Prisoner Early Release Scheme

Jess Phillips Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jake Richards]

I thank the hon. Member for her questions. Of course, we want to ensure that when prisoners are released and it is necessary for them to be tagged—there is a presumption that those who will be released will be tagged—they will be tagged at source as soon as possible. Of course, those operational decisions are matters for the Probation Service.

Regarding the hon. Member’s suggestion of a royal commission, in the first two years of this Government, we have managed to stabilise the criminal justice system. We have begun to get some stability in terms of prison capacity. It was necessary to pass the Sentencing Act 2026 and implement the new sentencing regime, and over the course of the coming years we will make progress on the Crown court backlog—we will debate that later today—and tackling reoffending, which is at the heart of the criminal justice system crisis that we face.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham Yardley) (Lab)]

Historically, whether people were released at the right time or were released early under the various different schemes of various different Governments, it has always been rubbish for victims of domestic abuse. They are often not informed, and the proper safeguards are not put in place. I hear the Minister saying that there is now better communication and that there are helplines, but we have to do better than what the Conservative party did. There needs to be a proper, systematic approach for victims of domestic abuse, to make sure that every single possible safeguarding opportunity has been taken in every single case. I am afraid to say that I feel as if the Department does not know what is going on in the world, because I meet women every week who have not been informed and have not been provided with any safeguards. Can the Minister assure me that that vital work is going on?

[Jake Richards]

I thank my hon. Friend for her question. Of course, she is a long-standing campaigner on these issues, and she is right that the criminal justice system has failed domestic abuse victims for too long. The Minister for Victims is working at pace with the Minister for Prisons, Probation and Reducing Reoffending and alongside the Victims’ Commissioner to ensure everything is done to try to support victims during this period. We have invested more money, but it is not just about money; it needs to work. Of course, I will make sure that the Ministers for Victims and for the Prisons and Probation reach out to my hon. Friend to get the details of any cases.

Courts and Tribunals Bill

Jess Phillips Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading
Tuesday 13th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to take part in the further consideration of the Courts and Tribunals Bill as we reach Report stage. Not for the first time with this ministerial team, this Justice Secretary and this Prime Minister, what we were told was necessary has turned out to be unnecessary, what we were told was impossible is now possible, and what we were told was unavoidable was avoidable after all. This Minister told us again and again on Second Reading and throughout the Committee that each and every one of the measures in this Bill—each and every part of their proposals—was the only way to get on top of the court backlogs. But apparently not, because only days ago the Justice Secretary appeared on national television to announce a significant U-turn: the Government are dropping clause 3. We were told that their new division of judge-only trials was the only way the Crown court backlog could be brought down—that it could not be brought down without it. Yet now Ministers inform us that removing this very provision will actually allow the work to proceed faster.

The Opposition welcome this decision. I welcome the fact that the Justice Secretary put his name to our amendment removing clause 3, but how we got here matters. It is not the first time that this ministerial team and this Justice Secretary have let their Back Benchers defend the indefensible and then drop them in it. This same ministerial team and this same Justice Secretary told us that the release of various serious sexual and violent offenders was an absolute necessity, that they had no choice other than to put victims through the distress and upset over the summer. And then they did have a choice.

Why does this matter? Most of the time in politics in this place we are debating choices—which choice we should make as MPs and as different parties, weighing up the pros and cons of the options—but sometimes Ministers attempt to cut through that to secure the support of MPs by saying that they have no choice. When MPs resist and tell them their concerns over what the Government are proposing, Ministers have a fundamental duty to this House and to their own Back-Bench colleagues in particular. That duty is to test to destruction the proposition that there is no choice.

Only the Ministers have the army of civil servants, the data, the costings and the honest advice. When a Minister tells their own MPs that they have no choice, surely it must mean exactly that. That is how they secure the support of their Back-Bench colleagues. These Ministers have failed in that duty and have failed their colleagues. Ministerial credibility is a precious resource and this Minister has exhausted hers. If clause 3 was never truly required to tackle court delays, we must ask: what other assertions made by this Front-Bench team are equally unfounded? How can they expect their propositions of “no choice” to be accepted in future, and not just in future but on this very Bill before us today?

We must also be clear that, despite the headlines surrounding this partial retreat, the core damaging framework of the Bill remains almost entirely intact. The Government continue to press ahead with clause 1, which completely strips adult defendants charged with triable either way offences of their historic right to elect for a jury trial. At the same time, clause 6 doubles magistrates’ maximum sentencing powers up to 24 months. That means complex, high-stake cases—including sexual assault, actual bodily harm and burglary—will be retained in summary courts, exposing defendants to two-year prison sentences without ever having access to a jury.

Clause 7 and schedule 2 dismantle the automatic right of appeal from the magistrates court to the Crown court. Instead of a full rehearing before a judge and lay magistrates, wrongly convicted individuals will face a restrictive permission barrier on written papers alone.

It should be clear that, taken together, we are still facing a fundamental attack on the existing rights to a jury trial. The provisions still represent a sweeping contraction of access to jury trial and summary justice safeguards. The opposition from legal professions, victims groups and civil liberties organisations remains as firm today as it was on Second Reading.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham Yardley) (Lab)]

As somebody who has had someone elect to have a jury and now awaits a trial in 2029 on a simple order breach, I ask the hon. Gentleman: does he think, in his defence of jury trials, that a victim should be able to say whether they want the case to be tried by a jury, or should it just be the defendant? That is the system we have today. In the light of his desire to see jury trials, does he think that the system should be changed so that anyone can say, “No, I want it to be heard in front of a jury”?

[Dr Mullan]

What we are talking about is where we draw the ledger. I do not think the hon. Member is suggesting that we should have everything done by magistrates. Why not have everything done by magistrates? If it is fundamentally unfair to allow people to have a jury trial, why not let everything be done by magistrates? Then the victims do not have a say on whether it is a jury trial. The point we are clear about is that this is an unprecedented erosion of that right. It was not in the Government’s manifesto, it was until recently largely opposed by very large numbers of their own MPs, and it is based on a premise of necessity that I am afraid is paper thin. Ministers turned around and said that these were things that they had to do to get the backlog down. It turns out that they did not have to do that.

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[Karl Turner]

I agree completely, and the hon. Gentleman makes the point very strongly indeed.

Clause 6 is on magistrates’ sentencing powers. I cannot support the idea of magistrates having powers to give sentences of between 18 and 24 months without a credible plan to address the dire, desperate need to recruit magistrates, legal advisers, court staff and lawyers. That risks just transferring the pressure rather than solving the backlog. That is the reality of what this Bill will do.

That brings me to the anomaly in the Bill. As currently drafted, it presents a fairly obvious problem: a defendant of good character, with no previous convictions and who has never been arrested, interviewed, charged, prosecuted or convicted of a criminal offence is likely, by virtue of the sentencing guidelines on an either-way offence, to be tried in front of a magistrates court, whereas a defendant with numerous previous convictions, by virtue of the fact that under the guidelines that offending behaviour exceeds the three-year threshold, gets the benefit of a Crown court trial.

Let us picture the scenario: a section 47 offence of actual bodily harm is triable either way. This is a serious assault in a domestic scenario. Defendant A has no previous convictions and has never been convicted by a criminal court—

[Jess Phillips]

Just because a domestic abuser has no prior convictions, it does not mean he does not have priors. It does not mean he has good character.

[Karl Turner]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. She is absolutely right, of course. In my experience, offenders who appear in incredibly serious cases of violence in domestic scenarios have often never had previous convictions.

Let us think about the fairness of this scenario. Defendant A, who has never been convicted of a criminal offence, is charged with a section 47 ABH and appears in a summary trial. It is a very serious assault, an ABH. Defendant B, who has had numerous convictions over his adult life—let us be honest, it is mainly men who commit domestic assaults; that is the truth of it—gets the benefit of a trial in front of a jury. How is that possibly—[Interruption.] Well, it is a benefit. I am hearing “Why is it a benefit?”

[Jess Phillips]

A longer sentence is the benefit.

[Karl Turner]

I am hearing comments from a sedentary position. I have an awful lot of time for my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Yardley (Jess Phillips), I truly have—she is a mate of mine, as it happens—but there is a benefit to a jury trial.

The reality is that when a defendant appears in a summary trial before a bench of lay magistrates or a district judge, it is swift, summary justice. The evidence is heard, but it is not heard and presented in the same way as it is in a Crown court. That is just the truth. A Crown court trial in that scenario would last four or five days, and potentially into a second week. There is an opportunity to call defence evidence. Legal aid is available for experts. There is the potential for reports by the defence and the prosecution. It is about equality before the law. That is the reality of the scenario, and I cannot believe that this consequence is intended by this Labour Government. That is why I say that I cannot possibly support clause 6.

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[Dr Mullan]

As I said in my opening speech, a number of women’s victims rights groups were the leading critics of getting rid of jury trials. We cannot make out that victims have a singular view on this and that they are happy with it. There are different opinions among victims groups, and many of them agree with the hon. Gentleman.

[Jess Phillips]

None of them agree with you about the presumption of contact.

[Karl Turner]

Well, I am not going to get into the whys and wherefores of this particular juncture of the debate.

There is an easy fix for the scenario that I have described. My amendment 47 states that where a defendant has no previous convictions and the court decides that the case is suitable for summary trial, that defendant should be entitled to elect to have their trial in the Crown court. I do not think that the numbers will be very big. It is probably impossible for the Ministry of Justice to do modelling. In the 16 years that I have been a Member of this House and have been involved in debating criminal justice issues, I have rarely seen MOJ modelling that has been anywhere near accurate. However, even if it could do the modelling—I suspect it cannot, because that data is not kept—the numbers would be tiny. Why? Because only 0.4% of all convictions in the magistrates court are appealed.

However, in 41% of that 0.4% of cases—it is a tiny number—the conviction is overturned in the Crown court, because there has been a wrong decision. The Bar Council has produced more up-to-date data, which suggests that that 41% has now gone up to 56%. More than half the cases that are appealed from the magistrates to the Crown court for a rehearing end up with a defendant who was convicted in the magistrates court being acquitted in the Crown court. Why do I say that there is a benefit to a Crown court hearing? It speaks for itself.

What could the Government do instead? There is plenty that they could do. They could implement the relevant recommendations of the Leveson review. They could improve co-ordination between the police, the CPS and the courts to progress and identify unnecessary prosecutions earlier. It happens to be a fact that prosecutions sometimes end because the CPS—the Crown—throws in the towel. There is lots to welcome in the Bill, and I do welcome it, but there is too much in it for me to support it at this time.

Finally, I want to say a few words of gratitude. I thank the Prime Minister, because from the very outset of my opposition to the worst excesses of the Bill, he was supporting me in the background. Similarly, Lord Sadiq Khan was there texting me, encouraging me and supporting me when it mattered. My biggest thank you of all is reserved for my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Charlotte Nichols) for her bravery in standing up, waiving her anonymity and explaining her personal situation in the criminal justice system, in the face of all the pressure that was being exerted on Members who had the audacity to say that these measures were not suitable for a Labour Government to be implementing. We suffered the pressure exerted on us, and my hon. Friend showed real bravery and determination. For that, I will forever respect her.

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[Ayoub Khan]

Is there not another problem? Even if we had capacity at the magistrates courts, where trials would be taken away from the Crown courts, is not the elephant in the room that we do not have enough lawyers?

[Jess Phillips]

There’s loads around here!

[Catherine Atkinson]

While there are some lawyers on the Benches of this House, there are also many coming through the ranks; we need to ensure that they are going into the criminal justice system, and I am concerned that we are not seeing enough taking that path.

Accelerating reforms means accelerating the strain on our magistrates court, so will the Minister bring forward target dates to match the accelerated timeline? Precisely what capacity will be added to the magistrates court before this wave of work arrives?

Removing the right to elect in either-way offences drives an even bigger wave of work into the magistrates court. I understand the Government’s concern that more and more defendants are electing a jury trial; many are exploiting the Crown court delays and betting that victims and witnesses will tire and pull out. I have spoken to lawyers and judges who share our frustration. However, if the right to elect is removed, the allocation guidelines that the magistrates apply in deciding whether defendants should face a magistrates court or a jury trial should be reviewed.

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[Sir Geoffrey Cox]

I draw your attention, Madam Deputy Speaker, and the attention of the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

It has been a peculiar pleasure to listen to the two speeches made so far by Labour Back Benchers. Both the speech of the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) and that of the Chairman of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Derby North (Catherine Atkinson), have been treats to listen to, and I feel I can do no better than to say, “Listen to both of them.” However, it would be wrong of me to say that I oppose the Bill in its entirety. The truth is that some of its provisions contain very useful and reasonable directions of travel. Personally, I do not have the profoundest objection to grounds needing to be given for an appeal to the Crown court. I think that would be a reasonable thing to require, provided that the Chairman of the Select Committee’s warnings are heeded and those who have to fill out that appeal are given the opportunity of advice. As has been said, I think by Opposition Members, the problem is that there is a lack of legal advisers in the magistrates court—what we used to call magistrates court clerks.

That brings me to another way in which I should commend the Minister and the Government. The initiative to enhance the resources of the magistrates court can only be a good thing, although I must warn the Minister that the recruitment of more magistrates is something that we looked at years ago, when I sat in the position that she now sits in. It is social and economic factors that are effecting the diminution in the number of those willing and able to put themselves forward for this onerous type of public service, so that diminution is not going to be remediable just by brave words and advertisements. It is going to have to be a sustained campaign, and it will not happen even in the term that she will serve as Minister—long may that continue. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] That was not a wish—it was an observation—but nevertheless, it was heartfelt.

With those cautious commendations given, though, I have to return to the very focus and centre of this Bill. It is a bit like asking us to be grateful to the crocodile who leaves us with our head after it has taken our legs. The reality is that the right of election of trial by jury is at the very heart of the right itself. Since the 17th century, Governments of all colours that have come and gone have continued to respect that as a right, not as a concession or a privilege afforded by the state to a defendant. It is perfectly true that in Scotland it is the court that decides whether or not the defendant should enjoy the right of trial by jury, but in England, it has always been a right—a right given, broadly speaking, to anybody accused of an offence serious enough to warrant more than 12 months’ imprisonment.

For the first time in English legal and political history, a Government have decided to breach that right, and to make the decision reside with the representatives of the state. That places the decision out of the hands of a powerless defendant—some of the most powerless in our society. Some of them may very well be guilty. Many of them may very well be guilty, but the system we have adopted over the centuries does not legislate so much for the guilty, but for the innocent caught up in the system. So many examples in history have shown how the innocent can be caught up in this system, and it is for the innocent that the criminal justice system is ultimately designed. It is designed for their vindication, requiring against them the level, burden and standard of proof that the criminal justice system enforces, with the presumption of innocence.

[Jess Phillips]

rose—

[Sir Geoffrey Cox]

Because time is short, I will give way to the hon. Lady, but only she.

[Jess Phillips]

What the right hon. and learned Member is saying about the system being designed for the innocent is compelling, but the system is absolutely not designed for the person who is absolutely innocent in the system, and that is the victim. No part of the system asks them to elect where the trial might go. No part of the system asks them if they think it should be appealed. The real innocent—the definitely innocent—gets no say.

[Sir Geoffrey Cox]

That invites a long answer, which I do not have time now to give, but any defendant who appears before a court enjoys the presumption of innocence, and it is upon that basis that any system has to proceed. In England, the right has been accorded to those who enjoy this presumption of innocence to decide where they should be tried. Any abrogation of that right, such as for an offence that carries a sentence of more than 12 months’ imprisonment, removes the power from the individual and hands it to the state. In England—peculiarly in England—it has always been regarded as the right of a defendant. Make no mistake, this is an historic Bill for that reason.

To remove and abrogate the right of a litigant to trial by a jury of their peers has exactly the effect that the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East has said. A person of good character, a professional person or an employee in the workplace accused of theft from his employer—all of these would have had the right to say, “No, I wish to have the careful and meticulous process that the Crown court provides, not the swift and summary justice that the magistrates court provides.” That person may suffer for the remaining years of their life the most profound impact upon their history. A Member of this House accused could be tried before the magistrates court, despite the impact and consequences that that might produce. In the magistrates court, the only criteria will be whether it might receive more than two years’ imprisonment. Many such offences would not. That is broadly the criteria that is applied by the magistrates.

If this egregious act is to be taken by this House, I strongly support that the Chairman of the Select Committee’s recommendation be taken on board by the Minister, because unless the magistrates have the express ability to consider whether someone is of good character, whether they have a profession, whether it would mean that they would be disqualified forever from whatever profession they are in, or expelled from their employment—with massive implications for the rest of their life—how can it be fair or proper to impose upon that person a system of summary justice that cannot, at its heart, achieve the levels of fairness of a Crown court trial? That is not only because legal aid is available in the Crown court, but because of the forensic scrutiny that the allegation is placed under. The automatic right of appeal has always been provided in the magistrates court, even where the sentence would be less than 12 months, because it has always been acknowledged that the kind of justice distributed in the magistrates court is necessarily swift and necessarily summary.

There are not provisions for the disclosure of unused material in the magistrates court. What is to be done about those, if offences are now going to be tried that might carry a two-year imprisonment? None of these things have yet been thought through within this Bill. There has simply been a transference from the Crown court to the magistrates court, in breach of a provision and a right that has been respected in this country for 300 years.

I therefore say that Members should listen to the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East and to the Chairman of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Derby North. They spoke the milk of human wisdom, and I suspect the fact that it came from them is not wholly unrelated to the fact that each of them have years of experience in professional practice in the courts. Heed them.

I urge the Minister—even if she is to take the step that I profoundly oppose and regard as an historic mistake: the abrogation and dilution of the right to trial by jury, making it, in fact, no longer a right but a concession made by the state to the individual—to listen, please, to the comments, the recommendations and the warnings given by those on her own side. For someone of good character to come before a court for the first time, facing a two-year sentence of imprisonment, and for the magistrate to be unable to consider such a factor would, in many cases, constitute the profoundest injustice. The risk is that over the coming years there will be all the appalling, wearisome, grievous experiences of realising that injustice has actually been done, although the whole system that we have devised over the centuries was designed to avoid that at all costs.

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[Sarah Pochin (Runcorn and Helsby) (Reform)]

I make my contribution as someone who served as a magistrate for 20 years. I am deeply concerned about increasing magistrates’ sentencing powers to two years of custody. That must be accompanied by rigorous training, because in reality we get good and bad, and experienced and inexperienced, magistrates on magistrates’ benches. For a lay person, removing the liberty of another is one of the biggest decisions that they can make.

I am also concerned about the presumption of suspension of all custodial sentences of up to 12 months. That is what is in the guidelines, but in training, magistrates are being told that there is a presumption of suspension of sentences of up to 18 months. Punishment should not be dumbed down because of insufficient prison places. Furthermore, the Government are leaving the supervision of the requirements of community orders in the hands of the Probation Service. How can those in the Probation Service be qualified to do that, when they are not trained to do that, unlike magistrates? Even more troubling is the fact those in the Probation Service are being given the power to cancel community orders, if they feel that the offender has been sufficiently rehabilitated. This comes at a time when the Probation Service has never been so overwhelmed and underfunded. The policy of the presumptive suspension of sentences, and the removal of magistrates’ powers to decide on community orders, betray justice for victims.

[Jess Phillips]

There are so many things in the Bill that I could talk about, but I shall start where my friend, the right hon. Member for the royal town of Sutton Coldfield (Sir Andrew Mitchell), left off; I am from the royal town of Birmingham Yardley. I want to get Members to understand what we are seeking to change and clarify in law. When we are in this Chamber, we do not get sued for the things we say. I can be held accountable for anything I say—I would not say it on X, because I would not go on it—until I walk into this building. Civil action could be taken against me for work that I did leading up to that point. Let me set out what the judgment that the right hon. Gentleman talked about means. In cases in which the police or the Crown Prosecution Service make mistakes, they should of course have immunity covering all the time that leads up to them entering court, as any witness does; but that that immunity cannot cover them against civil action relating to anything that happened in the case. If I had a pound for every time I have seen terrible mistakes made by police officers or the CPS, I could get rid of your backlog—not your backlog, Madam Deputy Speaker, but the nation’s.

I want to be clear about how dangerous the overreach is that results from the Court’s decision to allow that immunity, and will refer to some cases that caused Front Benchers to change the law. These were legal cases taken by victims of rape, domestic abuse and other forms of sexual violence that have changed the law of our land. They were based on civil actions taken by those victims against the police and the CPS, including by Jade Blue, the survivor of rape who waived her anonymity and brought a claim against the CPS after it made an erroneous decision to discontinue the proceedings against her abuser. As a consequence of Jade’s civil action and campaign, and her successful claim against the CPS, the Government rolled out the early victims’ right to review scheme. That was done on the basis of civil action taken by a rape victim, but this could be threatened by this new overreach in the law, and I hope that the Minister will tell us how she intends to sort this out. If we do not allow victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence—or any victim, or anyone who is treated poorly by the police and the CPS—to take civil action, we in this place are missing an opportunity to make better laws. Frankly, if I can be held accountable, coppers and the CPS should be held accountable, too.

I understand that we are awaiting a Supreme Court judgment, but I would be interested to hear what the Front Benchers can say to allay the fears of victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence all over the country. They fear that if, say, their address was wrongly given out, they would have no recourse to civil action, despite the danger they would be put in.

My hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Dr Tidball) gave a powerful speech. I worked with Claire Throssell for years. The shadow Minister said that victims groups do not all think the same about the jury part of the Bill; I can tell him that they all think the same thing about the presumption of contact. The fact that the shadow Minister did not even mention that he has tabled an amendment that would genuinely endanger victims of domestic abuse across the country is—I do not know what I am allowed to say—a bit cowardly. He should have stood by his words and argued the case.

As a victim who has been dragged back to court on a completely unmeritorious appeal case by people who stalk me, so that they can get me in another room, I am pleased about the changes in the Bill. In these debates, I often think that this place thinks that the very worst thing that could happen to a person is being accused of rape. I think the worst thing that can happen is to be raped and have no one believe you.

[Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst (Solihull West and Shirley) (Con)]

I draw the House’s attention to the fact that I am a member of the Bar of England and Wales, and my wife is an employment judge. Notwithstanding some noble and commendable elements, particularly in clauses 12 to 17, in totality, I am afraid that this is a bad Bill. It was a bad Bill when it came before the House on Second Reading; it was a bad Bill when it left Committee; and without significant refinement, it will be a bad piece of law, should it come on to the statute books.

This is not the Lord Chancellor’s legislation; he inherited it from his predecessor. It is right to welcome his efforts on the amendment that recognises that clause 3 is unsustainable; it would be churlish not to. He has listened to the legal profession, to this House, and most importantly, to the public, who have raised serious and significant concerns. But I am afraid that the measures do not go far enough. If this Bill is the answer, then the exam question is fundamentally wrong. Nowhere can that be seen more clearly than in clause 6. That is why I am very supportive of amendment 7 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Dr Mullan), which seeks to remove clause 6.

The clause, as we have heard, merely moves the problem from one part of the system to another. It pushes, on a conservative basis, some 25,000 cases into the magistrates court. About 5,500 of those are likely to be trials—and not necessarily straightforward trials; they may take more than a day or two to be heard. We are asking an under-resourced and ill equipped magistrates court to deal with them. That is not the way to deal with the magistrates court backlog, which, in the last year, increased by more than 9.5%.

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[Jess Phillips]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Rebecca Smith]

No, I have already given way twice. I will not get any more time. I am very sorry.

We must avoid a situation in which the law views children as the state’s ultimate responsibility while parents must justify their involvement on a case-by-case basis. We must also avoid anything that presumes that the state makes a better parent than the actual parents themselves. Of course, the state should intervene when a child is at risk, but our default position should be that, wherever it is safe and appropriate, children benefit from the love and guidance of both their parents. The state should step in only when there is clear evidence that it should do so, and we do not reject that point. If we remove this principle from the law, we take another step towards a system in which parental involvement becomes discretionary and the state’s role becomes paramount. That is not a healthy direction for family justice.

I recognise, of course, that this is a sensitive issue for survivors of domestic abuse. To be clear, there is no absolute right to contact under existing law. Courts already have the power to restrict unsafe contact. The presumption of parental involvement is already qualified by risk of harm to the child, so why do we need this clause at all? Surely we in this House should be ensuring that current safeguards work properly instead.

As I said in a recent debate on fathers and male role models,

“There is a widespread perception that family courts make it difficult for fathers to maintain a meaningful relationship with their children.”—[Official Report, 10 September 2026; Vol. 790, c. 450WH.]

One possible solution is a child-centred parental relationship test. The test would direct courts to consider the quality and sustainability of the child’s relationship with each parent. It would help courts to distinguish between safe and harmful contact.

As things stand, there is a real risk that clause 17 will weaken, not strengthen, children’s relationships with safe parents without addressing the current failures that leave children exposed to their unsafe ones. Fundamentally, parental involvement is a relationship recognised by the state, not a privilege granted by the state. Both parents matter, and we should not be afraid to say so.

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Jess Phillips Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 11th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dame Karen Bradley]

I accept what the hon. Lady says, and I know she speaks with great sincerity, but it is still the case that under this Bill, somebody could be seen remotely—without a face-to-face appointment—where they are not alone and the coercive perpetrator may be forcing them.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham Yardley) (Lab)]

Suicide currently outstrips homicide as the main reason for the deaths of women in cases of domestic abuse and coercive control, so what the right hon. Gentleman outlines is currently happening. Arguing for the status quo is not something I feel comfortable with. I feel considerably stronger about the safeguards that I worked with my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) to ensure that the Bill had.

[Dame Karen Bradley]

I have enormous respect for the previous Minister, who I have worked closely with, but the point she is making about suicide of women who were victims of domestic abuse is a separate matter. For women to feel that they have nowhere else to go other than to commit suicide, is the most outrageous and horrendous situation, and we absolutely have to tackle and work on that. But this Bill is not the solution to that problem.

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[Jess Phillips (Birmingham Yardley) (Lab)]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Claire Hazelgrove). Mainly because I am a bit lazy, I rarely prepare to speak in debates, and never have copious notes. Her remarks have led where my remarks will go. I will cover the issue of coercion, which hon. Members have mentioned, and, like her, will talk about my mother, who also died when she was 61 years old, unfortunately when I was much younger than my hon. Friend. My mother died when I was 28 years old—many years ago now.

My mother had a leiomyosarcoma, and suffered with it for around three years. The prognosis did change—I hear the arguments that some hon. Members are making—but towards the end of her life, at one point she felt she was going to die. It was coming to the end. She was in a wheelchair. She was completely paralysed. She was doubly incontinent by this point. To give hon. Members an idea of the kind of woman my mother was, she was an absolute titan. She was like Erin Brockovich, but with a bad perm, in the 1980s. She could lay claim to being able to spot talent, because she gave a job to the current Prime Minister, who worked for her for some time. He is often teary-eyed when I talk to him about her.

My brothers live in different parts of the world and country, but I live 20 minutes from where I was born and where my mother lived. When she got to this stage, we all went back to be with her, because we believed that this was it—that she was going to be taken, that she was going to die. She did not die on that occasion, so my brother, who lives in France, went back home. Then, when it came to the point that a doctor made the call and said, “Your mom is about to die,” my brother could not come back—this was about four weeks later. So it was me who was with my mom when she died—not all of her children, and not all of her grandchildren. I am eternally grateful that I was there. This was a woman who had written every part of her funeral. She knew exactly what she wanted us to feel. She had planned, to the nth degree, what would happen after she was gone. The other day, I found a recipe for Christmas puddings and the PIN for her credit card—she was like, “Your dad might not be able to get money.”

My mom had thought about everything, but she was not gifted with the ability to think about this. She would have taken the choice on that day, when my brothers were surrounding her. She did not die in terrible pain—I recognise what my hon. Friend the Member for West Lancashire (Ashley Dalton) is saying. She was not writhing. It was not awful. However, she should have been able to choose to have her family with her. I will vote for this Bill. I went to women’s liberation playgroup, which she set up with a load of women. She raised me to believe in a right to choose—my gosh, more than anything else in life. She would tell me what to do today.

Many people have mentioned coercion. I am a scholar of coercion, and I say this to everybody today: do not rest on your laurels thinking that, if we do nothing, people today will not be coerced to death. That will literally happen today. The idea that if we just do nothing—

[Jess Asato]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Jess Phillips]

I am not going to, because Madam Deputy Speaker has been clear.

The idea that if we do not pass the Bill today, we are going to walk out of here and women in our country will be any safer is an absolute myth. Doing nothing is not the same as acting.

Prisoner Early Release

Jess Phillips Excerpts

Monday 29th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jake Richards]

Let me be very clear, Mr Speaker. The Sentencing Act, which received Royal Assent in January, sets out some provisions that will come into effect in September. We are determined to ensure that victims receive due notification in good time, not just because we believe that the Government have a responsibility to let them know, but because we know that victims need to play a role in the licence conditions that we set.

It is vital that victims’ voices are heard. That is why we have already begun communication with victims’ groups and, indeed, with victims who are party to the victim contact scheme. We will go further and ensure that all those who are party to the scheme receive precise information on their case—not just because we want to let them know, but because we want to hear from them to ensure that when we put in the most robust licence conditions in the community, victims’ voices are at the heart of the decisions we make. That is absolutely right, and that is not what happened under the Conservative Government.

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham Yardley) (Lab)]

I recognise that very few rapists went to prison under the previous Administration and that the increase in rapists, especially child rapists, going to prison under this Government has been huge. I congratulate the Government on that. It is, however, my opinion that there should be more exemptions within the release scheme, and we should all be working together to see if child rapists can be included in that, should the numbers allow it, because we also cannot let the prison system end.

I would like to ask a really specific question about the risk assessments that will be done on these cases before release. I have to say that my experience of risk assessment in these cases is not great. It does not take account of the victim or public safety more broadly. Can we have an assurance that there has been a change to the risk assessments regime from how it was under the previous Administration, so that any risk assessment done on the release of any prisoner will ensure that we are actually safe in public?

[Jake Richards]

Let me first pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the work she did both in government and in opposition on these issues. She has raised with me outside the Chamber the issue of pre-sentencing reports, in particular in relation to domestic abuse. As she knows, I have spoken with Lord Timpson and we will come back to her on those specific measures.

My hon. Friend is right to raise the issue of community safety. We have invested £700 million into the probation system—the biggest investment in probation for a generation —and recruited more probation officers than ever before. For the first time in several decades, the caseload of the average probation officer is coming down, in contrast to the record highs reached under the Conservatives.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jess Phillips Excerpts

Wednesday 5th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Warinder Juss (Wolverhampton West) (Lab)]

14. What steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to help tackle violence against women and girls.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Jess Phillips)]

Tackling violence against women and girls is a top priority for this Government. We will deliver a cross-Government, transformative approach underpinned by the new strategy, which we aim to publish as soon as possible. This strategy is overseen by the violence against women and girls ministerial board, the safer streets mission board and regular stocktakes by the Prime Minister. This structure holds the Government Departments to account.

[Irene Campbell]

As a former chair of North Ayrshire Women’s Aid, I was concerned to read reports that sexual assault and harassment of women and girls on trains has risen by more than a third over the past 10 years. That adds up to 2,661 incidents reported across England, Scotland and Wales last year, with one in 10 of them affecting children. Does the Minister agree that that cannot be allowed to continue, and that we must do more to tackle this shocking rise in violence against women and girls?

[Jess Phillips]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. However, there have been recent successful campaigns by British Transport police and the Rail Delivery Group, which is the rail industry-funded group representing the views of the rail industry, to encourage reporting of offences against women and girls, and we believe that some of the rise in recorded offences is because of that success and the willingness of victims to come forward and bystanders to intervene or report on a victim’s behalf. However, we are not complacent. The Department for Transport recently announced £17 million of investment to better connect CCTV at train stations. The project will enable greater real-time access for the BTP to accelerate investigations and identify offenders as quickly as possible to bring them to justice.

[Ms Minns]

Over the past year, my office and I have supported a depressing number of constituents who have been failed—failed by the police and social services for not listening to reports of coercive control; failed by the family court for not recognising who the victim is; and failed by the Crown Prosecution Service for not proceeding to prosecute cases of domestic abuse because it does not believe the victim to be credible. What steps is the Minister taking with colleagues from across Government to ensure that women are believed and listened to?

[Jess Phillips]

Sadly, what my hon. Friend describes is something that I think everybody in the House would recognise. We are strengthening the justice system to better support victims, and we have committed to ensuring that there are specialist rape and sexual offences teams in every police force and that police officers receive stronger training on violence against women and girls, including on coercive and controlling behaviour. We will also ban anyone with a history of violence against women and girls from joining the police force and we will increase the powers of the Victims’ Commissioner through the Victims and Courts Bill, so that they can hold criminal justice systems accountable and independently scrutinise the victims code of compliance.

[Steve Witherden]

Survivors of domestic abuse and violence, along with their children, must be able to access affordable housing. The local housing allowance, introduced by the last Labour Government to cover the lowest 50% of private rents, now covers only 1% of private rents in Wales and 2.4% in England. Does the Minister agree that unfreezing LHA and linking it once more to actual local rents is vital to reducing the risk of homelessness for survivors and ensuring that they have the safety of a stable home when fleeing abuse?

[Jess Phillips]

I thank my hon. Friend for his passionate plea, and I absolutely will take up his suggestions in the meetings to which I have already referred. Tier 1 local authorities in England have a legal requirement to assess and address the need for support within safe accommodation for all domestic abuse victims. The Government have increased the funding to local authorities to £160 million this year—an uplift of £30 million from previous years—to provide further support in safe accommodation for domestic abuse survivors. The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government has published statutory guidance, which is clear that local authorities should ensure that sufficient suitable support in safe accommodation is available to meet the needs of victims locally.

[Dr Opher]

Last week, I met “Loose Women” presenters in Parliament and heard about their “Facing It Together” programme. First, will the Minister support the “Facing It Together” programme? Secondly, will she support a plan we have hatched to get a poster about it in every GP surgery in this country?

[Jess Phillips]

I absolutely do support the “Loose Women” in this regard. I was about to say that I would like to think of myself as one, but I am not sure that that would come across very well. I agree that signage in GPs’ surgeries, dentists’ waiting rooms and pubs and clubs are valuable tools to warn the public about the signs of domestic abuse, and can help to point those who are worried about a friend or family member to places where they can be helped. We as a Government must ensure that when people need to see that signage it will be there, and that is what we are doing

[Ben Obese-Jecty]

In June I asked the Government to consider my private Member’s Bill calling for them to publish a strategy to tackle interpersonal abuse and violence against men and boys. The strategy would ensure that male survivors of crimes that are considered to be violence against women and girls—such as rape, sexual assault, domestic abuse, forced marriage and honour-based violence—were given dedicated support, and would also prevent male survivors from having to be in spaces that should be for women. On 1 September, the Minister told me that the strategy

“will be published early in the autumn.”

We are now well past that. What is causing the delay in the publication of the revised VAWG strategy, and can the Minister assure me that it will specifically address male

survivors of crimes that are considered to be violence against women and girls?

[Jess Phillips]

Yes, I can absolutely give the hon. Gentleman that assurance, and I would be more than happy to meet him to discuss these matters and see where we can go forward together. The delay is being caused by the fact that the work will be completely cross-governmental; we must ensure that the allocations processes, and all the things that go on in Government Departments, are as good as they possibly can be, because the National Audit Office reports about previous VAWG strategies have left a lot to be desired, and I do not want that to happen again.

[Warinder Juss]

In the last couple of months the west midlands has seen a spate of racially motivated attacks on women of colour, including rapes of Sikh women, who now tell me that they are scared to walk on our streets or use public transport to go to work. Does the Minister agree that there is no place in Britain for any kind of racial hatred and that these crimes must be punished to the full extent of the law? What assurance can she offer women and girls in my Wolverhampton constituency that they will have the full protection of the police and the authorities so that they can feel safe?

[Jess Phillips]

I thank my hon. Friend and Birmingham constituency neighbour and share his real concern about a spate of what appear to be instances of racially motivated sexual violence. All I can say is that some of these cases are sub judice and charges have been laid, but I absolutely assure him that I have spoken to organisations that work on the ground with black and minoritised women to ensure that we do everything we can, along with the police and other agencies, to make sure that women where he and I live feel safe.

[Aphra Brandreth (Chester South and Eddisbury) (Con)]

Strangulation is an extremely common form of gendered violence: up to two thirds of women suffering domestic abuse report having been strangled. I have corresponded with the Minister about the need for the Institute for Addressing Strangulation to have funding certainty beyond March next year in order to continue its vital work, but have had no assurances. I know how seriously she takes this issue, but can she tell us what she is doing to make it clear to the Chancellor that sustaining this lifesaving work must be a priority if we are to meet the Government’s target of halving violence against women and girls?

[Jess Phillips]

I greatly appreciate the hon. Lady’s question, and I was very proud when it was announced yesterday that this Government would make strangulation in pornography illegal in our country, because of the rising tide of its becoming acceptable. Much of that work comes from the institute that she mentioned. She must be in absolutely no doubt that there is not a Cabinet Minister in the country who is not aware of the strength of my feelings about what should be spent on violence against women and girls.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

We know—and I have sadly seen through my casework—that coercive control can continue for years after a relationship has ended through the manipulation of child maintenance payments by perpetrators. What steps is the Minister taking with her colleagues in the Department for Work and Pensions to ensure that the systems work to support survivors rather than enabling perpetrators?

[Jess Phillips]

I have seen those cases. Domestic homicide reviews point to failures in the Child Maintenance Service that have led to the most tragic circumstances. We are working with the Department for Work and Pensions to ensure that the system that operates in our country is completely safe, but we are also working with the DWP more widely on exactly what we are doing in that Department on violence against women and girls.

[Kirsty Blackman (Aberdeen North) (SNP)]

One of my constituents was domestically abused by someone on a dependant visa. She has been trying to obtain information from UK Visas and Immigration about whether that person is still in the United Kingdom, or still has a visa. Would the Minister consider a measure similar to Clare’s law, so that people have the right to ask what a person’s current visa status is and UKVI can release that information to them?

[Jess Phillips]

I have handled cases myself that were not dissimilar, where a third party could not be given that information, so I absolutely understand the hon. Lady’s frustration. That area, which sits within the Home Office, is one that I scrutinise very closely, and I will gladly take away her recommendations, because, frankly, I think they are quite good ones.

[Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

The Minister will know that I am unashamedly pro-life. While I strongly welcome the Government’s commitment to ending violence against women and girls, surely that must mean protecting women from harm and coercion in every setting. Given the serious safeguarding concerns and reports of coercion linked to abortion pills by post, will she commit to reviewing that policy to ensure that women are never put at risk?

[Jess Phillips]

The hon. Lady makes a very important point about how women’s health can be used in coercion, especially their fertility—on both sides of the coin: about having an abortion or not having one. She will know that, unlike her, I am positively pro-choice. However, she is absolutely right that, when we look at any changes to abortion legislation in our country, those conversations will absolutely be going on, and all safeguards will be put in place.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

[Mims Davies (East Grinstead and Uckfield) (Con)]

This Government talk about better protection for women and girls while actively passing changes to our sentencing laws that disgracefully mean that more than 90% of grooming offenders and 60% of rapists sent to prison will get their prison time cut. Was there an assessment of the impact of those changes on women and girls specifically? Can the Minister point to a single organisation representing women and girls that supports cutting prison time for sexual assault or grooming to one third of the sentence?

[Jess Phillips]

I will have to go away and check exactly what the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) has said regarding the people who the hon. Lady says will be released, because there are, of course, exceptions—and more exceptions than there were under her Government’s prison release scheme, because people like me and my hon. Friend had oversight of this process and cared about the women involved.

It is absolutely shocking that someone from a Government who oversaw the total collapse of our prison system, where we would not have been able to arrest rapists because there were no places for them in prison, can dare to stand there and suggest that that is something that we should—it is unbelievable that she cannot recognise her own role in this.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Marie Goldman (Chelmsford) (LD)]

I recently met the Centre for Action on Rape and Abuse, also known as CARA, which supports thousands of victims and survivors of sexual violence across Essex, including in my constituency. CARA is concerned about future funding and the need for a stronger focus on tackling sexual violence. Will the Minister confirm that funding for the rape and sexual abuse support fund and independent sexual violence adviser services will continue beyond March 2026, and outline how the Government will prioritise addressing sexual violence?

[Jess Phillips]

The Ministry of Justice, which oversees victims funding, absolutely ringfenced those two sexual violence funds last year to ensure that they were protected. As for future funding, it would be difficult for me to stand here and guarantee anything while the comprehensive spending review is being allocated, but as someone who used to work in one of those services, I find it vanishingly unlikely that they will not be funded in the future.

[Kenneth Stevenson (Airdrie and Shotts) (Lab)]

3. What steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to help increase the female workforce within STEM industries.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Simon Opher (Stroud) (Lab)]

T4. In Stroud, a fantastic volunteer group—the Night Angels, started by Chrissie Lowery—patrols streets and trains to provide safety for young women. Will the Minister support this group and would she like to join us on a patrol, donning the trademark pink fluorescent jacket?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Jess Phillips)]

The Minister for Women and Equalities is already wearing a pink jacket. I absolutely pay tribute to the group in my hon. Friend’s constituency. The Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), who is the Minister with responsibility for tackling violence against women and girls, will be visiting Stroud very soon and has offered to don the pink jacket on our behalf.

[Alison Griffiths (Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) (Con)]

Mr Speaker, last night I was honoured to speak at an event you kindly hosted with the Royal National Institute for Deaf People. I met Craig, the chief executive of Action Deafness, which delivers vital services across my constituency, as well as Stuart, an academic focused on the needs of deaf young people. They told me that deaf people too often navigate support from siloed health, education and welfare systems that create barriers. What steps is the Minister taking to co-ordinate cross-departmental support for deaf people to prevent them from falling between the gaps?

Violence against Women and Girls

Jess Phillips Excerpts

Thursday 9th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mims Davies (East Grinstead and Uckfield) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to be called in this important debate to speak on behalf of His Majesty’s loyal Opposition. I welcome this general debate being called by the Government on such a topical issue as we return to the Chamber in the new year. It is important that there is a significant focus on women and girls being heard in every single community. I agree with the Minister: enough is enough. That is one of the most magnificent campaigns the Home Office could have come up with, and I applaud all those who work in the Department on this important issue and who are focused on protecting women and girls in every nation, region and community.

I heard people being congratulated in business questions on their awards in the new year honours. One of those was Nicole Jacobs, the Domestic Abuse Commissioner, who I had the pleasure of working with, and I know that Ministers will enjoy working with her.

Let us all agree in the Chamber this afternoon and say clearly that we do not accept any abuse directed at us as Members of Parliament, Ministers and people speaking up for women and girls, such as that we have seen in recent days. There are women and girls in our communities who want to know that we are here and are focused on keeping them safe. When it comes to domestic abuse or any kind of criminality aimed at women and girls in our community, criminality is criminality, wherever it is found. Domestic abuse, wherever it is, must continue to be tackled. It cannot remain untackled; it must always be uncovered. I welcome the measures that the Minister outlined in her speech and the strategy, in terms of education, support and the pursuit of justice, particularly in respect of deepfakes and intimate images.

I appreciate the focus on halving violence against women and girls, but that is not enough. Let us focus on pure eradication—that is one thing that those from all parts of the House can agree on. We can equally agree on how wonderful Dawn Dines is. She has led the Stamp Out Spiking campaign and brought such energy to it. In my brief time working in the Department, I wanted to see a focus on an updated spiking law, so let us celebrate with Dawn when that comes through.

We very much welcome the protection orders that have been brought forward. On behalf of my party, I want to thank and applaud all the charities, groups and networks that support survivors and victims, so that there is always someone to turn to. I would like to reiterate that: there is always someone to turn to, so please speak out. All too often, people feel that they will not be heard. Sadly, there is a leap from rhetoric to intimidation and then potentially to violence when it comes into the political arena. We need to ensure that that does not seep down into what victims feel might happen to them if they come forward and speak out.

Our men and young boys are key, as the Minister said. This is a partnership. Everything in life and in the community is a partnership. I have the honour of co-chairing the all-party parliamentary group on men and boys’ issues, and I ask the Minister to update the House on the men and boys ambassador and the ministerial work being done on this.

It is the duty of any Government to keep their citizens safe, and I am proud of the work of the outgoing Conservative Government. We did our utmost to fulfil that job. In the face of the pandemic and the war on our continent, we focused on ensuring that our constituents felt safer and that our commitment to this never wavered. Progress is best made when a Government build on the foundations of the previous one; perhaps this fixing of the foundations is one area that we can agree on. It was therefore a little bit disappointing to see in the Labour manifesto—some of us did read it—that

“For too long, violence against women and girls has been ignored.”

I do not think that is the case, but let us not have 50% of it ignored; let us have the whole lot eradicated. Let us ensure that the voices and the asks of the women and girls in our communities are listened to.

In the last 24 hours there has been a vote on victims of grooming gangs, which was very difficult. We need to set the record straight on why the Opposition are strongly focused on getting agreement that no stone should be left unturned on this issue. The previous Government accepted 18 of the 20 recommendations in the important Jay review, and it is disappointing that the legislation could not be agreed on before the change of Government, although it was put forward in the wash-up—a techie term, for people watching. Ultimately, we wanted to tackle the issue, and my party is again determined to work with the Government to get this moving.

The last Conservative Home Secretary to focus on grooming gangs was my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Fareham and Waterlooville (Suella Braverman), who rightly set up the taskforce that led to 500 further arrests and over 4,000 more victims protected. In all the hubbub of the last day or two, what is important is that the questions of victims and survivors are answered on the recommendations of the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse.

The taskforce set up under the Conservative Government worked with 43 forces in England and Wales on supporting investigations into child sexual exploitation and grooming. It is right to give our police officers on the frontline the support they need to tackle this scandal. The Minister rightly talked about justice, but it must start with coming forward to the police. I completely agree with her: the crucial step of coming forward and saying what has happened is the bravest and hardest thing imaginable for a young child or woman who knows that the people around them should have been protecting them. We need to ensure that the police are there for them.

As a vital next step, let us all agree to collect the data on ethnicity. Let us not shy away from this. Let us get it and share it. This is at the heart of the matter. People feel that political correctness should not hold us back. To protect all victims from sexual abuse and abhorrent crimes, no stone should be unturned. This is further and wider than what IICSA investigated, which is why my party believes that a further-reaching inquiry is urgently needed. There was nothing in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill. As my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) said, nobody in the Chamber should feel that they cannot raise on the Floor of the House, without fear or favour, something that is happening in their constituency. That is what we come here to do.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Jess Phillips)]

No one should ever feel afraid of raising any issue in this Chamber with me or anybody else. To reiterate, the ethnicity data is collected. It was published for the first time in November, and I am not entirely sure why the Opposition keep insisting that it has not been published. To be honest, the data that had started to be collected under their Government is not good enough, and we will be working to improve it, but ethnicity data is collected and published.

[Mims Davies]

I thank the hon. Lady for coming to the Dispatch Box to give that undertaking to the House. Our friend Sajid Javid and others were keen to ensure that that was out there. I am sure that will reassure the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Jess Phillips)]

As a Minister, I get given a speech that I am told to read out, but the hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Sorcha Eastwood) reminded me who I am today, so I am going to give an impassioned speech. The first person I will respond to is the Minister, the hon. Member for East Grinstead and Uckfield (Mims Davies). [Hon. Members: “Shadow Minister!] Sorry, the shadow Minister. No, she is not actually the shadow Minister; the shadow Minister with this brief is not here. The shadow Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp)—he certainly got on the bandwagon—is not here. The shadow Justice Secretary, the right hon. Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), is not here. The Conservatives had to have the same person starting and finishing the debate.

Do you know what? I will give credit to the last Conservative Government for the work that they did. I worked with many Members on the Opposition Benches to carry out lots of that work, but what happened was that loads of brilliant words were written on goatskin and rolled up somewhere in this building. Really good legislation was passed, including the Modern Slavery Act 2015, and the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, which I remember being a Bill, because I worked on it—not that I am jumping on a bandwagon, too. What did not happen was actual, fundamental change on the ground.

Being in this debate has been a little bit like being at my own memorial. My husband said that my house looks like a funeral parlour. The hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) said she was pleased to see that my gumption has not gone away; I am indeed very much not dead.

I have had lots and lots of correspondence from grooming victims—some I have known for years, and some got in touch with me freshly to ask for help with their case, which of course we will provide—and lots of child abuse survivors. I will read out something that a child abuse victim sent me in the last few days:

“I’m a victim and survivor, and I gave evidence to the IICSA inquiry. I am angry at the lack of response.”

He goes on to say:

“We haven’t resourced the police, the courts, victim support, therapies, schools, councils, and I am angry that men, by and large, have turned this into a political football.”

Lots of good words have been written on goatskin in this place. The hon. Member for Richmond Park said that cuts have meant that panic alarms have not been put in place and so forth. My hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Jess Asato) mentioned some of the cuts in her area; lots of people mentioned the issue. Do you know what has actually happened? It is harder than it has ever been for a grooming victim to get a house in this country—a place of safety where she can get away from the grooming, whether it be for sexual exploitation or county lines criminal grooming, in which we see terrible cases of knife crime. We could have amended the Domestic Abuse Act to give domestic abuse victims priority need. I pushed the amendment myself. Cracking! But it would have put them on a seven-year-long priority need waiting list.

As for the Conservatives’ record on the courts and the criminal justice system, lots of Members have graciously talked about SDS40 today. The shadow Minister mentioned it at the beginning of the debate. All I can say is that we—many of the people sat behind me, as well as the victims Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), and the Home Secretary—worked tirelessly to make sure that this time, when it had to be done because of the terrible failures of the last 14 years, we put some exemptions into the system. I do not remember that happening before.

As the victims Minister mentioned, the absolute degradation of our justice system over the last 14 years has left rape victims waiting seven years. People can jump on the bandwagon, and can speak in this building on the subject—I welcome every single word that has been said—but it is action that is needed. “We accepted 18 of the recommendations.” Cracking! I have “accepted” that I am a size 10, but it is not fact. Accepting something does not make it so; it does not change things in people’s actual lives. That is my response to the first speech.

The Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Luton North (Sarah Owen), mentioned Gisèle Pelicot. Many Members mentioned issues affecting women around the world, and we do not serve women in this country if we ignore the plight of women around the world. Gisèle Pelicot deserves to be the person of the year, or the century. What a woman! We have all watched what she has done with absolute pride.

Like me, the hon. Member for North East Hampshire (Alex Brewer) came to this place from the sector; it makes me very happy every time that happens. She talked about the femicide data and the sticky nature of the list of names that I read out in this place every year—my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Chris Vince) said that it is also read out in Harlow.

The hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Helen Maguire) talked about a case in her constituency that will go on this year’s list, which has not yet been read out. My hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington), similarly, mentioned the murders on Christmas day in her constituency. I am not willing to keep that list long.

The Government have talked about the metrics by which we will measure change. Of course, I want to get rid of domestic violence and violence against women and girls completely, and I love the suggestion that halving it is unambitious, but I do not remember a previous target. There was no target. Femicide will absolutely be part of the targets. The murder of women by men will absolutely be something that we target and measure, because we count what we care about in this country.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Charlotte Nichols) said, focusing on perpetrators is vital. We are working with the police to develop a national framework, using data-driven tools and algorithms, to track and target high-harm offenders. For too long, we have looked only at victims. It is about time we really started to target offenders.

I will calm myself down for a moment. The right hon. Member for Staffordshire Moorlands (Dame Karen Bradley) said that when she stands up in the House to scrutinise our work—she did not say “criticise,” but that was the intimation—it should be taken in good faith, just as she always showed good faith when under scrutiny from me and my sisters. That is absolutely how the scrutiny will be received. She has a record to be proud of on both modern slavery and domestic abuse. She took a cross-Government approach to her work on violence against women and girls, and that iteration of the strategy was considerably better, and attempted to do much more, than the one that came later. I promise that my door will always be open to her.

The right hon. Lady talked about welcoming Raneem’s law. That legislation is inspired by a woman close to my heart who comes from Solihull—the neighbouring constituency, close to where I live—whose sister was murdered. When they rang 999, they got no response, so we will embed advice on risk assessments in 999 control rooms, not just make sure that there is somebody there who cares. The measures will ensure that there is real speciality in teams, so that victims are referred to appropriate services, not just given the emergency response that they need. We will seek to put dedicated domestic abuse teams in every police force in the country.

A number of Members talked about domestic abuse protection orders in their areas; I see the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Luke Taylor) in his place. Domestic abuse protection orders are a good example of walking the walk, rather than talking the talk. The legislation was passed four years ago, but absolutely nothing was done. Then we took office, and set up schemes that are delivering arrests and custody for people who breach the orders. I suggested to the Home Secretary that we might ring a bell for every arrest we get during the pilot. It is all well and good writing words on goatskin, but they do not put people behind bars, or ensure that victims do not ever have to enter a courtroom to get somebody behind bars. That is the outcome we were all striving for, and that is what we have delivered.

When I became a Minister, I felt I may have left a Jess-shaped hole to be filled by somebody who would always hold to account the person standing at the Dispatch Box. I cannot think of anybody better to fill that Jess-shaped hole than my hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft. She talked about funding; I want her to never stop moaning about that. Apart from the funding from Refuge, it is not okay that grants for the work she talked about come solely from the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice, which are represented on the Front Bench by Ministers. It is not okay that health services across the country do not fundamentally take on this work.

We are grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch (Katrina Murray) for her beautiful and impassioned speech, but it is not okay that looking at welfare is not a fundamental part of the duty of jobcentres in every part of the country. As many hon. Members have said, domestic abuse affects so many areas of the life of those affected, and just 10% of women affected get a criminal justice response. As my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum), who is a brilliant advocate on this issue, said, working across Government is the only way to tackle violence against women and girls, and that is exactly what we will do.

I am running out of time. Before the hon. Member for South West Devon (Rebecca Smith) took her seat, her predecessor, Sir Gary Streeter, came to me and said, “You will love the woman who I think will replace me—she’s an absolute cracker.” He was not wrong. She talked about a terrible incident in her area, and she led a local response—essentially, an inquiry—that led to recommendations that changed things on the ground. Well done on that, because that is what works.

I want to make special mention of the deft manner in which my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Paul Waugh) spoke, and I also want to mention Sara Rowbotham, the whistleblower in the Rochdale case. Hon. Members do not need to look in Hansard to see if I have referred to this case before; I wrote a book six years ago about Sara Rowbotham being a whistleblower in Rochdale. She is one of the bravest and best people I have ever worked with. As for the Johnny-come-lately shadow Justice Secretary, I look forward to reading the book he is writing on the subject.

I am about to run out of time. I just want to say a massive thank you to everybody who spoke; I am sorry I have not been able to mention them all. I cannot stress enough that the thing that matters is making something actually happen. As for waving flags, that time is over.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the matter of tackling violence against women and girls.