Justice and Security Green Paper

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Lord Clarke of Nottingham

Wednesday 19th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clarke]

The idea is floated in the Green Paper, and it often comes up. We will obviously look at it, alongside all the other things we are looking at to make the security services more accountable, but it is a suggestion often made, it remains a live issue and we will consider it very carefully.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

One way we could make the new Committee effective would be to guarantee that its reports were debated in this Chamber. Will the Government commit to making time for such debates, or will they leave it to the Backbench Business Committee?

Sentencing Reform/Legal Aid

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Lord Clarke of Nottingham

Tuesday 21st June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

In view of the mistakes that the right hon. and learned Gentleman’s team have made in their policies relating to women, what risks does he see in making domestic violence a gateway to access to legal aid? Does he think that that will make people sceptical about victims’ claims of domestic violence?

[Mr Clarke]

We have defined domestic violence, and we are not sceptical at all. Indeed, I hope that the hon. Lady will be pleased that we have looked again at this matter and extended legal aid to cases of domestic violence more than we had originally proposed. I think that our policies towards women probably have her fairly wholehearted support. We have a particular policy towards women in prisons; indeed, we are following the policy of the previous Government and the recommendations of Lady Corston. At the moment, the number of women prisoners is going down; it is the number of adult males that is still rising slightly.

Sentencing

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Lord Clarke of Nottingham

Monday 23rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Kenneth Clarke)]

I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “House” to the end of the Question and add:

“deplores the previous Government’s failure to tackle the national scandal of reoffending and its mismanagement of the justice system; notes that discounts for guilty pleas have been an established principle of common law for decades, and that they can speed up justice and spare victims and witnesses the ordeal of waiting and preparing to give evidence at trial; and welcomes the Government’s intention to overhaul sentencing to deliver more effective punishment for offenders and increased reparation for victims and to reform offenders to cut crime.”

I welcome the shadow Secretary of State’s coming to the Dispatch Box and moving the motion, which took me rather by surprise when it was tabled at the last minute last week. At one point, he gave a clear exposition of the opinions of the Leader of the Opposition on the encouragement that is given for an early guilty plea. No doubt we will discover at some stage how many days ago the Leader of the Opposition came to that conclusion, but I think it is rather more the right hon. Gentleman’s than his leader’s.

The shadow Secretary of State also, quite fairly sometimes when giving way to interventions, said that there were substantial parts of the proposed reforms with which he was in broad agreement with the Government, and he offered to work with my colleagues and me in that regard. However, he tried to get away from that by saying that he would support me if it were not for the reductions in public expenditure in my Department to which I am submitting. I regard it as being in the national interest to make reductions in public expenditure in most Departments. If the right hon. Gentleman believes that my Department should be totally exempt from any reductions in public expenditure at all, perhaps he would indicate in which other part of the public service he would volunteer reductions. With respect—I do not normally tender such advice—the weakness of the Labour party is that it does not have the first idea when it is going to stop denying the need for any reductions in public expenditure. There are some perfectly reasonable reductions to be made in the criminal justice system, but that is not the principle motive for reform. The principle motive is to make the criminal justice system better and to tackle some of the problems we have inherited, as my right hon. and hon. Friends have touched on.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Mr Clarke]

The right hon. Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan) was very generous in giving way and we all appreciated that, but there will be no Back-Bench speeches if I give way too frequently. I will give way in a second.

Let me get one thing out of the way first. I have always believed, along with every sensible person, that Britain needs a criminal justice system that is effective in properly punishing offenders for their wrongdoing and in protecting the public from further crime. When I took office as Justice Secretary it seemed to me perfectly obvious that that had to be the first priority for all my policies. That is self-obvious; it is a platitude. The Government’s policy, and my first duty, is to punish crime and have an effective system for protecting the public from further crime. The problem that I face, which causes the reforms, is the fact that I inherited a system that was not effective in protecting against offenders’ committing further crime or even in punishing offenders. So that is at the forefront of where we are going.

Without going over all the exchanges that we have just had, let me explain briefly what we have taken over, which causes the need for the proposed reform. Our prisons are pretty nasty, unpleasant places, far from the holiday camps they are sometimes made out to be. The people in most of them pass their days in a state of enforced idleness, quite a few of them making some tougher friends than they have had in the past, and not facing up to what they have done. That is not what I think of as a satisfactory and effective punishment. But a bigger scandal still is our system’s failure to protect the public from future crime committed by offenders after completion of their time inside. Reoffending rates in this country, as we have taken over the system now, are straightforwardly dreadful.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Clarke]

Let me finish describing the legacy of the previous Government, then we will move to the more constructive matter of my reforms and I will give way to my hon. Friend.

I have not forgotten, and I am sure the public have not forgotten either, what 13 years of Labour government was like in this field, despite the attempts of the right hon. Member for Tooting to skate over some of it. We had 13 years of eye-catching initiatives, schemes, meddling and prescription that made a complete Horlicks of the criminal justice system. We had more than 20 Criminal Justice Acts. Thousands of new criminal offences were created. Senior judges complained that

“Hell is a fair description of the problem of statutory interpretation”

when talking of this stream of legislation. We had a 39% increase in the number of prisoners in our jails—it was not planned and it was not policy—with the cost to taxpayers rising by two thirds in real terms.

And what for? That was meant to be the embodiment of the policy of being tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime—an attempt to give reality to an admittedly rather catchy slogan. What we got was a sentencing policy so chaotic and badly managed that, as my hon. Friends quite rightly keep emphasising, the previous Government had to let out early 80,000 criminals, who promptly went on to commit more than 1,000 crimes, including alleged murders and one rape. We had a system under which more than 1,000 foreign national offenders were released without being considered for deportation—the total number of foreign prisoners in our jails doubled during Labour’s period in office. We had a system under which offenders serving community sentences in practice usually completed only one or two days of unpaid work each week. Above all, as I keep emphasising, there was the national scandal throughout Labour’s period in office—not a new problem—that the exorbitantly high reoffending rates went completely ignored.

Why was that? A recent quote from the right hon. Member for Tooting is worth repeating, as he gave an extremely good description of what went wrong and what was driving Labour’s policy. Speaking to the Fabian Society about New Labour’s record on this subject just two months ago, he said that

“playing tough in order not to look soft made it harder to focus on what is effective”.

He gets a murmur of approval from the Conservative Back Benches, and certainly from those of us who had to witness the effect of that policy.

Let me move on to our proposed reforms, including the one to which the Opposition’s motion refers. What are the problems that we are now tackling and that our large package of reforms seeks to address? First, criminal trials are needlessly long, drawn out and expensive. The court experience is often deeply unpleasant and almost always uncomfortable for victims, witnesses, jurors and most people who have anything to do with it. As I have said, at least half of all crimes are committed by people who have already been through the criminal justice system. More than one in 10 adults in prison have never been in paid employment, almost a fifth of prisoners who have used heroin did so for the first time while in prison, and one in five appears to have mental health problems. If we wish to take this subject seriously and really want to protect society and the victims of crime, we must recognise that that is the context of today’s debate.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

I thank the right hon. and learned Gentleman for giving way at last. He is talking about practical studies on how to deal with prisoners with mental health problems, such as the work done by the Bradley review. I will go along with him on those issues, but I do not understand what studies he has done on the precise issue that we are debating today and on the effectiveness of early guilty pleas. It is clear that already two thirds of Crown court cases that result in a conviction involve people who have pleaded guilty. More than 10,000 of those cases in 2008-09 were at the door of the court but could easily have been dealt with in a magistrates court. Why is he not acting to ensure that those guilty pleas happen in a magistrates court, rather than having this widespread policy that will lead to violent criminals being let off?

[Mr Clarke]

On Lord Bradley’s report and the problem of mentally ill people in prison, it seems plain from the hon. Lady’s intervention that she agrees with me. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and I are working on ways to divert people from prisons, in proper cases and with proper protection of the public, to places where they can be more sensibly and suitably treated. In that respect the hon. Lady and I are in total rapport.

What I am suggesting about the system of guilty pleas, and the reason I have described the unpleasantness of going to court for most people who unwillingly go there as victims and witnesses, is that although most cases wind up with guilty pleas, more should do so and far too many such pleas are made ages after the event and at the last possible moment. I shall explain in a moment how we are addressing that problem, because the long-standing system we have at the moment is not working well enough.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Lord Clarke of Nottingham

Tuesday 17th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clarke]

I shall look at the report to see whether it is the source of my hon. Friend’s views on the subject of crime and punishment, which he frequently gives, and then I will try to find some counter-reading to recommend to him. I will try to study it if I get the chance.

The purpose of sentencing in this country is to punish offenders effectively and proportionately for what they have done. The purpose that I intend to add to that more clearly is to try to reduce the number who simply offend again and come back into the system. If we cut reoffending, it will mean fewer crimes and fewer victims, and we will make a positive contribution instead of recycling the same old people through the same old not very well functioning system.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State take a look at the case of Shrien Dewani, a British citizen who faces extradition to South Africa? He has shown me convincing evidence that he will not face a fair trial there. Can we reconsider extraditing that citizen?

[Mr Clarke]

That is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, who I am sure will be interested in considering the case.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Lord Clarke of Nottingham

Tuesday 20th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State agree with the retiring chief inspector of prisons Dame Anne Owers that a reason for the reduction in young people coming into the criminal justice system is the effect of Sure Start? If he does agree with her, will he speak to colleagues across the Government about investing in Sure Start, rather than in youth jails, because it is cheaper and works better?

[Mr Kenneth Clarke]

We are, of course, having to address Sure Start, as with every other programme, in the light of the resources—or rather lack of them—that we have inherited as a result of the economic situation, but the Government are concentrating Sure Start on its original priority purpose, which was particularly to target areas of deprivation and social difficulty. That part of Sure Start’s work does indeed have some relevance to what we have been talking about in our exchanges on youth justice and how to keep people out of criminality in their youth.

Legal Aid Payments

Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Lord Clarke of Nottingham

Thursday 17th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clarke]

The contract operation is based on both quality and quantity. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary and I will certainly ensure that the Legal Services Commission follows through on the fact that there are meant to be quality standards; it is not just a matter of making bids for the work. However, we cannot intervene and take money out of the legal aid fund to rescue one voluntary body. That body is briefing everybody through very extensive public relations activity: archbishops are writing to me, and everybody seems to be informed that the body has gone broke, but someone is still producing a great deal of campaigning material on its behalf. It does very valuable work, but it is no good diverting money from the fund to it because it is the only one that has gone bust.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

What this high-quality body has done is highlight a problem that is not restricted to it. In my constituency, which has high immigration advice need, there is no LSC-funded adviser. Will the Secretary of State bring together those Members who have a large number of such cases to discuss with him whether there are better ways of funding immigration advice in our constituencies?

[Mr Clarke]

I am sure that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary and I will be only too happy to meet the Members of Parliament particularly affected by the issue. We will have to take advice on whether we will be subject to any kind of legal review if we do that in the middle of the bidding process but, subject to that, we would welcome advice from Members who have particularly large numbers of such cases to deal with, because we will have to look at the whole provision of legal aid in this and other areas.