Oral Answers to Questions

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vara]

No firm decisions have been made at the moment. The consultation document has individual papers as far as each individual court is concerned. They are quite comprehensive. If the hon. Gentleman has issues and concerns, I am happy for him to write to me and I am happy to correspond with him while the consultation is taking place.

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

T8. Last week, the Youth Justice Board announced that the contractor running the Rainsbrook secure training centre in my constituency will change shortly. What discussions has the Minister had to help to ensure that the centre and its staff have a smooth and timely transition to the new contractor?

[Andrew Selous]

We obviously share my hon. Friend’s concerns about what happened at Rainsbrook. There was a rigorous inspection. There will be a further inspection and we will make absolutely sure that the new contractor maintains the highest possible standards.

Prison Overcrowding

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

The figure is, of course, now coming down. It is lower than it was when we took office, and it is roughly proportionate to the number of people in the population who were not born in the UK. We have to bear in mind that one of the reasons why we have a high proportion of foreign national offenders in our jails is that when the Labour party was in government it had a reckless policy on the number of people allowed to migrate to this country.

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

I have three excellent custodial institutions in my constituency: Rye Hill and Onley prisons, and the secure training centre at Rainsbrook, all of which have fantastic staff and do a brilliant job. I welcome the answer to the urgent question, which was spurious at best, but will there be a recategorisation of prisons? Her Majesty’s prison Onley is heading down the track of being fully made up of sex offenders, and it perhaps deserves recategorisation.

[Chris Grayling]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I am in favour of greater specialisation within the prison estate; it allows us to concentrate expertise in particular places. Of course, the biggest change in the estate will be the shaping of a system of resettlement prisons—that will begin later this year—to accompany our rehabilitation reforms, so that some prisons specialise in particular needs, as is the case in his constituency, and others are very much geared to preparing people who are in the last few months of their sentence for release, to try to reduce the likelihood of reoffending.

Wellingborough Prison Site

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Monday 18th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate and on making a good speech. He will know that in my Daventry constituency, we have two prisons: Onley and Rye Hill. If we were to draw a line from London as the crow flies, both would be further away than Wellingborough prison, and they, too, are pretty much full of prisoners who originate from the London region.

[Mr Bone]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for mentioning that, which is an issue I shall develop a little later in my speech.

Wellingborough prison also has the huge advantage of being a very cheap area in which to build and develop. If that were not enough, the Wellingborough prison site has a massive amount of land for development, a proposed new road link to the A45, a community that supports and wants the prison, a council that is keen to see the prison develop and many prison officers living just minutes from the site.

In addition, there is another difficulty for the Ministry of Justice in trying to sell the site. If the sale of land were to go ahead, there would be serious questions about whether the Government would remain financially responsible for the prison-owned sewerage system on the site, which is used by the local housing estate. We could end up having to fork out more money for a site of which we are not even making use. I cannot see how that is cost-effective on any level. Much more than that, most of the prison is very modern and has, in fact, won prizes for its design. In the five-year period from 2004-05, an incredible £22.4 million was spent on the prison—all to be thrown away if the site is to be sold.

Clearly, we have a golden opportunity to knock down the 1960s old prison blocks, to extend the existing modern blocks and facilities and to build new blocks within the existing boundaries. We should then implement new prison operational procedures, mix both state and private employees on the same site, allow prison officers to do the essential running of the prison, while allowing private contractors to carry out other functions. We would then have the cheapest prison in the country per prisoner place and a model new prison, which could be the basis for the rest of the prison estate and provide additional overflow capacity for London.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Wright]

I am not sure what method of travel my hon. Friend was looking at. As I have explained to him, there are a number of factors to consider: the transfer time between the relevant prison site and the local courts it would serve; and the relevant travel time for those who may be visiting inmates at the prison. Given that the majority of prisoners we would be looking to accommodate will come from the London area, it, again, seems logical that where we can, we look at a site within the London area. I say again to my hon. Friend that given what he has said to me, I think it only right that I should take the opportunity to look at this matter again, and I will do so.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) will be pleased to hear of the Minister’s generous offer. I have a question on the policy for London prisoners. As the Minister knows, I have a vested interest, because my area contains two prisons that take prisoners from London. When I have visited these prisons, I have found that they have mainly been full of former gang members who have been taken out of London. Removing them from the north of London, where they come from, is seen as a benefit, because that makes it more difficult for them to maintain contact with the gang networks from which we have just extracted them. How far have we gone with this policy so far? What are the thoughts for the future? Surely we are going against our own vested interest here, which is to remove these people from whence they came.

[Jeremy Wright]

My hon. Friend is right to an extent, and he knows that the two prisons in his constituency are probably no more than a stone’s throw from the edge of mine, and I know them well. He is right that there are a number of London prisoners who are in prisons outside London for good and sensible population management reasons. I can reassure him that it is highly likely that whatever provision we make for an additional London prison, there will remain some transferring of London prisoners to sites outside London. That will be necessary because of the figures that my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough has given the House tonight. That does not mean that we should not consider the needs of the majority of London-based prisoners, which will be to remain in the London area, and the needs of their families who will wish to visit them, as much as the needs of those offenders themselves. It still seems to me that we will want to consider the building of additional prison capacity in or around the London area.

Football Referees

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 4th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

The times being what they are, I feel I should declare an interest at the very start: I have always wanted to be popular. Some would say that being a Conservative Member of Parliament is not exactly the best way of going about that. If we add the fact that I am an active and qualified football referee, one could think that I have chosen what we might call a “challenging path” to that popularity. I took my referees’ course at the age of 12 and qualified shortly afterwards, which I believe means I have just finished my 33rd season as the man in the middle. I have been a member of the Referees Association for all of that time. I should also declare a financial interest. For each game I officiate I receive a fee. I have tried to register it, but the relevant authorities got bored after a while and told me to stop wasting their time.

I have to admit that I love the game. Like anyone who volunteers, coaches or officiates at any sport, I am passionate about the sport I practise every week. One has to be passionate to go out there in most weathers doing one of the least popular jobs in the country week in, week out. I have officiated at all types of games in the UK and abroad at amateur and semi-professional level. I have been very lucky not to have personally experienced what too many referees have experienced: I have not been assaulted while officiating at a game of football.

Every ref I know looks forward to his or her next fixture. While we get paid a small amount, we do not referee for the match fee. We receive good in-service training from the Football Association and the Referees Association, and we go out to do the best job we possibly can in every game. Occasionally—I know this will be hard for Members to comprehend—match officials do make the odd mistake. The vast majority of times, however, we get the decision right. Alas, on some occasions—Members may have seen some well-publicised examples—players do not like the decisions we make. Referees have to deal with that by using common sense.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman feel that the introduction of goal-line technology and a fourth official would reduce some of the friction between footballers and referees on the pitch?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I am sure that that would help at the highest level of the game, but at my level I am lucky to have two club linesmen, let alone a fourth official. I hear where the hon. Gentleman is coming from, but I do not think they would necessarily help in this particular situation. There is no goal-line technology in Northamptonshire Combination football league games as of yet.

We deal with challenging situations by using common sense, people management skills and the odd yellow or red card. In most cases, while the teams and their supporters might not like some decisions, everyone just gets on with the game. Sometimes they do not, however. Recorded assaults on referees are thankfully few and far between. The number of physical contacts against officials has fallen quite dramatically by 21% since 2010-11, from 618 cases to 528, but that is still 10 physical assaults on football referees in England and Wales each week.

[Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the number of recorded assaults on referees has decreased because it is often difficult for referees to have those assaults taken seriously by the authorities?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

Yes, that is absolutely the case, and it is something I intend to come to later, so I thank my hon. Friend for his point.

In fact, over the past year, the number of cautions has fallen: all cautions fell 10%; dissent cautions fell 13%; dismissals fell 13%; and in general all misconduct on the football pitch fell 9%. Some put this gradual improvement down to the Football Association’s respect agenda, and I would tend to agree, but whatever the reason, it is obviously to be welcomed. I still find it astonishing, however, that in the last year for which full records are available 528 referees—more than 10 a week—were assaulted during a match.

Obviously, in these cases, the Referees Association and the FA step in, the first helping the assaulted and the county FA offering some punishment post-disciplinary hearing. There were concerns that county FAs were being too lenient in the punishments handed out, so several changes were made to the appeals process. Now anyone, not just the person subject to the violation, can appeal a decision and ask the FA to review the case. For the police to take action, referees must report incidents to the police themselves. The FA recommends that they do this but cannot intervene or compel an official to do so. If criminal action is taken in a case of assault or physical contact on a referee, the player in question is automatically suspended pending the outcome of the case.

The purpose of this debate is singular: to ask the Minister for his help. Referees up and down the country are becoming more and more concerned that neither the police nor the Crown Prosecution Service is following through with the investigation of assaults, believing that footballing sanctions—bans for a certain period—are enough of a punishment. It would be fantastic, therefore, if he could help. The FA could do with improved feedback from the courts.

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate, which one might think a game of two halves: the soft cop in the early part and the rougher stuff coming later. Does he agree that the FA could improve conviction and prosecution rates by launching private prosecutions where other parties do not wish to get involved? That would, I suggest, still be possible.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

That is true, actually. The Referees Association offers insurance to referees, so if someone joins it—not all referees do, but most do—it will help and guide them down that route. If, though, there is a physical assault on a football pitch, it should first be a matter for the police, but if they choose not to act, perhaps there could be this second way of doing it.

To return to the subject on which I would like the Minister’s help, the FA would appreciate automatic feedback from the courts on football cases to ensure that any criminal cases involving footballers are also subject to football disciplinary hearings. A simple communication would suffice to ensure that if a banned player tried to play for a different football club, they would not be allowed to. Furthermore, assaulting a referee should automatically mean a formal interview by the police. It has been suggested that sometimes the police only log details and do not formally charge a player with assault, saying that it is a footballing matter. Any player who assaults a referee should be formally interviewed by the police as a matter of course, and witness statements could be taken to prepare for appropriate action. A simple interview after an assault would also act as a strong deterrent.

In the more serious cases, we need to urge the CPS to treat this type of assault seriously and to ensure that football offences do not receive more lenient sentences than the same crimes committed off the football pitch.

[Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this important debate. He has mentioned serious offences, suggesting that some are not so serious. What would he say is the difference?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

Less serious offences would include one that the hon. Gentleman might have seen Paul Gascoigne commit in a football game not so long ago—taking the yellow card out of the referee’s hands—or a gentle shove. If the hon. Gentleman will allow me, I will come to the details of more serious offences, but there is a gradual scale, as there is in all matters to do with assault.

Essentially, referees would like the police to be more willing to charge those who assault match officials, rather than leaving the issue to be dealt with in-house by local county football associations. Police action is a far greater deterrent and would ensure that referees felt more supported, thus helping to retain the number of referees we need in our game.

I said earlier that I had been lucky. I have not been physically assaulted while officiating, although I once had to go to the police because of what I perceived to be a very real threat made against me. However, I had a horrible experience once when I gave a penalty and the manager of the team, who thought he was a bit like Alex Ferguson, did not like my decision. Unlike Alex Ferguson, he decided to charge on to the pitch. Fortunately, one of his own players rugby-tackled him, inches away from me on my blind side before he got to me. As I did not really know that he was coming at me, who knows what could have happened? That happened on what I chose as my last ever game of Sunday morning football.

Others have not been so lucky. Anyone who goes to a referees’ society meeting and talks to those present will hear some horrific tales. In 2011, a Coventry referee was assaulted at a match that took place on Sowe common on a Sunday morning. He was taken to hospital by ambulance and needed stitches inside his mouth and other things. Two police cars attended with four officers. Two of the officers went and spoke to the assailant, but decided not to arrest him and walked off the pitch saying that the football authorities would deal with the incident.

Last year in Manchester, an individual walked out of court with a suspended jail sentence and community service for a cowardly assault on a referee. The referee had sent the player off for aggressive behaviour and swearing during a Manchester amateur Sunday football league match. As he recorded the red card in his notebook, the player ran towards him, jumped with both feet off the ground and kicked him in the face—a karate kick of some kind. The referee needed a number of stitches around his eye and was left scarred for life. Doctors told him that he was lucky not to have been blinded. The player was eventually charged and pleaded guilty at a Manchester Crown court to the charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm. The judge did not give him a custodial sentence—he said he had escaped “by a whisker”—but suspended a 10-month jail sentence for two years. The player was also ordered to carry out 100 hours’ unpaid work and pay the referee £750 compensation. However, if that had happened on a Saturday night in any town or city across the country, the result would have been very different.

Referees across the country are concerned that assaults of this nature are not always taken seriously by the authorities. We are seriously worried about that, because we know of recent examples elsewhere, such as the case of Richard Nieuwenhuizen in the Netherlands, who was killed in December 2012 as he officiated at a game of football in Holland, or, just last month, that of Ricardo Portillo in the United States. In both cases, the assault of an official resulted in their death. I am not saying to the Minister that he must act now or this could happen here, but I would like assurances from him that, after this debate, he will send the appropriate message, as strongly as he can, that officials of all sports across the country can pack their kits for this weekend, comforted in the knowledge not just that they are appreciated, but that there is an extra deterrent that will stop those who use violence to show their disappointment at a decision that the ref has just made.

Oral Answers to Questions

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

8. What plans he has to assist ex-offenders into employment.

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

12. What plans he has to assist ex-offenders into employment.

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

14. What plans he has to assist ex-offenders into employment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Wright]

As my hon. Friend says, and as the Select Committee has made clear, resettlement is hugely important. We agree that the voluntary and community sector can play a major role, and we think it important for that role to begin while offenders are still serving the custodial part of their sentences. The reforms that we have in mind will enable those who are dealing with rehabilitation to make contact with offenders early, and to see them through the prison gates and out into the community. One of the main ways in which we expect them to help offenders to go straight and stay straight is by finding jobs for them to do, for, as we know, keeping a job is one of the best ways of keeping out of crime.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

The Minister is doubtless aware of National Grid’s young offender programme, under which 80 companies are now delivering training and jobs to those who are heading towards release. Does not a reoffending rate of less than 7% suggest that private providers can play a big part in the rehabilitation revolution?

[Jeremy Wright]

I certainly think that it demonstrates that a range of different organisations have a significant part to play. I am familiar with what National Grid does, and I know that it does an extremely good job. One of the questions that it has raised with me is whether there are better ways of enabling it to work with offenders in a limited number of prisons. I think that the restructuring of the prison estate that we have in mind, which will ensure that prisoners can be released into the community from only a certain number of prisons, will help it to do even more good work along the lines that my hon. Friend has described.

Budget and Structure of the Ministry of Justice

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

There is recognition on both sides of the House for the work that National Grid has done on reoffending. It has taken more than 2,000 offenders, given them work, mentored them and found bank accounts for them—the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) is a great proponent of that. That proves that someone does not have to be a senior official in the Ministry of Justice to be able to bring forward a good idea that massively reduces reoffending.

[Jenny Chapman]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. We can all cite anecdotes and examples of very good practice, but anecdotes remain just that. There is no systemic sharing of good practice. These opportunities should be assessed, evaluated and made available for all the offenders who need them, but the truth is that they are not. According to the Public Accounts Committee, senior officials at the MOJ have a poor record of managing commissioning, so I am not sure about trying to transform the service through that method. At the moment, there is not enough evidence of a good track record to be able to put much confidence in their ability to do that. The problem with the reforms is that they are all of structure rather than of practice. The Government are rightly disappointed in reoffending rates of around 50%, but for nearly three years they have done nothing of any substance to improve the situation.

Let me deal now with payment by results. Instead of importing a failed policy from the Department for Work and Pensions to the MOJ, why not take a closer look at what works in preventing reoffending? For all the academic studies and Government data, the truth is that there is precious little understanding of what really makes a difference. Plenty of organisations are prepared to tell us that what they are doing works and are prepared to buy reports to prove it, but there is very little objective analysis of outcomes of programmes and interventions. As a result of scrapping probation service PBR pilots, the Government are failing to use evidence that they should have to help them to decide where to spend their money. When the Secretary of State cancelled the pilots, he said, “Sometimes you just have to go with your beliefs.” There we have it: Chris Grayling, Secretary of State for Justice, our very own mystic Meg.

This simply is not good enough. Interventions in health, for example, are assessed. They are monitored and evaluated before public money is used to provide them, and the same should apply to interventions in criminal justice. The rate of reoffending is stubbornly high, so why are the Government not doing what can be done in health? Why are they not asking for interventions to be evaluated and funded only if they prove to be effective, and then insisting that only what works should be delivered in our prisons and in community sentences? There is too much okay practice, and too little sharing of the very best ideas.

We need to know which are the best interventions, which are the best providers of services, and which are the best prisons. We need a value-added measure for criminal justice. The Government should be investing in ways of assessing the performance of establishments, based on the profile of inmates entering prisons and their future reoffending. Establishments should be accountable for their performance: the best should be given greater freedom to innovate, and the worst should be closed down. Farming out the supervision of medium-risk offenders to private sector providers with no idea whether that will work any better than the current arrangements is reckless, ideologically driven and dangerous, and the Government should think again. They are not showing any interest in practice on the ground, but are preoccupied with structures in the organisations without any evidence that they will make any difference.

The Government’s performance in the management of this Department has been woeful. The Department has failed to submit its accounts on time three years running, it has been subject to withering criticism from the National Audit Office over its ability to commission, it has scrapped PBR pilots—thus losing any evidence that payment by results works—and it has failed to show that its mandarins can manage projects and implement policy.

European Union (Approvals) Bill [Lords]

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak on a matter European where there is general agreement across the House and no time limit on the scoreboard. I shall go on for only a couple of hours, and I have already issued my press release saying I was “speaking to a packed Chamber.” As long as the few Members here keep quiet about it, I shall be fine.

I thought it might be wise to explain why it is important to discuss these matters. As the European Union Act 2011 has brought today’s debate forward on the basis that Parliament is required to pass an Act to approve the relatively low-level EU decisions in clause 1, it might look as though those decisions are of no consequence and do not need to be talked about. As both the Minister and the shadow Minister said, however, these are quite important matters, and some other member states find them amazingly important.

The German Federal Constitutional Court talked about article 352 of the treaty on the functioning of the European Union—the flexibility clause that has caused so much excitement in the past—on which these proposed decisions are based. It considered that article as part of its 2009 judgment on the constitutionality of German basic law and the Lisbon treaty when Germany was seeking to ratify the treaty. Specifically, it considered the question of whether the article, which gives the European Union sweeping legislative power, was compatible with democracy as enshrined within German basic law.

The court had already found that, to have democratic legitimacy, the powers of the EU must be rooted in a democratic decision of Germany’s national Parliament to confer those powers to the EU. The German court said:

“Article 352 TFEU not only establishes a competence of action for the European Union but at the same time relaxes the principle of conferral.”

That is the principle that powers must be conferred on the EU by member states under article 352. The court continued:

“action by the European Union in fields set out in the Treaties is intended to be possible if the Treaties have not provided the specific competence necessary…The provision can thus serve to create a competence which makes action on the European level possible in almost the entire area of application of the primary law”

across the EU treaties.

The court ruled that

“As regards the ban on transferring blanket empowerments or transferring Kompetenz”—

the competence for the EU to decide its own powers—

“the provision”—

that is, article 352—

“meets with constitutional objections because the newly worded provision makes it possible to substantially amend Treaty foundations of the European Union without the mandatory participation of legislative”—

national—

“bodies beyond the Member States’ executive powers”.

Essentially, the court said that the German Parliament would have to examine these matters again.

It is good that we are at least mimicking the German Parliament, albeit a few years later. We are here to discuss relatively important issues, as has the German Parliament. It could perhaps be argued that the German public may be a tiny tad less Eurosceptic, because their Parliament talks about these matters sensibly and regularly, and that they therefore may understand them slightly better.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I knew that I was going to provoke some reaction.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am very concerned that our speaking about these matters will make the country more pro-European. I want to encourage people in their Euroscepticism, so I think that we should perhaps talk about them less.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I think that all scepticism should be based on reality. We should talk about things with decent facts in front of us. This is a very good forum in which to discuss the facts, so let us do that.

The Bill has been produced as a result of the requirement of the excellent European Union Act 2011 to approve the three EU decisions that have already been mentioned. Under the Act, before a United Kingdom Minister can give final agreement in the Council of the European Union or the European Council to decisions proposed on the basis of the EU treaties being used in these cases, the proposed decisions must be approved by an Act of Parliament. That is what we are doing today. Although certain proposals based on the EU flexibility clause are exempt from the requirement for an approving Act of Parliament, those exemptions do not apply in these cases. I will happily go into the details if Members want to know what they are. The hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) is obviously keen to discuss them; perhaps we will do so afterwards, over a beer.

Under the EU treaties, EU decisions of this kind require unanimity in the Council or the European Council, which means that without the UK’s support they cannot be adopted, at least to cover all member states.

Members have already listed what the proposals would achieve. There is an EU regulation enabling the electronic rather than the printed version of the Official Journal to take EU legal effect. There is an EU decision that would set out the broad areas of work of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights between 2013 and 2017. There is also an EU decision on the number of European commissioners.

Although the first two proposals may not seem to be hugely important, they are based on the flexibility clause, which gives the EU sweeping powers to adopt laws when the treaties have not otherwise given it the power to legislate. It has been used to adopt significant EU measures in the past, such as the creation of the EU bail-out fund for non-eurozone member states. It was therefore thought to warrant parliamentary control, and that thoroughly good idea was introduced by the European Union Act.

The two proposals dealt with by clause 1 are being introduced under the flexibility clause: they are article 352 decisions—flexibility decisions. As I said, the flexibility clause has been used to co-ordinate national social security systems for the benefit of all member states’ nationals when moving within the EU; to provide for measures against the counterfeiting of euro coins that apply to member states outside the euro; and for the bail-out fund. We are talking about significant measures.

The Bill deals with the EU Official Journal, which is not exactly the most exciting document in the world but, as the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David) said, it contains striking elements of importance to the functioning of the single market, and to EU business and UK business in general. I have a small problem with it, because everything has to be translated into each of the official languages of the European Union. This is not a debate for now, but that approach means that everything that is said in the Official Journal has to be translated into, for example, Gaelic, and that is perhaps not the best use of money.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

I was recently at a European Union conference where the Irish did speak in Gaelic, and I applaud them for doing so. The great linguistic creations of humankind should be preserved, and I am glad that the Irish are speaking in their own language and insisting that it be translated.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I completely understand the cultural point that the hon. Gentleman makes, but the European Central Bank uses only a couple of languages and many international institutions manage to cut down the number of languages they use, and they do so purely to keep costs down. The European Commission, the European Parliament and other European institutions do not do that and perhaps they should examine their approach. I merely wanted to make that point in relation to how difficult it is to produce the Official Journal for the very next day in written and electronic form. The Government have given political—not legally binding—agreement to the proposed regulation, with the Council supposedly ready to adopt it and the European Parliament having given its consent.

The Bill also deals with the proposed EU decision establishing a multi-annual work programme to cover 2013 to 2017 for the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights. Again, one can give a parting shot, at least, about the growth in the number of these EU agencies; there is a huge number now and, as with commissioners, one at least has to go to each member state. In 2007, the EU adopted a regulation, based on the flexibility clause, establishing the agency, which is based in Vienna. Its objective has been outlined by the hon. Gentleman, but according to article 2 of its founding regulations it is to provide “assistance and expertise” to support member states in fully respecting fundamental rights. Under article 4 of its founding regulations, the agency’s activities include: gathering, analysing and disseminating information; publishing reports; and developing “a communication strategy” and a

“dialogue with civil society, in order to raise public awareness of fundamental rights”.

In 2013, the agency will receive a subsidy of €21.3 million from the EU budget, about half of which will be spent on staffing. According to article 5 of the agency’s founding regulation, the Council needs to adopt five-year multi-annual frameworks that set out

“thematic areas of the Agency’s activity, which must include the fight against racism, xenophobia and related intolerance”.

In addition to the multi-annual framework, the agency can respond to requests from the Council, the European Parliament or European Commission for it to conduct studies or produce conclusions on particular topics.

The draft Council decision before Parliament is the proposed multi-annual framework for the four years between 2013 and 2017, proposed by the European Commission on the basis of the flexibility clause. Under that decision, the thematic areas of the agency’s work in that time period will be: access to justice; victims of crime, including compensation for victims of crime; the information society, particularly respect for private life and the protection of personal data; Roma integration; judicial co-operation, except in criminal matters; the rights of the child; discrimination based on sex, race, colour, ethnic or social origin, genetic features, language, religion or belief, political or other opinion, membership of a national minority, property, birth, disability, age or sexual orientation; immigration and the integration of migrants, visa and border control and asylum; and racism, xenophobia and related intolerance. The Government have given political but not legally binding agreement to the proposed decision. The Council is apparently ready to adopt the proposal and the European Parliament has already given its consent.

That leaves us with the final measure, which is probably more controversial than was originally said: the retention of one European commissioner per member state under clause 2. The European commission consists of one national of each member state, so there are 27 commissioners and there will soon be 28 when Croatia comes in. Following great debate in the European Parliament and many other EU institutions and in the Parliaments of many member states, the treaty of Lisbon introduced the ratio of two thirds commissioners to member states. The logic was quite sensible: it was an attempt to stop bureaucracy growing out of control and to maintain some easier management of the bureaucracy from the top. The member states whose nationals would be commissioners would be decided

“on the basis of a system of strictly equal rotation between the Member States, reflecting the demographic and geographical range of all the Member States”.

The system would be agreed by unanimous decision at the European Council and each commissioner’s term would be five years.

Article 17(5) of the treaty on European Union states that the European Council, acting unanimously, can vary the size of the Commission from November 2014. As the Government’s explanatory notes to the Bill state in paragraph 12:

“when the Irish people voted ‘no’ in a referendum on Lisbon Treaty ratification in June 2008 the loss of a guaranteed”

Irish commissioner in every Commission

“emerged as a key concern. Without Irish ratification the Treaty could not enter into force, and as a result EU Heads of State and Government offered concessions to Ireland”.

One of the main concessions, offered in December 2008 and reiterated in June 2009, provided that when

“the Lisbon Treaty entered into force, a decision would be taken…to the effect that the Commission shall continue to include one national of each Member State”.

Those concessions seemed enough for the Irish people, who voted in the second referendum in October 2009 and approved that treaty.

The draft European Council decision based on article 17(5) has now been introduced and provides that from November 2014 onwards that the number of commissioners will continue to equal the number of member states. The draft decision states that it will be reviewed in advance of the appointment of the Commission due to take office in 2019, but for the decision to be altered there will need to be unanimity in the European Council, meaning that any member state can veto such a change. Having a European commissioner is a big deal for many, if not all, of the countries of the European Union, so it is highly unlikely that the change will ever be made. We will therefore continue to build on the number of European Commissioners.

[Bob Stewart]

Does that mean that every European Commissioner will need a department to be built to support them or will there be commissioners without portfolio?

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I shall address that point in a moment, but yes, no commissioner is merely in charge of paper clips. Every commissioner needs a cabinet—a group of people around them from the top of the civil service—and normally brings an extra language with them, so a huge amount of cost and bureaucracy is associated with it.

The Government have given political but not legally binding agreement to the proposed decision, which is scheduled to be formally adopted by the European Council some time this year. Agreeing with the decision sits slightly oddly with something that the Prime Minister said in his speech on EU policy last week under the theme of competitiveness:

“Can we justify a Commission that gets ever larger?”

That is a fair question, considering that many other European bodies—the European Court of Auditors, for example—have an appointee from each member state, and work by having so many cooks making this particular broth. Appointments to EU agencies, as I have said, seem to be farmed out nearly one per member state, and it has almost got to the point where we need to have a serious discussion about how, if the European Commission is to work effectively, that can be done.

It is a particularly thorny issue, and warrants much more discussion. It is amazingly political. As I have said, it was one of the more important assurances gained by the Irish to secure a yes vote in their referendum. Everyone in Parliament will remember that the UK, along with four other large countries, had two commissioners, but we gave up our second commissioner with the enlargement of the EU in 2004. It is de rigueur in the EU for each country that comes into the club to get a commissioner—a seat at the main decision-making table in Europe. While that is a fine principle, it brings with it, as my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) suggested, some powers to guide and oversee, but also a mass of bureaucracy. I believe that that is one reason why my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister raised that question in his excellent speech at Bloomberg the other week.

One does not have to be pro-European or Eurosceptic to see that the European Commission has become unwieldy in size, and while this might not be the time to sort out the issue for good, it would be a good opportunity to raise this thorny issue for discussion with our European counterparts. With many new accessions down the line, it seems that this is an opportunity missed. Certainly, it would be an interesting discussion to have at roughly the same time that the multi-annual financial framework is decided. I wonder, if we had a reasonable debate on the subject, whether proposals at least to trim the Commission’s total budget for the next seven years could be achieved, even if it is not possible to trim or cap the number of commissioners.

I conclude where I began. It is really good to see some proper scrutiny as a result of the European Union Act 2011. I thank the Government for introducing that excellent piece of legislation and for sticking to both the letter and the spirit of it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Cash]

I did not say that. What I said was that the referendum that the Prime Minister has announced goes outside the provisions of the 2011 Act, and I am glad to say that that demonstrates that, where there is fundamental change, he recognises—with some help from his friends— that a referendum is a requirement, even though it is not taking place as early as some of us would like.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I thank my right hon. Friend—

[Mr Cash]

Not yet.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

He is not yet a right hon. Gentleman, but he might be soon. I thank him for giving way. Does he recognise that, while the 2011 Act was designed to stop powers being sucked away from the UK at the request of the European Union but without much say from this place, the Prime Minister’s referendum is about a new settlement that may require powers to be returned from the EU, so they are slightly different things?

[Mr Cash]

That is true, but I maintain that the key question is whether the requirements contained in the five principles, which include repatriation and the primacy of national Parliaments—on which the European Scrutiny Committee has insisted on a three-hour debate on the Floor of the House because of the implications for economic governance—are all part and parcel of what has been going wrong in the European Union. I welcome the idea of the referendum, but with the caveat that I do not think the timing is right, although that is a separate question.

Turning to article 352 of the treaty for the functioning of the European Union, my hon. Friend made an excellent speech, as did my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) and the hon. Member for Luton North (Kelvin Hopkins). They are all on the European Scrutiny Committee and very familiar with the intricacies of the arguments, although they are not that intricate. In fact, the provisions of article 352 derive, in effect, from article 308. I have now served on the ESC for 27 years, and those who have been around for as long as I have—

Oral Answers to Questions

Chris Heaton-Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 18th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Jeremy Wright)]

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, but I have not had a chance to look at that report yet. I will look at it and come back to him. Generally, resettlement is hugely important. We are keen to see offenders get back into the community and straight into productive work, which is one reason we want offenders to be admitted quickly on to the Work programme that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State introduced so successfully in his last job.

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

T4. In welcoming the Secretary of State to his role, may I ask what are his initial impressions of how his Department’s relationship with the European Court of Human Rights will evolve?

[Chris Grayling]

Although good work is being done to encourage initial reforms, decisions such as today’s in the European Court of Human Rights suggest that its focus is wrong. Through the work of our commission and discussions across the coalition, we will put considerable effort into ensuring that the human rights framework in this country is something that we can all have confidence in, as the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice, my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Damian Green) said earlier.