Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Tuesday 6th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Rory Stewart]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend and others for the very active campaign that they are leading. I would of course be delighted to meet them to discuss that law.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Given that Canada, America, Australia and many European Union states have a law similar to that being introduced by the right hon. and learned Member for North East Hertfordshire—I am a sponsor of his Bill—why did the Minister order the Government to block the Bill last Friday?

[Rory Stewart]

As we have discussed, very significant sentences of up to 10 years can already be imposed for this kind of action, but I would be delighted to discuss the issue in more detail with the right hon. Gentleman and my hon. Friends.

Prisoners: Outdoors Endurance Activities

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Wednesday 31st January 2018 Westminster Hall

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax) on securing this debate, which gives us an opportunity to air issues about purposeful activity in prison. I welcome what he said about the Airborne Initiative and the fact that he has brought it to a wider audience. I welcome his comments in promoting the scheme. He is absolutely right about purposeful activity and investment, and about giving young people and more established prisoners the opportunity to receive education, feel self-worth, contribute in a positive way to a task, develop new skills, work as a team, show respect for peer groups, and show and learn respect for prison officers. I join him in praising the work of the Prison Service and the very difficult work that prison officers do.

Any investment in building skills, confidence and trust; showing people that there is a life outside prison; and encouraging people to learn new skills is extremely positive. The scheme—a public sector partnership with the voluntary sector—is a very positive model, and the hon. Gentleman has made a very strong case for it to be looked at.

I came to the debate because I wanted to hear what the hon. Gentleman said. Having done so, I think there are two challenges: one for him and perhaps more than one for the Minister. I want to talk about those challenges and how we can build on the laudable objectives that the hon. Gentleman set out. In making the case for the expansion of such initiatives, it would help if he clarified, now or later, some of the key issues that he touched on, which need fleshing out. First, it is important to look at the value and the reoffending rates. He was absolutely right about the figures. Reoffending rates of between 60% and 65%—perhaps averaging 65%—are simply unacceptable.

The purpose of prisons and young offender institutions must be punishment—that means deprivation of liberty, being away from family and not being able to do the things that we wish to do in society—but there also has to be reform. Reform is about employment, housing, training, the removal of drugs and alcohol and the problems associated with them, tackling mental health issues, promoting self-worth and dealing with all the issues the hon. Gentleman mentioned. It would help his case if he could establish in detail from the Airborne Initiative what the reoffending rates were. He touched on them, but the details would establish whether we could attribute the reoffending rates to the initiatives that were taken.

Also, we need to know the costs per place in the scheme. The hon. Gentleman mentioned two prison officers having to accompany prisoners, which represents a cost. Are there additional costs that the Prison Service has to cover, and does the Airborne Initiative require public sector support in addition to its voluntary activity? Did the hon. Gentleman look at completion rates? I did not get a sense of how many people started and completed the courses. We need to know about not only reoffending rates, but the impact one or two years down the line. I know from my own school life, private life and business life, that I can point to certain things in my life and say, “That two weeks, six weeks or four days made a real difference to my life” when I look back on them two years later. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will undertake such an evaluation.

[Richard Drax]

I am listening carefully to the right hon. Gentleman’s excellent speech, and he is raising perfectly fair points. A point I would add—this is for the Minister, too—is that, as I said in my speech, the effect of the scheme began to be monitored carefully only quite recently. The charity now needs the Government’s help to monitor the effect even more carefully, and to do all the things the right hon. Gentleman suggests. There is work afoot to do that, but we need help from the Government if we are finally to get all the statistics, costs and figures that he has mentioned.

[David Hanson]

I think that would be valuable, because we are, like it or not, in a time of tight resources, particularly in the Prison Service. There are many strains on the whole prison system. If it can be proven that the scheme has the value that the hon. Gentleman evidently believes it has, it would be a useful addition, for the reasons I have mentioned.

My argument now moves to the Minister. The hon. Member for South Dorset made some valid points about the challenges of operating a voluntary sector-funded scheme that aims to build self-confidence, education and self-worth at a time of challenge in the Prison Service. Perhaps I might outline the challenge for the Minister, who is new. I welcome him to his position and wish him well in a difficult and challenging job. He will have constructive support from the Opposition and from the Justice Committee, on which I sit. We wish him well, but in the past seven years we have lost 7,500 prison officers. I know that there is a move to bring back 2,000-ish, but we will still be 5,000 short of the number that we had before.

The hon. Member for South Dorset said that one of the challenges was releasing prison officers for the activity. Self-harm incidents, drug abuse, deaths from self-harm, and assaults—both on prison officers, and prisoner on prisoner—are at record levels. The Minister knows from last week’s report from Liverpool about the difficulties and challenges of broken window syndrome in the prison system. To make possible schemes such as the one that the hon. Member for South Dorset wants to make progress with, those issues need to be realistically addressed; I hope that that is constructive. We shall welcome the Minister’s remarks today, but his challenge, as long as he is in his present job, is to make an impact on the situation.

This is not just a matter of prisoner officer numbers; it is about attitude. I met Russ Trent last week at HMP Berwyn—which the hon. Member for South Dorset pronounced perfectly. Russ was at HMP Portland, which I visited perhaps nine years ago when I had the privilege of doing the job that the Minister now does. I know that there is good work to do, and it is partly about leadership, understanding, and giving governors and prison staff the time to invest in education, self-worth, respect, positive attitudes and teamwork. Unless the Minister addresses some of the structural issues, there will be less opportunity to support valuable schemes.

I have two final points, the first of which is about governor autonomy. The plea of the hon. Member for South Dorset was to roll the scheme out more widely and organise it. I am still not clear what that means with respect to the Minister’s central Department and governor autonomy. Perhaps that can be answered today, or perhaps it is for another day. Does the Minister have confidence in governors to make local decisions about deploying prisoners and prison officers to support such schemes? Where does accountability lie? The Minister can help today by taking on that question.

That leads to my other central point, on which I am pleased the hon. Member for South Dorset touched—release on temporary licence. If there is governor accountability and autonomy, if risk is managed locally, if governors have the resources to determine that x, y or z prisoner can benefit from the course and if the governor determines that the risk can be taken to release on temporary licence, I hope that the Minister will give the decision his backing. If governor autonomy means anything, it is allowing those decisions to be made at the local level. If the Minister does not know now, he will learn in the next few weeks about the restricted nature of ROTL, which the hon. Member for South Dorset pointed out. The risk is transferred to the Ministry of Justice, and governors’ ability to make judgments at a local level is restricted, so there is a lack of participation in the type of scheme so ably promoted by the hon. Gentleman.

My challenge to the hon. Member for South Dorset is to get clarity about the worth of the scheme. I wish him well in doing that, because if it works, it will work well. My challenge to the Minister is to tell him that the scheme will not work, and will not be supported, unless he gets the basics right. I know that he is focused on that, but a series of prisons Ministers has presided over a reduction in staff and increases in incidents, self-harm, attacks and prisoner-on-prisoner violence. Those problems have not allowed good work to thrive. It is impossible to undertake such good work while dealing with drugs, attacks, self-harm and the problems that the hon. Member for South Dorset raised. I wish the Minister well, in the context of the need to do better overall.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Lee]

My hon. Friend is spot on. These vulnerable children require the very best care, particularly for their mental health. In negotiations with the main contractor, I rule out absolutely nothing if the contract obligations are not being met.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The right hon. Gentleman needs to focus his supplementary question exclusively on the Oakhill secure training centre in Milton Keynes.

[David Hanson]

Absolutely, Mr Speaker. Has the Minister taken any view on reducing the financial arrangements with G4S for running Oakhill or imposed any sanctions? What does it take to lose a contract?

[Dr Lee]

The right hon. Gentleman, as a previous Minister responsible for the institution, will acknowledge that the contract is subject to a series of obligations. It was signed in 2004 and lasts for 25 years. I am fully aware of the need to improve standards at Oakhill. I rule absolutely nothing out, and I have already met senior people at G4S to point that out.

Parole Board and Victim Support

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Tuesday 9th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I gently point out, in respect of this extremely serious matter, that the statement has now been running for over half an hour, but we have had only 10 Back-Bench questions. To be candid, we need shorter questions—not people’s observations, comments, tributes and commendations—and then brief replies from the Secretary of State.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

There is a third aspect to this, which is post-release supervision. Given that Dame Glenys Stacey, the chief inspector of probation, says that there is a fractured system, will the Secretary of State, as one of his first tasks, consider strengthening that post-release supervision system?

[Mr Gauke]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an important point, and I would certainly hope and expect that in this case the conditions will be stringent and rigorously enforced.

Prison Reform and Safety

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Thursday 7th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Starting from now, Mr Deputy Speaker.

This is a particularly hard-hitting motion; it does not draw back from the challenges the Prison Service faces. It is important that today Select Committee members focus on specific issues and ask the Minister for the Government’s response to the major challenges, and we will do that. As the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), the very good Chair of the Justice Committee, said, the situation is deteriorating; the problems in prisons are getting worse.

While staff are doing an excellent job and trying their best in difficult circumstances, there have been 300 deaths in prison custody in the past 12 months, of which 77 were self-inflicted deaths. Self-harm has reached a record high and increased by 12% over that period, and the number of incidents requiring hospital attendance rose by 9%. Meanwhile, prisoner-on-prisoner assaults have risen to record highs, and the numbers of assaults on staff and of hospital admissions continue to rise, so there is a real challenge in the system.

I contend that there is a challenge because of reductions in resources and staff numbers, but there is also a challenge because of an increase in the amount of psychoactive substances and drugs getting into prison. It is a difficult job and a challenge to tackle, but if we do not get the basics right in our prison system, the aims of reform, rehabilitation and turning positive individuals back into society will be hampered.

[Norman Lamb]

Over the past year, people in prison have taken their own lives at the rate of one every three days. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the prison services should set a zero-suicide ambition, that we should be seeking to save every life and that it is intolerable that so many people are losing their lives in the prison system?

[David Hanson]

Absolutely. The threat assessment and self-harm assessment are extremely important, but this requires staffing, so a watch can be kept on individuals and they can be supported through what are often challenging mental health problems, particularly in the first few days and weeks of incarceration, when people are coming off alcohol and drugs, or are arriving in prison with severe mental health challenges.

We must tackle these issues in a positive way. One of the Minister’s challenges is to ensure that we undertake a review of the strategy, particularly on psychoactive substances and drugs. The Government have said that they have rolled out new tests for psychoactive substances across the estate; can the Minister tell us how many have taken place and their outcome? The Government have said that they have trained more than 300 dogs to detect these substances; does every prison have access to those dogs, and do those dogs ensure we catch substances that are smuggled in? The Government have said they are making smuggling psychoactive substances into prisons and possession of them criminal offences; I want us to monitor how we enforce that legislation.

The Minister must look at introducing planned searches of prisoners in prisons. He must also look at whether there should be searches of prison officers and delivery staff. I spoke this week to prison officers who said they would welcome that because they want to weed out corruption among staff. I want the Minister to tell us how that will be undertaken generally. I also want the Minister to take further steps to ensure that all category C prisons have netting around them, to stop people throwing drugs and other things into prisons.

I want to see the re-establishment of the dog units, not just as the regionalised resource that they are now, but as a resource that can be allocated locally.

We must look at the criminal gangs inside and outside prisons who are making money out of the delivery of drugs into prisons by many means. What I do not get from the Government is what their overall strategy is, and I think that feeling is shared by external agencies such as Her Majesty’s inspectorate of prisons. I see a number of individual measures, but I do not get the overall strategy. Will the Minister also tell me what is happening with reform prisons? We had a report this week about Holme House prison, which showed that every indicator was going in the wrong direction. It showed more drug use, more self-harm and more attacks on staff—and that is in a reform prison. We need to know who is accountable for that, and what plans are in place to drive improvements in that prison.

Time is extremely pressing, so I shall just ask the Minister one more question. When the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, the hon. Member for Bracknell (Dr Lee), appeared before the Justice Committee recently, I asked whether the Oakhill training centre was now performing to a contractual level with which he was satisfied, and he replied, “Currently, they are.” Since that discussion, a report on Oakhill has shown that, yet again, that establishment is not performing to the required standard. Will the Minister tell me what concrete steps are being taken to improve performance at Oakhill? If the improvements that have been set out are not made, will he seek to remove the contract from G4S, as has happened elsewhere?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gyimah]

The Chair of the Select Committee makes an important point about the repatriation of foreign national offenders. He will be aware that the most effective scheme to repatriate foreign offenders is the early release scheme, under which 40,000 foreign national offenders have been moved out of the UK since 2010. Prisoner transfer agreements are also in place but they are a lot more challenging because they require the co-operation of the receiving Government, who do not always seem that keen to receive their own criminals back. A cross-governmental task force is focused on that very point.

To realise our vision for prisons, we must first make sure that they are secure environments that are free from drugs, violence and intimidation. Again, I do not shy away from acknowledging that the use and availability of drugs in our prisons is too high. The House has often discussed how the rise of psychoactive substances in our prisons was a game-changer, but it was when organised criminal groups moved in to take control of supply routes into prisons that the rules changed. Those groups have embedded themselves throughout the prison estate, becoming ever more sophisticated in driving the drug market and making enormous profits from peddling misery to those around them. Their activities have been facilitated by the rise of new technologies, such as phones and drones, which they have used to try to overcome our security. Those things represent an unprecedented threat that we have not faced before.

As our prison officers and law enforcement partners across the country regularly prove, however, we are more than up to that challenge, and our investment in security is bearing fruit. Last year alone, HMPPS officers recovered more than 225 kg of drugs from the prison estate. Our new team of specialist drone investigators has already helped to secure over 50 years of jail time for those involved, and the team is supporting ongoing investigations across the country.

We are providing officers with the tools that they need. We have already introduced drug tests for psychoactive substances across all prisons, provided every prison with signal detection equipment and trained more than 300 sniffer dogs specifically to detect new psychoactive substances. The right hon. Member for Delyn (David Hanson) asked about the availability of sniffer dogs to prisons. The dogs operate on a regional basis and are therefore available for prisons to call on as and when they are needed.

We are investing heavily in security and counter-terror measures, including £25 million to create the new security directorate in HMPPS. This year we will also invest more than £14 million in transforming our intelligence, search and disruption capability at local, national and regional level, to enable us better to identify and root out those who seek to supply drugs to our prisons. That investment includes more than £3 million to establish our serious organised crime units, which will relentlessly disrupt our most subversive offenders.

We are already seeing early successes from the new capability. A recent joint Prison Service and police operation at HMP Hewell, involving our specialist search teams and dogs, recovered 323 items, including 79 mobile phones, 29 improvised weapons, 50 litres of alcohol and a large quantity of drugs.

[David Hanson]

The Minister is indicating that those things are all intelligence-led. They should be routine.

[Mr Gyimah]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, but we need to know what we are looking for, and we need to identify the prisoners who are most likely to have links with organised crime. We now know that about 6,000 prisoners have links with organised crime on the outside and are conduits for drugs into our prisons, and that allows us to be far more effective in what we are doing to combat those operations. It is still very early days, but the point I am making is that we are beginning to see success. As we go forward, we intend to build on these successes, through our new drugs plan, which he mentioned, and our work on corruption, where it exists—even if it be only among a very few officers. He will be hearing more from me about that shortly.

Of course, this is not just about seizing or intercepting drugs. We should never forget that we have a duty of care to our prisoners—we want to help offenders with drug problems—and more of our prisons now have specialist wings to support them in overcoming their dependencies. We are also working closely with health partners to provide information, guidance and support to prisoners, visitors and staff on the impact and damaging consequences of drugs.

Hon. Members have mentioned the safety of our prisons. Ensuring safety is partly about having the right staffing levels to deliver safe and consistent regimes, and we are making swift progress in recruiting the additional 2,500 staff in the adult estate we promised in 2016: 1,255 extra prison officers have been recruited in the last year, and officer numbers are now at their highest levels since August 2013. In the youth estate, we have likewise expanded frontline staff capacity in public sector youth offender institutions by about 20%.

Preventing suicide and self-harm is also a focus of mine. We are taking decisive action to reduce the levels of self-harm by strengthening the frontline. Each individual incident of suicide or self-harm is one too many and a source of deep tragedy. We have introduced new suicide and self-harm prevention training to give everyone working in prisons, whether officers or staff from other organisations, the confidence and skills they need to support those in their care. So far, more than 10,000 prison staff have started the training, and all new prison officer and prison custody officer recruits now complete the programme as part of their initial training. I am glad to say that the number of self-inflicted deaths in custody is significantly down from last year, although I will be the first to admit that there is still a lot of work to be done.

The Chair of the Select Committee referred to the architecture of the prison system and how we can hold ourselves to account. We are strengthening the ability of the inspectorate to hold the Government and the Prison Service to account and have introduced a new urgent notification process, which had formed part of the original Prisons and Courts Bill, to enable the Secretary of State to be alerted directly where the chief inspector has a significant and urgent concern about the performance of an institution. We launched that process last month. The Secretary of State will be directly alerted by the chief inspector if an urgent issue needs addressing to ensure that recommendations are acted upon immediately. A new team of specialists accountable to Ministers will ensure that immediate action is taken and will respond within 28 days with a more in-depth plan to ensure sustained, long-term improvement for the prison.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lidington]

Yes, I do agree. I think it important for Ministers and officials in the Prison Service to trust the professionalism of governors who are in charge of individual establishments, which is why, as national contracts for particular services expire—for example, maintenance, repairs and food procurement contracts—we will seek opportunities to devolve them to establishment level.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State will have noted that comments made by chief inspector of prisons about one of his reform prisons are quoted in today’s edition of The Times under the headline “‘Trailblazing’ jail is swamped with drugs”. The prison is said to have deteriorated over the last 12 months. I am genuinely interested to know whether the Lord Chancellor can tell us who is responsible for that—the governor, the head of the prison and probation service, Michael Spurr, or the Lord Chancellor himself.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Committee: 3rd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 21st November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[The Temporary Chairman (David Hanson)]

Order. I have no power to impose a time-limit in Committee, but I do have the power to advise. We have 20 hon. Members who wish to speak, and if we continue to have speeches of the current length, we will disappoint at least half of them. I therefore advise Members to try to keep the length of their speeches to between 10 and 12 minutes; that is a voluntary instruction.

[Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

I rise to speak to new clause 79, which is in my name and those of my right hon. and hon. Friends and hon. Members from other parties.

First and foremost, I recognise that the UK has voted to leave the European Union. It is an outcome that I did not vote for, but it is the position in which we find ourselves. It is now incumbent on us to strengthen this legislation ahead of our exit from the Union. We can only achieve this fully by recognising what European integration has done for us over the past 40 years, and the ways in which we can help one another.

Before entering Parliament, I was an employment rights lawyer for many years. I represented trade unions and their members for 10 years. More recently, I ran my own business providing advice on maternity discrimination and flexible working to mums and families. So I know at first-hand how many of our employment rights come from Europe. As my explanatory statement points out, my new clause would ensure that Parliament was kept abreast of changes in EU provisions regarding family-friendly employment rights and gender equality, as well as committing the Government to considering their implementation.

It is clear that working parents and carers in the UK are struggling. The Modern Families Index 2017, which examined the lives of 2,750 working parents and carers, found that more than a third of working families say that they do not have enough time or money for their family to thrive. Half of parents agreed that their work-life balance was increasingly a source of stress. A third said that work had a negative effect on their relationship with their partner, and a quarter said that it led to rows with their children. One in 10 parents would consider resigning from work without having another job to go to. Research by the Equality and Human Rights Commission shows that 54,000 new mothers in Britain may be forced out of their jobs each year as a result of pregnancy and maternity discrimination. The Fawcett Society, Working Families—the work-life balance charity—and trade unions, among others, continually fight to protect against these types of discrimination.

We have a collective responsibility to ensure that we help to protect the rights of workers and employees amid the cut and thrust of the Brexit negotiations. People voted to leave the EU for many varied reasons, but they did not vote to be worse off. Our laws on these matters must be no less favourable than they would have been had the UK remained a member of the EU beyond exit day. Indeed, the EU may well go on to legislate in ways with which we do not agree. The wording of new clause 79 is clear; it is there to inform, not to commit.

As many of my hon. Friends pointed out during the previous Committee sitting, we must make every effort to keep this House fully aware of the advancements that occur in Europe. To be clear, the new clause is not about binding the UK into implementing future EU directives in the family-friendly employment and gender equality space. Rather, it would ensure that Parliament was informed of any developments and would commit the Government to considering their implementation.

In the Prime Minister’s Florence speech, she signalled that the UK and the EU will continue to support each other as we navigate through Brexit. I have much to say on the work that we have collectively achieved in Europe, strengthening workers’ rights, maternity rights and employment practices. For example: the 1976 equal treatment directive established the principle of equal treatment for men and women in access to jobs, training and working conditions; the 1992 pregnant workers directive provided for statutory maternity leave, protected the health and safety of pregnant workers and breastfeeding mothers, prohibited dismissal due to pregnancy or maternity, and introduced paid time off for antenatal care; the 1993 working time directive provided a maximum 48-hour working week, and the right to rest periods and paid holiday; the 1996 parental leave directive provided for the right to unpaid parental leave, as well as time off for dependants; and the 1997 part-time work directive prevented part-time workers from being treated less favourably than full-time employees. All these measures have helped to improve the work-life balance and family-friendly employment rights in the UK, and it is vital that we do not fall behind Europe in the years ahead. To dismiss the last four decades of progress without looking to the future would set a dangerous precedent, which fills me with deep concern.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Cox]

No, no. [Interruption.]

[The Temporary Chair (David Hanson)]

Order. The hon. and learned Gentleman is not giving way.

[Mr Cox]

The point is that these broad and general rights are ripe with value judgments. Quite often, they are not appropriately dealt with by six or seven elderly white judges in a Supreme Court; they are better resolved on the Floor of this House and by a democratic vote in this Parliament.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Tuesday 31st October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that we need to reduce the stress and trauma experienced by victims and witnesses. We are doing a range of things. First, we are establishing model waiting rooms for victims and witnesses so that they will feel less stressed and more comfortable, meaning that they are more likely to give compelling evidence. Secondly, in the courtroom itself, we are rolling out section 28 measures for pre-recorded cross-examination to Crown courts nationally. This autumn, we will extend that to victims of sexual offences or modern slavery offences in Leeds, Liverpool and Kingston upon Thames.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

19. What recent changes his Department has made to community rehabilitation company contracts.

[The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Mr David Lidington)]

We changed CRC contracts earlier this year to better reflect the fixed costs that they were incurring. However, payments to CRCs are still below our original forecasts.

[David Hanson]

I am grateful for that answer. Will the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State publish how much additional resource he has given to CRC companies in total, which CRC companies have received that additional resource, and what he intends them to do with the product they have been given?

[Mr Lidington]

The answer to the right hon. Gentleman’s last question is that we expect them to use that money to improve the delivery of services and to match the best CRCs, such as Cumbria, which recently received a very impressive report from the inspectorate. We did not award the CRCs a specific sum, but agreed to alter the contracts in such a way that we accepted a greater proportion of their costs as fixed. The figure of £277 million that is in public circulation is an estimate of how that adjustment might increase the total contract value, but that is based on certain assumptions about volumes and payment by results, and I reiterate that payments will still be well within the forecast budget.

Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Bill

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 20th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

I thank my hon. Friend for those comments. She makes her point extremely well. It is worth saying that the Bill is supported not only by the Royal College of Nursing and all the trade unions that represent staff in these different lines of work, but by the Metropolitan police, the Police Federation and nearly every part of civil society. I hope we do not end up with a vote later today, but the lack of a vote will not show a lack of assent by this House. Indeed, I think it will show the unanimous assent of the House to change the law in this regard.

It is a depressing fact that the number of assaults on emergency workers has dramatically increased in recent years. The Home Office’s own figures—these are frightening—suggest that there were 24,000 assaults on police officers in England and Wales in 2016-17. The Police Federation reckons that there is an unarmed assault on a police officer every four minutes, and that is even without including police community support officers. The Ministry of Justice says that there were 7,159 assaults on prison officers last year—up a third on the previous year.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

As my hon. Friend will know, not only have attacks on police officers risen by about 7% in the past seven years, but those attacks are on fewer police officers. We have lost 20,000 police officers, so there is now more chance of a police officer being attacked than there was seven years ago.

[Chris Bryant]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why I pay enormous tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch), who, with the Police Federation, has led the charge on this issue and brought it to the House. I feel as if I am merely carrying the baton that she elegantly shaped.

Figures from NHS Protect are equally disturbing. There were 59,794 attacks on NHS staff in 2011-12. That is bad enough, but the figure increased to 70,555 by 2015-16. Yet the number of criminal sanctions for those assaults has actually fallen in that time, from 1,380 to 1,250. That is a lot of people who are not seeing justice.

Prisons Policy/HMP Long Lartin

Lord Hanson of Flint Excerpts

Thursday 12th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gyimah]

I hold the recommendations of the Justice Committee very dearly to my heart. We will of course look at all its recommendations. The Chair of the Select Committee makes a very important point about the prison population. We not only hold some very difficult individuals, but some very troubled individuals. Dealing with issues such as mental health is a key part of dealing with the security and stability of our prisons. It is not just about security solutions.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Two of the three murders in the prison system last year were at Long Lartin. Last week, two individuals were convicted of the murder of a prisoner committed in June in Long Lartin. In the last four years, there have been four murders in Long Lartin. Why does Long Lartin seem to have more murders than any other prison in the country?