Victims and Courts Bill

Tuesday 10th March 2026 Lords Chamber

Report

Welsh legislative consent granted.

15:23

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Lemos) (Lab)]

We are now on Report on this Bill. It is relatively short but there are some important topics for discussion, so I thought it might be helpful to draw your Lordships’ attention to paragraph 8.151 of the Companion which says:

“Arguments fully deployed in Committee of the whole House or in Grand Committee should not be repeated at length on report”.


Clause 3: Restricting parental responsibility of certain sex offenders

Amendment 1

Moved by

[Baroness Brinton]

1: Clause 3, page 5, line 40, leave out from “offender”)” to end of line 1 on page 6 and insert “for any sexual offence in relation to children, including online offences,”
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment lowers the threshold at which the restrictions in Clause 3 can apply.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister and her officials for the helpful meetings between Committee and Report and for the correspondence. I have retabled my amendment from Committee, which would place restrictions on parental responsibility, as Amendment 1, and signed Amendments 2 and 3 from the noble Lord, Lord Meston, which I support. I listened very carefully to the Minister and was grateful to be able to discuss the matter with her. We thank the Government for recognising that there must be a clear position on when those convicted of child sex abuse lose their parental rights. It has been iniquitous that parental rights have trumped the safeguarding of children, even when the person with parental rights has been convicted of child sexual abuse.

However, we are not convinced that this is strong enough and Amendment 1 includes all convicted of child sexual abuse. This is not about the punishment of the offender; it is about protecting all children. The organisation We Stand told us that research from the Centre of Expertise on Child Sexual Abuse shows that natural parents are the highest offending group in intra-familial child sex abuse, which accounts for two-thirds of offences. As a result, children of convicted child sex offenders are at the most risk.

Any non-abusing or protective parent has a legal duty to protect their child from any child sex offender and at any level of offending. Too many have to fight the family court’s assumption about the rights of a parent, even one who is a convicted child sex abuse offender. Everything is stacked against the protective parent, with little or no legal aid to fight to protect their children and no right to know where the offender is, which also means court papers cannot be served to them. They have no right to the rehabilitation or risk assessments of the offender. That is also extraordinary: how can they comment on them or ask for assessments to be made?

Contrast that with the offender, who has the right to make multiple applications to vary or overturn protective orders and to make repeated requests for contact with the children. This is especially problematic in households where there has also been coercive control and domestic abuse, as repeated requests continue the abuse, but the family courts have too often seen it only through the eyes of the offending parent trying to assert their rights. Judges and other authorities, such as social services and Cafcass, are forced into a legislative anomaly: they must balance potential harm to a child from a convicted sex abuser parent with legislation stating that both parents’ involvement in the child’s life further supports the welfare of that child. This leads to inconsistent outcomes.

Even if the presumption is repealed, this fundamental belief is still enshrined in the introduction and guidance to the Children Act 1989’s key principles. Children of a child sexual abusing parent are often at greater risk than other children, who are automatically protected by criminal restrictions, such as sexual harm prevention orders and registration requirements.

On a technical point, the serious sexual offences listed in new Schedule ZA1 to the Children Act 1989 include both indecent imagery offences and contact offences. Imagery offences have a minimum sentence of a community order; this means we could well argue that serious offences under Clause 3 could be triggered at any sentencing threshold. However, the majority of sentences for indecent imagery tend to fall between three months and a year, while sentencing guidelines for contact offences start at a minimum of one year. Those convicted of these offences would be excluded from the Government’s proposal in Clause 3.

Surely, for safeguarding reasons, now is the time to change the legal responsibility, with the offending parent having to prove why they are safe to exercise parental responsibility, through rehabilitation courses and, of course, assessment by professionals. The position of the court must surely start with the assumption of the protection of the child, not the rights of the offender parent. I beg to move.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 2 and 3, which were laid by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, who apologises for being unable to be in the House today. Rather courageously and dangerously, he has asked me to present the two amendments in his name. I shall do my amateur best.

Amendment 2 would restrict the acquisition of parental responsibility by those convicted of serious sexual offences against a child. The Bill as drafted requires the Crown Court to prohibit convicted offenders from exercising parental responsibility and does so by requiring that the court makes an order when sentencing the offender. However, this would not and does not cover children of convicted offenders who are born after the sentencing hearing. As the current law stands, a convicted child sex offender could still acquire parental responsibility automatically for a child after sentencing—even one day after sentencing—leaving the mother and child unprotected from controlling or obstructive interference by the convicted father.

One accepts that many of the convicted fathers in such cases might not automatically acquire parental responsibility because they are not married to the mother, and it is very unlikely that the mother would then agree that the father should be included on the birth certificate. However, if the father and mother were still married to each other at the time of the child’s birth, the father would automatically acquire parental responsibility. To change that, under current law the mother would have to apply to the family court on notice to the father.

15:30

This amendment would ensure that children born after conviction have the same level of protection as the Bill intends to provide to children born before the offender is sentenced. It would remove the offender’s eligibility for parental responsibility at birth but would preserve his ability to apply later to the family court, where the child’s best interests remain the test. The important point is that this would not leave it to the mother to have to apply to the family court herself, as would currently be the case. It is relevant to both Clauses 3 and 4, as a child may be conceived out of rape but may not be born until after the offender has been sentenced. The duty to notify the local authority under the proposed new Section 10F in Clause 4, under the current wording, does not apply to a child who has not yet been born.

I move to Amendment 3. Current bail arrangements allow police and courts to impose conditions to prevent reoffending or interference with victims and witnesses. But children are rarely included, raising concerns that fathers accused of rape and serious sexual offences can manipulate, intimidate or coercively control their children or their children’s mothers. This amendment would add an automatic condition that bail granted to a person accused of RASSO would prohibit direct or indirect contact with any of the accused’s children.

The current bail arrangements under the Bail Act 1976 allow police and courts to impose conditions to prevent reoffending or interference with victims and witnesses. Although children affected by domestic abuse are recognised as victims under the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, they are rarely included in bail conditions, even when their parent is accused of rape or other serious sexual offences. There are related and growing concerns that fathers accused of these sorts of offences retain direct or indirect contact with their children, potentially enabling witness intimidation, manipulation or coercive control of the mother. The proposed amendment would require that, whenever bail is granted to a person accused of one of these offences, an automatic condition must be imposed prohibiting direct or indirect contact with any of the accused’s children. This would help guarantee the children’s protection from witness tampering and the children’s parent’s protection from intimidation and coercion.

[Lord Sandhurst (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, for her Amendment 1, which addresses the thresholds proposed in the Bill. As she knows, we on these Benches have similarly expressed concern about the proposed threshold. This restricts the effect of Clause 3 to offenders sentenced to four years or more. Given the evident consensus against the current threshold, we on this side look forward to the Minister’s response.

Amendments 2 and 3, spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, raise interesting and entirely reasonable points, revealing potential gaps in the present legislation, so again I look forward to what the Minister will say.

This brings me to Amendment 4, in my name and that of my noble and learned friend Lord Keen of Elie. It seeks to extend the safeguarding framework in Clause 3 so that it applies to those convicted of the most serious child cruelty offences—and I emphasise “cruelty”, as it is not just about sexual offences. It should be noted that in respect of the Crime and Policing Bill we understand that the Government have tabled a new schedule, which lists child cruelty offences, taking the step of treating sex offenders and child cruelty offenders analogously. Our amendment uses the very same definition of child cruelty, so it is wholly consistent with the Government’s thinking.

Our amendment asks the Government only to take the same stance in this Bill to ensure that the parental responsibility of offenders is restricted when serious child cruelty has been committed. If the Government are not inclined to support this, we ask why. I ask the House again, regarding parental responsibility, why should our response to a child who has suffered cruelty differ from cases where a child has been sexually assaulted? I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Baroness Levitt) (Lab)]

My Lords, the Government appreciate that this group of amendments is driven by a desire to safeguard the children who are, quite rightly, at the centre of these difficult and sensitive cases. As I said in Committee, this aim is one I share.

Amendment 2, in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Meston and Lord Russell, and the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, seeks to apply our proposed parental responsibility measures to as yet unborn children. There are complexities to this, because there are three distinct groups of as yet unborn children who would be caught by this measure. These are as follows: first, a child who has been conceived as a result of the rape of the victim by the defendant, but who is as yet unborn at the date of sentence; secondly, a child who has been conceived but is as yet unborn when their father is sentenced to four years’ or more imprisonment for a child sex offence; and, thirdly, a child who will be conceived at some point in the future but has not yet been conceived. Different considerations apply in relation to each.

We thank the noble Lords and the noble Baroness for their amendment because, in the course of our consideration of it, we have realised that an unborn child who has been conceived as a result of rape is not covered by Clause 4, as currently drafted, to which the noble Lord, Lord Russell, referred. As my honourable friend Minister Davies-Jones said in the other place, safeguards are in place through the family courts which could restrict parental responsibility in these cases, but it is a serious gap in Clause 4, and I have asked my officials to look further at this and consider how we can best protect this group of children. This is complex, and I cannot address it today, here and now, but I will write to your Lordships with an update on this as soon as I can.

The second group, to which I have already referred in outline, consists of women who are pregnant by a man at the time he is sentenced to four or more years’ imprisonment for a child sex offence. I appreciate that these children are likely to be at the same risk as the living children for whom he already holds parental responsibility. Again, in relation to that category, I have asked my officials to consider what approach may be possible in these cases.

It is the third group covered by this amendment that causes us difficulties. It refers to any or all future children of someone who has received a four-year sentence for a child sex offence, in perpetuity. This would cover a child conceived, say, 50 years after that sentence had been imposed and served. It is this last cohort of children that is the reason the Government cannot accept this amendment. We cannot know what the circumstances of each case will be for future children, particularly when decades may have passed between the sentence and their birth. We cannot, therefore, be sure that we are acting in the best interests of a child who may not be conceived for many decades hence by automatically preventing the offender acquiring parental responsibility.

It is important that I restate what has already been said by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton: these measures are not an additional punishment for the offender. The point of them is to offer rapid protection to the offender’s existing children who are deemed to be at an immediate risk, right then and right there, in the Crown Court. That is why under the Government’s proposals, the restriction can and should happen automatically, at the point of sentence—but a child conceived many years later is a much more complicated and challenging proposition. In general terms, the proper place to make decisions about the welfare of future children is in the family court, so in most cases it is the family court where these applications should be determined.

As I have said before, criminal court judges do not have the training, the experience or, frankly, the time to consider, in each individual case, whether the restriction of parental responsibility is in the best interests of that particular child. That kind of consideration should be made by the expert and experienced judges of the family court—judges such as the much-respected noble Lord, Lord Meston—who will have the benefit of reports from, for example, expert social workers. It is self-evident that this kind of determination cannot be made in advance of the child’s birth, possibly many decades in advance.

Finally, as the noble Lord, Lord Meston, and probably other noble Lords are aware, parental responsibility can be acquired in multiple ways, and while it may be the noble Lord’s intention that this amendment should apply only to parents who automatically acquire parental responsibility, it would not prevent an unmarried father obtaining parental responsibility for future children by being named on the birth certificate if the mother wished to do so. It is a fact that not all mothers accept the guilt of their partners, even post-conviction and sentence. This would create a situation in which some offenders could never acquire parental responsibility for a future child without a separate order being made, while others could. That would be a significant inconsistency in the law which we cannot accept. For these reasons, we cannot accept this amendment, but again I thank your Lordships for bringing to my attention cases where the mother is pregnant at the time of sentencing. Those unborn children require protection, and we will look at how best to provide it.

I turn to Amendment 3, also in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Meston, but spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Russell. This amendment seeks to create mandatory bail conditions preventing defendants contacting children for whom they hold parental responsibility while they are under investigation or awaiting trial on bail. We all want to ensure that children are protected when a parent has been accused of a serious sexual offence, but the Government cannot accept this amendment. Existing legislation already provides the police and courts with powers to impose robust bail conditions, which can include requirements not to have any unsupervised access to children and not to live and sleep at an address where children are living, and it is absolutely standard for there to be a condition not to contact prosecution witnesses, including children, in a case where those children are giving evidence. If there is a real danger to witnesses or to children, it is very likely that bail will be refused. However, in the real world, there will be some cases in which there is plainly no risk to the suspect’s children, so to remove the judge’s discretion would probably be incompatible with Article 8.

As the law stands, there are no mandatory bail conditions of any kind for any type of offence. To start introducing them would restrict the important discretion of the police and courts to apply conditions on a case-by-case basis to address real risks. It would also interfere with the presumption of innocence and the presumption of entitlement to bail, both of which underpin our whole criminal justice system. The amendment also seeks to impose a condition which would require the accused to disclose the nature of any bail conditions imposed to the family court while they are under investigation or on trial if there are existing children proceedings. The joint protocol on the disclosure of information between family and criminal agencies and jurisdictions already provides a clear framework for the sharing of information, so there is no need for such a statutory provision. For these reasons, I ask the noble Lord not to press his amendment.

I now turn to Amendment 1 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. I have had a number of very useful conversations with the noble Baroness, whom I greatly admire, and I understand the aim of this amendment. I think and hope that she understands that I share her wish to protect as many children as possible, but Clause 3 is not a marker for when parental responsibility should be restricted; it is about when such a restriction should happen automatically at the point of sentence—that is to say, without the usual consideration by the family court. Any individual who poses a serious risk to children should not be able to exercise parental responsibility, but to restrict it automatically, we must be certain that the restriction is in that child’s best interests. The seriousness of the offences in scope of our measure, marked by a sentence of four years or more, ensures that we can be confident, in those cases, that that is the case.

That is not to say that an offender who has committed sexual offences against children but has received a sentence of less than four years’ imprisonment cannot or should not have their parental responsibility restricted; in some cases, that will be exactly what should happen, but an application to restrict parental responsibility can then be made to the family courts in exactly the same way as it can be now. They will consider all the circumstances of the case and make a decision in the child’s best interests.

Amendment 4 in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, and the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, seeks to introduce an automatic restriction on the exercise of parental responsibility for offenders convicted of child cruelty and sentenced to imprisonment of four years or more. The Government believe the aim of this amendment is sound and principled; child cruelty offences are heinous, and we all wish to protect as many children as possible, so we understand why the noble and learned Lord seeks to extend the Government’s measures.

15:45

However, these new provisions in the Bill are novel and untested. We need to understand how the measures we are proposing work in practice before we consider expanding them any further. We do not know, for example, how many offenders will apply to the family courts to seek to vary or discharge the prohibited steps order made automatically at the Crown Court, and therefore we do not know the impact this will have on the family courts. We cannot take the risk of overwhelming them with an influx of cases arising from the new automatic restriction. The family courts are involved in difficult cases every day and it is important that any changes we make do not delay those cases and thereby put other vulnerable children already in the system at risk.

We will monitor how these provisions operate once they are implemented. Officials will develop a system which allows us to understand the impact they are having, how they work in practice and how they can be improved. We should be cautious and not expand these measures further without this insight and understanding. There are already routes to apply for restriction of parental responsibility in child cruelty cases. For these reasons, I urge the noble and learned Lord not to press his amendment.

Finally, on a related subject to these amendments, I want to take this opportunity to update your Lordships’ House about the implementation of Section 18 of the Victims and Prisoners Act 2024, commonly known as Jade’s law. I am pleased to restate the Government’s firm commitment to bringing these important measures into force and am glad to be able to announce when Jade’s law will commence.

I add one caveat. It is complicated because delivering this legislation requires a substantial and carefully co-ordinated programme of work. It will require secondary legislation, which in all probability will include amendments to the Criminal Procedure Rules and the Family Procedure Rules, updates to judicial guidance and significant procedural and training changes across the police, the legal profession, local authorities, the CPS, HMCTS, Cafcass, Cafcass Cymru and the Prison Service. This body of work will take time, so officials gave me the date of 6 April 2027 for implementation, due to the scale of the task and the steps that will need to occur between laying the commencement statutory instrument and commencement. But I was concerned that that was too far away, so I have good news. I am very grateful to officials in the Ministry of Justice, who have made a huge effort, and, as a result, I am delighted to say that the implementation date has been brought forward and is planned for the end of December 2026.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this fairly short debate. I think we have managed to get to the essence of the issues remaining from Committee. I am particularly grateful to the Minister for her explanation about children born by rape and conceived pre sentencing. I really welcome her comments on that. I think from across the House we also want to thank her and the Government for delivering on Jade’s law. We are not quite there yet but, as I think everyone across the House accepts, there is a considerable amount of work to do and it is more important to get it right when it starts at the end of the year.

I understand the points the Minister made on my Amendment 1. This goes to the heart of this set of amendments. I spoke about the difficulties between the criminal court system and the family court system and why children are falling between the gaps. I accept these issues and will not call a Division on my amendment, but I really hope the Government can bring forward a Bill where we can discuss both the family courts and the criminal courts and get some understanding and change on these sensitive and difficult issues of safe- guarding children. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 1 withdrawn.

Amendments 2 to 4 not moved.

Amendment 5

Moved by

[Baroness Brinton]

5: After Clause 7, insert the following new Clause—
“Access to free court transcripts for victims(1) Victims of criminal offences shall be entitled to receive, without charge, court transcripts of—(a) the Route to Verdict, and(b) bail decisions and conditions,which are relevant to their case.(2) The Secretary of State must ensure that such transcripts are provided within 14 days of a request.(3) The entitlement under subsection (1) shall apply irrespective of whether the victim gave evidence in the case.”Member's explanatory statement
This new clause would give victims a right to receive, free of charge, court transcripts of the Route to Verdict and bail decisions relevant to their case. It requires that transcripts be provided within 14 days of a request and clarifies that this right applies whether or not the victim gave evidence in the case.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for her helpful meeting between Committee and Report. As a result of her concerns about the practicalities of summing up for victims, I have amended my Amendment 5 following discussion with others outside your Lordships’ House.

From these Benches, I say again that both the previous and present Government undertook the pilot scheme to provide victims with judges’ sentencing remarks. It is encouraging that this pilot scheme will now be rolled out across England and Wales—it is certainly better than nothing at all.

In Committee, I argued that there are a number of reasons why sentencing remarks alone might well not provide the help a victim needs, whether this is information to explain what has happened when they may not have been present or to give them an understanding that it might help lead them to closure after whatever the incident was, or information that might help them to decide whether to challenge the sentence as unduly lenient—the subject of the last group in this Report stage later today.

Yesterday, I submitted a revised amendment which deletes the summings-up and replaces them with the route to verdict. Those I discussed it with said that this has to be done anyway, and it should be cost-free as it will be produced as part of the court process for others and should provide victims with an extra understanding of what has happened and why. That being cost-free is very important, because in Committee we heard of the extraordinary amounts of money that some victims have been asked to pay when they have asked for transcripts of court hearings. In one case, this was quoted at £7,000—that is too much. I am therefore grateful that the Minister says the Ministry of Justice will look at how technology can be harnessed in the future to ensure victims are not charged thousands of pounds if they need to see a full transcript, or even a partial one, and I will hold the Minister to that in the future.

Amendment 5 also says that the victims should be informed about bail conditions. This is important especially if there is a restriction placed on the defendant from approaching the victim. Too often, victims are not told of bail conditions. We know they should be, but they are not, which can cause chaos, especially when changed at short notice and without the knowledge of the victim.

Amendment 16, tabled by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, sets a framework and timescale for the publication online of sentencing remarks. We hope that if this is accepted, the Government would also undertake to ensure the victim is told as soon as they are published online. The amendment also says the victim must be aware they have the right to request anonymity. This is already covered in the rights of victims set out in the victims’ code for the entirety of the process and not just at the end, but it is helpful that it is clearly stated here. I beg to move.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 5 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, reflects a commitment to ensuring victims are entitled to free transcripts on the route to verdict and bail decisions and conditions that are relevant to their case. In Committee, we supported the broader amendment, which included sentencing remarks as well. On the amendment now before us, which includes transcripts of the route to verdict, our position has not changed; if anything, we are even more supportive, and I am grateful to the noble Baroness for bringing this matter to Report.

Similarly, Amendment 16 in my name and in the name of my noble friend Lord Sandhurst is also designed to enhance access to important transcripts without charge, this time focusing on sentencing remarks. I will not rehearse the arguments and evidence for this, as we have all heard the benefits and how it would help the interests of victims and underlines our open justice system.

We have listened carefully and, after further thought, have revised the amendment that we brought forward in Committee. While we have not changed our position on this amendment focusing on sentencing remarks, the amendment now gives the relevant victims the right to anonymity rather than non-publication. In addition, it still requires the court to make victims aware of this right before sentencing remarks are published. With this crucial and pragmatic safeguard in place, we hope that the House finds this to be a well-considered and reasonable amendment that focuses on how this will work in practice and not only on the principle of transparency, on which I believe we are all agreed. In these circumstances, I intend to test the opinion of the House on Amendment 16.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, and the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, for their constructive engagement on the subject of court transcripts over recent weeks.

As the noble and learned Lord said, there is nothing between us on the principle of increased transparency for criminal court proceedings. As your Lordships will know, the Government recently announced that we will provide free transcripts of sentencing remarks for victims whose cases are heard in the Crown Court; it is one of the provisions of the Sentencing Act. Delivering this new entitlement is a significant operational undertaking. It is essential that we get it right, so that victims can receive the information they need in a timely way. However, the new proposals in the amendments in this group, taken either individually or together, would put that commitment under strain.

Through her Amendment 5, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, wants to include an entitlement to transcripts of bail decisions and the route to verdict. There are two difficulties with that. First, providing transcripts of bail decisions would involve extra resource. Transcripts are not free and producing even those for short hearings, if extended across England and Wales, would be expensive. Secondly, it would not provide significant benefits over and above the systems already in place. Transcripts on bail decisions are rarely informative for victims; they usually just set out the decision—where the judge says either that bail is granted and lists the conditions, or that bail is refused, with rarely any kind of reasoned judgment—and, as I said, they would come with cost implications. Under the victims’ code, victims already have the right to be informed of bail outcomes and release conditions.

We recognise that, when information is not provided in a timely or consistent way, this can cause distress and anxiety for victims and add to what is already a difficult experience. The experiences spoken to in Committee by the noble Baroness is clearly not what we expect or wish—nor are they, I am pleased to say, the norm. We are currently exploring how responsibilities under the victims’ code are being met by the relevant service providers and how better to support them in the delivery of the code.

We will also seek victims’ views on access to bail information and whether current processes are working correctly, through the ongoing victims’ code consultation. To strengthen that further, the Victims and Prisoners Act 2024 will introduce a compliance framework requiring criminal justice bodies to keep their delivery of the code under review. Therefore, legislation needed to drive improvement in notifying victims of bail conditions is already in place.

Because this amendment arrived only yesterday, I have not had an opportunity to discuss the question of routes to verdict with the noble Baroness, but I think it is possible that she may have been misinformed about what a route to verdict is and what it consists of. It is our view that a route to verdict is unlikely to add significant, or indeed any, value for victims. It is usually a very short document; in most trials, it is typically about 10 lines long. Very rarely would a route to verdict be longer than two pages. It sets out a few questions that the jury should ask themselves in private, when they are applying the law to the facts of the case. However, the jury never gives its answers to those questions because we do not have reasoned judgments in criminal trials. Therefore, the victim will not be any wiser as to what the answers were; they would simply know the questions that were asked. These routes to verdict are almost always—unless the printer is broken—provided to the jury in hard copy, so a transcript is not needed and would add nothing.

The noble Baroness also raised concerns in Committee about victims being asked to leave the courtroom after giving evidence. I agree that this is a real issue and should not happen. I give the noble Baroness my assurance that I will work with the appropriate officials to ensure that victims understand that they are generally entitled to remain in court if they wish to do so and that arrangements—such as the use of screens or remote observation, so that they cannot be seen and do not have to see the person they accuse—can be made in some, if not all, circumstances. This is a practical and immediate step that we hope will make a real difference to victims’ experience without requiring further legislation.

Amendment 16 in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, and the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, would require the Crown Court to publish transcripts of sentencing remarks within 14 days of a request for such remarks being made. Publishing sentencing remarks online is significantly more resource-intensive than simply providing them to the victim.

Public release demands a higher standard of anonymisation to remove both direct and indirect identifiers of victims and witnesses. Jigsaw identification is where a number of apparently innocuous pieces of information, when put together, particularly by people who have some knowledge of the local area, for example, can in fact lead to the identification of the victim. Even something such as the location of a shop, if there are people around who know it, could tell them who the victim is.

That kind of anonymisation is detailed and skilled work. Current AI-based tools cannot reliably carry out anonymisation for the complex and sensitive material heard in the criminal courts. The cost of getting it wrong is profound. It requires trained staff manually to review each transcript, and research suggests that it takes around 45 minutes of staff time to review every hour of a transcript before publication is possible. That means that even a modest increase in publication volumes would create disproportionate pressures in operational capacity in the Crown Courts, which cannot take any further pressure.

Furthermore, requiring the court to make the victim aware of their right to request anonymity, to make the appropriate redactions and to publish the transcript online within 14 days of any request is just not viable. Our priority must be delivering the sentencing remarks for victims, as set out in the Sentencing Act, properly and at pace, before taking on any further changes that could undermine or delay that work.

Finally, I would like to reassure your Lordships that we have listened to what was said in Committee, and work is already under way to improve the transcripts application process to make the system more accessible for all users. I thank your Lordships for raising these important issues. We all agree about the principle of transparency; the only issue between us is the best way to deliver it. We believe these issues can be and are being addressed through non-legislative means, and I ask the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, if content, to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, and the Minister for their contributions. I thank the noble and learned Lord for his support of our Amendment 5. We on our Benches absolutely agree that his amendment helps the interests of victims’ right to anonymity, and we are very grateful for that. As he said, it is practical.

I preface my reply to the Minister by saying that through these amendments we are seeking to ensure that the problems that victims have at the moment are resolved. The difficulty we have is that we are being told it is all too expensive, difficult and complicated. I have been sitting in your Lordships’ House for at least six years getting that sort of response. Victims are very grateful for the pilot that has gone through on the sentencing notes, but the issue is that there are other things that victims need to hear.

We appreciate that there are significant issues that need to be resolved, but it was only through pressure from your Lordships’ House during the passage of the Victims and Prisoners Act that we got the pilot that is now being rolled out. I really hope we can convince the Government that they should do another pilot to at least look at some of the issues that either my amendment or the amendment from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, tackles, because we believe that to be important. However, in the meantime, because we think that this is just too far in the future, I would like to test the opinion of the House.

16:03

Division 1

Amendment 5 agreed.

Ayes: 273

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Conservative: 172
Liberal Democrat: 57
Crossbench: 22
Non-affiliated: 11
Ulster Unionist Party: 3
Democratic Unionist Party: 3
Green Party: 2
Plaid Cymru: 2
Bishops: 1

Noes: 180

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Labour: 153
Crossbench: 25
Non-affiliated: 2

16:15

Amendment 6

Moved by

[Lord Hacking]

6: After Clause 7, insert the following new Clause—
“Victim navigators(1) The Secretary of State must, within six months of the passing of this Act, make provision for each police force in England and Wales to have access to one or more independent victim navigators.(2) The purpose of an independent victim navigator under subsection (1) is to—(a) liaise between the police force and potential victims of offences relating to slavery or human trafficking, and(b) assist in the provision of specialist advice for either the police force or the potential victims.(3) The Secretary of State may by regulations provide further guidance on the functions of independent victim navigators.(4) Regulations under this section shall be made by statutory instrument, and may not be made unless a draft has been laid before and approved by resolution of each House of Parliament.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new clause seeks to implement the recommendation of the House of Lords Committee on the Modern Slavery Act 2015 (HL Paper 8) by introducing provisions for Independent Victim Navigators to be in operation on a national level in England and Wales, acting as a liaison between the police and potential victims of slavery or human trafficking in accessing the appropriate support.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I am happy to disclose that I am being supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, who has been kind enough to sign my amendment.

I think it would be helpful if I began by telling your Lordships the major features of modern slavery. It affects principally those in the agricultural industry, domestic employment and the provision of sexual services. It impacts mainly on immigrant labour. Immigrants are brought to this country by their exploiter; in the case of sexual offences, it will be by their pimp. When here, they continue to be controlled by their exploiter, having to give, for example, a portion of their earnings to the exploiter.

I think it would also be helpful if I explained the role of the victim navigator. Their role is to protect the victim, particularly in the prosecution process. They are often former police officers who understand the processes to which the victim is subject. In gaining the confidence of the victim, they gain most valuable information that can lead to the prosecution of the exploiter. In the provision of sexual services, this will be the prosecution of the pimp.

We must understand the scale of the problem relating to sexual services and the current increase in sexual exploitation. The figures are difficult to obtain, but it has been estimated that in the years 2020 to 2025 there was an 86% increase in the sexual exploitation of women, from 1,114 victims to 2,076. It has also been estimated that there has been a 61% increase in the exploitation of girls, and I understand that to be women who are under the age of 18.

Sex provides, and this is very alarming, a very big market on the internet. For those accessing ASWs, as they are called, there can currently be found 63,000 listings for women. These sites attract—this is another awful figure—no fewer than 41.7 million visitors.

I do not see her present, but my noble friend Lady Goudie spoke to this amendment in Committee. I was not able to be in Committee. It is important to remind your Lordships of the major points that my noble friend made.

She referred to the report of the House of Lords Modern Slavery Act 2015 Committee, which was so ably chaired by my noble friend Lady O’Grady. I do not see her, either, in the Chamber. My noble friend Lady Goudie cited paragraph 46 on page 77, which was the conclusion of our committee report, which reads:

“Victim navigators should be rolled out nationally. The objective must be that they are available in all cases”.


She also drew attention to the economic benefit provided by the use of victim navigators. It was estimated that the financial gain for each victim who benefited from this process came to £150,000. She cited the chief executive of the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority, who stated in reference to the victims:

“That means they’re better able to get help, and it also helps us when we’re taking people to court, because they understand the process better, they understand how to engage, and they feel supported. It has made a real difference to us”.


The other compliment came from a detective sergeant in the Metropolitan Police, who commented as follows:

“I am in no doubt that a dangerous predator would not have received a 31-year jail sentence without the support of Justice and Care ... I led the police investigation into the case and think that the Victim Navigators’ work was nothing short of exceptional”.


I am citing my noble friend Lady Goudie because it is very important that we understand this.

The government response to our committee report, from the Home Office, reads as follows:

“The Government recognises the importance of supporting victims to engage with the criminal justice system and the positive impact an independent support worker, working alongside law enforcement, can have on securing this engagement”.


It goes on to refer to research on victim navigators:

“The Government is keen to build on this research, working in partnership with NGOs and law enforcement, to identify how to best support victims to engage with the criminal justice system”.


So the Home Office certainly responded positively to our report.

The Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, Ms Eleanor Lyons, supports this amendment. My noble friend the Minister kindly met her last week, on Thursday, so she has heard directly the views of no less a person than the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner on this amendment.

I refer to the first annual report of the commissioner, which came out only a few days ago, because its foreword states that

“modern slavery is still with us. It lurks in the shadows, hidden in industries, supply chains, and even in our neighbourhoods. The victims, in rural communities as well as big cities, continue to suffer in silence”.

In short, this continues to be a major matter of concern. The report, from a very small office, is remarkable. Its 58 pages identify the commissioner’s strategic plan of prevention, protection and prosecution. To summarise the importance of victim navigators, I refer to the most recent survey—

[Lord Lemos (Lab)]

I invite my noble friend to move his amendment as he has now been speaking for 10 minutes.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

I think I am allowed 15 minutes.

The commissioner summarised her strategy in this excellent report. It is the protection of victims, and 724 have been supported. As a result of the activities of the victim navigators, 1,420 police investigations have taken place, and 74 convictions have resulted in a total period of imprisonment of all those convicted of 522 years.

I recognise that modern slavery is under the remit of the Home Office, not the Department of Justice. This inevitably restricts the Minister and what help she can provide. If she cannot accept this amendment, could she kindly convey to her colleagues in the Home Office the strong views that I have expressed and that I hope others will express in this short debate? The Home Office did very well in introducing the Modern Slavery Act 2015, which put us at the forefront internationally of anti-slavery legislation, but it did slip up rather badly. This was identified in the Independent in, I think, January 2024, which had a headline:

“Commissioner: Modern slavery no longer Home Office priority”.


There was also a very serious failure by the Home Office in leaving the post of the anti-slavery commissioner vacant for, in the words of Ms Lyons, “a staggering 20 months”. This was taken up as a point of criticism in our Select Committee report. So can the Minister, if nothing else, get the Home Office to start paying attention again to modern slavery and its problems? I beg to move.

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to support the noble Lord, Lord Hacking, especially when he is so right on an issue. This is an interesting group. Clearly, the Government are going to have a choice of routes to increase human rights for victims, because we need a justice system that puts victims first. We have to understand that many, particularly in the cases we are talking about, are frightened, traumatised and very much deserving of care. For many survivors, the moment they come to the attention of the authorities is not a moment of relief: it is a moment of fear and confusion. They may have been controlled, threatened and abused for months or years. They may not trust the police—many of us do not—they may not speak English and they may be terrified about what will happen next.

In those moments, survivors are asked to engage in an intimidating criminal justice system and to relive traumatic experiences, often without truly understanding what is happening or why. Too many fall away from investigations not because they are unwilling to help but because the process feels overwhelming, frightening and isolating. Victim navigators exist to meet people at that point of fear and vulnerability. They provide a trusted person who stays with the victim, explains what is happening, listens to their concerns and helps them feel safe enough to continue.

16:30

What makes victim navigators so special is their unique position. They are situated within police forces, which means that they can be present when victims are first found, including during raids on sites of exploitation. Survivors can receive clear, accurate information. At the same time, victim navigators are independent of the police. That independence matters enormously to survivors who may have been harmed by authority figures in the past or who fear retaliation. Navigators are trusted because their loyalty is to the person in front of them.

This amendment reflects what survivors themselves have told us works. The victim navigator programme from Justice and Care has helped people to stay engaged with investigations, feel less alone and begin to recover their sense of dignity. It frees up police time and reduces costs. I urge the Minister to accept this amendment, so that compassion, trust and continuity are not dependent on postcode or on charity funding. I think that keeps me well within my 10 minutes.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 7, in my name. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Russell, and my noble friend Lord Farmer for supporting it.

The Government’s own intention with this Bill is to “strengthen support for victims” and deliver a justice system that puts the “needs of victims first”. These are crucial aims that I wholeheartedly support. However, I do not see how they can achieve such goals without addressing the concerning lack of specialist support services available to victims and survivors of abuse and exploitation across our country, something on which the Bill is notably silent. Therefore, I urge the Government to accept Amendment 7. The amendment proposes to introduce a duty on local agencies to commission specialist support services for victims of abuse, which would help put a stop to victims and survivors being denied their right to access support. It is backed by 16 charities that work every day with victims of exploitation and abuse.

This is an urgent issue. Every year, millions of victims and survivors suffer horrific abuse and exploitation, including sexual abuse, domestic abuse, stalking and many other forms of harm. These are staggering numbers. We cannot ignore them. Yet right now, the support services available do not come close to matching the scale of abuse and exploitation. Support services are vital for enabling victims and survivors to process what they have experienced and begin to move on with their lives.

The lack of provision has left victims and survivors facing a postcode lottery of access to support. Fewer than one in 10 women and one in 10 children who have experienced domestic abuse are currently receiving support from a refuge or community-based support service. Similarly, according to the Centre of Expertise on Child Sexual Abuse, an estimated 55,000 adults and children in England and Wales are currently on waiting lists for child sexual abuse support services. There are just 363 services remaining across the whole of England and Wales providing the necessary specialist support. That leaves an estimated, and frankly unworkable, 16,500 victims and survivors for each service. Additionally, the Suzy Lamplugh Trust has found that fewer than 1% of all stalking victims are supported by specialist stalking advocates due to limited capacity and funding. We cannot allow this undeniable trend of patchwork provision to go on.

While I welcome the recent announcement in the Government’s freedom from violence and abuse strategy of funding for victim services, including the rollout of child houses for victims of child sexual abuse, according to the sector this will simply not be enough to address the current gaps in provision. In addition, this kind of funding too often gets diverted from specialist care to more generic services that simply lack the knowledge to support survivors in their time of need. I must emphasise that the specialism of these services is crucial to their success. Specialist services are best placed to provide the wraparound support that survivors need. Instead of leaving victims to be passed around from service to service, having to retell their stories, often not being believed, specialist victim support understands the needs of survivors and ensures that they get the right care and support when they need it most. Support specialism is not a luxury for survivors; it is a necessity.

Without a statutory imperative to commission these services, and clarity on what organisations should be funded, specialist community-based services will continue to go undercommissioned and the support available to victims and survivors will be further diluted. Not only do we have a moral duty to ensure that victims and survivors receive these services but it is their right under the victims’ code of practice—a right that countless victims are currently being denied.

Recent activity from the Government has made it clear that they know commissioning is in desperate need of reform. With the announcement of the abolition of police and crime commissioners, the police reform White Paper, and the actions committed to for improving commissioning in the freedom from violence and abuse strategy, I argue that now is the crucial time to reshape our commissioning landscape into one that works for victims and survivors. To do this, there must be clear systems in place that guarantee victims and survivors the support they are entitled to, no matter where they live. We need to seize the opportunity that we have in front of us to ensure that we will not only preserve current provision for victims but make the system better for all.

It is a simple and harrowing fact that our commissioning system is letting victims down. We as a country have allowed this dearth in services to go on for far too long, and we owe it to victims and survivors to act with urgency to rectify our current failings. By doing so, we can work together towards ensuring that every victim of abuse and exploitation has guaranteed access to the specialist therapeutic support that they are owed. I urge the Government to incorporate that in the Bill.

[Lord Farmer (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Polak in his Amendment 7.

It is now rightly impossible for any public discussion of the Epstein files and grooming gangs—or rather child rape gangs—not to put victims front and centre. About a year ago, we were discussing child rape gangs in this House, and I flagged to the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Anderson, how the recent tragic news of the death of Virginia Guiffre demonstrated the long-term effects of child sexual abuse. I declared at that time my interest that my sister had suffered serious sexual abuse as a young girl and, thereafter, for the rest of her life, suffered long-term depressive and self-destructive effects. I mention that again simply to explain why I have signed the amendment. We can say that victims should be at the forefront but, without taking action, this could sound very much like virtue signalling.

I understand, as my noble friend Lord Polak has highlighted, that specialist domestic abuse and other trauma-focused services, particularly those supporting child victims of sexual abuse, have very high waiting lists, and that where counsellors with the necessary expertise are practising, funding is always inadequate to the need. I suspect that, even if sufficiently high levels of money were forthcoming, workforce shortages would become even more apparent. Have the Government done a needs analysis that would identify prevalence, the scale of the staff shortfall, how many more specialists are needed, how they could be trained and how potential candidates could be identified? Prevalence certainly appears very high. Could all professionals interacting with victims, including teachers, nurses, GPs, and police and prison officers, be given appropriate training in trauma-informed practice so that there was more of a whole-society approach?

I understand that this is straying a little from my noble friend Lord Polak’s amendment, but it gives us the opportunity to hear from the Government how they will put the victims of perpetrators such as Epstein and child rape gangs at the forefront, as they have promised to do.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I was very happy to put my name to the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Polak, not least because he and I, every Thursday morning in the post-legislative scrutiny committee for the Domestic Abuse Act, hear from the sector exactly what is going on and, perhaps more pertinently, what is not going on.

The Minister, like me, is a great fan of the “child house” approach to treating children who have had the most appalling direct physical and sexual abuse. It demonstrates what best practice looks like. Best practice really makes an enormous difference and is incredibly efficient, is very incisive and can work very quickly. That is partly why His Majesty’s Government have thankfully decided to roll this out throughout England to a large degree; that is a great step forward.

As we take evidence, we are hearing again and again that there are examples of really good practice. I recognise that it is unrealistic to imagine that His Majesty’s Government are suddenly going to find coffers bursting with money to enable the whole panoply of support services that one would wish victims to be able to access—that is not going to happen. However, I appeal to the Government and their officials to identify those examples of really good or best practice that are making a difference, rather than taking a blanket approach and saying we need to try to cover all support services. Clearly, some are dramatically more effective than others.

My appeal to the Government is to try to strategically identify those support services that are making a huge difference. For example, two areas that make an enormous difference are the independent domestic violence advocates and the independent stalking advocates. The proof of the pudding in both those areas is that when those individuals are involved and work with the victim from very early on, first, the victim’s experience is transformed for the better, but secondly, and more pertinently from the point of view of the Ministry of Justice, there is a much higher chance of the case coming to court and there being a successful prosecution. Not only does it help the victim but it helps the Government achieve their laudable aim to reduce violence against women and girls.

I do not expect the Government to say that there is a magic wand and that Rachel Reeves is the Minister’s new best friend, but I hope that an approach to identifying services similar to the Lighthouse, which really make a performative difference, could be identified more strategically and assisted more proactively and in a more focused way.

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, I will focus on the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Hacking, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones. We seem to have done a bit of mini-regrouping within the group, but I checked with my noble friend Lady Brinton and I think she will wind up the group while introducing her own amendments at the same time.

At the last stage the Minister resisted the proposal for more victim navigators on the basis that the service is already provided, but victim navigators are quite distinct in what they do from the Salvation Army and their subcontractors funded by the Home Office. As I said, I supported the amendment in Committee but I did express a reservation about the ambitious six-month period within which they could be rolled out. Victim navigators are collocated with police in the forces where they work—the term “embedded” with the police seems to be used quite often.

I was a member of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 Committee, and the comments on victim navigators in our report were under the heading “Evidence gathering”. That describes quite a lot of what they do. I will try not to repeat what other noble Lords have said, but the link between support of the victims and the criminal justice system is their job, filling a very specific gap with access to details of cases but with the independence to build trust. They are of great value to the police—and we know how difficult it is to get convictions in this area.

16:45

The report quoted the chief exec of the GLAA, one of the organisations with which navigators are collocated, as supporting their rollout. The then National Police Chiefs’ Council lead on modern slavery said that the police

“dearly hope [they] will be rolled out across the country”.

It was very sad and surprising that the then Minister, when we took evidence from her, had not heard of victim navigators. Justice and Care, which developed the scheme and runs it, commissioned an independent cost-benefit analysis. As the noble Lord said, it was found that one victim navigator has an economic benefit per year of just under £150,000. I found that quite staggering, but it is what we were told.

I asked Justice and Care why more forces do not involve victim navigators; I was told that modern slavery and human trafficking have not been a political priority. They have dropped down the priorities of some in police leadership, who are unwilling to pay for them. Those who work in Scotland are in fact funded by the Scottish Government. In England, most are funded by Justice and Care’s own charitable funds. A couple have funding or co-funding from their host agency, or from a mayoral office or PCC.

To answer the point made from the Dispatch Box at the last stage, support available under the victim care contract does not continue throughout the case. Participation in an ongoing criminal case is not regarded as justification for ongoing support after basic recovery. I understand that the Salvation Army has a reach-in service for people who are in that position, but it only gives signposts. It does not reconnect the victim with a support worker. Given the courts backlog and the increased speed of NRM decisions, victims are very likely not to receive Salvation Army support for quite a long period before the case comes to trial.

I have a question for the Minister, which is possibly not the one that she would expect. It is really an invitation. Assuming that her brief says “resist”—I know she will interpret that as “resist nicely”—would she be prepared to meet representatives of Justice and Care, who can explain the scheme much better than I can? I checked with them this morning and the answer was, “We’re very happy to meet the Minister. We could even host a visit with victim navigators and the police they work with”. I do not expect her to get her diary out now; I will leave that with her.

I just want to comment on the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Polak. Personally, I have often found that the best value for money in providing support comes from the third sector, which I wish was much better funded. Generally, they are specialists and they do a lot with very little.

What connects police, health services and local authorities? One thing is budget, or lack thereof. I thought the phrase used by the noble Lord, Lord Farmer—a “whole-society approach”—was very apt. I declare that I chaired the domestic violence charity Refuge for many years, although it was in a rather different place, certainly in my early years, from where it is now. We must continue to pursue support for people who have been abused, exploited and victimised—that is coming from right round the House.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, this group is titled simply “victim support”, but in the debate so far we have heard strikingly different issues in victim support, none of which can really be put together. But what they say generally—I hope to reflect this when I speak to my three amendments in this group—is that, although there is progress in victim support, some of it can be patchy, not well embedded and inconsistent. I know that this Government, at their heart, particularly through their VAWG strategy, are determined to do something about that. I think the Minister is finding that there is pressure from all around the House, saying, “Could you speed that up a bit, please?”

I have three amendments in this group: Amendment 11, on the provision of support for parents and carers of victims of sexual or violent offences, and Amendments 12 and 13 on restorative justice, which I will speak to in a minute.

I have raised the problems that face the parents and carers of some victims of sexual or violent offences on a number of occasions. The problem is that there is a fault line in the current victims framework, which does not understand the role of a parent—it is usually a parent—or carer of a victim of sexual or violent offences who has been traumatised by what has happened to their child. Too often, the distraught victim returns to the family and, not infrequently, family members provide essential support. Sometimes, the trauma is so great that at least one parent has to give up work to look after their adult child. These family members provide an essential safeguarding and recovery role. Research has shown that many carers experience significant psychological, practical and financial difficulties, with no support or redress at all for themselves.

The victims’ code allows parents, guardians or carers to receive rights where the victim is a child, and it provides more limited recognition in cases involving vulnerable adults. In practice, these rights are framed primarily around acting on behalf of the victim, but the code does not establish a clear stand-alone entitlement to support for the parent’s or carer’s own trauma, well- being or capacity to sustain safeguarding. Unfortunately, delivery can be discretionary and inconsistent.

Therefore, this amendment recognises that some parents or carers of adult victims may require some proportionate support as a consequence of the offence and the justice process, and it would require relevant authorities to commission and make that support available, while distinguishing caregiving support from evidential witness support. It does not create new victim categories for sentencing or compensation; nor does it dilute the primacy of the effect on the victim or expand the ISVA role. I am grateful for the conversation I had with the Minister, and I hope she will agree to meet Restitute, the small self-help group trying to help parents and carers navigate a world in which their child has been severely traumatised. The loophole in the law about not qualifying because they are witnesses is very real to them.

Amendment 12 sets out the rights for a victim of an offence to make a referral to restorative justice services. Note that it is only the victim, not the offender—the Minister and I had a debate about that. The amendment is very clear: this would not put the victim at risk of being approached by the offender.

Amendment 13 would give the Secretary of State a duty to report on the use of restorative justice services and to lay the report before Parliament. In Committee, I set out the experience of my honourable friend Paul Kohler MP, who was brutally attacked in his own home, witnessed by his wife and daughters. Somewhat reluctantly, they all went through a restorative justice process, which they actually found helped them all. These amendments are not general, which is why it is important that offenders would not be able to request restorative justice under them. But we know that this helps a number of offenders. There is evidence to show that, when offenders engage in good faith, it can be transformative for them too and can reduce the rate of recidivism.

The final benefit is to society as a whole. Restorative justice works. Not only can it reduce reoffending by up to 27% but it can save society money in future, in reduced costs for the police, courts, prisons and probation services. We Liberal Democrats have championed restorative justice for many years; it has been in our manifesto for as many elections as I can remember, and we support the work of Why Me and the Common Ground Justice Project. We recognise that the criminal justice system is under considerable pressure at the moment, which is why we will not test the opinion of the House on any of these three amendments, but I hope that the Ministry of Justice might look at running a restorative justice pilot to assess the benefit to society, as well as to victims and offenders.

[Lord Sandhurst (Con)]

My Lords, the important amendments in this group address real issues for victims and victim support. Amendment 6 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hacking, seeks to introduce independent victim navigators on a national basis to act as a liaison between the police and victims of modern slavery and human trafficking. The principle behind this amendment has force. Victims of these offences often face complex barriers to accessing support. To navigate the criminal justice system can be daunting for those who have experienced exploitation or coercion. This specific service is needed. The amendment reflects recommendations made by your Lordships’ Modern Slavery Act 2015 Committee. We on these Benches therefore hope that the Government will give careful consideration to the proposal, and we look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

Amendment 7 in the name of my noble friend Lord Polak, introduced so eloquently by him and echoed by my noble friend Lord Farmer and others, likewise focuses on strengthening the framework of support available to victims. It places a duty on relevant authorities to commission sufficient and specific services for victims of domestic abuse, sexual violence and child criminal exploitation. The principle that victims should have access to appropriate and specialised services is widely shared across this House. To ensure that support provision responds to the varied needs of victims, including children and those with particular vulnerabilities, is an important objective. My noble friend’s Amendment 7 also draws on the recommendations made by the Modern Slavery Act 2015 Committee. It seeks to translate those recommendations into a more structured system of support. These are serious matters that deserve careful reflection. We hope that the Government will consider the intent behind this amendment with that in mind.

Amendments 11 to 13, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, address different but no less important aspects of victim support. They include support for caregivers of victims, access to restorative justice services, and the assessment of their use. Each of these raises serious issues about how the criminal justice system supports victims and those adversely affected by crime. It is important to do something in this direction. They highlight questions around the availability of services, the role of restorative justice and the broader framework through which victims are to be assisted. They all deserve serious consideration. Again, I look forward to hearing the Government’s response.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 6, in the names of my noble friend Lord Hacking and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, would require the Government to implement independent modern slavery victim navigators in every police force in England and Wales, and would also define their functions.

The Government welcome the interest shown in modern slavery and in providing assistance to survivors. I am grateful to my noble friend for meeting me to discuss the issue, and I was pleased to meet Eleanor Lyons, the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner. I have also been extended an invitation irresistibly put by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and I hope that I can respond in an equally irresistible manner by saying that of course I will make a commitment to meeting, particularly since I think that I am committing my noble friend Lord Hanson to doing so, rather than myself. If, however, it is me, I shall be delighted to meet Restitute and, indeed, would be genuinely interested to do so.

I am sorry to disappoint noble Lords, but the Government cannot accept this amendment because it would duplicate existing services, so statutory funding is not an effective use of taxpayers’ money. We are not saying that victim navigators, who are widely valued, cannot or should not be used. They are already successfully funded through police and crime commissioners, through central government grants such as the Ministry of Justice’s victims fund and through charitable donations. Of course local areas can continue to use them: it is right that each local area should determine their value and provide funding if it is appropriate to do so. Each police force, and other law enforcement bodies, such as the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority, has the autonomy to fund a victim navigator if it is considered a necessary resource to help it carry out its functions.

17:00

It would not be right for the Government to specify central requirements for the modern slavery victim navigator role, as would be required by the amendment. Keeping such support flexible and responsive to local needs strengthens our ability to combat modern slavery and provide the right help to survivors. In the light of this, I hope that my noble friend will consider withdrawing his amendment.

I turn to Amendments 7 and 11, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Polak, and the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. I pay tribute to all noble Lords who have spoken movingly about the importance of these kinds of services. I think particularly of the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, and what he said about his sister. We are all moved by hearing that kind of story, and it is important that we should continue to be reminded of this.

The Government entirely agree with the objective of better supporting victims. Indeed, we have consistently put victims at the heart of what we are and what we do, but we do not think that these amendments are the best way of doing so. We do not agree that relevant authorities should be statutorily required to commission certain support services for certain groups. Rather, we believe that improved multi-agency working on commissioning is the best approach to address any issues with the commissioning of victim support services. That is the way to target provision most effectively.

The Victim and Prisoners Act 2024 contains a duty to collaborate. Once commenced, this will require commissioners to work together to form a better understanding of the needs of victims in their area, including victims of abuse and exploitation and the caregivers of those victims in due course, allowing them to target resources and provision of services most effectively. This new duty to collaborate specifically requires relevant authorities to consider child victims of exploitation and abuse, and victims with specific needs, ensuring that the needs of such victims are considered when services are commissioned. This may result in the commissioning of specialist or “by and for” services if commissioners decide that that is what is most needed to best meet local requirements.

Furthermore, the Ministry of Justice will invest £550 million in victim support services over the next three years. This includes ring-fenced funding for sexual violence and domestic abuse support, as well as annual grant funding, via the rape and sexual abuse support fund, to over 60 specialist organisations offering support to both adult and child victims of abuse and exploitation. Often, these services will also offer support to families and caregivers of the victim, particularly where the victim is a child. The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, invited me to meet Restitute. This is an invitation I will accept on my own behalf, rather than committing someone else to do so, and I will be very pleased and interested to do so.

Victims of abuse and exploitation are also being supported through nationally commissioned services, including the Home Office’s modern slavery victim care contract for adults, the independent child trafficking guardian service for children and the 24/7 rape and sexual abuse support line commissioned by the Ministry of Justice, but we intend to go further. As part of the VAWG strategy, this Government have, as the noble Lord, Lord Russell, said, committed up to £50 million to transform support for victims of child sexual abuse through expanding the use of child houses. I agree wholeheartedly with what the noble Lord said: anybody who has visited the existing one that provides provision in London cannot fail to be deeply impressed, and I am really proud to be a member of a Government who are expanding this. It will offer vital wraparound support to non-abusing parents and carers in one physical location. I hope this has provided some reassurance to noble Lords that services for these victims are already considered and provided for without the need for a specific statutory duty.

On Amendments 12 and 13 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, I am grateful to her— I mean that—for raising restorative justice again today and I thank her for her recent engagement with me and continued commitment to championing this important subject. As I have said before, this Government are committed to the effective use of restorative justice where it is appropriate. We entirely agree that, when delivered in the right circumstances, it can improve victim satisfaction, reduce reoffending and bring benefits to victims, offenders and the wider community.

Under the victims’ code, victims must be informed about restorative justice and how to access it. As part of the consultation on a new code, which is currently live, we are engaging widely to ensure that victims are offered restorative justice at the right time. I would very much welcome the noble Baroness contributing to the consultation. However, placing referral to restorative justice for all victims on a statutory footing would be neither necessary nor appropriate. The safety and welfare of those involved is paramount, and automatic, or certainly repeated, referral would therefore not always be suitable. The Government already receive regular reporting from police and crime commissioners as part of the Ministry of Justice grant management process, which includes information on restorative justice. A further national assessment would simply duplicate what is already in place. For these reasons, I ask the noble Baroness not to press her amendments.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to my noble friend for her reply. She said that the Government are supportive of Justice and Care and the victim navigator scheme; the problem is that they are not prepared to fund it and thereby bring it in as a national scheme. I have to be satisfied with that reply. It is disappointing that the Government are not going the whole hog, as there would be financial benefits for them in taking on this scheme, but one has to accept the crumbs offered to one. I accept all the crumbs that my noble friend has offered and beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 6 withdrawn.

Amendment 7 not moved.

Amendment 8

Moved by

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames]

8: After Clause 7, insert the following new Clause—
“Compensation for victims of fraud and other economic crimes(1) The Secretary of State must, within six months of the passing of this Act, report to Parliament the findings and recommendations of a review of victims of fraud, bribery and money laundering offences.(2) The purpose of the report under subsection (1) is to inform Parliament how the Secretary of State will provide for victims of such economic crimes to be compensated without such victims needing to pursue civil action.(3) The Secretary of State must conduct a public consultation on the review, the terms of which must be published no later than 1 June 2026, and which must open on that date and close on 1 September 2026.(4) In this section “victims of economic crime” includes United Kingdom and overseas victims of complex corruption cases where the harm caused by the offending is not easily quantifiable.” Member’s explanatory statement
This new clause requires a review to explore how domestic and overseas victims of fraud, bribery and money laundering offences could be better compensated without the need for civil proceedings to recover their losses or compensation and for the Secretary of State to report his conclusions to Parliament without undue delay.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, noble Lords will remember an amendment in these terms from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, who moved it in Committee. He is the lead tabler of this amendment on Report but cannot be here today, so he has asked me and its other co-signatory, the noble Lord, Lord Murray of Blidworth, to present the case for it.

The amendment seeks a review of the issue of compensation for victims of economic crimes such as fraud, bribery and money laundering without the need for civil proceedings. Noble Lords will no doubt remember the frustration that the noble and learned Lord expressed in Committee that, after all his years campaigning on this issue and for all the warm words of support he has received from successive Governments, he has not made progress in getting acceptable provisions enacted. The arguments in favour of this amendment are extensive and were extensively canvassed in Committee, so I hope that I will be forgiven for setting them out in reasonably staccato form, without the academic support they received in Committee.

First, the present arrangements for the victims of economic crime are unsatisfactory, and in the vast majority of cases of serious fraud, bribery, money-laundering and other economic crime, very few victims receive compensation. This is particularly true of overseas victims.

Secondly, resort to civil proceedings is difficult and expensive; the costs are often prohibitive. Potential claimants inevitably have difficulties in finding and calling evidence on economic crimes, for a host of reasons—again, which is particularly true of overseas claimants. Successful claimants, even after winning cases, face serious difficulties with enforcement of judgments against fraudsters and other economic criminals—again, particularly overseas victims. Then, fines which are levied as a result of prosecutions in the UK go to government, and a derisorily small amount is awarded to victims in the form of compensation. That is also true in the case of deferred prosecution agreements and arrangements made pursuant to them, which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, was active in introducing when he was Solicitor-General.

It was agreed around the Committee—this is the reason for the form of this amendment, both then and now—that it is not yet clear what the best arrangements for providing adequate compensation for criminal cases involving economic crime might be. That is the reason why a review is essential and why the amendment calls for a review. Then, it may be that a new scheme to enable compensation to be awarded in cases involving overseas victims might just involve arrangements to award compensation not only to the direct losers who might qualify as claimants in civil proceedings, but also, or alternatively, to some Governments abroad, some NGOs, or some other organisations which may not be claimants in civil proceedings or even entitled to be so, but may well nevertheless be substantial actual and identifiable losers and victims of such crimes.

It is certainly the case that, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, said, successive Governments have reacted to the call for sensible and fair compensation arrangements for victims of economic crime with warm words but no action at all. So, the need for a review of what should be done to fill this gap is urgent. This is why the amendment has a tight timetable for public consultation, for undertaking the review itself and for a report to Parliament.

Finally, a set of sensible and respected arrangements for providing such compensation would enhance the reputation of this country as a financial centre. We are already leaders in many fields: in insurance, in legal services—including arbitration—the quality of our courts and judiciary, and banking, to name to just a few. Arrangements for proper compensation for economic crime could raise our international standing even further.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

My Lords, it gives me great pleasure to say that I agree entirely with the noble Lord, Lord Marks—not something I perhaps say terribly frequently in this Chamber.

There is one material distinction between the proposed new clause the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, brought forward in Committee and the proposed new clause before the House today. That is in proposed new subsection (3), which requires that

“The Secretary of State must conduct a public consultation on the review, … which must be published no later than 1 June 2026, and which must open on that date and close on 1 September 2026”.


Members of the House might ask why that is so specific. The reason is a simple one: I know that the noble and learned Lord met the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, to discuss this issue, and was told a review was going to be conducted, but that it would not report until 2028.

Given that this campaign has been going on for some time, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, had a justifiable point in trying to bring forward that date through this amendment. As he rightly said in his Second Reading speech and in Committee, it is important that the United Kingdom Government make it possible for victims of fraud, bribery and money-laundering offences, both here and overseas, to recover compensation from the offending person or company, rather than the fines simply going into the system here in the UK.

There is one final point from the noble and learned Lord’s Second Reading speech that warrants repetition here:

“The African Union estimated in 2015 that 25% of the continent’s gross domestic product was lost to corruption. Every company convicted of overseas corruption in this jurisdiction should be ordered to compensate the communities it has harmed”.—[Official Report, 16/12/25; col. 689.]


Can any of us disagree with that?

17:15

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 14; I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Polak, and noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, for adding their names to it. It seeks to clarify the definition of a “crime of violence” in the criminal injuries compensation scheme when it refers to the abuse of a child that has happened online. I hope there will be a response to my arguments not dissimilar to the Minister’s response to Amendment 2—namely, that there appears to be a gap that is worthy of being looked into properly and systematically.

Survivors of technology-facilitated child sexual abuse—I am afraid that it has an acronym, TCSA—and other coercive online sexual offences may be refused compensation under the criminal injuries compensation scheme on the basis that the injury did not result from a “crime of violence”, despite the seriousness of the abuse and the criminal offences involved. Amendment 14 seeks to clarify that cases that involve “coercion”, “domination” or “compelled” sexual acts fall within the scope of the scheme.

I am afraid that it will probably not surprise your Lordships that the scale of online child sex abuse is going up dramatically. Over 7,000 offences of sexual communication with a child were recorded in 2023-24, and 122,768 child sexual abuse and exploitation offences were recorded in 2024, of which almost half—42%—had an online element. The criminal injuries compensation scheme obviously cannot accept all the applications made to it for support. Year on year, it has increasingly not been allowing some of the applications that are made. Nevertheless, the number of applications for support involving sexual abuse and sexual assault is going up even more quickly. Some 1,601 applicants who reported sexual assault were refused compensation in 2024-25. The number of refusals under this threshold has increased by just over one-quarter in two years. However, the scheme does not record detailed offence categories, so we do not know exactly how many of those referred to child sexual abuse situations.

To illustrate, I will briefly give an example of exactly what this involves. We are working with a Northern Ireland-based charity called the Marie Collins Foundation, which is particularly focused on trying to help victims of these offences. The foundation recently supported a child who was subjected to sustained online sexual coercion by an adult offender who used manipulation and threats to compel the child to perform sexual acts via digital communication. Over time, the offender established control through grooming, emotional manipulation and threats to expose the child if they did not comply with further sexual demands. The abuse caused significant psychological harm, including anxiety, shame and trauma, consistent with other forms of child sexual abuse.

When the victim applied to the criminal injuries compensation scheme, the claim was initially refused on the basis that the injury did not arise from a crime of violence. But the decision was subsequently overturned on appeal, recognising the seriousness of the abuse and the harm it caused. The case illustrates the uncertainty in how coercive online sexual abuse of children is interpreted within the scheme and the additional burden it places on victims, who have to pursue appeals to the scheme to try to get their case heard.

Amendment 14 seeks to provide clarity by confirming that cases that involve coercion, domination or compelled sexual acts, including those facilitated online, fall within the scope of the scheme. The amendment seeks to provide clarity rather than an expansion of the scheme. It would simply ensure that cases involving coercion, domination or compelled sexual acts, including those facilitated online, are recognised as crimes of violence for the purposes of compensation. This would help the survivors of serious sexual abuse and ensure they are not excluded due to uncertainty over the interpretation of the scheme.

I hope that we do not have any children in the Public Gallery at the moment. I will just briefly describe what some of this involves online. I have already mentioned blackmail, coercion, threats, domination, and emotional and psychological abuse. There is the creation and sharing of sexual images, livestreamed sexual activity and other sexual acts, fear, loss of autonomy, erosion of agency and long-term psychological harm. The children are sometimes asked or invited to insert various objects into parts of their body. Some of the things that happen are simply unspeakable. The purpose of the amendment is to draw this to the attention of the Government and to ask that this be looked at carefully and seriously, not least because, as we know, in so many cases happening in the online world, the volume and types of abuse are increasing exponentially.

[Baroness Kidron (CB)]

My Lords, I added my name to Amendment 14, alongside that of my noble friend Lord Russell, and he has adequately explained the gap.

I started, unfortunately, looking at child sexual abuse in 2012. Unfortunately, in the period since then, I have had the misfortune to look at a great deal of child sexual abuse and I say that it is an act of violence against the person in the image.

While the noble Lord, Lord Russell, was speaking, I remembered one of the very first experiences I had. I filmed an interview with a young girl at the moment she realised that the person online, who she thought was her lover, was indeed a groomer. In the next moment, she realised that she had been recorded, and in the next moment, she realised that the recording had been shared. In those moments, I watched a heartbreak, faith-break and trust-break. That young child tried to commit suicide twice in the following summer. We were able to get her help and, thankfully, she is now a survivor and not a victim. I am standing up only to stay that what happens online does not stay online. What happens online is violence. What happens to children online must not be ignored by the law.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 14 and there is not much to add, other than to pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, for all the work she has done over many years in this area and to support the noble Lord, Lord Russell.

To make it very clear, this amendment is not trying to radically expand the compensation scheme. Instead, it is asking the Secretary of State to assess whether certain forms of online child sexual abuse should be recognised as crimes of violence when they involve coercion or threats, domination or control, or the compelled creation and sharing of sexual images and sexual acts directed by an offender.

The amendment is therefore targeted, proportionate and legally defensible. It recognises that violence is not always physical. As we have heard, the reality of online coercion is that, when a child is threatened with the exposure of images, blackmailed into producing further images or directed in real time to perform sexual acts online, the child is not acting freely. They are acting under coercion, fear and domination. The absence of physical proximity does not make the abuse any less real, nor does it lessen the psychological injuries suffered by the child. Therefore, I suggest that it is our duty to protect children who are subjected to such abuse, and this amendment represents an important step towards strengthening those protections.

[Lord Sandhurst (Con)]

My Lords, I will start first with Amendment 8, in the name of my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier but introduced so ably by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, and my noble friend Lord Murray of Blidworth. The amendment seeks to insert a new clause. It would require a review of how domestic and overseas victims of fraud, bribery and money laundering offences could be better compensated. Crucially, such a review must look into how this can be done without the need for civil proceedings, which we all know would be drawn-out, expensive and not always fruitful. I have supported this concept since my noble and learned friend Lord Garnier first started arguing for it: certainly as long as I have been in the House and since I was a member of the Select Committee inquiry into fraud four years ago. Something must be done.

We hope that the Government have given this serious consideration since Committee and I look forward to hearing from the Minister what steps the Government are taking to address the issue and whether conclusions will be reported to Parliament. Warm words—which we have heard—butter no parsnips. We on this side want to hear that something will be done. If it is true that a review has been offered that will report in 2028, that is far too long. As Mr McEnroe would say, “You cannot be serious”.

Amendment 14 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, also addresses an important issue that we should not overlook. The amendment creates a clarification to support recognition of certain forms of online-only child abuse. It would bring them into the scope of recognition of the criminal injuries compensation scheme. We can only ask, “Why on earth not?” As I said in Committee, the scheme must keep pace with the way in which and the places in which criminal activity now takes place. We look forward to hearing an update from the Minister.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 8, in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, and the noble Lords, Lord Murray and Lord Marks, has been spoken to most persuasively, as ever, by the noble Lord, Lord Marks. I too join him in thanking the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, for his ongoing commitment to this matter. I am sorry he is not in his place today, but he and I met recently with my noble friend Lord Hanson to talk about this in more detail.

There is a review and it is a priority for all of us, and I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, for his continued drive to champion victims and his expertise in this matter. The Government take the compensation of victims of economic crime very seriously. We are committed to ensuring that, wherever possible, funds are taken from criminals and returned to victims. As I have said on several other occasions and will not repeat now, there are several existing mechanisms that enable compensation for victims of economic crime. We accept that they are either not used sufficiently or they do not go far enough.

The Government have an existing public commitment through the UK Anti-Corruption Strategy 2025 to review UK policies and procedures for compensating victims of foreign bribery. There is a review; it is comprehensive and I have happy news for the noble Lord, Lord Murray: it is not 2028 but 2027—and that is next year. I understand the desire of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, to see this matter addressed as soon as possible and I completely understand his frustration, which he has expressed both in this Chamber and privately when we met, but given the existing review and the other current and future measures, the Government do not believe that it is appropriate for a legislatively required review to be introduced at this time.

17:30

Turning to Amendment 14, tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Russell and Lord Polak, and the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, I hope and believe that the noble Lord, Lord Russell, knows that the Government share his desire to support victims who have been harmed by child sexual abuse. I want to clear up something about how the criminal injuries compensation scheme works. Online abuse is already regarded as a crime of violence where it escalates and involves actual physical violence or the immediate threat of it. However, this scheme does not and was not set up to compensate for harm in the widest sense. It compensates for injury caused rather than by the type of violent crime that caused the injury. Were we to include other forms of online abuse, this would broaden the scope of the scheme. Extending it to some types of crime only would send a clear message that some victims are more deserving than others. This would be quite wrong and is something that this Government cannot support.

Broadening the taxpayer-funded scheme would also put it under more financial pressure. It is already facing record and increasing demand. There is also a further aspect. The amendment would not achieve what the noble Lord intends, because although the Secretary of State creates the scheme, he does not exercise any other functions in relation to it. That is the job of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority, which already considers when assessing every application whether the conduct in question amounts to a crime of violence, because that is a core eligibility requirement. It is considered on a case-by-case basis.

To reiterate, we wish to support all victims of crime with the resources that we have. We are considering the current scheme and will update Members of both Houses as our work progresses. For now, I invite the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

Given the incidence of appeals where initially it was ruled that it was not a crime of violence but, on it being investigated further, it was acknowledged that it did count as a crime of violence, can the Government request that that be looked into more carefully and closely? The incidence of such crimes, which may or may not be viewed as crimes of violence, is increasing rapidly. Clarification from the board as to what criteria it is using, so that those who have suffered have a much clearer idea of whether that might be included, would be extremely helpful to them and save a lot of time and anguish.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

I will certainly take that away and write to the noble Lord. A number of things are in issue here. For example, I do not know how many appeals across the board are successful. It may be that it is a greater number for this category of cases; it may be a smaller number. I simply do not know, so I will write to the noble Lord.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for her comprehensive response on the question of a review. I know that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, was grateful for the meeting. Our continuing frustration is about the timescale. The noble Lord, Lord Murray, and I are very pleased to hear that 2027 is there rather than 2028, but we both know that that is next year and that now is March 2026. We would be even more grateful if there were a commitment to finish the review and produce results this year, because almost undoubtedly for a comprehensive scheme there will require to be legislation. That takes time, as we all know, and therefore the sooner that we can get on with this the better it is. Meanwhile, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 8 withdrawn.

Amendment 9

Moved by

[Lord Keen of Elie]

9: After Clause 7, insert the following new Clause—
“Extension of Victim Contact Scheme(1) The Secretary of State must ensure that the Victim Contact Scheme is made available to—(a) victims of offenders sentenced to less than 12 months for violent and sexual offences,(b) victims in cases involving coercive or controlling behaviour, stalking, or harassment, and(c) bereaved families in manslaughter or death by dangerous driving cases.(2) The Secretary of State must ensure that information under the Victim Contact Scheme is communicated in a timely and trauma-informed manner.(3) The Secretary of State must publish data each year on uptake and accessibility of the Victim Contact Scheme.”Member's explanatory statement
This new clause would require the Secretary of State to extend the Victim Contact Scheme to certain categories of victim. It would also ensure information is provided in a timely, trauma-informed way and require annual reporting on the Scheme’s uptake and accessibility.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, within this group are amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, regarding the victims’ code, and from the noble Lord, Lord Russell, with regard to incidental matters thereto.

Perhaps I may begin with the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Russell. These address the important question of how hospital managers exercise their discretion when responding to requests for information about offenders detained under the mental health legislation. Amendment 17 seeks to ensure that when hospital managers consider whether it is appropriate to disclose information, they explicitly take into account the risk of further physical or psychological harm to victims if that information is withheld. The purpose of providing information to victims is in large part to enable them to feel safer and to plan appropriately for an offender’s discharge. We support the principle underlying this amendment.

Amendment 18 would require hospital managers to provide written reasons when information is not disclosed. Greater transparency in decision-making can help build confidence in the system and ensure that victims and probation services understand how such determinations have been reached.

Amendment 19 would create a clearer route of appeal where information requests are refused. This amendment raises the question of whether a more structured and independent route of appeal might provide additional clarity and reassurance to victims.

Amendment 10 would require the Secretary of State to create an appendix to the victims’ code outlining how the code applies to victims whose close relative was the victim of murder, manslaughter or infanticide outside the United Kingdom. This is a proposal with which we are at least sympathetic.

Amendment 15 in my name would extend the victim contact scheme to include victims whose offenders are sentenced to less than 12 months for violent and sexual offences—as well as bereaved families in manslaughter or death by dangerous driving cases where the offender is sentenced to less than 12 months. Much has been said about the Sentencing Act in this Chamber. In light of that legislation, it is undeniable that many victims captured by those provisions will have to face the reality of their offenders living in their communities. It is therefore only appropriate that victims of violent and sexual offences should be eligible for the scheme. For stalking, the Government are happy to extend the victim contact scheme with no limitation on sentence length. There should similarly be no such limits for the narrowly drawn list of serious offences in this amendment. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I have tabled Amendment 10 in this group, on bereaved victims of murder abroad. I have also signed the three amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Russell, on victims of mentally disordered offenders.

To speak briefly to those amendments, which we are happy to support from these Benches, it is very important that hospital managers and senior clinicians take a balanced approach regarding victims of offenders who are detained under the Mental Health Act. Unfortunately, hospital managers and clinicians often withhold data that could be released which would assist victims—and worse, not even tell them that they are withholding it. The amendments set out a balanced approach for hospitals and would require written reasons to be given to the victim for any decision to withhold some or all of the information requested. The third amendment would create an independent route for victims to appeal where a hospital manager has decided not to share information.

I turn to my Amendment 10, which seeks a pathway for bereaved victims of murder abroad. We had an extensive debate on this in Committee, and I am grateful to the Minister for the very helpful and informative meeting with Home Office and FCDO staff who specialise in this area, including those who liaise with the coroners service and support victims whose family members have been murdered abroad.

With around 80 British nationals being murdered abroad each year, the numbers may appear low, but families are not just navigating the horror of a murder, which is bad enough at home in the UK, but doing so in a country where legal systems will differ. There are also likely to be language barriers. Even worse is managing the complex logistical issues of repatriation of the body—which, speaking from personal family experience, is hard even with a natural death—as well as coping with limited police updates from afar.

The problem is that these people are not recognised as formal victims of crime because the murder occurred outside the United Kingdom, nor do they receive any of the relevant protections and entitlements given to their UK equivalents. These Benches thank the Government for their recently updated family information guide on murder and manslaughter abroad, and on how the differing parts of the Government will work. We believe this is a good start and we understand that these new arrangements will take time to bed in.

The Minister mentioned in Committee that the homicide service, which is currently run by Victim Support, is being retendered at the moment. Is there any news yet as to whether the budget for that service is being absolutely sustained? I realise that times are hard, but we cannot have a service that cannot function and support these families because it does not have the resources that it needs. It is clear from the guide that the homicide service is the key that keeps on top of all the different moving parts and keeps the victims informed.

However, it is early days, and I know from talking to Murdered Abroad that there are still real concerns about how this will work effectively. Too often, despite the best intentions of the very willing staff across the board, families still struggle for information, support or translation services. That is why we have retabled our amendment, which sets out the application of the victims’ code in respect to victims of murder, manslaughter or infanticide abroad. We do not seek for these families to be treated exactly the same as UK victims. Rather, the amendment seeks an appendix to the victims’ code that sets out which services they can access, and only those.

I hope that the Minister feels that this is a supportive mechanism which would give core strength to the excellent but invisible work of those in the Home Office, the FCDO and our embassies, and the coroners service, as well as of Murdered Abroad. Above all, it would support the bereaved families at the worst time of their lives. At present, I am minded to test the opinion of the House, but I really hope for a more positive response from the Minister on the recognition of the status of these victims.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I was pleased to add my name to Amendment 10, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. I thank the Minister for the very helpful meeting that we had with the FCDO and the officials charged with this responsibility. The person in charge of it, who is very impressive, has the slightly alarming job title of director, consular and crisis, which I do not think I would particularly like to have on my business card, but she and her team were very reassuring and forthcoming.

For those of us who have been pushing repeatedly in different pieces of legislation to acknowledge that the families of those who are murdered abroad have slightly been left out in the cold—it has been rather Russian roulette as to whether they have been fortunate enough to have interacted with a consular team who have been on the ball, helpful and proactive—one of the effects of that pushing is that the message appears to have taken root. We were reassured, on questioning that team in quite a lot of detail about the training they do and the support they are able to give, so I am extremely grateful for that.

However, I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. To have a more holistic, clearer, and more efficient process to allow the victims, who are, usually, living in this country to access help, support and advice quickly, to have some processes in place similar to what UK victims of other crimes receive under the victims’ code, and to have a more proximate approach for those families of those people who are murdered abroad is a justified cause. I hope that the Minister will be able to clarify slightly more than she was able to in Committee.

I turn briefly to Amendments 17, 18 and 19, which are about the response that victims of mentally disordered offenders get—or do not get, because there are various systemic problems within the NHS, which has its own rules about the type of information it can give. That means a slight lack of clarity for people in terms of understanding exactly what they can and cannot do. The Minister said very helpfully in Committee that her officials are working closely with the Department of Health and Social Care to consider routes by which this could be improved. I hope that she will be able to update the House on the progress they are making and whether there will be any positive outcomes from that.

17:45

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, these amendments clearly touch on important issues about victim safety, transparency and access to information. Amendment 10 raises an interesting question about how the victims’ code applies where a close relative has been killed abroad. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s thoughts on that proposal.

With regard to Amendment 15 in my name, the victim contact scheme needs to be extended here, given that some offenders convicted of violent and sexual offences may now receive sentences much lower than before. It is important to consider whether victims in those circumstances will be adequately supported and informed. I look forward to hearing from the Minister on that amendment as well.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords, I begin with Amendments 9 and 15 in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, and the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, which seek to extend the eligibility for the victim contact scheme. As far as Amendment 9 is concerned, as I said in Committee, victims of coercive or controlling behaviour, stalking and harassment are already eligible for the updated scheme regardless of sentence length. Victims of violent and sexual offences, and of dangerous driving, where the offender receives a sentence of less than 12 months’ imprisonment will be able to request information through the new dedicated helpline.

The Bill already includes a mechanism for providing information about an offender to victims of any offence, irrespective of sentence length, where probation considers them to be at risk of physical or psychological harm if they are not given such information. However, the Government have a duty to safeguard taxpayers’ money and to ensure that it is used in the most effective and proportionate way. Our approach targets finite public funding on those most in need of the proactive contact through the victim contact scheme, while still providing the helpline for all victims to request information. Any expansion of the scheme would require diverting public funds from other essential parts of the criminal justice system.

That said, we will keep the eligibility under review. 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 scheme. The Government believe that secondary legislation is the much more effective way of being able to tweak the scheme should it prove to be needed, rather than requiring primary legislation, which, of course, is much more difficult to deal with if it has an unintended consequence. Each of these amendments contains a requirement that information should be communicated in a timely and sensitive way. Of course this matters, but we believe that this is best achieved through guidance and training, not primary legislation.

Finally on the subject of these two amendments, I reassure your Lordships that we will be monitoring the scheme through the victims’ code compliance framework under the Victims and Prisoners Act 2024, which will include an annual report. With this in mind, I invite the noble and learned Lord to withdraw his amendment.

I turn next to Amendment 10 in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and the noble Lord, Lord Russell. I thank them both for their tireless work for victims and for continuing to raise this important matter. We have had a number of helpful and constructive meetings about this, and it is common ground between us that, when the unimaginable happens and a relative is a victim of homicide abroad, the help available to their families and loved ones can be patchy. We know that, and we all agree that it is not good enough.

As is so often the case with the noble Baroness’s and the noble Lord’s amendments, we agree entirely on the objective, but there is perhaps less consensus about the right way forward, because we think we can do this a better way. In addition—as the noble Baroness knows because I have discussed this with her—we are worried about unrealistically raising the expectations of victims’ families at an enormously sensitive and difficult time for them. The difficulty with this amendment, attractive though it may seem, is that many of the provisions of the victims’ code cannot and do not apply to most homicides abroad, because they cannot be prosecuted in the UK. In cases where the offence can be prosecuted in the UK, the code already applies.

Many aspects of support in these cases depend upon overseas judicial systems, which fall outside the scope of the victims’ code. Including them in an appendix risks creating unrealistic expectations. At a very stressful and dangerous time, we do not want families, who have had a quick look at the code and were not able to take in all the detail, to have the impression that they are guaranteed support and then to feel let down because decisions are made by foreign authorities over which the UK has no control.

Police in England and Wales can become involved only if they are formally invited by the relevant overseas authority. For example, under right 6 of the current victims’ code, victims have the right to be told by the police when key decisions on the investigation are made. However, in cases overseas, updates and access to information are determined by the processes and timelines of the foreign jurisdiction. This means that fixed reporting requirements, such as those in the victims’ code, cannot be guaranteed.

That said, we are all in agreement that these families can experience particular challenges navigating overseas criminal justice processes. For that reason, the Government published the victim-facing guidance in January 2026, and I am pleased to hear from the noble Baroness that she regards this as a good start. It brings together clear and accessible information for families in these difficult situations, setting out the services that can support them and directing them to the help that they need. As the new victims’ code is developed, we will review what further signposting information can be included to support all families bereaved by homicide abroad. Our feeling is that it should be a bespoke thing, rather than being tacked on to a victims’ code, most of which will not apply. The code consultation went live on 5 February; we are interested in encouraging everybody to contribute to it.

In addition, the newly updated organisational roles and responsibilities document, published in February 2026, sets out how the FCDO, the National Police Chiefs’ Council, the Ministry of Justice, the Chief Coroner and the coroners service will work together when a British national is the victim of murder or manslaughter abroad. While every case is considered individually, this document seeks to ensure a consistent level of service for bereaved families.

Within this, the Homicide Service can and does support families bereaved by a homicide abroad, including emotional and practical support, such as by covering the cost of translated documents. I suspect that the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, will not be surprised to hear that I cannot confirm anything today about the long-term future and budget of the Homicide Service. I am sorry that I cannot do that here and now, but I am sure she understands.

When the Bill was in Committee in this place, I heard concerns that families accessing Homicide Service support for translated documents are not always having a consistent experience. In the delivery of the next multi-year Homicide Service contract from April 2027, the Ministry of Justice will work with the provider to look again at how translation services are provided for this group of victims. We want to ensure that their needs are properly met when documents require translation and that this is reflected in the contract.

In addition to addressing concerns from Members of your Lordships’ House, the FCDO will review and refresh the training provided to consular staff on supporting families bereaved by homicide abroad.

Finally, I am grateful to the office of the Victims’ Commissioner for engaging with the FCDO and other agencies through the murder and manslaughter working group, which brings together stakeholders from across government, policing and the third sector to share expertise, align efforts and drive meaningful improvement. Where appropriate, the FCDO’s senior officer for global consular services will offer to meet the Victims’ Commissioner herself, or her representative, when particular issues arise that merit further discussion. I have already put the Victims’ Commissioner in touch with those representatives whom the noble Lord and the noble Baroness met at our meeting.

I turn finally to Amendments 17, 18 and 19 in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Russell, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and my noble friend Lord Ponsonby. Before I move on to the operational issues that concern the Government, there is a drafting issue, so I first must raise a technical point. These amendments apply only to new Sections 44F and 44K in Part 2 of Schedule 2 to the Bill. Those sections apply where a restriction order or restriction direction is not made. In Committee, noble Lords indicated that their concern is with cases of homicide—entirely understandably—but, in such cases, the offender will almost certainly be a restricted patient. Those victims would therefore be eligible for the victim contact scheme and would not need to request information through the helpline. The provisions updating the victim contact scheme are in Part 1 of Schedule 2, so the amendments as drafted cannot achieve their aim. I believe that noble Lords are more concerned about homicide cases, which would not be covered.

However, I turn to the wider points of principle. I listened carefully to the contributions made in your Lordships’ House and to the powerful arguments made to me by Emma Webber and Julian Hendy of Hundred Families, whom I was privileged to meet. I entirely accept that these three amendments are motivated by a desire to improve the provision of information to victims of mentally disordered offenders, but the challenge we face is not a legislative gap. The most effective way to secure better outcomes for victims is to ensure that clinicians have the understanding, confidence and tools to get it right first time. That is not achieved through more primary legislation, nor through complex, costly bureaucracy; it is achieved through improving decision-making in the first place, increasing awareness and embedding a clearer understanding of responsibilities—ensuring that there is not a knee-jerk defensiveness about supplying information.

That is why I am pleased to announce that we will be bringing forward a comprehensive capability-building programme with three core strands. First, we will make sure that clinicians understand their duties. To do that, we will work together with the Department of Health and Social Care to update the statutory Mental Health Act code of practice. We are going to add victim liaison requirements to the NHS secure service specifications, introduce a detailed joint protocol for clinicians and HMPPS staff and work with the Caldicott Guardian Council to support guardians’ role as expert information advisers to clinicians. Secondly, we will improve victim liaison officers’ understanding of this complex area and provide training to bolster the role of specialist mentally disordered offender victim liaison officers. Thirdly, we will produce victim-facing materials to explain clearly what information is and is not usually provided to victims of mentally disordered offenders. These will also explain the routes by which they can make a complaint, including if they did not receive the information they expected.

I consider that these measures will significantly improve the consistency of information provided to victims, and I therefore ask the noble Lord, Lord Russell, not to press his amendment.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

I am sorry, my Lords; I had not actually spoken to Amendment 9, as may have been noted, so it rather passed me by that it was for me to respond.

Having heard from the Minister, it is certainly my intention to support the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, which she will be moving.

Amendment 9 withdrawn.

18:00

Amendment 10

Moved by

[Baroness Brinton]

10: After Clause 7, insert the following new Clause—
“Application of the victims’ code in respect of victims of murder, manslaughter or infanticide abroad(1) The Victims and Prisoners Act 2024 is amended as follows.(2) After section 4, insert—“4A Application of the victims’ code in respect of victims of murder, manslaughter or infanticide of a close family member abroad(1) This section relates to victims as defined under section 1(2)(c) who are close family members of a British National resident in England and Wales who was the victim of— (a) murder,(b) manslaughter, or(c) infanticide,committed outside the United Kingdom.(2) The Secretary of State must by regulations issue an appendix to the victims’ code, setting out how the code applies to victims in the circumstances set out in subsection (1).(3) The appendix must set out the services to be provided to victims as defined under subsection (1) by those persons based in England and Wales appearing to the Secretary of State to have functions of a public nature relating to—(a) victims, or(b) any aspect of the criminal justice system.(4) The appendix must make provision for services based in England and Wales which reflect the principles that victims require—(a) information to help them understand the criminal justice process,(b) access to services within England and Wales which provide them with emotional and practical support (including, where appropriate, specialist services),(c) in circumstances where the criminal justice process is engaged in England and Wales, the opportunity to make their views heard in the criminal justice process, and(d) the ability to challenge decisions which have a direct impact on them.(5) In setting out the services to be provided to victims under this section, the Secretary of State must specify the following—(a) how such services will be provided with accessible information;(b) how they access emotional and practical support.””Member's explanatory statement
This new clause requires the Secretary of State to create an appendix to the Victims’ Code which outlines how the code applies to victims whose close relative was the victim of murder, manslaughter or infanticide outside the UK.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her comments. The difficulty we face is that a lot of the responses from the Government talk about raising victims’ expectations. We are trying to balance raising victims’ expectations with the crisis that they are facing when they do not to get the service they are entitled to or—as in this particular case, of murder victims abroad—because at the moment they are lacking in formal terms.

Even if the Government wish to create a separate document, which I would entirely endorse, I suspect that it would have to be signposted in the victims’ code, because a lot of people would look there first. On that basis, and perhaps to encourage the Government to move a little faster on this, I wish to test the opinion of the House.

18:01

Division 2

Amendment 10 agreed.

Ayes: 257

---

Conservative: 165
Liberal Democrat: 57
Crossbench: 15
Non-affiliated: 10
Ulster Unionist Party: 3
Democratic Unionist Party: 3
Plaid Cymru: 2
Green Party: 1
Bishops: 1

Noes: 174

---

Labour: 160
Crossbench: 12
Non-affiliated: 2

18:12

Amendments 11 to 15 not moved.

Amendment 16

Moved by

[Lord Keen of Elie]

16: After Clause 7, insert the following new Clause—
“Publication of court transcripts of sentencing remarks(1) Where a request is made for the sentencing remarks delivered in the Crown Court, the court must, subject to subsection (2), make those remarks publicly available online within 14 days of the request being received.(2) The court must, before publication, make the relevant victim(s) aware that they have a right to request anonymity, and if such a request is made, take the necessary steps to prevent the risk of identification of the victim, including through jigsaw identification.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment provides that sentencing remarks released by the Crown Court are freely published online, whilst also requiring the Court to inform applicants of their right to request anonymity in such remarks.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, I wish to test the opinion of the House with regard to Amendment 16, which was addressed during our submissions on the second group of amendments.

18:13

Division 3

Amendment 16 agreed.

Ayes: 252

---

Conservative: 160
Liberal Democrat: 55
Non-affiliated: 13
Crossbench: 13
Democratic Unionist Party: 4
Ulster Unionist Party: 3
Plaid Cymru: 2
Green Party: 1
Bishops: 1

Noes: 171

---

Labour: 158
Crossbench: 11
Non-affiliated: 2

18:24

Schedule 2: Victims’ rights to make representations and receive information etc

Amendments 17 to 19 not moved.

Clause 12: Private prosecutions: regulations about costs payable out of central funds

Amendment 20

Moved by

[Lord Keen of Elie]

20: Leave out Clause 12

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, in this group there are Amendment 20, in which I move that Clause 12 should not stand part of the Bill, Amendment 23 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, to extend the period in which a case can be discontinued in the Crown Court to bring it into line with the magistrates’ court, and Amendment 29 in my name, which deals with exemptions to early release for sex offenders.

On Amendment 20, Clause 12 would represent a major departure from the long-established practice of private prosecution, with damaging consequences for access to justice in England and Wales. Where the state fails or indeed is unable to act, private prosecutions provide an alternative route for victims, be they individuals, corporations or, in many instances, charitable organisations. That is plainly in the public interest, and private prosecutors should therefore receive a reasonably sufficient compensation for the costs incurred, and indeed the victims should not have to meet the costs of having to vindicate their rights in the absence of a public prosecution. As I observed earlier, in Committee, the total reimbursement of private prosecution costs, which comes from the Legal Aid Fund, amounts to 0.18% of that fund. It would hardly pass muster in the stationery department. It is a tiny proportion of overall costs.

Clause 12 would give the Government the power to impose a cap on those costs. The saving would obviously be minimal but the result would be to make many private prosecutions quite untenable. Take the example of charities. They have to take action on a regular basis to protect their reputation in circumstances where they have been the victims of fraud—often very minor fraud, but which nevertheless can be highly damaging to their reputation and their ability to raise funds. In the present circumstances, the solicitors they engage to carry on those private prosecutions recover a reasonable amount of costs. The court can award costs, although it is not bound to, and thereafter they can be determined by the senior costs judge. They are not going to take up alternative judicial time.

I shall touch upon the Explanatory Notes that were issued by the Ministry of Justice. They acknowledge that the costs are generally those given in the Senior Courts Cost Office Guide. As the notes say:

“These are intended to reflect civil market rates of pay”.


Yes, they are, and these are the very lawyers who step forward to carry out these private prosecutions.

The relevant guidelines or rates are set by the Master of the Rolls. They did not move for 11 years but now they are subject to annual review, and rightly so. They are assessed in line with the services producer price index, which is entirely appropriate. The problem for the Ministry of Justice is the disparity between that reasonable rate of pay for those who carry out the private prosecution and what is paid to the defence under the legal aid scheme, which is, frankly, outrageously low and has not changed to any material extent during the last almost two years of this Government. The result is a vast disparity between one party’s costs and another’s. The Explanatory Notes go on to tell us that this is going to be an enabling power:

“This measure seeks to address this inequality to reduce the disparity between the amounts which may be paid to private prosecutors and legally aided defence lawyers”.

18:30

If noble Lords believe that this enabling power will be used to somehow increase legal aid rates or increase the payments for private prosecutions, then I must confess I have a London Bridge to sell you. Clearly, this is an enabling power intended to bring down the reasonable rate of remuneration paid to those who undertake private prosecutions. The result, I am afraid, will be adverse to the interests of the many companies which bring private prosecutions—for example in the retail trade, with regard to intellectual property, and in respect of fraud—but more particularly the many charities, and there are many, which rely upon this mechanism to protect not only their funds but their reputations.

I move on to Amendment 23 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, which simply seeks to bring consistency between Crown Courts and magistrates’ courts regarding the period in which cases can be discontinued. I simply express my support for that amendment.

Amendment 29, which has been placed in this group and is in my name, would exempt sex offenders and domestic abusers from being eligible for early release at the one-third point of their sentence under the new sentencing regime. Across the House, we have already discussed the seriousness of sexual offences and domestic abuse and the need to improve the way these crimes are handled. In Committee, noble Lords were told that most offenders would not be eligible for early release at the one-third point; unfortunately, this is not the case. The vast majority of sexual and domestic abuse offenders will not be serving extended determinate sentences and will therefore be eligible for early release under the present scheme. In these circumstances, unless the Minister can provide appropriate and sufficient assurances, I will be minded to test the opinion of the House on Amendments 20 and 29.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, I will express support for Amendment 20 moved by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen; my noble friend Lady Brinton will address the other amendments in the group. Amendment 20, to remove Clause 12 from the Bill, may be technical but it is important because the regrettable fact is that, as is now well known, the relevant authorities and the police lack the resources to prosecute all crime reported to them. As a result, a significant proportion of reported crime goes insufficiently investigated and, too often, unprosecuted.

That is true across a whole range of offences, from shop theft to some offences of violence and many cases of fraud. There is therefore a practical need for private prosecutions, and that practical need is complementary to the traditional—and we would say justified—view that it is not and should not be solely for the state to prosecute breaches of the criminal law. It is also open to private citizens and organisations to bring private prosecutions, and that is an important aspect of access to justice.

It is certainly true that there are some cases where prosecutions require the consent of the DPP or the Attorney-General, but those tend to be special cases where Parliament has decided that that restriction is appropriate. An important feature of private prosecutions in this jurisdiction, and of their successfully being brought, is that the prosecution is entitled to recover the bulk of the prosecution costs from central funds by payment at a reasonable rate; the noble and learned Lord has stressed the importance of the reasonable rate.

The noble and learned Lord is right to say that a significant proportion of such prosecutions are brought by charities, including Macmillan and Help for Heroes. Those charities are often the victims of fraudulent schemes. Other private prosecutions are, of course, brought by commercial organisations, notably retailers which suffer substantial losses as a result of theft from shops. They may be commercial organisations, and they may have a commercial motivation for the prosecutions, but as a matter of simple and instinctive justice and a matter of principle, it is not and should not be the sole responsibility of the state to initiate prosecutions. Nor should the state fail to assist financially those who bring meritorious prosecutions against those who transgress the criminal law. When I say assist financially, I mean bear the costs of successful prosecutions, in large part.

The fact is that organisations may be deterred from bringing private prosecutions if their costs recovery is capped at a level that makes them unaffordable or uneconomic. Furthermore, if frauds against charities or offences against others, whether not for profit or commercial, cannot be prosecuted, the prevalence of those offences may be increased, to the general detriment of society as a whole. Yet, Clause 12, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, said, would introduce a mechanism for capping the amounts payable to prosecutors for their costs and cannot be read in any other way.

My understanding is that the Government say they will consult on this proposal to cap prosecution costs recovery but want to see a reserved power in this Bill first. We think that is the wrong way round. The Government should carry out their consultation and then, in the light of the consultation, abandon, as we would hope, the idea of a cap on costs recovery or introduce any necessary legislation, following and taking into account the results of the consultation. It follows that Clause 12 is an utterly undesirable clause. It is not worth saving and cannot be saved, and we therefore support Amendment 20, which would remove it from this Bill.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I will comment briefly on Amendment 29. During the passage of the Sentencing Act, we discussed the concern about early release schemes for those categories of offenders in some detail. As a result, about two weeks ago, the Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Timpson, kindly had a meeting after the passage of the Act. The Domestic Abuse Commissioner, the Victims’ Commissioner and the noble Baroness, Lady May of Maidenhead, were there to talk to the Minister about our concerns.

The outcome of that—had I thought of it, I would have spoken to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, to inform him—is agreement by the MoJ to form a working party with the offices of both the commissioners and their teams to review the scheme and the training of the Probation Service and start using some of the expertise of the third sector and its knowledge of the perpetrators and experience of the victims. That will be fed into the training of the Probation Service. There is a very positive move going on within the MoJ which I hope and think will directly address the concerns the noble and learned Lord mentioned when he was speaking to Amendment 29.

[Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd (CB)]

My Lords, I have a brief observation about Clause 12. The costs of private prosecution mean that money disappears from the overall Treasury contribution to the justice system. I think we should pause long and hard before we remove the power of the Government to control those costs. My own experience is that the costs of private prosecutions can, in many cases, be excessive. They are not subject to the rigorous discipline of CPS costs. If we deny the Government the power to regulate, we will come to regret it.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, on behalf of these Benches, I have relaid the amendment on the victim’s right to review in the event of discontinuance of proceedings. Amendment 23 would extend the period that a case can be discontinued in the Crown Court to bring it in line with the magistrates’ courts. This would mean that the CPS could discontinue a case at the Crown Court, with the option to reopen it following a successful victim right to review application, if it concludes that it made an error in stopping the prosecution.

I was grateful for the Minister’s response in Committee, when she explained that this amendment would mean wide-ranging implications for both victims and defendants. I have relaid it because I hope that she will be able to clarify the timescale for the Government’s response to Sir Brian Leveson’s important report on wider court reforms and improving efficiency. Perhaps even more importantly, will this issue of a victim’s right to review be, at the very least, included in discussions in the MoJ in the context of Sir Brian’s report and the wider court reforms? While appreciating that all of this may take time, there is a pressing and unequal arrangement at the moment. We will, I suspect, continue to lay amendments on this and to question Ministers in the future.

My noble friend Lord Marks has supported Amendment 20 on private prosecutions, from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen. As he said, we will support the Conservatives if they should choose to divide on it.

Amendment 29, laid by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen of Elie, would create exemptions to the early release scheme for sex offenders and domestic abusers. In Committee, the Minister referred to enhanced supervision when offenders of sexual crimes are released—that is, the use of tags and bail conditions that can impose wide restrictions on an offender visiting or travelling in areas that pose risk for the victims. That is as it should be. However, the proposers of this amendment say that it has not been working well in recent years—I have to say that includes when they were in power. If that is the case, can the Minister tell me how we can then protect victims from their offenders?

I want to ask whether those convicted of stalking and coercive control would be included in the category in Amendment 29, given that they are now included in the appendix of relevant serious crimes covered in the victims’ code and are exempt from automatic release after recall, such as breach of a protective order.

Having asked these questions, we are minded to support the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, if he should decide to test the opinion of the House in due course.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords, I begin with Clause 12. There are two points that I want to make at the outset: the Government’s motivation for introducing this provision is not to save money, and we do not wish there to be a chilling effect on private prosecutions. Indeed, we are supportive of the long-standing right to bring a private prosecution and we recognise the important part such prosecutions play in the criminal justice landscape.

Expenditure on private prosecutions is, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, has already said, a very small proportion of overall Ministry of Justice spending. But what matters, regardless of the scale of expenditure, is clarity, consistency, proportionality and value for money. 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. An enabling power as in Clause 12 allows us to do precisely that, in a careful and evidence-led way. The Justice Committee highlighted three key principles which should underpin reform. These are: 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. We agree with the Justice Committee about these principles.

At present, there are no prescribed rates for private prosecutors recovering costs from central funds, which is public money. This results in significant uncertainty, with the courts and the Legal Aid Agency required to assess claims case by case, often by reference to civil guideline rates and leading to disputes, appeals and judicial reviews, adding to costs and delay in the courts. The courts play a vital role in overseeing private prosecutions and have made a number of important changes, but, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, said during debate in Committee, this is a matter with which the Government have to grapple. The question of the amount of costs recoverable in principle is a matter of public policy and it is appropriate that such policy decisions are made by a democratically accountable officeholder, rather than developed incrementally through case law. The enabling power in Clause 12 ensures that any framework adopted has a clear statutory basis and is subject to parliamentary oversight.

The majority of private prosecutions do not result in any claim on central funds and will be entirely unaffected by this measure. Moreover, most private prosecutors are assiduous in applying the full code test set out in the Code for Crown Prosecutors and in their overall conduct of the case. But there is some evidence that, at the margins, the near certainty of substantial costs recovery may cause private prosecutions to be pursued which are either disproportionate or an unsuitable remedy, when the issue in dispute is essentially one which requires a civil law adjudication.

18:45

Charges for litigation work can be far in excess of those which a privately paying client would consider reasonable and may, in some instances, be disproportionate to the losses incurred. For example, in one fraud case, the Ministry of Justice received a claim for private prosecutor costs of £90,000, despite the loss amounting to £5,000 and there being fewer than 400 pages of statements and exhibits to consider. Clause 12 allows rates to be set only in order to make it clear, through secondary legislation, what the state considers to be appropriate remuneration. The rates proposed would be subject to extensive engagement with stakeholders and a full public consultation, aimed at ensuring that they reflect the complexity and seriousness of cases, while also improving certainty and efficiency.

We entirely agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, said in Committee, repeated today by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, about a number of respected charities making use of the private prosecution route where this is necessary to protect the public and to pursue wrongdoing. But these cases account for only around 10% to 15% of all private prosecutions that make applications for costs from central funds.

I say again: nothing in this clause alters the fundamental right to bring a private prosecution. That is long-standing and preserved in statute, and the Government have no intention of changing it. This enabling power does not limit who may prosecute, nor does it restrict the type of cases they may bring. It simply ensures that there is a clear statutory mechanism for setting what costs may be recoverable from central funds. It is a power that will be used only following full consultation.

I want to repeat the assurances I gave at Second Reading and in Committee that the Government have an open mind about where the rates should be set. The purpose of taking this power is to enable a proper assessment of the landscape, informed by evidence and consultation. The Government are bringing forward this enabling power now to make efficient use of parliamentary time within an already full legislative programme. Legislating for the power at this stage ensures that, once the consultation has concluded, the Government can act promptly and avoid delay or the need for additional legislation. This clause represents a measured first step towards reform that will improve clarity and efficiency, and help ensure the responsible use of taxpayers’ money, while safeguarding access to justice and the fundamental right to bring a private prosecution.

However, I am a bit worried about the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen. I fear he may have a touch of amnesia. He complains, quite correctly, that the legal aid rates for defence lawyers are far too low, but appears entirely to have forgotten which Government were responsible for that. With that, I hope your Lordships will join me in supporting that Clause 12 stand part of the Bill.

I turn to Amendment 23, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, who has identified a very real problem with the victim right of review scheme—and it is one which, as she knows, has troubled me personally for a number of years. If the prosecution offers no evidence without notifying the victim first then the victim right of review is rendered nugatory because the case cannot be revived—it is finished. Even if the prosecutor’s decision turns out to have been wrong, nothing can be done. To paraphrase a legal truism: if there is no remedy, it is not much of a right. Once again, I thank the noble Baroness for putting the spotlight on a really important point. Where we disagree is on whether extending the power to discontinue is the right way to deal with the issue.

The noble Baroness’s amendment would permit discontinuance to be used in a much wider range of situations, far beyond rectifying any errors that arise through the victim right of review process. By allowing discontinuance up to the start of trial in every Crown Court case, the amendment would, in effect, make discontinuance the default mechanism for stopping prosecutions in the Crown Court. That could affect up to 10,000 cases a year currently brought to an end by the prosecution offering no evidence. It would be a major change and one that might be to the significant disadvantage of not just defendants but victims.

I hope your Lordships will bear with me for a minute or two while I give a little bit of detail about why we feel so strongly about this. Discontinuance of proceedings up to trial happens in the magistrates’ court, where the cases are less serious and the length of time until trial is usually shorter than in the Crown Court. But this proposal seeks to extend this power to the Crown Court for all cases, which would include terrorism, rape and even murder. The significance of this is that discontinuing a case is not pressing the pause button; it brings the case to a complete halt, but with no conclusive result.

Let us contrast this with what happens when the prosecution takes the final step of offering no evidence. Then, the prosecution is required to explain its position openly in court, and it results in an acquittal, after which the case cannot be restarted. Discontinuance, by contrast, is an administrative step: the prosecution simply writes a letter saying that it is discontinuing. It does not have to give any reasons to the court, the defendant or the victim for stopping the prosecution. That reduction in transparency and judicial oversight is an important constitutional change, particularly where it would apply to cases such as terrorism, rape and murder. I repeat: discontinuance is not a pause. It ends the proceedings without a verdict, but the proceedings can be restarted, just with no time limits and no supervision. So everyone is left in limbo and, importantly, the defendant would not be on bail; they would simply be free, with no conditions, so there would be no possibility of protecting victims or witnesses.

At the moment, when proceedings are live in the Crown Court, if the prosecution wants an adjournment to give it more time to do something, it has to persuade the judge, who will listen to what both sides have to say and then make a decision in the interests of justice. There is a significant risk with this amendment that, if the judge refuses an adjournment, the prosecution will simply discontinue, leaving everybody in limbo, possibly for ever. At best, there is a risk of significant delay and uncertainty for both victims and defendants.

It has been suggested by some that Crown Court judges could regulate this by use of the doctrine of abuse of process. Although this is true in theory, it is highly unlikely to happen in practice. Staying an indictment for abuse of process is a remedy of last resort, to be used only in exceptional circumstances. It is not to be used for judges to express disapproval of the prosecution’s behaviour, except in the most extreme cases. In my experience, it is highly unlikely that the courts would stop a viable trial because they felt the prosecution had misused the power to discontinue—indeed, many victims’ groups would be up in arms were that to happen.

In the Crown Court, any widening of the discontinuance power would require robust safeguards and clear oversight in order to maintain transparency and confidence in the system, avoid unnecessary disruption and ensure that the legitimate interests of both victims and defendants are properly balanced. We would, for example, need to think carefully about how this would affect child defendants. If proceedings were discontinued and then restarted after the defendant has turned 18, that young defendant would then be prosecuted as an adult through no fault of their own.

This amendment has been framed as bringing the Crown Court into line with the magistrates’ court, but in fact it would go considerably further. In the magistrates’ court, the extended discontinuance window is balanced by a statutory safeguard, which is that the defendant can refuse to allow the prosecution to discontinue and can require the proceedings to continue to ensure legal finality. The prosecution then has to decide whether to go ahead or to offer no evidence. But no equivalent safeguard is proposed here, nor indeed any other safeguard, such as judicial oversight or a time limit on when proceedings can be reinstated. Applying the magistrates’ court model selectively, without its balancing protections, would therefore be a departure from established principle and would create a host of problems for victims as well as defendants.

However, that does not mean that we should not do anything about the position of the victim who has not been told that the prosecution will offer no evidence until it has already done so, by which time it is too late. Practical steps are already being taken to address the circumstances that have prompted the noble Baroness’s concerns. These include enhanced senior oversight for rape and serious sexual offences where the CPS proposes to offer no evidence, and the expansion of a pilot to enable victims to request a second opinion from a different prosecutor before any final decision to offer no evidence is made. These are important steps to help prevent cases such as that of Jade Blue McCrossen-Nethercott happening again. I have already discussed this issue with the Victims’ Commissioner, with whom I wish to work further on this, and I hope to meet Ms McCrossen-Nethercott and other victims to understand fully what more may be needed to reach the right, balanced solution. For all these reasons, I invite the noble Baroness not to press her amendment.

Amendment 29, in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, and the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, seeks to exclude all sexual and domestic abuse offenders from the new one-third release provision. I think I am suffering from déjà vu: the principles surrounding the one-third release were discussed at length in the debate on the Sentencing Bill, so I am not entirely clear why your Lordships’ House is being asked to revisit this given that Parliament has already made its decision. The Government recognise the seriousness of these offences and the harm that they cause. Many offenders convicted of the most serious sexual and domestic abuse offences already receive one of the three most serious forms of sentence—life sentences, extended determinate sentences or sentences for offenders of particular concern—so none of these cases would fall within the scope of the one-third release provision.

Beyond this, excluding certain offences from the Sentencing Act changes would make the new system more operationally complex and increase the risk of inaccuracies in release calculations. No one wants any more releases in error. The Government are working hard to reduce these by modernising the legacy paper-based systems that we inherited, but anything that increases complexity is bound to increase the risk. As we have already argued, if we run out of prison places, no one is safe, because the criminal justice system will collapse.

Through the implementation of the Sentencing Act, this Government are putting the prison population on a sustainable footing, ending the cycle of repeated crises presided over by the party opposite when it was in government. Any amendments to this legislation risk this pathway to stability. I hope it will reassure noble Lords that, once released, offenders will be subject to a period of intense supervision, with a presumption that they will be electronically tagged; the highest-risk offenders will continue to be actively supervised until the end of their sentence; and all offenders will remain on licence, with the possibility of recall to custody if they breach the terms of it. I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Russell, for outlining his conversation with my noble friend Lord Timpson about this. I therefore invite the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, I begin with Amendment 20, which deals with Clause 12. First, I am relying on the Explanatory Notes from the Minister’s own department. Where there is a private prosecution and then an award of costs, the costs are assessed by the criminal cases unit in the Ministry of Justice. If there is a dispute—and there should not be, because there are established guidelines, the Senior Courts Costs Office guidelines—it can go to the senior costs judge, who is experienced in addressing these matters. So that is not a problem at all, and there is no real difficulty there.

However, the Minister suggested that there was “some evidence at the margins” that people might be overcharging. Well, if you think that there is some evidence at the margins, go away and consult—and if you discover that there is evidence at the margins, come back and we can legislate. But you do not legislate and then go looking for some evidence at the margins: that is simply back to front.

I make one further point. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, mentioned that this was money leaving the MoJ. Let us put this into context: 0.18% of the legal aid budget is £3.6 million, and it is not leaving: it is actually a very wise investment by the Ministry of Justice. Investing that very modest sum relieves the Crown Prosecution Service of a vast number of relatively minor prosecutions that would cost a great deal to pursue. So I do not accept that this is somehow “lost money”: it is actually an extremely good investment on the part of the MoJ and it shows results.

I appreciate that the issues around Amendment 29 were touched on in the Sentencing Act, but there is no prohibition, subject to the clerks, on us revisiting it if we did not get it right the first time. We now have an ideal opportunity to get it right, and there is no reason why, with sexual and domestic abuse offences, we should not be able to reconcile our sentencing provisions with other serious crimes. So I shall seek to test the opinion of the House on both Amendment 20 and Amendment 29.

18:59

Division 4

Amendment 20 agreed.

Ayes: 216

---

Conservative: 148
Liberal Democrat: 49
Non-affiliated: 8
Crossbench: 5
Democratic Unionist Party: 4
Ulster Unionist Party: 2

Noes: 170

---

Labour: 154
Crossbench: 10
Non-affiliated: 3
Plaid Cymru: 2
Green Party: 1

19:09

Amendment 21

Moved by

[Baroness Chakrabarti]

21: After Clause 12, insert the following new Clause—
“Admissibility and reliability of computer evidence(1) Evidence produced by or obtained from a computerised device or system may be admissible in proceedings, where—(a) it is not challenged,(b) it cannot reasonably in the view of the court, be challenged, or(c) the court is reasonably satisfied of the reliability of the evidence. (2) Rules of Court must provide for reasonable opportunity for the reliability of evidence referred to in subsection (1) above to be challenged, and for the factors to be taken into account in assessing both reliability and the weight to be given to any such evidence as is admitted.(3) The common law presumption of the reliability of evidence referred to in subsection (1) is removed.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new clause replaces the current common law presumption of the reliability of computer evidence with a statutory and court rules’ scheme for the reasonable challenge and testing of such evidence.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, I can be short on this important group, because of the detailed scrutiny and cross-party support that I enjoyed in Committee, because of my eminent co-signatories and because Report stage discipline is a courtesy to all noble Lords hoping to do their voting duty and get home at a reasonable time.

This group concerns two dangerous evidential practices that have already led to significant miscarriages of justice. Amendment 21 addresses computer evidence too easily presumed reliable without appropriate testing or proof—I give you the Horizon scandal and the postmasters. Amendment 22 addresses the pernicious and discriminatory police and prosecution practice of admitting evidence of people’s musical tastes. Young black men’s liking for rap and drill music, in particular, are somehow probative of criminal proclivity and intent, especially in joint enterprise cases—I give you Ademola Adadeji, the young, promising law scholar sent to prison in a case of total mistaken identity, a conviction overturned only after he served three years of his young life. My noble friend Lady Lawrence of Clarendon explained that case in Committee. This practice is exacerbated by police officers holding themselves out as expert witnesses in rap and drill music. I shall say no more.

I am so grateful to my noble friend the Minister for her repeated and expert engagement with these concerns. I look forward hopefully to her response and I beg to move.

[Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)]

My Lords, on Amendment 21, which is about the reliability of computer evidence, I am grateful to Sam Stein KC for his advice on this difficult issue. I am also extremely grateful to the Minister for meeting me and other signatories to this group, which is quite remarkable given her workload. Earlier today, we were discussing modern slavery: I think that she has fallen foul of it. She understood the urgency of dealing with the issue of the reliability of computer evidence and I came away from that meeting with the impression that she is determined to address it through the Criminal Procedure Rules rather than through the legislative process that we propose today. Maybe that is right, but I have three questions for her.

First, will she agree to further meetings, perhaps involving Sam Stein KC, so that we can do our best to get these rules right, dealing not just with the issue of hearsay evidence but also with the issue of the admissibility of computer evidence?

Secondly, in the meeting that she and I had, we discussed an issue that was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, in Committee—namely, international comparisons. The Minister kindly sent me a letter today setting out some of those international comparisons, in which she said that it was clear that, in France, digital evidence must be shown to be reliable and unaltered; in Germany, systems must meet formal test protocols before their output can be relied on; in India, it is required that evidence must be authenticated through a strict statutory process; and so it goes on. In other words, they are much more restrictive on computer evidence than we are and their criminal processes have not ground to a halt.

19:15

My third question concerns an issue that was raised a year or two ago by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron—namely, how do civil processes get dealt with through this? Will the Minister commit to following this up, not only through the Criminal Procedure Rules but also through the Civil Procedure Rules? I would like to give the Minister the benefit of the doubt on this issue and I re-express my gratitude to her for our meeting. It leaves in place the absurdity that computer evidence is held to be reliable even though we know that it often is not, but we must come back to that perhaps some other time.

[Lord Beamish (Lab)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti’s amendment. We discussed this in Committee. My involvement, like that of the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, is through the experience of the Post Office Horizon scandal. In those cases, we saw computer evidence put before the court with the presumption that it could not be faulty or in any way questioned. I accept that the Government started a consultation on trying to update the present law. That was last April and I think that, like all these things, it has been put in the “too hard to deal with” category, but as the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, has just said, other jurisdictions and other countries have moved ahead on this. It is, I have to say, a challenge for any Government, in the sense that the rapid rate of change in our technology throws up these challenges to any system. However, when there is a situation whereby a body such as the Post Office not only used the law but actually pressed it and persecuted people in a very hard and uncaring way, we get the scandals that face us today, with the Post Office scandal.

It is still going on. We now have the first of the Capture cases, which was the system before Horizon, going to the Court of Appeal. Even though, when I first exposed this, the Post Office had no information on this system, we were helped to put together, through various campaigners and individuals who came forward, the details of the Capture system. It was not a network system like Horizon, but still a system that was reliant, in those days, on corrupted floppy disks, and the program was wrong. The Government’s position has been that these cases should go to the CCRC. I think that there are fewer than 30 cases in this category. Even though the Government have now agreed to pay compensation to the Capture cases, the first case is going to the Court of Appeal.

Strangely, for some reason the Post Office has taken it on itself to oppose this case. No doubt we will hear from Ministers—I accept this is not my noble friend the Minister’s responsibility—that the Post Office is at arm’s length and therefore a decision has to be taken on what it does with cases such as this. But with the Horizon scandal we saw the Post Office spend somewhere in excess of £100 million of public money to defend the indefensible. I am not suggesting that it will spend that much on this case, but it seems to be carrying on the argument that the computer cannot be wrong.

To me and other campaigners, a clear precedent has been set on this and those cases should be set aside and overturned as the Horizon cases were. In one case going before the court, the individual is dead but her elderly husband is now facing a longer wait and yet another fight, with the Post Office using public money. As I say, when I and other campaigners first exposed Capture, the Post Office said that it had nothing on it, but it now seems very quickly to have found a good reason to oppose this case. That is why an urgent change needs to happen, as my noble friend has outlined.

I join others in thanking my noble friend the Minister for her engagement on this issue. She realises that this needs to be addressed and the constructive way she has engaged with us on it should be commended. I hope we can get some change and that, with the wider issues arising from not just this but the Capture case, the Government think before again allowing the Post Office to go down this blind alley of defending the indefensible. I look forward to my noble friend’s response.

[Baroness Kidron (CB)]

My Lords, I join the Minister’s fan club and thank her for her engagement on this, which has really helped get this to a better place. I am grateful for that. I believe we will hear from her what the Government’s plan is, but can she also assure me on a couple of points?

First, whatever the new process is to be, how will a person subject to a glitch or misinformation assert their case without having proper access to the system from which the evidence emerged? How will we ensure that the court is quick to understand and question the validity of the information and the system that produced it, and how will we educate the legal profession on the depth and breadth of information that seems plausible but is false? How will we do all that in sufficient time to save the next set of victims?

I too recognise the problems raised by the Minister in those meetings around the ubiquity of computers, but there is an equal and opposite concern that, in an age of AI where hallucinations, deepfakes and melded information are a norm, if we are willing to continue with the presumption, as the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, said, that information from a computer is reliable, that not only is untrue but creates distrust in the law. When this moment has passed, could there perhaps be a piece of work looking forward to challenge the presumption in law in a more careful and considered way, which this quick fix does not quite reach?

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti and the three other noble Lords who signed Amendment 21. I also support Amendment 22. Concerning Amendment 21, mention has been made of the Post Office/Horizon scandal. As we all now know, this was a very defective computer. The law must in future be on the side of truth and accuracy, in relation to computers or to anything else.

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I were members of the Justice and Home Affairs Committee of this House, which was formed only in 2020. Our first inquiry and report were on the advent of new technologies in the justice system. During that work, I often asked myself—sometimes aloud—how you would feel if you were arrested, charged, convicted and imprisoned on the basis of evidence that not only did you not understand but could not be explained. We now know how people felt and feel.

That was in 2022, which was centuries ago in technical terms. I realise that the lexicon has expanded here and I hear terms that I have never heard before, but the basic issues remain. Our concerns then were about transparency and regulation, among other things, and that anyone could be affected. We were talking not just about insider trading and corporate fraud, as one witness powerfully put it, but

“high-volume data that is mostly about poor people”.

We found a lot of enthusiasm for the technology, but not a corresponding commitment to a thorough evaluation of it. These Benches support Amendment 21, which seems to have been a very constructive contribution to taking these issues forward.

At the last stage, I supported Amendment 22. I do so no less now. Sometimes we show that we are not as open as we should be to the way that society moves on or to the life experiences of people younger than almost all of us and how they wish to express them. I do not really feel qualified to say more than that.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, this has been a thoughtful debate. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and her supporters for their work on these issues.

On Amendment 21, I reiterate the sentiments expressed in Committee and by many noble Lords across the House from all parties. In light of the appalling Post Office scandal, keeping in mind the increasing use of artificial intelligence, the need to remove the presumption of reliability for computer evidence is now clear. The noble Baroness has responded to some of the concerns expressed in Committee in bringing forward this redrafted amendment. I commend her attention to this issue.

My concern is that the Government have had long enough to look at this. Their call for evidence closed on 15 April 2025, so I look forward to hearing from the Minister where we are now, given that the call for evidence is a year old. I am sure she will be anxious to update us on that.

I understand the basis for Amendment 22, but I have some reservations about its detail. There is an issue about the objectivity of the conditions listed in subsection (2) of the proposed new clause. I would certainly be interested to hear more about how the court should consider who is suitably qualified to give evidence about

“linguistic and artistic conventions and the social and cultural context of the creative or artistic expression”.

It is an important area, but it is also a difficult one that will repay further consideration.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 21 in the names of my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti and a formidable trio of other Members of your Lordships’ House, the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, who is not in his place, is extremely important. I really mean it when I say I want to thank my noble friend, both for tabling it and for the work she has done to refine it since Committee. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and my noble friend Lord Beamish, all of whom have given up their time to meet me during the last two weeks to discuss this amendment to try to get it right. I know the entire House wants to thank the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, and my noble friend Lord Beamish for their ceaseless championing of the victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal. It is thanks to them that we are here taking the steps we are today.

19:30

The reason I say I really mean it when I thank my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti is that this is a really important subject. It is one that has been causing the Government—and me personally—great anxiety. Anyone who has even heard of the Post Office Horizon scandal will have been shocked both by the wrongful convictions and by the scale of them, and we all agree that this must not happen again.

The conundrum that has faced us all is how to achieve this without inadvertently bringing the criminal justice system to a standstill, because it is estimated that, as at the present day, 90% of criminal cases involve the prosecution relying on some kind of computer evidence. In most cases, that computer evidence is entirely uncontroversial—for example, CCTV evidence or notes produced from accident and emergency—but what needs to be understood is that were we to remove the presumption of computer reliability, that is not neutral because of the legal maxim: he who asserts must prove. That means that if we remove the presumption, the prosecution must prove the reliability of the device in every single case—and defence lawyers are there to make sure that it does. I can say this with confidence, because I have been one of them, picking away at how to challenge admissibility if it is in my client’s interests. It is what good defence lawyers do.

Requiring the prosecution to prove that the computer was working accurately in all these cases could quickly bring the system down. For example, there are many rape and domestic abuse cases in which the prosecution wishes to rely on social media messages sent between the defendant and the complainant. Computer evidence in those cases would relate both to the individual device used and to the social media platform’s broader system. However, most of the social media companies are not based in the United Kingdom, so UK law enforcement has no power to compel them to produce a statement saying that the computer was working reliably. Therefore, it can easily be seen how this could add to delays in such cases or might even mean it was not possible to prosecute some at all.

I know my noble friend readily agrees that we do not get justice for one group of victims by causing injustice to another group. We therefore need to find a method of preserving the position in the vast number of cases where the computer evidence can safely be presumed to be reliable unless there is some real reason to doubt it, while ensuring that where justice requires a defendant to be able to mount an effective challenge, the court takes this seriously and the defence is able to make proper submissions. But trust me—this really is not easy to achieve.

I understand that there is frustration about how long this issue has been under consideration, and the reason is this: the call for evidence which closed in April last year demonstrated a lack of consensus as to whether there is even a problem. Some argued that what happened in the Horizon cases had more to do with the prosecution improperly withholding evidence and important information from the defence than with the computers not working properly. Even experts who support reform cannot agree on how computer evidence ought to be defined, far less on what an effective solution might look like. There is also an overlap with the Government’s ongoing criminal justice system reform programme, so we are anxious to make sure that reform in this area does not interfere with, nor pre-empt, that piece of work.

Since the consultation closed, officials have been engaging across government and with public bodies to test options for reform of the admissibility of computer evidence. My noble friend Lady Chakrabarti and I have had a number of conversations about this: we agree on what the problem is, and we agree the solution is much harder to find. She has now tabled a new amendment in narrowed form, but the Government are concerned that a statutory solution such as the one she proposes, in a fast-moving and highly technical area of law, will have unintended consequences across the justice system, with victims bearing the cost. If we get this wrong and the provision is enshrined in primary legislation, it is very hard to put it right, as we would have to find other primary legislation where this would be in scope to allow us to amend or even repeal. Even the noble Baroness’s new amendment would still capture routine material such as body-worn video or a single downloaded phone message. This underlines the need to proceed carefully on the basis of evidence.

However, I am absolutely not saying that this is all too difficult. On the contrary, we must find a solution; I am determined that we will. The Government’s preferred solution is that we do this by way of procedural reform, and what we propose is this: the Lord Chancellor will invite the Criminal Procedure Rule Committee to develop rules of court that will introduce procedural safeguards and ensure enhanced disclosure in cases where the introduction of computer-generated evidence could be determinative of an issue in the case. This would allow safeguards to be strengthened where computer evidence was genuinely determinative, but without creating a rigid statutory regime that risks unintended consequences in cases where the evidence is basically routine and not of concern.

The Criminal Procedure Rules are binding on prosecutors and judges, who must follow them. The great thing is, they can be produced quickly—much more quickly than enacting primary legislation. Plainly, I cannot speak for the Lady Chief Justice or the Criminal Procedure Rule Committee, as they are independent of government, but I am sure they understand the urgency, and I commit today to writing to the Lady Chief Justice to ask her if it would be possible to do this speedily.

The good thing about court rules is they provide a more flexible mechanism. They can adapt as technology evolves without the need for primary legislation; they can be tested in consultation both with experts and those they will affect, and they can be tweaked quickly, should it become necessary. We are confident that this is the right way forward to achieve the objectives of my noble friend’s amendment, in a manner that is both practical and legally defensible. I have discussed this in some detail with my noble friends Lady Chakrabarti and Lord Beamish, the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, and the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron. We can and will continue to discuss it with them to make sure we get this right. I absolutely agree to further meetings with the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, and anybody he wishes to bring to them—in fact, I already know Sam Stein; I think we may have been called to the Bar at the same time.

The international comparisons plainly need more work. I did not have a great deal of detail, but I wanted to get an answer to the noble Lord quickly, because he asked me a few days ago for it. As far as civil processes are concerned, again, I absolutely understand the need for this. It is plainly not within the scope of the Bill, but I undertake to talk more to the noble Lord about this when we meet.

As for the questions raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, on how they assert their case, the burden of proof will sort that out. Basically, once the defendant raises a real issue, the burden moves to the prosecution, which then has to satisfy the court beyond reasonable doubt that the computer is working accurately. That is the kind of issue we have in mind.

I absolutely agree that educating the legal profession is essential. At the moment, I think that simply saying the word “Horizon” will do it, but, obviously, memories are short, and once that has faded, we want to make sure that whatever we put in place endures to make sure that this does not happen again.

I am very grateful to all noble Lords for the positive and constructive way in which they have engaged with me. It is not a surprise—I have huge respect for them all—but it has made it a pleasant experience and one in which I think we have made real progress, so I thank them.

Amendment 22, also in the name of my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti, aims to prevent unfair prejudice arising from the use of creative or artistic expression. Again, this is an important subject. The Government recognise the concerns about the potential for material with limited probative value being used in a way that is in fact significantly prejudicial. My noble friend has spoken passionately and persuasively in the past, as have others, in particular about the use of drill and rap music, which in some cases may not prove anything very much, save what is known as the forbidden reasoning of negative stereotyping of young Black men.

I completely understand the intention underlying the amendment, but we suggest that a highly prescriptive statutory test for admissibility is not the right approach. The reason is that the amendment, as drafted, is extremely wide: it would apply to all types of creative expression and is not limited to content produced by the defendant. At the moment, prosecutors currently use this kind of evidence across a wide range of serious crimes. One example is child sexual abuse, where images and writings can demonstrate the intentions of the defendant partly by what they choose to possess or what they write. Another example is terrorism, where possession of certain artistic materials may be evidence of what is in fact going on. All this kind of material would be captured by the amendment, and there is a very real risk that, as drafted, it would restrict the ability of prosecutors to adduce evidence that is needed and should continue to be admissible.

That said, concerns about room for misinterpretation and the unfair prejudice that might follow are taken seriously. This issue is already being actively considered by the Crown Prosecution Service. I hope it will give some reassurance that, in the small number of cases where music is properly relevant—for example, where it contains details that only the perpetrator of the crime would know—the CPS is now formally committing to issuing legal guidance. I am a big fan of the CPS’s legal guidance; I declare an interest here in that I wrote some of it when I worked there, so it is perhaps a bit immodest to say that I am a big fan of it. It gives prosecutors a clear, consistent framework, ensuring fairness and transparency; it is publicly available on the CPS website; and it can be used in court to hold the CPS to account.

Further, to ensure transparency, the CPS will also convene a national scrutiny panel examining the use of drill and rap music in prosecutions. This panel will include third-sector representatives, legal professionals and academic experts, who will review anonymised past cases involving the music, answer questions, gather feedback and help the CPS to refine its approach. I repeat my thanks and gratitude to my noble friend for her concern and efforts in relation to both these areas of evidential reform. I hope she will be content not to press her amendments.

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very sorry to interject at this stage, but I am a bit puzzled as to whether changing the rules of the Supreme Court will impact on county courts and magistrates’ courts.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My noble friend will forgive me, because this has nothing to do with the rules of the Supreme Court and the county courts. He will forgive me.

I am grateful to all noble Lords for their contributions, not least for being an exemplar of how Report should be dealt with—notwithstanding the broken clock, which I hope will be fixed by tomorrow’s no doubt lengthy business. I am particularly grateful to the supporters and co-signatories of this amendment, in particular the noble Lords, Lord Arbuthnot and Lord Beamish, who have done, and continue to do, all that doughty work on behalf of the postmasters.

I am grateful also to Justice and Art Not Evidence for their help with both amendments. I am particularly grateful to my noble friend the Minister, because not all Ministers respond with this level of detail and positive engagement. The crack is how the light gets in. Of course, the devil will be in the detail of the rules and the CPS guidance, but I trust her to keep going with this. I certainly trust my noble friends and co-signatories to keep up their doughty campaigning and to accept her invitation to stay involved in the discussion. With that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 21 withdrawn.

Amendments 22 and 23 not moved.

Clause 13: Reviews of sentencing: time limits

Amendment 24

Moved by

[Lord Keen of Elie]

24: Clause 13, page 16, line 37, leave out paragraph (b) and insert—
“(b) in that sub-paragraph, for the words from “within” to the end substitute “—(a) in relation to England and Wales, within 56 days from the day on which the sentence, or the last of the sentences, in the case was passed, subject to sub-paragraph (2);(b) in relation to Northern Ireland, within 28 days from the day on which the sentence, or the last of the sentences, in the case was passed.”;”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would extend the time limit for the Attorney General to apply for leave to refer an unduly lenient sentence in England or Wales to the Court of Appeal.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

My Lords, this group contains my amendment seeking to increase the unduly lenient sentence deadline to 56 days, and amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, seeking to allow that timeframe to be extended in exceptional circumstances. The whole group concerns both how the unduly lenient sentence scheme operates in practice and how long the timeframe should be for an application. Amendments 24 and 25 in my name would increase the window for applications to 56 days.

These were in fact amendments that the Government had pledged to table. However, they decided to withdraw them just two days later. They explained that an increased timeframe for the scheme would be of little use if victims were unaware of its existence. I entirely agree with that in principle, but I wonder why we cannot have both an increase in the timeframe and a suitable means of intimation.

Amendments 26 and 27 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, would also act to strengthen victims’ rights in this respect, and we support them. Amendment 27 would place a duty on a nominated government department to inform victims and their families. While the Minister will no doubt say that this is the responsibility of the witness care unit and should therefore not be in legislation, we are inclined to disagree. Too many cases exist of victims losing the right to an unduly lenient sentence application because they were either not notified or notified too late, and therefore statutory provision may be appropriate.

I do not intend to press these amendments to a Division, but I hope that the Minister will address the reasons why the Government decided to withdraw their own amendment and explain the reasoning behind that. I believe that that would be welcomed across the House.

19:45

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, in Committee, we welcomed the Government’s recognition that there are practical issues in ensuring that victims are told of the sentencing within the 28-day limit, and under the present rules they cannot ask the Attorney-General to review the sentence as unduly lenient. My Amendments 26 and 27 would specifically allow for the 28-day timeframe to be extended in exceptional circumstances, which may include, but is not limited to, delays in being told. It also strengthens the route for victims to be told with a duty to inform victims.

In Committee, we had an extensive probing debate about increasing 26 days to 56 days, and Amendment 25 from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, relays that in Amendment 24. However, my amendment tries to focus entirely on giving victims the right, if something has gone wrong and only in the most exceptional circumstances, to ask the AG to extend the period for a submission. We genuinely think that this safety net is the best way to do that. If the Government accept the formal route to notifying victims set out in Amendment 27, the most common reason for not being notified should almost completely stop. Other exceptional circumstances—including, perhaps, a victim being in hospital during the period—might be permitted.

The Minister was concerned that too many expectations would be raised, but we have not pressed on detail. It would be down to the AG’s office to provide a guidance note for victims that would notify them of their rights, as well as the type of extraordinary circumstance. Currently, victims do not have access to this, and because of other problems about who should inform them, their right to ask for consideration of an unduly lenient sentence falls. This should be remedied and, subject to the Minister’s response, I may wish to test the opinion of the House.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly. I put my name to both amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, which we first laid in Committee. In essence, what the Minister said when she wound up this group in Committee was “We are listening and I am making a listening speech”. I hope that, even though she has been on her feet for much of today, she is still in listening mode. I do appreciate, as I think we all do, the way she has approached both Committee and Report; it is a refreshing change from some experiences one has had in recent years. I look forward to what I hope will be a positive “listening” response.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords, I express my thanks to Claire Waxman, the Victims’ Commissioner, and to Tracey Hanson and Katie Brett, who have campaigned with great commitment on behalf of victims.

In Committee, much was said on all sides about the importance of the unduly lenient sentence scheme in ensuring consistency. As all who participated know, it is not an appeal for victims who are dissatisfied by the length or type of sentence: rather, it is a legal safeguard, exercisable by the Attorney-General, to correct sentences that fall outside the appropriate range. As such, it is a constitutional safeguard vested in the Attorney-General as guardian of the public interest, not a mechanism for anyone to relitigate sentencing. That said, victims will often play a vital role in drawing cases to the Attorney-General’s attention for consideration: we recognise and indeed encourage that.

As is generally known, the time limit is a strict one: 28 days with no exceptions. The Government are aware of and have listened to the comments of the victims and those supporting them, who have long complained that the system just is not working for them; in particular, that they are often not told about the ULS scheme; and, in any event, 28 days is not long enough.

Against that background, I turn to the amendments concerning the time limits, in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and the noble Lords, Lord Russell and Lord Sandhurst. Your Lordships will be aware that the Government had been considering tabling their own amendment to increase the time limit. As I said in Committee, we hoped to bring something forward on Report. Today, I take up the invitation of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, to set out why we have not done so.

This is fundamentally a Bill for victims. Unsurprisingly, victims have told us that they want to be listened to by the Government. Both victims and the Victims’ Commissioner have told us clearly that increasing the time limit to 56 days would not address the problem they face. They have told us that any time limit, whether it is 28 days, 56 days or 365 days, is meaningless if they are not informed about the ULS scheme in the first place.

Plainly, all victims should be told. There are mechanisms in place for doing so, but we have heard enough from victims to make it clear to us that there are occasions on which this is not happening. To paraphrase what I said today in an earlier group, a right is not much of a right if you do not know about it.

To the victims, I say: we have heard you and we will continue to listen. The victims asked us not to bring forward our amendment extending the time limit to 56 days, and so we have not done so. This explains why we cannot accept Amendments 24 and 25.

I turn to Amendment 26 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. I thank her for not only raising the issue but for the positive and constructive talks we have had. As some of your Lordships may have gathered, the noble Baroness and I have been spending rather a lot of time together over the last few weeks. I have enjoyed every moment, of course. I can understand why it is felt that an exception from the strict time limit would be a good thing, but there are a number of issues with it, and I will try to deal with these briefly.

First, it seeks to treat a symptom of the problem rather than tackling the cause. The underlying problem is that some victims are apparently not being told about the ULS scheme. The noble Baroness’s amendment seeks to address that by creating a mechanism to bypass the time limit if that happens. But this Government are not here to patch up the symptoms; the Government’s view is that we must address the root cause—victims are telling us that they are not being informed—rather than create a mechanism that responds only after the problem has occurred.

The second issue is the question of what exceptional circumstances would mean in practice. The Government’s concern is that the amendment will be self-defeating, because “exceptional” has its ordinary meaning—something unusual, not typical—and cannot be exhaustively defined in legislation, but something that is not genuinely unusual cannot be described as exceptional. Given that the noble Baroness’s reason for tabling the amendment is, regrettably, that victims do not get told about it, if they are not told, it cannot be exceptional. This is very likely to apply to the very cases that would not be able to take advantage of the law. I hope the noble Baroness will understand why the Government cannot accept the amendment and that she will work with me and my officials as we look to address the real issue: ensuring that victims are notified of the scheme in the first place.

Amendment 30 in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, would require a public consultation. The Law Commission did exactly this. The Law Commission has held a public consultation on the ULS scheme, including specific questions about the 28-day time limit. Holding another one would be a waste of taxpayers’ money. I hope your Lordships will join me in looking forward to the commission’s final report when it is published later this year. The Government will, of course, consider its findings carefully.

I turn briefly to the remaining amendments, which seek to place a statutory duty on a designated government department or the Crown Prosecution Service to notify the victims. Again, there is no issue between us about the fact that the Government need to ensure that every victim is told. I entirely agree with what the noble Baroness is trying to achieve, but I want to persuade her that there is a better way of doing it.

The amendments seek to create a duty which already exists. Police in witness care units are already responsible for informing victims about the unduly lenient sentence scheme. Using primary legislation to try to make people do what they are already required to do is not the best way of going about things. These amendments impose a duplicative statutory duty, potentially with different timeframes or differing lines of accountability. It must be self-evident that this risks confusion rather than clarity, particularly where concurrent statutory duties could blur operational responsibilities. The fear is that the victims might actually, as a result, end up worse off.

I therefore ask your Lordships to work with us, the Victims’ Commissioner and the victims themselves to get to the heart of the issue and develop practical, workable improvements to notification and awareness. We want every victim to be properly informed, in good time, so that they can exercise their rights with confidence. Our focus is on fixing the long-standing problems with notification rather than changing the time limits themselves.

We already have the commitment of the Attorney-General’s Office, the CPS, the Home Office and the National Police Chiefs’ Council to work closely with us to improve awareness of the scheme. They have all urgently assessed what actions can be taken in their respective areas. There is a quite a detailed plan.

Given the time, I will undertake to write to the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, rather than read out the next four pages of my speech, for which I do not think anybody would thank me. For these reasons, I ask the noble and learned Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Keen of Elie (Con)]

I thank the Minister for her explanation and understand that she is giving further consideration to this issue. In these circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 24 withdrawn.

Amendment 25 not moved.

Amendment 26

Moved by

[Baroness Brinton]

26: After Clause 14, insert the following new Clause—
“Unduly lenient sentences: time limitIn paragraph 1 of Schedule 3 to the Criminal Justice Act 1988, at end insert“, subject to sub-paragraph (2).(2) The time limit of 28 days shall be extended in exceptional circumstances, which may include but not be limited to a failure of the relevant body to inform the victim and families of their rights under section 36 (reviews of sentencing).””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would allow for the 28-day timeframe to be extended in exceptional circumstances, and prompt criminal justice agencies to meet their obligation to inform of their rights and the tight time limit.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

I will be brief, given the hour and the fact that there is some other business to come. I am very grateful for the Minister’s response. I am somewhat disappointed by it—I do not think she will be surprised by that. It is my understanding that if Amendment 26 is carried, the Government will not oppose Amendment 27. In that case, I wish to test the opinion of the House on Amendment 26.

19:56

Division 5

Amendment 26 agreed.

Ayes: 189

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Conservative: 128
Liberal Democrat: 43
Non-affiliated: 5
Crossbench: 4
Democratic Unionist Party: 4
Ulster Unionist Party: 2
Plaid Cymru: 2
Green Party: 1

Noes: 157

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Labour: 146
Crossbench: 9
Non-affiliated: 2

20:07

Amendment 27

Moved by

[Baroness Brinton]

27: After Clause 14, insert the following new Clause—
“Duty to inform victims and families of the unduly lenient sentencing schemeAfter section 36 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, insert—“36A Duty to inform victims and families of the unduly lenient sentencing scheme(1) The Secretary of State must nominate a government department to inform victims and their families of their rights set out in section 36 (reviews of sentencing).(2) The information provided under subsection (1) must include the type of sentence and the time limit for application, and advise that applications must be made to the Attorney General.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment will ensure that victims are aware of the Unduly Lenient Sentencing scheme which presently has a strict 28-day timeframe in which to apply, there being no power to extend the time.

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

I beg to move.

Amendment 28 (to Amendment 27) not moved.

Amendment 27 agreed.

Amendments 29 and 30 not moved.