Backing Business to Create Economic Growth

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Monday 18th May 2026 Commons Chamber

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith and Chiswick) (Lab)]

What an abrupt end that was. What a cliff-hanger!

I want to speak briefly about the justice measures in the King’s Speech. Important Bills are being introduced or carried over, and it is disappointing that the Opposition did not nominate justice and home affairs for a full day’s debate, even more so because today those in the other place are debating those very same subjects, which are indeed important.

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Andy Slaughter]

It is a bit early, but all right.

[Max Wilkinson]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way on the subject of home affairs. As the Liberal Democrats’ home affairs spokesperson, I too am disappointed that there is not a day for me to have my say on this matter, and I will try to do so in this brief intervention. When I am opposite the Home Secretary, who makes a great play of shouting things at me as if I am a terrible liberal making unreasonable statements, she tends to imply strongly that by moving to the authoritarian right, the Labour party is seeing off the challenge of the Reform party. I wonder whether Labour Members are reflecting on that in the wake of the recent election results.

[Andy Slaughter]

That was a bit off-subject, so I will confine my comments to saying that, as usual, we are all disappointed by the official Opposition. We will leave it at that.

Fortunately, the Justice Committee has been involved in scrutinising some of the legislation being carried over—namely, the Courts and Tribunals Bill, which I believe has now been reborn as the courts modernisation Bill, and the Public Office (Accountability) Bill, by which I mean the Hillsborough Bill; I hope the House is keeping up with these nomenclatures. I will deal with those Bills before outlining what else the Committee is doing.

First, on the courts modernisation Bill, the Justice Committee has been engaging closely with the Government’s proposals for reform of the Crown court, holding evidence sessions and collecting written evidence to gather views. We have heard from Sir Brian Leveson, whose independent review of the criminal courts formed the basis for the proposed changes, and from a wide range of practitioners, including barristers, solicitors, magistrates, retired judges and victims’ representatives. The Government declined to allow the Committee to undertake pre-legislative scrutiny, so we have conducted our own on behalf of the House, and next week we will publish a major report of our findings. The passage of the Bill through the Commons has been rapid, and there has been little opportunity for scrutiny of its contents by Members and indeed the wider public, despite the profound constitutional implications.

[Ruth Cadbury]

As a fellow Committee Chair, does my hon. Friend agree that the Government could reconsider their relationship with Select Committees and provide more opportunities for pre-legislative scrutiny by Committees, which play such an important role in addressing legislation prior to it coming to its formal stages in this House?

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Slaughter]

I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for her intervention, and the answer is that there is a balance. We all want the Government to press on with all the wonderful things that they intend to do, which are in the King’s Speech, but that must be mitigated by the guiding hand of experienced practitioners, such as my hon. Friend, in their Select Committee roles.

I hope that our report on the courts modernisation Bill will make a significant contribution to Members’ understanding and analysis of its provisions, and aid their scrutiny and deliberations. I also hope that Ministers will take on board the issues that we will raise.

Secondly, I welcome back the Hillsborough Bill, which is the result of years of committed campaigning led by the families, victims and survivors of the Hillsborough disaster and other public tragedies. I spoke on Second Reading to highlight the areas of the Bill where I thought further clarity was required, including the application of the duty of candour to subcontractors, not just those with a direct contractual relationship; the scope of the exemption from the offence of “misleading the public” for acts done for the “purposes of journalism”; and how the expansion of legal aid will be funded. I am pleased to see that the Government have now published their proposals for the last of those.

When the Bill’s remaining stages take place, I intend to table amendments to require the Government to consider the merits of a national oversight mechanism—an independent body tasked with collating, analysing and following up the conclusions and recommendations made in the course of inquests and inquiries. I will also add my support to amendments relating to the role of the Independent Public Advocate and its information-gathering powers, and to the extension of the duty of candour to subcontractors, who are used by the vast majority of service provides, including Fujitsu during the Horizon scandal. I look forward to the Bill returning so that these issues can be considered in more detail. The national oversight mechanism, championed by the charity Inquest, is getting considerable traction. The Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee and the Liaison Committee are discussing what may be the best method of ensuring that the recommendations of inquiries are implemented, and the Justice Committee also has an interest in this matter. We are also exploring the wider issue of how information from inquests can be collated and presented to prevent future deaths, whether or not there is a formal prevention of future deaths report. To that end, I am tabling amendments to the Bill that would establish a national coronial database.

Thirdly, I turn to the immigration and asylum Bill. The Justice Committee has been engaging with the Government’s proposal, since it was made last August, for a new independent appeals body to speed up decision making on asylum appeal cases, which is to be implemented via the Bill. In February, we visited the Taylor House tribunal hearing centre in London and spoke to senior judges to try to understand the causes of the current high appeal backlog. From speaking to them, it was clear that the failures in the current system, which have led to high appeal backlogs, are operational. They include: a shortage of administrative officers to check validity and collect papers; a shortage of court lawyers to issue directions and prepare cases for hearing; inadequate legal aid provision, causing essential legal and evidential groundwork to be performed far too late or not at all; poor or absent Home Office representation at hearings; and failure to comply with tribunal directions on both sides. Replacing judges with adjudicators will not solve those problems. Operational investment in the tribunal infrastructure is clearly required.

The Committee will endeavour to shine a light on that as the Bill goes through the House, but our initial thoughts are that replacing or supplementing judicial decision making by the first-tier tribunal with Home Office administrators will complicate rather than speed up the process, and simply move contentious cases to the upper tribunal or administrative court. In addition to scrutinising that significant legislation over the coming months, the Justice Committee will be concluding and reporting on its inquiries on the rehabilitation and resettlement of offenders and access to justice, and progressing its inquiry on children and young adults in the secure estate.

It was good news earlier to see the Government launch the White Paper on youth justice. The Committee will be holding individual sessions with senior office holders, including the Attorney General, the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Lord Chancellor. We will expand our work on tribunals by launching an inquiry on delays in employment tribunals, which currently have a backlog of over half a million active claims. We will also want to scrutinise the impact of the reforms contained in the Sentencing Act 2026 both on the prison population and the Probation Service, and on offender rehabilitation and public safety.

There are omissions from the Gracious Speech that are a matter for regret. Despite broad consensus, there is no measure to reverse the Supreme Court’s ruling in PACCAR. The Committee heard in its access to justice inquiry how that is adversely affecting litigation funding. There is also no proposal for anti-SLAPP—strategic lawsuits against public participation—legislation, despite substantial evidence of the use of litigation to stifle free speech, nor is there anything to help the victims of press harassment.

It is disappointing that calls to introduce a legal right to consular assistance for British nationals arbitrarily detained or abused by foreign Governments have been ignored, and that proposals mooted to reform the position of cohabiting couples are absent. None the less, this is a substantial King’s Speech with a full programme that includes full, wholesale reform of leasehold and commonhold, social housing renewal, closer ties with the EU, and nationalisation of the steel industry. It is to be commended and supported in all those aspects, which are firmly based on sound Labour principles. Who can argue with that?