Economic Crime Committed by Commercial Organisations: Deferred Prosecution Agreement (Government Response)
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The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
I am today publishing the Government response to the “Consultation on a new enforcement tool to deal with economic crime committed by commercial organisations: Deferred Prosecution Agreements1”.
Economic crime is far from victimless and has a pernicious and damaging effect on our economy and on that of the wider world. Options for dealing with offending by commercial organisations are currently limited and the number of outcomes each year, through both criminal and civil proceedings, is too low. The Government’s consultation paper set out their proposals for an additional tool for prosecutors to deal effectively with white collar crime committed by organisations, the deferred prosecution agreement (DPA).
Some 86% of responses to our consultation agreed that DPAs can play a vital role in helping to overcome the challenges of bringing organisations that commit wrongdoing to justice. There was widespread support for an approach that ensures that redress is available, with wrongdoing seeing the light of day, victims properly compensated and offending organisations facing stringent sanctions. Respondents also endorsed our proposed operational model and processes.
Primary legislation is required to provide for deferred prosecution agreements and accordingly the Government are today tabling amendments to the Crime and Courts Bill which is currently being considered by the House of Lords.
Copies of the document have been placed in the Libraries of both Houses, in the Vote Office and in the Printed Paper Office. The document is also available online, at: www.justice.gov.uk/consultations.
1Command Paper 8348, 17 May 2012.
Consultation on Firearms Control (Government Response)
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The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
The Home Secretary launched the “Consultation on Legislative Changes to Firearms Control” on the 8 February 2012.
The consultation looked at the need for a new offence for possession of illegal firearms with intent to supply and whether the penalty for illegal importation and exportation of firearms should be increased. Today, I am announcing the Government’s response to that consultation.
Gun crime and drug offences cause considerable harm to our communities and are linked to organised crime and so we believe that the law for importing and supplying firearms should be no less serious than importing class A drugs.
Having carefully considered the consultation responses from a broad range of key partners it is clear that there is strong support for taking a tougher stance on control of prohibited firearms.
We will:
Increase the maximum penalty for illegal importation of firearms to life imprisonment.
Create a new offence of “possession with intent to supply” with a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
Subsequently, we will bring forward the necessary legislation as soon as the parliamentary schedule allows. A copy of the summary of consultation responses and the related impact assessment will be placed in the House Library.
Criminal Cases Review Commission (Triennial Review)
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The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
In March 2011 the Government responded to the Public Accounts Committee report “Smaller Government: Shrinking the Quango State” setting out the coalition’s plans for reforming the public bodies sector. It includes the requirement to undertake triennial reviews of Executive and advisory non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs).
The Criminal Cases Review Commission is an independent body set up to review possible miscarriages of justice in England, Wales and Northern Ireland and to refer appropriate cases to the courts. It was established as an Executive non-departmental body on 1 January 1997 by the Criminal Appeal Act 1995.
To deliver the coalition Government’s commitment to transparency and accountability the Criminal Cases Review Commission will be subject to a triennial review. The Ministry of Justice, as the sponsoring Department, has today launched a call for evidence which will last until 14 December 2012 inviting views. In line with Cabinet Office guidance the review will consider the following:
the continuing need for the Criminal Cases Review Commission—both its functions and its form; and
where it is agreed that it should remain, to review the control and governance arrangements in place to ensure that the public body is complying with recognised principles of good corporate governance.
In conducting the triennial review, officials will be engaging with a broad range of stakeholders and users of the Criminal Cases Review Commission. The review will be aligned with guidance published by the Cabinet Office: “Guidance on Reviews of Non- Departmental Public Bodies”. The final report and findings will be laid before this House.
Crime Outcomes Recording Framework (Consultation)
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The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
As part of the Government’s commitment to increasing democratic accountability and reducing bureaucratic accountability, we are consulting on proposals to broaden the current “sanction detections” framework to better reflect all of the work that the police do to solve and resolve crime.
A revised framework for recorded crime outcomes will support police officers to use their professional judgment to ensure a just and timely outcome which reflects the harm to the victim, the seriousness of the behaviour, the impact on the community, and which deters future offending. Furthermore, it will also give the public more detailed information about the work their police forces are doing and so further empower local communities to hold their chief officer and police and crime commissioner to account for tackling crime locally.
The aim of the consultation is to ensure that the final disposal framework is based on a full consideration of the impact of these changes, and that it is clear, accessible and meaningful to the widest possible audience.
The consultation is launching today on 19 October 2012, and will remain open until 7 December 2012. Copies of the consultation paper have been placed in the House Library and on the Home Office website at:
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/about-us/consultations/
Police and Crime Commissioner Elections
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The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
I would normally congratulate the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David) on securing this debate but given the content of his speech, the thought occurs that perhaps we would both be better engaged in being out there and campaigning for some of our respective candidates in the PCC elections on 15 November. In that regard, I feel I should put it on the record that I did indeed spend this morning in Stevenage and Hitchin campaigning with the excellent Conservative candidate for Hertfordshire, David Lloyd, and meeting people working on crime prevention in the area—
Wayne David
I just wish to make the point that I will be out tomorrow morning with the excellent Labour candidate in Gwent, Hamish Sandison—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. If we have finished the comments about people’s diaries, perhaps we could return to the important subject of this Adjournment debate.
Damian Green
I will happily do that, Madam Deputy Speaker, because it gives me the chance to correct a number of inaccurate assertions that the hon. Gentleman has made.
I will deal with the hon. Gentleman’s final point about whether Members are doing their best to increase interest in the elections. I cannot remember whether he attended Home Office questions on Monday, but, as the Home Secretary observed, many Government Members took the opportunity to refer to the elections and individual candidates. The only Labour candidate referred to by name, however, was the right hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Alun Michael), and he was referred to by himself, so, although I agree that Members should help to raise public awareness, I think I can say, in the fairest and least partisan way possible, that the hon. Gentleman might want to spread that message on his own Benches. It has been well spread on ours.
The hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) mentioned police numbers, so it is worth putting it on the record the fact that crime in Leicestershire has fallen by 5% in the past 12 months, which shows how effective the current arrangements for policing are there.
I remind the House why we are introducing police and crime commissioners, the most significant democratic reform of policing ever. It will introduce greater transparency and accountability to a service of which we are rightly proud but which can sometimes be too distant from the public it serves and can fail adequately to reflect their concerns and priorities. For too long before the Government came into office, the Home Office interfered too much in local policing and cared too little about national threats. The introduction of PCCs is a step along the road to reversing that trend. The creation of the National Crime Agency to focus on serious and organised crime nationally is another. PCCs will not just focus on their local area but will have a duty to co-operate in dealing with national threats under the new strategic policing arrangement.
Within four weeks, we will find out who the first PCCs will be. They will be the first people elected with a democratic mandate to hold their local force to account, set the budget and draw up the policing plan. Of course, the wider landscape into which the new PCCs will enter is also evolving fast. The college of policing will be launched later this year, and PCCs will sit on its board. Crucially, then, direct representation of the people of England and Wales will also be introduced on to that board. The purpose of the college will be to enhance professionalism across the service. Everyone in the country cares about the continual improvement of professionalism in the police, and the college will play a significant role in making that happen.
The issue of public awareness lay at the heart of the speech by the hon. Member for Caerphilly. It is worth putting that in the context of the picture we now have of crime. By happy coincidence, the latest crime statistics were out yesterday, and they are very pertinent to this debate. They show that on both measures—the crime survey for England and Wales and police recorded crime—crime is falling. It has fallen by 6% in the crime survey and by 6% in the record crime figures. Most significantly, the fall is across the board—violence, burglary, vandalism, vehicle theft, robbery and knife crime are all down.
PCCs will be taking up their posts, therefore, in a time of a continuing downward trend in crime rates that proves—this is relevant to the point about Leicestershire—that it is not how many officers we have but what we do with them that counts. Wise PCCs will understand that point when they take up their offices and start deploying the police plans that they will need to operate. We are replacing what were bureaucratic and unaccountable police authorities with democratically accountable PCCs so that, for the first time, the public will be given a voice and a seat around the table when key decisions are made about how their communities are being policed and how their money is being spent. I suspect that the hon. Gentleman would agree that that simply does not happen under the current system, and I genuinely hope that the tone of his speech did not reflect an underlying unease about greater and better democratic control of the police.
Damian Green
I am glad that the hon. Gentleman confirms that it did not.
I suspect that the hon. Gentleman and I can also agree that for all the good work that people on the police authorities do—many do very good work—we know that police authorities are often invisible and unaccountable. Inspections have shown that fewer than a quarter of police authorities perform well on their basic functions and that fewer than a third engage well with their communities. In part, that is because only 7% of the public know what a police authority is. The hon. Gentleman adduced survey evidence showing the level of engagement with the PCC elections, but none of the figures is as low as the 7% of people who have heard of police authorities. That figure represents a huge failure in democratic accountability, because it is the job of a police authority—as it will be of a PCC—to spend the public’s money in a way that guarantees that the police in its area are doing what the public need. However, it is impossible to do that when 93% of the public do not even know what police authorities are. There is simply no possible measurement of success in that area. Up to now—and up to next month—the public have been simply unable to do anything about those failures. PCCs will have a clear incentive to perform better than that. If PCCs fail to represent their communities, engage properly and deliver on their priorities, the public will be able to tell them what they think of them at the ballot box.
The hon. Gentleman made the point about the November elections. He will be aware that the legislative timetable meant that this was an early date, but the Government correctly took the decision that further delay would simply mean that it would take longer before we could apply what are appropriate democratic controls. He also made the point about the weather. On the whole—but not always, in these troubled climatic times we live in—the weather in May is better than the weather in November. However, I should also observe that every four years America holds what is possibly the most important election in the world in November and the American electorate seem to engage in it, so it is not insuperable for people to go and vote when it is a bit cold and wet.
It is also clear—this is hugely relevant—that with more than 90% of the public not even aware of what a police authority is, we are starting the procedure from a very low base of public engagement. We could have a long, academic debate about what the turnout may or may not be in a few weeks’ time. The hon. Gentleman made it clear that there is no shortage of commentators criticising the date of the election or demanding that ever-increasing amounts of money be spent on strategies to engage the public, which may or may not work. What is neither academic nor remotely in doubt is that whatever happens—however many thousands of people turn out to vote in each force area—every PCC will have more legitimacy to make important decisions about what the police do than unelected, unaccountable and, as I have said, largely invisible police authorities.
There is no question but that there is huge public interest in policing issues. They regularly come near the top of issues that people want addressed, particularly when they are asked about antisocial behaviour, which many feel is not taken seriously enough in some areas. The Home Office advertising campaign, which the hon. Gentleman mentioned and about which I shall say more shortly, is focused precisely on telling the public that PCCs will respond to those priorities. The hon. Gentleman made some critical remarks about the content of the advertisements, but that content is dictated by what the public care about. That is what they think about when they think about crime, and that is what they will want the PCCs to address.
There is evidence that the public are engaged. Our crime-mapping website is the most successful Government website ever. There have been more than 500 million hits since it was launched, and—perhaps because of the elections next month, and the gradually increasing public awareness and willingness to discuss crime-related matters—the traffic to the site has increased markedly in recent weeks. This month alone, it is averaging more than 360,000 hits each day. I know how much of an increase that is. Because I am relatively new to my post, I still remember my initial briefing just over a month ago, when I was told that the average was 250,000 hits a day. I am fairly sure that the only reason for the increase—an extra 100,000 hits a day—is the advent of the PCC elections, as nothing else has changed.
We are expanding the website to respond to that ever-increasing demand for information. We have added justice outcomes so that people can see what happens when a crime takes place, measures to compare similar areas, and mug shots of convicted criminals, all of which are proving popular with the public.
We know that the public care about crime, that they want to know more about crime in their local areas, and that they want their voice to be heard. The elections on 15 November will give them an opportunity not just to talk about crime, but to take action to make a change in their communities. A week from today, information about every candidate who supplies such information will be published online. That will give the candidates an opportunity to set out their stall to the electorate, and to reveal their vision for policing. Let me stress again—I have said this many times, but it clearly has not got through to the hon. Gentleman yet—that the information will be delivered free of charge, in written form, to anyone who asks for it, via a phone line.
Wayne David
I am aware of that—if the Minister had listened carefully to my speech, he would have heard me make it very clear that I was aware of it—but why on earth does he not follow the example of the mayoral election campaign, and send information directly to households?
Damian Green
There is a certain amount of confusion among Opposition Members. Half of them complain that the elections are a waste of time and cost too much, while the other half demand that we spend more on them. The hon. Gentleman falls into the latter camp, which is entirely consistent with his general approach. That is fine from his point of view, but I have to tell him that there is no such thing as a free mail shot. The so-called free mail shot would actually have cost the taxpayer more than £30 million. If the hon. Gentleman wants to go and decide, along with his colleagues, whether he wants more to be spent or not, he can do so.
We should publicise this information. The address of the website is www.choosemypcc.org.uk, and the telephone number—which is Freephone from landlines—is 0800 1 070708. It is very easy for people to obtain information about the elections. Details of both the website and the phone line will appear on every polling card that is delivered to every registered voter in England and Wales outside London. We launched an advertising campaign this month that explains the reforms, encourages participation in the elections, and provides a phone number. No one will be denied information. I hope that the hon. Gentleman has seen our advertisements. We have calculated that 85% of the population will see the television advertisement alone an average of six times. In addition, every household will receive information about the elections from the Electoral Commission, which will include information about the role of PCCs and, crucially, about how to vote.
The hon. Gentleman has been consistent in saying that every effort should be made to familiarise the electorate with the role of the PCCs, with the candidates and with the electoral system. All that has been done. In addition, a large number of candidates have already started campaigning and will be doing much of that work themselves. So not only will the public be made aware of the elections, but they will have the information they need to make informed choices. Beyond that, it is up to the candidates locally to make these elections a success. Given that the three main parties in this House are fielding candidates, it is incumbent on us all to go out to explain to the public why the competing visions for policing and tackling crime are worth turning out for, and how PCCs can best ensure that the public get the policing they deserve.
Question put and agreed to.
Oral Answers to Questions
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Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
13. What assessment he has made of the effect on victims’ services of the work of police and crime commissioners.
The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
We expect that the needs of victims will be one of the key priorities for police and crime commissioners and that the effect on victims’ services will be a positive one. PCCs will be ideally placed to commission the most appropriate services to support victims in their area.
Grahame M. Morris
Will the Minister explain how the necessary funding will be provided to the police and crime commissioners so that they can protect those services for witnesses and victims of crime?
Damian Green
Central Government currently spend about £66 million a year on supporting witnesses and victims of crime, and we aim to raise up to an additional £50 million a year from offenders, through the victims surcharge and other financial impositions, to be used for support services for victims and witnesses. The police and crime commissioners will therefore have sufficient budget to enable them to make their own judgments on how best to support victims in their area.
Nigel Mills
Many victims feel let down by the whole process. Does the Minister agree that the police and crime commissioners, with their local knowledge, will be able to ensure that victims get a fair deal throughout the investigation and sentencing processes?
Damian Green
My hon. Friend is right. Individual PCCs in specific areas will be the best placed to understand the needs of the local community and to commission the services to meet those needs, as they will be taking those decisions closer to the people who will be most affected by them. That is the whole thrust of this important reform.
Alun Michael (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)
May I first declare an interest, as I am standing as the Labour and Co-operative candidate for police and crime commissioner in south Wales?
Does the Minister agree that the treatment of victims and witnesses remains deeply unsatisfactory in many areas of the court system and in the criminal justice system generally? In providing resources to police and crime commissioners, will he ensure that attrition does not occur along the way and that those resources will be adequate to allow proper, enhanced attention to be paid to the needs of victims?
Damian Green
I am enchanted to hear a pre-bid for additional public spending from a candidate, even before the election. The right hon. Gentleman is demonstrating his experience there. As I have just explained to the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris), we are seeking to increase the amount of money that the perpetrators of crime pass directly to the victims, through the victims surcharge, but it will be a matter for the individual police and crime commissioner—whether that will be the right hon. Gentleman or one of his opponents—to decide how best to spend that money in their local area. I am sure that he would agree that such decisions are better made locally than centrally.
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD)
People are concerned that funding for Victim Support might be lost following the introduction of the new services, including that for mediation and conciliation. Does the Minister agree that those important services save the police a lot of time and resources?
Damian Green
I agree with my hon. Friend that mediation services do a very good job. He mentions Victim Support, which has, of course, asked all PCC candidates to sign up to five pledges. Many candidates of all parties—and, indeed, independent candidates—have signed up to those pledges. With the range of services involved, I repeat that it will be for the PCCs to make a decision, and they are best placed to do so in their individual areas.
Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)
Victims will almost certainly be adversely affected when PCCs are elected in November, but the Government’s plans for the criminal injuries compensation scheme could make that even worse. After we forced last week’s dramatic eleventh-hour retreat, victims rightly want to know the Government’s next steps. Will the Minister confirm whether the Government propose to try once again to shove this deeply unpopular proposal through, rewrite it, apply cosmetic changes in the hope of dampening down the opposition on their own side or, as we hope, to scrap it altogether?
Damian Green
In the first instance, I find it extraordinary that the hon. Gentleman should attack all PCC candidates, including his own right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Alun Michael), who has just announced that he is a PCC candidate, and that the hon. Gentleman is telling the people of south Wales that his right hon. Friend would not spend the money as well as I would. That is an extraordinary assertion. As for the second half of the hon. Gentleman’s extraordinary question, we will, of course, look at what best to do, and we will want to bring back the scheme, but in a better form so that individual cases can be treated in a more individual and sensitive way. I assure him that if he condemns every PCC candidate as being unable to deal with public money before they are even elected, he really does not understand democracy.
Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
4. What steps he plans to take to reduce the number of foreign nationals in prisons.
Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)
10. What progress he has made on televising court proceedings.
The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
Legislation to amend the current prohibition on televising court proceedings is included in the Crime and Courts Bill, which is currently being debated in the other place. Initially, we plan to allow broadcasting of judgments and advocates’ arguments from the Court of Appeal.
Chris Evans
I thank the Minister for that response. Will he give a cast-iron guarantee that when the legislation comes before the House, safeguards will in place to ensure that we do not see a repeat of what happened with sensational trials such as those of O.J. Simpson and Conrad Murray in the United States? Will the Minister assure us that if such things do occur, the judge will be able to stop televised proceedings?
Damian Green
Absolutely, and I think that the hon. Gentleman’s concerns will be shared across the House and, indeed, across the judiciary and the courts system more widely. I am very clear that although this reform is in the interests of transparency, which we hold to be very important, it must not give offenders opportunities for theatrical public displays. Victims, witnesses, offenders and jurors will not be filmed, so I hope that we will be able to avoid the problems that we all want to avoid.
Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab)
Let me first congratulate the justice—
The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
The commission published its second consultation in July 2012; this is due to close on 30 September. In accordance with its terms of reference, the commission should aim to report no later than the end of 2012, taking into consideration responses from both consultations.
Mr Sharma
I apologise, Mr Speaker, for that rush; I was so excited to be asking the question.
Let me first congratulate the whole Justice team and thank the Minister for his response. Will he inform the House where he stands on the future of the Human Rights Act 1998? Is he with his predecessor in wanting it to be retained or would he prefer it to be abolished and replaced by a Bill of Rights? If the latter, which of the rights currently protected by the Act does he believe are no longer worthy of protection?
Damian Green
The hon. Gentleman should never apologise for his characteristic courtesy, which is welcome on both sides of the House. I will tell him what we hope to achieve through the commission: we hope to move to a position in which human rights are once again completely accepted. In this country, “human rights” has become almost a boo-phrase, which is ridiculous. They are the basic rights to which we and all democracies adhere, but in various actions inside the courts and outside, human rights have been abused and this Government will put an end to that.
Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)
May I congratulate the Minister on his appointment? Is not an important right the British people’s right to a final say, and, with 80% saying in opinion polls that they want the Supreme Court to have the final decision, is it not right that we should consider how that can be done?
Damian Green
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his kind remarks. It is precisely because of the strong feelings that we have set up the commission, which will report in a few months’ time. I hope that then we can have a well-informed debate about how we will take forward human rights in this country, preserving what is essential while avoiding the terrible abuses that have grown over the past few years.
Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)
Will the Minister take this opportunity to say something positive about the European Court of Human Rights and the European convention on human rights, which have done so much to improve the human rights of minorities and individuals all over Europe, and stop listening to the neanderthal voices behind him of those who think there is some salvation in walking away from what was a very important step forward in European human rights after the second world war?
Damian Green
As I hope I made clear in my answer to the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma), I want to restore human rights and the basic ideas behind them to their place as not only a central part of our political debate but something that is unquestioned on either side of this House or anywhere outside it. That is what we should think about human rights; the problem is that they have been abused in both the European Courts and our domestic courts and in other parts of the system. We need a proper balance and, once the commission has come up with recommendations on that, that is what this Government will achieve.
Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)
12. What estimate he has made of the number of women in prison who have been victims of domestic violence; and if he will make a statement.
Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)
T8. Does the Minister agree that the British people have lost confidence in the Human Rights Act, with many seeing it as a charter for criminals? Will he consider bringing forward a British Bill of Rights and Responsibilities?
The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for allowing me to repeat that we have set up a commission to look at this important issue and that we want to get back to a position where human rights are taken to be one of the basic values of a democratic society, rather than having human rights abused in such a way that the whole concept has fallen into disrepute.
Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)
The Secretary of State will be aware of the problems facing the market testing of eight of Her Majesty’s prisons. When will an announcement be made in the House about who the preferred bidder will be at the end of that market testing?
Damian Green
The Government support people’s right to wear a cross, and the law requires employers to consider whether any provisions or criteria that they adopt would disadvantage employees of any religion. We have discussed court actions in a previous Question Time, and common sense is important on behalf of both courts and employers, so as to allow the legitimate expression of religious views in the workplace.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
The previous ministerial team offered the astonishing innovation of drug-free wings in prisons. What progress is being made to ensure that prisoners returning to society are not burdened with an addiction to illegal drugs?