Criminal Justice Bill (Fifteenth sitting)

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 30th January 2024 Public Bill Committees

I hope Members understand the spirit of what I am intending with these new clauses. They are quite simply designed to ensure that those who seriously injure or kill a person they collide with face justice if they decide to leave the scene of the collision. As I said earlier, if Minister wishes to take away my new clauses and give the intent behind them some thought, I would be more than willing to withdraw them and give the Government the opportunity to carefully consider the points I have made, our constituents have made and road safety campaigners would make if they could speak directly to the Committee.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

I rise to speak to new clause 49 on behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Gerald Jones) and others. The new clause would amend the Road Traffic Act 1988 to provide that dangerous and careless or inconsiderate driving offences may be committed on private land adjacent to the highway. In August 2017, 22-month-old Pearl Melody Black from Merthyr Tydfil was tragically killed while walking with her father and brother. Pearl was killed by an unoccupied vehicle that rolled from a private drive in Merthyr on to a highway and down a hill, crashing into a wall that subsequently crushed Pearl and injured her father and brother.

In the months after the incident, officers from the serious collision unit of South Wales police worked tirelessly to put together a case to provide justice for the family. In short, all tests concluded that the car was mechanically sound and that it had rolled because the handbrake was not fully engaged and the automatic transmission was not fully placed in park mode. The case was sent to the Crown Prosecution Service in March 2018 and was worked on by the London office as well as by an independent QC hired by the CPS. Everyone was hopeful of a conviction under the causing death by dangerous driving category, and the CPS looked at other possible options. However, in June 2018 the CPS stated that it was unable to send the case to court as a glitch in the law states that the vehicle must have started its journey on a public road for a prosecution under the Road Traffic Act 1988. Even though Pearl was killed on a public road, the fact that the vehicle started its descent from a private drive meant that prosecution was not possible.

The coroner stated that the vehicle was well maintained and it seemed that the issue was very much driver operation. The inquest heard that the handbrake had not been fully applied in park mode. The inquest into Pearl’s death was heard in October 2018 and the outcome was that it was an accident. However, with the support of South Wales police and the CPS, Pearl’s parents have been seeking a change in the law to prevent other families from being unable to secure justice due to a legal loophole following such a tragic and completely preventable accident as this. As Gemma and Paul acknowledge, it will not help to bring justice for Pearl, as legislation is not retrospective, but if this law can be changed to prevent anyone else from suffering this injustice again, it may provide some comfort.

My hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney put forward a ten-minute rule Bill that had cross-party support, including mine, but it fell due to a lack of parliamentary time. Meetings with various Justice and Transport Ministers have been helpful in that they were all sympathetic, but there is currently no major transport Bill that could provide a vehicle for this change. This new clause would therefore allow for the change to be made.

It is wholly wrong that, in cases as tragic as the one I outlined, justice cannot be achieved. There can be no conviction simply because the land on which the incident took place is not classified as public. If the law were changed in relation to driving offences occurring on private land adjoining public land, that would be a powerful deterrent to road users being careless, as well as those who have no doubt exploited the current loopholes in the law to avoid conviction when they have undoubtedly been at fault. People would be more likely to take care and pay more attention when parking or driving on private land close to public land if they knew that there could be serious consequences for their careless and reckless behaviour.

There are a huge number of instances where private land adjoining public land is readily used and potentially dangerous to those around it, including residential driveways, schools and nurseries, supermarkets, shopping centres, hospitals and doctors’ surgeries to name some of the more common ones. When we consider those examples, we can see that driving on that specific category of land can present a high risk to people in everyday situations, and especially children, the elderly and some of the most vulnerable among us.

I am sure that all hon. Members agree that nobody who has suffered the loss of a loved one or had an accident or an injury as a result of a driving offence should have to endure the injustice of seeing those responsible go free simply because of a loophole in the law. Prosecutions for driving offences—indeed, for any illegal action—should be based on what happened, not where it happened.

[Alex Cunningham]

I shall be brief. My hon. Friends the Members for Bootle and for Swansea East have addressed new clauses 17, 18 and 49, and I pay tribute to them and to my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney for the work they have done on road traffic incidents. All three new clauses illustrate the need for a sentencing review for serious road traffic offences, and Labour is committed to doing that alongside sentencing for other serious crimes across the system.

The Minister and the Committee heard the tragic accounts outlined by my hon. Friends, including that of a runaway car that killed a young child. Sadly, in that case, there could be no justice for the child or her family as no offence related to the circumstances of her death. Surely that cannot be right. I am sure the Minister agrees that we have a duty to act in all three areas outlined in the new clauses. Has she examined the impact of those measures on cost, particularly in relation to the additional cost of prison places? If she has not, will she consider doing so before Report and share that information with the Committee, so that we are better informed? If she cannot support the new clauses today, I would be obliged if she told us what action, if any, her Department is considering for such offences and whether the Government plan to address them in the Bill at a later stage, or perhaps during Committee of the whole House on the Sentencing Bill, which I believe is due within the next few weeks.

There can be no doubt that the new clauses would close loopholes in the law that currently prevent families of loved ones killed in tragic circumstances from achieving either justice or closure. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Criminal Justice Bill (Twelfth sitting)

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 23rd January 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Alex Norris]

Using anything for a purpose for which it was not intended risks damage, because the possibility of that damage has not been designed out. What if someone is sleeping on the bench persistently over a period? “Damage” could be breaking one of the wooden slats, but it could also be whittling down the paint or varnish. The Minister rolls his eyes. If he gave the commitment today that he personally will make all these decisions every day across the country, well, that might give me some comfort, but he clearly will not apply the test. It will be applied by possibly relatively junior members of staff with very little training. If the test is applied overly officiously, and there is a clear risk of that, then the damage to an individual could be considerable, and their recourse minimal. That is why this point matters, even in an extreme case.

Subsection (5)(c) refers to

“damage to the environment (including excessive noise, smells, litter or deposits of waste)”.

“Smells” is particularly problematic. That is part of the stigma relating to people who do not have a roof over their head. Smelling could be enough to make them a nuisance. That is a real problem. My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley talked about the stigma test; the provision does not pass that test.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend makes a very passionate representation. Last November, on a very wet, cold night, I slept in a doorway. I went armed with a tarpaulin, a sleeping bag and cardboard. Homelessness is not a lifestyle choice. There were other people there who were obviously suffering from mental health issues, and some had been victims of sexual abuse. I had gone armed with equipment to be homeless, and to sleep on the streets. Does he not agree that under the rules in the Bill, I could have been arrested?

[Alex Norris]

My hon. Friend would certainly have passed the test of intending to sleep rough. A subjective decision would then have to be made on whether her behaviour caused damage, or even was capable of causing damage—the damage does not have to occur. She might also be found to have caused “disruption”, which is

“interference with…any lawful activity in, or use of, a place.”

It would not be very hard to pass that test. She is a fearsome opponent, so perhaps she is also a health and safety risk to others at times. So yes, she could in some way fail many, if not all, of the tests. [Interruption.] I think she will probably take that as a compliment.

Criminal Justice Bill (Ninth sitting)

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 18th January 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Laura Farris]

The provisions on the removals of foreign nationals are set out in the 2012 immigration rules; it is section 339 that governs removal. If the sentence has been two years or more, only truly exceptional circumstances would allow them to stay. The simple fact of somebody who has committed a category A or B—

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Laura Farris]

Let me finish the point. It has to be truly exceptional. I have done cases in court for the Home Office. The Home Office is nearly always successful when it relies on that clause because, as the court always says, when the offence is serious, there is an overwhelming public interest in the removal of a dangerous offender from the United Kingdom. Article 8 is qualified under paragraph 339 of the immigration rules.

[Carolyn Harris]

Would those exceptional circumstances include prisoners whose crime was committed after they had been trafficked to the United Kingdom, if they committed it because of the trafficking?

[Laura Farris]

I have never been involved in a case of that nature; cases where the offending is really serious tend to be much more straightforward. There is flexibility, because we can take such cases to court to appeal the removal. Obviously, when someone is already a victim of crime, that is a different context, so I do not know how the courts would deal with it. The law itself, however, is set out under the established immigration rules, in primary legislation and has been operational for 12 years now. That is not part of the dispute today.

To continue, it is right that we take innovative measures to ensure that we always have sufficient prison capacity to fulfil the orders of the court and to punish the most dangerous offenders. I reiterate at this stage that the powers simply lay down the foundation for future arrangements. I repeat: all the points raised by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Stockton North, about the considerations that might apply were relevant, but this is about future arrangements so that we will have the power to transfer prisoners to rented foreign prisons. No foreign prison rental agreements are yet in place, however. As he is aware, there is precedent in Europe: both Norway and Belgium have similar arrangements with the Netherlands at present.

Criminal Justice Bill (Tenth sitting)

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 18th January 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Laura Farris]

On Jonathan Hall’s comments, there are two points to make. First, given his expertise, it is relevant to consider what he said about polygraphs in general, which is that

“polygraph measures for released terrorist offenders are a good thing.”––[Official Report, Criminal Justice Public Bill Committee, 12 December 2023; c. 64.]

You asked for an updated example of where polygraph testing had been instrumental, and he gave an example—in fact, I do not think it had been used—when he said:

“I was in favour of polygraph measures after Fishmongers’ Hall. It was partly on the back of one of my recommendations that polygraph measures were brought in. They always, or at least for a long time, existed for sex offenders. You will recall Usman Khan, who was clearly a very deceptive man. My view was that polygraph measures could be useful.”––[Official Report, Criminal Justice Public Bill Committee, 12 December 2023; c. 66.]

It is difficult to prove a negative, but they were brought in shortly after that.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

Can the Minister clarify whether the polygraphs are administered by the private sector or the statutory sector? Given that we have had some startling problems with technical issues in the private sector of late, it would be interesting to know who is responsible for the polygraphs.

[Laura Farris]

Polygraph conditions are set by the Secretary of State.

[Carolyn Harris]

Yes, but what about the company responsible for provision?

[Laura Farris]

Can I come back to you on that? The shadow Minister talked about the categorisation of former terrorist offenders, and I hope I can answer his point.

We have made the point, and I hope it was clear, that those who were convicted of an alternative offence where there was a strong belief that there was a terrorism connection—it is a small cohort—were convicted before the counter-terrorism law came in. They would have been convicted separately. Politicians are not making a random adjudication of whether an offender should be classified retrospectively as a terrorist. It is about looking at the sentencing remarks and what the judge, who heard all the evidence and sat through the trial, made of that offender.

It is a fair challenge. I know that it is quite an irregular provision in law to have, effectively, a retroactive clause. However, when you look at the failings that applied in the Fishmongers’ Hall case, there is a very strong public interest in ensuring that we maximise and extend the protection of this provision in a way that the public would find reasonable. When you refer back to sentencing remarks, you can be reasonably confident that you are—

Criminal Justice Bill (Seventh sitting)

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 16th January 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Chris Philp]

I will do my best to conclude prior to 11.25, when the Committee might consider adjourning.

Clause 20 and schedule 3 create a new power for UK law enforcement and other investigative agencies to suspend IP addresses and domain names that are being used in serious crime. Under the power, law enforcement will be able to apply for a court order requiring the organisation responsible for providing the IP address or domain name to prevent access. Sadly, we have all too often seen that criminal actors use domain names and/or IP addresses to carry out crime including fraud and malware dissemination, targeting the vulnerable. When IP addresses and domain names are being used to conduct criminal activities, law enforcement agencies need to be able to block access, preventing the crime occurring.

In the UK, the police and other law enforcement agencies currently use public and private partnerships, and industry will, in the majority of cases, voluntarily suspend domain and IP addresses used for criminal purposes. This has led to the UK being generally one of the safest jurisdictions in the world. However, voluntary suspension is not an option in all cases. In particular, the majority of cyber-crime emanates from outside the UK, where the same voluntary arrangements are not available. Quite often, internet infrastructure providers based overseas will only take action when a court order is handed down. This measure will provide for such a court order to be obtained. Overseas infrastructure providers are much more likely to comply with a court order than a simple request made by the police without a court order.

We reviewed the Computer Misuse Act 1990 in 2021. As part of that, we invited views from stakeholders. Responses indicated that although much of the 1990 Act remains effective, more could be done in cases where the UK wants to take action against offences committed from overseas. The main function of these provisions is to ensure that UK law enforcement and certain investigative agencies can act to suspend IP addresses and domain names where they are being used for criminal activity with a link to the UK. Schedule 3 enables UK law enforcement agencies listed in paragraph 12 of the schedule to apply for a court order, which they can serve on entities based outside the UK.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

Will this apply to illegal gambling sites and crypto casinos? Will the Gambling Commission have the authority to have these addresses pulled down?

[Chris Philp]

If illegal activity were taking place, which would include illegal gambling, then the provisions of the clause would apply. As to whether the Gambling Commission can make the application or whether it would have to be the police, to answer that question we will have to refer to schedule 3 on page 91 and look at the list of entities. The hon. Member will see that paragraph 12(2)(e) does include

“a member of staff of the Gambling Commission of at least the grade of executive director.”

Indeed, paragraph 12(1)(a)(v) also expressly references the Gambling Commission, so I hope that answers the question about the Gambling Commission’s powers. I obviously prepared that in advance, anticipating her question—as Members of the Committee could surely see!

That is very helpful and will strengthen our hand with overseas entities that might not respond to a polite request but are willing to act when there is a court order. I hope that is something that we can all get behind. It will help protect our constituents from online crime, particularly fraud, but other forms of illegal activity, including illegal gambling. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Swansea East for her work combating gambling harm, which I saw at first hand during my time as Minister for technology and gambling a couple of years ago.

Criminal Justice Bill (Fifth sitting)

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 11th January 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Chris Philp]

The hon. Member raises a concern that inventive criminals might exploit the defences we set out in clause 5(3), on lines 37 to 40 at the bottom of page 3, which he was quoting from. He is concerned that criminals might find a way of pretending or purporting to offer, for example, legitimate broadcasting services when in fact they do not. I think that a court would take a view on legitimate broadcasting services. If there was a prosecution and a criminal advanced that defence, it would be up to the jury to decide whether the broadcasting services really were legitimate.

Since the hon. Member has raised the point, I will happily take it away and see whether there are any concerns that the clause might inadvertently provide a loophole for ingenious or inventive criminals. I will seek to satisfy myself that that is not the case, but if he has identified a problem or potential loophole, I will happily come back to the Committee. I will take that away as a point to double check. We can probably rely on juries, or magistrates in a magistrates court trial, to apply common sense to those defences, but it is good that he raised the question and I will certainly look into it.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

On that point, it is possible for scammers to intercept texts that come from a credible bank, so they can slot in a text in the line of communication between a person and their credible bank. Have the Government given any thought as to how we can stop that happening? I feel it makes us even more vulnerable.

[Chris Philp]

That sort of interception and insertion is not addressed by this clause, which is about SIM farms and the almost industrial-scale transmission of thousands of messages. What the hon. Lady is describing is a little different. It can happen to emails as well. For example, if someone is about to buy a house, they may be corresponding with their solicitor. When the solicitor tells them to transfer the funds to X bank account, a criminal can insert themselves into the email chain, pretending to be the solicitor, and put in a message telling the client to send the funds to their own bank instead of the solicitor’s client account. Inserting messages into an email chain happens quite a bit, but that is not what this clause is designed to address. The Security Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), is very aware of the issue because it falls into his portfolio rather than mine. Perhaps I could ask his officials to write to the hon. Lady to update her on the work he is doing with law enforcement on that point, because this clause just does not address it.

Turning back to the group of clauses, it is worth saying that these offences will make it difficult—I hope impossible—for criminals to access and use SIM farms for the purposes of fraud, and the police will be given the tools that they need to disrupt them. Clauses 5 and 6 ban the possession and supply of a SIM farm. However, as I have already said in response to the hon. Member for Bootle, if a person has good reason or lawful authority, obviously that is not criminalised. We have talked a bit about the legitimate use issue already, and there are some examples provided in clause 5, as we have discussed.

I will turn to amendment 47 to schedule 1. Schedule 1 confers powers of entry, search and seizure in relation to these offences. There is an offence of intentionally obstructing a constable when they are carrying out a search—the search is to be unimpeded, obviously . That offence also needs to apply in the case of people who are exercising the power of a constable, such as designated National Crime Agency officers, who are not necessarily constables. Amendment 47 to schedule 1 is a technical amendment that makes sure that all the relevant people can exercise this power of search: not just constables, but any person who is exercising the power of a constable. It is a technical amendment, making sure that it applies to everybody undertaking those searches to hopefully find and prosecute criminals who are using SIM farms. On that basis, I commend these provisions to the Committee.

Criminal Justice Bill (Sixth sitting)

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 11th January 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Chris Philp]

I am grateful to the shadow Minister for setting out his amendment and his views, as he did this morning in such a thoughtful and considered way.

I turn first to the substance of the clause. It increases the maximum penalty from six months’ to two years’ imprisonment for the offences of possessing, importing, manufacturing, selling or supplying prohibited offensive weapons when they are sold to those under the age of 18. We take seriously the sale of knives to under-18s, so the increase in the penalty from six months to two years is important.

We do not want people under 18 to be sold knives; we have heard about all kinds of tragic examples of them using knives to commit homicide. On 27 September, a tragic case in my own borough, Croydon, involved a 15-year-old schoolgirl, Elianne Andam, who was brutally murdered with a knife at 8.30 in the morning. The alleged perpetrator was himself only 17 years old. Preventing such knives from getting into the hands of young people is critical. That is the purpose behind the clause.

The clause relates to selling knives to those under 18, but the amendment speaks to a slightly different point: delivering knives to those under 18. Delivering something is obviously different from selling it. If someone is selling it, they are a shop, a retailer, and the person responsible for the transaction. Acting as a delivery agent—whether the Post Office, FedEx, UPS or some such—means delivering a parcel on behalf of someone else, which is a slightly different responsibility. That is why the law as it stands sets out in the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 some measures to address the issue. The delivery company must have arrangements in place, together with the seller, to ensure that the items are not delivered into the hands of someone under 18. The penalty for delivery is an unlimited fine.

Some new guidelines have been set out by the Sentencing Council. They came into force on 1 April 2023. Organisations now face fines with a starting point of between £500 and £1 million. That is a starting point, so they can be very substantial fines indeed when applied to a corporate body. Individuals can, of course, be fined as well. It is important to make it clear that corporate bodies can be liable for such fines, as I said a second ago, because they are obviously capable of paying much larger amounts of money than an individual.

Amendment 54 raises an important issue. The case that the hon. Member for Nottingham North referred to is relevant—I completely accept that—but I think that the changes made in the Offensive Weapons Act and the Sentencing Council guidelines that came into effect less than a year ago strike the right balance on the delivery of such items. For the sale of items, however, we are increasing the custodial maximum up to two years.

In addition, the provisions of the Online Safety Act, which will be commenced into full force once the various codes of practice are published by Ofcom, will place duties on things such as online marketplaces, which historically have not been regulated. Online marketplaces have been facilitating, for example, the sale of knives to young people or the sale of illegal knives—the kind of knives that we are banning. Those online marketplaces will fall into the remit of the Online Safety Act, so the online space will get clamped down on a great deal.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

For the sake of clarity, will the Minister confirm that if a shop owner sells offensive weapons, the shop owner will be liable and not the person who works on the premises—obviously, they should not be held accountable for a shop owner’s decision to sell the weapon.

Oral Answers to Questions

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Monday 22nd November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Damian Hinds]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for highlighting the 7726 service, because referrals to that help to build up the intelligence on SMS fraudsters or scam texters and can help to lead to take-downs. It is really important that law enforcement works both with regulators and directly with individual telecoms companies to protect victims and go after the criminals responsible.

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

7. What recent assessment she has made of trends in the level of suspected modern slavery offences.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Rachel Maclean)]

Modern slavery is a truly awful crime. Statistics for England and Wales show that police-recorded modern slavery offences increased by 2% in the year to June 2021, and live investigations also increased from 188 in December 2016 to 3,869 in October 2021. We are committed to tackling modern slavery and we have invested £15 million to strengthen the police response over the past five years.

[Carolyn Harris]

Prosecution and conviction rates of perpetrators of modern slavery are surprisingly low. Evidence from Justice and Care’s victim navigator programme shows that with appropriate support more victims would have the confidence to help investigations, resulting in more prosecutions. Will the Minister please consider giving all confirmed victims at least 12 months’ support in the country so that they can feel empowered to engage with the justice process?

[Rachel Maclean]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question; she has highlighted an important issue. The whole point of our modern slavery strategy is to be able to track down and prosecute those horrendous criminals who heartlessly traffic human beings into this country. The entire force of the Government’s policy making is devoted to that end.

Protection of Retail Workers

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray. I, too, declare an interest, as a proud member of both USDAW and the Co-op party.

I am an ardent support of USDAW’s Freedom From Fear campaign, as 2020 was a year like no other. As the pandemic took hold, we realised what services and occupations we relied on most. Our shop workers were and still are vital frontline key workers. For too long, they have been undervalued. The pandemic exacerbated that. We have to acknowledge the contribution that those workers make, and ensuring their safety and protecting them from violence and abuse is a good place to start.

Nothing would please me more than to be able to share with hon. Members a decline in the incidence of abuse but, unfortunately, I cannot. Our shop workers put themselves at risk of covid so that we can have our essential supplies, but abuse of staff have worsened. Each year, USDAW conducts a survey of the violence and abuse experienced by members and those working on the frontline of the retail sector. The 2020 survey found that 88% experienced verbal abuse, 61% were threatened by a customer and 9% were assaulted, and that abuse, threats and violence doubled in the first few months of the pandemic.

I will share some of the shocking first-hand experiences of shop workers:

“I’ve had customers say they’ve got covid-19 and then cough in my face because they were asked to stand behind a marked line”;

“Customers grabbing my arm to verbally abuse me”;

“Pushed, shoved, coughed at and not given any social distancing”;

and

“I was filmed in work and threatened to be posted all over Facebook. Sworn at for refusing a return with no proof of purchase.”

I am sure we can all agree that such accounts are beyond appalling and that nobody should be exposed to that level of abuse. We would not tolerate that abuse of any other frontline occupation. It is time that shop workers were afforded the same consideration as other professions.

The abuse and violence stands at an unacceptably high level. It is essential that we take action to reduce incidence of abuse. Like others, I will continue to support USDAW’s Freedom From Fear campaign and the calls for legislation to help shopworkers against these acts of abuse, threatening and assault. I urge the Minister to listen the many contributions of hon. Members, to the 104,000 people who signed the petition and to the shopworkers who were subject to this vile treatment. Our shopworkers’ safety is paramount. We do not need empty words; we need change and we need it now.

[James Gray (in the Chair)]

We come now to Mike Amesbury, but he has not been here for the debate, so theoretically we should not call him. On this occasion, as we have some time in hand and he probably has perfectly good reasons for not being here, we will call him towards the end of the debate. That brings us to Liz Twist.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Philp]

I will now come to that critical point, which the shadow Minister also raised. I hope I have demonstrated in my foregoing remarks that, first, the criminal offences to prosecute assaults on emergency workers are already on the statute book, and secondly, that where prosecutions are secured, a longer sentence will already be given owing to the aggravating factors I have just read out. Creating a new offence does not answer the question, because the offence exists already. The aggravating factor exists already. The issue is prosecutions, as the shadow Minister and the hon. Lady have raised.

I have some data. I am not sure whether it came from the USDAW survey or another source. I got it through the Home Affairs Committee’s survey. I am not sure whether that is the same one or a different one.

[Carolyn Harris]

It’s a different one.

[Chris Philp]

Thank you. The Committee surveyed 8,742 people, whom I believe were retail workers, asking if they had been assaulted, and many had been. They were asked whether they had reported the offence, and 87%—not quite 100%—of respondents reported it to the employer. The Committee then asked whether they had reported the offence to the police, and only 53%—half of those retail workers who suffered an assault—had done so. In 12% of cases there was an investigation and arrest. That 12% figure is clearly too low, as the shadow Minister and the hon. Member for Blaydon pointed out. Putting a new criminal offence on the statute book does not fill the gap. It is about investigation and prosecution, and that has to start with reporting.

Support for Women Leaving Prison

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 9th March 2021 Westminster Hall

[Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered support for women leaving prison.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Charles. When you look at the female prison population, you are faced with the stark reality that, for the most part, it is nurture, not nature, that has led these women down the path they are following: a path of destruction; a path that embodies a lack of self-worth; a path that has been created for them by life experiences and subsequent complex needs.

Nearly 60% of women who come into contact with the criminal justice system are survivors of domestic violence, and more than half report having received emotional, physical or sexual abuse during childhood. Both of these figures are likely to be underestimates. If we add issues such as poverty and addiction to that, we can start to see the full picture of how past trauma leads to crime, conviction and imprisonment.

I could talk—and I have talked—at great length about the need for alternatives to prison for many women in the first place. The female offender strategy gave me a sense of real hope that more would be done to advocate for women’s centres, with the emphasis on supporting and rehabilitating women in a more constructive setting. In the strategy, the Government signalled a commitment to a new programme of work for female offenders, driven by three priorities: early intervention, an emphasis on community-based solutions, and an aim to make custody as effective and decent as possible for those women who have to be there.

I was therefore shocked and disappointed by the Ministry of Justice’s announcement earlier this year of 500 new prison places for women, at a cost of £150 million, particularly when co-funding for women’s centres, which are proven to reduce offending, is being cut.

Today, I want to look at what happens to women when they finish their sentence. What support is available to them to help them rebuild their lives? What more needs to be done to reduce the number of women whose initial conviction becomes a catalyst for a lifetime in the criminal justice system?

I recently met representatives from the Safe Homes for Women Leaving Prison initiative. Shockingly, they told me that over half of all women leaving prison have nowhere safe to go. They walk through the gate with three things: the paltry £46 prison discharge grant, a plastic bag full of belongings, and the threat of recall if they miss their probation appointment. For some, the simple fact that they have been in prison a long way from home means that they have no local connections when they are released. For others, who are victims of abuse, returning to their homes, and consequently the perpetrators, comes at a huge personal risk. Yet what other options are there?

A lack of secure housing is a significant barrier to rehabilitation. According to a report by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of probation, between 2019 and 2020, 65% of men and women who were released from prison without settled accommodation reoffended. Without somewhere to live, the chances of finding employment are minimal and the impact on mental health is devastating. A return to familiar surroundings, harmful behaviour, substance abuse and crime is almost inevitable.

The duty to refer in the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 is failing vulnerable women leaving prison. The Government must take urgent action to change this and improve the Act’s effectiveness. Although the announcement of dedicated staff to act as brokers for prisoners in order to give them faster access to accommodation on release is welcome, having this resource in only 11 prisons around the country will not come close to solving the problem. These staff need to be placed in every women’s prison in the country and be fully trained to address the challenges faced by women when they leave prison.

Likewise, the new pilot announced by the Government of temporary basic accommodation for prison leavers at risk of homelessness does not go far enough. It has been launched in only five of the 12 probation regions in England and Wales. It is limited to a maximum of 12 weeks’ accommodation and does not address the particular needs of women at all. This needs to be a national scheme that takes into account the specific issues faced by vulnerable women with complex needs and offers safe and secure permanent accommodation to enable them to achieve resettlement and rehabilitation.

Leaving prison should be the chance for a new beginning, but the way things stand, it is just the start of another battle for many women—a battle to find somewhere safe to live, to get a job, to stay clean and to not reoffend. It is a battle to avoid being recalled, because that £46 was just not enough for a fresh start.

Will the Minister look again at the Government’s commitments in the female offender strategy? Will they make commitments to take an approach that addresses vulnerability, follows the evidence about what works in supporting them to turn their lives around and treats them as individuals of value? Will he consider what could be done to improve women’s life chances on release, be it an uplift in the prison discharge grant; a pledge to look again at additional prison places, given that it is clear that women’s centres provide better outcomes; extending dedicated support across the whole female justice estate to help with accommodation before release; making available guaranteed accommodation for all those leaving who are at risk of homelessness; or perhaps all these things?

We know that the majority of women with convictions have experienced trauma. We have all heard the harrowing stories of abuse, addiction, coercion, and self-deprivation that have led these women to commit crimes in the first place. We need a system that supports their rehabilitation and offers them freedom from the past, to help them avoid recall and allow them to choose a different path; not a system that is set up for failure from the very start.

If we are to see an end to this injustice, so much more needs to be done to offer women the support and tools they need to build themselves a better future. I talk to very many women who started on this vicious journey because of the environment in which they lived. I have met women whose original crime was not having a TV licence. Unable to pay the associated fine, they ended up in prison. I have met women whose children refused to go to school. Again, unable to pay the fine, their punishment was prison. When they are released they have lost their family, their home and their dignity. They now live on the streets, and too many are working the streets and financing the pimps and the drug dealers. We have to break this cycle. The Government must act now to prevent this cycle of inevitability.

--- Later in debate ---

[Carolyn Harris]

I thank all Members for their contributions—I am pleased to see so many people here. I came to this debate feeling really apprehensive about the subject—it is something I have sleepless nights about. I am leaving terrified at the prospect of 20,000 extra police on the streets spending a large proportion of their time filling 500 spaces for women in prisons in order to justify the money that the Government have spent on this. That is certainly not what we need to be doing. We need to provide a different service for women. We need to recognise the fact that women have specific needs. They are in large part victims, despite the fact that they have been labelled as criminals. Most of them are victims of society and, I am afraid to say, victims of this Government’s disinterest in providing anything for them.

We have to stop perpetuating the cycle of criminality and incarceration, criminality and incarceration. We have a moral duty to provide sustainable, productive, appropriate and holistic support and to encourage these women to be productive and to re-engage with society. That is a far better way of using taxpayers’ money than freeing up spaces in prisons. We have to be more humane in the way that we provide for these vulnerable and all too often exploited individuals. That is where we need to concentrate our efforts, not on putting them in prisons. I ask the Minister to please rethink the strategy. Too many women will lose their life, dignity, children, families and homes. We cannot perpetuate this any longer.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered support for women leaving prison.