Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Lords Hansard - part one & Committee stage
Wednesday 27th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I rise to support the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, taking us back to very late on Monday night, if the Minister remembers, when we were discussing Clause 15, on the disclosure of information. The Minister—I think, from memory, although it was late—implied that the disclosure of information was voluntary and that the clause was there simply to facilitate the disclosure of information. In challenging the Minister in that, I quoted from Clause 17.

I can be brief. Clause 17 enables the Secretary of State, if satisfied that a specified authority, educational authority or youth custody authority has failed to comply with the duties to collaborate or disclose information—including, presumably, sensitive personal information and information covered by a duty of confidentiality—to direct the authority to comply and enforce her direction through a mandatory order. That is what Clause 17 says.

I have already explained at length why professionals should use their professional judgment—as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, just said—within existing policies, procedures, practices and protocols, rather than being forced to divulge sensitive personal information when it is not, on balance, in the public interest to do so. For example, there will often be a greater good to be derived from maintaining a relationship between, say, a youth worker and a young person at risk of becoming involved in serious violence than from divulging sensitive information to the police. All authorities dealing with these issues are committed to preventing and tackling serious violence. They may, from time to time, have a different perspective on the problem, or a different view on the best way to achieve what we all are desperately seeking to do.

This clause is one of the reasons why so many organisations believe that the Bill is really about a police-led enforcement approach, because it is the Home Secretary who can force them to comply, rather than the public health, multiagency, multifaceted approach that has been so successful in preventing and tackling knife crime in Scotland. Can the Minister give examples of where public authorities involved in preventing and tackling serious violence have obstructed efforts to achieve those objectives? If not, why is this clause necessary? We believe that Clause 17 should not stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, this group starts with government Amendment 72, which I will say a brief word about. The amendment requires the Secretary of State to obtain the consent of Welsh Ministers—not just consult them—before giving a direction under Clause 17 to a devolved Welsh authority. I understand that the change was requested by the Welsh Government, and we support it on this side of the House.

I turn to the debate on whether Clause 17 should stand part of the Bill, which was tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, who introduced it, and the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. Their explanatory statement says that:

“The purpose of this amendment is to explore the extent of the Secretary of State’s powers to issue directions under this section and the consequences of failure to comply with such a direction.”


A number of very searching questions have been raised, and I have a few questions myself. It would be helpful if the Minister could give some more information on what a “direction” might be and what it might consist of under this clause. The central point made by both the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, was about the context of police-led enforcement rather than a more equal arrangement between other agencies such as education and the National Health Service.

In the House of Commons, the Minister said that it is envisaged that this power will be used extremely rarely. Nevertheless, could the Minister give an example of when this power might be used and what checks might be in place when it is used? What would the prior steps be before a direction is considered? How would an authority’s progress in acting upon a direction be measured? Further, can the Minister say something about how the Government see this power working in practice?

I thought the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, raised a particularly interesting question about what the sanction might be if a public servant fails to comply with an order to disclose information. My noble friend Lady Chakrabarti also spoke of the rare disputes between professionals and how these may be resolved by direction from the Secretary of State, rather than through the courts. She gave a historical context, if you like, to that status of professionals making their own judgments.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, in moving Amendment 73, I will speak also to Amendment 74 in my name.

Clause 18 states that those authorities that are, under this chapter of the Bill, under a duty to prevent and tackle serious violence

“must have regard to guidance issued by the Secretary of State”.

However, in the Bill, the only people the Secretary of State must consult are Welsh Ministers. As we will see in a later group, when it comes to similar guidance in relation to offensive weapons homicide reviews, Clause 31 requires the Secretary of State to consult

“persons appearing to the Secretary of State to represent review partners”

and

“such other persons as the Secretary of State considers appropriate.”

That is in addition to Welsh Ministers.

We on these Benches believe that the Secretary of State should also consult representatives of the authorities that will be subject to the guidance, and such other persons as may be appropriate to consult. That is the intention of Amendment 74. We also believe that such guidance should be statutory—that is, contained in regulations—to enable Parliament to scrutinise the guidance before those involved become subject to it, as set out in Amendment 73. I beg to move.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, we support the amendments put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. On Amendment 74, we believe it is vital that the Government should consult front-line organisations on the content of the guidance. They are the ones who know how this will, or will not, work in practice and their expertise is the driving force behind the duty. The Government have of course published draft guidance on this, and I ask the Minister whether this guidance is being consulted on.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, has made it clear that these are probing amendments. The noble Lord, Lord Beith, has just expressed scepticism about the number of initiatives which the Government have put forward in this section of the Bill.

Having said that, we support this part of the Bill on offensive weapons homicide reviews. Amendment 75 raises the question of what happens if a death is already covered by an existing review mechanism, and not duplicating reviews. When this question was raised in the other place, the Minister said:

“To avoid duplication of work, the Bill provides that these new offensive weapons homicide reviews will be required only where there is not an existing statutory requirement to review the homicide”.—[Official Report, Commons Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill Committee, 27/5/21; col. 268.]


Clause 23(5) provides that a review is not required under this chapter if a review of the death is already taking place under different arrangements. If I understand it correctly, I think this meets one of the questions raised by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, in his amendment.

Amendment 76 deals with data protection. It would prevent data being shared for these reviews if it breaches an obligation of confidence or any other restriction other than the Data Protection Act. These issues were debated in detail on Monday in relation to the serious violence reduction duty. Obviously, data sharing is absolutely key to a homicide review to allow us to identify and learn lessons from the death, and to decide on actions to take in response. However, as raised in the earlier debate, we must know how this is to be balanced with safeguards.

Clause 29 provides that a person may not be required to disclose information under this chapter that they could not be compelled to disclose in High Court proceedings. It would be helpful if the Minister could talk us through the specific provision of potential High Court proceedings.

Amendment 77 is based on a recommendation of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. The DPRRC has said that guidance on this chapter of the Bill provided by Clause 31 should be subject to parliamentary scrutiny and done through a statutory instrument subject to the negative procedure. We support the committee’s suggestion and call on the Government to look carefully at all the committee’s recommendations.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, for explaining his amendments to the provisions in the Bill which establish offensive weapons homicide reviews. Before I turn to the specifics of the amendments, it may assist the Committee if I first set out the context and rationale for the introduction of these reviews. Noble Lords asked a lot of questions and I will do my best to get to all of them. If I have missed any, I will write to noble Lords.

Every homicide is a tragedy and the Government are committed to doing all they can to prevent the senseless loss of life and tackle serious violence. We are naturally disturbed by data showing that homicide has risen by about a third in England and Wales between 2014-15 and 2018-19. We have also seen that homicides involving offensive weapons now make up a large and growing proportion of all homicides—approximately 354 out of 732 in 2019. Homicide is now the fourth leading cause of death for men aged 20 to 34, behind suicide, drug overdoses and car accidents. Yet there is currently no legal requirement to formally review the circumstances around the majority of homicides involving an offensive weapon.

This provision will require local agencies to consider the circumstances of both the victims and perpetrators during an offensive weapons homicide review, and identify lessons that could help prevent future deaths. By deepening our local and national understanding of homicide and serious violence, together we can improve our response and ultimately save lives.

The amendment would change the definition of a “qualifying homicide” whereby, alongside the other requirements already set out in Clause 23, an offensive weapons homicide review would be applicable only if no other mechanism is available to review or hold an investigation or inquiry into the death. We agree with the sentiment of the amendment that it would not be necessary or proportionate to require the review partners to conduct an offensive weapons homicide review where the homicide already meets the conditions for an existing review—for example, a domestic homicide review—as this would involve duplication of work and create an unnecessary burden on the review partners, yet produce the same outcomes. However, we do not consider the amendment necessary as Clause 25 already provides for the relationship between offensive weapons homicide reviews and other review requirements to avoid duplication of effort, including disapplying the duty to conduct an offensive weapons review in certain cases.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, cited coroners’ inquests as an example of existing reviews that would preclude a homicide from qualifying for a review under Chapter 2 of Part 2 of the Bill. We should remember that inquests are designed for a different purpose. They are legal inquiries into the cause and circumstances of a death, and are limited to the four statutory questions of who, where, when and how or by what means a person came about their death. Further to this, in many homicides where an offensive weapon is used, there will not be an inquest because the criminal trial will answer the statutory questions and an inquest will not need to take place.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, also asked if consultation with coroners had taken place at an official level. It has and that will continue during the design phase.

Regulation of Investigatory Powers (Criminal Conduct Authorisations) (Amendment) Order 2021

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Tuesday 12th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for tabling this regret Motion for debate today. It brings the House back to the detailed, thoughtful and vital discussions which were held on what is now the Act during its passage earlier this year.

The first priority of any Government, and of this Opposition, is to ensure the safety and security of our communities. We pay tribute to those who serve honourably and put themselves in harm’s way to protect us, and to prevent and disrupt serious criminal activity. The Act addresses the necessary, though difficult, use of covert human intelligence sources to combat serious crime. The key purpose was to place the authorisation of CHIS activity on a statutory footing, where previously there was not that underpinning. The version of the Act which was passed was not the draft that a Labour Government would have passed but we did support it, as urgently needed legislation which created that statutory footing and contained some improvements on the status quo.

I recognise the significant contribution that this House made to improving the Act as it passed through Parliament, including securing extra protections for children and vulnerable people, ensuring access to compensation for innocent victims, and increasing oversight mechanisms. I pay particular tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich, for his work on securing notification of all authorisations to the Investigatory Powers Commissioner, providing real-time oversight by the IPC.

The order about which today’s Motion is tabled makes a series of changes in secondary legislation which are consequential to the Act. They include: updating requirements to keep records of authorisations granted under the Act, extending some existing safeguards on matters subject to legal privilege to the new authorisations, and updating the designations of the rank of a person able to grant an authorisation with a public authority. Here I should say that I listened with great interest to what the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said about the relative seniority of police officers needed for particular authorisations. I look forward to the Minister’s response to the questions which he raised.

The Motion, however, deals with a wider issue which was debated as part of our deliberation on the then Bill. During its passage, colleagues from across the House sought a wide array of improvements to the Bill. The Labour Party particularly sought for the Government to look seriously at the possibility of prior judicial authorisation as a gold standard. We also tabled amendments in the Commons and supported amendments in this House, including those tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, on the key issues raised in today’s Motion. These were changes which would have put explicit limits on the type of activity that could be authorised on the face of the Bill itself. As a House, this was one of the issues we sent back to the Commons for further consideration, although we were ultimately unsuccessful.

The Human Rights Act is a proud achievement of the previous Labour Government. It provides safeguards to this Act and to all public authorities that take action under it. Adding explicit limits to the face of the Bill would, though, have provided clarity and reassurance, and positioned the protection of human rights as an integral part of this package. But as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said, this argument was had and lost when the Bill was before Parliament.

As has been well rehearsed, the inclusion of limits has been modelled by countries which are our allies and have similar judicial systems to ours, and with which we co-operate on security matters: Canada is the obvious example, a point made by the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza. While those countries are able to do this, these Benches and our Commons colleagues remained unconvinced by the Government’s argument that we could not.

I will be interested to hear the Minister’s response to the questions put to her by noble Lords across the House today, particularly on what ongoing monitoring there will be of the operation of the Act and whether amendments of any kind are required. Specifically, will oversight of the Act be led by the IPC’s oversight of the practical arrangements? Presumably, any concerns which could be raised will be addressed by the IPC.

[Lord Mackay of Clashfern (Con)]

My Lords, it is worth reminding ourselves that the original Bill contained a restriction in relation to the Human Rights Act. The person operating under this Bill with authority will operate on behalf of Her Majesty’s Government and will therefore be bound by the authority of the Human Rights Act in relation to the activities which they can undertake. That is an important consideration which was raised in the debate on the Bill.

Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2021

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Thursday 15th July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I, too, thank the Minister for explaining this order. As she said, terrorist groups now recruit, radicalise and train individuals from a distance, distributing terrorist material at the click of a button. Young people, mainly young men, are sucked into a world of conspiracy theories, fascist propaganda, race hate and quasi-military action. The use of the internet for propaganda and training purposes has had an impact on this potential threat to our way of life; it also means that the Government have to respond to this threat in a sophisticated and direct way. The Government, quite rightly in the Opposition’s view, have a responsibility to act to protect young people from being sucked into this world and to protect the public from the race hate, bombs and bloodshed that these groups promote. We will support today’s order.

This is the third white supremacist hate group that Parliament has proscribed in the past year. The group, called the Base, was founded in 2018 and has been operational since then. That was three years ago. There have been TV programmes about it and there is plenty of information on the internet on its activities, so the question of delay arises—the central point that the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, made in his contribution. Is the Minister satisfied that this group and far-right groups like it are properly monitored and that action, such as today’s proscription order, is put in place in a timely manner for the protection of the public? My honourable friend Mr McGinn, in the other place, asked about the status of the proscription review group and the Minister, Chris Philp, described proscription as a powerful tool to degrade terrorist organisations. I would be grateful if the Minister could update the House on the work of the review group—for example, on how often it meets, whether she believes that the current review process is working satisfactorily and whether there is there a robust strategy within which it works. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, spoke in some detail on the information available 18 months ago, in January 2020, and made the point that there seemed to be enough information available 18 months ago to ban this group, so why the delay?

As I understand it, ministerial responsibility for dealing with these types of potentially terrorist groups currently lies with the noble Baroness. This is following the resignation of Mr Brokenshire. Yesterday in the debate in the other place, fulsome tributes were paid to Mr Brokenshire, which I am sure were well deserved. My honourable friend the Member for Barnsley East, Stephanie Peacock, in yesterday’s debate expressed a desire to meet the Minister to talk about another far-right group that is potentially terrorist in its nature; she referred to the details of that group yesterday and her work through the relevant all-party group in looking at potential right-wing terrorism activity. I hope that the Minister will meet my honourable friend so that she can explain the nature of the threat as she sees it.

There are 77 terrorist organisations currently proscribed under the Terrorism Act 2000. Four are far-right groups and the majority are Islamist groups. Last October, the new director-general of MI5 warned that violent far-right terrorism was now a threat, with eight of 27 serious terrorist plots stopped in the final stages in the past three years linked to neo-fascist and racist groups. Online chat forums and video games are used as recruitment tools. The number of those under 18 among those arrested over the last three years has almost trebled. I believe that this trend is worrying and getting closer to home. The use of hateful ideologies to prey on young and vulnerable people is wrong and abhorrent and the Government have a responsibility to do everything in their power to crack down on them.

I close by paying tribute to the dedication, courage and skill of counterterrorism police and our security and intelligence services. We should be grateful that most of the proscribed organisations have never carried out a successful attack on UK soil.

Immigration (Collection, Use and Retention of Biometric Information and Related Amendments) Regulations 2021

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing these two instruments. The first—the Immigration (Collection, Use and Retention of Biometric Information and Related Amendments) Regulations 2021—makes a series of changes to the capture of biometric information on foreign nationals, including asylum seekers, those who arrive at the border undocumented and those who are detained or bailed under immigration powers. The second—the Immigration and Nationality (Fees) (Amendment) Order 2021—makes some technical changes to definitions to reflect the gradual movement of the Home Office from physical documentation to a digital system.

I have a number of questions, some of which replicate the questions just asked by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. In the policy statement published alongside the 2014 Act, the Government stated they planned to retain biometric information for up to 10 years. What is the rationale for now extending the limit from 10 to 15 years? It seems an arbitrary increase.

The impact of the regulations appears to be that sensitive biometric information can be held for significantly longer periods of time. Can the noble Baroness confirm that that is indeed the Government’s intention? The regulations provide for the general limit of 15 years, but also provide that the Secretary of State may retain information for as long as necessary, for immigration purposes. Is there guidance on what “necessary” means in this context? The examples given in the supporting documents of where information will be held for longer include where

“the person is subject to a Deportation or Exclusion Order.”

In what other situations should we expect data to be routinely held for longer than 15 years?

On the immigration fees order, it seems odd that the cost of processing data already held is the same as the cost of enrolling new biometric data. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, made this point and gave a vivid example from his experience as a police officer. Can the Minister give a fuller explanation of this apparent disparity?

Photographs of facial images were raised by the Labour Party during the passage of the 2014 Act. Where a person is granted citizenship, their fingerprints are destroyed, but the photograph is kept until they apply for a passport. For those who never apply for a passport, this means their photo will potentially be kept indefinitely. Does the Minister know how many people this impacts and why a time limit has not been considered?

Regulations under the 2007 Act set out what information a biometric document may contain. The Explanatory Memorandum tells us:

“These Regulations provide that other information may … be included … limited to information connected with … immigration status or nationality.”


What other information is this expected to include?

On the power to prevent the use of a digital immigration document, is there a risk that a digital status could be cancelled without the person being notified, bearing in mind that the number of successful appeals demonstrates how often the Home Office makes incorrect decisions and that digital status is also a person’s access to work, healthcare and the right to rent, et cetera? What will be the system for effectively switching off a digital status, as it were?

A related issue following on from the Domestic Abuse Act, which we recently considered, is that Southall Black Sisters and more than 50 other expert organisations have raised concerns over changes to the enrolment of biometrics for migrant survivors of domestic abuse. They have been informed that victims of abuse must now travel to immigration centres, rather than the existing system, which used local post office locations. Southall Black Sisters and others have raised concerns over the impact on these extremely vulnerable victims of being required to criss-cross cities to access the service and over the resource strain that this will put on the specialist community organisations which would support them when they do this.

I have seen the letter to Marc Owen, who is director for visas and citizenship, dated 19 May 2021, and his response, dated 24 May. The expert organisations were not consulted on these changes and have requested a meeting with the Minister. Would the Minister be able to commit to looking at these issues and meeting those organisations, which have a specific concern regarding the lack of access through the Post Office system to these facilities? My understanding from reading the letter to Marc Owen is that the contract with the post offices is coming to an end, so they will not offer these facilities in future. Therefore, there will be some seven centres for the whole of England and Wales and only one in London, in Croydon, where the people from these centres would be expected to go to register their access, if I can put it like that. This will be very resource-intensive for the organisations supporting them, because they will have to accompany them and help them with their applications. It was a much simpler process when they were able to go to local post offices. That is the point that I am making to the Minister.

British Nationality Act 1981 (Immigration Rules Appendix EU) (Amendment) Regulations 2021

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I, too, welcome this instrument and, along with the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, and the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, I shall raise a number of questions, many of which overlap with the questions that they have already asked.

The British Nationality Act provides that a child born in the UK automatically acquires citizenship where, at the time of their birth, at least one parent is British or settled. A person waiting for their settled status to be resolved or who is eligible but has failed to apply would not count as settled during that time. This instrument amends the current law and provides that, first, a child born after the end of the grace period may be considered British from the date that their parent is granted settled status after a late application, and, secondly, that a similar protection is given to a child born after the grace period where their parent had applied to the scheme before the deadline but was still awaiting their status on the date the child was born.

We welcome this instrument, which seeks to fill a gap in provision for children born while their parents are still awaiting confirmation of their settled status or who are eligible but enter a late application. For absolute clarity, will a child born in the UK under these circumstances automatically—and by that I mean with no separate application—acquire citizenship when their parents’ status is confirmed to reflect the situation as it would have been before 30 June? Secondly, can I confirm that they will not have to register to access their citizenship and be charged the exorbitant fee, now declared unlawful, which children registering their British citizenship currently face?

Crucially, how will parents and children be alerted to the child’s right to citizenship? That was a point that was emphasised by the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, and the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. We welcome the fact that the non-exhaustive reasonable grounds for a late application have now been published. What is being done to reach those people who are eligible but have not made an application? Will public services that expectant parents come into contact with be aware of and able to advise on this law change?

The organisations the3million, Amnesty International and the Project for the Registration of Children as British Citizens have written to Home Office Ministers to welcome this step of securing children’s rights to citizenship. They have asked them to seek to clarify the law under this instrument on a number of points.

One question is around what information will be made available to an EU citizen who becomes settled on or after 1 July about the provisions of new Section 10A, and what it means for any children of theirs. What records will the department maintain relating to: first, the timing of any application for settled status, particularly of persons applying by the deadline but whose applications are granted after that date; secondly, the eligibility of settled status immediately before 1 July of persons granted settled status on or after that date; and, thirdly, the reasons for a grant of settled status on or after 1 July? What records will be kept for those different scenarios?

A further question is whether the department will provide access to these records to the child to whom new Section 10A applies. What other steps will the department take to ensure that the child is able to confirm their British citizenship, whether during childhood or adulthood? This was a point that the noble Baroness, Lady Ludford, made as well. Will the department provide access to these records to the parent—whether the parent is an EU citizen or otherwise—adoptive parent, local authority or other carer with parental responsibility for the child?

On those still awaiting their settled status while the deadline approaches, what extra initiatives are the Government putting in place to handle the extremely high backlog of cases of people who applied in time but are waiting for a Home Office response? In May, the backlog stood at more than 300,000 cases. Can the Minister give an update on that figure? We know that people are already being impacted by the Home Office’s delay and that it is affecting their ability to get a mortgage or their university applications. These applications have been held up by the wait people are currently undergoing.

On child citizenship more widely, earlier this year, the Home Office’s £1,000 fee for children registering their citizenship was ruled unlawful by the Appeal Court. The court found that the Government had failed in their duty to consider the best interests of children impacted by this scandalously high fee. Can the Minister say what the Government’s action will be when they reconsider this unlawful fee?

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments
Tuesday 27th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Finlay of Llandaff and Lady McIntosh of Pickering, for their tenacity in protecting the interests of vulnerable children and abuse victims. Their knowledge and experience have fuelled their tenacity and insistence that a solution be found. The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, has used his great experience in the family courts, and I have had, if not exactly the same level of experience, raw enthusiasm in backing the cause.

However, that would have all been to no avail if the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson of Tredegar, had not only seen what we were trying to achieve but gone the extra mile in seeking a solution, despite the fact that we did not have all the incontrovertible evidence he sought. I am sorry that he is not in his place, but I know that the Minister will pass on these remarks. When we suggested that the Government, not the NACCC, should obtain the evidence, he has come up with the amendment, which I hope the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, will be minded to accept, to go and get the evidence. The widening of the definition of a child contact centre will catch many informal organisations—those that we are most concerned about—in the net.

All that any of us wants is to protect our children at a most difficult and vulnerable time, to ensure that unskilled and even unscrupulous people do not get anywhere near those children, and that those children are received into a welcoming environment manned by skilled, trained and compassionate people. We are not there yet and, as the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, said, the movers of the original amendment will be setting two-year reminders in their diaries after the passing of the Bill, so the Government can expect timely reminders if the report has not appeared as the deadline looms.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I too pay tribute to the tenacity of the noble Baronesses, Lady Finlay of Llandaff and Lady McIntosh of Pickering. Although I have experience in the family courts and was aware of the child contact centres, I was not as well briefed on this issue as I am now, given the noble Baronesses’ backgrounds on this matter, particularly the legislative history of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh.

I should also pay fulsome tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, who is relatively new to our House. We met him a number of times; he has properly engaged on the issues and expressed scepticism, which is sometimes helpful to people moving amendments. He has come up with a solution. Although, as the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, said, it may fall short of what we were hoping for, it nevertheless provides a road ahead for addressing the concerns that he expressed. He has potentially come up with a proper solution for the various loopholes in the child contact centre system, if I can put it like that.

As the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, said in his introduction, the Government’s problem was one of evidence. As we repeated in numerous meetings, it is very difficult to get evidence of contact centres that come and go, perhaps operating in particular communities and essentially functioning under the radar. I am glad that the Government appreciated that point to the extent that they are willing to take on the responsibility of seeing whether this is a real problem and whether appropriate measures can be put in place to protect children who go to these child contact centres.

The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, asked three good questions for the Minister to answer. The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, went on to quote Sir James Munby’s support for the earlier amendments. Sir James Munby has unequalled experience in these matters, so the Government should listen to what he says.

In conclusion, the noble Baroness, Lady Burt of Solihull, and I have sat on a lot of committees together over the last couple of years and she has always been sensible in her support of the noble Baronesses, Lady Finlay and Lady McIntosh. As she said, I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, accepts the Government’s amendments and that we continue to work together for the next couple of years to ensure that the Government follow through on their promise to review the existing provision.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, first, I thank and agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, and the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, in paying tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and my noble friend Lady McIntosh for their tenacity in pursuing this issue in the interests of vulnerable children. We have all been mindful of that throughout these discussions and are grateful to them. I am also grateful to noble Lords for their tributes to my noble friend Lord Wolfson. I will pass on their thanks and appreciation, and I know that he would have liked to have been here to see the conclusion of this important matter. But I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, for saying that my noble friend went the extra mile. That has been the Government’s approach to the Bill throughout and, even those provisions that will not be in the Bill have launched some important work, which will continue to bear fruit and help victims of domestic abuse, whether legislatively or not.

The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, asked three questions on which I hope I can provide reassurance. Her first was about whether contact centres mean the people who work in the place. Yes, we are going to review the way that a place is used, rather than a building, which may be empty. Her second was about the spirit of the amendment. Again, yes, we want to build an evidence base through the review that assesses the need for regulation, along the lines that the noble Baroness proposed. Her third was about promoting the judicial protocol. That protocol is being updated and will be communicated by the judiciary, not Her Majesty’s Government. That will provide an opportunity for its promotion but, as I am sure she and other noble Lords understand, that is a matter for the judiciary.

My noble friend Lady McIntosh asked some questions about the review. As I say, we want to establish a robust evidence base about the scale of the problem, so that we reach a fully informed decision about any further steps necessary. We would welcome her input and that of others into establishing the terms of the review. We will also be engaging the judiciary, among others, so the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, about Sir James Munby is well heard.

That has answered all the questions raised. Again, we are very grateful to all noble Lords for their engagement on this and hope that it is a sensible resolution. I hope that noble Lords support Motion A.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 17th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, for her commitment on this issue—a commitment that all speakers in the debate share. As the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, said, all Peers who have spoken have acknowledged the link between pornography and violence against women.

Of course, we strongly agree that there needs to be a mechanism to prevent children accessing pornographic material. We also believe that the Government have failed to show leadership on that matter and have dragged their feet. They should already have brought the online harms Bill forward.

As Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act was going through, we in the Labour Party criticised it as inadequate because it failed to focus on where some of the most serious harm was caused—for example, by not tackling social media sufficiently. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, also made that point.

My understanding is that we now have a timeline for the online harms Bill, with pre-legislative scrutiny expected immediately after the Queen’s Speech—before the Summer Recess—and that Second Reading would be expected after the Summer Recess. I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm that my understanding of the timetable is correct.

We think that there are real inadequacies in Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act, and that the best way to deal with this matter is in full, and as a priority, in the online harms Bill. That will give time for the Commons to consider the amendments to this Bill that we have already sent back to it, including the supervision of dangerous perpetrators, ensuring that all women have access to life-saving services, and ensuring that child contact centres are regulated to protect our children.

I freely acknowledge that the decision we have taken to abstain on this matter has been a difficult one—but I think it would be wrong to give a misleading sense of certainty by passing this amendment, when that certainty is not merited by the Digital Economy Act. For that reason, we shall abstain on this vote.

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, outlined on Monday when we began this debate, her Amendment 87A would require the Government to undertake an investigation of the impact of children’s access to online pornography on domestic abuse, and to review the commencement of Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act 2017.

Her Majesty’s Government are committed to ensuring that the objectives of Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act will be delivered by the online harms framework. Children will be at the heart of our new online safety Bill, which will bring in a new era of accountability for online services. I am afraid I cannot comment on the timings that the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, asked about, as announcements about the Queen’s Speech and other things have not yet been made. I am sorry to disappoint the noble Lord on that.

We are confident that the online safety Bill will provide much greater protection for children than would have been the case with Part 3 of the 2017 Act. Unlike that Act, the online harms regime will capture both the most visited pornography sites and pornography on social media, thereby covering the vast majority of sites where children are most likely to be exposed to pornography.

One of the criticisms of the 2017 Act was that its scope did not cover social media companies, where a considerable quantity of pornographic material is available to children. Research by the British Board of Film Classification published last year found that across a group of children aged between 11 and 17, 44% intentionally accessed pornography via a social media site, compared to 43% for dedicated pornography websites and 53% via an image or video search engine.

Crucially, however, just 7% of children accessed pornography only through dedicated pornography sites. Most children intentionally accessing pornography were doing so across a number of sources, including social media, as well as video-sharing platforms, fora, and via image or video search engines, the majority of which would not fall within scope of the Digital Economy Act, but will fall within the scope of online harms legislation.

Implementing Part 3 of the 2017 Act would therefore leave a significant gap in meeting the Government’s objective of preventing children from accessing pornography —an objective that has also been raised by noble Lords who have spoken in the debate. Our online harms proposals will achieve a more comprehensive approach and allow us to address children’s access to pornography in the round, and avoid children moving from one, more regulated, area of the internet to another, less regulated, area to access pornography.

In addition, recent technological changes could render Part 3 of the 2017 Act ineffective in protecting children if it were introduced as an interim measure. One of the Act’s enforcement powers was the power to require internet service providers to block access to material on non-compliant services. Internet service providers themselves have made it clear that they are no longer the sole gatekeepers to the internet. Current and future developments in the way the architecture of the internet functions mean that they may not always be able to offer effective blocking functions, which might make this power obsolete. These potential enforcement challenges could make age-verification very difficult to enforce via the 2017 Act, even as an interim measure.

The most recent prominent change is the introduction of DNS over HTTPS—that is a bit of a mouthful; it is also known as DoH—which, in specific implementation models, could provide an alternative route to access online content that bypasses the current filtering function of internet service providers. Other proposed internet encryption standards may in future limit even further the ability of providers to filter. The Government are actively engaging with the industry to ensure that the spread of DoH and future internet encryption standards do not cause unintended consequences. For example, specific implementation models of DoH could circumnavigate the current filtering mechanisms of internet service providers, which are used to block access to child abuse content.

The noble Lord, Lord Browne of Belmont, raised the definition of internet service providers in the Digital Economy Act. A reference in legislation to internet service providers or similar is usually applied in the traditional sense, requiring the major internet service providers to block access to certain websites. The Secretary of State would have to prepare revised guidance to the regulator to implement Part 3 of the 2017 Act. As the noble Lord has said, this guidance, coupled with the broader terminology of an “internet access service”, as used in European Union legislation, might offer sufficient flexibility to extend the duty for internet service providers to cover other means of accessing the internet, where technically feasible. However, the key point that my noble friend Lady Williams of Trafford set out in her letter to the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, was that, given the evolving nature of how internet services are provided, this approach lacks the necessary certainty.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Report stage & Lords Hansard
Monday 8th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD) [V]]

My Lords, in Committee, we heard the very moving testimony of the noble Baroness, Lady Meyer, whose children were abducted by their father and kept in Germany with very little contact between them and their mother. It appears that, during that separation, the father turned the children against her. It is a shocking and upsetting case of parental abduction. I pay tribute to the noble Baroness for her campaigning work on parental abduction. A friend of mine in Oslo, who has shared custody, is having the relationship between him and his son poisoned by the mother.

As my noble friend Lady Brinton said, such behaviour is already covered by Clause 1(3)(c) and (e) and subsection (5) of the Bill as it stands in a way that economic abuse is not. Parental alienation amounts to controlling or coercive behaviour and psychological or emotional abuse. It includes, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, has said, conduct directed at another person—for example, the victim’s child.

As the noble Baroness said in Committee, using children as weapons in a war by one parent against the other can equally apply to mothers seeking to alienate fathers as to fathers seeking to alienate mothers. It can inflict damage on both parent and child. I fundamentally disagree with the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, that this a gendered issue.

In Committee, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, who has a wealth of experience, said that it is important to leave discretion over contact and parental alienation to the judges. She reinforced that this afternoon. As she said, there are two types of case: one where a child witnesses abuse and turns against the perpetrator, and the other, where there is a malicious attempt to turn a child against a parent. Abusive behaviour turns children against abusers.

As with many areas of domestic abuse, the issues here are complex, and there are both advantages and disadvantages to the noble Baroness’s amendment. In Committee, my noble friend Lady Brinton quoted from a Ministry of Justice report which cites:

“Fears of false allegations of parental alienation are clearly a barrier to victims of abuse telling the courts about their experiences.”


The domestic abuse commissioner-designate has talked about

“the potential for the idea of ‘parental alienation’ to be weaponised by perpetrators of domestic abuse to silence their victims within the Family Court.”

The noble Baroness, Lady Meyer, said that the justice system needs to be better equipped to deal with these issues. As my noble friend Lady Brinton said, the House will consider in Amendment 44 whether there should be mandatory training, so that magistrates and judges at all levels might be better trained in this and other areas of domestic abuse. I accept that the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, thinks that the existing training is adequate but, along with the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, we believe that there should be changes to the training of the judiciary, rather than

“behaviour deliberately designed to damage the relationship of a child of the parent and the other parent”

being listed as part of the definition of domestic abuse in the Bill. For these reasons, we do not support the amendment.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I remind the House that I sit as a family magistrate in central London and regularly deal with these types of cases. I have to say that this has been a better debate than the one we had in Committee. The reason is that many of the speakers showed a greater appreciation of the complexity of these types of cases, which we hear in court. A number of speakers, including those who put their names to this amendment, stated that if the Minister were to make it crystal clear that the term “parental alienation” will be dealt with fully outside of the Bill, then they would think that a good solution to the issue in the amendment. We have also had a number of very eminent lawyers—the noble and learned Lords, Lord Mackay and Lord Morris, and my noble friend Lady Chakrabarti—clearly say their view is that the amendment is not necessary, as long as the issue itself is addressed elsewhere.

We have had a lot of contributions and I will not go through all the speeches. However, I want to pick up a couple of points noble Lords have made, in particular a contribution by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth. He spoke about the distressing and polarising effects of the issue being debated in Committee; I think we have all received a huge amount of lobbying material since then. He also said that he had no doubt that parental alienation exists and that professional organisations such as Cafcass, through its child impact assessment, and the court system try to address the whole range of domestic abuse, including parental alienation.

I want to make one point, which has not been made by any other speaker, and stems from that made by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss. She summarised it, in a typically succinct way, by saying that the effects on the child are twofold: first, the witnessing, either directly or indirectly, of domestic abuse, which is clearly extremely bad for the child; and secondly, the malicious attempt by a parent to turn the child against the other parent. She has characterised that issue accurately, but I have been sitting as a family magistrate for about eight years now and have seen many cases where a parent has admitted, perhaps through a conviction, that their behaviour means they have committed such abuse. I have seen that many times but never seen a parent admit trying maliciously to alienate the child from the other parent. I have simply never seen a parent acknowledge that they have indulged in such a course of action. The court is of course in a very difficult position, so we move on to the possible use of experts, training for the judiciary and the life experience of magistrates and judges who are dealing with these cases.

I come back to where I opened: there has been a greater acknowledgement by the contributors to today’s debate of the difficulty in making these decisions. Of course, I am in favour of more training—magistrates, lawyers and judges are trained in any event, but more training would be welcome. I hope that the Minister will manage to convince the noble Baroness, Lady Meyer, that it is not necessary to press her amendment. I personally believe that the issues she has raised and the intensity of the speeches she has given can be properly met through regulations under the Bill.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, on this International Women’s Day, I pay tribute to the courage of and thank my noble friend Lady Meyer, and other noble Lords, for their continued engagement on this issue. As pointed out by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, parental alienation clearly proved to be one of the most polarising issues in Committee. He challenged us to focus on the areas of agreement and I will try to do that. It was apposite that the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, referred to the comments of the noble and right reverend Lord and said that we had a better debate today than we did in Committee. I agree. We are beginning to develop a shared understanding on where we are trying to get to on this, and to understand what points the amendment is driving at.

My noble friend Lady Meyer has lived experience of this very difficult, deeply distressing and personal issue, and 19 years of campaigning experience to boot in the area of alienating behaviours. I pay tribute to her; in no way do I seek to deny or to minimise the devastating impact that alienating behaviours can have on family life. But we must carefully consider the suggestion that legislation in the form of my noble friend’s amendment is the appropriate response here, and I hope that I can give her comfort on that. I will now outline the aspect of things that I think go to the heart of the Bill and the nub of the point that she is trying to make.

Our approach in Clause 1 is to define domestic abuse by reference to types of abusive behaviours, as pointed out by my noble and learned friend Lord Mackay of Clashfern and by the noble Lord, Lord Curry of Kirkharle—although he agrees with the amendment—and not by reference to the form in which those behaviours may be manifested. We are fearful of creating a hierarchy of behaviours by appearing to give more weight to one manifestation than another, and do not—as my noble and learned friend Lord Mackay said—wish to inadvertently narrow the Clause 1 definition by giving specific examples such as that proposed by my noble friend in her amendment to Clause 1(5), as the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, pointed out. The behaviours to which my noble friend Lady Altmann referred would be in scope; whether the examples she cites would be covered would clearly be a matter for the courts to decide.

As I indicated in Committee, I accept that there are circumstances where alienating behaviours indicate a wider pattern of emotional or psychological abuse. However, where this is the case the definition of domestic abuse in Clause 1—subsections (3)(e) and (5) are particularly relevant, as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, the noble Baronesses, Lady Chakrabarti and Lady Brinton, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Morris of Aberavon, said—already applies and, as such, does not need to be further expanded.

To answer the question about statutory guidance asked by my noble friend Lady Meyer, and almost all noble Lords who spoke in this debate, the draft statutory guidance covers alienating behaviours. I am very grateful to noble Lords who have already shared their views on the guidance and we welcome further feedback and suggestions for improvement. There will then be a further opportunity to comment on the guidance when we formally consult following Royal Assent.

One of the strengths of the Bill is that it recognises the impact of domestic abuse on children, considering them as victims in their own right. From the perspective of risk of harm to the child, the relevant legal framework is provided for in Section 1 of the Children Act 1989, together with the definition of harm in that Act. My noble friend Lady Meyer and the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, referenced the Cafcass definition of parental alienation. Although that definition supports our shared understanding of the impact of alienating behaviours on the child, it is an important point of clarification that the Cafcass definition is not one of domestic abuse—we need to be clear about that. Cafcass is clear that there are a number of reasons why a child might resist time with, or be hostile towards, one parent following separation or other breakdown of a parental relationship.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 10th February 2021 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede]

171: After Clause 72, insert the following new Clause—
‘‘Repeal of provisions about defence for controlling or coercive behaviour offence
In section 76 of the Serious Crime Act 2015 (controlling or coercive behaviour in an intimate or family relationship), leave out subsections (8) to (10).”Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause seeks to repeal the ‘carers’ defence’ for the offence of controlling or coercive behaviour in intimate or family relationships.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the previous group. The noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, has had many decades of campaigning for older people. I know that she had a long-standing friendship with my father, both when he was a Member of this House and in his days in local authorities, and that it was of great benefit to him.

Amendment 171 looks at another group of people—those who suffer from some form of disability—who are also disproportionately affected by domestic abuse. The amendment would repeal what has been labelled by some as the “carer’s defence” under Section 76 of the 2015 Act. Domestic abuse of disabled people has not been discussed as part of the Bill so far, and it is not generally discussed.

When abuse against disabled people is discussed, it is usually in the context of safeguarding issues. The disabled people are labelled as vulnerable adults and the carer’s defence is that their behaviour is reasonable and justified, given the nature of their caring responsibilities. The defence in the carer’s defence is that there could be a wrongful conviction of a carer for coercive and controlling behaviour when the carer was acting in the disabled person’s best interests. They might say, “I did it for their own good”—an expression often used by abusers who are also carers, and the courts might let them off with that defence.

The statistics on the abuse of disabled people are frightening and grim, and I imagine that we will hear more of them from my co-signatory, the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, but I will give a couple of statistics which have been brought to my attention.

Disabled adults are at least one and a half times more likely to be a victim of domestic abuse than non-disabled adults. Disabled women are up to three times more likely to experience domestic abuse from their family members. Some of these abusers will also be their carers. I believe it is highly likely that those figures are an underestimate, as disabled people often find reporting crime difficult, and DA survivors often find it more difficult to access the help that they need.

There is a proper place for a carer’s defence. Genuine carers must be able to protect themselves from malicious allegations, but I argue that other Acts do this better—namely, the Care Act 2014 and the Mental Capacity Act 2005. Both provide proper protection for genuine carers.

This Bill is about domestic abuse and how to tackle its many manifestations and protect victims. Too often, disabled victims are ignored. Through the Bill, the Government have an opportunity to show that they are listening to disabled victims, who can be fully acknowledged with this landmark legislation. With the carer’s defence being found in other legislation, my amendment would not dilute the central message of the Bill, which is that all forms of domestic abuse are unacceptable. Disabled victims, too, need to be fully reflected in the Bill. I beg to move.

[Baroness Grey-Thompson (CB) [V]]

My Lords, in speaking to this amendment, I draw your Lordships’ attention to my declaration of interests, and I am vice-chair of the Local Government Association.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, for comprehensively covering the reason for tabling the amendment, and I am delighted that my name is added to it. It is a very difficult issue to raise. There are many, many kind carers out there, but we should recognise that some are not. I know that some people have difficulty with this being debated as part of a domestic abuse vehicle and question whether it is the right vehicle for raising the issues, but I argue that it is, because many cases of abuse occur in a domestic situation.

It is incredibly difficult for disabled people to raise these issues when not only personal care but control of transport and money and the ability to get out might be at stake. We know from various pieces of work that it is very difficult for disabled people to raise these issues. The Equality and Human Rights Commission, in its work from November 2020 entitled Survival, Recovery and Justice: Specialist Services for Survivors of Domestic Abuse, said that disabled women are already disproportionately impacted by domestic abuse. In its 2017 report, SafeLives says that they are

“twice as likely to experience domestic abuse as non-disabled women”

and

“four times more likely to report abuse from multiple perpetrators”.

The charity Stay Safe East, which supports disabled survivors of domestic abuse, considers that the defence has the potential to prolong the abuse of disabled victims, to prevent victims getting justice and to disadvantage disabled victims of coercive control. This is particularly concerning in a context where disabled survivors already experience abuse for longer before seeking help. According to the SafeLives work from 2017, called Disabled Survivors Too, on average disabled victims wait for 3.3 years before accessing support, compared with 2.3 years for non-disabled victims.

A statutory framework is already in place to involve professionals where a person might lack capacity and require medication or confinement—for example, the procedures under the Mental Capacity Act or the Mental Health Act—and there is protection from criminal liability for carers of people who lack capacity. Should a person not lack capacity, they have the right to refuse medication or other treatments or restraints. Nobody should be subject to coercive or controlling behaviour by a spouse or carer, and the law should not provide lesser protection just because somebody is disabled.

There is a high bar for the crime of coercive control. Behaviour must cause a victim serious alarm or distress and have a substantial adverse effect on their day-to-day activities. We should consider the best-interests defence and the risks of it, as it could enable potential abusers to justify that behaviour by claiming that they were acting in the disabled person’s best interests. It also risks feeding into the stereotypes of disabled people, which suggest that they lack autonomy.

We are living in an increasingly paternalistic and ableist world. I know from my personal experience of the pandemic, because I have not been out every day and carrying out my normal line of work, how much resilience disabled people need to deal with their day-to-day experiences, when they are not being believed or having their views accepted. This applies to simple things. Even before our first lockdown, when I was travelling on public transport people felt able to ask me whether I was able to make the right decision about whether to get on a bus or Tube in London, whether to wear my coat out or what I should do with my purse in a shop.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

My Lords, I start by commending the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, because she spotted something that nobody else noticed on Monday evening, which is that I spoke in response to this amendment, but the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, and the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, had not moved it at all. That might be why I sounded as if I had prejudged a bit. I will reiterate some points on this occasion, but I apologise for being a bit previous with my comments.

As the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, said, Amendment 171 addresses the so-called carers’ defence within the controlling or coercive behaviour offence. Subsections (8) to (10) of Section 76 of the Serious Crime Act 2015 allow for this limited “best interests” defence, where the accused can demonstrate that they were acting in the best interests of the victim. The defence is not available in situations where the victim fears that violence will be used against them. I must be clear on that. For this defence to apply, the accused would also need to demonstrate to the court that their behaviour was reasonable in all the circumstances.

The defence was designed to cover cases where the accused is genuinely acting in the best interests of the victim. The first example that comes to my mind is a situation where the accused is looking after an elderly partner or parent with Alzheimer’s disease and must ensure that that person does not leave the house for their own safety. In these circumstances, it is entirely possible that the accused’s behaviour, while it might be considered controlling in a different context, is reasonable given the nature of their caring responsibilities.

As we have heard today, proponents of this amendment fear that it may enable the abuse of disabled people. However, there is a real risk that, without such a defence—and bearing in mind the example that I have just given—a person may be wrongfully prosecuted for and convicted of controlling or coercive behaviour, when in fact they were acting in a person’s best interests.

Ultimately—and I am repeating my words from the other night—it is for courts and juries to decide merit on a case-by-case basis, whether or not the threshold for the defence has been met. It should also be noted that similar or equivalent offences in Scotland, such as Section 6 of the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018, and the proposed new domestic abuse offence in Northern Ireland, in Clause 12 of the Domestic Abuse and Family Proceedings Bill, which has recently completed its passage through the Northern Ireland Assembly, also contain a similar defence.

I hope that, in the light of my explanation—for the second time—of the necessity of this defence, the noble Lord will be happy to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate, which has been a short but important one.

The central point I took from the intervention from the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, is that the Carers Trust wants better support and wants the support of carers to be a more suitable focus rather than this potential loophole for wrongly accusing carers of some form of abuse.

The noble Baroness, Lady Burt, was much more robust in her language than I have been. She called it a patronising defence and said that the courts should decide. Essentially, that is what the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, said; the courts can decide because the charges can be brought with other legislation, as she acknowledged in her intervention.

The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, argued that the neatness and ease of reference may be a deciding factor in keeping this defence in this legislation and that putting it in other Acts would create difficulty for practitioners. That is the point that I think both the noble Baronesses, Lady Burt and Lady Grey-Thompson, would not have agreed with, because this Bill is about domestic abuse; it is not about giving potential defences to abusers that are already covered in other legislation.

The noble Baroness, Lady Williams, opened her comments by saying that nobody noticed. I am sorry to disappoint her, but we did notice—but there was no easy way of informing the authorities that she had given an answer to these points on Monday evening. Nevertheless, this is a probing amendment and we will consider our position. I think that it shows that people with disabilities want to be fully represented in this landmark legislation. On that basis, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 171 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Paddick (LD) [V]]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Benjamin, who introduced Amendment 177A in such an inspiring way and for whom I have the greatest admiration and the highest respect, has been a passionate campaigner her whole life on protecting and nurturing children. In her own inimitable style, she says, “Childhood lasts a lifetime”. I am very glad that she got that in, even if it was in the penultimate sentence of her speech. She is absolutely right. What happens in childhood impacts people for the rest of their lives, potentially with devasting consequences, and accessing pornography is one of those influences that can have an adverse impact on children.

In this Bill we are addressing domestic abuse, and many children grow up in households where domestic violence is a regular occurrence. I was at the same time impressed and saddened when I visited the only young offender institution in Scotland. The young people there were engaged in sessions with someone from a domestic abuse charity who taught them that the abusive home environment in which many of them had grown up is not normal and that it is not what a healthy, loving relationship looks like, despite it having been the lived experience of many of them. Living in an environment where you are surrounded by violence normalises violence as a way of life, and accessing harmful violent pornography is part of the landscape viewed by many young people.

As a police constable I was called to a disturbance. We were presented with a couple, a room that looked as though it had been ransacked, and a broken glass-top table. The woman had red marks around her neck. We found a ligature and a plastic bag with the impression of her face on it, like a mask. We arrested the man for attempted murder and took the victim to hospital. At court the next day, the accused’s lawyer claimed that it was consensual rough sex and the victim—I thought reluctantly—agreed, and the case was dismissed. To this day, those images haunt me, as does the nagging doubt about the extent to which the woman had really consented to what was done to her.

I am glad that this Bill finally, over 40 years later, is going to address this issue, but we have to ask ourselves where people get these ideas from. Some 57% of people in the BBC survey that my noble friend referred to said it was from pornography. Any means of preventing young people from accessing such harmful pornographic content should be implemented, so it seems quite extraordinary that the Government should work for a number of years with the British Board of Film Classification to develop a system of age verification for pornographic websites and pass legislation in the Digital Economy Act to enable such a system to be put into place—only to abandon it.

Age verification systems are not a panacea. There are numerous and easily accessible ways for a determined teenager to bypass them. I am not sure how many read Hansard, but I do not intend to publicise them. The means of enforcing age verification systems on the operators of pornographic websites is not without difficulty. Many are free to view and hosted outside the UK. Asking UK internet service providers to block websites that fail to comply with age verification rules would also block adults in the UK, who should be able to access legal pornography, if they so wish, from accessing them.

The measures to prevent young people from accessing pornography on some social media sites have improved, with users being prevented from posting pornography. This is effectively policed and enforced by website operators such as Facebook and Instagram. There are exceptions. The measures to prevent young people from accessing pornography on Twitter, for example, are somewhere between weak and non-existent. However, that does not mean we should not do all we can, despite the limitations, to encourage, cajole and use every legislative means possible to put pressure on these websites to introduce age verification for UK users and, in the case of social media, to ban pornographic content unless they can prevent children from accessing it.

We also have to work on the basis that a determined teenager is going to find a way around the system and that even curious younger children may try and succeed in accessing pornography. Comprehensive and compulsory personal, social, health and economic education—PSHE—including healthy relationship and age-appropriate sex education, is vital to combat what children might see and hear if they access online pornography, and what they might see and hear in their own homes.

It is particularly important that children of all ages are taught as early as is they learn what a loving, caring relationship between two people looks like, so that they see this as the norm, rather than anything that they might see online or experience when they are growing up. It is particularly important in this male-dominated, patriarchal society that children are taught that treating women and girls with dignity and respect and as equals with men is essential.

We are all impacted by our experiences and I have said some things in debates on this Bill as a survivor of domestic abuse to remind the Committee not to forget male victims and survivors who are or were in same-sex relationships. That is not intended to diminish the real issues that society must address in relation to the inequality between men and women in general and male violence against women and girls in particular. Some online pornography reinforces that inequality and glamorises male violence. We must do all we can to prevent the harmful impact this can have, particularly on children and young people. We support this amendment to require an investigation into any link between online pornography and domestic abuse.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, we have heard powerful speeches in this debate. I shall start my contribution with the things I would question in the amendment. I should make it clear that I support the amendment in principle, but I question whether simply making the Government commence Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act is the right solution. I question also whether the British Board of Film Classification is the right body to lead on this, whether the technology would work, and whether privacy concerns have been adequately answered.

As we have heard from other speakers, the worst material is generated outside the UK and we would have no legislative ability to control or curb it. The Government have consistently refused to take powers to block internet service providers from carrying material that harms children or glorifies domestic abuse. They have also not taken powers to prevent credit card issuers making payments for illegal content. So I will be interested in the Minister’s answer to the suggestion made by the noble Lord, Lord Alton, that an interim arrangement could be made to bring in Part 3 of the Digital Economy Act until more substantive legislation is put in place.

The speeches we have heard were extremely powerful, particularly from the noble Lord, Lord McColl, who spoke with real passion and knowledge on this issue. My noble friend Lady Massey is clearly playing a leading role in the Council of Europe in setting international standards because, of course, our problem in the UK is not unique and all our friends in Europe and indeed across the world are grappling with these issues. The noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, and the noble Lord, Lord Morrow, also spoke with real knowledge. I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, had it right when he said that education is the key to addressing this issue. That is a wider point and one that he has made in other groups, both today and on previous days in Committee, but it is a point that is worth repeating.

I was not here last Wednesday for the fourth Committee day because I was sitting as a magistrate. I was dealing with a sex case and I had reason to read two reports on a young offender which had been written by more than one specialist. The reports both commented on the use of porn by the offender. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the use of porn influences the way people behave, and that the influence is bigger if the users of porn are younger. We have really been led on this by the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, and I hope that the Minister will be able to respond as favourably as she can to that leadership.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 1st February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee (LD) [V]]

My Lords, we have Amendments 61, 65, 66, 67 and 70 in this group and support Amendment 63, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, requiring a risk assessment, which I would have thought should be an automatic item on a check list.

Clause 22 deals with matters to be considered before giving a notice. We support a police officer being required, under the clause, to consider any representations about the giving of the notice—to use the words in the Bill—by the person to whom it is to be given. Amendment 61 is to establish that representations must be considered regarding the provisions of the notice. If that is not so, an officer could simply ignore representations about specific provisions, for instance—harking back to the previous debate—“But I work in the same building” as him or her.

Amendments 65, 66 and 67 are amendments to Clause 24, which deals with breach of a notice. Regarding Amendment 65, is it appropriate that, if it is believed that there is a breach of a notice and a person is arrested, he or she is automatically held in custody, albeit for a very short period—possibly overnight, sometimes over a weekend? I have not discussed this with my noble friend Lord Paddick, but is there a risk of the use of custody as a punishment in itself—“Let’s put him in a cell to cool down”, that sort of thing? Should this not, however, be at the discretion of the officer?

Clause 24(7) allows the court to impose requirements when remanding on bail. Amendment 66 probes whether a domestic abuse protection notice continues in any event, with its requirements, or are these transferred to become conditions of bail if the court so decides?

Amendment 67 addresses “interference” with witnesses. I guess that this term has a history in legislation, but the amendment probes whether it means or covers direct or indirect contact with witnesses, for instance via a third party or social media. The same point would apply, in the last of our amendments, to Clause 38. I beg to move.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 63 which, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, said, would ensure that a risk assessment is carried out. That would consider any risk to the victim which was likely to occur due to the perpetrator being given notice that a DAPO is likely to be given to the perpetrator.

I presume that the amendments in this group are probing amendments—mine certainly is—going into the detail of how the DAPOs and notices are to be administered. It is right that these are only probing amendments because each case is different and, while there should be comprehensive guidelines on the way that the police operate these procedures, they need to be sufficiently flexible for police officers to make reasoned judgments. There is a very real point about risk assessments: it could be that the victim is put at greater risk through the perpetrator receiving a notice. Counter to that, it could also help the victim if an order is put on without her consent—but that is a matter for a separate amendment in a later group.

I support all the probing amendments in this group, and I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Lord Paddick (LD) [V]]

My Lords, for reasons of brevity and clarity, I will refer to person to whom a domestic abuse protection notice is given as the “perpetrator”, rather than the “alleged perpetrator” or “defendant”, and the person the notice seeks to protect as the “victim”, rather than the “complainant”, the “alleged victim” or “plaintiff”. Clearly it will be for the court to decide, ultimately, whether they are in fact perpetrator and victim.

As my noble friend Lady Hamwee outlined, Amendment 61 proposes the common-sense change to ensure that the victim is consulted not only about whether a domestic abuse prevention notice should be given but about what restrictions it should contain. The person to be protected is likely to be in the best position to advise the senior police officer as to the circumstances in which she may be vulnerable.

Amendment 65 questions whether someone arrested for breach of a domestic abuse protection notice, which is discretionary, in that a constable “may” arrest the person, must be held in custody until they are brought before a court, which would be mandatory. My noble friend is right: we did not collude on what we were going to say on this, but we come to the same conclusion. Surely there may be circumstances where the arrest of the individual has a sufficiently salutary effect as to make further breach unlikely and, therefore, remand in custody unnecessary. I will return to that in a moment.

If the person breaches the domestic abuse prevention notice, if they are arrested and taken before a court, the court may impose conditions to ensure that the person does not interfere with witnesses or otherwise obstruct the course of justice. But Amendment 66 asks whether these conditions are in addition to, or replace, those set out in the DAPN. I am assuming that they are additional, in that the DAPN is designed to protect the victim, not just protect the course of justice. In that case, does the court need to ensure that the conditions it imposes are compatible with those of the DAPN, and does that need to be stated on the face of the Bill? As my noble friend explained, for completeness, our Amendments 67 and 70 suggest that the perpetrator should not contact witnesses, either directly or indirectly.

Amendment 63 is also in this group. I recall research in the United States some time ago, which found that the involvement of the police in cases of domestic abuse generally had a salutary effect on professional classes, who felt shame at their actions being made public, but an unwelcome effect on lower socio-economic groups, who were enraged that the police had become involved in their private business. I am not sure whether the class divide aspects are useful, but the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, has a point, and this should be taken into account by the police. My noble friend and I did not collude, I promise. I would hope that most senior police officers would automatically take this into account, particularly as they need to seek the opinion of the victim as to whether a notice should be served—a conversation that should draw out such risk factors. I am not sure that it needs to be on the face of the Bill.

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Moved by

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede]

71: Clause 32, page 20, line 21, leave out “just and convenient” and insert “practical and within five working days”
Member’s explanatory statement
This would ensure there is a maximum time (within 5 working days) in which a contested DAPO which was made without notice is brought back to court.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 71, 72 and 73. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, for putting his name to Amendment 71; I thank both him and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, for putting their names to Amendments 72 and 73.

These amendments as a group look at time limits and prohibitive requirements. Amendment 71 would ensure a maximum timeframe—five working days—within which a contested DAPO made without notice was brought back to court. There may be cases where a particular programme has to be assessed but the police may not know whether it is readily available, and it may take a certain amount of time to get an assessment for a programme. The purpose of this amendment is to put a time limit on that rather than it dragging on for a longer period.

Amendments 72 and 73 address the same issue but from a different perspective: that is, if there is a positive requirement as part of a DAPO, either to go on a course or to go to drug rehabilitation, the person who is to be submitted to the DAPO should agree to go on that course. While I understand that putting negative requirements on alleged perpetrators is something one can do without their permission, positive requirements will have a far greater likelihood of success if, first, they have been assessed and, secondly, the person agrees to go on whatever course it may be. There could be a number of different elements to this. I have mentioned drug and alcohol and domestic abuse courses, but there are also mental health issues with a number of the alleged perpetrators. All this needs to be taken into account, and that is the purpose of this group of amendments. I beg to move.

[Lord Anderson of Ipswich (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I welcome the introduction of DAPOs but believe that, in certain respects, clearer rules are required to ensure that they are used in a practical and proportionate manner. It is in this constructive—I hope—spirit that I have put my name to the amendments in this group.

The potential scope of a DAPO is extraordinarily wide. Under Clause 33, it may include any prohibition or restriction considered necessary to protect a person from the risk of domestic abuse, expressly not limited to what are referred to as the “examples” of non-contact, residence and tagging provisions in subsections (4) to (6). I remind the Committee that even the types of measure that can be imposed on suspected terrorists under the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011—TPIMs—are exhaustively spelled out in the Schedule to that Act. They include some measures that one assumes would never be imposed in the context of domestic abuse, but the contrast in approach is striking none the less. With such a powerful and open-ended instrument as the DAPO, it is important that we get the safeguards right.

Of course, it will sometimes be necessary to impose the DAPO without notice. Amendment 71 would ensure that those cases did not fall between the cracks and were brought back to court as soon as practical, and in any event within five days. That matters for the reasons given just now by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, and more broadly because DAPOs are highly personalised and highly intrusive. Without the presence of the person against whom the order is made, no one can be sure that the most effective and appropriate DAPO will have been arrived at first time around. Indeed, Clauses 31 and 34 acknowledge the principle that, if DAPOs are to be effective, they must be suitable and enforceable having regard to such matters as the work and educational commitments of their subjects, any other court orders or injunctions which may apply to them, and the interests of other persons including children.

As to Amendments 72 and 73, I comment only that in my days as a Crown Court recorder, it was axiomatic that one did not impose a positive requirement, such as a drug or alcohol rehabilitation order, or a mental health programme, in the absence of the intended subject of that requirement. These interventions are costly and, if they are to be effective, they require not just the presence but the consent and indeed the commitment of the subject. I have strayed there into Amendment 81, which we will come to shortly.

Self-evident as these matters may be to some, there is an advantage to putting them clearly in statute so that magistrates and their clerks are in no doubt as to the position. The amendments in this group are particularly compelling to me because they are supported by the Magistrates Association and by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, in his capacity as a magistrate with current front-line experience. I hope that the Minister will look favourably on them.

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[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, there will be correlations and differences between various orders in this context. I can certainly undertake to write to the noble Lord on this point, but I hope I can go one better: if, in addition to a letter, a conversation would be helpful, I am very happy to offer that as well.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I will start with the point that the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, has just made about the read-across between knife crime prevention orders and DAPOs. I would certainly be very interested in attending the meeting that the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, has just offered because the earlier point that the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, made was strong: that it is reasonably likely that perpetrators might be subject to both of those orders, so there is merit in having a similar approach, whether it is a knife crime prevention order or a DAPO. I would be very happy to join the meeting that the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, has offered.

I thank all noble Lords who have spoken on this group. I was interested in the comparison made by the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, between these orders and TPIMs. He said that these are much more widely drawn, which was an important point. The noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, sought to contrast treatment and punishment, which, I suppose, is a theme here—although we are not dealing with convicted criminals but prevention orders. The point I invariably make when I am sentencing in court or making an order like this is that, even if it is a punishment, it is for the benefit of the people who have positive requirements made of them in whatever that sentence might be. When I make that point, I invariably get a nod from the person I am sentencing, so people understand that point, in my experience.

I listened carefully to the explanation and summary given by the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, but I think I have quite a strong pack of cards, if I can put it like that, and although I will withdraw my amendment I may consider coming back at a later stage.

Amendment 71 withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede]

80: Clause 34, page 21, line 21, at end insert “and probation or youth offending teams, as appropriate.”
Member’s explanatory statement
This would provide that evidence provided to courts includes evidence from probation or youth offending teams.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 80, 81 and 82. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Ipswich and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, who have also put their names to them. Amendment 80 would ensure that evidence which is provided to the courts before imposing a DAPO includes evidence from probation or youth offending teams where appropriate. Amendment 81 would provide that drug, alcohol and mental health treatment should be imposed as a requirement only where the recipient has agreed to attend, as referred to in an earlier group. I believe that that would maximise the effectiveness of any such programmes.

Amendments 83 and 84 would prevent an indefinite DAPO being imposed and place a limit of two years on them, which could provide for extensions to be made on application. This would also, if they so wished, allow courts to put in place a review of hearings if appropriate. In the court system we have restraining orders and non-molestation orders which can be, and usually are, imposed for a limited period, but they can be imposed for an unlimited period. It is certainly my experience that practices vary across different courts. There may be reasons for that: for example, when sitting in a domestic abuse court, a more arduous restraining order might be put in place than in a court that does not specialise in domestic abuse. Either way, we are not talking about people who are convicted of offences—it may be somebody who is of good character.

To put a maximum of two years in place would be a safeguard, particularly since a further application can always be made and so that these orders do not just run on and on. I had an individual come to court with a restraining order on him that he wanted taken off. His problem was that he did not know the address of his former partner, so he had no way of contacting her to apply to get the restraining order removed, and we could do nothing to help him. Given that we are not dealing with convicted offenders, a two-year limit would be appropriate for the DAPO. I beg to move.

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[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, for explaining the contempt of court point in more detail and for setting out the question of the standard of proof. I will be happy to include a paragraph on that in my letter as well.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) (V)]

My Lords, this has been a very wide-ranging debate with a lot of legal detail. I will respond to the fellow laymen who have taken part in the debate. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, I should say that I have found the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, to be very helpful and I certainly have not found him to be dismissive in any way. In fact, before this debate he went out of his way to help me and other colleagues.

I turn to my Amendment 81, referred to by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and the noble Lord, Lord Randall. Although it is my amendment and it does say that there should be agreement to any drug, alcohol or mental health treatment, perhaps I may say a word against it. I believe that this should be a judicial decision. It is a difficult one and obviously it is better if the participants in the courses agree and sign up to them. Nevertheless, there are occasions where it is helpful to make this part of a court order. If there is some ambivalence, it can be made very clear that they should go on the courses. So, even though I moved the amendment, I believe that the decision on whether to make it compulsory should be a judicial one.

As I have said, this has been a wide-ranging debate and I too will read the response of the Minister and the contribution of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, very carefully. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 80 withdrawn.

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[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) (V)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay. Her introduction covered all the points that were made in the various briefings sent to me. I am also conscious that the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, is a long-standing expert in this area who has been pursuing the issue for many years. I thought that I would make a different point from that which is set out in the briefings.

I sit as a family magistrate in London. I am also the chairman of the Greater London Family Panel, which means that I have a pastoral responsibility for 300 family magistrates. About six weeks to two months ago, I sent all my colleagues the email address of the NACCC because I thought all that information would be a useful resource for them to use in their work in court. I specifically did this recently, while we have been moving in and out of lockdowns, because one issue that has been coming up in court a lot is the reasons for contact breaking down. We were told many times that the contact centres were not open. The truth of the matter is that it is a mixed picture and some forms of contact have been facilitated by different centres. Using the NACCC website, we have been able to check with the relevant contact centres to see whether what we had been told by the participants in court proceedings was indeed true. In some cases it was not true; the parents had not been facilitating contact when it was available.

I have given a practical example of how useful the information provided by the NACCC can be. I understand that the purpose of this amendment is to regularise and put it on a similar footing to other children-based services. I also understand that there is a long history of trying to regularise the status, if you like, of the NACCC. I am happy to have added my name to this amendment and hope very much that the Minister will give it a favourable response, so that people can be confident that only appropriately regulated services will be available for parents.

[Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) (V)]

My Lords, I am delighted to follow the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, and pay tribute to his wealth of experience as a family magistrate. I too am delighted to lend my support to the amendment and I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, on introducing it so eloquently. It follows on from a Private Member’s Bill which I sponsored soon after I was introduced into the House. It called for the equalisation of standards for child contact centres; that is, centres offering public and/or private provision.

I am sure my noble friend Lord Wolfson will recall, from his early days in private practice, some of the heartrending cases we have all had to deal with of trying to allow and permit family relationships to continue. That is why I pay tribute to the National Association of Child Contact Centres and declare my interest as a vice-president. I join the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, in paying fulsome tribute to the work it does. I am also an officer of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Child Contact Centres and Services, where we try and bring these issues to the fore in both Houses of Parliament.

This amendment is particularly appropriate to this clause in Part 4 of the Bill, which looks at local authority support. Children are often caught up as innocent victims of domestic abuse but it is essential they maintain contact, in so far as is safe and possible, with both parents in any family situation. What is clear at the moment is that public and private provision in child contact is not equal; it is important to ensure safeguarding is recognised and extended to both. The child contact system, as I understand it, is the only child service that is not nationally accredited or regulated, and addressing this is the purpose of Amendment 91. I accept this clause is looking at the “Support provided by local authorities”, but it is in these difficult situations that a child may have suffered through no fault of their own from the abuse of a parent—most likely, the non-resident parent.

I hope my noble friend Lord Wolfson, other noble friends and the Government will look favourably on this amendment. It seeks to rectify a situation to ensure all child contact centres will work to the highest standards and that those children who are separated from one or other parent, in these particularly sensitive situations, will continue to have access and contact with both parents. It seems entirely appropriate that we consider Amendment 91 against the background of Part 4. In these circumstances, I am delighted to lend my support to Amendment 91 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and others who have lent their support.

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[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. It was not my intention to be specious. I was trying to be accurate and constructive. I have already said that I will engage with the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, if she provides evidence that there is a systemic problem with the current arrangements that cannot be resolved by the existing mechanisms. That was a genuine offer. I am sure that the noble Baroness will take me up on it. I will be very happy if she does.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, the Minister has invited comments about potential systemic problems. I draw his attention to one group of cases which he did not refer to: people who self-refer to contact centres. They are not sent there by social workers or by the courts, but are self-referring for their own reasons—trying to sort out the issues themselves. They could easily end up at unregulated contact centres, which may well be cheaper, so if the noble Lord is looking for systemic problems, I suggest that this may well be one.

[Lord Wolfson of Tredegar (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, for that point. As I said in my response to the main debate, even unaccredited centres are still subject to the various requirements that I set out, but I am very conscious of the noble Lord’s expertise in this area. In a previous answer, I committed to writing a long letter to him. I do not want to add to it now, but perhaps he and I can have discussions, with the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, which include the point he raises. I hope that is helpful.