Oral Answers to Questions

David Nuttall Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

It is important to recognise that the rate of mandatory drug testing producing a positive result has dropped considerably, from 25% or so in 1996-97 to about 7% now. So it is not that we are without success, but the hon. Gentleman is right to say that there is no cause for complacency. We do everything possible to prevent the influx of drugs into our prisons, but that is an extremely difficult exercise. It is important to attack demand as well as supply, and to make sure that prisoners come off drugs and stay off them.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I warmly welcome last week’s announcement of a new prison to be built in north Wales. Will the Minister undertake that from the moment the new prison opens it will be 100% free of illegal drugs?

[Jeremy Wright]

I suspect it would be unwise for me to make such a pledge, but we will make sure that in all our prisons we do everything we can to restrict the inflow of illegal drugs, by whatever means. As I said, we will also make sure that we provide the maximum effort to get prisoners off drugs and keep them that way.

Oral Answers to Questions

David Nuttall Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I am happy to reassure the hon. Gentleman that not only would that not be disallowed, the Cabinet Office is providing advice for probation trusts that want to do that.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree that long prison sentences are more successful in deterring reoffending than short sentences?

[Damian Green]

Those who are sentenced to less than 12 months certainly have a higher propensity to reoffend—57% as opposed to 47%—but the length of a sentence is dictated by the seriousness of the offence. A failure in the current system, which the scheme that we are introducing will address, is that those who come out after a shorter sentence have no rehabilitation. We will provide that under the new system, and we hope and expect that that will bring down the reoffending rate among precisely the group he complains about.

Human Rights Act 1998 (Repeal and Substitution) Bill

David Nuttall Excerpts

Friday 1st March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Charlie Elphicke]

I could not agree more, and that is precisely why I am presenting the Bill.

The February 2011 YouGov poll also found that 55% thought that Britain should leave the ECHR altogether, and that we should have our own Bill of Rights instead, with the British Supreme Court as the final court of appeal. Just 24% thought that we should remain part of the ECHR.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree with that opinion poll finding? If so, why does the Bill not reflect the opinion that we should withdraw from the European convention on human rights?

[Charlie Elphicke]

That is a telling question. I tabled the Bill as a Member of Parliament and a law-maker, in relation to the laws of the land. Whether we remain signatories to the convention is a matter of royal prerogative, and a matter for the Privy Council and the Executive of the day. I drafted the Bill in such a way as to leave it open to the Executive to decide whether they wished to remain party to the convention or to withdraw from it altogether. I have sought to establish the cornerstones and foundation blocks of a uniquely British settlement, and to provide optionality in regard to whether we remain a signatory to the convention. I myself have grave doubts about the convention, but I nevertheless wanted to keep that optionality, just in case the Government of the day were not prepared to go as far as that.

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[Charlie Elphicke]

I do, because I believe that we need to deal with the margin of appreciation and proportionality. The European Court in Strasbourg has taken a disproportionately narrow view of the idea of the margin of appreciation, and so this is a key change that we should make. We should not be shy in doing this if we are to get the right settlement for the UK.

Since its entry into force, section 3 of the Human Rights Act has had a far-reaching effect on how British judges apply legislation in the UK. Before that provision, the British judiciary’s interpretation of an Act of Parliament centred on the ordinary meaning of the Act’s words when viewed in their context, taken together with the intention of Parliament when enacting the words. However, in his opinion in the leading case on the application of section 3—Ghaidan v. Godin-Mendoza—Lord Nicholls stated that

“the interpretative obligation decreed by section 3 is of an unusual and far-reaching character. Section 3 may require a court to depart from the unambiguous meaning the legislation would otherwise bear. In the ordinary course the interpretation of legislation involves seeking the intention reasonably to be attributed to Parliament in using the language in question. Section 3 may require the court to depart from this legislative intention, that is, depart from the intention of the Parliament which enacted the legislation.”

That is a crucial point in terms of how Acts of Parliament are interpreted. I think they should be interpreted in line with what Parliament intended, not with what a group of judges from overseas might seek to rule.

Another impact of section 3 is that the courts are empowered to strike down what the HRA classifies as “subordinate legislation”—what we call secondary legislation or statutory instruments—if it is not possible to read this legislation as being compatible with ECHR rights, and the primary legislation under which it is made does not prevent the subordinate legislation’s incompatibility from being removed. Under the HRA, subordinate legislation includes most legislation that is not in itself an Act of Parliament but is made under the authority of an Act, including much legislation approved by resolution of each House of Parliament. That position is a concern and we should change it.

Section 6 of the HRA obliges all public authorities in the UK to act in compliance with European convention rights in the HRA, except where an authority cannot act compatibly because of a provision of primary legislation or where the authority is giving effect to a provision of and made under primary legislation that cannot be interpreted in a way that is compatible with convention rights. In other words, this reaches into not only our legal system, but our public authorities, as an obligation that they need to follow. We can see that the HRA has been incredibly far-reaching.

On that note, I want to deal with the key changes that I am seeking to make in this Bill to address the mischief that I have described. We need to restore balance in this entire area, so the Bill would repeal the HRA and replace it with a new settlement, which would draw on the framework of the HRA but vary it in relation to the key concerns that have arisen. There are 10 pillars to the reform I am proposing. First, the UK Supreme Court should be the final court of law for human rights matters.

[Mr Nuttall]

This follows on from my earlier intervention. Clause 7 specifically states that a “public authority” is defined as including “a court or tribunal”. However, although clause 17, which deals with the application of the convention, includes “any public authority” in its provision, it does not explain that a “public authority” in that clause includes a court. I just wonder whether what my hon. Friend has just said is borne out by what is in the Bill.

[Charlie Elphicke]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point, and I hope that he, too, will consider joining the Committee to scrutinise the Bill to ensure that we get the right balance. I hope that he will table amendments to take forward the debate, even perhaps on whether we should remain part of the treaty. He might join forces with my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset on that issue. Such issues are important and they need to be explored. This is a Second Reading debate, so it is a sighting shot as to what a British Bill of Rights would look like. I have no doubt that the Bill could be dramatically improved in Committee and that the new settlement could be made even more ideal.

As I said, my first principle is that the UK Supreme Court should be the final court in UK law for human rights matters. Secondly, serious foreign criminals and persons in the UK illegally should not be able to avoid deportation by using human rights claims, as has happened in the past. Thirdly, the right to family life should not be available as a tool to avoid justice and escape answering criminal charges. Fourthly, suspected foreign terrorists should not be able to subvert national security or our personal security, or avoid deportation, by using human rights claims.

Fifthly, freedom of thought, freedom of conscience and freedom of religion should be protected to a greater extent than they are today. We have seen too many attacks on people’s thoughts, feelings and beliefs. There has been too much aggressive secularism, which has sought to attack the Church and people who have deeply held religious beliefs. We have seen that in the case of the Plymouth Brethren and the Charity Commission, and in the constant attacks on the Church and on religion both in Parliament and outside it. We must ensure that there is a space for people to have religion and religious beliefs in this country, and that people should be able to set out and preach what they think. Their right to free speech should be better protected.

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[Charlie Elphicke]

The answer is that if we are a member of the treaty, of course they could go to the European Court of Human Rights. That is why the question of whether we should remain part of the treaty is important. Nevertheless, the decision would not take place in the UK legal system so they would not be able to stand on those European rights before UK courts or seek relief before the UK courts unless they had British rights under the British settlement. That is the key part of what we might call the dualist approach and obviously the Strasbourg machinery clanks more slowly and does not take every single case going, as the British courts are required to do. We would see a massive reduction in the level of cases but also in the level of public concern.

On the detailed provisions on UK rights and UK responsibilities, the Bill does not simply copy the text of the convention rights; it is a UK Bill of Rights and the rights it contains are referred to as British rights. The convention text is varied where needed.

Let me take the House through a few of the major headline changes. The main qualification is that the right to life is brought more into line with domestic law on the ability to use force in self-defence and to prevent crime. The prohibition of forced labour is clarified so that it explicitly does not prevent people from being required to undertake work or training as a condition of receiving welfare benefits. The right to respect a private and family life will no longer be available as a tool to avoid trial and punishment for criminal acts. The scope for limiting the right to manifest one’s religion or belief is reduced, and the right is limited only to stop the causing or incitement of physical harm to others so far as is necessary to protect public order. It is made clear that the right of free elections does not confer a vote on convicted prisoners or those who are not British citizens. I hasten to add that we have constitutional settlements that allow European, Irish and Commonwealth citizens to vote in certain cases, which are matters for Parliament to extend as it sees fit. The basic right should be that British citizens who are not prisoners should be able to vote.

The rights should not be used by those who are not British citizens to delay or avoid their deportation or extradition from the UK. They could not be used to prevent public authorities from taking action in relation to a person to uphold national security or public safety when the authorities reasonably believed that a clear and present danger to national security or public safety was presented by that person, although such action would not include the killing of that person, because we do not believe that Governments should go around killing people, unless it was already allowed under the right-to-life provision. Such action would also not include the use of torture or inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment. By getting the settlement right, we can put national security at the heart of our constitution and our constitutional rights, ensuring that the Government can protect our national and personal security. To my mind, that is the first call on Government.

In addition, the Bill includes rights not set out in the text of the European convention. They are: in England and Wales, the right to use force against intruders in a home, so long as that force is not grossly disproportionate; the right of a parent or guardian to challenge in court without undue delay the lawfulness of any removal of a child from their custody when the child is placed in custody by a public authority; and the right for a British citizen to challenge extradition to another country on the basis that they should have the right to trial in the UK if the alleged crime is committed while the person in question is in the UK. It does not displace basic rights in the UK legal order, so all our other constitutional documents from Magna Carta onwards remain, but provides an additional baseline of rights that apply in our nation.

Alongside the rights, the Bill includes a list of basic individual responsibilities. A person’s basic responsibilities include obedience to the law; rendering civil or military service when this country requires his support or defence; supporting, nurturing and protecting minor children to the best of his ability; respecting and upholding basic public order without placing himself in significant danger; seeking to support himself without recourse to a public authority to the best of his ability, including but not limited to seeking work or gainful employment where he can; and rendering help and assistance to other persons where reasonable and to the best of his ability, including but not limited to help for elderly and disabled persons. Those responsibilities are not direct obligations on individuals, nor would they automatically confer new powers on public authorities. Instead, they will be taken into account when a court considers a UK right.

[Mr Nuttall]

I appreciate that my hon. Friend is being very generous with his time in giving way. Article 23 in schedule 1 sets out the responsibilities that he has just listed. How does he think it would be enforced if an individual was thought not to have followed those basic responsibilities? We already have courts that people appear before if they break the law. What is the purpose of this provision and what more will be achieved by its inclusion in the Bill?

[Charlie Elphicke]

That intervention takes us to the key issue of determining whether a person should be able to stand on their UK rights. British courts must take into account all the facts and circumstances of the case, including the conduct of the person seeking to assert the UK right and his adherence to the responsibilities set out in article 23, in considering whether it is fair, equitable and in the interests of justice for such a UK right to be applied to the question at hand. It is effectively the heart of the subjective test to which my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch referred earlier as coming to equity with clean hands.

An important point that goes to the heart of the Bill is that rights must be matched by responsibilities. If someone has not discharged their responsibilities, that is taken into account when they seek to stand on a right. In other words, if they have broken their half of the social contract, that will go against them when they seek to assert the part of the social contract or rights on which they want to rely. It is right that judges and the courts should be able to consider the case in the round to determine whether a person can avail themselves of those rights. As I have said, someone should not be able to use the right to family life to stay on the run. That is a basic part of the subjective test.

The Bill is intended to help rebalance the approach to human rights towards a more subjective application to particular cases with the aim of ensuring that justice and fairness are not trumped by the rigid objective view that has characterised the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights. Those broader considerations should include whether a person seeking a basic right has kept his part of the social bargain and the social contract. That is incredibly important. If we talk to a person in the street about the social contract, they will say, “Well, there are two halves, aren’t there? There are rights, but there are also obligations”—or responsibilities, as I have called them. That recognises the duality of the social contract that lies at the heart of our society.

When it comes to interpreting UK rights, the Bill removes the provision of the Human Rights Act that requires British courts, when interpreting and applying the rights in the Bill, to take into account rulings of the European Court of Human Rights. Instead, the Bill makes it clear that UK courts may take account of judgments from a wide range of sources, including but not limited to the Strasbourg Court, with courts of common law jurisdictions getting top billing, and rightly so, because we are a common law country, and there is a common law world out there that we helped to establish in the days of our empire, which now proceeds with common law jurisprudence. Australia, New Zealand, the United States and Canada are all countries that have common law foundations and have given much thought to many of the issues that often come before our courts. Why would we not look to them first, before we looked at the civil law jurisdictions of Europe? I think that is the right balance for us to have.

The Bill removes the provision of section 3 of the HRA, which requires UK courts to interpret and apply legislation in compliance with human rights so far as is possible. Instead, the courts are directed to give legislation its ordinary and natural meaning. Where the meaning is ambiguous, the courts would typically presume that a possible meaning that complies with UK rights is intended. In that way, we would give primacy back to Parliament and restore the confidence of the British people that Parliament decides. We would have a uniquely British code of rights that is right for this country.

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[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg), who, along with my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart), has treated the House to an excellent discussion, full of the moral and philosophical complexities of the field of human rights. This is an enormously complex area. I feel loth to dive into it having heard the debate that has gone on for the past hour and a half, but I want to try to bring the debate back to the Bill and how my constituents look at this field of human rights.

[Rebecca Harris]

We have heard a superb debate on the moral and philosophical merits of human rights. We seem to have lost our way slightly on looking at the real problem we are facing in this country, which is a disconnect between what our judges are decreeing in our law courts as a result of the Human Rights Act and what the public understand to be common sense. The Bill addresses that issue, and we may have slightly veered away from looking at it directly.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention and I might be able to address that point in the course of my remarks. This is a matter of great concern to our constituents, and there is, perhaps, less of a philosophical disagreement among our constituents than that which we witnessed in the passionate and erudite speeches of my hon. Friends the Members for Penrith and The Border and for North East Somerset.

I warmly congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke), who I am pleased to see back in his place. I understand that he quite reasonably took the chance to nip out for some sustenance, having made such a wonderful opening speech. It is entirely thanks to my hon. Friend that we are here this morning and I know that he has put in an enormous amount of hard work over many months to put the Bill together. I know that he had the help of others, but I shall leave it to him to decide whether he wishes to name them.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way and for his typically generous comments. I should place on record my thanks to Robert Broadhurst, who helped me to put the Bill together and make the case for it. He has done a fantastic job. I also thank the members of the official Commission on a Bill of Rights, particularly Anthony Speaight and Martin Howe, whose learned input has helped, I hope, to improve the Bill.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention and I associate myself with his comments. The whole House is indebted to them for their work and diligence in putting together this Bill. I might not agree with every particular of it, as my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset has just said, but that is not the point. The point is that the House has been given an opportunity to debate a matter that is of great consequence and concern to our constituents.

We must not forget the manner in which my hon. Friend the Member for Dover managed to obtain the slot for the Bill in the first place. As Members might be aware, I am a member of the Procedure Committee, along with my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset. We had the pleasure of listening to my hon. Friend the Member for Dover when he came before us to give evidence as part of our inquiry into the private Members’ Bills procedure. My hon. Friend regaled the Committee with the manner in which he obtained the slot to introduce the Bill as a presentation Bill—I think that is right, and he is nodding in assent. He slept overnight outside the Committee Room—in the corridor, I understand—with little by way of sustenance. I think he mentioned that he might have slipped out for the odd beer, which is quite understandable. He stayed in the corridor overnight to ensure that he was first in the queue the next morning to secure a slot and have first pick of the dates for Second Reading. It is as a result of his hard work and diligence on that occasion that we are here today. The whole House should be grateful to my hon. Friend for that. He has done us all and the country a great service.

Looking at the Bill, one can see that it is no ordinary private Member’s Bill. Such Bills often run to just one or two pages, but this is a substantial Bill, which runs to no fewer than 21 clauses and has a schedule of several pages annexed to it. That gives some measure of the work that has gone into preparing it and bringing it before the House this morning. It should have been introduced as a Government Bill. Had a majority Conservative Government been formed after the last general election, perhaps it would have been. On page 79 of the Conservative manifesto at the last general election the following commitment was made:

“To protect our freedoms from state encroachment and encourage greater social responsibility, we will replace the Human Rights Act with a UK Bill of Rights.”

We all accept, of course, that the Conservatives did not win that general election and it is therefore understandable that the Government, being a coalition Government, have not introduced a Bill that was foreshadowed only by the Conservative manifesto. The coalition agreement provides for a commission, about which we heard this morning, to be established to look into the appropriateness of replacing the Human Rights Act with our own UK Bill of Rights.

[Mr Chope]

Would my hon. Friend comment on the conspicuous absence of Liberal Democrat participation in this debate? It is the Liberal Democrats who, in effect, prevented the Conservative party manifesto commitment on this being implemented.

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[Mr Nuttall]

I can only speculate that it is perhaps as a result of yesterday’s by-election in the parliamentary constituency of Eastleigh, which I am sad to say was won not by the party to which both my hon. Friend and I belong, nor by the party of Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition, but by our coalition partners in government, the Liberal Democrats. It may be that, inexplicably, they found it necessary to celebrate long into the wee, small hours of the night their success in holding what was a Liberal Democrat seat in the first place, and that as a result of that celebration not one of them has managed to make it on to their Benches this morning.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I thank my hon. Friend for his extremely generous comments. Would he care to comment on the absence of Labour Members? Considering that they made this massive change to the British constitution, putting us under the hegemony of a foreign court and undermining our justice system so wholeheartedly, is it not amazing that they have not turned up to defend it?

[Mr Nuttall]

It is indeed disappointing that we have not yet had the pleasure of hearing Opposition Members’ thoughts and observations on the Bill. I hope that we will hear from them later in proceedings. Perhaps, just as I am disappointed not to have heard from them, they are disappointed about their by-election performance and are commiserating with each other.

Let me say at the outset that I would have preferred the Bill merely to repeal the Human Rights Act and to make it clear that we would no longer accept the rulings of the European Court of Human Rights. I appreciate what my hon. Friend the Member for Dover said about the nature of international treaties, but it ought to be for this House to give a steer by stating that we think it is time to pull out of the European convention on human rights. I will explain, over the course of my comments, why I think that would be reasonable and feasible, why we could do it without any loss of international influence and why it would be entirely in tune with what the British people expect us to do.

My mind is taken back to the run-up to the last general election, when I detected two common themes that were brought up on the doorsteps, in street surgeries and when I chatted to people on the phone. I am not saying this to be directly critical of the previous Administration; this is just a fact and how I found it. First, people were concerned about what has been described as the “something for nothing” culture. I will not go down that avenue, because it has nothing to do with today’s proceedings. Secondly, they were concerned about the whole arena of human rights and the way they had been enforced in the years following the passage of the Human Rights Act. There was a feeling that we had somehow been dragged down a road that meant that criminals—I will hopefully have an opportunity to explore this in more detail later—are the one group in society who have the time to analyse in depth the detailed provisions of human rights legislation. That group, spurred on by lawyers, seem to have adopted the whole field as a lucrative source of income while incarcerated in one of Her Majesty’s prisons. That, above all, is what has caused my constituents, at least, to feel that somehow the system is letting them down. To put it in a nutshell, that is bringing the whole field of human rights into disrepute.

Perhaps I would not have introduced the Bill in exactly the same form, but it is nevertheless absolutely a step in the right direction. In common with my constituents, I am far from satisfied that the current position is acceptable, and what the Bill proposes would be far preferable. It would establish a situation that was much more even-handed and fair to the British people than currently, where our constituents feel that it is entirely wrong that time and again what they see as a foreign court is telling our courts and, in essence, this House what they should and should not be doing.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Is not the key and central point that we need to get the convention and the European Court of Human Rights out of our legal system so that our courts are not hog-tied by the European Court but can follow the hundreds of years of case law that has been developed in the English legal system?

[Mr Nuttall]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, because he hits the nail on the head. Part of the problem with the whole arena of human rights legislation is that, as the years have passed, particularly as the process has speeded up since 1998, we have ended up in a situation where because of judicial activism there is almost no end to the triviality of the cases that are being brought before the Court. I have some figures on that to which I may refer later. That brings the whole field of human rights into disrepute.

People traditionally thought of human rights in the context of what happened during the last century when unspeakable atrocities were inflicted on men and women by, principally, the Nazis in the second world war, and also behind the iron curtain. My right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor said in an article in, I think, The Daily Telegraph before Christmas that anyone who is concerned about human rights should be aware of what Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote in his portrayals of the brutality of the Soviet gulags under Stalin and his successors. Local Communist party members were sent to labour camps without trial for crimes as trivial as being the first to stop applauding at the end of a meeting. Peasant farmers were driven off their land and literally dumped at the end of a railway line in the heart of Siberia and left to fend for themselves or die. People were tortured to death in the basement of Moscow’s Lubyanka prison.

It was having in mind the atrocities that had happened in parts of Europe in the 1930s and ’40s that inspired Winston Churchill and other democratic leaders to come to together in the aftermath of the second world war to forge the European convention on human rights, which was signed in Rome back in 1950. It set out the fundamental rights regarded as the absolute basis for a democratic nation at the time, such as the right to life, the right not to be tortured and the right to a fair trial, which are not the sorts of things that we have seen litigation on in recent times.

It would be remiss of me not to welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Martin Horwood) to the Chamber, given that we have commented on the absence of Liberal Democrats. We are delighted to see him here—he obviously did not celebrate last night’s result in Eastleigh too much—and look forward to hearing the Liberal Democrats’ views on the Bill later.

I have set out the background against which the 1950 European convention was crafted. What has gone wrong? We seem to have moved away from those very high moral principles. Although I hesitate to venture down that road, I will dare to do so in the absence of my hon. Friends the Members for Penrith and The Border and for North East Somerset. We have moved a long way from the sorts of rights that were in the minds of the draftsmen of the 1950 convention to where we are today.

Claiming that an individual’s human rights have been infringed has become something of a niche industry in the legal sector. There are now lawyers who appear to do very little else but engage themselves in making claims that one or other persons have had their human rights infringed. It is obviously a lucrative business. They often work at the taxpayers’ expense, thanks to the availability of legal aid. I would be interested to know—perhaps the Minister will be able to tell us this—how many of the claims relating to human rights legislation that go through the courts are funded privately. I venture to submit that there are very few indeed and suspect that the majority are funded through legal aid, a no win, no fee agreement, or charity sponsorship. I suspect that very few individuals pay for their own cases to go to court.

That is a double whammy for the taxpayer, because as well as paying the costs of bringing the case, the British taxpayer picks up the bill if the case is lost but the European Court of Human Rights finds that there has been a breach of an individual’s human rights. In fact, it is probably a triple whammy, because as well as paying the legal aid bill and any damages awarded, we also have to pay the costs of those Government lawyers and civil servants who defend the case. As we have heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Dover, it was revealed recently in a parliamentary answer that Abu Qatada has received about half a million pounds of taxpayers’ money through the legal aid system to pursue his apparently never-ending series of appeals. I do not think that my constituents are alone when they express to me their outrage at the current system.

[Charlie Elphicke]

My constituents take the view that the half a million pounds that Abu Qatada has been given in legal aid could have been used to great effect to employ more teachers, nurses and doctors and to provide better public services. One reason why people are very critical of Labour for having brought in the Human Rights Act is that it has put an even greater strain on the public finances.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Our constituents are outraged not because of human rights per se, but because of the knock-on effect and where it is leading us as a country. They see the hard-earned money that they have handed over to the Government in taxes being spent on cases, the majority of which are seen as trying it on. They see criminals behind bars bringing cases that are nothing more than fishing expeditions. The criminals have nothing to lose personally if the cases fail and everything to gain if they are successful. From the lawyers’ point of view, if they are being funded through the legal aid system, as is the case with prisoner voting, and they are successful with one case, they can go farming among the prison population to find dozens, hundreds or perhaps even thousands of other cases that they can adopt and bring forward for adjudication in order to claim damages.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Is it any wonder that the overwhelming majority of people tell pollsters that they see the Human Rights Act as a charter for criminals, the undeserving and lawyers? That is a key reason why we should have a new settlement to rebalance the situation and get some real justice back in the UK.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is one of the key reasons why the majority of people in this country would support the Bill.

We have not heard from the Opposition or our friends in the Liberal Democrat party. Perhaps they have been convinced by the strength of the arguments this morning, but they may well oppose the Bill. However, I find that supporters of all political parties support what my hon. Friend’s Bill seeks to do. It is not a party political issue among ordinary voters. They are all equally outraged at some of the cases that have hit the headlines in recent years. I agree with my hon. Friend that people see the Human Rights Act as something that diverts their hard-earned taxpayers’ funds away from the things that they should be spent on, such as providing more doctors and nurses, to paying lawyers to bring forward spurious cases.

Perhaps I could refer the House to one such case. Samuel Betteridge was a young man who raped a 14-year-old girl after luring her to his flat and forcing her to drink alcohol. In 2005 he admitted at Lincoln Crown court two counts of rape and one of attempted rape. His minimum jail term of five years was later reduced on appeal to three and a half years. His parole hearing was fixed for May 2009 but later postponed until January 2010.

Through his lawyers, Mr Betteridge appealed to the European Court of Human Rights on the grounds that the delay in his parole hearing violated article 5 of the European convention on human rights—the right to a speedy hearing. The Strasbourg judges, needless to say, agreed with Mr Betteridge’s submission and found in his favour. They said that

“the delay in reviewing Mr Betteridge’s case was the direct result of the failure of the authorities to anticipate the demand which would be placed on the prison system following the introduction of IPP sentencing”.

Those are indeterminate public protection sentences which, as the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter) and other hon. Members know, are now being abolished—[Interruption.] Yes, changed; effectively abolished, perhaps.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

I will address the hon. Gentleman’s request for the Opposition’s views on the issue under discussion, but IPPs are being abolished, which Opposition Members think is something of a shame. The issues of public protection that the hon. Gentleman mentions, and the balance between the offender and the victim, are being changed not for better but for worse.

[Mr Nuttall]

If my memory serves me rightly, together with my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) I took a similar view on that matter and— I think—went into the Division Lobby to try to avoid it happening. There is a place for such sentences but I do not want to be drawn down that avenue. This debate is not about sentencing policy, but that was the subject of the case I mentioned and it is therefore right at least to touch on how it came about.

The High Court in London originally dismissed the case, but the European Court of Human Rights backed Mr Betteridge and awarded the rapist £640 in damages plus £1,710 in legal fees—I bet that did not go far towards paying those fees. According to my information, Mr Betteridge was apparently not alone in receiving payments for delayed parole hearings and was one of 100 prisoners who has received in total more than £313,000 over the past three years as a result of an alleged breach, found to be an actual breach, of their human rights. Most of our constituents would agree with Robert Oxley of the TaxPayers Alliance who said:

“It’s disgusting that taxpayers are being made to pay for an award to a rapist thanks to European Court meddling.”

Of course, he was referring to the European Court of Human Rights, not the European Court of Justice.

As the House is aware, that was not the only case to hit the headlines. A case with an even more substantial effect, certainly on proceedings in this place, was that of Hirst, which was, in effect, the leading case on prisoner voting rights. In 1979, John Hirst used an axe to kill his landlady in her own home. In the following year he was convicted of manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility and sentenced to life imprisonment with a tariff of 15 years, after which he could be released on licence. In fact, he was not released until May 2004 because of concerns that he might present a danger to the public; for example, he was found guilty of an offence under prison rules when, in 1998, he slammed a van door against a female prisoner officer.

Mr Hirst used his time in prison to teach himself law. He became a student of human rights legislation and a serial litigant against the authorities. There is no time this morning to go into his various cases, but suffice it to say that in one of them the court ordered that the Government pay Hirst £1,000 in damages and a further £7,500 in costs. That was before what we might call his cause célèbre—Hirst v. United Kingdom (No. 2)—which was to prove far more controversial, and related to whether his human rights had been violated because he was not able to vote while he was in prison.

[Charlie Elphicke]

The case of Hirst is entirely clear-cut. He is a man soaked in blood. He is remorseless and unapologetic, yet he uses taxpayers’ money to seek the right to vote. I am hard pressed to think of a more despicable and evil person in this country.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend echoes the views of many millions of our constituents across the country. Hirst submitted a claim to the European court based on article 3 of the first protocol—the right to free elections—which states:

“The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature.”

The wording of article 3 does not actually confer individuals with a right to vote. When the Grand Chamber gave its judgment, it stretched a point; the court had already decided in the case of Mathieu-Mohin and Clerfayt v. Belgium that article 3 included an individual’s right to vote and to stand for election.

It is illuminating to consider how Hirst built on the previous Mathieu-Mohin case. It shows how rights are developed incrementally, case by case, salami-slicing common sense and gradually moving away from what most people would think article 3—in this case—actually meant. As was discussed during our debates on prisoner voting, the Court ruled that this issue had not been considered here. I submit that it was considered in section 3 of the Representation of the People Act 1983. It may not have been debated specifically—I was not here at the time—but presumably that was because both sides of the House took it for granted that prisoners would not have the vote. That was accepted by the whole country and the whole House.

[Mr Chope]

Is not one of the most critical issues the way in which the Court interpreted the amendment through the protocol, which was contrary to the rules of interpretation of the Vienna convention? If we had stuck to those strict rules, we would not have got into the difficulty we are in at the moment.

[Mr Nuttall]

I bow to my hon. Friend’s greater knowledge of these matters, and I am sure that he is absolutely right. We have allowed ourselves to stray from the original meaning of the article.

I will not detain the House for much longer on the prisoner voting case, but it strikes at the heart of the issue. The Court is, in effect, saying that this House cannot decide for itself what to do and who it can allow to vote in our elections, and that somehow people such as Hirst, a convicted axe killer, should be allowed to vote and decide who has the right to sit in this Chamber. Most of my constituents would say, without hesitation or doubt, that that cannot be right, and it is because of such cases that it is right for us to consider the Bill promoted by my hon. Friend the Member for Dover.

One problem with the European Court of Human Rights is that 47 nations—it is not the same as the European Union, which has 27 members, shortly to be 28—have signed up to the European convention on human rights. With a population of some 800 million, any one of whom can choose to bring a case at any time, it is unsurprising that an avalanche of cases has been brought before the Court. The evidence of the Court’s statistics calls into question how genuine some of those cases are. I looked briefly at the Court’s website, which lists what it calls “rule 39 requests” granted in the past five years for all 47 countries. That gives us an idea of how many countries out of the 47 did not have any cases against them at all. One would have thought that, if the convention were really dealing with serious breaches of human rights, the odd case might be brought before the Court from somewhere in Europe, bearing in mind that all the countries concerned are democracies that operate under the rule of law. One might expect the odd case, here or there, to be brought before the Court.

In fact, only Andorra and Montenegro had zeros beside their name on that list. At the other end of the scale, the United Kingdom soared up to the top with 5,176 cases. Using that yardstick, one would assume that we had a worse human rights record than any other country, but that makes no logical sense. I believe that those figures are, in fact, attributable to the assiduity of our human rights lawyers in bringing cases to the attention of our courts and then taking them to appeal in Europe, particularly since the passage of the 1998 Act, rather than to any failing on the part of our Government or, to be fair, the last Labour Government. Yet anyone glancing casually at those figures might assume that those Governments had been going around inflicting atrocities on people.

Mention was made earlier of the Brighton declaration, and I believe that the Government have done good work in that regard. It was entirely right that we should use our presidency of the Council to try to bring some common sense to the system and to reform the way in which the Court operates, but I am not sure that that endeavour has met with a great deal of success. I looked at the latest figures available, which represent a snapshot taken on 31 January this year. That makes them quite up to date in terms of Government and international statistics. They showed a total of 126, 850 outstanding applications to the Court, including 3,250 from the United Kingdom. We were not top of that particular chart; other countries had far higher numbers than us. Russia, for example, had 27,450 pending cases. This demonstrates the fact that, with 800 million people entitled to bring their cases before the Court, there is a huge backlog.

One advantage of my hon. Friend’s Bill for the British people is that, by effectively repatriating these powers back to the United Kingdom, it will make things far easier for anyone with a genuine grievance, and who genuinely feels that their human rights have been infringed, because their case will be dealt with entirely within this country.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dover has done a wonderful job. Much more could be said on this issue, and I fear that the time available today does not enable us to do it proper justice in many respects. I would have liked to deal with how we could withdraw from the European Court and the European convention and to explain why I believe that even if my hon. Friend’s Bill, which has much to commend it, were to become law, all we would be doing—unless we withdraw from the convention, as my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley said in an intervention some time ago—is creating another hurdle. As long as we are signed up and as long as people have the ability to go to Strasbourg, we will not solve the problem. Equally, as long as we are members of the European Union and as long as it has the desire to sign up to the European convention of human rights and to build on what it calls fundamental rights under the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, which we briefly discussed here a few days ago—and make no bones about it, this is where the leadership of the EU would like to go—we will not, frankly, solve this problem.

Let me finish with two points. First, in yesterday’s by-election, the majority of votes were cast, if not for parties, for candidates who believe as I do that we would be better off out of the European Union. Part of the reasoning is that we would free ourselves from the risk of being tied in to the European convention on human rights by the back door that would result from our membership of the EU. Finally, one problem with having this debate today is that it is the final Friday for private Members’ business in this Session. I only wish that this Bill had been able to be considered on the first and not the last Friday, so that it would genuinely have stood a chance of having further consideration in Committee—a Committee on which I would happily have served. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dover for bringing the Bill forward and look forward to hearing the remaining contributions to the debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

I am grateful and the House will be grateful to my hon. Friend for that important clarification. He also spoke, rightly, about section 2 of the Human Rights Act and the obligation for the courts to take into account Strasbourg jurisprudence. He entered the discussion that has been taking place for some time about what exactly that should entail. The Commission on a Bill of Rights noted that Lord Phillips, then President of the Supreme Court, said in evidence to Parliament:

‘If the wording “take account” gives a message at all, it is that we are not bound by decisions of the Strasbourg court as binding precedent.’

I think that many will welcome that clarification.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dover also mentioned the International Criminal Court and terrorist trials. Not only are there offences of universal jurisdiction—this was debated by my hon. Friends the Members for Penrith and The Border and for North East Somerset—but there are clearly offences, such as war crimes and genocide, that have universal jurisdiction and are of such seriousness that they can be tried anywhere. There have been trials in the UK for such offences, and indeed Parliament chose to extend the possibility for that in the Coroners and Justice Act 2009.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dover also raised a point of debate—one of continuing importance—on the balance between rights and responsibilities, arguing that the possession of rights must inevitably entail some responsibilities. The commission had points to make on that as well. It concluded that rights should not be made conditional on the exercise of responsibilities. It concluded that a Bill of Rights may allow the courts, when awarding damages, to take into account the conduct of the applicant, but my hon. Friend’s Bill would go further in incorporating the notion of responsibilities in determining whether a right has been breached. It concluded that any provision on responsibilities should only be declaratory.

I would like to deal with some of the points my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North made in his thoughtful speech. He said that the Brighton declaration had not been successful, but I must part company from him on that, because I think that the declaration is a substantial package of welcome reforms. Their implementation is being negotiated in Strasbourg. No changes have yet been made to the text of the convention, but once the reforms are realised we expect their net effect to be that more cases will be resolved at a national level and fewer will go to Strasbourg. The European Court will be able to focus on the more important cases, which is what it was originally set up to do, and, equally importantly, to do so more quickly.

I am conscious that in previous debates on the subject, particularly those relating to individual cases, and often those involving extradition, including from this country to the United States, Members on both sides of the House have expressed understandable frustration about the delays in the legal process. That is because British citizens have been kept in British jails for many years not because of delays in the British legal process—of course, there are also delays in that process—but specifically because of delays in the European Court. The measures that will follow the Brighton declaration, which I think will lead in the long run to cases appearing before the Court more rapidly and, therefore, more rapid decision making, will have a direct effect on individual human rights, because they will mean people spending less time in jail.

[Mr Nuttall]

I must have inadvertently misled my right hon. Friend and wish to clarify my views on the Brighton declaration. I think, for the reasons he has just set out, that it is a step in the right direction. All I had intended to do was show that the most recent statistics bear out the need for what was agreed as part of the declaration to be brought into force as a matter of urgency.

[Damian Green]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s clarification. I completely agree with him that the sooner implementation can happen, the better it will be not only for us but for individuals.

My hon. Friend also made the point about rule 39 applications about the stay of deportation, and the UK’s supposedly very high numbers in this regard. Under rule 39 of the Strasbourg Court, the Court may, on application, advise a stay of deportation, for example. This is about indications, not violations per se, and the Court has become stricter about granting such requests. As a result, fewer than one in 20 requests made for interim measures against the UK are now granted. In real numbers, that is only about 30 or 40 requests a year.

Various hon. Members have talked about prisoner voting. I think that everyone would recognise that the strength of feeling in this country is clear, and we have been clear in our view that it should be a matter for national Parliaments to decide. The Government are under a legal obligation to bring forward legislation. We have therefore published a draft Bill that presents a range of options, including banning prisoners sentenced to four years or more from voting, banning prisoners sentenced to more than six months from voting, and reaffirming the current ban on prisoners voting. We have asked a Committee of both Houses to examine the Bill. In the end—the point made most eloquently, as ever, by my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset—Parliament is sovereign and it will decide on whether to change the law, and the draft Bill is the first step in Parliament’s considering the issue.

Transforming Rehabilitation

David Nuttall Excerpts

Wednesday 9th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

The probation service in Wales has been one of the most innovative in doing this and has, in fact, in the past few months produced a blueprint on how this could happen in Wales, following a similar model to the one I have set out today. I fully expect to see members of the Wales probation team at the forefront of creating either mutuals or co-operatives to deliver the services. I pay tribute to the Wales probation trust, which is imaginative and innovative and has some great ideas to do precisely what my hon. Friend is talking about in difficult areas where communities in rural areas are spread out.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I warmly welcome the Lord Chancellor’s statement. Often, small and medium-sized enterprises and voluntary providers are put off applying for Government contracts because of the complexity of the process involved. May I urge my right hon. Friend to make the application process to run probation services as straightforward as possible in order to maximise the number of applicants?

Prisons (Property) Bill

David Nuttall Excerpts

Friday 30th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. He might think it easy for me to say—now he has made the point—but I was specifically thinking of hospitals when I drew up the amendment. As he said, lots of prisoners have health problems and require medical treatment, entailing a trip either to a doctors’ surgery for an assessment or to hospital for treatment or a more detailed assessment. The last Government did an awful lot in that regard, taking forward telemedicine so that people could be seen while still in prison via video link. That was a perfectly good innovation, but it does not apply in every case. As my hon. Friend said, prisoners often have to visit hospital.

It is not just about hospitals, however; lots of prisoners go out to work on day release, if they are coming to the end of their sentence, as part of their rehabilitation. Many people in open prisons go out to work or out into other parts of society to do some rehabilitation work. As things stand, however, it seems that the Bill would not cover those people. People in custody also go to court, either to have their remand hearing considered or to have further charges put to them, and it would be bizarre if something was found while somebody was in court but was not covered by the Bill just because they happened to be in court rather than in prison.

I genuinely do not know—perhaps the Minister will tell us—how many trips are paid to hospital, how many people go out to work each day or how many court appearances are made, but I am sure there are people with better minds in this place who do know. It would help to have that information. It seems to me, however, that many people make such trips, so there might be a large loophole when prisoners are away from their prison and prisoner escort vehicle and therefore not covered by the Bill.

I am also slightly concerned about the use of the term “prisoner escort vehicle”. I wonder exactly what it covers. Again, I would not want people to get away on a technicality. We have lots of clever members of the legal profession in the House, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) being one of them, and I would not want any of those clever people—much cleverer than me—to be able to find a loophole by which it could be claimed that a vehicle was not strictly speaking a “prisoner escort vehicle”. I wonder, therefore, if we have a definition of exactly what it means.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point about the definition of “prisoner escort vehicle”, but I am concerned that the problem would not be dealt with by his amendment 2, on the grounds that a similarly silver-tongued lawyer might say that “location” does not include a moving vehicle.

--- Later in debate ---

We come to amendment 4. [Interruption.] Does my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North wish to intervene?

[Mr Nuttall]

indicated dissent.

[Philip Davies]

I was misguided in thinking that my hon. Friend momentarily wanted to intervene, but he did not. He has obviously been so persuaded by my case that he could not think of anything in amendment 4 to disagree with, as he could with amendment 3.

Proposed new section 42A of the Prison Act 1952, in clause 1, deals with

“Disposal of unauthorised or unattributable property”.

Where an article is being used for any of the purposes set out in subsection (3), it is not authorised. Those purposes include

“concealing an article which a prisoner is not authorised to have in his or her possession…causing harm to the prisoner or others…prejudicing the security or operation of the prison.”

My amendment 4 would add another category, in proposed new subsection (3)(d), which reads:

“for any unauthorised or unlawful purpose.”

Again, the amendment is designed to strengthen the reasons in the Bill for which property may be confiscated and destroyed. Perhaps it is too restricting simply to use the criteria currently set out in subsection (3). There could be circumstances where property was being used for another unlawful or unauthorised purpose, which would not be covered without my amendment. Surely we are not talking just about things that cause harm to the prisoner or prejudice the security or operation of the prison. Subsection (3)(a) refers to

“concealing an article which a prisoner is not authorised to have”,

but what if someone is caught red handed with an article that they are not concealing, but brandishing openly in front of everybody? Would we then find ourselves in the ridiculous situation where if a prisoner was hiding the article, that would be covered, but if they were brandishing it openly, that would not?

Perhaps my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey is satisfied that everything is covered by the Bill. However, there is certainly no harm in the belt-and-braces approach adopted by my amendment. For example, what if an item was being used to facilitate the taking of drugs? That would not necessarily fall under either “concealing” an item or

“causing harm to the prisoner or others”,

nor would it be

“prejudicing the security or operation of the prison”,

yet I am sure we would all want to ensure that those things were covered. My amendment would introduce a catch-all element to ensure that any property associated with any unauthorised or unlawful use could be seized and disposed of.

Amendment 5 would insert

“recycling it or donating it to any charity”

at the end of proposed new section 42A(5)(c) of the 1952 Act, as set out in clause 1. Again, I guess—[Interruption.] I am pleased to see the return of my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North, because this might be another area where he can help out, with his undoubted expertise on legal matters. As the Bill stands, proposed new subsection (5) says:

“In this section…references to disposing of an article include selling it”,

but I do not know whether the Bill is trying to say, “You can do that if you want to,” or whether that is the preferred way of dealing with such articles. In any case, if references to the disposal of an item are to include selling it, it seems perfectly worth while to include other options, including recycling things or donating them to any charity. If items could only be either destroyed or sold, that would leave out some of the things that most people would consider to be the most appropriate ways of disposing of them. If we were talking about things of particular use to a charity or things that could be recycled, why would we not want to do that?

[Philip Davies]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. As ever, he is eagle-eyed on these matters. The point he makes about proposed new section 42A(1) is a good one, but like him, I would have thought that if “otherwise dispose of” included any other method, there would be no need for the words “selling it” in proposed new subsection 42A(5). Perhaps the Minister may like to explain that. My concern is that the Bill might encourage prisons to go down that line—it is as though that kind of behaviour is being encouraged. Personally, the behaviour I would most like to encourage is recycling or donating to charity. The things that are most likely to be caught include mobile phones, for instance, which mobile phone companies are trying to encourage us to recycle. It would be bizarre if we ended up destroying things that could otherwise be recycled.

[Mr Nuttall]

In drafting amendment 4, my hon. Friend has not referred specifically to a “registered charity”, but simply to a “charity”. I wonder whether he could clarify whether, in not using the word “registered”, he had in mind general good causes, which might not necessarily have formally registered as charities.

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. It just goes to show the value I would have gained from speaking to him before I drew up my amendments. There is certainly a lesson in there for me. Indeed, given his nature and the fact that he is so expert at looking at such details, I am rather surprised that I did not discuss my amendments with him before tabling them. He makes a good point, although he seemed to imply that I went through a certain thought process—that I considered putting down “any registered charity”, but made a conscious decision not to and instead just put down “any charity”. He is doing me far too much credit by suggesting that I went through that thought process. The fact of the matter is—as I am sure you would have well known, Madam Deputy Speaker, knowing me as you do—that I did not go through any such thought process. I merely put down the sentiment, I guess, that such items should be given to any charity. I will certainly consult my hon. Friend in future, because as ever he spots things that I always miss. If he will bear with me, I will leave that detail to one side for the moment.

We should trust the prison officers, governors and directors to decide how best to deal with the items in question. I would not want us to push them down a particular route if there was a better one available. They might wish to support a local charity, for example, and the amendment would encourage them to use their discretion as widely as possible. My suggestion on Second Reading regarding the use of eBay was mentioned in Committee. Prisons might be able to make some money from the sale of the items. Times are tough, and I would not have a problem with a prison setting up its own eBay personality to sell those items in order to make money that could be reinvested in the prison. I want to give prisons the greatest possible flexibility.

Amendment 6 would remove the words after “force” and insert the words

“and which is held by the prison on that date”

into clause 1(6)(a). As the clause stands, the power to dispose of property

“may be exercised in relation to the relevant article found before the day on which this section comes into force if the article remains unclaimed at the end of six months beginning with that day.”

I think that that is too prescriptive. I would like to give the prisons the widest possible scope, and they should not have to wait six months to dispose of an item. If they think that the prisoner should not have an item, and that it ought to be disposed of, why should we insist that they wait six months to see whether it is claimed?

I want to speed through these matters a bit more now, and I will briefly mention amendments 7 and 8. Amendment 7 would remove clause 1(6)(b), which states that the power to dispose of items

“may not otherwise be exercised in relation to an article found before that day.”

Amendment 8 would remove parts of clause 1(7) and insert the words

“covered by this Act if it had been in force at the time the items were seized.”

All three amendments are trying to make the same point. As the Bill stands, it would cover only items seized after its introduction, or a limited type of item that had not been claimed six months after its introduction. That is very weak. It should be dealing with all confiscated items, not just those that have not been claimed. Whether or not they have been claimed is wholly irrelevant. It is beyond me to understand why on earth an unauthorised or illegal item should be given back to someone just because they claim it is theirs.

There are many examples of the appropriateness and correct application of this approach. A pertinent one relates to sentencing. Someone might commit a crime before a change to the sentencing guidelines, but if they fall to be sentenced after the change, they will be sentenced as per the new guideline. I am suggesting a similar approach in the Bill. It would be ironic if someone had an item confiscated after committing a crime and it was handed back because it had been confiscated before the change took place, and if that same person could go to court and be sentenced on the basis of the sentencing guidelines that pertained on the day of sentence, rather than on the day of the offence. That would be a topsy-turvy situation.

--- Later in debate ---

I want to ensure that any property that could contain vital evidence in the form of recordings or images could not inadvertently be disposed of too rapidly, without having been checked to ensure that it did not contain anything that could implicate someone in a crime. Such articles should be available for use in any internal disciplinary hearings or as evidence in a court case.

[Mr Nuttall]

I have been gently supportive of my hon. Friend’s amendments so far, but I have my reservations about this one. I fear that it might be used to ensure that items of property were never disposed of. There is always a chance that a device could contain evidence, even if it was not known about at the time of confiscation, and that, in six months or a year’s time, that evidence could turn out to be relevant to a crime.

--- Later in debate ---

I am, however, grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley for his keen interest in the Bill. As he says, we have a shared goal. It is unacceptable that, at present, prison officers and governors are powerless to destroy items that prisoners are not supposed to have anyway.

[Mr Nuttall]

I should say at the outset that I know that the amendments presented so ably by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) are not in any sense wrecking amendments designed to destroy the central thrust of the Bill. Indeed, they are very much in the spirit of the Bill, and are intended to strengthen it so that it achieves the purpose that we all want it to achieve.

Let me begin with amendment 2. As we have heard, there are many reasons why a prisoner may be away from the confines of the prison. He may, for example, be visiting a hospital, or he may have been released to attend a funeral. The question has been raised of how many times a prisoner will leave the prison in the course of a year. Given that there are 85,000 people in prison, and given all the reasons why a prisoner might want to leave the prison, the number of such occasions must amount to many hundreds of thousands.

[Philip Davies]

As my hon. Friend knows, it is not just a question of 85,000 prisoners. Far more than 85,000 people go to prison over the course of a year. There are about 80,000 people in prison at any one time, but obviously many more thousands go to prison during the year, and all of them may at some point leave the prison for the day.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend is right. There are probably 85,000 prisoners at any given moment in time, but over the course of a calendar year the number will be vastly greater. When, back in 2007, my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) asked how drugs had got into Dorchester prison, the right hon. Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson), who was a Minister at the time, replied that in a single year there had been

“Under the current system, 405,259 releases on temporary licence”.—[Official Report, 19 June 2007; Vol. 461, c. 1253.]

There is, therefore, some evidence to support my estimate that there are some hundreds of thousands of such releases each year.

It now seems to me that the point about the definition of “prisoner escort vehicle”—I wondered whether my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) would mention this—is covered by clause 1(5), which defines it as

“a vehicle used for taking a prisoner to or from a prison or other place while in custody”.

I think, on reflection, that I am satisfied that the provision is drawn widely enough to defeat any silver-tongued lawyer who might suggest that a vehicle was not, in fact, a prisoner escort vehicle. I therefore intend to support amendment 2.

I think that there is some merit in amendment 3. Those who are closest to the prisoners and to what is going on in the prison environment should be allowed to determine whether something is used or may be used for unauthorised purposes, within the terms of the Bill, instead of having to refer the matter to the governor or director of the prison. I appreciate that some may not share that view, however.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

I used to feel the same way as my hon. Friend, but I think that if a prison officer decides that an unauthorised item should be destroyed or disposed of, a senior manager of the prison ought to agree with that. The issue is not about whether an article is unauthorised or being used in a way that is unauthorised; it is about the disposal of the article afterwards. I am now convinced that the right approach is for a prison officer to be able to confiscate an article and for the governor or director of the prison to decide about disposal.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a valuable point, and he has persuaded me on it. I would be interested to know, however, whether the Minister has had any feedback on amendment 3, perhaps from the Prison Officers Association.

Amendment 4 is a sensible proposal, and I have nothing further to say on it this morning.

Amendment 5 is of considerable interest. I asked in an intervention whether my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley had deliberately not put “registered” before “charity”. Whether or not that is the case, it is the right decision, as it overcomes any bureaucratic problems that might arise over whether a local charitable organisation had gone through the registration process. Such an organisation may be in the process of registration—indeed, that is often the case. The amendment would serve to avoid long-winded discussions as to whether individuals who are doing good work should be prevented from benefiting from confiscated property. Most of this property is mobile phones and there is a considerable market in recycling them, so they have a great value, especially as nowadays most of them are, in fact, small mobile computers.

Amendment 9 addresses the question of the data on these phones. The right solution is for the data to be routinely taken off the phones and stored on a central hard disc, logged with the prisoner’s name and number. Therefore, if at any point in the future it turns out that some of that information is pertinent to an alleged offence, it can be used in evidence.

[Philip Davies]

I agree with my hon. Friend, but does he agree that there would be a different perspective on this question if the Minister were unable to give the assurance that these data will be routinely checked and stored? Does my hon. Friend agree that that would give some merit to my amendment that the Minister currently does not see?

[Mr Nuttall]

That is right. Our concern is that property that was disposed of might later turn out to have contained evidence that was central to securing a conviction. I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey, the promoter of the Bill, would not want that information to be unavailable. There is a great deal of merit in having routine cleansing of phones, but only after having saved all the data contained on them on a central hard disc for possible future use.

We know from the Minister’s comments on Second Reading that 41,000 phones are currently stored, so I accept that storing these data would be a major task. We were told on Second Reading that the cost of storing the phones is £20,000 a year, and they are seized at the rate of 800 a month. This is a major problem, therefore, and there would be a great deal of merit in the Minister’s exploring the possibility of a standardised system whereby information is taken off phones and stored for future reference.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

About 13 years ago I became rather conscious of what was going on in prisons. I had taken part in a campaign to help overturn the convictions and to free Ruth Wyner and John Brock, who had been working at the Wintercomfort project in Cambridge, helping the homeless. I remember helping to lead a procession across London that had the slogan, “Help the homeless: jail the social workers?” An account of these events is given in Alexander Masters’ book, “Stuart: a life lived backwards”. With the knowledge of the police, these two people were running a project for homeless people, some of whom were addicted to illegal street drugs. Another police officer found that some people were exchanging drugs on or outside the premises, and for some ludicrous reason the people running the project were prosecuted and jailed.

In jail, Ruth Wyner was asked to sign a confidentiality agreement so as to give counselling to other prisoners who were getting illegal street drugs in prison. I asked how many times each year someone in prison was detected as having used illegal street drugs. The answer was about 20,000, which is really quite high. I then asked somebody who had worked for me but who went on to work in the Prison Service how the drugs got into prison. The answer was, “Sometimes they’re thrown over the wall.”

I also refer Members to the first book Lord Archer wrote about his prison experience. It described how new prisoners, most of whom were inexperienced at crime—and at life—were sent to a high-security prison for a period, and if they were not on drugs before they went, they were often on drugs by the time they had finished their three weeks there, because the senior, experienced prisoners would arrange for the new prisoner to get their family to pay the experienced person’s family or associates outside the prison. That demonstrates why the mobile phones issue is important and why detecting unauthorised possession of mobile phones matters.

We ought to support the Bill. The question of how to deal with the amendments will be determined by the Minister’s responses to the points made by my hon. Friends the Members for Shipley (Philip Davies) and for Bury North (Mr Nuttall). I am grateful to the Bill’s promoter, my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew), and I wish him success with it.

We must address the underlying issue, which is that 800 mobile phones are detected a month, and many more surely go undetected. A technical fix ought to be possible, so that any use of a mobile phone in a prison is linked to the identification number of a phone, and if any phone is used that is not part of the approved list, investigations should take place and people should find out where it is. The technology cannot be that difficult. Perhaps that is how it is done anyway, and that is why the detection rate is as high as it is.

I am a great believer in helping prisoners to be rehabilitated, but if there is a currency in mobile phones in a prison, let alone in controlled or illegal drugs, we need to stop it. The Bill is about the particular issue of how one can dispose of or destroy items that are not illegal to possess but that are unauthorised in prisons. Its limited purpose is one that this House should support, and I do support it.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mrs Helen Grant)]

Amendment 2 proposes an addition to proposed new section 42A(1) of the Prison Act 1952, as inserted by clause 1 of the Bill, which would extend the power of a governor or director to places outside a prison or prison escort vehicle, such as a hospital, court cells or a police station where a prisoner might be detained in custody. In some circumstances, the prisoner, although they are in custody, will not be in the custody of the governor. It would therefore not be appropriate to extend the powers in such a way. I think that deals with the question raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) about extending the power beyond the prisoner escort vehicle.

It is already possible to remove any unauthorised items found on a prisoner while they are in custody outside the prison. Such items would be returned to the prison with the prisoner and dealt with as the prisoner re-entered the prison. The prison governor or directors could authorise the prisoner to keep the item with him or her in prison or disposal could be required. If appropriate, the governor could confiscate it and use the general power of destruction already provided in the Bill. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) will therefore withdraw his amendment.

Amendment 3 is not necessary. Prison officers will have the power to act in the way envisaged by the amendment through the delegated authority of the prison governor. It is therefore not necessary specifically to include them in that power. In addition, “prison officer” is the term used to describe officers in a public sector prison and would not cover prison custody officers, who carry out the same function in private sector prisons. I therefore hope that my hon. Friend will not press that amendment.

The purpose of amendment 4 would appear to be to create a catch-all power to cover all property used for any unauthorised or unlawful purpose. Although I can understand my hon. Friend’s reasons for tabling the amendment, I do not believe that it is necessary. Any unauthorised item could be confiscated and destroyed under the power created in subsection (1)(a) or (b) of proposed new section 42A. Furthermore, an item used for unlawful or unauthorised purposes that would clearly prejudice the security or operation of the prison or cause harm to prisoners or others would be dealt with by proposed new subsection 3(c) or (b). I therefore hope that my hon. Friend will agree with me that the amendment is not necessary.

On amendment 5, I applaud my hon. Friend’s desire to see that confiscated property is put to good use and to ensure that charities might benefit wherever possible. The Bill already enables that. Proposed new section 42A enables a governor or director to

“destroy or otherwise dispose of”

confiscated property. My hon. Friend’s amendment is not necessary, because the phrase “otherwise dispose of” would allow the item to be recycled or donated to charity. I can assure him that the guidance given to governors and directors in the relevant Prison Service instruction will make it clear that those options are available.

The sale of property, mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West, would involve a financial gain for the Prison Service and has therefore been specified in the Bill. Other methods of disposal, such as recycling, do not need express provision as they are covered, as I have explained, by the expression “otherwise dispose of”.

Amendments 6,7 and 8 are the most significant and have the potential to undermine the progress of the Bill. The Bill as drafted contains a limited retrospective power and although retrospective legislation is generally not a good idea, that limited power has a specific purpose with which I am sure the House will agree. It is intended to enable the Prison Service to deal with the large number of mobile telephones held in storage. The House will be aware from previous debates on the Bill that more than 40,000 telephones are held at a cost of £20,000 a year and it is appropriate that we should take a power to deal with them. It is, after all, a criminal offence both to possess a mobile telephone in prison and to bring one into a prison. Governors and directors have options for other property that is not illegal per se. They can authorise the item, place it in central storage, require a prisoner to send it out of the prison or otherwise dispose of it. There is therefore no need for a general retrospective power to deal with such property and I hope that my hon. Friend will not press those amendments.

Amendment 9 is intended to address the ability of the Prison Service to destroy or dispose of mobile phones found in prisons. It is unlawful to possess or use a mobile phone in prison. The amendment would therefore prevent the Prison Service from disposing of them, as it is likely that every unauthorised mobile phone found in prison would contain or constitute evidence of a criminal offence. My hon. Friend asked about the checking of mobile phones and I understand that they are interrogated for evidence of criminality on confiscation. I hope that in the circumstances he will therefore agree not to press the amendment.

[Mr Nuttall]

The Minister has told the House that the mobile phones are interrogated. Will she briefly expand on what happens to any information that is found after they have been interrogated?

[Mrs Grant]

I will have to write to my hon. Friend with the precise detail on that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Nuttall]

I rise merely to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) for steering the Bill to Third Reading. The Bill is sponsored by Conservative Members only and does not have cross-party sponsorship, but it has nevertheless received cross-party support. On behalf of my constituents, I thank my hon. Friend for his work, and wish the Bill a speedy passage in the other place.

Voting Eligibility (Prisoners)

David Nuttall Excerpts

Thursday 22nd November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I absolutely confirm that. That advice has come from distinguished legal figures at both ends of this Parliament, from the former Law Lord, Lord Justice Hoffmann, and a current distinguished legal figure, my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General, who have given identical advice on the sovereignty of Parliament and its right to take the final decision on the matter.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I warmly welcome the Lord Chancellor’s statement and look forward to being able to vote again in favour of maintaining the status quo. In the meantime, will my right hon. Friend please confirm that the pre-legislative scrutiny will in no way be rushed and that when the Joint Committee comes to consider the draft Bill every single issue will be explored and every interested person will be given the time and opportunity to put their views in full and to be examined about them?

[Chris Grayling]

Given the wide range of views expressed in the House today, it is clear that there will be an extensive and broad-ranging debate, and it would be entirely wrong to curtail the parliamentary process and prevent legitimate views from being heard.

Sentencing (Female Offenders)

David Nuttall Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2012 Westminster Hall

[Philip Davies]

Yes, they do. I will happily supply the Minister with the relevant information from the House of Commons Library, which goes to show, beyond all doubt—I am sure that she trusts the figures from her own Department—that for every single category of offence, for all ages and in all types of court, men are more likely to be sent to prison than women. There is not one blip anywhere. For every single offence, for every age and in every type of court, women are less likely to be sent to prison than men.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

The point raised by the Minister is important. Surely these other factors that have to be taken into account on sentencing would not affect the statistics, because they would be taken into account whether it was male or female. In fact, one assumes that they would be taken into account for both sexes, so they will not affect the statistics.

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend makes a good point and he is right. Not only are women less likely to be sent to prison than men, and more likely to be sentenced to a lesser term than their male counterparts, but they are also more likely to serve less of the sentence they are given in prison. In its offender management statistics, the Ministry of Justice says:

“Those discharged from determinate sentences in the quarter ending December 2011 had served 53 per cent of their sentence in custody (including time on remand). On average, males served a greater proportion of their sentence in custody – 53 per cent compared to 48 per cent for females in the quarter ending December 2011. This gender difference is consistent over time, and partly reflects the higher proportion of females who are released on Home Detention Curfew”.

Prisons (Property) Bill

David Nuttall Excerpts

Friday 14th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) for bringing forward the Bill. He is my parliamentary neighbour and does a fantastic job in his constituency, as I know all too well. That has been emphasised today not only by the quality of his speech, but by his introducing such an important measure, which many of my constituents will consider long overdue, as will many of his. In fact, I would go so far as to say that most of my constituents probably think that the measure is already in place and would not imagine that there is still a need to legislate for something that most people think common sense dictates should happen anyway. It is therefore my great pleasure to support my hon. Friend today. You, Mr Deputy Speaker, as a renowned parliamentarian, will know that for that reason I do not intend to speak for too long in supporting the Bill.

I do not want to cover the ground my hon. Friend has already covered, because I think he set out perfectly clearly not only the problem and its impact on victims of crime, but how wrong it is that people can be given property that they should not have had in the first place. I will move on to some of the other points that I am not entirely sure he has considered in the Bill, but which might be considered in Committee. I want to raise some of these issues because, before we talk about destroying property that gets into prison in a way that it should not, we really need to look at how it gets into prisons in the first place. If we want to tackle the problem of people having mobile phones, drugs, weapons—whatever it may be— in prison, it is important that, rather than focusing on what we do when they are caught with them, we look at what we might do to stop them having them in the first place. Surely that would be better all round.

Obviously, as I am sure we are all aware, there are a number of ways that contraband stuff can end up in the hands of a prisoner. It can often be brought in by people visiting the prisoners. It is sometimes secreted in deliveries sent to prisoners, for example in books and other kinds of merchandise. Unfortunately, it is sometimes brought in through the collusion of prison officers themselves, something we always need to be mindful of.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

My hon. Friend says it can come inside books. The search procedures must be seriously lacking if that can happen.

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend might well be right. That is the point I want to get to, because although I absolutely support what the Bill would do, I contend— I hope that the Minister will pay some attention to this—that we absolutely need to do more to stop such material getting into prisons in the first place, and perhaps the Bill can be amended in Committee to reflect that. Some of the checks are not what they should be. For example, there are what are known as BOSS chairs in prisons—body orifice scanners—that are used to try to stop prisoners bringing stuff into prison with them at the time they are sentenced by secreting it in ever more ingenious and, it seems to me, painful ways. The prisons have these body orifice scanners to try and detect that, but occasionally they will not be working properly or have not been working for a few months and no one has bothered to have them repaired. Alternatively, the prison officers may not have confidence that the scanners can pick up everything that they should. We should do much more to stop the stuff getting through in the first place.

Things also get into prison by being thrown over the wall for prisoners to collect on exercise. Lots of prisons have nets to stop that happening, but the nets should be more extensive.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

I add my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) on doing so well in the lottery to get a private Member’s Bill so high up the list; perhaps he should participate in other lotteries and then have millions to spend on good causes.

I also want to congratulate the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Jeremy Wright), on his promotion. It is a pleasure to speak in a debate to which I know he will reply. I am grateful to him for asking me to speak on Disraeli earlier this year. It was a great pleasure, but I shall not talk about the late Earl of Beaconsfield today.

With this Bill, I want to go back to first principles. As a House, we should always be careful when we do anything that undermines the rights of property. The foundation of our state is the right of property—the right of people to enjoy the property they legitimately own. We can go back to the Magna Carta of 1215 when it comes to the right of people not to have their property taken away without proper process.

It is very easy, in looking at prisoners, to say that they have given up all their rights, so they do not have this right either. It is a very tempting argument and in some respects it is true. It is justly part of the punishment that some of prisoners’ rights are taken away. In my view, it is right for them to lose the ability to vote in general elections. It is a right that they have lost, by the will of Parliament, and it should remain lost to them. It gets more complicated, however, when it comes to things that they are sometimes allowed to have and sometimes not allowed to have. What we do not want is a prison regime that is fundamentally arbitrary, in which a prison governor can decide that he will allow a prisoner to have a mobile telephone at one moment, but then change his mind the next moment because the right circumstances have not been met. It is, I believe, the case that many people in prison are not as educationally advanced as many people in the House of Commons, so they might not fully understand the regulations that apply to them or be able to cope with the differentiations that might apply.

As a starting-point—here I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh)—I believe that we should always be enormously careful about extending the powers of the state to do something, and we should be particularly careful where there is cross-party support. In that case, there is often a popular view that it is right to do something and people find it very hard to object to it, but that is because they have forgotten the first principle that they should have borne in mind at the beginning of the process. My starting point, then, is general suspicion of extending the powers of the state and general suspicion of undermining the rights of property.

There is, of course, an exception. Going right back to the Magna Carta again, people’s property can be taken away if a proper process is involved, if the system allows it to be taken away and if the approach is fundamentally just and proportionate. To quote the Magna Carta, it says that “no free man” shall have certain penalties applied—and, of course, by their very definition, prisoners are not free men; that is the whole point of them being in prison. The definition of a free man in the Magna Carta is, of course, completely separate from our modern understanding, but I think a brief foray into the feudal system would be unhelpful on this occasion. Here, it is perhaps more interesting to look at the language literally rather than to apply a mediaeval interpretation of “a free man”. The limitation on the protection of property is that it is the protection of the property of a free man, and for many centuries the state has taken upon itself the right—to some extent, the obligation—to take away property from people as a form of penalty for their misbehaviour.

We then come to the question of whether the penalty is appropriate and suitable or unduly harsh in relation to what the prisoner has done. There are some categories where it will be incredibly easy to determine that. As we have already established, something that is a criminal item of itself can be taken by the police—although that is a different procedure—and destroyed by them. Fortunately, it will not be the case that a prisoner who is found with a stash of heroin on him will get it back at the end of his sentence, only to be arrested by the police and have it taken off him again. That would create a bureaucratic muddle. Of course, it would not necessarily be heroin—it could be any number of other illegal substances—but because some Members probably know more about illegal substances than I do, I shall stick to heroin for the time being.

Then there is the question of armaments. Some of us remember the break-out from Brixton prison when Lord Baker, I believe, was Home Secretary. Some IRA prisoners smuggled in a gun in the false bottom of a shoe. Had it been found, as it should have been, it would have been confiscated and undoubtedly not returned. However, there are grey areas. What if a prisoner has a replica gun? Replicas may be legal in the outside world, but they are obviously not encouraged in prison because they cause a certain amount of confusion, especially if they are good replicas. Prison officers would fear that a good replica might be a real gun. You would have to be a brave soul—and I know that you are a brave soul, Mr Deputy Speaker—to be certain that a replica gun was genuinely a replica, and would not actually fire. Although replica guns can currently be confiscated, it seems to me quite sensible to destroy them as well.

[Mr Nuttall]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

It would be an honour.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am not sure that it is right for them to be destroyed. There are many reasons for which guns can be legally held in this country. Surely if a gun were capable of being used, it could be sold and the money sent to the victims of crime.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I thought that a replica gun might not be of enormous value, and that it might therefore be easier to destroy it. Let us, however, take the example of a set of 18th-century duelling pistols. I do not know whether those crop up frequently in prisons, but they might. They are not very effective, the gunpowder that is required for them has got a bit damp and the flint does not work perfectly, so they are not necessarily enormously dangerous items, and they are legal to hold in the outside world. My hon. Friend is right, however: if these were found—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

As always, it is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg), who gave this matter some historical context while putting forward cogent arguments against the hypothecation of taxes, which I am sure will have been heard on the Treasury Bench. He also highlighted the one area where there is a difficulty with the central thrust of the Bill: the impact on prisoners held on remand. There is a debate to be had on how we deal with that category of prisoner.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey (Stuart Andrew) for bringing the Bill before us and I congratulate him on his success in the private Members’ Bills ballot. He was not, in fact, all that near the top of the ballot; some outside the House may think that he came just after my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell), who presented the previous private Member’s Bill, but I think I am right in saying that my hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey was 11th out of the hat. It is a great testament to him that he has persevered and not given up.

The situation is somewhat unusual in that we are in the happy position—I hope—of being able to shepherd not one but two private Members’ Bills through the House in a single Friday sitting. That may be approaching a record, even if it does not actually break one. I do not want to take up all the time available because I want to hear from the Minister, who I am sure will give the Bill the Government’s blessing.

Many of my constituents will be surprised that the loophole that the Bill addresses exists at all. They will be amazed that contraband seized from prisoners has to be given back at the end of their sentences, but such is the state of the law at the moment. The Bill proposes to change the law so that smuggled items, whether mobile phones or other things, that are confiscated do not have to be returned to inmates on release.

The items come in different categories. In its “Conveyance and Possession of Prohibited Items and Other Related Offences” document, the National Offender Management Service helpfully categorises items according to seriousness of offence. List A items are drugs, explosives, firearms or ammunition, or any other offensive weapon. I think we can all be satisfied that those are rightly put into the most serious category. List B items are things such as alcohol, mobile telephones, cameras and sound recording devices, or the constituent parts of those items, such as SIM cards, mobile phone chargers and so on, as well as other computer-related equipment such as discs, data sticks and memory cards. List C consists of things such as tobacco, money, clothing, food and drink, letters, papers, books, and tools.

These items are not always smuggled in in the ways that we have heard about so far—brought in by visitors, by the prisoners themselves, or sometimes, sadly, through the corruption of prison officers. Back in 2006, the director general of the Prison Service, Mr Phil Wheatley, gave evidence to the Public Accounts Committee, in the course of which he explained that in spite of all the security that prison authorities put in at the entry to prisons, there is sometimes little they can do to prevent items from getting into the prison. He gave an example:

“one of the things we found recently was a dead pigeon”.

One might think, “A dead pigeon—there’s nothing unusual about that, it’s just fallen out of the sky,” but in fact it was, he said, “stuffed full of contraband.” That demonstrates the resourcefulness and ingenuity that is sometimes used in getting contraband into our prisons. As my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) said, the way to deal with the problem of things being thrown over the walls may be to extend coverings over open areas and put in netting. The first thing to do is to make it more difficult for these illegal items to get into prisons in the first place. As he observed, it is a problem not only in this country but throughout the world.

Once these items find their way into our penal establishments, the problem then arises of what to do with them when they are confiscated. I am concerned about the cost of this to the public purse. My hon. Friend commented on reports in the newspapers earlier this year about the lightning raids that were made on some of Britain’s prisons in the north-west of England, when hundreds of items were seized, including 322 mobile phones, 201 SIM cards and 308 chargers, leaving aside the 371 pints of hooch. I hope that the illicit alcohol was thrown away, but all those mobile phones, chargers and SIM cards would have needed to be stored somewhere. At a time when, as we all accept, public resources are extremely scarce, it cannot be right that NOMS is put to the trouble of having to retain these items indefinitely.

My hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes South (Iain Stewart) enlightened us on one of the problems—I had not come across it before—namely communal wing mobile phones. The difficulty with such phones is that no one owns up to their ownership, so it is impossible to find out to whom that item should be returned.

Notwithstanding the views of my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset on the hypothecation of taxes, I think the public would appreciate the justice of the situation if the proceeds from the sale of confiscated items, perhaps as a result of an auction, went towards the victims of crime and a charity that looks after them. I appreciate his point that we might reach the happy state of affairs whereby there is so much money in the fund that we will not know what to do with it, but I hope that our efforts to cut down on the amount of contraband will mean that there is less of it about and less of it to sell, so perhaps the fund will not have a surfeit of money after all.

I hope that one of the Bill’s consequences will be fewer mobile phones entering prisons. My hon. Friend the Member for Pudsey mentioned the fact that nowadays mobile phones are much more than a means of communication. In fact, I would go as far as saying that they are, in all manner and means, mini-computers. They do much more than simply transmit messages. As he said, they often have recording devices and can record videos and take photographs. They are of great value, and if they were confiscated they could raise a considerable amount of money for the public purse, regardless of what we decide to do with it.

Another way that I would like us to clamp down on contraband—this is my own pet scheme—is by increasing the sentence. If a prisoner is found to have arranged for contraband to be brought in, increasing their sentence would, I think, be met with widespread public approval.

I want to deal with a specific point and hope that the Minister will touch on it. Clause 2(2) provides that the operative clause, clause 1, should not come into force until such day as the Secretary of State may order it by statutory instrument. Since my arrival in this place, I have discovered that, sadly, dozens of Acts of Parliament and sections of Acts of Parliaments, having passed through all the procedures of this House and the other place, sit on the statute book without ever being brought into force. When I read clause 2(2), it set alarm bells ringing. I sincerely hope that the Bill does not become one of those pieces of legislation. I hope that the Minister will reassure the House, notwithstanding clause 2(2), that an appropriate statutory instrument will be brought forward at the earliest opportunity, so that this valuable Bill can be brought into force as soon as possible.

In conclusion, I support the Bill entirely. I think that it will make sense to most people outside the House. It cannot be right that prisoners’ ill-gotten gains are returned to them, because they should never have had them in the first place. Many people, both inside and outside this House, feel that far too much time and attention is paid to the interests of prisoners. The Bill will go a small way towards redressing the balance. It will affect only a small number of people, because the vast majority of people in this country will never be in prison. However, it sends out the message that we are on the side of the victim of crime, not on the side of those who choose, of their own free will, to break the law. If the spoils of prisoners’ activities can be sold for the greater good, so much the better. I am delighted to support the Bill, I wish it well in Committee and I hope that it receives a Second Reading. I look forward to hearing from the Minister.

Data Protection in the Areas of Police and Criminal Justice (EU Directive)

David Nuttall Excerpts

Tuesday 24th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Blunt]

I am afraid I do not agree with the hon. Lady. The directive is important for the security of our citizens. I will go on to give an example of the kind of co-operation that we wish to protect under these arrangements. If we are not party to these arrangements, we will have to start negotiating at least 27 bilateral arrangements, which would take us to precisely the same place as the directive, without the benefit of negotiating under the directive.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Blunt]

Let us be clear about what is at stake here. Rules enabling the sharing of data have made a tangible difference to the United Kingdom, and we take steps that imperil them at our risk and at risk to our citizens. Let me give an example, which concerned a 32-year-old Romanian national who was arrested in the United Kingdom on suspicion of raping two women within the Metropolitan area. A request for conviction data identified that the suspect had a previous conviction for rape in Romania. Just prior to the trial, the individual disputed the Romanian conviction, but through close liaison with the central authority and the police liaison officer at the Romanian embassy in London, a set of fingerprints relating to the Romanian rape conviction was obtained and proved the conviction beyond doubt when they matched the suspect.

An application to use the previous conviction as bad character evidence was made by the prosecuting counsel and was granted by the judge, allowing the Romanian rape conviction to be put before the jury. The defendant was convicted of four counts of rape and other offences at the Inner London Crown court in July 2010. The defendant was given an indeterminate prison sentence, with a recommendation that he serve at least 11 years in jail as he presents a “high risk” of further sexual offences. The investigating officer on the case said:

“The use of foreign conviction data can be of great importance to police investigations. In my case, by working with the UK Central Authority I was able to draw on their professionalism and expertise to secure details of”—

the individual’s—

“previous conviction for rape in Romania which was put before the court and used as bad character evidence. This information undoubtedly assisted in providing a successful outcome, convicting a dangerous offender who will now spend a considerable number of years behind bars.”

Perhaps I hope that under European Union and Council of Europe prisoner transfer agreements, a good proportion of those years will be spent behind Romanian bars, but if I follow that up, I may be diverging from the immediate subject of the debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I will be conscious of your remarks, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is, as always, a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Kate Hoey). If this motion is passed tonight, it will result in yet another slice of the sovereignty of this House passing to Brussels and to the European Union. We have no obligation to do it. This country has every right to opt out of the measure, and that is exactly what we should do. The rest of the EU would, of course, continue to be bound by the measure, and if there was a benefit to our citizens, they would benefit too. If the House felt the need to legislate independently of the EU, we could do so, but we should not simply accept the measure as it stands.

We have a choice. The Government propose to inch further down the path to greater European integration—a path that, I submit, runs in the opposite direction to that in which the vast majority of the British public wish to go. Although the two Front-Bench teams might agree, I suspect that millions of people outside this place agree with those who have spoken from the Back Benches who, in this argument, are on the side of the British public. Once we have chosen not to exercise our right to opt out, there will be no option to reverse that decision, and we will have slipped yet further into the EU’s clutches.

The Minister expressed concern that if we did not accept the measure, other European countries might choose not to co-operate with us. My first thought to that was, “Simple. Let’s tell them we’ll stop sending the cheque every month.” That might soon get them into order. Then there is this nonsense that we might be obliged to enter bilateral agreements and that it is all too difficult. What nonsense! We have thousands and thousands of civil servants who must surely negotiate bilateral agreements all the time.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Not only would it not be too difficult but we have an agreement in place already under which it is a requirement of the EU that every effort be made to maximise its effectiveness in the event of it being replaced. So the Government’s argument does not stand up.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. It would not be at all difficult, as the Minister suggested, for us to reach separate bilateral agreements, not just with the remaining 26 members but with the other European countries that are not members. We need to be doing deals with them as well, if this is such a good idea.

As pointed out, if we adopted this measure, it would have significant resource implications, as paragraph 33 of the Government’s explanatory memorandum, dated 13 February, makes clear. At a time when the whole thrust of Government policy is aimed at reducing the amount of regulation, our public services will have to contend with yet more rules and regulations. Many will rightly question why we are subjecting them to more Brussels red tape. The bundle of papers available from the Vote Office on this motion demonstrates the size of the problem. It contains well over 300 sides of A4 paper. So we have more regulations, the cost of which we know not. In essence, we are being asked to sign a blank cheque. We should not be taking this step, and I urge the House to vote against the motion.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Blunt]

No, I did not speak directly to my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe. Yes, it is in the recitals, but the regulation published by the European Commission in parallel with this also asserts some involvement with Schengen, which we dispute. These issues are not always very straightforward. On the timetable we have placed on ourselves to have this debate in time for the Government’s decision on the opt-out, which has to be taken, and on parliamentary arrangements, I accept that things could always have been done better—

[Mr Nuttall]

rose—

[Mr Blunt]

I will not give way, because I want to try to finish with—

Victims and Witnesses Strategy

David Nuttall Excerpts

Monday 30th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clarke]

We must ensure that the approach is proportionate and the circumstances appropriate. The hon. Gentleman, who raises a perfectly serious point, will see his question canvassed in the consultation document. It is not for me to suggest circumstances in which difficulties might arise. However, if someone was convicted for shoplifting and then, a year or two later, was the victim of an extremely serious assault in unrelated circumstances, that might be an exceptional case. If someone with a previous conviction has got themselves injured intervening to protect another victim from another crime, that, too, might be an exceptional case. I do not want to sketch out all the exceptional cases, however, because there would not be many of them. Nevertheless, I think that we can protect ourselves against challenge as long as it is possible to consider those cases. However, the bulk of criminals should not be entitled to payment from the taxpayer when they are victims of crime themselves.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

The current maximum award available under the criminal injuries compensation scheme to the most seriously injured victims of crime is much less than they would receive from a civil law claim for damages. Do the plans contain any proposals to remedy this problem?

[Mr Clarke]

That was the problem when the scheme was first set up—I remember wrestling with it 20 years ago. At that point, we had slipped into a situation in which a compensation claim was assessed as though it was a personal injuries claim in a civil court, which meant that every case took ages to litigate, lots of lawyers would turn up to make representations on the basis of large numbers of medical reports, and the costs soared. Everybody accepted that this was completely unsustainable. The compensation scheme for criminal injuries is not meant to be full compensation; it is meant to be a contribution towards covering the financial consequences of the injury. As I said earlier, it would be nice if the taxpayer could pay everybody full compensation as if it were a civil award, but frankly that was never practicable from the moment it started, and it certainly is not affordable now.