show that these upgrades have added vital capacity to some of the country’s busiest roads and are largely on course to meet their environmental goals.
Lord Harries of Pentregarth (CB)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for her reply, but according to National Highways’ official reports, these big projects to convert hard shoulders on the M1, M4, M6 and M25 were regarded as poor, or very poor, value. I wonder whether the Government agree with that assessment. My main concern, however, is safety. Although I totally respect the huge improvements made by the technology—the electronic signs that can control traffic and close lanes—it has nevertheless been shown that casualties and serious injuries have gone up on some stretches of these smart motorways: the M3 and parts of M1, for example. Therefore, what further steps will the Government take to improve safety on these smart motorways?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
Just to broaden the issue, the majority of schemes are delivering economic benefits and have created additional lane capacity, which is beneficial now and into the future. I think it goes back to the perception issue. Smart motorways remain our safest roads, and we are monitoring the impact of investment in safety, including the 150 emergency areas we have added. I hope that answers some of the noble and right reverend Lord’s questions. Although carrying half the traffic, 327 more people were killed or seriously injured on A-roads compared with motorways. We take road safety seriously, and recently published our new road safety strategy, in which we outline the further measures we are intending to take.
Baroness Pidgeon (LD)
My Lords, it was clear from the start that so-called smart motorways were nothing of the sort, and they have led to a huge waste of public money and time, not only in building them but in having to retrospectively install more than 150 additional emergency areas. What is the total cost of these additional works, and will the Government assure the House that no further smart motorways will be installed?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
I can absolutely assure the noble Baroness that no more smart motorways will be installed. It is difficult when you inherit a programme, and it has obviously been done with the best of intentions—to save lives, increase capacity, help people move around and support the economy. Obviously, the costs involved are relevant, but we need to make sure that we learn from the experience we have had thus far and deal with the absolutely disgraceful issue of the safety statistics on our roads.
Viscount Goschen (Con)
My Lords, can the noble Baroness comment on why, on the section of the M3 between junction 2 and junction 4a, the rate at which people have been killed or seriously injured has increased by around a third?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
I cannot give the noble Viscount the specific details about that particular section of road, but I am very happy to ask for those statistics.
Lord Spellar (Lab)
My Lords, is not the reality that, when the initial M42 smart motorway programme was introduced, it showed very considerable reductions in congestion, great improvements in driving time reliability and a reduction in accidents? When the programme was rolled out further, under the next Government, a lot of cost-cutting took place, which did create some issues. However, is this not an extremely good way of getting better capacity, and particularly of dealing with peak-hour congestion?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
Obviously, dealing with capacity on the roads is one of the major contributors to the value-for-money exercises in terms of reducing congestion and enabling people to move around. We need to be careful in how we analyse the reports that have just come out. This is a long-term study, and we have to be mindful of the fact that we had just been through Covid as well. However, as my noble friend says, there are examples where improvements have been made, and we will continue to analyse all the schemes to make sure that we get the best value for money and the best reduction in congestion.
Lord Swire (Con)
My Lords, does the Minister share my concern about the plethora of broken tyres and rubbish on both smart motorways and normal motorways? Who has responsibility for keeping these motorways clear, and what do the Government intend to do about it as part of their road strategy?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The noble Lord touches on a very sensitive point. The ward in Leeds that I represented had the M1 going right through it, and all the litter on the side of the motorways was the responsibility of National Highways. It is a crucial factor, particularly where safety is involved. Given the new smart technology that so many people have in their cars, their ability to report things as soon as they see them should help with improving the performance.
Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate (Con)
My Lords, we should all congratulate the emergency services that have to attend to accidents on our motorways. Sometimes motorways are closed for quite a long time as a result of accidents, but the emergency services behave admirably.
I want to ask the Minister a question that almost touches on the one we had before. With the increased use of electric vehicles, particularly those powered by lithium batteries, is she happy that our emergency services are sufficiently well educated in dealing with fires from lithium batteries, which I understand are extremely difficult to extinguish?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The raw facts of the cost of collisions and fatal and serious injuries in this country are staggering. It is estimated that over £3.1 billion was spent on medical and ambulance costs due to collisions on our roads last year alone. That is a crucial issue, and of course the lithium battery issue is an important one for our fire and emergency services. There is a lot of misinformation around this space, and it would be useful to have the latest figures updated to see how the fire and emergency departments are coping with that.
Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall (Lab)
My Lords, given what my noble friend has just said about the cost of road accidents, particularly accidents on motorways, is she confident that the standards now expected of new drivers and the way in which they are examined ensure that people behave on motorways in ways that are likely to minimise the risk of accidents? It would probably be the observation of some of us that driving standards on motorways have deteriorated quite significantly over recent years, and in the end, it is mostly human beings that cause accidents.
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
My noble friend raises an interesting point, but I have to go back to the fact that 793 people were killed or seriously injured on the motorways in 2023, compared with 1,120 on A-roads. Making sure that we consider carefully how we can improve driver safety, whether that means looking at young people or at older people—we know that eye tests are being proposed—is fundamental. I go back to the point that we are prepared to tolerate a level of death and injury on our roads that is, frankly, unacceptable. If such accidents and injuries happened on any other part of the transport network, there would be outrage. It is down to all of us to take very seriously, and not to be overcritical of, the attempts to change safety on our roads.
Lord Moylan (Con)
My Lords, when you come off the motorways, you quickly notice the rapidly deteriorating condition of many of our rural roads, which are becoming a threat and a safety risk in themselves. The Government have pledged to fix 1 million more potholes a year. Can the Minister update us on what progress is being made towards meeting that target?
Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)
The noble Lord will be aware that we do not hold that level of detail on potholes, but what I can say is that this Government have made the biggest commitment of financial support to local authorities, so they can assess priority need and get on and repair the roads in their areas, which will contribute to the safety and well-being of all road users.
Commissioners for Standards
Lord Kakkar
That this House approves the appointment of the Rt Hon Dame Anne Rafferty DBE as a House of Lords Commissioner for Standards for a period of five years; and extends the appointment of Martin Jelley QPM DL as a House of Lords Commissioner for Standards to 30 June 2029.
Lord Kakkar (CB)
My Lords, the Motion invites the House to approve the appointment of Dame Anne Rafferty as Commissioner for Standards for a five-year term and to approve the extension of the term of the existing commissioner, Martin Jelley, for a further three years. Since 2021, the House has appointed two commissioners who divide the duties of the role between them, and the last five years have demonstrated the benefits of this model.
Last September, our previous commissioner, Margaret Obi, who had taken up the position of commissioner only a few months earlier, was appointed to serve on the High Court Bench; I wish Dame Margaret well in her new role. I chaired the recruitment panel for Dame Margaret’s successor, supported by other members of your Lordships’ Conduct Committee. The unanimous recommendation of that panel was that Dame Anne Rafferty be appointed as commissioner. Dame Anne brings vast experience. She is a former Lady Justice of Appeal, led the Iraq fatalities investigations and is chair of the State Honours Committee. A short biography giving further details of her experience is available in the Printed Paper Office.
I turn next to the term of Martin Jelley. Mr Jelley was appointed to the role in 2021, and his term was due to end on 30 June this year. The Conduct Committee is acutely aware of the need for continuity in this important role, and, given the changes over the past year which I have described, it was agreed in consultation with the usual channels to recommend an extension of Mr Jelley’s appointment for a further three years. This approach will stagger future appointments, maintaining continuity in the commissioner’s office. I beg to move.
Local Government Finance Act 1988 (Prescription of Non-Domestic Rating Multipliers) (England) Regulations 2026
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Lord Livermore
That the draft Regulations laid before the House on 7 January be approved.
Relevant document: 48th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee (special attention drawn to the instrument). Considered in Grand Committee on 10 February.
Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2026
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Baroness Sherlock
That the draft Orders laid before the House on 12 January be approved.
Relevant document: 49th Report from the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee. Considered in Grand Committee on 10 February.
Tobacco and Vapes Bill [HL]
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Baroness Merron
That the amendments for the Report stage be marshalled and considered in the following order: Clauses 1 to 16, Schedule 1, Clauses 17 and 18, Schedule 2, Clause 19, Schedule 3, Clauses 20 and 21, Schedule 4, Clauses 22 to 40, Schedule 5, Clause 41, Schedules 6 and 7, Clauses 42 to 64, Schedule 8, Clause 65, Schedule 9, Clauses 66 to 83, Schedule 10, Clause 84, Schedules 11 to 13, Clauses 85 and 86, Schedules 14 and 15, Clauses 87 to 126, Schedule 16, Clauses 127 to 140, Schedule 17, Clauses 141 to 145, Schedule 18, Clauses 146 to 151, Schedule 19, Clauses 152 to 156, Schedule 20, Clauses 157 to 159, Schedule 21, Clauses 160 to 170, Title.
Crime and Policing Bill
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Lord Hanson of Flint
That the amendments for the Report stage be marshalled and considered in the following order: Clauses 1 and 2, Schedule 1, Clauses 3 to 5, Schedule 2, Clause 6, Schedule 3, Clauses 7 to 18, Schedule 4, Clauses 19 to 56, Schedule 5, Clause 57, Schedules 6 and 7, Clause 58, Schedule 8, Clauses 59 to 70, Schedule 9, Clauses 71 to 77, Schedule 10, Clauses 78 to 89, Schedule 11, Clauses 90 to 107, Schedule 12, Clauses 108 to 132, Schedule 13, Clauses 133 to 137, Schedule 14, Clauses 138 to 143, Schedule 15, Clauses 144 to 152, Schedule 16, Clauses 153 to 155, Schedule 17, Clauses 156 to 161, Schedules 18 to 20, Clauses 162 to 180, Schedule 21, Clauses 181 to 202, Schedule 22, Clause 203, Schedule 23, Clauses 204 to 220, Title.
Rare Cancers Bill
Baroness Elliott of Whitburn Bay
That the order of commitment be discharged.
Northern Ireland legislative consent granted.
Baroness Elliott of Whitburn Bay (Lab)
My Lords, I understand that no amendments have been set down to this Bill and that no noble Lord has indicated a wish to move a manuscript amendment or to speak in Committee. Unless, therefore, any noble Lord objects, I beg to move that the order of commitment be discharged.
Ministry of Defence: Palantir Contracts
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Baroness Goldie (Con)
My Lords, everybody knew that this contract between Palantir and the MoD was going to expire in 2025, with, we understand, interest from British companies in tendering for the new contract. We now know that, in February 2025, the Prime Minister attended a meeting in Washington DC with Palantir, at which the now disgraced former ambassador, Peter Mandelson, who held shares in a company engaged by Palantir, was also present. In December 2025, the MoD, without competition, awarded a lucrative three-year contract to Palantir. There is a very unpleasant smell hovering over this particular bucket of fish. Will the Minister tell the Chamber what was discussed at that February meeting in Washington and, if he does not know, go away and write to me? Why, given the interest of British companies, was this contract not put out for competitive tender?
The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Coaker) (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Goldie, for the courteous way in which she asked the question. I will reflect on what she has said and respond appropriately once I have discussed it with others.
On the fundamental issue of single-source contracts, I can do no better than to quote the Conservative spokesperson in the other place, who said:
“It is true that many contracts in the MOD are rightly let on a single-source basis”.—[Official Report, Commons, 10/2/26; col. 691.]
In this particular instance, the MoD judged the capabilities and record of Palantir in the delivery of the systems that it has, and the artificial intelligence and data sharing that can take place, which started with the enterprise agreement that the last Government entered into in 2022, enabling Palantir to embed itself in all sorts of operations that were and are ongoing and will continue. The transparency notice that we published a few weeks ago, in December, laid out why the direct award was justified in this case, giving it to Palantir as a single-source contract and not making it available to more general competition. It was in our interests, the interests of the MoD and the interests of our country that we let that contract to Palantir to deliver the very special capabilities that it has.
Lord Fox (LD)
My Lords, leaving aside the nature of the ownership of Palantir and the questionable involvement of Peter Mandelson, we have another key concern. On the Government’s own admission, this is a strategic contract. It seems that only Palantir is in a position to deliver this, otherwise it would have been a contested commissioning. The Minister in the Commons has said that the data will remain under sovereign protection. However, the core competence of developing the ways of using that data for AI will rest with Palantir and will be embedded, as the Minister has said, with its proprietary systems and software. Does the Minister share my concern that this is outsourcing what should be a sovereign capability—not just owning the data but knowing how to use it? Does he recognise that we will be reliant for crucial AI expertise embedded across the defence industry on a single US supplier?
Lord Coaker (Lab)
I say to the noble Lord, who asks an important question with respect to this, that the UK defence data used and developed in Palantir’s software remains sovereign and under the control of the MoD. It resides in the United Kingdom. We have clear contractual controls in place to ensure that, as well as control over the data system that Palantir software sits upon. Any change from this cannot be conducted without the consent of the United Kingdom, so very real protections are in place to ensure that we can get the benefits from Palantir while protecting the data and information, so that we can allay the noble Lord’s concerns.
Lord Bellingham (Con)
My Lords, when the Prime Minister and Lord Mandelson visited the HQ of Palantir, met the chief executive, toured the offices and obviously had meetings with many other representatives there, were minutes taken of that meeting?
Lord Coaker (Lab)
No minutes were taken of that meeting, but it was a routine visit. The noble Lord will know from his own experience that going to visit businesses and industry is a significant part of the job. The noble Lord will have done it in the past; he will have gone with civil servants and others, maybe not industrialists but with industry representatives, to see that capability. That is not a criticism of the noble Lord; it was him doing his job. The Prime Minister went with the then ambassador to Palantir. As I understand it, during that visit he had a short presentation, followed by a tour of the premises and an introduction to members of staff. That is the Prime Minister doing his job: trying to develop and build business contacts with huge companies which are of benefit to our country.
Baroness Wheatcroft (CB)
My Lords, on 5 January, I asked the Government if they could give us details of contracts with Palantir and Anduril. The noble Baroness, Lady Anderson, said that, as an honorary captain in the defence of the country through the Royal Navy, it was of prime importance to her and she would write to me. She has obviously been incredibly busy, and a lot of information has come out since. I wonder if the Minister could let us know about contracts with Anduril too, please.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
I will write to the noble Baroness about that. I will write, along with my noble friend Lady Anderson, to make sure that the noble Baroness gets one joint letter rather than two. I will take that on board and make sure that she gets it, and put a copy of it in the Library so that other noble Lords can see it as well.
Lord Watts (Lab)
My Lords, while I am not particularly worried about the way this contract was awarded, it does raise the issue of single companies being given large defence contracts without competition. It also raises value for money. I would hope that the defence department was looking at value for money and at making sure that where British industry can compete, it is encouraged to do so.
Lord Coaker (Lab)
Again, that is an extremely important point. There are two things. Of course, single source is something that you try to avoid by having open competition, but there are circumstances where single-source contracts are in the interests of our country. Alongside that, as my noble friend hinted, we are trying to ensure that we develop UK industry and business as well. He will be interested that, as part of the enterprise agreement, it was announced in December 2025 that Palantir would commit £1.5 billion-worth of money to grow British business—to grow small and medium-sized enterprises—and develop skills right across the UK. We were conscious of the fact that it was a contract to a US-based company, as prestigious as it is, and wanted to ensure that the UK gained benefit from it as well. I hope that reassures my noble friend that, to some extent, we took the UK into account with that enterprise arrangement as well.
Baroness Cash (Con)
My Lords, it is of note that, as reported by openDemocracy, one of the Labour Party’s largest donations, if not the largest, of £4 million, came from a hedge fund called Quadrature, which has holdings in Blackstone. The openDemocracy website reported that it stood to benefit from government contracts awarded to the likes of Palantir. Will the Minister address this and, if he is unable to do so today, undertake to write and provide further information about that donation, and whether the conflicts were properly examined?
Lord Coaker (Lab)
If necessary, I will write to the noble Baroness, but let me reassure her that everything was done properly and appropriately. The decision to award the contract to Palantir was made by the Defence Secretary alone. Of course, I will reflect on what the noble Baroness has said, but what she said is something that a Government would not do in awarding a contract with respect to defence or any other part of the Government. That sort of thing is not allowed to influence decisions. The Defence Secretary made the decision, and he made it on the basis that Palantir was the right company to do this, the right business to do this, and that it was in the interest of our defence and that of our allies to award it that contract.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, I want to return to the question from my noble friend Lord Fox. The Minister referred to the company not having a sovereign right, but the key issue is what the company can do with data. During the passage of the then Procurement Bill, we and Labour—then in opposition—argued for special arrangements for Palantir’s contract under health where it could access only extremely anonymised data. Do we have that assurance with this contract that data is safe and will not go to Palantir?
Lord Coaker (Lab)
That is an important question, which is why I tried to address the point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Fox. The ability of our country to protect its data, its information and systems is very important. This is why I am saying that the control of that data is a sovereign decision-making power for the UK Government. Nothing can be done without the consent of the UK Government. Those protections and shields against anything moving from where it should be are in place. I hope that will satisfy the noble Baroness.
Court Reporting Data
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Lord Keen of Elie (Con)
My Lords, the Courtsdesk court reporting data has been a great success in providing access to data from our courts. It has been reported that about 1,500 journalists have used the platform. It has proved particularly important in collating information about grooming gangs and in properly investigating that terrible issue. It would be extremely damaging to the transparency of our justice system if that service was to be extinguished.
Various excuses have been advanced by the Minister in the other place, despite her having announced in July of last year that the agreement with Courtsdesk would be continued. I highlight two of the excuses put forward. First, there is the allegation of a data breach. We now know that the Ministry of Justice data protection officer concluded, following investigation of that report, that there was no basis for a report to the Information Commissioner. Does the Minister agree with her department’s data protection officer? Secondly, there was an allegation of the sharing of data with a third-party AI company—I use the term “third party” advisedly. The data platform had contracted with an AI firm to carry out sub-processing in terms of an agreement. Does the Minister agree that, under Article 4(10) of the general data protection regulation, someone carrying out processing in terms of such an agreement is not to be regarded as a third party for the purposes of data protection?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Baroness Levitt)
My Lords, I am in the happy position of being able to reassure your Lordships’ House that there is no cover-up or conspiracy. The facts are as follows. Courtsdesk, a commercial company, was given copies of the data held in magistrates’ courts’ registers for one purpose only: to share it with bona fide journalists. However, Courtsdesk then shared it with a third-party company without asking or even telling the Ministry of Justice. This data contained sensitive information about both defendants and victims.
When the Ministry of Justice found out that Courtsdesk had done this, it was less than transparent with us, at which point the Government did what any responsible Government would have done: we stopped sending copies of the data to Courtsdesk and required it to remove the copies it still had from its platform. I reassure your Lordships’ House that the original data has always been retained by the Ministry of Justice, and no records have been deleted or lost.
Captain of the King’s Bodyguard of the Yeomen of the Guard and Deputy Chief Whip (Baroness Wheeler) (Lab)
My Lords, this is a 10-minute Urgent Question, so questions must be brief. We will now move on to the Lib Dems.
Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)
My Lords, we are all committed to open justice, but so we are to the protection of sensitive personal data. Minister Sackman told the Commons yesterday, as has the Minister here, that Courtsdesk had been sharing with an AI company, no doubt for commercial purposes, personal data of defendants and victims, including full names, personal addresses and birth dates. Minister Sackman said that at least 700 individual cases were involved in that direct breach of contract by Courtsdesk, which Courtsdesk has accepted was a breach.
I suggest that we accept both Ministers’ accounts as accurate, as, notably, did Conservative MP Sir Julian Lewis, who, unlike his Front Bench—and indeed the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen—rightly described this as a “cause of great concern”. How and when do the Government propose to replace Courtsdesk with an alternative provider? Meanwhile, can the Minister say how HMCTS will deliver accurate information in a more easily accessible and digestible form? By all accounts, journalists are currently finding the MOJ’s presentation of data to be fragmented, impractical and difficult to navigate.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, first, I reassure your Lordships’ House that all journalists can access the information in exactly the same way as they could through Courtsdesk—it is just a slightly more complicated method: they have to go through HMCTS. The point about Courtsdesk was that it provided a slightly more convenient method, but there is no material that journalists could get then that they cannot get now.
Secondly, the agreement with Courtsdesk, which was a licensing agreement rather than a contract, was entered into by the previous Government as a pilot, which is why it applied to magistrates’ courts only. This Government decided that it might be better to make it available to more than one commercial company. We are in the process of looking at new licensing agreements, which lots of companies can bid for if they wish to, including Courtsdesk if it would like to do so. Anybody who can reassure us that they will treat our data with the respect and dignity that victims and defendants deserve will probably get that licence.
Baroness Brown of Silvertown (Lab)
My Lords, I know my noble friend the Minister will agree that it was utterly unacceptable for the company concerned to release personal information about vulnerable victims and witnesses without their permission or the permission of the department. As she knows, I am not a lawyer, but does she consider this to be a breach of the contract made with the previous Government by the company concerned?
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
I thank the noble Baroness for her question. In fact, there was no contract; it was a licensing agreement. Our view is that there was a clear breach of the licensing agreement, and that is why we were concerned. The real issue is Courtsdesk’s lack of candour with us when this came to our attention. If there was no problem, why did Courtsdesk not ask us about it or even tell us that that was what it was doing?
Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)
My Lords, it is worth saying that there has been a substantive rebuttal by the CEO of Courtsdesk, to which I understand the Government have not responded. I have no vested interest in this issue, but it is a matter of fact that Courtsdesk has gone to extensive lengths to protect victims’ personal data and ensure that it was handled responsibly and securely. This included working only with security-cleared engineers and building its AI test features in an encrypted sandbox environment, hosted in the EU, that is automatically and permanently deleted every 24 hours. Is it not the case that there has been a misunderstanding, and that this company has been treated quite shabbily by the Government?
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
Absolutely not. The first thing I would say in reply to the rebuttal put up very recently by the chief executive of Courtsdesk—it went up during my meeting with officials earlier this morning to discuss this issue—is, they would say that, wouldn’t they? Secondly, if there was nothing wrong with this, why did they not ask us and tell us they were doing it?
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
My Lords, while I commend the MoJ for doing what departments do not always do—policing these contracts properly—is there an argument, given the importance of this information and of making it accessible to journalists, but also of protecting sensitive data, for the department developing an in-house function capable of sorting this out, with a panel of journalists and others to help devise the scheme?
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
It is a very good question. In fact, that already exists in part. There is something known as CaTH, which deals with listing information in relation to civil courts and tribunals, and a criminal court listing service is going to be added to it in March. The thing about the information Courtsdesk had is that it went a bit further than that. It would, for example, give the charges; it would say what the outcome was; it would give what the sentence was. We accept entirely that journalists need and ought to have that information, but only journalists, because, first, journalists are familiar with the contempt of court rules and know what they can and cannot do. Secondly, there is an HMCTS protocol in place with journalists, which is based on the criminal procedure rules and makes it clear how this data can be used. We do not know what a third party is going to do—we did not know about this, we did not see its contract, and we want to know why not.
Viscount Stansgate (Lab)
My Lords, I read the exchanges yesterday in the other place and I welcome what the Minister has said about this. Out of interest, what reason—or should I say, what excuse—did Courtsdesk give when it was revealed that it was passing personal, private and legally sensitive information to a third-party AI company? Will my noble friend reassure the House, partly in the light of the answer she has just given, that the information that is there and is publicly available will continue to be publicly available? I appreciate that journalists need to have it in a more accessible way, and I hope that, as a result of this episode, the Government will continue to do what they can to provide to journalists the information they have every right to have.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
The answer to the first of my noble friend’s questions is that Courtsdesk says that it did not think there was anything wrong with what it was doing. We venture to disagree. The answer to the second question is, absolutely, and that is why we are going to issue licences to far more commercial companies, in the interests of competition, so that others can perform the same service and journalists can get the vital information they need so there is transparency in our courts.
Victims and Courts Bill
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Lord Sandhurst
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment broadens the cohort to whom Section 35 (victims’ rights to make representations and receive information) of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 applies to include any victims listed in Schedule 6A. It also probes the rationale behind the three part categorisation of crimes in Schedule 6A.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, Amendments 48 to 54, in my name and that of my noble and learned friend Lord Keen of Elie, concern the operation of the victim contact scheme and the new helpline provisions introduced by the Bill, and in particular the Government’s decision to structure eligibility around the three-part categorisation of offences in new Schedule 6A. We welcome the Government’s intention to expand access to information for victims. The extension of the victim contact scheme and the creation of a statutory helpline represent important recognition that the victim should not be left in the dark about the progress, release or supervision of those who have harmed them. But the detail matters, and it is the detail of Schedule 6 that these amendments probe.
Amendments 48 and 49 address the decision to confine the statutory rights under Section 35 of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 to victims of offences listed in Parts 1 and 2 of new Schedule 6A and subject, in the case of Part 1, to a specified custodial threshold. Amendment 48 would align Section 35 more broadly with new Schedule 6A as a whole, and Amendment 49 probes why the current drafting draws the line where it does. Noble Lords will have seen that new Schedule 6A divides offences into three parts. Victims of Part 1 offences qualify when the offender receives
“a sentence of imprisonment … for a term of at least the specified … length”.
Victims of Part 2 offences qualify without that same threshold. Other offences are treated differently still.
The question before us today is: what is the principled basis for this threefold division? For example, Part 1 includes crimes such as wounding with intent to cause GBH, rape, aggravated burglary, abduction and child sex offences. Part 2 includes crimes such as stalking, coercive behaviour and putting people in fear of violence. It seems to us wrong that the latter list of offences does not include a custodial threshold for eligibility for the victim contact scheme, but the first list of offences does include such a threshold. The Minister said on Monday that use of the victim contact scheme is available for the “most serious cases”. Why, then, should the victim of, say, child sexual offences or abduction whose offender did not receive a sentence of imprisonment for a term of at least the specified sentence length be ineligible for the victim contact scheme? Following the Sentencing Act and subsequent reforms that were debated in this House, we have seen, and will continue to see, a marked shift in the sentencing landscape. Fewer people will receive immediate sentences of imprisonment, and sentences will be shorter.
First, the automatic presumption for suspended sentences will mean that many offenders guilty of crimes under Part 1 of the new schedule—wounding with intent, rape and so on—may receive suspended sentences. That will make their victims ineligible for the victim contact scheme. This, frankly, is an insult to victims and the public. Part 1 is a shopping list of serious crimes for which there should be no restrictions on victims’ eligibility for the victim contact scheme.
Secondly, under the Sentencing Act, the majority of offenders will be released after just one-third of their sentence. The practical consequence is that far more offenders than now are to be subject to supervision outside custody. That shift makes the victim contact scheme more, not less, important. The scheme is not a mere information line. It allows victims to make representations regarding licence conditions and, where they apply, parole decisions. In a world in which release and supervision decisions affect more and more cases, the ability of victims to engage meaningfully with those processes becomes essential to maintaining confidence in the system.
The noble Lord, Lord Timpson, stated that the Sentencing Act will more or less double the number of people being tagged. That will mean that at least double the number of victims will want to engage with the victim contact scheme. Faced with these facts, it is difficult to see why eligibility should depend so rigidly on whether an offence falls into Part 1 or Part 2, or whether a custodial sentence crosses a certain line.
From the perspective of the victim, the impact of the offence is not measured in statutory parts or sentencing thresholds. If the offender is subject to release conditions or to supervision in the community, the victim may well have legitimate concerns about notification, exclusion zones or contact restrictions. Those concerns do not disappear simply because the sentence imposed fell just a little below the specified sentence length.
Amendment 50 turns to the new helpline. The Government have rightly recognised that some victims fall outside the formal victim contact scheme but nevertheless need access to information. The helpline is intended to fill that gap. However, as the Bill is drafted, it is still limited by reference to the categorisation in new Schedule 6A. If the purpose of the helpline is to provide a route for victims to obtain basic information about the offender’s custodial or supervisory status, why should it not extend to all victims of offences listed in new Schedule 6A? If Parliament has already determined that those offences merit inclusion in new Schedule 6A, what is gained by further subdividing access to information within that list?
Amendments 51 to 53 similarly address the exclusion of victims whose offenders are serving suspended sentences. As matters stand, victims whose offenders are serving suspended sentences or community orders may not fall within the scope of the helpline in the same way as those whose offenders are in custody. Yet, arguably, it is precisely in such cases that victims will have acute and immediate concerns. An offender not in custody but serving a suspended sentence or community order remains in the community; the victim may live nearby. The potential for proximity, breach or renewed contact is real, not nugatory.
I once again point out that it is government policy that the presumption for most of the offenders for whom this clause is relevant will be to receive suspended sentences. This automatically means their victims will not be able to access the helpline. If the Government are going as far as to legislate for a helpline, it should reflect the realities of modern sentencing. The distinction between custody and community supervision is no longer as clear-cut in terms of risk or impact. This is the result of the Government’s own legislation. A victim whose offender is under probation supervision in the community has every bit as much interest in knowing the conditions imposed and the mechanisms for enforcement as one whose offender is in prison.
Finally, Amendment 54 probes the question of accountability. The Bill places duties on providers of probation services to take reasonable steps to provide information to victims about release, licence conditions and other relevant matters. That is welcome, but what is to happen if a victim believes that those reasonable steps have not been taken? It is not clear from the legislation what mechanism exists for review or appeal. Probation officers increasingly exercise functions that have a quasi-judicial character, particularly in relation to the formulation and management of licence conditions. This is once again due to the Sentencing Act.
Where discretion is exercised, there should be some form of oversight. Amendment 54 proposes a modest and practical solution: that where a victim is dissatisfied, there should be a route to seek reconsideration by a senior probation officer. The Government no doubt accept that the existence of an appeals process is important. Indeed, it is a fundamental element of our judicial process. It does not seem right, therefore, that probation officers, who are already subject to fewer checks and balances and less public scrutiny, should be shielded from an appeals process concerning their decisions.
These amendments ask the Government to explain the rationale behind the categorisation in new Schedule 6A, and to consider whether access to the victim contact scheme and helpline should better reflect the contemporary sentencing landscape. If we are serious about placing victims at the heart of the justice system, access to information and participation cannot depend on seemingly arbitrary distinctions. I beg to move.
The Senior Deputy Speaker (Lord Gardiner of Kimble)
My Lords, I should inform the House that, if Amendment 48 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendment 49 by reason of pre-emption. Also, if Amendment 50 is agreed to, I cannot call Amendments 51 to 53 by reason of pre-emption.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, for outlining the detail of the amendments in this group. I was slightly surprised by what he said, because I understood that it was not about whether a prison term was suspended or not, it was the conviction itself that acted as the trigger for the victim’s rights. I see the Minister is nodding. Just to double-check, I went to the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime. This makes it absolutely clear that the moment there is a possible crime against somebody which falls within something that could be considered by the code, the victim is entitled to support and help. For certain particular crimes, they are entitled to enhanced rights and help. I am sorry: I printed it off the web and it does not have a page number, but it states that victims of the most serious crimes are eligible for enhanced rights under this code. There is no question at all of them being reduced or stopped if a conviction is suspended. Once again, I repeat that this is exactly what happened to me. In my particular case, the offender was given a prison sentence and it was suspended, but the victim support continued in spite of that.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Baroness Levitt) (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity of setting out the Government’s position. Our approach is carefully considered. I regret that the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, seeks to make party-political points out of this by using language such as “insult to victims”, particularly when, in relation to the principal part of his argument, he is just plain wrong.
The starting point is that we must prioritise public funds to ensure that they go where they are most needed. We have done this by providing proactive support to those victims where the court has imposed a longer sentence, because a longer sentence reflects the seriousness of the offence. Of course we recognise that all victims of crime will want information about the offender in their case. For that reason, we are introducing a new route for all victims—the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, is quite right about this—to request information via a dedicated helpline.
This is why new Schedule 6A is in three parts. Part 1 ensures that the most serious cases, involving victims of violent, sexual, and terrorism offences where the defendant has been sentenced to a custodial sentence of 12 months or more, can receive proactive support through the victim contact scheme.
Part 2 ensures support for victims of stalking and harassment offences, regardless of sentence length. We recognise that, even where there is a short sentence, this cohort of victims needs and will receive proactive support through the victim contact scheme.
I am just trying to ensure that the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, can hear the information I am giving him back, because we think that what the noble Lord said is not right, so I thought he might be interested in hearing what I have to say about it.
Part 3 ensures that victims of other sexual and violent offences, and breach offences linked to violence against women and girls, will be able to get information through the helpline should they request it, including for those offences in Part 1 where the sentence for the offence is less than 12 months. We consider that this is the right place to draw the line, but we will keep eligibility under review to make sure that we are reaching the right victims.
The Bill includes regulation-making powers for the Secretary of State to amend the list of offences, and the specified lengths of sentence of such offences, which determine eligibility for either service. The Bill also includes a discretionary power that enables victims of any offence, where the offender is serving a sentence of imprisonment, to be provided with either service, where they request it and probation deem it to be appropriate.
The victim contact scheme and the victim helpline will apply only where there is a custodial sentence. That is not only because of the consideration of public funds but because the information provided via these routes, such as the date of release on licence and conditions of licence, self-evidently does not apply unless there has been a custodial sentence. Where a suspended or community sentence is imposed by the court, under the victims’ code, the police witness care unit will explain the sentence to the victim.
Finally, regarding Amendment 54, I am pleased to reassure the noble Lord that there is already a route for victims to request a senior probation officer review of a decision about what information to provide, so this is already catered for. In the circumstances, I invite the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I addressed this at some length in opening. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and the Minister for correcting my errors. I shall add nothing more. I am also grateful for the Minister’s explanation of how—she hopes, at least—this will work in practice. On that basis, I shall withdraw the amendment.
Lord Sandhurst
“Functions of Commissioner: protecting those assisting victims of crime(1) Section 49 (General functions of Commissioner) of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 is amended as follows.(2) After subsection (1)(a) insert—“(aa) take such steps as the Commissioner considers appropriate to support or protect individuals who act in good faith to assist victims of crime, where those doing so promote the interests of victims and witnesses or encourage good practice in the treatment of victims and witnesses.”(3) After subsection (2) insert—“(2A) For the purposes of subsection (1)(aa), steps taken by the Commissioner may include reporting, making recommendations, or consulting with relevant authorities regarding individuals who assist victims to promote good practice and victim protection.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment clarifies that the Victims’ Commissioner may take discretionary steps to support individuals who assist victims of crime, as part of their statutory role promoting the interests of victims and witnesses.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, Amendments 58, 59 and 60 are intended to strengthen the role of the Victims’ Commissioner. They would ensure that the commissioner can more effectively promote the interests of victims and witnesses and respond to cases that have wider public policy relevance.
Amendment 58 clarifies that
“the Victims’ Commissioner may take discretionary steps to support individuals who assist victims of crime”.
The amendment was brought about following the recent case of Mark Hehir, the bus driver who courageously intervened to prevent one of his passengers being the victim of theft. His actions were nothing short of heroic. He placed himself at real risk to protect passengers and members of the public. His decisiveness in a high-pressure situation should be applauded. Public recognition of his bravery has been strong. A petition in support of him gathered over 140,000 signatures. This demonstrates the widespread view that those who act courageously to protect others should be commended and supported, not left vulnerable to professional or personal consequences. The case highlighted the gaps in protections for citizens who step in to assist victims. Ordinary people who act responsibly should not face penalties or career repercussions for doing the right thing.
Amendment 58 would go some way to addressing that gap. By explicitly allowing the Victims’ Commissioner to support individuals who assist victims, the amendment would ensure that the commissioner can take discretionary action in cases of public significance, such as providing advice, engaging relevant agencies or highlighting best practice. The amendment represents a practical safeguard for citizens such as Mr Hehir and a clear statement that society values and protects bravery and civic responsibility. If individuals such as Mr Hehir do not deserve protection, it is difficult to see who does. This is about recognising heroism and ensuring that those who intervene to protect victims are not left unsupported.
Amendment 59 proposes the removal of the statutory restriction that currently prevents the Victims’ Commissioner exercising functions in relation to an individual victim or witness. We welcome the expansion of the Victims’ Commissioner’s powers in Clause 8, but would like to understand why the Government have included a restriction to the expansion. By removing the restriction entirely, the amendment would ensure that the commissioner can intervene in such cases without procedural or statutory impediment.
It is important to stress that this amendment does not seek to replace existing complaints mechanisms; nor does it transform the commissioner into a case-by- case complaints handler. Instead, it would empower the commissioner to identify and address systemic issues revealed through individual cases, providing a crucial bridge between personal experiences and broader improvements in policy or practice. In doing so, it would strengthen the commissioner’s statutory remit to promote the interests of victims and witnesses rather than limit it.
Amendment 60 takes a more targeted approach, should the Minister oppose Amendment 59. It seeks to limit the restriction on the Victims’ Commissioner exercising functions in individual cases to circumstances where there are ongoing criminal proceedings. This would strike a sensible balance, preserving the integrity and independence of live judicial proceedings while allowing greater engagement with victims and witnesses outside the live court processes. By doing so, it would ensure that the commissioner’s statutory role in promoting the interests of victims and witnesses is meaningful and practical rather than being constrained by overly rigid restrictions.
Amendment 60 seeks to allow the Victims’ Commissioner to request information from agencies, to monitor how individual cases are handled and to promote good practice where lessons from a single case could benefit other victims or witnesses. It would maintain the commissioner’s ability to drive improvements and to highlight systemic issues, without creating any conflict with ongoing judicial processes.
These amendments are designed to enhance the Victims’ Commissioner’s role in supporting victims and witnesses, to ensure that individual cases can inform systemic improvements, and to promote best practice. I look forward to the Minister’s response. I beg to move.
The Senior Deputy Speaker (Lord Gardiner of Kimble)
My Lords, I inform the Committee that if Amendment 59 is agreed to, I will not be able to call Amendment 60 by reason of pre-emption.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, for tabling these amendments and to the Government for the expansion of the Victims’ Commissioner’s powers as set out in the Bill.
However, there are some broader issues that it might be helpful to air here, which are not the subject of amendments, for obvious reasons. It is 22 years since the office of the Victims’ Commissioner was created. I wonder whether, given the legislation that is going through to remove police and crime commissioners, that will change the landscape in which the Victims’ Commissioner’s office works. Therefore, it may be worth reviewing exactly what the roles of the Victims’ Commissioner are. I have some sympathy with the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, in that context.
From these Benches, we have argued that the entirety of the responsibilities of the Victims’ Commissioner should be broader than they were up until the presentation of this Bill. But there is another point that we have raised consistently—not just in legislation but in Questions and at other times—and that is the disparity of resources between the Victims’ Commissioner’s office and the office of the Domestic Abuse Commissioner. I have been told that this is partly because the Victims’ Commissioner’s office looks only at policy, but we know the reality in the complex world of victims is that it sees many more things. If the Government would consider a review of the role in light of the change with police and crime commissioners, it might also be a time to look at whether the Victims’ Commissioner’s office has the resources that it needs to deliver the very important job that it does.
Lord Pannick (CB)
My Lords, I am very doubtful about Amendment 58. It would expand the role of the Victims’ Commissioner very substantially indeed if the Victims’ Commissioner is going to take action to support or protect individuals who act in good faith to assist victims of crime. That would involve a great deal more work for the Victims’ Commissioner. I am very doubtful, with the resources available, that the role of the Victims’ Commissioner should be diverted from the primary responsibility of considering victims of crime.
Of course, one has every sympathy with the bus driver whom the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, mentioned—his behaviour was heroic and his treatment seems to have been very unjust indeed. I understand he does not actually want his job back, but that really is not the point. The point is that to expand the role of the Victims’ Commissioner to other persons who have assisted the victim seems to me to be unjustified and a diversion of resources.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, the Government firmly believe that the Victims’ Commissioner—I have known the current occupant of the role for many years and have the utmost regard for her—has a crucial strategic role in representing the interests of victims and the witnesses of crime and anti-social behaviour.
Amendment 58 would significantly widen the commissioner’s remit by requiring her to support and protect individuals who assist victims. Of course, we agree that the work of those who dedicate their efforts to supporting victims is crucial, but the proposed widening of the Victims’ Commissioner’s statutory functions would, in the Government’s view, dilute the fundamental purpose of the Victims’ Commissioner; that is, to promote the interests of victims and witnesses themselves. In fact, the commissioner’s statutory function of promoting the interests of victims and witnesses already allows her to work with and support those who themselves support victims, and she does not need an explicit statutory function to continue with that.
Since the definition of “those assisting victims” could be interpreted broadly, this amendment also risks heavily extending the casework burden that would be imposed by the two other amendments, to which I now turn.
The Government have already brought forward Clause 8, which proposes to amend the existing statutory limitation on the exercise of the commissioner’s functions in relation to individual cases to allow her to exercise her functions in relation to cases that indicate a wider systemic issue. But Amendments 59 and 60 would go further—either entirely removing or narrowing the existing limitation. We understand the amendments to be creating an alternative. We do not believe that this is the right approach and consider that our carefully designed Clause 8 achieves the right balance.
The Victims’ Commissioner is not a complaints body, and it is important to maintain this distinction. Her role is to advocate for victims as a group and to address system-wide issues—that is what Clause 8 does. It is up to her to decide which cases she believes create those system-wide issues.
Individual victims already have a clear escalation route through the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman if they are dissatisfied with their experience of the criminal justice system. Expanding the commissioner’s involvement in individual casework to this extent would shift his or her role towards handling complaints rather than overseeing the system as a whole.
It is also vital that decisions of the judiciary and other independent public bodies that support victims of crime remain free from external influence. The current legislative bar, and the amendment to it that we have proposed through Clause 8, safeguards that independence and avoids any uncertainty about the commissioner’s role in such processes. We do not believe that Amendments 59 or 60 achieve that.
The point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, which she has raised and discussed with me before on the many occasions on which we have now met—obviously, I look forward to many more—is a good point and one that we need to keep under review. Perhaps the noble Baroness and I can discuss it further the next time we meet. As I say, I very much look forward to that.
I hope the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, agrees that preserving the Victims’ Commissioner’s strategic function is essential to holding the system to account effectively, and I invite him to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I listened with interest to what the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, had to say, and indeed to the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. I encourage the Minister to listen with care to what the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, said and perhaps to move our way on certain aspects.
Dealing with Amendment 58, the law should not leave people such as Mr Hehir exposed to detriment for acting courageously. It may be that the Victims’ Commissioner is not the right person, but we put this forward in the hope that it would allow consideration of what to do in such situations. The amendment sends a clear message that civic responsibility and bravery should not be met with silence or indifference on the part of authority.
Amendment 59 would remove the restriction on individual cases. We appreciate that the commissioner has a strategic role to promote the interests of victims and witnesses generally, but that cannot be done effectively if individual cases are placed beyond reach. We accept that Clause 8 enables the commissioner to act in cases relevant to public policy, and we are grateful for that, but individual cases often reveal systemic failings. Removing the restriction entirely would enable oversight and the identification of patterns that will require reform. If we are serious about learning lessons, we suggest that the commissioner should be able to look at cases from which those lessons arise, but do so with discretion.
If the Minister considers that Amendment 59 is too broad, Amendment 60 would provide a possible balanced alternative. It would preserve the integrity of live criminal proceedings, it would allow engagement in individual cases once proceedings have concluded, and it would ensure that the commissioner can examine outcomes, seek information and promote improvements without interfering with the courts. It reflects a sensible constitutional boundary.
In summary, these amendments would not unduly expand the commissioner’s role but would clarify and strengthen it. They would ensure that individual experiences inform systemic reform and that statutory restrictions do not undermine the purpose of the office itself. A Victims’ Commissioner who cannot meaningfully engage where necessary with individual cases is constrained in fulfilling the commissioner’s core duty.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
The noble Lord seems to be suggesting that the Victims’ Commissioner does not now engage with individual cases. My understanding is that she very much does, but to feed towards her statutory role. That is quite different from getting involved in the minutiae of an individual case, supporting a victim or witness and promoting that individual’s interests.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, there is clearly a balance to be struck. I think we should, as we go forward, because we all have the same interests at heart here, look carefully at whether there will be occasions when the commissioner should look at individual cases, not so much to interfere but to draw on the information that can be gleaned from them and use them in setting policy. With that said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I oppose the Question that Clause 11 stand part of the Bill. This clause seeks to extend the right to prosecute to those with different qualifications from solicitors or barristers.
As my noble friend Lord Gove highlighted at Second Reading, the Crown Prosecution Service faces constraints in whom it can employ, and the criminal Bar is facing a retention crisis. Last year, a national survey by the Criminal Bar Association found that one in three criminal barristers intends to quit. It is obviously crucial that we have enough Crown prosecutors for cases, and we fully appreciate on this side the challenge that the Government face. However, I do not believe that this clause is an appropriate solution. Rather than carefully addressing the causes of those pressures and looking for proper solutions, this clause simply moves the goalposts. It redefines who is qualified to undertake what is highly serious work. That is not good enough.
While it has been argued that allowing CILEX members to prosecute will help to increase diversity, this argument should not be used as a smokescreen for what could potentially dilute standards. I dare say that is not what those truly calling for diversity want either, on their part. Genuine diversity in the legal profession is not achieved by lowering thresholds or by altering qualifications to fill gaps. It is achieved by facilitating pathways and by supporting structures within the profession, so that people from all backgrounds can succeed on an equal footing. To suggest otherwise risks turning diversity into a box-ticking exercise. It does not demonstrate an authentic commitment to broadening access to the profession.
We cannot risk lowering the quality of prosecution. This would not be fair on the defendant, and certainly not on the victim, and it is definitely not in the long- term public interest. Victims and defendants rely on the competence of the prosecutor. A victim must have confidence that their case is being handled by someone who is suitably qualified. Those who prosecute murders today will some years ago have prosecuted in the magistrates’ courts; they start at the lower level and they move up, gaining their experience moving from level to level as proportionate to their skills.
A defendant whose liberty may be at stake is entitled to proper assurance. These are not minor concerns; they go to the heart of our justice system. More widely, any weakening of our standards risks undermining public confidence in the justice system as a whole and weakening the supply, I suggest, of future prosecutors of serious crime. Can the Minister please explain what assessments were undertaken previously of the impact of this proposed change?
If we are to expand the pool of prosecutors, we must be absolutely sure that this shift is backed by sufficient evidence of good quality, and that any necessary safeguards are in place to ensure that standards will not drift or diverge over time. The Committee deserves clear evidence that this reform will enhance, and not diminish, the quality of prosecutions. We have not been shown that evidence. Without it, this clause risks creating more problems than it solves. I urge the Minister please to reflect carefully on these concerns and to ensure that any change to the thresholds is supported by robust, transparent evidence and proper safeguards. I beg to move.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
My Lords, I will make one or two brief observations about this, if I may. First, I must declare an interest, in that about 10 years ago I was made an honorary vice-president of CILEX. In case it is thought that I am speaking with the interests of CILEX in mind, I wanted to make that absolutely clear.
My first observation is this: the transformation of the way in which the legal profession operates and its financial position has been enormous over the last 20 or so years. Sometimes, I think we forget the huge difference there is in remuneration for those who practise in areas such as commercial and administrative law and those who practise in the criminal sphere. This is having a very serious effect on the ability.
How that problem is solved is a matter for Her Majesty’s Government, not for me, but it seems to me that, in looking at what the state can afford, it is necessary to look at the way in which an organisation such as CILEX has transformed itself, the qualifications that are given and the reality of many cases. As a judge, one sometimes feels that the best experience for being a good prosecutor is having done a lot of prosecutions, not necessarily where they had a first-class degree from a great university or whether she had done extremely well in the solicitor’s or Bar finals; experience is important.
Lord Pannick (CB)
My Lords, I entirely agree with what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas has said. I shall add some observations. It is self-evident, as the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, says, that only those who are qualified and competent should be responsible for prosecutions, and no one would dispute that. However, it seems to me equally self-evident that not every criminal prosecution requires presentation by a barrister or a solicitor. There are many criminal prosecutions that others are perfectly competent to present. What matters is to ensure that whoever prosecutes in any particular case has the qualifications and experience that are necessary, and that will depend upon the nature of the case, whether it be a murder case at one extreme or a driving case at the other. I hope the Minister will be able to assure us that those factors will be, and are being, taken into account in deciding, once this reform is introduced, who prosecutes in any particular case.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
The noble and learned Lord has said what I wanted to say much more sensitively and tactfully, but I will say what I was going to say.
There is a danger that lawyers of my generation— I shall just apply it to my generation and not suggest which generation other Members of the House belong to—are prejudiced against lawyers who do not have standard qualifications, if you like, or the backgrounds that many of us come from. I understand from CILEX that there are 133 members working as associate prosecutors who cannot progress or get promotion. That is a real shame. It is a much wider issue than just prosecution.
I think the noble Lord answered his own point because he was talking about members of the Bar progressing. The Minister will tell us—I cannot believe it is not the case—that no one joins the CPS and prosecutes a murder the next day. Every profession has its hierarchy, and one progresses in the hierarchy dependent on both skill and experience. The current position is out of date, so, even if it were not to solve an immediate problem, what is proposed in the Bill is a good idea. I am afraid that we cannot support the opposition to the clause.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, it is vital to ensure that the Crown Prosecution Service can recruit and retain a sufficient number of qualified Crown prosecutors. We suggest that Clause 11 supports this aim by increasing the CPS’s recruitment flexibility through the removal of an unnecessary legislative barrier. In turn, this will help increase the pool of eligible candidates for appointment as Crown prosecutors. It is axiomatic that a shortage of Crown prosecutors adds to the backlog because it cannot make decisions quite as quickly about prosecutions as it could if there were more of them.
Currently, the Crown Prosecution Service is restricted in who it can appoint as Crown prosecutors due to an unnecessary legal requirement. This is set out in the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985, which provides that Crown prosecutors and those who prosecute cases on behalf of the CPS must hold what is known as the general qualification. The general qualification is a term of art, having a very specific meaning in this context. It means that a prospective Crown prosecutor must have
“a right of audience in relation to any class of proceedings in any part of the Senior Courts, or all proceedings in county courts or magistrates’ courts”,
even though most of those rights of audience—for example, before the Court of Appeal or the Supreme Court—are never going to be exercised by a Crown prosecutor in a million years.
This requirement can exclude certain qualified legal professionals, including CILEX practitioners—from the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives—who have relevant criminal practice rights but are prohibited from becoming Crown prosecutors. These legal professionals, including CILEX practitioners, often hold the right skills and specialist qualifications required to perform the Crown prosecutor role, including having rights of audience for the courts in which they will actually appear, as opposed to rights of audience for the courts in which they will not, but they do not meet the general qualification criteria. This restriction limits the DPP’s ability to consider a wider pool of legal talent and reduces the CPS’s flexibility in managing existing and future recruitment challenges.
The purpose of this clause is to remove the requirement for the general qualification and, in doing so, give the DPP the discretion to appoint appropriately qualified legal professionals, such as CILEX practitioners, as Crown prosecutors for the CPS. I can reassure the Committee that the removal of the general qualification requirement will not in any way dilute professional standards; there are appropriate safeguards to preserve standards.
Prospective professionals eligible to be a Crown prosecutor who do not at the moment hold the general qualification must still meet the authorisation requirements of the Legal Services Act 2007—they have to be appropriately qualified, authorised and regulated, and be able to exercise rights of audience and conduct litigation, both of which are reserved legal activities under the Act. It is a criminal offence under the Act to carry out reserved legal activities unless entitled to do so.
In addition, it is important to note that the measure does not require the CPS to appoint any specific type of legal professional. Instead, it gives it the flexibility to do so where appropriate and ensures that recruitment decisions remain firmly within the DPP’s control. The DPP will retain full discretion over appointments, ensuring that only suitably qualified and experienced individuals become Crown prosecutors. Newly eligible professionals must meet the same Crown prosecutor competency standards as those who qualify through more traditional routes. I also emphasise that those appointed following this change will, like all Crown prosecutors, be subject to performance monitoring by the CPS, including case strategy quality assessments focused on the application of the Code for Crown Prosecutors.
This change reflects the modern legal services landscape, spoken to powerfully by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas. Alternative routes to qualification are increasingly common, where professionals from non-traditional backgrounds play a growing role in the justice system. By removing this unnecessary legislative barrier, the clause may also support the recruitment of a diverse and representative cohort of Crown prosecutors.
I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, has ever met any CILEX practitioners; I certainly have, and they are an amazing cohort of people. I am sure he absolutely did not intend to suggest that somehow those who have qualified through an alternative route are, by very definition, less competent than those who have gone through the traditional route. If that is the suggestion, then it is not one this Government can support. I therefore hope that the Committee will join me in supporting Clause 11 to stand part of the Bill and I invite the noble Lord to withdraw his opposition to it.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, this has been an interesting debate. At the heart of it lies the underfunded state of our criminal justice system—something which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, has highlighted. Looking forward, the criminal justice system needs more money and the prosecution service needs proper funding, as of course do those who defend in the criminal courts; but Clause 11 does propose a significant shift, extending the right to prosecute to individuals who do not hold the long-standing qualifications of solicitors and barristers. I cast no aspersions on CILEX, but I make that observation. There is a difference in their training and educational background. This clause will expand capacity, there is no doubt about it—and there is no doubt that the system requires it, for the reasons that others have outlined in this debate—but it will not address the underlying cause of problems faced in the criminal courts. We must not go down a route which results in weakening of standards, undermining of public confidence, and unfairness to victims and witnesses involved in the criminal courts.
A central issue remains the absence of clear evidence in support of Clause 11. We have sought clarity from the Minister on what assessments were undertaken on the impact of this change, whether risks to standards were considered, and whether safeguards are in fact in place to maintain standards over time. Without clear evidence, Parliament cannot truly judge whether the proposed reform protects the quality of prosecutions. We must not embark on a position where there are unclear professional boundaries and variations in training and oversight.
We recognise the pressures facing the criminal justice system and the need for more good people to embark on careers in the criminal courts, whether in defence or in prosecution; in this case, we are talking about prosecutors. We share the desire for a stronger, more resilient system, but Clause 11 does not, we suggest, properly address the causes of these pressures. We urge the Minister to reflect carefully on the concerns which I have raised and to consider whether Clause 11 provides the assurance and evidence that this House, our justice system and, indeed, victims deserve. That said, I will not pursue my opposition.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, Clause 12 is an exception to the many provisions of the Bill that we support. It concerns the recovery of costs in private prosecutions. On its face, it may seem a minor and rather technical amendment, but in substance Clause 12 represents a significant shift in long-established policy and practice. It has serious implications for access to justice, particularly for victims of fraud and economic crime.
Private prosecutions should be regarded as a safeguard, rather than an anomaly, in our criminal justice system. Such prosecutions exist precisely to ensure that, where the state cannot or does not act, victims are not left without recourse. Private prosecutions are conducted in the criminal courts and are subject to the same judicial oversight, obligations of disclosure and prosecutorial duties as any other prosecution. Judges retain full control throughout, and the Crown Prosecution Service retains its power to take over cases where it considers that to be appropriate. For many years, Parliament, Ministers and the courts have recognised that private prosecutions serve a public interest. That is why the current costs regime allows courts to order payment from central funds for reasonable sums properly incurred by private prosecutors. This payment is not a windfall. It is simply reasonable compensation for costs already borne, and even then recovery is typically partial and not complete.
It is our strong belief that Clause 12 would change that settlement fundamentally. It gives the Government power through regulations to cap the recoverable costs of private prosecutors. In so doing, it risks making many legitimate prosecutions financially unviable. That is particularly so for charities and other public interest bodies which pursue cases only after other routes have failed. This would represent a sharp departure from previous ministerial policy.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
My Lords, the issue of costs in private prosecutions is an extraordinarily serious one. The noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, has spoken of the position of charities, the RSPCA being one example. One can well understand the position of a charity conducting a prosecution through a small solicitor where costs are modest. On the other hand, one must recall that for good reasons of public interest, there are private prosecutions by large corporations to protect intellectual property. The consequence of the change in the market for solicitors and barristers has produced a problem, because what the CPS pays prosecutors to prosecute is completely out of line with what a large, industrial conglomerate that wants to enforce its intellectual property rights can pay. This is a problem that has to be grappled with.
One of the reasons why the CPS cannot prosecute more than it does is the Government’s constraint; both the last Government and this one are responsible for that. There is not enough money in the system to enable the CPS to prosecute where it should be doing so. More than 10 years ago, the change in the market and the constraint on the finances of the CPS, arising out of the 2008 financial crisis, began to manifest themselves in the contrast between what happened in private prosecutions by large conglomerates, or associations of those interested to protect their economic position, and in the CPS. The courts have tried to do something about it through a number of cases, but it is an extraordinarily difficult area.
For example, in a commercial case—many of these cases go to solicitors—there did not used to be the idea that you would have to get a tender before you prosecuted, but the courts now require it. The courts have made a number of very important changes to try to bring this cost under control, because, although it cannot be shown that if you pay a large sum—several hundred thousand pounds—to defer the costs of a private prosecution it will directly come out of any bit of the overall justice budget, anyone who has had to deal with the Treasury knows that that is the case. The Treasury looks at a pot for justice and, if you take large sums out of it by paying for private prosecutions, the other part of the justice system suffers.
This is a matter that has to be grappled with, and the right people to grapple with it are the Government. It is not a very good position for judges to be in to be making these very difficult decisions because of the gross inequality between what you pay private lawyers, which many may think is far too much but that is not for me to judge, and what you pay the Crown Prosecution Service, which may not be enough—again, that is not for me to judge. The problem of what I might call public penury and private affluence is absolutely illustrated by the problem of paying for private prosecutions. It is for the Government to grapple with, and setting rates is one of the ways to do it. I think it is probably the right way, but all I am saying is we that cannot run away from this problem that has arisen because of changes in the market and the constraints on public expenditure.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, the noble and learned Lord has inevitably given us a very brief tour d’horizon of the problems of the costs and charges of the legal profession getting out of hand. Looking at the Bill over the weekend, I had to turn up the 1985 Act and write into it the changes that would be made by the Bill. It seems that the one to focus on is making the provisions subject to regulations, which boils down to the Lord Chancellor setting rates—at least that is how I read it. It is not much of a stretch to think that those are going to be linked to legal aid rates, and one can see the problem.
The noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, who explained some of the problems very clearly, mentioned consultation and rather dismissed it as being helpful, but it is important that the Committee should know what is planned by way of consultation. I hope the Minister can help us on that, because so much turns on its outcome.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, in the view of the Government, Clause 12 provides a modest enabling power for the Lord Chancellor to set through regulations the rates at which private prosecutors may recover expenses from central funds where a court has ordered that such costs be paid. To be clear at the outset, this clause does not set any rates, and it does not affect the long-established right to bring a private prosecution, which remains protected under the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985.
I should say at this stage that I have a great deal of experience in the area of private prosecutions, both as a state prosecutor working for the Crown Prosecution Service, where I oversaw all the private prosecutions that came to the CPS for consideration, and in private practice, where I brought a number of private prosecutions on behalf of clients and advised on many more.
The Justice Select Committee, in its 2020 report, Private Prosecutions: Safeguards, invited the Government to take a closer look at the private prosecution landscape, particularly where public funds are engaged. Taking an enabling power of this kind allows us to do precisely that in a careful and evidence-based way. The committee highlighted three key principles, which this Government agree should underpin reform: first, addressing the disparity between defence resources and those of private prosecutors; secondly, safeguarding the right of individuals to bring a private prosecution; and, thirdly, ensuring the proportionate and responsible use of public funds.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I listened with interest to the Minister. I remain of the view that private prosecutions are a constitutional safeguard for when the CPS is unable or unwilling to act. There remains the position of charities and there remains the position of corporations and other organisations trying to protect their intellectual property by exercising perfectly lawful prosecutions. The example given of the costs in a particular case is not really helpful, as we do not know the details. It is the sort of things that we would have had detail of had there been a proper consultation first, and we would not have one cherry-picked example given to us.
That said, I remind the Committee that what we are looking at here is £3.9 million—not a lot. It is not a small sum, of course, but it is not a large sum in the context of the criminal justice budget. My concerns have not been put to rest but, in the circumstances, I shall not occupy any more of the Committee’s time. I beg leave to withdraw.
Baroness Chakrabarti
“Removal of presumption of computer reliability(1) Section 69 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 is reinstated.(2) Section 60 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 is repealed.”Member's explanatory statement
This new clause removes the statutory rebuttable presumption that a computer system is working correctly for the purposes of criminal evidence produced by it. Instead, prosecutors would have to offer a reasonable demonstration of the reliability of any relevant hardware and software on which it proposes to rely, thus giving the defence an opportunity to scrutinise and challenge the same.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
My Lords, this group contains two amendments that seek to address dangerous practices relating to criminal evidence. While the Bill does much to protect victims of crime, our justice system must also protect people from becoming victims of miscarriages of justice. Both of the problems we identify have already led to serious wrongful convictions and risk many more in the future.
Amendment 61 is in my name and those of the noble Lords, Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom and Lord Beamish, who fought so hard in the other place for the sub-postmasters, and of the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, who has been such a distinguished campaigner for the rule of law to apply as much to big tech as anyone else. I share Amendment 62 with my old and dear noble friend Lady Lawrence of Clarendon. If honour by association was as easy as guilt by association, I would be honoured indeed.
Amendment 61 is a simple amendment that would reinstate Section 69 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. It was repealed by the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 on a recommendation of the Law Commission, but long before contemporary understanding of both the capabilities and fallibilities of digital technology.
Under the old Section 69, a party seeking to rely on computer evidence had to show that there was no improper use of the computer, that it was operating properly at all material times and that any faults did not affect output. It allowed for court rules to scrutinise computer evidence. Since the repeal of that vital protection, a common-law presumption of computer reliability and accuracy has applied, in effect reversing the criminal burden of proof in some cases and leading to serious harm, most recently in the Post Office Horizon scandal. Several Justice Ministers have acknowledged this since 2018. The Ministry of Justice released a call for evidence in January 2025. I hope my noble friend the Minister will tell us what has come as a result, because that is too long, I suggest.
The presumption is inaccurate, unsafe and far from future-proof. Technology is not infallible, as we saw so graphically in the end with the Fujitsu Horizon scandal. Perhaps my noble friend can also tell us what attempts that corporation has made to recompense the UK taxpayer and the victims of the abuse and scandal. Flaws can be hidden and very difficult for a lone defendant, or even a group of defendants, to detect. They cannot take on the corporation, let alone look in the black box. Developments in artificial intelligence, including the capabilities for deepfakes, make the risks of presuming computer evidence reliability even more dangerous. I hope that the Government will either accept our amendment or offer an alternative in this Bill. The clock is ticking.
As for Amendment 62, I ask Members of the Committee to consider whether they have ever indulged in crime procedurals as a guilty pleasure, whether reading them or watching them on their favourite streamer after a long night in Committee in your Lordships’ House. Middle England is addicted to those dramas, whether on TV or in books, and the creativity behind them is big business. But what if those who participated in the creation of that art, or even just enjoyed it, found themselves prosecuted on the basis that that interest was somehow probative of criminal intention or propensity?
If noble Lords find that a ridiculous proposition, they should spare a thought for the young Black men and boys who have increasingly been prosecuted with reliance on their enjoyment of rap and drill music. It is disgraceful and has been allowed to go on for some years now. Even more outrageous, there are groups and units of mostly middle-aged white police officers who hold themselves out as expert witnesses to translate this music, these lyrics and the patois for juries. Learned friends at the Bar, including my learned friend Keir Monteith KC, who is currently in the Chamber, have had to take this on in court and have dealt with miscarriages of justice in the Court of Appeal because of this kind of prejudicial and racially prejudiced practice.
The figures are not good. The Crown Prosecution Service does not keep records of music evidence being used in this way in court, but studies at the University of Manchester in particular show that there have been many cases: 68 cases involving 252 defendants between 2020 and 2023. That is probably an underestimate, because these are first instance trials and are not always reported. Two-thirds of the defendants in the Manchester study were Black, 12% were mixed race, 82% were under 25 years old, and 15% were aged 17 or younger. Over half the cases were of course joint enterprise prosecutions, because there is a particularly toxic cocktail when you combine the use of this prejudicial material with casting the net so wide as in joint enterprise.
In the case of the Manchester 10, Black teenagers were collectively sentenced to 131 years in prison for conspiracy to murder and to cause grievous bodily harm. During the trial, a nine-second video clip of someone identified as one of the defendants, with drill music playing in the background, was used as evidence of his gang membership. In closing, the prosecution Silk told the jury that some of the defendants had become involved in gang culture
“because they had an interest in drill … with its themes of violence, drugs and criminality”.
“The Night Manager”, anyone?
The Court of Appeal found that the young man had been misidentified. There was not even rapping in the video. This is how bad this practice is. He was of good character: head boy and captain of the rugby team, with an unconditional offer to study law—forgive me for being particularly attached to the study of law as a noble pursuit, but I hope noble Lords take my point. His conviction was quashed, but only after serving three years in prison.
We talk about equality before the law. That requires that no one is above the law’s reach, nor anyone below its protection. The shameful events currently rocking our politics only highlight the dangers of entitlement, hypocrisy, and the obvious destruction of trust in our vital institutions when there is “one law for some” and no fair hearing for others.
This is a modest but vital reform. It would create a presumption that any creative expression on the part of a defendant—not just rap and drill music—should be inadmissible unless four tests are met. First, the expression must have a literal, rather than figurative or fictional, meaning. Secondly, it must refer to the specific facts of the case. Thirdly, it must be relevant to an issue of dispute. Finally, that issue cannot be decided by other evidence.
Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)
My Lords, I will speak on Amendment 61. I did not speak at Second Reading, for which I apologise to your Lordships’ House. I lacked the ingenuity of the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, in moving an amendment to the Bill. I pay tribute to her for doing so. Everything she said about Amendment 61 was right. I also pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, for pursuing this issue with her usual persistence and eloquence. I am grateful to her for having involved me in some of the meetings that she organised.
My first point is that evidence derived from a computer is hearsay. There are very good reasons why we treat hearsay evidence with caution. To admit hearsay evidence is a step in itself, but to presume that it is reliable is a giant stride beyond that.
Secondly, we are all aware of how frequently we have to redo the programming on our Apple iPhones or whatever, partly because of bugs in the programming of the computer technology on which we rely so much. Bugs are inevitable in computer programmes. That was why Fujitsu—I hope the Minister will answer the point about whether Fujitsu has paid, or might pay, any money to the taxpayer or to the sub-postmasters— had an office dedicated not just to altering the sub- postmasters’ balances, shocking as that was, but to altering and amending a programme that was never going to be perfect, because no computer programme is. If computer programmes are inherently unreliable, to have a presumption in law that they are reliable is unsustainable.
Thirdly, the consequences of the repeal of Section 69 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984—which, I remind your Lordships, happened partly because the Post Office asked for it to happen to make its prosecutions easier for it—were that Seema Misra was sent to prison when she was eight weeks pregnant and on her son’s 10th birthday. She collapsed when she was sentenced. This is an urgent matter. If we leave it in place, further injustices may happen as soon as tomorrow.
That is the first point about why it is urgent. The second point about why it is urgent is that any defence lawyer, in any event, will point to the Horizon case and say that it is perfectly obvious that this presumption is wrong. It is perfectly obvious. We cannot, in all good conscience, permit to continue in law a presumption which we know to be incorrect, and I hope that the Minister will at least set out a path to changing it.
Lord Beamish (Lab)
My Lords, I too support Amendment 61 in the name of my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti.
When I left my home in Durham on Monday morning, I had a phone call. It was from an individual I had met five years earlier. He was the husband of a postmistress in Northumberland who had been prosecuted by the Post Office. She was prosecuted in 1998. He was ringing me to tell me that on the Saturday morning, she had received the letter overturning her conviction under the Horizon Post Office scandal.
I met the couple five years ago. They had a thriving business and were well respected in the community—a small village in Northumberland. They now live in a small council house in the same village. As they explained to me when I sat in their living room, everyone still thinks, “That is the woman who stole the money from the Post Office”.
That woman was traumatised. That is the only word I can use. She had blanks in her mind. It was very difficult for me to get the information from her, so traumatised she was. That woman has suffered for nearly 30 years. She has now got that letter saying that she did nothing wrong and can now hold her head up high in her community. As I said to her husband, that must be an unbelievable feeling.
That couple are going to get compensation—quite rightly—but, as the husband said, that is not important. The important thing was that woman’s and their family’s good name. That was ruined, because computer evidence, as the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, just said, was used to persecute a decent, hard-working woman.
Over the last 15 or 16 years that the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, and I have been campaigning on this, I have met many victims of this scandal. They are decent, ordinary people whom you pass in the street. If you were their friend, you would consider it a privilege. Their lives have been completely ruined. That is because the presumption was that the computer had to be right. It was classed as a mechanical machine and that this could not be infallible.
The judiciary needs to take some blame in the Post Office scandal, because I have read many court transcripts of the cases. I think of one. There was a postmistress from County Durham called June Tooby, who was not involved in the Horizon case but the pre-Horizon scheme—Capture. She was an absolutely marvellous woman and she defended herself in court. She said to the judge that her argument was that the computer was wrong and gave the reasons why. He dismissed her completely out of hand and would not listen to her that somehow this was a possibility.
That is not the only case that I have seen where judges have taken the approach of completely dismissing that. I am not one for attacking our judiciary, but I get annoyed when judges get on their high horse and say that somehow they cannot be criticised. The judiciary played a part in this scandal and must take responsibility for that.
The noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, said that this is urgent. It is urgent. My noble friend Lady Chakrabarti said that the consultation started on 21 January 2025. Sarah Sackman, the then Minister, said at the opening of that consultation:
“We must learn the lessons of the Post Office scandal … Ensuring people are protected from miscarriages of justice is … one part of the government’s Plan for Change”.
That was over a year ago. I know that things move very slowly in this Government and that things sometimes have gestation periods longer than that of an African elephant, but this cannot wait. I urge the Minister. We do not want any more reviews or need any more consultations. That seems to be the in word these days—if you do not want to make a decision, have a consultation or say, “We are considering it”. This is now urgent.
I congratulate my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti on tabling this amendment. It must be done in this Bill. It cannot wait. Speaking for myself—and, I think, on behalf of my friend, the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot —we will not let this rest. This is the opportunity for the Government to put this right. I would love to know what the Ministry of Justice has been doing for the last year because it is a very simple thing; nor is it controversial. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, has just said, people will still be found guilty. There will be more victims if we do not change this. This would also send a clear signal to those victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal that this Government are taking this seriously.
I say, very gently, to the Minister, not to come back with, “We’re going to review it” or that there is some next stage to go through. Frankly, I am getting sick of this. My heart drops when I hear of another review or consultation. It seems to be a great “Yes Minister” way of kicking things into the long grass. This cannot be kicked into the long grass. I am determined that it will not be.
Baroness Kidron (CB)
My Lords, I support Amendment 61, to which I have added my name, and associate myself with the noble Baroness’s words on Amendment 62. I was sitting here thinking that if I was guilty of the total creative expression that I have consumed, I would have to be locked up for life. It was moving to hear how one small fraction of the population is being discriminated against on this count, so I add my support on that issue.
The noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and the noble Lords, Lord Beamish and Lord Arbuthnot, have laid out the case comprehensively and persuasively. There is indeed a great deal of history to it. I thought it might be useful for me to concentrate on the justification of successive Governments for resisting it. This centres primarily around the idea that computers now permeate every aspect of life and that altering the presumption in law, in the words of the former Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, would bring into scope
“evidence presented in every type of court proceeding and would have a detrimental effect on the courts and prosecution—potentially leading to unnecessary delays”.—[Official Report, 18/12/24; col. GC 160.]
It is important to hear that, because it was almost identical to the words spoken by the previous Minister, the noble Viscount, Lord Camrose, who said:
“Almost all criminal cases rely on computer evidence to some extent, so any change to the burden of proof would or could impede the work of the Crown Prosecution Service and other prosecutors”,—[Official Report, 24/4/24; col. GC 580.]
leading to great delays. In other words, they had exactly the same rebuttal to a suggestion that we made, as the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, explained, in not one but two previous Bills. My worry is that the argument appears to be that computer evidence is so pervasive that we cannot change the law. But the reverse must also be true: if it is going to be so pervasive, how can we allow it to remain above the law?
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
My Lords, I support the principle behind Amendment 61. The real question is: how quickly can this be done?
I want to give an illustration of a problem that has arisen in civil courts across the world: the ability of artificial intelligence to hallucinate—to create cases and precedents for lawyers to use that do not exist. All civil courts across the world, including those in this country, have realised that this is an immense problem. It is being dealt with by practice direction—in some cases, very quickly indeed—because it is corrosive to the proper conduct of litigation, and it seems to me that there is no reason why, when this comes back on Report, it cannot be dealt with. It is not a difficult problem, and if it has been around for two years, that is 18 months too long.
The other point I want to address, in a slightly different manner, is Amendment 62. This is a much more difficult problem and has arisen because of the way in which drill music, and similar music, has been used in the prosecution of cases. The admissibility of such evidence is quite complicated.
What is very worrying—as can be seen by the attendance here today of one of the counsels involved in these cases—is that the way in which this evidence has been used in some cases has caused a lot of deep misunderstanding and suspicion about the way our criminal justice system operates for certain minorities. The thought that you will be found guilty because of the music you listen to is deeply troubling.
However, it seems to me that what we need to do first is look at the cases where this has been used. I looked at the case of the Manchester 10 and, coincidentally, in that case, the evidence had been admitted by agreement, and the Court of Appeal upheld the way in which it had been used for certain purposes.
It seems to me that this is a more complicated problem, and it would be helpful if the Minister was able, between now and Report, to put before the House a short letter explaining what the problem is. I think it would be easier to look at the amendment in the light of a better understanding. The last thing I want to do is to bore the Committee by explaining the ways in which evidence can and cannot be used legitimately. It is much better that members of the Committee have the benefit of reading that on a piece of paper.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, I have two brief points on Amendment 61, and I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, for tabling it. It is really wrong that computers or systems have ever been deemed to be reliable, let alone infallible. My husband is a research and design engineer who has worked in Cambridge Science Park for well over 40 years. He and his friends have a phrase that they use among themselves and about themselves: “Garbage in, garbage out”. When we started hearing about the Post Office Horizon scandal and Fujitsu, the first thing he said to me was, “Garbage in, garbage out”. The problem we have is that too many people, the courts and the court of public opinion believe that computer systems are infallible.
I also want to touch very briefly on AI because we are seeing cases in the courts now. Facial recognition cases are coming up. Big Brother Watch reported on one last June. I notice that not quite weekly, but quite frequently, an individual is arrested as they go into a store and are accused of taking something very small and then evidence is produced of them on a facial recognition watch list. It then transpires some time later that they are not that individual. One particular firm’s name keeps coming up—I will not go into that —but the reaction of the shop is exactly that: it is infallible. I support the amendment, and I urge the Minister and the Government not to pause on this at all. It is needed, not just for the legacy of Post Office Horizon, but for cases in our courts right now.
Lord Bailey of Paddington (Con)
I rise in support of Amendment 62, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti. Perhaps I can help the Minister with some of the intricacies of this. We have heard from Members who have a legal background. I have a youth work background, and I would like to say this: much of the music that is being talked about—drill music, rap music—is horrific. The content of the music is horrific and it is horrible, but, unfortunately, it is also very entertaining. Many young people will listen to it just by association. The music is entertaining, people party and you have no other choice. So for someone to view your output as an individual through your membership of that genre is a very slippery slope. Many years ago, I dealt with a group of young men who made a video that pointed to some serious criminality, and the police dealt with it in the right manner. They used it to understand who they might further investigate. They did not use the evidence, except one part that was quite blatant, as a reason to prosecute individuals.
When someone tells you that they are an expert in interpreting the music, I am afraid they are wrong. I was born in that community, I come from that community, many members of my family make that music, but because young people make the music and technology allows them to make it so quickly, the words they use, the meanings they use and the characters they build change almost on a daily basis. If you were to say to my son, “the man dem”, he would understand. Would noble Lords? When I grew up, “the man dem” existed as a concept, but the words did not, so he and I can have a conversation about the same thing and not know that we are talking about the same thing.
Very rarely will you hear me stand up, talk about race and accuse the police of being racist, but this cuts very close to that because when a lovely, well-meaning, educated, middle-class man or woman listens to the music, they have no understanding of the cultural background of that music or of the fact that that music might have been produced in the way it was to display a character. Much of the bragging and the boasting is simply that: bragging and boasting about fictitious situations that they hope they will never be in and that we also hope they will never be in. To present that in court as some kind of evidence of their associations and their behaviour is a slippery slope. If you want to destroy the relationship between young people, particularly young Black people, and our system, this would be the way to go.
Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon (Lab)
My Lords, I declare my interest as an anti-racism adviser to the Labour leadership. I added my name to Amendment 62 tabled by my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti. I hope noble Lords understand why I have done this, given my years of campaigning for race equality, in the criminal justice space in particular. Our amendment is essential but also modest and proportionate. We do not say that creative expression can never be admissible in criminal trials. We just say that there must be a strict rule against racial prejudice in particular. It is not new in our system to try to ensure that prejudice associated with criminal evidence should not outweigh its probative value, nor, unfortunately, is it new to find the police and the prosecution system working against people of colour when they should be protecting everyone from all our diverse communities equally. As my noble friend said, we would not dream of prosecuting a middle-class, middle-aged, white person for crimes on the basis of them writing or enjoying crime fiction. Why then are we happily prosecuting young Black men and boys on the basis of rap and drill music? I think we all know why. We talk about equality before the law, but 28 years after the Lawrence inquiry, we know the principle is still not a reality.
My noble friend Lady Chakrabarti mentioned a young Mancunian man, a model student, a head boy aspiring to be a law student who had an unconditional offer to study law at the University of Birmingham—until the police and the prosecutors wrongly mistook him for a youngster in a nine-second video in which drill music was playing in the background. Through reliance on this ridiculous evidence, he was convicted of violent conspiracy. His conviction was overturned, but only after he served three years in prison. I urge the Committee to support our amendment and my noble friends in the Government to accept it.
Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, I rise briefly to speak to Amendment 61. In doing a little background on this, I looked at the Law Society’s response to the MoJ call for evidence, which it produced last April. I wish to read two brief excerpts, because I think they are both particularly pertinent to what we are talking about. The first says:
“But given the increasing complexity of computational systems, computers should not be assumed to be operating correctly. Instead”—
this is important, because this is what other jurisdictions outside the UK systematically do—
“it should be evidenced and demonstrated through assurance, regular review, and disclosure of the technical standards applied by the system”.
That is what happens in Germany. That is what happens in France. That is what mostly happens in the United States.
Secondly, returning to the issue of artificial intelligence, the Law Society has been thinking about this and is clearly very worried about it. I quote again:
“Careful consideration needs to be given to emerging AI technologies that overlap with but go beyond the scope of this call for evidence. For AI, an additional layer of certification for meeting internationally recognised standards is important to ensure accountability and transparency, especially if they were designed and developed”—
which they mostly are—
“outside of the jurisdiction … Attention must be given to the ability for domestic regulation and requirements to be adhered to for computer systems and AI tools that are built outside of the jurisdiction”.
Baroness Hamwee (LD)
My Lords, it is six years since the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I were among the members of a newly formed committee that looked at—I do not think I have got the title quite right—advanced technology in the justice system. We were concerned, among other things, about the need for a human in the loop and whether it was possible to have a human in the loop. We were given very firm assurances by two Home Secretaries, which I do not think convinced the committee at all.
We were also concerned about the attitude, “X must be right because the computer says so”. Have we actually moved on from that? I do not think so. On that basis —and was it my noble friend who added facial recognition into the mix?—we support the amendment.
I am deliberately going fairly fast because I do not need to add a whole lot to what has already been said. On Amendment 62, there have been a number of occasions when I have heard a rapper and realised how very clever the work was. I really admired what I heard. Then I thought back to the occasion decades ago when my father started criticising my musical taste and calling it Simon and Godawful. Tastes change; generations move on and develop. I cannot speak to the detailed content of all rap and drill, but I think we are in danger of dismissing the importance of this music to the generation that produces it.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and her eminent supporters for bringing forward these amendments, and to all noble Lords for their contributions in respect of Amendments 61 and 62. I think I can deal with Amendment 61 quite shortly. We have had powerful and compelling speeches on the amendment from its proposers. It seeks to remove a presumption that a computer and software system on which a prosecution relies is working and reliable. We all know what has prompted this: the terrible Post Office scandal.
It is absolutely plain that prosecutors must no longer be able to rely on the systems being necessarily in working order as evidence for the purpose of criminal cases. The Government have had long enough now—and officials even longer than this Government—to look at this problem. If they have not, they have been prodded with a sharp stick by these amendments, and I am confident that, prodded with that sharp stick, they will come up with a solution. They will have to do so by Report, because otherwise I think this amendment will be carried then. I need not say any more.
Amendment 62 proposes a new clause to prevent an overreliance on a person’s musical taste as probative of criminal proclivity or intent. On this side we agree that a person’s creative or artistic taste should not result in them being treated prejudicially by the judicial system. We have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Bailey of Paddington, the noble Baronesses, Lady Lawrence of Clarendon and Lady Chakrabarti, and others in support of this amendment.
We have some reservations about this amendment as it is currently drafted. We accept the good intentions behind it. We understand the danger it is designed to meet, namely that people are treated prejudicially for their creative and artistic tastes, and it is undoubtedly the case that those from particular backgrounds are vulnerable to this and may in effect suffer, or risk suffering, mistreatment in our courts. Against that, we fear also that the amendment might create other difficulties, creating genre-specific shields for certain evidence and thereby treating some expressions differently from others—in other words, shifting the balance too far and creating another class that is not protected. While we are sympathetic to this amendment, for those reasons we cannot support it.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, I get to my feet with some diffidence, given the range of eminent speakers, many of whom I have the most utmost respect for, who have spoken in favour of this group of amendments. I start with Amendment 61 in the names of my noble friends Lady Chakrabarti and Lord Beamish, my other friend, who is in fact also noble—the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot—and the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron. This is a powerful group, and I entirely accept what they say about the difficulties created when there is a presumption that a computer is working properly unless the defendant is able to produce evidence that it is not. That can create an enormous obstacle for defendants. It is extremely difficult to prove that something is not working in those circumstances, so I accept that. I also understand that what is sought here is to reverse that position and to take it back to the position of Section 69 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.
I have already discussed this briefly with my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti. The difficulty I have with this amendment is that it is extremely broad, and the problem with that is that, since Section 69 was introduced, what constitutes digital material has evolved significantly. The noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, says that it is no answer to say that computers are everywhere, but I am afraid we have to be realistic about this. The computer evidence that is adduced in the criminal courts is, for example, the extremely complicated accounting software that is relied on by banks. That is at one extreme. But there is also the routine evidence that comes into criminal courts every single day, which can include text messages from mobile telephones, email chains, social media posts, DVLA printouts, medical records from GP surgeries and even criminal records themselves from the police national computer.
There is a real risk that if the amendment in this broad form were introduced, it could bring the criminal courts to a standstill. I know that is obviously not the intention, but I am concerned about whether there is a way of finding that we can limit it so that it excludes the routine use of computers—often things that people would not even think of as computers at all; the law recognises that a mobile phone is a computer, but most people would not think of it that way—and is limited to the cases that have caused real concern to those in your Lordships’ House, where a conviction is often based solely or mainly on the evidence of a computer. I can see a very different case to be made for that kind of evidence as well.
I entirely understand the intention behind this amendment, and I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Beamish and the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, for the work that they have done in relation to Horizon. It is humbling to stand here and talk about the Horizon victims and survivors and what happened to them, and I would not want anyone to think that the Government are not listening in relation to this.
Lord Beamish (Lab)
I am not opposed to consultation, but, I am sorry, this Government are hiding behind consultation. Once the consultation is finished, we then need action, but that is not happening, not just in this area but in a whole host of other areas.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
I do not accept that. My noble friend should think carefully about making accusations such as that.
The point is that we are looking at the evidence that we have received in order to evaluate it to ensure that we make evidence-based and informed changes. The Government are considering this matter carefully. I am not announcing another review or another consultation; I am simply saying that we are looking at the evidence that we have.
I hope that my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti will hear the words that I am using. She knows that I understand the problem and that I am not unsympathetic, but we need to find a way that does not create a lot of unintended consequences.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
The noble Baroness is competing with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas.
Baroness Kidron (CB)
I would never compete with the noble and learned Lord.
Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)
The Government have had nine months. Normally, if you went to a competent lawyer and said, “This is the evidence. We need a solution”, you would be horrified if you had to wait nine months. Why is there not an answer? Can we have one when this comes back on Report? There is no excuse for delay.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
I will answer the noble and learned Lord and then I will give way to the noble Baroness, because, as she knows, we do not permit interventions on interventions.
The answer to his question is that this is not the only thing we are doing. Your Lordships know how much legislation is passing through this House. It is a question of bandwidth and having time to do things. I am trying to assure the Committee that our intentions are good ones and that we are listening.
Baroness Kidron (CB)
The words that the Minister used, which I believe her to believe, are exactly the same words that we have heard from several other Ministers. The only words that would give succour to members of the Committee are, “We will have something on Report”. While I take her point about broad and narrow, that is not an excuse that can last for years. That consultation was not the first consultation, so we have been waiting for years.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
I entirely understand the point that the noble Baroness is making, and I pay great tribute to her expertise. She can imagine just how popular I would be if I gave that undertaking from the Dispatch Box right now. All I can say is: leave it with me.
Lord Beamish (Lab)
Having been a Minister myself, I know that the Minister can do that tonight. She knows what will happen if she does not bring it forward: an amendment will be tabled, and it will get passed.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
I think I have already said that I am listening carefully.
Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)
Before the Minister moves on to Amendment 62, would she please comment on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Russell, about the Law Society’s contribution to the consultation about a system of assurances? That may be a way forward that might allow her to bring forward her own amendment on Report.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
That is exactly what the Government are evaluating. I cannot go any further than that today, but those are all the things that are being considered. I cannot go any further than to say that I am listening.
I turn to Amendment 62, in the names of my noble friends Lady Chakrabarti and Lady Lawrence. I am very aware of these issues, particularly in relation to rap and drill. I knew about this amendment, but in the course of my practice and when I was a judge I have been to a number of lectures on the subject and read a number of articles, including some by Keir Monteith, King’s Counsel, who I see is sitting below the Bar today.
The question here, on the use of this material, is one of relevance. Like the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, I do not want to go into a boring exegesis of when evidence is admissible and when it is not. The real concern here is to make sure that if—and it is a big if—this evidence is to be used then it has proper probative value, on the basis that it goes further than either that this defendant is a bad person because they like rap and drill music or, even worse, some spurious and crude racial stereotypes. Judges have a duty to ensure that only evidence meeting these standards is adduced and they should exclude any evidence that does not meet the required threshold—that is not a matter of discretion. However, I understand the concerns about the fact that that has not happened in all cases.
It is axiomatic to say that creative and artistic expression is of itself not a crime, and it is rare that it would feature in the evidence of a prosecution unless it inherently involved criminal activity, such as damaging another person’s property with graffiti or drawing sexual images of children. As for musical expression, the Crown Prosecution Service is clear that creating or listening to music is not a crime, but it says that, on occasion, it has encountered cases where, upon investigation into a violent offence, it became clear that drill and rap music had been used in the build-up to encourage or incite violence or to reveal information about a crime that only the attackers would know. These instances are rare and, importantly, are already subject to rigorous scrutiny under existing evidential rules. However, I am aware of the disquiet, and we understand the community concerns.
I take the point made by my noble friend Lady Lawrence. I am a lover of crime fiction but I do not think anyone is ever going to use that in a prosecution against me—well, I hope they do not. She makes a valid point.
The Crown Prosecution Service is actively consulting on this matter through a public consultation, seeking views on whether formal prosecution guidance should be issued regarding the use of musical expression evidence. We want to ensure that any future approach is clear and informed by a wide range of perspectives.
It is the Government’s view that, as currently drafted, the amendment would be unduly restrictive and would, in effect, frustrate the ability of the Crown to adduce relevant and probative evidence before the court, with the potential consequences of frustrating justice for victims in some serious cases. The Government intend to await the outcome of the CPS consultation and announce next steps in due course. I invite all noble Lords not to press their amendments.
Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, I did not speak to Amendment 62 when I briefly got up but I did some research on it. I think it is usually the case in a particular area of law that, where you have a body of experts in particular areas of evidence, it is not uncommon for those experts to be used by both the prosecution and the defence. In doing my research on Amendment 62, I found that that is not the case. The so-called experts who are used by the prosecution are solely used by the prosecution, while the experts who are used by the defence—who would be able to talk knowledgably in the sort of detail that the noble Lord, Lord Bailey, was able to give us—are used only by the defence. That in itself tells you that there is something wrong.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
I do not disagree with the noble Lord. I have already made it clear that I understand the disquiet, the concerns about it and the very real possibility for something that is in fact crude racial stereotyping to look as though it is evidence. That is why we need to await the outcome of the CPS consultation.
Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)
I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in what was a very important debate that did credit to the whole Committee. I am most grateful to my noble friend the Minister, who is a distinguished criminal lawyer and a distinguished former member of the CPS, but, with all due respect, no one should mark their own homework. It is not for the Crown Prosecution Service to mark its own homework, nor any other lawyers even.
In relation to Amendment 62, to go in reverse order, I urge my noble friend to consider what the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, and others have said about what is happening in practice—the University of Manchester study and so on—because just reading out the official statement from the CPS is hope-sapping—I know that my noble friend would not want to sap my hope in difficult times. In relation to Amendments 62 and 61, she suggested that she is listening and said it with some personal input. She is not AI. She is not a projection from the Government. She will forgive me for saying that she is one of our best advocates on these Benches and the Government are very lucky to have her. However, as I know our noble friend Lord Timpson has said, publicly and privately, many times, we are not all here for ever; we are not on this earth for ever; we are not in this Chamber for ever; we are not in positions of power and influence for ever. We must make the most of our opportunities to make change, as was promised, and make it for good. Race equality surely must be one of the foundations of any Labour Government, specifically one that has promised so much.
In relation to both amendments, I heard no proper pushback from any side of the Committee. On Amendment 61, I have to defer to the noble Lords, Lord Beamish and Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom, and the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron. The time is now; the vehicle is this Bill. Finally, I say gently to my noble friend that when she walks into rooms in the Ministry of Justice with officials or even Commons Ministers, I hope she realises that she is the cleverest person in the room or at least the one with the most direct experience of practising criminal law in the courts. If anyone can find a way through, I trust that that is my noble friend.
Amendment 62 could theoretically be dealt with by rules of court—but it must be dealt with—but with Amendment 61 we need an urgent legislative amendment in this Bill. My noble friend foreshadowed the possibility of a way through, partly on her concerns about sole and determinative evidence and partly responding to the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool. I urge her to deliver for the Committee and for the people of this country, for the past victims of miscarriages and for all those who might come. I say that as respectfully and positively as I can to my noble friend. I hope she knows how much respect I have for her, but we are looking for something on Report in respect of both Amendments 61 and 62. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Russell of Liverpool
“Discontinuance of proceedings: victims' right to review(1) The Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 is amended as follows.(2) In section 23A (Discontinuance of proceedings after accused has been sent for trial), subsection (2), omit “indictment is preferred” and insert “start of the trial on indictment, as defined in section 22(11A) of this Act.””Member's explanatory statement
This amendment would extend the period a case can be discontinued in the Crown Court, to bring it in line with the Magistrates Court. This would mean that the CPS could discontinue a case at the Crown Court with the option to reopen it following a successful VRR, if it concludes that it made an error stopping the prosecution.
Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, I start by addressing the Minister and saying, “No pressure”. I think this amendment is particularly pertinent to her because it talks directly about the Crown Prosecution Service and some of the things it does and does not do. She will know more, I suspect, than anybody else in the Committee about the detail of what I am about to address.
The purpose of the amendment is to enable the Crown Prosecution Service to discontinue proceedings in the Crown Court up until the trial, bringing it in line with its opportunity to do so in the magistrates’ court. Importantly, this change would mean that proceedings could be ended at a later point and still reinstated where it was determined that the prosecution was ended in error. For victims of crime, this is an important safeguard which would enable them to meaningfully exercise their right to challenge Crown Prosecution Service decision-making.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, I signed Amendment 63, proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Russell. I will not go into any of the detail that he has just given so comprehensively, but I did want to give your Lordships’ Committee the chance to hear two voices of victims who have found that VRR really worked for them.
In September 2021, “Daria”, an anonymous survivor, reported offences of harassment, stalking and image-based abuse to the police. The perpetrator was arrested in November 2021; however, confusion between police forces and errors in case handling resulted in delays and lapses in time limits for some offences. By December 2022, the CPS issued a decision of no further action for the most serious charges of disclosing and threatening to disclose private sexual photographs and films with intent to cause distress. This was despite Daria providing detailed evidence that the intent threshold was met.
Daria immediately requested a review under the victims’ right to review scheme. Over the following months, the CPS kept her updated and requested further statements, and in May 2023, a district Crown prosecutor overturned the original decision. The CPS authorised two counts of disclosing or threatening to disclose private sexual images with intent to cause distress. In December 2023, the perpetrator was convicted on both counts and sentenced in the Crown Court in March 2024. The CPS formally apologised for the distress caused by the initial wrongful decision.
Daria has said:
“Without the Right to Review, my case would have ended in silence. The CPS originally decided not to prosecute—despite everything I’d reported and the evidence I’d provided. It was only through the VRR process that my voice was finally heard, and justice was served. The man who targeted and humiliated me online was ultimately convicted. Survivors deserve this second chance. The right to review gave me mine”.
Victoria was groomed and sexually abused from the age of 14. When she reported the crime years later, the CPS initially decided on no further action, wrongly re-aging her as 16 and dismissing the evidence that she had been below the age of consent. Victoria requested a VRR. The first review upheld the decision, but she escalated it further. In 2021, after a second interview, the CPS overturned its decision and charged her abuser with seven counts of indecent assault. A further charge was added at trial. Her abuser was unanimously convicted on all eight counts and sentenced to 23 years in prison. He was also placed on the sex offenders register indefinitely. Despite this, Victoria had endured nearly six years of delays before her trial, which left her with PTSD, agoraphobia and severe anxiety. She said:
“After the CPS refused to charge my abuser, I requested a VRR. This led them to overturn that decision, and my abuser was later convicted. He would not have faced justice without the VRR process. My case highlights the need for VRRs to be permanently accessible to complainants so mistakes can be addressed”.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I can be brief. I support Amendment 63 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool. We have already spoken about the need for consistency across our justice system. That includes extending the powers to compel offenders to attend their sentencing in the Crown Court to magistrates’ courts. This amendment would also bring the periods in which a case can be discontinued into alignment; indeed, I am interested to see what justification exists for the difference between the two. We have heard a compelling speech also from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, with a particular example. I know that one should be wary of individual examples, but it is a compelling example and we should listen to it carefully.
Apart from making the system more consistent in its procedures, this amendment would allow prosecutors in the Crown Court to discontinue a case at a late stage, preventing unnecessary, costly and time-consuming trials. In the context of a court backlog and the need for efficiency, allowing this more flexible mechanism for bringing prosecutions to an end appears to us to be a measured and sensible improvement. To be clear, Amendment 63 still allows the option to reopen a case following a successful victim’s right to review request, if it is concluded that the CPS has made an error in stopping the prosecution. This amendment would not do away with this important scheme which is available to victims. We thank the noble Lord for his efforts and look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, I will start with a little trip down memory lane. In either 2010 or 2011, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas, when sitting in the Court of Appeal, heard a case called Killick. That was a case where prosecution had been restarted and, as part of his judgment in relation to it, the noble and learned Lord said that the Crown Prosecution Service needed to come up with a system that would allow victims to challenge a decision not to prosecute, without them having to bring judicial review proceedings. As he may remember, I was the prosecutor who remade the decision to charge in that case and, as a result, the Crown Prosecution Service—under a certain Director of Public Prosecutions, who may be known to your Lordships in another context at the moment, and I, working as his principal legal adviser—devised the victims’ right to review scheme.
I wrote much of the legal guidance, so the noble Lord, Lord Russell, is correct when he says I know quite a lot about it. I am a huge fan of the victims’ right to review scheme, because although the Crown Prosecution Service is in many ways a completely wonderful organisation, everybody is human and sometimes people get things wrong—and when we get it wrong, we want to put it right. Obviously, a right is not a right unless it has a remedy attached to it, and that is a real problem in some of these cases. The noble Lord knows, because I discussed this with him when we met, that my practice when I was dealing with reviews of cases was always that if I took the decision to offer no evidence, I would write to the victim and say, “In 14 days I am proposing to do this, unless you want to make representations to me as to why I should not, or seek judicial review proceedings”. I completely get the issue here.
The only note of caution I will sound is this. It would be a substantial change, with wide-ranging implications for both victims and defendants. For that reason, it needs to be considered carefully, because discontinuing a case is not simply putting a pause into proceedings. Restitution requires fresh proceedings, starting back in the magistrates’ court, which risks delay and uncertainty for both victims and defendants. It does not go straight back into the Crown Court as a restart. That is why robust safeguards and controls, which are not in this amendment, are essential when making these decisions.
For example, in the magistrates’ court procedure, which this amendment seeks to replicate, the defence can refuse to accept a discontinuance and insist on no evidence being offered, or insist that the Crown Prosecution Service makes a decision as to what it is going to do. We are anxious to ensure that discontinuance is not, for example, used in the Crown Court as a way of getting an adjournment that would not be got under other circumstances, as in saying: “We don’t have enough evidence here. We need another three months to get it, so we’re going to discontinue and then restart”. That could create awful uncertainty, both for victims and defendants, as to what is going on. There are, for example, cases where somebody is a youth at the time they are charged and, if the case is then discontinued, they may then be tried as an adult later on.
I am not saying that I do not understand the problem or that this may not be part of the solution, but it needs to be considered carefully. What we plan to do is to consider this proposal further in the context of the wider court reforms and Sir Brian Leveson’s most recent report, with his recommendations for improving efficiency. I also welcome the expansion of the CPS pilot, strengthening victims’ voices before final decisions to offer no evidence are made. The outcome of that pilot will also inform our thinking. For the time being, I invite the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)
I thank the Minister very much for her response. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, for adding her name and for the examples she put forward. As I surmised, the Minister does indeed know what she is talking about—on a 24 hours a day, seven days a week basis, from what we have heard—and she is looking remarkably well on it.
I thank the Minister very much for the broadly positive way in which she has responded. I think she acknowledged, as we have all acknowledged, that there is an issue and an inconsistency here. But putting it right is not a matter of just snapping one’s fingers and changing one thing, because that has knock-on effects. I am hoping that the Minister will agree to have some follow-up discussions between now and Report, to see either what it will be possible to do by Report or what changes one can start instituting or committing to look at carefully, which can then be enacted later. But on that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Lemos) (Lab)
My Lords, I do not want to jump the gun, but I have just spoken to my fellow Whips, and our plan is to try to get to target before the dinner break. I thought it would be useful to let everybody know.
Clause 13: Reviews of sentencing: time limits
Amendment 64
Lord Sandhurst
“(aa) in that sub-paragraph for “28” substitute “56”;”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment increases the window for applying to the Unduly Lenient Sentences Scheme from 28 days to 56 days.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, this group of amendments concerns the terms of the unduly lenient sentence scheme, which we consider has too narrow a window to effectively allow for victims to reflect upon and review the sentences given to their offenders. Amendments 64, 65 and 66 aim to increase the existing 28-day window for applying to the unduly lenient sentence scheme to one of 56 days.
Similarly, Amendment 69, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, seeks to allow the 28-day time limit to be extended in exceptional circumstances. We thank the noble Baroness for this amendment. We on these Benches are very receptive to the idea of including an “exceptional circumstances” clause in the unduly lenient sentence framework. It is a safeguard that recognises that victims may, for one reason or another, not always be able to act within the current timeframe. Currently, there exists an asymmetry between offenders and victims. Offenders might be able to seek extensions or have certain deadlines adjusted, whereas victims are rigidly bound by the 28-day window. This amendment helps to address that imbalance.
The process of applying for review of a sentence is not one that can always be readily undertaken within four weeks. It requires a knowledge of the law that often requires the instruction and subsequent direction of a lawyer, which in and of itself is a process that can often take up to, if not beyond, the 28-day window that victims are given in which to appeal. Crucial to this process is the availability of the sentencing remarks, a problem which we have partially solved in the Sentencing Act by requiring their release within 14 days, but that occupies, none the less, half the time the Government currently offer to appeal a lenient sentence.
Perhaps the most effective case for change is a human one. Victims must face and relive the most traumatic events of their lives in court. They have to re-encounter their offender in some cases—not due to the current drafting of Clause 1, I accept—and in the cases we are concerned with, they have to deal with what they believe to be an unjust sentence.
An increase to 56 days is not a drastic one; it simply increases the window to two months, and it allows slightly more time for the process to be completed. We on these Benches are also open to the idea of a longer window to apply specifically for victims and, where they are murdered in cases of extremely serious crime, their next of kin. That may be for another day.
I turn to Amendment 72, which seeks to place a clear statutory duty on the Crown Prosecution Service to notify victims or, in the case of a deceased victim, their next of kin, of their right to request a review under the unduly lenient sentence scheme. At present, whether a victim is informed of the scheme can depend upon practice rather than principle. In some cases, of course, victims are advised promptly and clearly. In others, awareness depends rather upon chance, whether it is mentioned to them by their legal advocate or at some other time during the court process, or whether they independently discover its existence. That is not a satisfactory basis on which to safeguard a right of such importance, and particularly one that is time limited within a strict statutory window.
A right that expires after 28 days, or indeed 56 if our earlier amendments are accepted, is meaningful only if the person entitled to exercise it is made aware of it in good time, and before time starts to run. Without notification, the right is illusory at best. Amendment 72 therefore proposes a straightforward and practical safeguard; namely, the CPS must write to the victim, or their next of kin, within 10 working days of a sentence being delivered, informing them of their ability to seek a review. This is not burdensome. The CPS is already engaged with victims throughout the prosecution process. Contact details are held; communication channels should exist. This amendment simply makes notification consistent and mandatory. Amendment 75, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, has the same aim as our amendment, albeit with a marginally different mechanism. I hope that we can work together to achieve this reform.
If we are to maintain a short and strict time limit for challenging unduly lenient sentences, the least that we can do is to ensure that victims are properly informed of that right. Without such a duty, access to the scheme may depend less on justice and more on happenstance. We trust our judges, but we know that even they are not infallible. Some will be more sparing with their sentences; some will be more certain in their own judgment and not feel the need to alert victims to the scheme. Others will simply forget on occasions. This should not be the case. The Government are very well equipped to create a system in which a letter is sent out, within 10 days, alerting victims of their right to apply for a review of the sentencing. They do it endlessly in other departments; it should be a seamlessly transferable process. All are equal before the law. I beg to move.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
My Lords, my two amendments in this group, Amendments 69 and 75, also make proposals for unduly lenient sentences, as the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, has mentioned. From these Benches, we have been keen to improve the access that victims have to challenge what they believe is an unduly lenient sentence. I had amendments to try to achieve this in the Victims and Prisoners Bill in 2023-24.
It is worth pausing to review what has happened since 1988, when the ULS scheme started and victims were given the right to ask the Attorney-General to reconsider the sentence of their offender. One of the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, concerns guaranteeing that victims are informed. Currently, the victims’ code places responsibility for informing victims about the ULS scheme on witness care units. For bereaved families entitled to the Crown Prosecution Service bereaved families scheme, the CPS should where possible, through the prosecutor and the trial advocate, meet the family at court following sentencing—if they attend the hearing—and inform them about the ULS scheme where appropriate. However, evidence from victims and bereaved families shows that this often does not happen, with many learning about the scheme only when it is too late to apply. By contrast, the offender and their legal representatives are present at sentencing and able to start planning any appeal against the sentence. In extenuating circumstances, the offender can also be given more than 28 days to launch their appeal. The offender also has post-sentence meetings with their legal representatives. It was clear then, and it remains so now, that the offender had and has more rights and support than the victim. This is not a level playing field.
Lord Garnier (Con)
My Lords, I rise with a degree of caution. I entirely understand the motives behind the amendments moved by my noble friend Lord Sandhurst, and that moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. Shall we begin by trying to remember what an unduly lenient sentence is? It is one that falls outside the range of sentences that a judge, taking into consideration all the relevant factors and having regard to the sentencing guidance, could reasonably consider appropriate. In other words, the sentence must be not just lenient, but unduly lenient. One of the things the Court of Appeal must consider when it is looking at an application to review a sentence is that the offender has been put through the sentencing process, or will be put through the sentencing process, for a second time, and that it will not intervene unless the sentence is significantly below the one the judge should have passed.
Law officers often receive applications—I say this with some experience, as I was a law officer from 2010 to 2012, and in England and Wales it is the law officers who have the ability to make these applications to the Court of Appeal Criminal Division—on the basis that the person complaining about the sentence just thinks it is not adequately severe, but that is not the test. One therefore needs to not encourage an expectation—this is what may follow from the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton—that, by getting a government department or the Crown Prosecution Service to write to a disappointed victim or family member, it must follow that the CPS, or whichever government department is required to do this, agrees, or that it will lead to a successful appeal before the Court of Appeal.
I remember that all sorts of people used to read newspaper articles about a particular sentence that often bore very little resemblance to the sentencing remarks or the details of the case. Sometimes, in some newspapers, you would get an editorial saying that it was a disgrace that this lenient judge has done this, that or the other, and that something must be done, and all sorts of people would then write to the law officer’s department demanding that something be done. Very often the sentence was passed in relation to an offence that did not come under the scheme, or, if it did, on proper examination it did not fall within the ambit of what the Court of Appeal was likely to disturb. So I suspect that all sorts of expectations could be built into the public mind, which could lead only to disappointment.
Secondly, there is something to be said about finality. Although one does not always have any sympathy for a criminal defendant, they are entitled to justice and finality. Having sentenced people, I assure noble Lords that sentencing can be difficult, certainly for a judge who is dealing with, shall we say—I do not mean this in a silly way—the less serious types of criminal offence that none the less come within this scheme. I always found sentencing to be the most difficult part of the judicial function. This is a generalisation, but if you are a High Court judge dealing with criminal cases, the chances are that you will probably have to decide the tariff only on life sentences. But if you are sitting in the Crown Court as a recorder or circuit judge, you may very well have to deal with all sorts of quite complicated considerations when working out the just sentence for a particular defendant based on the facts of a particular offence. It is not always easy.
In my experience of having to seek the advice of the Treasury counsel and making up my own mind about whether an application should go to the Court of Appeal, I found that, by and large, the overwhelming majority of judges passed a just and correct sentence—when I say “correct”, it is not a binary exercise—that was entirely defensible and not the sort of thing that the Court of Appeal would have disturbed. To encourage people to make applications would be a mistake when it is going to lead only to disappointment.
Baroness Brinton (LD)
The amendment would not encourage the CPS, or whatever the notifying body is, to encourage the victim to appeal; it would merely be notifying them of the right. Does the noble and learned Lord accept that?
Lord Garnier (Con)
I can see what the printed words say, but if the Crown Prosecution Service was to write to the victim saying, “Do you realise that you can apply to the law officers to have this sentence reviewed by the Court of Appeal?”, it would give an imprimatur and an indication. That is the implication, and we should resist it.
I do not want to go on too long. Anybody can write to the law officers to say, “Will you review this sentence?” It does have to be a victim, or the family or next of kin of a deceased victim. There are plenty of avenues available to the public and to victims if they wish to explore this. To come back to my first point, we need to exercise a degree of caution before opening the floodgates to lots of disappointment.
Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)
My Lords, briefly, I support the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, to which I have added my name. I have listened carefully to what the noble and learned Lord has said, but this is not an attempt to encourage lots of challenges to unduly lenient sentences. It is, above all, an attempt to achieve a degree of parity between the way offenders and defendants are treated.
The intent of the amendment it to suggest that a government department nominated by the Secretary of State should do the informing. It would need to be a body that was viewed as genuinely neutral, but it would be perfectly possible to inform the victim of their right and make quite clear the orbit within which an appeal against an unduly lenient sentence is likely to be successful and the parameters beyond which it would be highly unlikely to be considered, so as to make very clear to the victim, from the very beginning, the possibility of their having a case that might be over the threshold as opposed to being clearly below the threshold. It is entirely possible to imagine that one could create that.
Lord Hacking (Lab)
My Lords, when I say that I will be brief, I will be very brief. I have listened carefully to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier. He is quite right in his observations, and particularly about the ultimate test of whether a sentence is set aside because it is unduly lenient. However, I think the answers have already been made by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and the noble Lord, Lord Russell: this is a notification. The CPS is not taking a position on the merits of making the application; it is just setting up a timetable.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, I will deal first with the existing time limit. We are listening—I am making a “we are listening” speech—not just to the strength of views in this Committee and in the other place on the time limit for the unduly lenient sentencing scheme but to the victims themselves. We are consistently hearing that this time limit is simply not long enough when victims are processing the outcome of the case, and I am extremely sympathetic to their representations. A ticking clock is the last thing that they need at a difficult time. The Government have been persuaded by arguments that something needs to be done, but we want to make sure that we get this right. Currently, we have been given a number of conflicting views on the best way to go about this. I would like to meet all noble Lords who have tabled amendments, and indeed any other interested Members of your Lordships’ House, to discuss the best way forward.
Turning to the question of notification, it goes without saying how important it is that victims are made aware of the ULS scheme. It is another subject that comes up over and again; it is not much of a right if you do not know that you have it. I am afraid that I am not persuaded by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, saying that we should not tell people that they have this right in case they want to use it—if that is not what he meant to say, I apologise and withdraw the remark. The way it is supposed to work is this. Under the victims’ code, police-run witness care units are required to inform victims about the unduly lenient sentencing scheme within five working days. However, we are hearing that this is not happening, so we need to ensure that it does. The question is how best to go about it.
At present, I am not persuaded that putting the obligation into primary legislation is the best way. The first reason is that, usually, if you create an obligation, you have to create a penalty for the breach. The second is that if you want to change it, you have to amend primary legislation in order to do so. The victims’ code is a statutory code of practice. Last week, we launched a consultation to ensure that we get it right and that the code is fit for purpose. Again, we would welcome your Lordships’ engagement with that consultation before it closes on 30 April, and any other ideas before we reach our final conclusion. For now, I invite the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords for their contributions. I am delighted that the Minister is in listening mode—I might win one at last.
Dealing with my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier’s points, I think the point is simply this: we certainly do not want to encourage victims down the road of hopeless applications which actually make things worse for them and make them more disappointed. Extending the time limit of itself does not do that; that is simply extending the time limit. Informing them properly does not do that, and the CPS could, I am quite sure, design a standard form letter which states the time limit for doing this but that the parameters —it would not use that word, obviously, but plain English —for an application are limited, so people should not raise their hopes. That would be the way forward.
I would be very happy to meet the Minister after the recess to discuss this. There is merit in the idea of guidance or guidelines—that seems attractive. We seem to be moving in the right direction, so that there might be an extension of time to 56 days and that the 28-day time limit on any basis might be extended where exceptional circumstances arise, and that on any basis there should be some mandatory obligation on the Crown Prosecution Service to notify victims of their right, and I hope that that would include next of kin in appropriate cases. I think that addresses everything. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw.
Baroness Sater
“Dealing with offenders for crimes committed as childrenWhere a court is dealing with an offender for a crime committed before the age of 18 but at the time of the first court appearance the offender is older than 17 but younger than 21, the offender must be dealt with by a youth court and sentenced according to the sentencing guidelines which apply in a youth court.”
Baroness Sater (Con)
My Lords, Amendment 68 is in my name and those of my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier and my friend the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, and I thank them for their ongoing support.
This amendment revisits an issue I previously raised during the passage of the Sentencing Bill. I return to it because I feel so strongly that this anomaly in our criminal justice system is one that must be resolved and merits further and careful consideration by this Committee. It concerns children who commit offences while under the age of 18 but who, through delay in proceedings entirely outside their control, are first brought before the court only after their 18th birthday. Under the current system, they will be sentenced as adults, losing access to youth-specific disposals, including referral orders, youth rehabilitation orders and the support of youth justice services, even though their offending behaviour occurred during childhood.
As I previously said, this can only be described as a postcode lottery in sentencing outcomes. If two young people commit the exact same offence at the exact same age in similar circumstances, and one happens to live in an area where their case reaches court before their 18th birthday and the other does not, the first will get all the support from the youth court process, while the second defendant, not because of the seriousness of the offence or their maturity, will end up in the adult court. The consequences of not being part of the youth justice process and the subsequent treatment of criminal record disclosures can affect a young person well into adulthood, including their future employment prospects. The Bill provides an opportunity to look at this issue, correct an unfair anomaly and ensure consistency in sentencing.
As I have said previously, the youth justice system exists for a reason. Those of us who have worked in youth justice know how the youth court has specifically trained magistrates who emphasise welfare, education and rehabilitation and can turn young lives around and reduce reoffending. Without this support, their future could be bleak. In the passage of the Sentencing Bill, my friend the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, and my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier spoke in support of addressing this anomaly, and I am grateful once again for their support today. I was encouraged by the support of the Minister. While he stated that youth sentencing lay largely outside the scope of the Sentencing Bill, he made it clear that the Government had a great deal of sympathy with the issue. He also indicated that there may be merit in looking at this issue further, while understandably pointing to the need to consider the wider implications across the justice system. I took that as a constructive response. It is in the same spirit that I bring the matter back today.
This amendment simply seeks to ensure that, where offending behaviour took place during childhood, it is assessed and addressed through the correct lens—one that reflects age, maturity and culpability at the time of the offence, rather than being determined by administrative delay entirely outside an offender’s control. I return to this issue today because I feel so strongly that we must address this clear anomaly. I hope that the Government will be willing to take a second look at this and consider how it might be resolved. I beg to move.
Lord Garnier (Con)
My Lords, I am delighted to be able to support my noble friend Lady Sater’s amendment. I have heard her express these views before, I heard her express them just now, and there is nothing more to be said. I urge this Committee to get on and agree with her.
Lord Sandhurst (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Sater, my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier and the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, for tabling Amendment 68. We agree with the principle that children who commit crimes should thus be charged as children, even if by the time of their court appearance they are above the age of 18. What matters is the mental state of the offender at the time the offence was committed, not the lottery of when he or she comes to court. The amendment seeks to ensure that there is no loophole preventing this being the case, and we therefore hope that the Government will agree with that aim.
Amendment 70 in my name concerns the collection and publication of data relating to offenders’ immigration history and status. This is a sensitive issue. Illegal immigration has long been a core political issue for voters and has become even more salient in recent years. There continues to be widespread misinformation and unfounded assertions, both in person and online. That is because empirical evidence concerning immigration has not always been readily available. People perceive changes occurring as a result of policy, but often operate under the assumption that the Government are shielding themselves from transparency. That is not the case, of course, but it must be dealt with.
Nowhere is this phenomenon more evident than with crime rates. The public feel less safe, they see the demographic change and they link the two. This is problematic. It can lead to misguided opinions about certain parts of society. There is no available data to inform opinions of what the true position is. Non-governmental studies and disjointed data releases have repeatedly justified this connection, but the lack of clarification from the Government still leaves room for the general public to be decried as fearmongering or bigoted. It is not just policy: people deserve to know the impact that government policies are having on their everyday lives, especially when they can have immediate impacts on their safety.
We say that there is a clear case to publish crime data by immigration status. Accurate and comprehensive data allows for informed debate and evidence-based policy. At present the information is scarce, it is fragmented and it leaves the public, and indeed policymakers, reliant on conjecture. If transparency and open justice are priorities, to release offender data by foreign national status and immigration history would provide clarity, support public confidence and allow all sides to address the facts without speculation.
The Minister will be aware of the time we have previously spent on the topics in Amendments 71 and 74. Amendment 71 would exempt sex offenders and domestic abusers from being eligible for early release at the one-third point of their sentence, while Amendment 74 would reaffirm the Government’s policy of favouring suspended sentences but once again seeks to exclude sexual offences and domestic abuse from the presumption. Custodial sentences should of course by judged by the extent to which they deter reoffending. We accept the Government’s belief that short custodial sentences often do not serve this end, but reoffending cannot be the sole metric by which the nature of a punishment is decided. The prison system at least prevents individuals from offending while they are incarcerated.
For sexual offences and domestic abuse, these considerations are not abstract, certainly for the victims. Victims’ lives, safety, sense of security, the opportunity to reorganise their lives and perhaps move or otherwise change their way of living, are directly affected by whether an offender is at liberty or in custody. In 2019, the first year for which comparable data is available, there were 214,000 arrests for domestic abuse and 60,000 convictions, a conviction proportion of 28%. In 2025—six years later and under this Government—there were 360,000 arrests for domestic abuse but only 41,000 convictions, a drop from 60,000 and a conviction rate of just 11%. Something must be done.
The Government have highlighted the scale and seriousness of sexual offences and domestic abuse. They have described violence against women and girls as a “national emergency”. They have committed to strategies including specialist investigative teams and enhanced training for officers, and demonstrated recognition that these crimes demand careful handling. It would be inconsistent to promote such measures while making it easier for offenders of these crimes to avoid immediate custody.
This principle also extends to early release. It becomes a moral question rather than a purely empirical one when an offender has drastically altered the life of a victim by means of their crime. I do not think it reflects who we are as a society if we say that those who commit as invasive and exploitative a crime as sexual assault or domestic abuse should not serve the full extent of their sentences.
I end by saying I hope the Liberal Democrats will support these amendments. They have made it a point of principle, as have we, that victims of domestic violence deserve targeted measures to prevent them suffering further harm. Their justice spokesman in the other place, Josh Barbarinde, tabled a Bill last year to prevent domestic abusers from being released early under the Government’s SDS40 scheme. They now have a chance to put their principle into practice, as Amendment 71 would have exactly the same effect. I hope they will be able to offer their support.
Baroness Levitt (Lab)
My Lords, I start with Amendment 68 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Sater. She spoke passionately about this issue during the passage of the Sentencing Act and I pay tribute to her wealth of experience on this topic. As a former youth magistrate and a member of the Youth Justice Board, I have a lot of sympathy for the issues raised.
However, this amendment would radically change the youth justice landscape. As the noble Baroness knows, sentencing guidelines already make it clear that, when an individual is dealt with as an adult for crimes that were committed when they were a youth, they are to be sentenced as though they were being sentenced at the time that they committed the offence and not when they appear before the court. They also state that the courts have got to consider not only the chronological age of the offenders but their maturity and other relevant factors that remind the court they are not just mini-adults and need to be treated differently. Our position is that we remain concerned about the operational and legal complexity associated with a proposal like this. We are worried that we may not be able to achieve this during the passage of the Bill. However, I would like to speak to the noble Baroness, if she is willing to meet with me, and let us see what we can do.
Amendment 70, in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, and the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, aims to place statutory duties on the Crown Court, HMCTS and the Secretary of State in relation to collecting and publishing data on sentencing. This Government remain committed to developing the data we publish on foreign national offenders. The Ministry of Justice has already taken action to increase transparency on the data published and, notably, in July, for the first time the offender management statistics included a breakdown of foreign national offenders in prison by sex and offence group.
Baroness Sater (Con)
I thank the Minister for her very positive response. I welcome and appreciate her offer to meet. I know it is difficult and complex, but I appreciate the further conversation with her. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Local Power Plan
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Lord Moynihan (Con)
My Lords, although I have no outside interests which impact directly on solar farms and onshore wind, I declare my interest in having worked in the wider field of energy transition since my time as Minister for Energy.
I start by reflecting that we all want clean energy, we all want full engagement with local communities, and we all want to work towards an energy policy based on energy security, sourced from trusted supply chains and, above all, delivering affordable energy. This announcement should be tested against these criteria, for we support community energy enthusiasm where it makes economic sense. Does the Minister agree that reducing energy bills comes only by increasing reliable generation and decreasing costs, yet the local power plan does not come with a generation target nor an analysis of the extent to which it will contribute to reducing bills? If these are not central factors within the policy, I am afraid that it will for sure be time and money misspent.
In the Government’s own press release, they rely on “internal analysis” to claim that additional solar and onshore wind procured through AR7 could lower bills in the early 2030s, but that analysis has not been published. It looks only at a narrow scenario, it seems to exclude wider system costs, and it does not give a full picture of future bill levels. Does it include the load in grid costs to get the power to market, given that many of the wind projects being considered are in Scotland? How does the plan impact on Labour’s promises to cut energy bills by £300, not least given that they have risen by £190 since Labour came to power? How does this initiative change that?
I had a good look at the map of all the proposed projects in the CfD allocation round 7a. There were only two small wind projects in England, some in south Wales, and the vast majority of the other wind projects were in Scotland. Given that there were only two wind projects in England, can the Minister comment on whether this will lead to further increases in the already staggering bill for curtailment—paying wind farms not to produce—because of the grid constraint from Scotland to the south, the B6 boundary, and the cost of debottlenecking that, which is estimated to be north of £50 billion?
Can the Minister comment on whether this initiative is good for employment? There has been real concern recently, which the Minister will be aware of. The OEUK talked a lot about his policies and the redundancies in the offshore sector, and fears that the industrial contagion will spread to onshore supply chain and manufacturing communities. To put this in context, on average, 1,000 direct and indirect jobs are being lost each month from the oil and gas sector. Without intervention, this rate of job losses will continue to 2030. RenewableUK has said that these initiatives being proposed for renewables may create 4,000 more jobs from now to 2030, as against the 50,000 losses of jobs in oil and gas. How does that help employment in the UK? The GMB union’s Scotland secretary, Louise Gilmour, gave the same warning:
“There is a human cost to these decisions that goes beyond the bottom line of this year’s budget and impacts workers, families and communities in Scotland and across Britain. The economic case for easing the financial pressures on our offshore industries is clear and compelling but so too is the moral argument for slowing the rushed and needless abandonment of workers and their communities”.
Does the Minister agree?
I turn to an exceptionally important point. This announcement is principally about solar energy, and solar imports come from China. The Minister of State, the noble Baroness, Lady Chapman of Darlington, stated in a debate initiated in this House recently that
“human rights are a non-negotiable part of this Government’s approach to China”.—[Official Report, 2/2/26; col. 1301.]
This is an initiative to import Chinese goods. Well over 80% of PV modules used in the UK have significant Chinese content, and the true figure is very likely to be above 90% when you include panels made by Chinese-headquartered manufacturers—for example, Jinko, Trina, LONGi, JA Solar and Canadian Solar, all of which are Chinese in origin—and the non-Chinese brands whose wafers, cells or polysilicon is sourced from China. Some 80% to 85% of the global polysilicon that is needed comes from China, and the UK imports almost all its PV hardware. Installers and trade bodies routinely report that Chinese supply chains dominate the UK market because of price and scale. In the map for AR7, we are talking about a widespread, historic, major increase in solar imports from China. This local power plan depends on Chinese goods.
I simply ask the Minister whether he can tonight guarantee that no imported polysilicon, no panels being installed in our schools at the moment under GBE’s first initiative, and no solar content on any of the panels that is foreseen by this particular measure will come from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. A very large share of the world’s solar grade polysilicon has recently come from China, and a significant part of that comes from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
It is a simple question and I hope the Minister can answer it by saying that there is absolutely no polysilicon that comes from that autonomous region. If he cannot answer it, it would have been wise and sensible to consider that question first. When comfortable that the Government could answer it in the affirmative, he could then come to the Palace of Westminster and bring forward this initiative for a historic increase in the import of solar panels.
In conclusion, can the Minister also say in this context why the Secretary of State, who is fast becoming a night manager, went to China a year ago, signed an MoU and locked it in his safe, marked “secret”, to be hidden from the public and not to be scrutinised? Why did the Government not publish it? They have published all the other MoUs that the Secretary of State has signed but not the one he negotiated with China a year ago. Why is it secret? Is there a reference to solar supplies from Xinjiang? Is there no reference to human rights? The Prime Minister has recently called for open government and honesty with the public. Surely, by locking it away out of sight, this is doing exactly the opposite; above all, to the local communities which are going to benefit from these solar initiatives. What is there to hide?
Earl Russell (LD)
My Lords, on these Benches we very much welcome the publication of the local power plan. This is a landmark moment: up to £1 billion of funding from Great British Energy for local community energy. This is the largest public investment to date. Our communities stand ready to generate their own power, cut bills and keep wealth circulating locally. They have been waiting for the Government to back them with serious funding and a level playing field.
We, and many others across the House, campaigned to secure community energy on the face of the Great British Energy Act 2025. We are pleased to see that commitment transformed into this concrete plan. Our communities should rightly be able to partner in, and directly benefit from, the renewable revolution. The vision is one we support.
Great British Energy aims to support an initial 1,000 local and community projects by 2030. However, I would like to see these plans going beyond programmes that the private sector can deliver itself; for example, a programme of community wind energy for our coastal communities. I would also like to see a broader range of technologies used, and greater integration with the warm homes plan. The four pillars—direct funding, expert advice, market innovation, and regulatory reform—are what community groups have asked for.
Delivery is where this plan will stand or fall. Although the plan is launched this month, the first grant schemes will not open until the spring and the new Great British Energy local products will not be piloted until the summer. There are hundreds of shovel-ready projects just waiting for capital finance. Will the Minister commit to an early fast track for schemes that can demonstrate that they are ready to build this year?
We welcome the commitment of up to £1 billion, but there is a clear gap between this figure and the £3.3 billion previously promised for community energy. Has this ambition been scaled back? How much of this fund is expected to go to actual deployment and how much on facilitation, advice and central programme costs? We recognise the importance of help with these processes but want reassurance that this will not become a scheme where too much is swallowed by planning and too little reaches the projects themselves.
The Government acknowledge that a lack of fair routes to market has held back community energy for too long. Without a genuine right to local supply, underpinned by statute, community groups will remain disadvantaged. The local power plan refers to developing new local energy supply models and a local energy platform, including smart community energy and virtual PPAs. When will the Government bring forward the regulatory changes needed to make them a reality? Can the Minister also confirm that legislation to create a clear right to local supply remains part of the Government’s programme?
The Government are right to recognise that delays and the cost of connections to the grid are among the principal reasons why community schemes have failed. The plan speaks of obligatory response times from DNOs, and of working groups with network companies, but what concrete powers will Ministers use to ensure that these things happen in practice? This matters especially when the technical and regulatory thresholds are already stacked against smaller schemes.
We strongly welcome the intention to introduce a mandatory shared ownership offer for larger renewable developments, and the indication that shared ownership templates and guidance with be published this spring. This could enable fairness into the next generation of large-scale infrastructure. What minimum stake will communities be guaranteed? How will the Government ensure that the offer is genuinely attractive rather than nominal? When will the Government publish the full community benefits framework, so that communities are not left at the mercy of voluntary schemes and of whatever crumbs are left over from the big companies? Will the framework include clear criteria on what counts as meaningful benefit, and will it be underpinned by statutory guidance?
One of the most promising elements of the plan is the commitment to build up local community capacity through expert teams and a “community energy in a box” toolkit, providing standardised documents and advice. Our most underserved areas have previously had the least spare capacity. Communities facing high deprivation, or with small and overstretched councils, lack the volunteers and technical skills needed even to begin. What criteria will Great British Energy use to define these underserved areas? Will they benefit from higher grant-to-loan ratios and more proactive outreach so that they do not miss out?
In the June 2025 spending review, £2.5 billion was allocated for small modular reactors—almost a third of Great British Energy’s existing budget of £8.3 billion. That decision pre-dated the finalisation of the local power plan and of GB Energy’s strategic plan for local energy. Does the Minister accept that the Treasury’s raiding of the Great British Energy budget has constrained what could otherwise have been a more ambitious and better-resourced programme for local power? It may have delayed the scaling up of exactly the projects the Minister is now bringing forward.
The local power plan has the potential to be transformative. Local, community-owned energy is one of the most powerful ways to cut bills, rebuild trust and take people with us on the journey to net zero. To realise this promise, we must move swiftly from plan to practice, getting money out of the door quickly, cutting through grid and regulatory barriers, and ensuring that every community has a fair chance to generate, own and—crucially—sell its own energy locally.
The Minister of State, Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (Lord Whitehead) (Lab)
I thank the noble Lords for their thorough and constructive response to this Statement on the local energy plan, and for their general support, particularly for the local power plan itself. I particularly thank the noble Earl, Lord Russell, for his forensic analysis of the detail of the report and for the various questions he asked, over and above what I took to be his very strong support for what the local power plan is trying to do: substantially to enhance the ability of communities to own and run their own energy arrangements and to distribute the benefit of those arrangements back to the local communities themselves. I know the noble Earl has been looking into and opining on this issue for a very long time, and I too have something of a track record in it.
I understand, therefore, why it is necessary to get the detail of this right. I hope that this evening I will be able to say one or two things about how that detail is going to be got right, but if there are things that I have missed, I will certainly be happy to write to the noble Earl, putting some of those things exactly into the place they should be. But I think I can give him an assurance that we have thought about most of the things that he has raised this evening.
Indeed, we see those things as an essential part of the move forward with the local power plan, so that communities can, for example, start to trade in local energy, have security and resilience in their local plans and benefit from a substantial hand-holding operation that is designed into Great British Energy’s approach to the 1,000 projects that it is hoped we will be able to get under way in this Parliament. We hope that those will be as robust as they can be with the sort of support that Great British Energy will give them—not just by throwing a little bit of money for a local community project and hoping it works, but actually being with those local communities right down the line, from development and first thought to the “valley of death”, where it gets to operation. I hope that the noble Earl can take some assurance from the fact that we have thought out the whole process, not just the first part of it.
As far as the ambition of the local power plan is concerned, the £1 billion is based on what we think can be reasonably accommodated, invested in and sorted out, and that is the 1,000 projects in this Parliament. That is not the end of the matter; there is potentially a lot more to come. Even within that £1 billion, there are other sources, from the National Wealth Fund and various other things, that can come into play to add resource to the investment. So the idea that a large part of what was supposed to be the original investment has been lost, I am afraid, is not correct; it is more about how we get through the process of this over the period of time, making it work constructively as we go forward.
The noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, for the Opposition, concentrated much more on the other part of the Statement, which concerned the results of the second part of AR7, which was the solar, tidal and onshore wind pots that came within AR7. He was, I think, generally supportive of the results of AR7. In AR7, we have secured a fantastic step forward in terms of the deployment of solar, a very substantial and encouraging initial deployment of tidal stream and the beginnings of the establishment, or re-establishment, of onshore wind, which, as the noble Lord will recall, was banned, in effect, by the previous Administration. So it is perhaps not surprising that we are building onshore wind back up again in this round, when it had been dormant for a long time previously. Overall, these are really good results, which, by the way, will in their own right lead to the development of a very large number of additional jobs in this sector. Indeed, overall, it is thought that the programmes that are under way will lead to perhaps 10,000 direct and indirect jobs over the next period.
In addition to that, the Government are quite earnestly engaged in what we might call a just transition process, which the noble Lord will know is under way, of making sure that those people who are working in the high-carbon industries, which will largely be replaced by these low-carbon industries, are able to transfer their skills and their contribution to the development of the low-carbon industry. Indeed, there are active retraining and reskilling programs under way. Examination of the skills in the high-carbon and low-carbon sectors show that something like 70% to 80% of jobs in the high-carbon sector are certainly transferable to the low-carbon sector, provided the skills are in the right place. It is not just a question of creating lots of new jobs. It is a question of making sure that as many of the jobs in the high-carbon sector—which, yes, will go as gas, for example, retreats in front of the new low-carbon regime—that can be translated to the low-carbon sector are indeed supported to do so over the period.
The noble Lord was also at pains to talk about how supply chains can avoid becoming involved in slave labour and abuses of human rights in the production of those supply chains. He was quite right to mention that, and it is something that we are obviously very concerned about on this side, as the supply chains for low-carbon power establish themselves. Certainly at the moment, the world supply of solar panels rests substantially with China. Of course, there are a large number of initiatives around the world to diversify that supply chain from China to other solar panel manufacturers, such as solar panel developments within the UK. That is the first point.
The second point is that GB Energy has established an ethical supply chain unit to support robust human rights due diligence and transparency in line with the UK’s legislation on modern slavery and the international human rights framework, including the UN guiding principles on human rights. GB Energy will be exploring alternatives to diversify high-risk supply chains and collaborate with partners to improve renewable supply chain transparency and accountability in the UK. Work is at hand to make sure that we are as robust as we can be in terms of those concerns about modern slavery and exploitation of human labour. The noble Lord will be aware that it is often very difficult to trace supply chains accurately as to exactly where they are coming from and going through, but I hope he will agree that we are doing and will do as much as we can to ensure, within that difficulty, that there is proof against those concerns about modern slavery and other practices.
Baroness Gill (Lab)
My Lords, this is a most welcome initiative. Energy poverty and security of supply have been a real concern for years for people in many parts of our country. I have three short points that I would like my noble friend the Minister to address. Does this mean that the consumer will get improved energy security and resilience? Will it save them money on their energy bills once the scheme is up and running? How does the local power plan balance affordability, reliability and decarbonisation under the worst-case scenarios, and what trade-offs are we prepared to make if there is a conflict in our goals?
Lord Whitehead (Lab)
I thank my noble friend Lady Gill for her carefully thought-out contribution. These are questions that we need to make sure we have got right as far as a local power plan is concerned.
The first thing I can say is, yes, the local power plan will start saving people substantial amounts of money on their bills. That will not necessarily be absolutely everybody under all circumstances, but certainly, provided that the local power plan is carried out properly, there will be lots of opportunities for the return on the investment that has been put into local communities through those schemes to come back in some instances directly off people’s energy bills.
As I mentioned in response to the noble Earl, Lord Russell, one of the things that we are doing is making sure that we have all the back-up material for the local power plan, which would give effect, for example, to people’s ability to trade locally, although that may require legislation. But that will mean, in conjunction with code changes, for example, there will be an ability of local power projects to deliver direct benefits, not just in the traditional way of the developer giving a little bit of money to the local community to help the village hall or whatever. This is about real changes not just in people’s energy relationship; the fact that they own the energy themselves and can get direct benefit from it will, I think, quite transform the local scene.
By the way, because that is all local and if it can be integrated with local power systems generally, it will add quite considerably to the resilience of the country’s energy supplies. It is all based in the UK, it goes around in the UK, the benefit comes out in the UK and it is a considerable addition to the energy security of our country. I hope that my noble friend can take some assurance that we have thought about all these issues and are determined to make sure that they are firmly a part of the local power plan as it rolls out.