Sentencing Bill

Debate between Baroness Neville-Rolfe and Viscount Hailsham

Committee stage
Monday 1st December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendment proposed by my noble friend Lord Jackson of Peterborough in general terms. In particular, I believe that we must assess the effectiveness of measures introduced—and, if they are not effective, we need to go back to the drawing board.

I also wish to speak to my Amendment 93B, which seeks to ensure participation by prison inmates in education and training or “other purposeful activity”. That was not my original description, although I find that the awful word “purposeful” was first used in 1598—but it also had a secondary meaning of “determined” or “resolute”, which makes me feel a lot better.

I have tabled this amendment because I am concerned about the state of education in prisons, both now and going forward. My wording is far from perfect, since to keep it in scope of this narrow Bill, it can apply only to custodial sentences from the day on which the Bill comes into force as an Act, whereas the problem is endemic across the prison estate. The amendment would provide for an annual review of progress, and the implementing regulations bringing it in would be subject to affirmative resolution, to make the amendment more palatable to the Minister and his officials.

As a fellow former retailer, I admire the Minister, his distinguished father and Timpson the company, the repair chain that they run, and their brilliant work on rehabilitation of offenders. However, I was sorry to hear that their workshop in Wandsworth Prison has not reopened. The truth is that the success of these and parallel efforts by other companies to get ex-convicts into long-term work requires offenders to be appropriately trained while inside.

The Government are hoping that the measures they are taking to free up prisons, some of which are hard for people to stomach, will provide more time and resource to supervise education, skills training and purposeful activity. However, on 15 October, Charlie Taylor, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, wrote a blog about the problems in adult prisons. He had been contacted by despairing governors and heads of education about the cuts in provision they are facing under new prison education contracts. The Prison Service has told him there will be an average reduction of some 25% of provision, but some prison leaders say they are losing as much as 60%. As he refers to, there are powerful reasons why we should

“ensure that an inmate does not spend day after day in blank inactivity”.

Why is there so little acknowledgement of the role of reduced reoffending as part of our goal of shrinking the prison population?

As few as 31% of prisoners are still employed six months after leaving prison. This is not surprising when 20 out of 38 prisons inspected in the last reporting year were rated poor or not sufficiently good for purposeful activity. It takes weeks to get prisoners into work and attendance at training courses is often shockingly low. The working day is short, often as little as five hours, particularly on Fridays, yet prisoners need to get into the job habit for their future success.

Another problem is the low literacy levels of many prisoners and, I suspect, poor English in many cases. We had a similar challenge at Tesco and, with the support of the trade unions, we arranged education that helped to keep employees in the firm, grateful for the lessons and the extra opportunities they opened up. With the widening of employment rights, it becomes even more important to use the many months that many spend in prison for remedial education and skills training, so that employers can take them on with confidence, without the fear of a long drawn-out industrial tribunal if they do not perform.

I know only too well that prisoners differ. There are career criminals who are very clever, entrepreneurial and risk-taking. They might have been captains of industry with a different background or ethical compass. They need something different and to be kept separate, but they need to be fully occupied so that they are not continuing their evil operations from inside prison. From time to time, some go straight, especially if they are inspired to change—for example, by taking a degree.

As the average sentence of those actually in prison becomes longer, the need for opportunities and for better education of the prison population becomes ever greater. Incentive schemes, early release and management of privileges are important. I hope that the Minister, in replying, will explain how the new sentencing laws can help with prison education by improving the incentive structure.

However, I believe that a more radical approach may be needed and that we should oblige prisoners who are still subject to custodial sentences to enter education, training, et cetera, as part of the prison regime, as is done in the military. Just providing adequate access to education, although important, is not enough. I have seen the failure of voluntary training in the Civil Service: the good and hard-working opt for the training and improve; those who really need it do not.

So I am looking for mandatory education or training for those who remain in prison after the Government’s reforms, all of whom will, in practice, be sentenced to 18 months or more. They will be serious criminals and badly in need of focused rehabilitation. That is why, to pick up a theme from discussion on day one, which I was sadly absent for, we cannot have a voluntary regime in prisons.

Our jails cost a fortune, and prisoners are bored, demotivated and wasting time as they serve their years. Education and the acquisition of skills, or helping out in the kitchens and gardens, can be transformational.

[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

I agree with almost everything my noble friend has said. I have been on a prisons monitoring board, so I am very familiar with the inside of prison. But it troubles me that, if there is a requirement that the prisoner, as part of his sentence, does A or B, but the prison does not provide the facility, is the prisoner not then in breach of the sentence and is that not going to be a problem when he seeks to get release or goes to a parole board?

Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill

Debate between Baroness Neville-Rolfe and Viscount Hailsham

Committee stage
Tuesday 28th February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

We can confirm that it is authoritative. The version that will come out in the spring—the next version—will be authoritative. The comprehensiveness of it will come when the archives have finished their process and so on. A lot has been made of this point, frankly. The key regulations are on the dashboard; for me, the key thing that matters is what departments do with them.

[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

Can my noble friend confirm that there will be consultation?

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

If we have new regulations then the normal form in departments is to consult on them.

[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

Will they have time within the deadline?

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

The Bill sunsets in 2023.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

It is the gentlemen and ladies in Whitehall and in the European Commission. If I may, rather than prolong this discussion, I will reflect on the point that the noble Lord has made.

[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

The noble Baroness could say that the Government will support Amendment 32, which would enable Parliament to have a word in the matter.

[Lord Wilson of Dinton (CB)]

I have listened to this debate and some important points are still left in the air. I may be slow, but there is an awful lot that I still do not understand, which needs to be resolved. Would it not be better—I have said this before—for the Bill to be withdrawn and for the Government to do the work and then come back and tell us what they want to keep, abolish and amend? If they cannot withdraw the Bill, put it on ice. We have a good precedent for putting Bills on ice. Why do the Government not do the work, rather than trying to grapple with questions that are almost unanswerable?

Ministerial Appointments: Vetting and Managing Conflicts of Interest

Debate between Baroness Neville-Rolfe and Viscount Hailsham

Tuesday 24th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Cabinet Office (Baroness Neville- Rolfe) (Con)]

My Lords, there are established procedures for the appointment of Ministers, and by Ministers, and these are followed. This was the purport of the question we are replying to, and we need to allow the process to run its course. As the noble Baroness suggests, the Prime Minister has appointed Sir Laurie Magnus, who is the independent adviser on Ministers’ interests. As I said when I answered questions last year, the Prime Minister was then moving quickly to appoint the independent adviser. The terms of reference will give the independent adviser the opportunity to look into what he thinks needs to be looked into—having a look at the issues that have been raised and speculated on—and we have made clear that anyone in the Government should help the independent adviser with that process. On the point about the texts, the Information Commissioner has looked at that. He concluded his investigation on 18 January this year—so, last week—and he did not require any steps to be taken. He considered that BEIS had conducted sufficient searches for the relevant information.

[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

My Lords, may I suggest to my noble friend that any public concern about ministerial interests will be greatly alleviated if the independent adviser could, of his own initiative, institute investigations?

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

The independent adviser, as my noble friend suggests, is appointed by the Prime Minister and it his constitutional position to be the ultimate arbiter of the Ministerial Code, and to decide whether a breach of the code has occurred upon the advice of the independent adviser. So it makes sense for the Prime Minister to be the ultimate decision-maker, but, of course, we have appointed Sir Laurie Magnus to take on this role and to look extremely carefully at the issues that have arisen and been reported on this week.

Tax Avoidance

Debate between Baroness Neville-Rolfe and Viscount Hailsham

Wednesday 18th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

I really do not see things that way at all. Actually, the UK tax gap is one of the lowest in the world. We are investing in work on avoidance and evasion, with an extra £800 million for HMRC, while the work we have done to bring in accelerated payments has yielded £3 billion in extra tax since 2014. The noble Lord talks about tax havens. I think the Prime Minister made it quite clear yesterday that Britain wants a new partnership with the EU and is hoping that we will get a good deal. The point about tax havens was the need to change the economic model if that was not possible. I am hopeful that, with that new agenda she set out, we will get a very positive agreement in this area.

[Viscount Hailsham (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend understand the concern of many of those who have to advise on statute law? Does she understand that it is undesirable to give to the courts a power to strike down an arrangement which complies with the letter of the law on the grounds that it does not comply with the spirit of it? The trouble with that is that it produces unpredictability and therefore injustice. Better by far, if Parliament is unhappy with the interpretation of law, to amend the primary legislation.