Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 23rd April 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, my honourable friend Layla Moran laid an amendment about the ending of non-disclosure agreements that prevent victims disclosing information to the police or other services, including confidential support services, ensuring that they cannot be legally enforced. She has campaigned on this issue for some considerable time. She and I both thank the Minister for the progress in Amendment 76, which is undoubtedly a step in the right direction. It certainly will help some victims access the support they need, but we on these Benches regret that this is not enough to fully give victims their voice back. We still need a complete ban on the use of non-disclosure agreements in cases of sexual misconduct, harassment and bullying to ensure that no victim is ever silenced. We will campaign on this in future but appreciate the step forward that has been made in this Bill.

I have signed Amendments 87, 88, 89 and 94 from the noble Baroness, Lady Bertin. I also thank the Minister for the meetings, his Amendment 76 and what he said in introduction—I agree with the response by the noble Baroness, Lady Bertin. The noble Baroness, Lady Morgan of Cotes, talked about third-party data requests, and again it was a privilege to be involved in those meetings. I thank her for her comments and her remaining concerns. She is absolutely right that it does not take us further forward enough.

Finally, I signed Amendment 96 from the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, on the immigration firewall. My noble friend Lady Hamwee was absolutely right: we have been here before. I was just thinking about amendments during the passage of the Illegal Migration Bill, the safety of Rwanda Bill and, I suspect, the Nationality and Borders Bill before that—yet we are not making progress. It is very unfortunate that the Government have gone backwards since the Modern Slavery Act in the protection of these particular victims. I know that across the House we will continue to push for ensuring that the loophole is closed.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, it is really a pleasure to respond to this group from these Benches, because there is real progress. It is important to record thanks to everybody who has made this progress happen. I very much welcome the clarification that the Minister has made in Amendment 76. The noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, is quite right, though, that this is a first step. Indeed, today a useful brief was sent to me and possibly other noble Lords from the Bar Council, which makes the point that the issue of non-disclosure agreements is ripe for legislative change. The Bar Council welcomes the Government’s intention to implement legislative reform and recognises that some NDAs are abusive in nature. NDAs cannot cover criminal acts, and under existing common-law protections many are already unenforceable, but those who are asked to sign them are not always aware of the relevant legal principles. When you have the Bar Council and everybody else on your side, you know that this is an important first step.

On the Government’s amendments, I welcome Amendment 85, as the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, welcomed it. I thank the Minister and his team for listening and for bringing forward this amendment, which was aired in Committee very powerfully indeed by the noble Baronesses, Lady Watkins and Lady Newlove. Then, of course, there is a suite of amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bertin. I was very pleased to be able to support these in Committee. These Benches are absolutely in favour of them; they have the support of the whole House. I know from the very long time ago when I was a Minister how much work goes into getting to this place. I congratulate the noble Baroness and say how much we are in favour of these amendments.

The noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, is absolutely right to be disappointed about the Government not accepting Amendments 87A and 88A. It is probably clear that we have not come to the end of this. The noble Baroness is quite right in nodding to say, “We have definitely not come to the end of this discussion about what needs to happen to support victims with requests for dealing with digital and other information, and providing the right kind of safeguards for them”.

The noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, is right, and she has our Benches’ support for her amendment. If there were to be a Division on this then it would be next week. Between now and then we need to look at what the Minister has said to see if we can push him a bit further than he has gone, and then maybe we could avoid that, but the noble Baroness needs to know that she has these Benches’ support, and probably that of the Liberal Democrats, if we need to take the issue further. All in all, we have made great progress.

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

I shall answer a couple of questions and make one clarification. I think it was the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, who said, “Come on now, when are the code and the protocol going to be available?” I am afraid that, at this point, I cannot advance matters further other than to say, according to my instructions, that the code will be available for parliamentary scrutiny this spring—I know that is not as precise as anyone would like—and that the protocol will be launched later this year. These matters are under the control of the Home Office, and we had a discussion earlier about the relationship between 102 Petty France and Marsham Street. That is as far as I can go at the moment, and I apologise to the noble Baroness that I cannot be more precise.

I am prepared, as always, to have a further exchange of views on Amendment 96. I am not sure we can take it much further but we are always ready to listen, since throughout the Bill we are dealing with the problem of striking a balance between effective immigration control and victim support, and unfortunately there are always trade-offs to be made.

To respond to my noble friend Lady Morgan about requests for relevant information, new Section 44A(6) requires that the request is proportionate. The authorised person must be satisfied that there is no other means of obtaining the information or, if there are such means, that they are not practicable. The decision to release the information ultimately lies with the third party, and that third party has their own obligation under the Data Protection Act and their own duties of confidentiality owed to the person concerned. Again, I respectfully suggest that, bearing in mind my noble friend Lady Bertin’s amendments, the balance between fair-trial rights and victim protection is effectively drawn in the result that we have arrived at. It is not perfect, I know, but it seems to be a practical solution to a very difficult problem.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 16th April 2024 Lords Chamber

I am mindful that, when we first managed to introduce a specific stalking law with a maximum sentence of five years just over a decade ago, two subsequent pieces of legislation have been added since to strengthen it. That has helped and enhanced it. I hope that these government amendments are the beginning of a journey. I believe that practice will show that there needs to be further strengthening. In the meantime, I am very grateful to the Government for taking these steps forward.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, there is great consensus across the House to say thank you to the Minister and his team for the steps that have taken us forward. I went through all these amendments to look at what they contained. They reminded me of the debates that we had in Committee about the things we wanted to see strengthened in the Bill. We should be pleased that we have made such progress. The Minister has done a great service to the victims’ code and compliance. I am also with my noble friend, in that it is a good start but we would like to go further. I think the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, echoed that.

We would be very pleased on these Benches to support the noble Baroness, Lady Gohir, in her amendment. I have been in the House for 26 years and have been in a similar position as a Back-Bencher on something I really cared about and thought should happen. It is possible that we may have a solution from the Liberal Democrat Benches, and that would be great, but there is always another Bill coming down the track. I can say from these Benches with some certainty that, if there is another Bill coming down the track and the noble Baroness goes for it again, we will support her. It sometimes takes a little while but, quite often, if you have an issue that you care about—I think this is a really important issue—you will get there. But perhaps the Minister will say yes to the noble Baroness —let us hope so.

The second issue is in the amendments about training, both of which are very important. We will certainly support the noble Lord, Lord Russell, in his amendment at the appropriate time, when it is dealt with. This is a very good example of how the House works best when we continue to talk to each other about all the things that we want to see happen. It is amazing how often you start a Bill and the Government Benches and the Bill team think that the Bill they have is perfect—of course they do—and should not be changed, but the iterative process of discussion and debate we go through in this House does improve legislation. This is a good example of that.

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for the sincerity with which their various points have been made. I will briefly reply to the amendments not proposed by the Government. Unfortunately, while understanding all the points that have been made, the Government are not in a position to accept the amendments as they are. Although noble Lords have been kind enough to say that this is good progress and to express their thanks, I make it absolutely clear that I work with my right honourable friend the Lord Chancellor Alex Chalk, and he is the boss, and my right honourable friend Minister Argar was responsible for this Bill in the other place. Although it is very kind of noble Lords to make compliments to me, they should please bear in mind that I am part of a wider team, supported by an excellent staff.

We are not in competition with Marsham Street—or at least, we do not see it that way—but under the present Lord Chancellor, progress on this Bill has reflected the current ethos of the Ministry of Justice. I fully welcome and support the plea from the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, for more financial resources for the Ministry of Justice; that would be wonderful. But we work with what we have and, of course, some of those constraints have provoked the Government’s inability to go quite as far as others would like.

Amendments 23 and 122, from the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, would place the victims’ code in a schedule to the Bill and make related changes. I hope I have reassured her on our strengthened approach, and that compliance with the code is not optional. It may have been seen as optional in the past, but this is quite a change. As an alternative to Amendment 32, which would promote enforcement through the courts, we have a different non-compliance notification process which I hope will be equally effective. We are very reluctant as a Government to go down a court-based route because that can take up more resources and be less effective and more counter-productive than other routes.

We are very much in favour of the other routes that we have developed, I hope comprehensively, in the Bill, including the need to have clear compliance procedures, bolstering the accountability framework to make sure that there is appropriate recourse and, in particular, relying heavily on the independent scrutiny of the Victims’ Commissioner. So those various mechanisms collectively should give us a good framework; let us give them a good try and see, as noble Lords have suggested. At some point we may need to go further, but this is a good start, is it not? That question is rhetorical, so noble Lords do not have to answer.

Amendments 24, 26, 27, 29 and 30 concern consulting the Victims’ Commissioner. We have effectively covered the same ground in the Government’s amendments, and I do not think I need say any more about that. We have not gone down the route of putting all this through the affirmative procedure. I am not entirely persuaded that the affirmative procedure is as good as it might be, in that you can only say yes or no, et cetera. But the procedures we have for bringing the code into force, reviewing it, issuing it and consulting on it are all good and should work quite well. I hope that, in the light of that, there is no need to pursue those amendments.

Similarly, Amendments 55, 68 and 69—the latter being one of the amendments proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool—concern consulting various commissioners and “by and for” services on the duty to collaborate. I am very grateful to all the commissioners who have collaborated with us on developing these measures. We will publish draft guidance on this part of the Bill, but the Government’s position is that the overall framework we have for consultation and publishing guidance is already sufficient and appropriate.

Of course, the department will continue to engage with all national commissioners. I am particularly grateful for the support of the Victims’ Commissioner. I mentioned earlier the Children’s Commissioner, and I work very closely with the Domestic Abuse Commissioner. They are all making a very significant contribution to a better system. Of course, we will continue to engage with a whole range of providers, including the “by and for” organisations. It is very much in the Government’s interests to consult and engage as widely as possible, so there is no reason not to.

Amendments 46 and 47 would require code compliance data to be shared with the Victims’ Commissioner. We have put forward a number of amendments to make the central role of the Victims’ Commissioner clear. I hope these are sufficient to place the Victims’ Commissioner at the heart and centre of the system, remembering that they already have existing and separate powers to issue reports and recommendations, and, under this Bill, the agencies have to respond to them.

This brings me to the important subject of code training in Amendments 34 and 58 from the noble Lord, Lord Russell. He is rightly concerned about this and has emphasised it throughout. I do not at all hide behind this fact, but if you believe in devolution—and we have 43 different police forces, different local authorities and 43 police and crime commissioners—you have to accept a certain degree of difference in the way those authorities operate. That is inherent in any devolved system. None the less, it is of fundamental importance that front-line staff are adequately trained to support victims of all crimes. That is why I can and do commit to using the statutory guidance to be issued under Clause 11 to set a clear expectation that agencies should have adequate training on the code so that staff know what the code is, can inform victims of their entitlements under it and do their job in a way that complies with it.

The Government are of the view that legislation is not the right place for such matters, given the level of operational detail required and the diverse requirements of the various organisations delivering the code. However, we appreciate that there needs to be a mechanism to ensure that training not only exists but is effective. I believe we can achieve the right balance by committing to prescribing in the regulations that bodies must collect and share information on the training they have in place to ensure that the code is delivered effectively as part of the delivery assessments within the compliance framework.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 12th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 155 in this group. The principles behind and the purposes of the amendments we have been discussing have already been well forked over, so I will cut straight to the chase.

I have intervened in Committee only on one other group of amendments, a few weeks ago on restorative justice. I link the two because they offer the opportunity to break cycles of offending and to give the individuals involved a chance of hope, to avoid the hopelessness that my noble and learned friend the Minister said was so pernicious when he was summing up the first group of amendments; the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, also said it when contributing to a later group. Nowhere can this be more important than when dealing with young offenders. As the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, said, the individuals who make up the group covered by these amendments are unlikely, at the time of their initial sentence, to have a great deal of emotional maturity or self-discipline. They are children, as she pointed out. This is unsurprising, given the likelihood of their background and their life chances prior to their sentence. One hopes that the framework provided by the prison regime for young offenders will accelerate that emotional and other development, paving the way for a return to society.

I endorse the remarks of my noble friend Lord Attlee and the noble Baroness that this is not seen as a soft option. We have to make sure that the public are properly protected—otherwise, respect for and confidence in our judicial and penal system are undermined.

This group is going to undergo a further shock. At a meeting of the All-Party Group on prisons, we had evidence from young people—25 year-olds, really—about what it was like to move from a young offender institution to full prison life. The evidence was pretty startling. The guy said that life in a young offender institution was no bed of roses, but when you got into prison it was a whole different world—quite shocking. Clearly, he was very shocked by it. Indeed, Recommendation 24 of the Justice and Home Affairs Committee report addresses the issue of how you transition and what it means to the people who are so caught up in it. He went on to say that, for some people, it hardened them into a life where they would be persistent offenders but, for some others, it was a wake-up call. They saw that it was a chance, if they managed to get their act together, and were encouraged, to be able to break out—and part of that was seeing some light at the end of the tunnel. This is one of the issues that is very important in these amendments: it is about light at the end of the tunnel, and people being able to see that something can happen to them.

I shall end with a different example that is completely outside the matters that we have been discussing but which might give a sense of what it feels like to be given an IPP sentence. My father’s best friend was captured at Dunkirk in June 1940. He was 24 years old, and he was in a prisoner of war camp until May 1945, when the war came to an end—first in Germany, then in Poland. He went in at 24 and came out at nearly 30. He did not talk about it much, but I remember when I was about 20 him being prepared to talk about what the experience was like. So much of it was like having an IPP sentence.

It began with a sense of shame: had you done enough? Should you have gone on to the bitter end and had you, by surrendering, let your country down? But that died away. Then it was about hardship, which was quite great in the first winter of the war, 1940-41, until Red Cross parcels and parcels from home began to arrive. But my father’s friend said that none of that in any way matched up to the appalling sense of hopelessness —that month after month and year after year ticked by, and you could feel your life running through your fingers.

My father’s friend could articulate that, but I suspect that that is what quite a lot of the IPP individuals are feeling, to some extent, even if they are not able to put it clearly into words. They are the ones for whom I hope we can find ways to help, so that they get that sense of hope. In the prisoner of war camp—they put it rather more roughly in those days—a lot of people behaved rather oddly. What they were saying, of course, was that they were under extreme mental stress. There were no drugs, of course, because they were not available in those days, but the stress of persistent confinement in very crowded conditions undoubtedly had a huge effect on a number of people in a prisoner of war camp.

That is why we need opportunities for reviews of individual cases to take place as often as is consonant with public safety. That is why I support this group of amendments and why I put my name to Amendment 155 in particular.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very struck by the words of the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, about light at the end of the tunnel. That is what this suite of amendments is about for a cohort of young people who, at the moment, will not be seeing a light at the end of that tunnel. I thank my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti for speaking with such clarity about what these amendments are about, and other noble Lords who have described what this must feel like for a young person and pointed, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope, did, to some of the remedies that these three amendments offer to the Minister and the Government. I hope that they take them up and carry them through.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Bellamy) (Con)]

My Lords, I again thank noble Lords for all the points made on this part of the Bill. I shall take it first in the general and then the particular. In the general, these amendments quite rightly put on the radar, the horizon and public consciousness the importance of dealing with prisoners who received their sentence when they were still under the age of 18. This is already a very important function that these amendments have performed. As for the question of the light at the end of the tunnel, I share the thoughts of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, that the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, were very pertinent as to what it feels like to be incarcerated in the dramatic circumstances that he related.

It is the Government’s view that these prisoners, among others, need to have light at the end of the tunnel. This is the whole purpose and thrust of the Government’s approach. In practical terms, as I understand it we have 32 prisoners in this position who have not been released, another 48 who have been recalled, and a hundred or so out in the community. These figures may not be exactly right; they are not quite the same as those given by the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, although they are approximately the same. For the recalled cohort and for those in the community, the reduction in the licence period from 10 years to three will be significant and very much benefit those serving this DPP sentence. Against this background, the Government are not quite persuaded that these amendments would achieve our joint objective of providing this light at the end of the tunnel.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

I am grateful to all noble Lords in the Committee. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, not least for giving us an opportunity to thank, once more, the Prison Reform Trust, and I would add the Howard League for Penal Reform and UNGRIPP, in particular, who are the family members of these desperate people in many cases. I thank her for pointing out this issue of the window of opportunity for rehabilitation and seeing another possible way of life.

Hope springs eternal, and therefore we are particularly lucky to have “hope” in the form of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, who is so active in this Committee. Every point he made was quite hard, if I may say so, to resist. But my man of the match, I am afraid, was, none the less the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbots, because I feel that one of the reasons that we have not had a serious penal reform campaign in this country, possibly since the Victorian period, is because we have lost empathy for the prisoner. We have locked them away—out of sight, out of mind. They do not vote, et cetera: all these things that will set the alarm bells ringing at the Daily Mail, if anybody is up there. We have lost empathy for these people. They are not human anymore; they are prisoners; but in this group of amendments at least, we are talking about people who were children when they were given this sentence, and the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbots, had sufficient empathy to compare “criminals” with his late father’s friend and a war hero is the kind of empathy that I rarely hear about any demonised group in our society, whether it is convicted people, refugees and asylum seekers or anyone else who is, for the moment, in a demonised category. I am grateful to the noble Lord for what he said.

I am grateful, of course, to my noble friend Lady Thornton for the support of the Labour Front Bench. She of course was an Equality Minister in the not-too-distant past, and I hope that she will be one in the not-too-distant future, shortly, or in due course, or whatever these other phrases are that are occasionally—

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

We are not complacent.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

We are never complacent, but always with hope.

Finally, in that regard, I noted that the noble and learned Lord the Minister said, “not quite persuaded”. In that “quite”, in that little space, I will keep hope. I was here to keep my noble friend’s hope alive in his absence, because these amendments were particularly important to him.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 31st January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

From these Benches, I will be extremely brief, because I agree with everything that has been said. I signed Amendments 27 and 29 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I absolutely support the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, which my noble friend Lady Hamwee has also signed. We cannot have commissioners who are commissioners in name only. They need clear roles, responsibilities and powers, and clear limits to those powers. The problem at the moment is that they do not, so we support the amendments.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, said it right when she said that it is time to give the Victims’ Commissioner the statutory place and rights that are appropriate. That is exactly the point of this suite of amendments. They aim to do two things. One is to give the Victims’ Commissioner the right status to be able to get the right information and have the right relationships to make them most effective, but it is also placing duties on other organisations to co-operate with the Victims’ Commissioner. That is what this suite of amendments is about. That means that they are very important. They also reflect the powers that other commissioners have in this space.

We have a group of amendments which give the Victims’ Commissioner a statutory duty to review the operation of the victims’ code, placing a statutory duty on the Secretary of State to consult the commissioner when making any changes to the victims’ code or issuing any statutory guidance relating to it. The amendment refers to the duty of the Secretary of State to consider any representations in relation to the drafting of the victims’ code in consultation with the Attorney-General. Again, I thought, “Why do you have to say that?” But, actually, I think we have to.

Amendments 27 and 29 alter the procedure for amending the victims’ code to require formal consultation with the Commissioner for Victims and Witnesses—I did not think that was necessary either, but if we need to say that, then we do—and affirmative parliamentary procedures.

Amendment 28 refers to

“the duty on the Secretary of State to consult the Attorney General on any revisions”.

Amendment 35 refers to

“the Secretary of State’s duty to issue regulations on the information to be collected by PCCs at a local level”.

Amendment 43 also places a duty on the Secretary of State to

“issue regulations on the timing and format of the information”.

This is about relationships that the Victims’ Commissioner needs to have to do their job effectively—with the Attorney-General, with PCCs, with the agencies with which the commissioner has to work.

My amendment—again, you would not think it would be necessary, but it clearly is—states that there is a specific public authority duty

“to co-operate with the Commissioner in any way that the Commissioner considers necessary for the purposes of monitoring compliance with the victims’ code”.

If we do not give the Victims’ Commissioner the power to ensure that the code is being complied with, we are not taking victims seriously. If we do not do that, we do not place the right kind of duties on the Secretary of State. We also need to make sure that the way the Victims’ Commissioner works is joined up with all the different agencies that she—it has always been “she” so far—needs to have.

We are very keen on this group of amendments because it does those two things: it gives the Victims’ Commissioner power, and it places a duty on different parts of the state to provide, as the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, said, formal parts of criminal justice infrastructure. This a powerful suite of amendments that I hope the Minister will agree to, and certainly will discuss with us as we move forward.

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

I am very grateful, once again, to all noble Lords who have spoken to this group of amendments, which is related to the previous group. I am very sorry if the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I have managed to fall out over what is actually a legal discussion. Maybe we can pursue some of the points that were made in the previous group further, so that we understand each other and where those who support those amendments are coming from.

As far as this group of amendments is concerned, I will take first the amendment that would place a specific duty on specified public authorities to co-operate with the Victims’ Commissioner. I do not think anyone is in any doubt—and certainly the Government are not—that the Victims’ Commissioner plays a most important role that requires collaboration across the criminal justice system and the support sector. We recognise that there is other legislation affecting the domestic abuse commissioner which gives them the kind of powers that I think are partly, at least, being sought under this amendment.

I cannot at this moment accept the amendment, as I am sure noble Lords completely understand. But I am very much open to working with the Victims’ Commissioner and the House on whether there is any common ground on this approach, which would help us build up the bricks we are looking to build up to create the building that will enable this whole system to be more effective.

As regards the amendments to require the Secretary of State to consult the Victims’ Commissioner, I first make an extremely nerdy point, just for clarification. Clause 3(3) states:

“In preparing the draft the Secretary of State must consult the Attorney General”.


That is probably a bit confusing at the outset, but what is essentially being said is that the Secretary of State must consult relevant Ministers responsible for the bodies to which the draft is to apply: the Lord Chancellor, the Home Secretary—both of whom are englobed in the phrase “Secretary of State”—and the Attorney-General, who is responsible for the Crown Prosecution Service and similar justice bodies. It is a sort of ministerial consultation.

As to the question of consulting the Victims’ Commissioner on the code, further amendments to the code and so forth, I cannot imagine any circumstances in which the commissioner would not be consulted on all these matters. We have not set out in the Bill all the stakeholders that should be consulted but I would very much like to continue to work with the Victims’ Commissioner on this issue and how we continue to recognise that vital role. Again, may we take this amendment under advisement and see how far we can go?

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 31st January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

My Lords, this is the first group of amendments which really gets into victims’ rights—not just what is expressed in the victims’ code, but ensuring that they can access it. The noble Baroness, Lady Gohir, started the group with the important issue of a victim’s right to challenge decisions, including but not only relating to multiple perpetrators. I thank her for that, because that and some of the cultural issues she raised are important in ensuring that victims’ services are tailored to victims’ needs and are not a tick-box exercise.

I thank Restorative Justice for All for its briefing, and all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. I will not repeat it all, but we know that restorative justice is a well-established and evidence-based alternative that certainly does not let offenders off the hook; it is as difficult for offenders as it often is for the victims. Restorative Justice for All wrote to us because it is concerned about how long it has been since issues about the right to restorative justice were addressed. It goes back to an EU directive of 2012, yet there is still no absolute right available. That needs to be remedied.

Unfortunately, under this Bill there is no obligation for criminal justice agencies to inform harmed parties about restorative justice systems. When we come to later amendments, we will be fighting hard to ensure that that does become a requirement, because victims deserve no less. The other part of this group also talks about signposting of services. I am grateful to the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harris of Pentregarth, who believes that the perpetrators need restorative justice as much. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester said that being told there is a code is a start, but much more is needed. I suspect that the Minister will try to say that having such a system would be expensive. However, we know that not having the alternative is even more expensive not just in terms of the consequences for victims’ lives, but for the criminal justice system, parole and stopping recidivism. Without restorative justice, all those costs will continue to pile on.

I do hope that the Minister will bring us some good news. I gently remind him that in the costings for this Bill we were reminded that Part 4, on prisoners, will cost around £0.5 billion, but only a very token amount is allocated for victims’ services. Perhaps that balance is not yet quite right.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, as I often do, that we are now digging into how this legislation can be improved for victims. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Gohir, on raising the issue of the gap in proceedings whereby, if there are multiple perpetrators, some of whom are not charged and some of whom are, the victim does not have the right to challenge why people are not being charged. That clearly needs to be remedied, and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s suggestion.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

I suppose it is like our written notes: sometimes we have them, sometimes we do not and sometimes we do not follow them.

We have heard that Minister Freer is looking at how audio recordings can be used. I wonder whether there is any more news on this than has been in the semi-public domain so far. The suggestion of listening to a recording or reading a transcript while supervised reminds me of the arrangements made for a very few senior politicians to read the assessments of the Chilcot inquiry. To me, like to others, that is not a sensible arrangement.

In any event, as I understand it, in magistrates’ courts recordings are not made. For a victim to have to sit in court and listen it is very likely that she or he will be close to the family and friends of the defendant. As my noble friend Lady Brinton said, it is a matter of open justice. This debate confirms that the adversarial system treats the victim as little more than a witness.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions. I appreciate that this places the Minister in a somewhat interesting situation; yet again, he finds that the Committee is united on this issue, as I think we are.

As when I last spoke a few minutes ago, when I first read this amendment, I thought, “Oh, for goodness’ sake”. What is the problem with people having access to the transcripts of the case that affects them as victims? As this debate has proceeded, and I have learned more about the barriers and what happens to people—supervised listening and people discouraged from going into court to listen to proceedings—I feel even more that this is an important matter which would enormously strengthen our victims’ code and the way victims are treated.

Let us think about how every single word that is said in public in this place is available to watch, and re-watch if you really want to, and to read—the committee transcripts may take a little while to be published, but they are there—and how important that is for our proceedings and for us to be able to do our job so much better. It is not a difficult thing to do given technology today; it is not difficult for those things to happen in this place. Think how much more important that would be for somebody who was the victim of crime.

In many ways, access to information about the proceedings that affect them is symbolic of victims’ rights. I accept that child victims would need to be considered because, apart from anything else, we would not want a child to be able to be identified through transcripts of their proceedings, but it is not beyond our wit to sort that out. A pilot is good, but there is a matter of principle here that the Government will need to address.

[Lord Winston (Lab)]

My Lords, as my name has just been mentioned in this short debate, I will make a quick interjection and give the example of medical treatment of patients. It is extremely common to have a detailed conversation with a patient who has listened and apparently understood exactly what has been said, but then you find that they have understood nothing at all and are later really confused about their treatment.

Perhaps I may tell a very short story. I once had an extremely well-off woman who was totally infertile; she had no chance of a pregnancy. I spent an hour and a half talking to her explaining why this was the case and that there was no possibility of her being pregnant. However, 18 months later, she came into my clinic— she had flown in from another country—and said, “Dr Winston, I am pleased to tell you that, as you predicted, I am now pregnant”, and she was. I was a complete fool; I was wrong. It is really important to understand that, because this is a situation that happens quite often, and it is significant in terms of a court when you are very anxious.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 24th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, it is an honour to be participating in the discussions on this important Bill. We have got off to a great start today—albeit a little later than we were expecting. I say from the outset that my noble friend Lord Ponsonby and I are very keen to work with colleagues from all parts of the House, and the Minister and the Bill team, to ensure that we end up with the best possible Bill and the best possible future of support and attention for victims in our criminal justice system, as eloquently expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove.

The amendments already show that commitment. I am thankful for the briefing that we have received from many directions, including from the victims’ commissioners of both the UK and London, the Children’s Commissioner and many other organisations, whose help and support will be important for our deliberations over the days and possibly weeks to come.

I will speak to all the amendments in this group, with particular reference to Amendment 4, to which I have added my name, and Amendments 12 and 19, to which my noble friend has added his name. These amendments address what should be included in the definition of “victim” in the Bill in Clause 1. In this debate, we are testing whether that definition is inclusive enough to cover the range of people who find themselves victims.

In Amendment 1, the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, seeks to include people who support witnesses or victims of the most serious crimes. She explained—with great clarity—what that would mean and how that would work. Amendment 2 recognises that being a victim abroad means you are a victim and recognises the distress that that experience brings. It was movingly described by the noble Baronesses, Lady Newlove and Lady Finlay.

Amendment 3 very interestingly probes the width of the definition, as exposed by the discussion and the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones. Amendment 4 addresses the issue of anti-social behaviour victims, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Russell. I thank both him and the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, for the way that they have talked about this. I added my name to this amendment because, although the Bill seeks to introduce measures to help victims, we have to have confidence that the right support is available and that, if they report a crime, the criminal justice system will treat them in the way they should rightly expect.

However, this Bill misses the opportunity to extend the right to access support to victims of persistent and anti-social behaviour in cases where the police choose not to take action. We can have a discussion about why the police may or may not choose to take action, but it seems to me that our duty to put into the Bill a way in which to recognise that these people are victims and that they need support in the victims’ code. This Bill presents us with the opportunity to recognise the victims of persistent anti-social behaviour and to set out their entitlement in the victims’ code.

This is an important matter. While it is possible that this amendment may not be the right way to do it, we need to do what the noble Lord, Lord Russell, has suggested, and work out with the Bill team and the Minister how we can do that in a way that recognises the very serious issues. I was very struck by both the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, and by the comprehensive brief that her office provided for us about this matter. For example, in one case study, 280 incidents of anti-social behaviour were reported over 10 months, including noise, nuisance, anonymous harassment, threats and intimidation—incidents that culminated in a firebomb attack on victims’ property. The continued impact of anti-social behaviour resulted in one victim attempting suicide on two occasions, and victims eventually having to move house due to the trauma that they were experiencing. These are victims and we need to work out how we can best recognise and support them in that.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 18th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Ponsonby and I have not mixed up the order in which we are speaking, even if the speakers’ list has. I thank the Minister for introducing the Bill today with such clarity. That greatly helps the House. I also thank the many organisations that have sent briefings, particularly the Library. I look forward to the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Carter.

The level of interest in this Bill suggests that there is no doubt that many people recognise the importance of the Bill and the opportunity it presents. I will focus on victims. Notwithstanding the words of the Minister, as with many matters associated with this Government, we are worried that the lack of grasping the opportunity that the Bill presents is the challenge we face and why so many organisations are so interested and want to make recommendations about how it might be improved. I think we would all agree that the challenge for this Bill is to redress a terrible and historic imbalance. In an adversarial system in which the state investigates and prosecutes the defendant, the judge ensures that he or she has a fair trial and the jury decides their guilt, it is easy for all the agencies to look in the defendant’s direction while the victim, even if a witness, comes and goes as what the academic Professor Paul Rock has called fodder for the system.

It may not be what anyone intends, but it is what happens—and worse, victims’ experience may be callous, careless and deeply scarring. We are currently failing victims, as I think we all agree, and they in turn may increasingly be abandoning the criminal justice system. So this is our long-awaited chance to bring about change.

The recent Victims’ Commissioner, the right honourable Dame Vera Baird KC, summed it up very well in her submission to the victims Bill’s consultation process in June last year, when she said:

“We emphasise that a profound cultural change will be needed from the criminal justice agencies to achieve the expectations and the Government’s aims”.


We can put this right if we focus on what victims have told us they want as a minimum, and ensure that it is delivered and can be done without impacting in the slightest on the fair trial rights of the defendant. So, despite the positive words of the Minister and after all the years waiting for this moment, we think the final product needs to be better than this, and it is our job to make it so. This was in the Conservative manifesto in 2015, so we know that we have been a long time waiting.

We need to improve support for victims who are leaving the justice system through its lack of regard for them and endless delay. People cannot move on with their lives while locked into the 65,000-long case backlog in the Crown Court—a backlog higher than at the end of the pandemic. The latest survey from the Office of the Victims’ Commissioner is a disheartening read—71% of victims were dissatisfied with the police response to their crime and only 28% believed it had been taken seriously. A tiny 6% agreed that victims were fully supported by the Crown Prosecution Service and only 8% that they were fully supported by the courts. Even more worrying, a full third—34%—of victims said they would not even report a crime to the police after their previous experience

The thing is that victims are not asking for much. Like all of us, they want a competent, speedy justice system. Vital to them are the delivery of simple procedural justice; being given a voice about what happened to them; and sensitivity to their interests and needs. Victims’ needs and interests are well-identified in the victims’ code of practice, which sets out the minimum standards of service required from criminal justice agencies and was introduced by the Labour Government in the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act of 2004. The code has been updated since then; the problem is that it is simply not implemented.

There are plenty of instances we will all hear about in this debate of where things have gone wrong and victims have found themselves put into terrible positions, both before and in our courts. The Office of the Victims’ Commissioner’s most recent survey shows that only 29% of victims had ever heard of the victims’ code, despite their journey through the very agencies required to deliver on it—that is an identical figure to the one in 2021.

We agree with the Justice Select Committee that, while putting the code on a statutory basis, which the Bill does, is important, it will not, of itself, make it effective. That PCCs will have to collect data on compliance is welcome, although accurate compatible data has proved difficult to find and PCCs have no means to enforce collaboration. If we give somebody a right, in this case the victims, we must give them a means of enforcing it and a remedy for its breach. Local victims’ champions in PCC offices might play a key role in prioritising the right in the currency of the case and dealing with complaints in default. The Government frequently say that they are increasing sentences of one kind or another to put victims at the heart of the criminal justice system, but these simple rights will not actually help the victims if the victims’ code is not enacted.

This is what the Justice Select Committee said:

“The Government has committed to enshrining the rights of victims in law. We find that the draft Bill does not appear to do any more to achieve this than is already provided for in existing legislation. The draft Bill includes overarching principles that are weaker than those consulted on and which, as currently drafted, will do little to improve agencies’ compliance with the victims’ code”.


So one of our main jobs is to ensure enactment and implementation of the victims’ code.

There are other issues that we will look for and raise during the course of the Bill’s passage which we hope will strengthen it. We want to look at free legal advocates for rape victims—a statutory right to free legal representation for the protection of the rights of rape victims. Protection for third-party material of rape complainants is proposed. That would mirror the PCSC Act for the contents of phones.

We need to test excluding pre-trial therapy notes being used in a sex case at all unless a judge, after a fully contested application, agrees to their relevance. It is a major deterrent to women taking a case forward when they are told that what they have said to their therapist may have to be revealed. The Minister is aware of this matter. I think we will have some useful discussions in Committee about that.

We wish to include victims of anti-social behaviour in the definition of “victims”. We want to consider the commissioning of specialist women’s community-based domestic abuse and sexual violence support services. We agree with Barnardo’s and the NSPCC about putting children at the heart of our considerations, particularly on the inclusion of child criminal exploitation and supporting children throughout any of these proceedings.

We think it is important to enshrine a duty to co-operate with the Commissioner for Victims and Witnesses. We want that to be included in the Bill.

Finally, there is the issue of migrant domestic abuse victims with no recourse to public funds and without a firewall against immigration controls. They are entitled to criminal justice support if they are victims and should not be treated as suspects; that seems an important matter of injustice that we have to address.

I very much look forward to working with my noble friend Lord Ponsonby on this important Bill, with the Minister and other noble Lords, and I very much look forward to the rest of today’s debate.

Joint Enterprise: Young Black Men

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Thursday 19th October 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, to the best of my knowledge, most of the recommendations in the Lammy report have been taken well to heart by all concerned. We are discussing here charging decisions, which are a matter for the CPS. As I have explained, the CPS is taking this very seriously, with the University of Leeds advisory groups. On the pilot concerned, there are two aspects of scrutiny. There is a scrutiny panel, which met quite recently and will meet again in February. All these actions are being taken as part of the wider attempt to get to the bottom of why we have such a high proportion of persons from ethnic minorities in the criminal justice system.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, I read the report from 29 September. It would appear, even with the small sample the Minister referred to, that young black men are overrepresented. That is a cause for concern. Will the Law Commission be reporting on the merits of reforming joint enterprise law as a priority before the end of next year? Will the Government be acting promptly to introduce necessary legislation?

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, as far as I am aware, the Law Commission is looking at the question of reforming the law on appeal. I am not so sure—I stand to be corrected—that it is looking into joint enterprise law, the boundaries of which are for the judiciary. It is an essential part of our criminal law to have a joint enterprise doctrine. The question is: where are the edges to the doctrine?

Rape: Prosecutions and Support

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

A legal aid solicitor ought to be able to challenge unreasonable demands by the police under the existing regime. However, I refer this House to Operation Soteria, which is directed to the very point that the noble Baroness makes about the focus on the victim rather than the suspect. It started as a pilot with Avon and Somerset Police, is gradually being rolled out nationally to 19 police forces, and should turn the approach around so that it focuses on the suspect, not the victim.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, many noble Lords have mentioned victims. When might we find the long- promised victims Bill coming forward? What is the Minister’s view on the Labour Party’s policy to make violence against women and girls a serious crime in legislation?

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

The Government hope to bring forward the victims Bill as soon as possible but have no present plans to change the legislation on violence against women or, indeed, anybody else.

Humanist Marriages

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, I am happy to meet the noble Baroness, but I doubt whether I shall be able to give her the assurance that she asks for. This is a quite difficult problem. We have to solve it across the board without discrimination either in favour of or against any faith group or non-faith group. We have to deal with the civil preliminaries for marriage, who is to be authorised, what is the regime for authorisation and, in particular, the problems raised by the All-Party Parliamentary Humanist Group itself in relation to the Law Commission’s report.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, why is it that Scotland and Wales have managed to have humanist weddings in their law? If I sound frustrated it is because I was part of the move in which, with enormous cross-party support, this House agreed an amendment to the equal marriage Bill which would allow humanist weddings. That has not been implemented by successive Conservative Governments. There must be a reason why that is the case, because it is not complicated or discriminatory. It is actually very straightforward. If and when my son wants to get married and wants a humanist wedding, he has to go to Scotland or Wales. That seems very unfair indeed.

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, the Law Commission recommended reform. That has already taken place in other jurisdictions. We are working on exactly how the reform should take place in this country as fast as we can.