Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme

Helen Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 7th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Sadiq Khan]

Of course I do. At the outset, I set out the basic principles of the scheme. Of course it is the case that with 25 tariffs we cannot expect to compensate every single victim for every single injury they have suffered. It is compensation of last resort. Let me say this. What was the reward for the honesty and candour shown by those three Members for speaking up for vulnerable witnesses and for their constituents? They were sacked from the Committee, which subsequently reconvened on 1 November to debate the draft scheme, and now the ministerial team is peddling myths about the scheme. We have heard a couple of them already. I have the letter that the Justice Secretary wrote to Liberal Democrat and Conservative MPs—not to Labour MPs, I hasten to add—on MOJ letter-headed paper claiming that only minor injuries will no longer be covered. That is nonsense: the criminal injuries compensation scheme at the moment makes payments only for injuries that have a disabling effect for at least six weeks. No payments are made for cuts and grazes, as has been suggested, unless they are serious enough to leave a permanent and visible scar.

[Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government have to explain why someone off work for six weeks—the minimum period under the scheme—who, even on the minimum wage, would lose £900, if they were on statutory sick pay, should then be plunged into further debt and poverty? Why should a victim of crime, as well as enduring the crime, be plunged into debt as a result?

[Sadiq Khan]

To be fair to the Government, I will assume that this is an unintended consequence of their obsession with cutting budgets without considering the consequences of legislation on blameless victims. We will hear shortly from the Minister, who will have to respond to my hon. Friend’s important example. We all have examples from our own constituencies of where blameless victims will suffer as a consequence.

Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs were also told in the letter that the scheme was financially unsustainable, but the Government’s own figures in their impact assessment do not back that up. The average cost of the scheme over the past four years has been £192 million—this out of a departmental budget of more than £8 billion. We also hear that the scheme is too generous and that the taxpayer can no longer afford it. Well, the tariff payments were not generous in 1996, when they were first introduced, and there has only been one 10% increase in the intervening 16 years, even though inflation has reached almost 50%. It is also worth remembering that, in 2010, 79% of all compensation paid out was for awards below £5,000. Nor is it right to accuse the scheme of being poorly policed. In 2009-10, only 57% of applicants received any compensation. Ineligible applicants are weeded out.

The Government also claim that the scheme is not needed, because people can get compensation elsewhere —we heard that said by the former Justice Minister—but that is also wrong. The scheme only makes awards to those who cannot receive compensation from any other source—for instance, if no assailant has been apprehended or claims on insurance are not possible. Also, we should not believe the propaganda claim—I am not sure whether you received the letter, Mr Deputy Speaker—that the scheme is collapsing under the weight of ever-growing numbers of applications. The data are clear: over the past 10 years, the number of eligible applications has remained broadly stable, at about 38,000 to 39,000 a year. Nor is it right when Ministers claim that this is about refocusing resources on the most serious injuries. There is no refocusing. This is a plain and simple cut.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)]

I rise to oppose the motion. I should like to start, as my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt) suggested, by outlining the overall context of services for victims of crime, of which the criminal injuries compensation scheme is just a part. The Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant), has pointed out throughout the important debates on this subject that support for victims and witnesses is a high priority of the Government.

At the beginning of this year, the Government launched a consultation, “Getting it right for victims and witnesses”, which set out a wide-ranging and ambitious reform package that will see us move from the previous one-size-fits-all model for supporting victims, with priority being given instead to the victims of serious crime, to the most vulnerable and to the most persistently targeted. Our reforms will also see police and crime commissioners using their local knowledge to ensure that victims get the services they need. There will, for example, be an increase in the use of restorative justice. There will also be a new victims code setting out clearly what victims should expect from the criminal justice system—not least that they should always be treated with dignity and respect.

[Helen Jones]

How is it treating a victim with respect if the children of a homicide victim, for example, could lose their compensation if the parent had worked all his or her life and then been out of work for a short period in the three years before the crime?

[Damian Green]

I shall come on later in my speech to the individual criticisms made of the changes, if the hon. Lady can be patient.

To return to the overall context, more victims will have the opportunity, through greater use of the victim personal statement, to tell the courts how crime has affected them. There will be compensation for victims of overseas terrorism and, following the recent announcement by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, there will be a new victims commissioner—directly to address the point of the right hon. Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan)—who will present the views of victims clearly, with integrity and with force to Westminster, to Whitehall, to the media and to the public at large.

On top of all this—and more, such as putting funding for rape support centres on a sustainable footing and opening new centres, with more to come where there are gaps in provision; and such as ensuring better support for the victims of human trafficking through a contract let last year with the Salvation Army—we will raise up to £50 million extra from offenders to pay for more and better services for victims. The changes to the victim surcharge came into effect on 1 October, which means revenue will start to be received next spring, building on the success we have had over the past year in raising money for victims through the Prisoners’ Earnings Act 1996—some £800,000 so far, with more to come.

The consultation also set out proposals to reform the criminal injuries compensation scheme. It announced that for victims of overseas terrorism, there would be a scheme for existing victims going back to 2002 and another scheme for future victims. We published the Government response to the consultation in July. In sum, this record demonstrates that we are determined, as we said in the consultation, to get it right and ensure that victims of crime get the help they need to cope with, and recover from, the effects of crime. That is the context.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

I have given way enough, and I know how many Members wish to contribute to the debate.

Those who sustain injuries of a more permanent nature will generally still be able to claim, because if an injury has a lasting impact it usually appears again further up the tariff. Let me also restate the point I partially made to the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon): tariff awards for sexual offences and patterns of physical abuse will remain at their current levels wherever they currently apply in the tariff. That will enable better protection for victims of domestic violence, for example, who very often are subjected to more than one assault. We have certainly defined the eligibility more tightly so that only those direct and blameless victims of crime who fully co-operate with the criminal justice system process obtain compensation under the scheme, and I think that is right.

Various points have been made about dogs, but the one that cannot be repeated often enough is that under our charges the authority will pay only where the dog was set on the victim by its owner—in other words, where it was used as a weapon—because this is meant to be a compensation scheme for criminal injuries. As I explained, the ability of victims of sexual offences to apply for compensation needs to be preserved, and we have done that.

One point that I have not yet addressed relates to loss of earnings. The scheme has never compensated the actual value of lost earnings, but these payments still account for a large part of the cost of the scheme. The payments are intended not to put the applicant back in the position they were in prior to the injury but to provide a safety net. There are, of course, other benefits provided by the state for which applicants may be eligible, but in making our changes we are no longer reducing loss of earnings payments to take account of those other benefits.

I have briefly mentioned the hardship fund. We recognise that some very low earners, be they employed or self-employed, may, as a result of the removal of bands 1 to 5, find themselves in real and immediate financial hardship. They will need short-term assistance, so we will make payments for up to four weeks’ absence from work, which will enable those most in need to keep their heads above water while they recover from their injuries. The fund will be administered by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority, at no additional cost, with a referral function provided by Victim Support. Applications will be processed quickly and payment made promptly, ensuring that debt is not accrued.

[Helen Jones]

rose—

[Damian Green]

I said that I would not give way again, but the hon. Lady has been very insistent.

[Helen Jones]

As I pointed out earlier, even those on low pay who are receiving statutory sick pay can be plunged into debt. In the past, their compensation in the lower bands has at least gone some way to relieving that debt. The Minister has to answer the question: why does he believe a victim of crime should be plunged into debt that they cannot get out of simply because they have been a victim? Offering them support services, however good, does not pay their bills.