Criminal Jurors

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Wednesday 6th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

To the last part of that question, as I have just said, the Government are extremely reluctant to qualify in any way the right of all citizens to be tried by a peer group of 12 good and true, whatever their background or walk of life, so the answer to the Roskill suggestion is no. As to the possibility of the option of being tried by a jury, a judge alone or a judge and two assessors, for example, that is not in contemplation by this Government for the same reason.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble and learned Lord opposite raised the question of accommodation for jurors in circumstances in which they operate within the courts. What consideration is being given to the position of witnesses, some of whom may be traumatised by what they are being required to do, or traumatised by other witnesses in the case? Is there sufficient being done to ensure that they have somewhere quiet, safe and secure where they feel they can wait to be called in evidence?

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord raises a very good point. Witnesses obviously form an essential part of the system. I can tell your Lordships that the witness support service has made great strides in recent years in making sure that witnesses are properly looked after and briefed as to what to expect. It is a completely different situation from what it was 20 or 30 years ago.

Prisons: Education

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Thursday 23rd March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

Staffing levels are a continuing problem, but full-time equivalent prison officers have increased by 3,677 between 2016 and December 2022; it now stands at 21,632. In the Government’s view, there is no problem with the quality of our existing providers. The challenges of prison education are evident to all, and the Government are doing their best to tackle them.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, when I conducted the review into self-inflicted deaths in prison some years ago, a very substantial issue arose about the cancellation of education sessions simply because there were insufficient staff to transport prisoners to education venues within prisons or, alternatively, because prisons were locked down. What proportion of education sessions do not go ahead for the reasons I have described? If those statistics are not collected, could the Minister explain why this rather important performance indicator is not looked at?

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, I cannot give the noble Lord the information he rightly seeks, but I will see if I can. Attendance at classes is an ongoing issue. It is sometimes due to staff shortages. We have introduced new KPIs for prison governors which include attendance, among other things, so I hope to see improvement in this area.

Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Saturday 10th September 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shipley (LD)]

My Lords, like many, I remember watching the Queen’s Coronation in 1953 on a small black and white television. As we have heard, the world today is very different from the world of that post-war period. But, although it has changed dramatically, the values of our society have remained constant, as our new King reminded us last night. The Queen promoted those values through her absolute commitment to parliamentary government, through her dedication and sense of service, through her loyalty and through her resilience.

Among her many achievements, two stand out for me. First, she was our Head of State, with a clear constitutional role. She was an extremely successful Head of State, understanding the requirements and limitations of the role. But, in truth, she was something more: she was the head of our nation. She reflected us—our country, our people and our society—and she knew when to provide support, such as in the recent pandemic. She had the gift of being able to bring people together—witness her visits to Germany and Ireland and the symbolic importance that those visits had.

Secondly, when she sensed a need for change, she made it happen—for example, in managing our transition from Empire to the Commonwealth, whose current strength owes so much to her leadership, as we have heard. She became the most widely travelled Head of State in the world, which I feel is a tribute to her resolution to build the Commonwealth.

Her Majesty visited my home city of Newcastle upon Tyne on many occasions to undertake official engagements. I remember her opening Eldon Square shopping centre on her Silver Jubilee in 1977 and distributing the royal Maundy money in St Nicholas Cathedral in 1990. She opened several of Tyneside’s major infrastructure projects, such as the Metro and the A1 western bypass. She also opened our new city library and the Great North Museum. In Gateshead in recent years, she opened the Gateshead Millennium Bridge and Sage Gateshead. I was present at many of these visits and several things stood out: her genuine interest in what she was seeing, her desire to learn from those she was meeting and, when she did walkabouts in the city centre, the happiness with which she was greeted by the thousands of people who had made the journey to welcome her. I remember their cheering, the flags and the flowers, which always made for a memorable occasion.

When her father died, the Queen promised to devote her life to the service of our country, but, as the King pointed out last night, it was her personal commitment that defined her life. It was not just a promise; it was 70 years of personal commitment. So we express our profound sorrow on Her Majesty the Queen’s death. We thank her for her lifetime of service and achievement. To our new King, we express our loyalty and support.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Warsi (Con)]

My Lords—

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, I am sorry for that slightly unseemly moment.

There have been many fine tributes and I am sure that there will be many more from all corners of the House. That reflects the way in which we have all been touched by the life of Her Majesty the late Queen. We have all suffered a loss but, until Thursday evening, I had not appreciated how much of a loss was felt around the world. I happened to be in Rotterdam at an international conference and I noted the number of delegates from all corners of the world who came up to express their condolences, in a way that reflected the fact that they recognised that, for someone from this country, this was a personal loss, like that of a family member. But, as they spoke, they also talked about their own sense of loss, because the Queen touched all of their lives, all around the world.

Continuity and permanence were part of what it was all about—the noble Baroness mentioned the words of President Macron. So what do we all remember about Her late Majesty? First, there are those acts of unsung kindness, such as the daffodils delivered, without any publicity, to hospital staff rooms during Covid.

Above all, I think that we most remember that mischievous twinkle. Theresa May has probably stolen the market with her anecdote about the cheese, but I too have a cheese anecdote, although it happened not to me but to a senior police officer, who found himself sitting next to the Queen at a small dinner at Sandringham. As is often the case, towards the end of the meal, a very large Stilton slowly circulated around the guests. In it was a spoon, with which you were supposed to dig in and that was your portion. So he dug in, but he could not detach the Stilton from the spoon. He tried more and more forcefully, until it flew off, and he decided that he would give up and pass the Stilton on. It reached the Queen and, looking him firmly in the eye, she dug the spoon in and then demonstrated that, when you pressed a little button on the side of it, the Stilton dropped out. That twinkle remained with him for ever.

We have all had our experiences and I think that we should limit ourselves to two anecdotes a speech at most. My personal anecdote is about when I was a council leader and, at the request of the children, the Queen came to a primary school in my borough. She had visited around 30 years before, when the school was reopened after it had been bombed in the Second World War. But it then suffered a fire and, when work on it was completed, the children wrote to the palace. I am very touched that she decided to visit. I was just a bystander, watching the way in which she arrived, engaged and so on. Of course, the children made presentations: first they gave a bunch of flowers, then there was a concert and then the Queen was presented with a papier-mâché crown, the best description of which would be of the exuberance with which it had clearly been put together. The twinkle with which the Queen received it, thanked the children and then spent far longer than her attendants had expected talking to and playing with the children was remarkable.

Several people have asked how we will, or should, remember Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth. A number of noble Lords have talked about “Elizabeth the Great” or “Elizabeth the Good”. There are other suggestions and one I particularly like is “Elizabeth the Dutiful”. But for me and, I suspect, for many other people, it will be as the Queen with the mischievous twinkle—not just for us but particularly for the children.

[Baroness Warsi (Con)]

My Lords, it is an honour to follow the noble Lord, Lord Harris—I had had an indication that I was apparently due to speak before him.

There is a great tradition in Muslim communities of a 40-day period of mourning at the passing of a close family member. That period is spent, among other things, reminiscing, remembering and recounting stories of the deceased; it is part of the grieving process. So today I wish to recount a few short stories of Her late Majesty.

In 1977, at the age of six in a small town in Yorkshire, I celebrated the Silver Jubilee. The school had decided that the way we were going to do that was to dress up as Liquorice Allsorts—I have still not worked out why. So there I was, dressed in a box with pink and black stripes, marching around the town. For six year-old me, the Queen was a distant, magical, almost mythical figure, removed from my life in that Yorkshire town. Years later, in 2010, then in my late 30s, I joined the Cabinet and attended my first meeting of the Privy Council. This was my journey, but it was also one of many journeys that played out during Her late Majesty’s reign and an example of what was possible during it and how this country had changed.

On Thursday evening, as the sad news of the Queen’s passing came through, my daughter called me. As with Her Majesty, she is the first woman in our family to serve in uniform, and she reminded me that we both had had the privilege of working for Her Majesty—she had been our boss. For that, we will both always be grateful. In time and for future generations, Her late Majesty will become a historical figure, but, for us, she will for ever remain someone whom we had the honour of serving.

I want finally to mention pets. I never grew up with pets in our working class, mill-working parents’ home. They had enough mouths to feed with their children. It left me with a lifelong fear of animals. So when I was invited to a small lunch at Windsor Castle and found myself in the company of the Queen and her corgis, I am not sure who struck fear in me most. My face must have reflected my racing heartbeat and my sweating palms. In the way that many noble Lords have reflected on today, in that very human and warm way, the Queen sensed my anxiety, smiled, engaged me in conversation and put me at ease. She also left me in no doubt that, although I was her invited lunch guest, the corgis came first.

Yesterday at Friday prayers, mosques up and down the country held prayers and paid their respects to our departed monarch. She was a friend of Muslim communities, both here in the United Kingdom and across the world. The tributes that have poured in are testament to that. So in line with Islamic tradition, I say this. Verily we belong to God and verily to him do we return. May her journey hereon be one of ease and her eternal final destination be one of peace. Long live the King.

Prisons: Death Statistics

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Wednesday 30th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, prison chaplains do a lot of very good work. They are astute at looking out for signs of prisoners who are at greater risk of self-inflicted harm, but that is something that prison officers are doing as well. We have put in place a strategy to identify on a prisoner-by-prisoner basis those who are at higher risk, and we focus more on them.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, it is almost seven years to the day since I submitted to the Minister’s department a report on the self-inflicted deaths of young people in the prison estate. Since then, all the figures seem to have got worse. An increasing number of people are self-harming. What has been done in the intervening seven years, primarily to stop young men entering the criminal justice system and to ensure that, when they are in prison, they are properly supported, supervised and advised? That is what is lacking.

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, I am sure the Prisons Minister will be familiar with the document; I confess that I am not. However, with respect, it is not right to say that the number of self-harming incidents has gone up. In the female estate, it is right to say that the rate of self-harm is higher than it was pre-pandemic; in the male estate, it is lower. Therefore, one has to look at the figures carefully.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

3rd reading
Tuesday 25th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

My Lords, my amendment would leave out Clause 80. The clause is consequential on a new clause from the Government that this House declined by a Division last week to add to the Bill. That new clause introduced the offence of “interference with use or operation of key national infrastructure”. What is now Clause 80 should surely not have been moved following that vote; it provides background detail for a power and a clause that do not exist. It starts off, for example, by saying:

“This section has effect for the purposes of section (Interference with use or operation of key national infrastructure)”,


and goes on to define types of national infrastructure for the purpose of the Government’s new clause to which this House disagreed. My amendment would thus remove that non-operational clause from the Bill. I understand that the Government will not be opposing this necessary tidying-up amendment, and I thank the noble Baroness the Minister for that. I beg to move.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, I want to make the very simple point that even if the Government were not going to accept the amendment, the clause would be pretty nonsensical due to the very strange way in which it defines “national infrastructure”. It has a unique set of definitions that includes some things that would not normally be regarded as infrastructure and excludes other things that are critical to the nation and the way it operates.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, who has explained that the amendment would remove Clause 80 from the Bill. It defines “key national infrastructure” for the purposes of the Government’s proposed offence of interfering with the operation or use of key national infrastructure. Of course, I was extremely disappointed that the House voted not to add this new offence to the Bill on Report. The proposed offence would help protect the British public from the misery that certain individuals targeting our key national infrastructure have been able to cause.

The Government fully defend the right to peaceful protest, but we stand behind the British public in protecting them from the serious disruption caused by some who think their right to protest trumps the rights of the public to go about their daily lives. That said, the fact remains that as your Lordships did not support the introduction of the new offence, we are not going to play games: what is now Clause 80 of the Bill is redundant, and, consequently, the Government will not oppose this amendment.

Covid-19: Impact on the Prison System

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Monday 22nd March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, first, I pay tribute to the work the chaplaincy organisation does. Chaplains from all faiths do important work in our prisons. They have been there during the pandemic, and that is much appreciated. So far as vaccination is concerned, we follow the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s recommendations on priority groups. Prisons have now been given permission to vaccinate all those in cohort 9, meaning everyone aged 50 and over. Noble Lords will be aware that the age range of the prison population is different from that of the population generally.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab) [V]]

This month, the director of public health for Derbyshire confirmed that high rates of Covid infection in the dales are entirely attributable to the significant outbreak at HMP Sudbury. Indeed, nine of the country’s 10 worst surges in Covid are occurring in areas around prisons with outbreaks. The Minister did not really respond to the right reverend Prelate’s reference to the independent advisory board, which has repeatedly warned the Lord Chancellor that it is unsafe to require unvaccinated prison officers to escort prisoners with Covid to hospital in handcuffs or to require prisoners to share small, poorly ventilated cells with someone who has the virus. That advice has been ignored. This is endangering not only those on the prison estate but those in the surrounding communities where prison officers live. Why?

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, I do not want to repeat what has been said, but on vaccinations we are following the approach of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, which we consider appropriate. The action we have taken in prisons has meant that the number of deaths seen in them is significantly lower than the approximately 2,700 deaths modelled by Public Health England last spring. There is rigorous testing in all our prisons and we do everything to make sure that there is no transmission of the virus into or out of them.

Prisons: Self-harm Among Women Prisoners

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Monday 15th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, my noble friend raises an important point. We are working to improve the availability of social work in prisons. She will be aware, of course, that at the moment all prisons are hampered by the Covid-19 pandemic in what they can provide. However, for example, we have been able to reintroduce chaplaincy into prisons at a very significant level, and the relevant authorities are trying to ensure that all services, including social workers, can be reintroduced as well.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the levels of reported self-harm are extremely concerning. Five and half years ago my review, Changing Prisons, Saving Lives, found that the despair that led to self-harm and suicide was exacerbated by prisoners being isolated without access to purposeful activity and sufficient contact with their families. Over the last year, what proportion of time have women prisoners been on regimes that meant that they were locked in their cells for 23 hours or more a day? What has been the impact of Covid on the number of face-to-face contacts they have had with their families?

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

The noble Lord asked two questions. On the first point, during the Covid pandemic, prison estates have tried to put in regimes which are as generous as possible given the surrounding circumstances. He will be aware, like everybody in this House, that those circumstances have changed rapidly from time to time, so the figures are not available because the data cannot accurately capture that constantly changing picture. So far as contact with family members is concerned, we have doubled the amount of phone credit given to prisoners, and we have introduced “purple visits”—video calls—so that prisoners can see their families and loved ones as well.

Prison Safety

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd May 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulks]

The Government are well aware of the profound difficulties for prisoners with various forms of mental illness. I think NICE has estimated that 90% of prisoners have some form of mental illness. It is a matter for NHS England to provide the appropriate facilities, but all prisons should make sure that these are available so far as possible. As to the question of assessment when prisoners arrive, NOMS has reviewed its assessment process to ensure that those at risk are properly assessed and appropriate steps are taken to try to deal with the risks that they represent.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for his reference to the review that I led, although I must say as the review’s author that the Government’s response read like a rejection of its central recommendation. The Minister talked about the welcome increase of 440, I think, prison officers. What are the projections for numbers, because 440 means that at any one time there may be one extra prison officer supervising 600 or more prisoners? Given that at the moment prisoners cannot be guaranteed an escort to take them to their psychiatric appointments within the prison and there is no guarantee that planned activities will take place because of staff shortages, surely the Government need to do better than 440.

[Lord Faulks]

As to the noble Lord’s first point, the Government accepted 62 of the 108 recommendations, and a further 12 are being considered alongside the reforms. Those that they did not accept were very useful and are part of the Government’s forward thinking. As to the question of staff, we are continuing our drive to attract more prison officers. We accepted in full the Prison Service Pay Review Body recommendation, which we hope will be an encouragement, although attracting prison officers to work in the south-east is difficult because of the challenges of accommodation. There is real commitment by a number of people to join the Prison Service; they have our admiration, and we hope that we can attract more to do this important work.

Prison Reform

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Tuesday 15th March 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulks]

The Government are always anxious to find out why we imprison so many people. Of course, imprisoning is done by judges, not by government. We believe that the way to reduce the prison population is to tackle reoffending. Fifty per cent of adult prisoners are reconvicted within one year and 60% in less than 12 months. We aim to get to grips with that reoffending, and that will reduce the prison population.

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, does not that answer indicate precisely why the Government have a problem? If those are the reoffending figures, why is that happening? Is it not true that there are simply insufficient staff in our prisons to escort prisoners to, for example, needed mental health appointments, to the classes for which they are booked or indeed to the exercise and other facilities that would enable them to go along the path towards rehabilitation? How will that rehabilitation take place?

[Lord Faulks]

In the last year we have recruited 2,250 new prison officers—a net increase of 440—and we are continuing to recruit at that rate. We have given prison officers all that they have asked for in terms of the recommended rate of pay. We very much applaud prison officers in the very difficult task that they have to perform, and I am sure that all noble Lords will join me in offering their condolences to the family and friends of Adrian Ismay, a prison officer from Belfast, who unfortunately died today.

Prison Reform

Lord Harris of Haringey Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Harris of Haringey (Lab)]

My Lords, I think that the whole House owes a debt of gratitude to the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, not only for securing this debate but for what has, frankly, been a brilliant speech and exposition of the issues that the prison service faces and, potentially, some of the solutions.

I cannot declare an interest as having written extensively for the Times, as I appreciate that that is clearly an important qualification for considering these matters, but last year I submitted to the Government the independent review of the deaths of young people in prisons, Changing Prisons, Saving Lives. It was commissioned by a former Minister for Prisons and the Government’s response was published in December, just as the House of Commons rose for its Christmas Recess.

That review was probably the most comprehensive independent examination of penal policy for a generation. It was rooted in an enormous volume of evidence and research, and underpinned by a detailed analysis of the tragic cases of 87 young people who died in prison between April 2007 and the end of 2013. Since then, there have been a further 29 self-inflicted deaths of young people in NOMS custody. Each of those deaths represents a failure by the state to protect the young people concerned—a breach of Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The failure is all the greater because the same criticisms occur time and time again. As the noble Lord, Lord Fowler, said more generally about prisons policy, the lessons have not been learnt and not enough has been done to bring about substantive change.

Our conclusion in the review was that all young adults in custody are vulnerable. Some have had chaotic lives and complex histories; others have been subjected to child abuse, exposed to violence or repeated bereavement; many have been in foster or residential care; and their vulnerability is often further compounded by mental health issues or lack of maturity.

Let us be clear. Prisons and young offender institutions are grim environments, bleak and demoralising to the spirit. When that is coupled with impoverished regimes, it makes the experience of being in prison particularly damaging to developing young adults. Quite frankly, the experience is not conducive to rehabilitation. Therefore, I welcome in the introduction to the Government’s response to the review that I led the ringing declarations by the Secretary of State for Justice, Michael Gove, about the primary purpose of prison being rehabilitation.

So, after those fine words at the beginning of the introduction to the Government’s response, it was disappointing that 33 of the central recommendations in the review were rejected outright. That included the fundamental concept at the heart of the review: that there should be a suitably trained professional who has personal responsibility for the journey of each individual prisoner through the prison system—what we called a custody and rehabilitation officer. That person would have a caseload small enough for him or her to know each of the prisoners for whom they were responsible and a caseload that would enable them to ensure that the health, social welfare, security, education, training and rehabilitation needs of that individual were adequately addressed during that time in prison.

Frankly, it is difficult to see how the rehabilitation revolution to which Michael Gove has committed himself can be achieved without someone ensuring and owning what happens to the individual prisoner during their period in the prison system. I feel that this is a major missed opportunity and will mean that many lives continue to be wasted by a prison system that fails to find what Winston Churchill, when he was responsible for the prison system in 1910, called the,

“curative and regenerating processes … in the heart of every man”.

When the review was submitted to Ministers I wrote that:

“Those who ignore the lessons of past failures are condemned to repeat them. And that will be the fate of policy-makers who fail to act on the proposals that we are putting forward.”

Quite frankly, much more needs to be done to support young adults before and after they come into contact with the criminal justice system. In the 87 tragic cases that we examined, many of the young people’s problems and vulnerabilities, including their mental health issues, had been evident from an early age, so why did so many of them end up in custody? There needs to be much earlier and much more effective intervention. That requires a cross-governmental input to address the multifaceted problems and needs of children and young adults and to ensure that their problems are identified and effectively addressed at an early stage, comparable perhaps to the approach of the troubled families programme—targeted and concerted support.

If the Government are serious about the changes in prison policy that have been signalled by the Secretary of State, I welcome that. But we have to make sure that we intervene early enough to divert people from ever entering the criminal justice system and, for those who do, that someone takes personal responsibility to make sure that the rehabilitation that we all want to see takes place.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Faulks) (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Fowler for introducing this important debate and all noble Lords for contributing to it. There is a great deal of expertise in your Lordships’ House on this subject. As the noble Lord, Lord McNally, pointed out, a number of noble Lords contribute not just to debates but to reports, and by chairing committees. There is no lack of interest and, it is remarkable to report, a considerable consensus apparent in the House across all parties and among those of no party. I can report that the Secretary of State, who has received several plaudits for his endeavours so far, reads carefully the debates in your Lordships’ House, so everything that has been said will be noted by him. I will not respond in detail to all the many suggestions that have been made, but suffice it to say that the five points emphasised by my noble friend Lord Fowler received widespread support, and I find no difficulty in supporting any of them myself.

There are some positives about prisons as well as the litany of negatives that have been pointed out by so many of your Lordships. It is important to bear in mind the invaluable work undertaken in prisons. We have many dedicated prison officers and governors working in difficult and often dangerous conditions. They strive to help offenders lead better and safer lives, and they take their duties to prisoners and to the public very seriously. I am shortly to visit their training establishment to gain a better understanding of the challenges they face and the training they receive. It is about not just prison officers but a whole host of professions, from psychologists to teachers and career advisers. There are also many from the voluntary sector. We should not neglect the charitable and voluntary sector for all it does for prisoners, a matter referred to by my noble friend Lord Farmer. But there are undoubtedly many challenges that face us.

It is helpful that the current political situation does not lead one to believe that there is any sort of arms race between the parties as to who can be tougher on crime. I think we have left those days behind. What we can all agree on is that reoffending has simply been too high for too long. Although the overall reoffending rate has come down slightly over the past decade, 45% of all adult prisoners reoffend within one year of release, with the figure rising to 59% for those serving sentences of under 12 months. The figures are significantly higher than for those who serve non-custodial sentences.

Perhaps I may pause briefly to say that although the current Secretary of State has received some qualified approval, his predecessor did not on the whole receive such approval in your Lordships’ House. However, I pay tribute to him for all he did on the Transforming Rehabilitation strategy. A number of noble Lords made the point that those who serve sentences of less than 12 months are particularly likely to reoffend. They used to be allowed to leave prison with £46 in their pocket and it was no surprise that they immediately reverted to their old habits. Under the stewardship of the Secretary of State, the previous coalition Government brought in a system whereby all those offenders received support in the community from the probation service and before they left prison to enable them to rebuild their lives as best they could. That was a brave initiative and it is one that we should pay tribute to the previous Secretary of State for introducing.

To help prisoners leave custody, we need our prison officers to be able to work in an environment which is suited to supporting offenders. However, our current prison estate is ageing, inefficient and ineffective at doing that. There are numerous “dark corners” which facilitate bullying, drug-taking and violence, and, within prisons, violence towards prisoners and prison staff is increasing. In the last year, serious assaults have risen by a third and, tragically, 95 prisoners have taken their own lives while in custody. While referring to deaths in custody, I pay tribute to the impressive and thorough report produced by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, and we have accepted a considerable number of the recommendations made in it. He mentioned particularly the identification of a custody and rehabilitation officer who would be responsible for each offender. I understand entirely what drives the suggestion, but, notwithstanding the wisdom that lies behind it, the Ministry of Justice believes that it could undermine the concept that reducing the risk of suicide is a key part of the role of all prison staff. Our philosophy is that every contact matters and every individual matters. Of course, the noble Lord will know, as will the House, that the death of a prisoner is not only a tragedy for that prisoner and their family, but also very destructive to the morale of those who work in prisons. All prison officers should be concerned for the welfare of each individual.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for responding. The point of the custody and rehabilitation officer is not to get away from the concept that everyone should be responsible for the security and safety of an individual. It is to create someone who would take personal responsibility for ensuring that the journey of a prisoner through the prison system, particularly in relation to rehabilitation, so that it is owned by an individual who makes sure that that journey happens and that the right solutions are found for each person. That is what I think is being lost and is what will undermine the Secretary of State’s desire to bring about a rehabilitation revolution.

[Lord Faulks]

I do not disagree with the objectives outlined in the suggestion; rather it is simply about how they can best be achieved. But the identification of the desire for continuity is of course important.

I was saying that one of the problems we must confront is the use of psychoactive substances, known as legal highs. Their use has been plainly linked with specific acts of violence and erratic behaviour, as referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Marks. This and the previous Government have already introduced measures to tackle the use of these substances, including the use of specialist dogs to search cells, and we are currently exploring the use of body scanners to reduce the threat posed by drugs being smuggled into prisons. This is a problem being confronted not only in prisons in this country but elsewhere throughout the world. It is proving particularly intractable, but it is vital that we do so. Despite the tireless efforts of all those working in our prisons, these issues, which were identified by many noble Lords, cannot be ignored. The Secretary of State has made it clear that our prison system is in need of reform. It fails to rehabilitate and it fails to ensure that criminals are prevented from offending again. Without reform, this cycle will continue.

What changes are we making? A key aspect of these reforms is the proposed changes to the prison estate itself. We will close down ageing and ineffective prisons, replacing them with buildings fit for today’s estate. We will invest in a high-quality modern prison estate, with appropriate facilities for training and rehabilitation. This is receiving enthusiasm across government. Some £1.3 billion will be invested to reform and modernise the prison estate to make it more efficient, safer and focused on supporting prisoner rehabilitation. The Chancellor announced that the Government will build nine new modern prisons, five of which will open during this Parliament, with better education facilities—as referred to earlier this week in a debate answered by my noble friend Lady Evans, which I shall not go into now—and other rehabilitative services, while selling ageing and inefficient prisons to free up land for new homes.

This includes the closing of Holloway prison. The female prisoners held there will be transferred to better prison environments, including HMP Downview, which we will reopen as a women’s prison. Downview provides better facilities for family visits as well as being a better rehabilitative environment for women. I do not in any way disparage what was achieved in Holloway, which I visited, because it was a remarkable prison. However, we feel that we can do better.

A number of noble Lords, among them the noble Lord, Lord Judd, and the noble Baroness, Lady Healy of Primrose Hill, mentioned the problem of women in prison. In 10 years of sitting as a recorder, I always found reasons not to send women to prison and I can hardly remember ever doing so. I am glad to say that the female prison population is now consistently under 4,000 for the first time in a decade. We are modernising the prison estate to provide the best rehabilitative regimes and hold women in environments better suited to them. We want to ensure that they serve their sentences in appropriate surroundings and to maintain their strong family ties. My noble friend Lord Farmer made the point that family ties are vital to assisting rehabilitation not only for women but for all the prison population.

Of course, it is not just the structure of the estate that we need to reform, but how we manage offenders. I entirely agree with my noble friend Lord Fowler that prison is a place where people are sent as punishment, not for further punishment. If we ensure that prisons are calm, orderly and purposeful places—I entirely accept that there is a need for more purposeful activity—the skills and habits that they acquire there will prepare them for outside life. We can all benefit from that.

The Secretary of State clearly set out his commitment to “liberating offenders through learning”. Prisoners must use their time in prison advantageously. We must offer them a chance to obtain qualifications and skills—I note what the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, said about that. I welcome the opportunity to visit prisons where that is going on: it is a vital part of the Government’s reform agenda.

We know that one in five prisons has an “inadequate” standard of education provision and two in five require improvement, according to Ofsted. That is why we have commissioned Dame Sally Coates to chair a review into the quality of education in prisons, which will report in the spring. Talking of reporting, of course I accept what the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, said: Mr Hardwick is there to provide an independent report to the Government on the state of prisons. That is important for him and his successor, and we should be able to take criticism robustly and respond appropriately. Their independence is crucial.

While the review by Sally Coates is going on, work is under way to improve the quality of learning and skills provision in prison. These measures include improving support for prisoners with learning disabilities—unfortunately, many have them— developing more creative teaching methods and collecting better management information. Giving poorly educated adults a basic level of literacy and numeracy is vital, following tried and tested methods, and the current failure to educate prisoners well is hard to defend. I do not think the House will need much convincing about the Secretary of State’s attachment to the importance of education.

Meaningful employment is crucial. It is a vital part of the Government’s approach to support those who have committed a crime to get out of the cycle of offending. We are keen to increase the number of employers who engage with prisoners and offenders to offer them employment opportunities. We hold an Employers’ Forum for Reducing Re-offending, chaired by the CEO of Timpson, James Timpson, which brings together employers who support the employment of offenders to share their experiences and promote the benefits of employing offenders to other businesses. We have built a relationship with several employers, including Halfords, which provides work for prisoners in its academy, which is run in a prison and employs the prisoners on release if they positively engage on their 16-week course. I have had several conversations with the Prisons Minister, Andrew Selous, who is particularly keen on and pleased with the progress that has been made in this regard.

We are also anxious that there should be greater autonomy at a local level for prisoners—a point made by my noble friend Lord Fowler and the noble Lord, Lord Beith, with his considerable experience of justice issues. That is a form of localism in the Prison Service. The noble Lord made the interesting point that Texas has brought about a strange consensus between the political parties on the way forward in that regard.

I could respond on the issue of IPP prisoners at considerable length; unfortunately, I do not have time to do that. Suffice it to say that we are progressing well in the number of courses available to IPP prisoners. We are also in the process of reducing the backlog for hearings before the Parole Board. As I told a number of noble Lords at a recent meeting, there remains the question of the Secretary of State’s powers to change the test for release. That is a matter which he continues to consider carefully. I will make sure that I faithfully transmit all messages from this House and noble Lords about the need to do something about that.

The points of the noble Lord, Lord Bradley, were well made. We are aware of the importance of reviewing the working of ROTL and liaison and diversion services. The Secretary of State has well in mind a possible wider review of sentencing. Similarly, several noble Lords, including my noble friend Lord Cormack, emphasised the importance of restorative justice.

Finally, my noble friend Lord Trefgarne rightly drew our attention to the plight of older prisoners, who are becoming a particular, somewhat unusual, feature of the prison population. That is partly to do with so many offenders having been committed for ancient offences of sexual abuse and the like. All prisoners, regardless of age, need to be treated in a humane manner that reflects their needs. That is a matter we should attend to particularly carefully.

I am grateful to all those who have taken part in this excellent debate and to my noble friend Lord Fowler for initiating it. The Secretary of the State and the Ministry of Justice will have learnt a great deal from it.