Prison Overcrowding

John McDonnell Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

Yes, I absolutely will. We will work on rehabilitation reforms post-prison and look to improve the level of work in prisons. We will also look to continue to expand education and training in prisons. We have, for example, set in train plans to double the amount of education in the youth estate. Those things simply did not happen under the previous Government. Labour Members accuse us of warehousing offenders, but I think they were the ones who were guilty of that.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State has quoted the Prison Officers Association. He is not a man who would want to mislead or confuse the House, so may I tell him what the POA has said today? It has said:

“The decision by NOMS”—

that is, himself—

“to further ‘crowd’ the already overcrowded public sector estate by an additional 440 undermines the commitment that prisons will be safe, secure and decent”.

The POA describes that as

“the perfect storm of a rising population, a lack of staff and too few prison cells.”

Could the Secretary of State start listening to the prison officers themselves, for a change?

[Chris Grayling]

When we set about the current programme of benchmarking, I did precisely that: I listened to our staff and governors and accepted their recommendation, and I am implementing their recommendation thanks to the hard work of staff at all levels across the prison estate. The hon. Gentleman talks nonsense when he suggests I am not listening to the staff.

Criminal Justice and Courts Bill

John McDonnell Excerpts

Monday 12th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Buckland]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. Already in the debate we have heard, in speeches and interventions, about the relatively short period of time that young people spend in custody. That continuity is absolutely essential if we are to take meaningful strides not only in dealing with rehabilitation, but in reducing reoffending rates, which concern all of us and are a priority for the Government.

My amendment is a probing amendment, but I am keen for my hon. Friend the Minister to consider further these proposals in relation to SEN provision in secure colleges: that education providers in those colleges be required by contract to put SEN at the heart of their education provision; that those providers also be required by contract to ensure adequate and proper training for staff so that they can properly identify special education needs and meet that need when it is identified; and finally, that we give further thought to exactly who in a secure college should be responsible for working with home local education authorities when young people either have education, health and care plans, or might be eligible for them. I commend those points to the House.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I will be very brief, because other Members wish to speak. I find this whole secure college proposal abhorrent. It flies in the face of all the evidence that has been put before the Justice Committee and debated in the wider media. What do we know about trying to address the issues that confront young people once they get involved in this system? We know that the most successful units are the smaller ones. So what is the response? It is to create a mass-scale prison.

The other thing that we know works—this is absolutely critical—is for young people to be located close to their homes so that they can maintain family and community contact. The scale of this proposal in catering for about 25% of young people in the prison system means that these colleges will be located in the centre of the country, nowhere near the vast proportion of homes where these young people live, so we will be breaking down family connections. We have warnings before us, right across the piece, that in a mixed-gender establishment those most at risk will be young women. Some of the statements and evidence provided about those risks were frightening.

All the evidence tells us that a system such as that proposed will not work, and I think the Government know that. This is Oakwood for children, and we know what happened in that privatised prison—riots, assaults, and a lack of control. I think the Government know that there is a danger that that will be replicated in this large institution. That is why the Bill is allowing for the use of physical force against young people, contrary to everything the courts have told us.

[Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) (LD)]

Given that the hon. Gentleman, who is a member of the Justice Committee, was unable in the circumstances to visit Oakwood when we did so recently, I hope he would not want to give the impression that the Committee had formed the view that his description fits Oakwood as it is now rather than as it was at the beginning.

[John McDonnell]

I was unable to go on that visit because I was in hospital at the time. However, I have had the reports from Oakwood and I have met the Prison Officers Association. We have seen time and again the level of assaults there and the riots that have taken place. Only recently, a whole wing was taken over by prisoners. That is a result of privatisation. That is the agenda; that is what this is about. It is not about the rehabilitation, education and care of young people; the main thrust is reducing the overall cost of the system. That is why privatisation has come on to the agenda. As a result of this Government’s drive to reduce costs within the system, we are putting the lives of young people at risk.

I grew up on an estate where young people were sent into the prison system—that is, borstals. This proposal is bringing borstals back into the system. We thought we had got rid of them. They were like large-scale prisons where a regime of brutality could emerge because of packing so many young people in, and where costs were limited so there was not the intensive investment looking at children’s individual needs.

This is a dreadful proposal. If it is enacted, with £85 million spent on this large-scale Titan prison for young people, we will live to regret it, because it will damage young people’s lives and, rather than rehabilitate them, force them into a more brutal form of criminal practice in future.

[Stephen Gilbert (St Austell and Newquay) (LD)]

There is much to commend part 1 of the Bill, but, like other hon. Members, I cannot say the same for part 2.

The plans for secure colleges are a leap into the unknown that have the potential to deliver worse outcomes for the very vulnerable young people who are placed into custody across the secure youth estate. It is not just me or other hon. Members who are saying that; it is the Howard League for Penal Reform, the Prison Reform Trust, the deputy Children’s Commissioner, and the Standing Committee for Youth Justice. Like them, I worry that the introduction of secure colleges could drive up the number of young people being sent into custody—something that we are seeking to avoid. I fear that they will not meet the emotional and mental health needs of children who are placed into them, that they will not meet the excellent standards of educational attainment in some of our secure children’s homes, and that they will provide for worse outcomes for some of the youngest, and therefore most vulnerable, people we need to detain.

As the hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) said, we are seeing a steady period of decline in youth imprisonment and youth crime, though one will not necessarily read about it in the newspapers. Overall, youth crime is down by 63% since 2002. Since 2009, there have been 55% fewer young people coming into the youth justice system and 36% fewer young people—that is, people under 18—in custody.

The introduction of detention and training orders under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 resulted in a large spike in the number of under-18s being sent into custody, because courts saw that as a new solution. I fear that secure colleges could create a similar spike, with children being sent into custody rather than accessing the restorative and rehabilitative options that are available to meet their complex needs.

It is clear, not least from what my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon (Mr Buckland) has said, that the secure youth estate already faces considerable challenges taking account of the mental health needs, learning disabilities and difficulties, addictions, childhood abuse and neglect of the children in its care. We should not underestimate the background problems faced by those children who end up in custody.

The Prison Reform Trust study of 6,000 children in custody revealed that at least three quarters of the sample had absent fathers; a third had absent mothers; half lived in a deprived household; more than a quarter had witnessed domestic violence; another quarter had experience of local authority care; and one in five was known to have harmed themselves, and a shocking one in 10 to have attempted to take their own life. It is clear that if we are to address reoffending among that cohort, we have to first address those underlying issues.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Wright]

I think that we had a constructive debate in Committee, and it is disappointing that the Opposition have set their face against secure colleges. I will not be able to pick up on all the points made during the debate, but let me do my best.

Amendments 16, 17, 18 and 21 would effectively remove from the Bill all reference to a secure college, and it is worth starting with the context of our proposed reform of the youth secure estate. At present we pay around £100,000 a year on average for a place in youth custody, and yet almost 70% of young people go on to reoffend within 12 months of release. For secure children’s homes the cost rises beyond £200,000 a place, yet reoffending outcomes are little different.

To give the House the facts, the proportion of offenders who reoffended in the 12 months to March 2012 is as follows: 69.9% in young offenders institutions; 70.1% in secure training centres; and 67.6% in secure children’s homes. That is why we need to do something different, and why we are pursuing the idea of secure colleges. I have heard the arguments tonight and, indeed previously, that there are better ways to improve the youth custodial estate, and in particular that smaller establishments such as secure children’s homes are more effective. The figures for reoffending that I have given do not demonstrate that, but I understand that plenty of good work is done across the estate.

The hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) asked whether we considered spending the money on the existing estate, and the answer is yes. However, if we continue to do the same things in the same ways, we can expect the same results. He seems to have said this evening that he accepts that the status quo is not acceptable but he does not think that secure colleges are the right way to go. He clearly favours a much more small-unit approach, such as secure children’s homes, but I wonder whether he has considered the cost of that. Our rough guess is that putting all young people currently detained in custody into a secure children’s home would cost in excess of £100 million more a year than we currently spend. I would be interested to hear—as, I am sure, would the House—how exactly that would be paid for by the Labour party if that is its intent. I suspect it does not know.

The truth is that no current model of youth custody is delivering the types of outcomes that we all want to see, or providing sufficient value for money for the taxpayer. That is why we want to consider secure colleges. I am conscious that there is an appetite to hear more detail on how secure colleges will operate than primary legislation can provide. It is therefore worth pointing out to the House that during the Bill’s passage we intend to publish and consult on our plans for secure college rules, including, where appropriate, setting out some indicative draft provisions. This will provide both Houses with more information on how we expect secure colleges to operate.

[John McDonnell]

During the passage of the Bill? We are on Report! This is the end of the Bill’s consideration in this House. We have one more day. We will not return to this issue unless the other place amends the proposed legislation.

[Jeremy Wright]

If the hon. Gentleman takes the time to look at the programme motion he will see that there are two days allowed on Report. This is the first day, not the second. [Interruption.] I have made the position clear.

[John McDonnell]

Will the Minister give way?

[Jeremy Wright]

No, I am afraid I will not. I have 10 minutes left and a good deal of ground to cover. There will be a second day on Report and the other House will get to consider this matter. The hon. Gentleman was not present in Committee. Had he—

[John McDonnell]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am sure the Minister does not wish to mislead the House about the processes of this House. I would like absolute clarity. I am a Back-Bench Member dealing with this part of the Bill on day one, which is considering this part the Bill. On the basis of the programme motion, this part of the Bill will not come back for consideration on day two, so this is my last opportunity to consider the matter unless the other place amends the Bill on this point. I will not have the opportunity to take part in a debate informed by the publication of these rules. Is that accurate, Mr Speaker?

[Mr Speaker]

The hon. Gentleman has described the procedure accurately. What he has said is not something from which I wish to dissent. I cannot rule on it, but what he has said is procedurally correct.

Oral Answers to Questions

John McDonnell Excerpts

Tuesday 18th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that working together to share best practice is important, and we will certainly seek to do that. There are good examples of rehabilitation to be found across the United Kingdom.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

At the heart of the Government’s reforms is the large-scale tendering of services. Does the grotesque debacle of the electronic tagging contract with Buddi not demonstrate that the Minister’s Government is incapable of managing this process efficiently? This is yet another contract where the competition has been ended. A Ministry of Justice statement says that it has had to retender the contract for the supply of new tags.

[Jeremy Wright]

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I do not agree with the way the hon. Gentleman has represented the situation. The position is this. We will work with a preferred bidder to try to ensure that our needs are met and that we can reach agreement in delivering what will be impressive new technology to help us keep better track of offenders. If we cannot reach agreement with a preferred bidder, we must move on to another provider, and that is what is happening here. Four lots are involved in this particular process. On three of them, things are working as well as we could possibly have expected. In relation to the fourth, there are difficulties, but we are resolving them. What I hope the hon. Gentleman will welcome is the use of the technology.

Criminal Justice and Courts Bill

John McDonnell Excerpts

Monday 24th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I doubt whether the Bill will be opposed today, but I hope that there will be time to consider amendments that might improve it at a later stage. I apologise, Madam Deputy Speaker, for coming so late to the debate. I heard the opening speeches and then had to chair a meeting elsewhere, but I will be brief.

I want to make three simple points. With regard to secure colleges, sometimes if we stand still long enough, things come round again. They will smack very much of the old approved schools if we are not careful. The proposed £85 million project seems to involve a 320-bed institution. All the evidence in recent years has demonstrated that tackling young offenders and rehabilitating youngsters to ensure that they do not offend in the future is better done in smaller units, rather than large ones. That is why we moved away from the old approved schools, so that more intensive work could be done with young offenders and young potential offenders in smaller units. The proposal flies in the face of all that evidence and seems to take us back, rather than forward. However, if the Government are to experiment in this way, it is important that at least some provision remains in smaller units, particularly for those young people who are vulnerable. We have had briefings from the Children’s Rights Alliance and others, and they have interpreted the Government’s commitment to maintain small secure children’s homes as somewhat ambiguous. It would be useful to hear from the Minister tonight about what the future is for small secure children’s homes under the proposed new structure. The vulnerable youngsters who are cared for in those units would be lost within the bigger establishments proposed by the Government today. There would be anxiety if we were to lose that element of specialism in the system in the future.

The second issue relates to the proposal for magistrates to sit alone when taking decisions. I read the Magistrates Association briefing, and I share some of its concerns that there is a need to ensure that justice is seen to be done. Removing cases from the courts into a side room in a police station or elsewhere with a magistrate sitting solely with a clerk may not be as open and transparent as in the past. I would welcome hearing the Government’s view on the magistrates’ recommendation about at least ensuring that lists of cases are published. Perhaps that should be incorporated into the Bill, so that we can give the assurance that openness and transparency will continue for two reasons: first, it is important that people know that justice is being done and that it is visible; and secondly, some people want to know that the perpetrators have been prosecuted appropriately and have received the appropriate sentences. Therefore, listing cases would at least maintain an element of openness and transparency in the system. I hope that the Government can take on board the Magistrates Association recommendation and build it into the Bill.

The third issue, which I am anxious about, is judicial review. In my own experience, judicial review has largely been used by an individual or small organisation to challenge decisions by state bodies; in my own area, those have largely been decisions made by local councils. At the moment, judicial review is incredibly hard to undertake, largely because of the costs involved. It takes about £10,000 to £15,000 just to get into court in any form to have a judicial review heard, which is beyond the means of most individual and many organisations, but at least there is the opportunity to challenge a decision.

In my area, a judicial review took place recently when the local authority closed down special needs centres, or undertook the exercise of closing them down. That decision was challenged by the parents of the centres’ clients. They won at judicial review, forcing the local authority to reconsider its decision and to consult properly. That is the appropriate mechanism for judicial review. The Government’s current proposals will bear heavily on those individuals or organisations that are challenging decisions by bodies such as local councils.

I refer back to the debates that we had during the passage of the Local Audit and Accountability Act 2014, when evidence was brought forward by Transparency International about the problems with local government decision making: its closed nature and the use of commercial interests to drive decisions into part 2 of the cabinet decision-making processes. In other words, it revealed the secretive nature of decision making by some local authorities. Again, judicial review becomes the last resort for many organisations and individuals—certainly in my community—to try to get some form of appropriate and reasonable decision making, or at least some form of supervision of that decision making by the courts themselves.

I fear that these proposals will restrict the opportunity of the most vulnerable in our society to hold the powerful to account. I welcome the Government’s reassurances that there will perhaps be an opportunity to consider some amendments to the current proposals, which would allow the current process to be maintained and improved.

The Government have included a commitment to cost orders within the process itself. I agree that we should try to ensure a limit on costs overall. The problem is that the cost orders come too late in the process, The decision-making process will be more at the permissive stage, so a lot more work will be required of representatives before a cost order can even be applied for, which would provide protection from the heavy burden of costs during the process.

I would like the Government to look again at where the cost orders can be implemented. Under the Government’s proposals, just to get to the permissive stage an individual will either have to fund a considerable amount of work or it will have to be done at risk by an individual lawyer, before there is even a discussion about the cost order and cost-sharing.

This is largely about individuals fighting institutions that are well-resourced. Again, I will give an example from my own area. Many times, individual councillors have been protected by the council’s insurance against any legal action that is taken about their own decision making. So the individual is at risk, but the individual councillor or the council body is protected, bizarrely using—most probably—part of that individual’s council tax payment to enable that protection to be given. The problem in these proposals is that the cost burden, or the cost deterrent, will fall more greatly on the individuals concerned. I would welcome the Government considering, perhaps during the progress of this Bill, a more effective way of ensuring that the cost burden is limited—overall, of course, but also as it falls on the individual concerned.

The issue of interveners was referred to earlier. Every time I have been involved in a judicial review process in my area, interveners have played an invaluable role in bringing their expertise to the table and to the discussions within court itself. I would be wary of restricting the ability of specialist organisations to intervene in a particular case. I could give example after example of what is happening with my own local authority not only of individual housing cases but of individual health cases, where interveners have helped by bringing their health expertise to a case, because it then merits a wider debate about a particular aspect of that case that has a wider public interest.

I am glad that the environmental issues have been separated from this process—largely as a result of European conventions, I see—because in my own area judicial review has been one of the mechanisms by which we have at least been able to seek to protect ourselves against adverse planning decisions that have had an environmental impact on my community. That may well be an issue that we will want to come back to when we debate the proposals for a third runway at Heathrow, because we will be looking for a judicial review of the Government’s decisions at every possible opportunity if they wish to proceed with those proposals. Therefore, it is good that environmental matters are excluded from the heavy burden of costs, as far as I can see.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

indicated dissent.

[John McDonnell]

I see that my hon. Friend on the Front Bench is shaking his head. I am happy for him to correct me on that matter.

[Mr Slaughter]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his excellent speech. However, I think that some matters under the Aarhus convention are protected but other environmental matters may well not be.

[John McDonnell]

I see. Again, we may well table amendments to broaden that protection, because we will rely on judicial review powers to challenge Government decisions—we will certainly do so in the case of the third runway at Heathrow and we might do so in the case of High Speed 2 as well—if we feel that the Government have not acted appropriately or reasonably in their decision-making process.

Having made those three points, I will finish. They are about critical issues that the Government need to address. There is no opposition to the overall legislation tonight, but I hope that there will be opportunities in this process for the Government to consider amendments to improve the legislation, so that certain rights can be protected, particularly those of the individual taking on the powerful within our society.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vara]

There are institutions of a custodial nature in which the numbers of people are far more than that at the moment. They will not all live in one unit. There will be separate units and different age groups and categories of people. I see no reason why, at a more cost-effective rate, we cannot seek to do what is not happening at present: reduce reoffending rates.

The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd also spoke of the possible use of force, and that issue was also raised by a number of hon. Members on both sides of the House. I will just point out that the Bill sets up secure colleges but it does not speak of using force. That issue needs to be addressed later, when it comes to dealing with the rules for secure colleges. I recognise that it is an important issue, which needs to be dealt with sensitively, and I am sure that when those rules are drawn up, that is how it will be dealt with.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) gave a very supportive speech and spoke with experience of having been a Minister both in my Department and in the Home Office. His arguments were well reasoned and he spoke about early release, electronic tagging and a number of other issues. He pointed out to the House that the magistracy that we have been discussing has been with us for some 650 years.

The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) also raised the issue of magistrates sitting on their own and I hope that I have covered that. He also touched on the issue of judicial reviews, as did the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), in a number of interventions, and other hon. Members. Let me be clear about this point too. My right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor did not say that all claims were being made by left-wing campaign groups, but it is a fact that some claims have been or are made by such groups. The hon. Lady herself admitted, in one of her interventions, that before she entered the House, she ran a group and was regularly involved in judicial reviews. If people are going to throw ammunition at this side, it is important that they at least put things in context.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) spoke with experience and was right to put education at the heart of secure colleges. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston continues to mutter away, but I suggest that she looks at Hansard tomorrow morning. My hon. Friend was right to highlight the issue of education and I am grateful for his general approval for all that the Government are doing.

The hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) also spoke of secure colleges. I emphasise to him that, as I said earlier, there will be separate units to cater for different categories of people in those colleges rather than everyone being in one structure.

As far as the magistrates courts are concerned, there was concern about openness and transparency—

[John McDonnell]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Vara]

I will not give way, as I want to make progress. I believe that I have been generous in taking a number of interventions, but I have limited time.

The issue of openness and transparency was raised, and I want to make it clear that each magistrates court publishes within its court buildings daily lists of cases being heard at that court. All magistrates courts routinely make lists of case results available to the local media, and the criminal procedure rules also oblige courts to give certain additional information on cases in response to third-party requests. I also want to put on the record that we are looking at further ways of making court processes and outcomes more transparent, including exploring the possibility of publishing court outcomes electronically.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Simon Reevell) reflected his experience at the Bar in the issues that he raised, and I am grateful for his support for the measures that we are introducing.

My hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) was characteristically robust and raised a number of issues. I am delighted, as I am sure the Chief Whip is, that he supports the proposals that we are seeking to introduce today, and I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor is appreciative of the personal congratulations that he conveyed to him earlier on introducing these measures.

My hon. Friend mentioned the magistrates courts; I assure him that our intention is to ensure that the proposals are confined to low-level offences. He also asked an important question: why can the maximum age of jurors be raised from 70 to 75, when a similar age increase is not allowed for magistrates and judges? One of the reasons is that jurors will work on one trial, and then return to their daily, routine lives, whereas magistrates and judges have to play their role day in, day out, and of course that is completely different from jurors sitting on odd cases.

My hon. Friend will be aware that there are transitional arrangements in place. When the rule about the age of 70 came in for the judiciary, those judges who were still in place could opt to work until they were 75. He also spoke of judges being held to account. All I would say to that is that we have to be mindful that the judiciary is an independent section of our constitution.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Angie Bray) for her supportive comments, and my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), who, again, spoke of his personal experience at the Bar. He was right to refer to the man on the Clapham omnibus and the use of common sense. Many of the proposals that we are introducing are absolutely that: common-sense proposals with which the majority of the public would agree.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) is right to highlight Labour’s record in government, because all that Labour Members, and certainly its Front Benchers, have been doing is complaining, rather than acknowledging their errors when in government. He also spoke about secure colleges. He is right to say that no one wants young children to reoffend. He is absolutely correct when he says that we have to give them education, and the skills and discipline to ensure that they can lead productive lives. Like others, he referred to the issue of force, but I hope that he accepts that I have given reassurance on that. He was concerned about the court charges that we propose, and I have dealt with that issue.

I thank the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), both senior Members of the House and Chairmen of important Select Committees. Their contributions reflected their expertise and breadth of knowledge.

The Bill toughens up terrorism and terrorism-related offences and ends automatic early release for certain serious, violent and sexual offences. The new secure colleges will place education at the heart of youth custody, ensuring that young people acquire the skills, qualifications and self-discipline to lead productive lives on release, and break away from the cycle of reoffending.

It has to be right for criminals who use the courts to pay towards the cost of running them, thereby reducing the burden on hard-working taxpayers. We are also putting in place important measures to deal with the growing number of unmeritorious judicial review applications that are clogging up our court system and putting additional burdens on public services. The consequences of the internet world that we live in simply cannot be ignored. That is why we are ensuring that jurors base their decisions on the evidence put before them, and not on the results of a Google search. These and the other measures in this Bill are important, sensible and necessary. They represent a critical next step in strengthening confidence in our justice system, and providing safety and security for people and their communities. I welcome all the contributions made today, and I assure the House that many of the issues raised will be debated in further detail in Committee.

Finally, I note that we have a new clock, which shows seconds, and not just minutes as the one before did. Happily, I can assure the House that I do not have to rely on the seconds today; I am more than happy to finish a little early—by minutes, rather than seconds. I commend the Bill to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND COURTS BILL (PROGRAMME)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 83A(7)),

That the following provisions shall apply to the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill:

Committal

(1) The Bill shall be committed to a Public Bill Committee.

Proceedings in Public Bill Committee

(2) Proceedings in the Public Bill Committee shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion on Tuesday 1 April 2014.

(3) The Public Bill Committee shall have leave to sit twice on the first day on which it meets.

Consideration and Third Reading

(4) Proceedings on Consideration shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion one hour before the moment of interruption on the day on which those proceedings are commenced.

(5) Proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption on that day.

(6) Standing Order No. 83B (Programming committees) shall not apply to proceedings on Consideration and Third Reading.

Other proceedings

(7) Any other proceedings on the Bill (including any proceedings on consideration of Lords Amendments or on any further messages from the Lords) may be programmed.—(Claire Perry.)

Question agreed to.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND COURTS BILL (MONEY)

Queen’s recommendation signified.

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 52(1)(a)),

That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of money provided by Parliament of:

(1) any expenditure incurred by a Minister of the Crown under or by virtue of the Act, and

(2) any increase attributable to the Act in the sums payable under any other Act out of money so provided.—(Claire Perry.)

Question agreed to.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND COURTS BILL (WAYS AND MEANS)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 52(1)(a)),

That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill, it is expedient to authorise:

(1) the imposition on persons convicted of offences of charges relating to the costs of providing criminal courts; and

(2) the payment of sums into the Consolidated Fund.—(Claire Perry.)

Question agreed to.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND COURTS BILL (CARRY-OVER)

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 80A(1)(a)),

That if, at the conclusion of this Session of Parliament, proceedings on the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill have not been completed, they shall be resumed in the next Session.—(Claire Perry.)

Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill

John McDonnell Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I join my hon. Friend in that state of grace of not being a lawyer. The difference is that we have removed the word “innocent”. There was, I think, a feeling that the original Government proposal required people to prove their innocence, which, of course, would alter the presumptions that lie at the heart of the criminal justice system. That is what could be described as the non-legal significant difference, which is none the less a significant difference.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

Will the Minister therefore explain to us what the difference is between “innocent of” and “did not commit”?

[Damian Green]

A lot of the debate was about the nomenclature—the thought that we were asking people to prove their innocence. I have just explained the effect of the new clause: if a new fact emerges that on its own shows the person could not have committed the offence or that an offence may not have been committed, that would entitle that person to compensation. Throughout this debate people have recognised that it is not simply a question of being declared innocent that requires a miscarriage of justice to be called.

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell]

I think I understand where the Minister is coming from, but I just think we are getting ourselves into a bit of a mess here. Let me give him a concrete example. I chaired the Guildford Four campaign for a large number of years. What happened there was the discovery that the confessions were completely wrong. They were wrong for all sorts of different reasons—the circumstances in which they were taken, the way they were taken. They were just false. At that stage it is then demonstrated that the prosecution—and the original decision of the courts—is unsound and it is then dismissed. Those people are then released. They will then have to seek to prove their innocence to gain any compensation, so practically I think we are digging ourselves into a hole here and are creating a system that will cause more problems than those we are seeking to solve.

[Damian Green]

I disagree. The hon. Gentleman seems to be saying the system will in some ways be more difficult because people will have to apply for compensation. That in itself is not a huge change.

[John McDonnell]

May I explain my point again? Let us take the Birmingham Six as our example. As soon as the confessions were seen to be completely false, they were released on the basis that their prosecution was unsound. However, to gain compensation they will now have to go out and prove they “did not commit” or they were “innocent”, whichever terminology is decided on.

[Damian Green]

I think this is just a genuine misunderstanding. Someone will be eligible for compensation if the new fact—the hon. Gentleman is talking about new facts emerging in respect of confessions and so on—which led to the quashing of their conviction shows they did not commit the offence for which they were convicted. I think the particular objection he is giving rise to now would not apply, therefore.

[John McDonnell]

rose—

[Damian Green]

The hon. Gentleman has had a go.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing his legal mind to bear on this, and explaining the difference.

[John McDonnell]

rose—

[Damian Green]

The hon. Gentleman may disagree, but he will have his chance to contribute to the debate.

We are seeking to provide greater clarity, which is why we are unwilling to accept the Lords amendment. We have listened to those who consider that the express reference to the concept of innocence is problematic. That is what lies at the heart of this change. Our amendment in lieu is intended to take this concern into account by removing what has been until now the controversial aspect of this clause: the use of the word “innocent”. I hope that removing the express reference to innocence will make our respect for the presumption of innocence clear, and I hope I can allay the concerns expressed by hon. Members.

We remain strongly committed to ensuring that compensation is paid only to those who genuinely warrant it, however. In our view compensation should be paid only to applicants where it is shown beyond reasonable doubt that they did not commit the offence. We believe that this change takes into account the points made in the House of Lords, which we have carefully considered. As Lord Phillips said in that debate, the primary objective of section 133 of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, which this clause would amend, is to provide redress to an applicant who has been convicted when he or she was in fact innocent. He also considered that its second and subsidiary objective was to ensure that an applicant whose conviction had been quashed but who had in fact committed the offence charged should not be compensated. Our proposed test goes a long way towards achieving both of those objectives. We consider that, while the definition of a miscarriage of justice for which we are seeking to legislate is drawn narrowly, it nevertheless provides for a range of circumstances in which compensation should rightly be paid to help people who need to rebuild their lives after suffering great injustices.

Throughout our debates, much has been said about the views of the European Court of Human Rights on compensation for a miscarriage of justice, and I am again grateful to Lord Phillips, who commented on this so succinctly during the debate on Report in the Lords. He stated:

“In substance, whatever interpretation is given to miscarriage of justice, something more than quashing a conviction is properly required”.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 22 January 2014; Vol. 751, c. 680.]

This much can be gleaned from the four most recent decisions of the European Court on this issue. Today, our business is to determine precisely what that “something more” is. We believe that the definition we are now providing in our amendment will make it easier for applicants to assess whether they should apply for compensation, and will make decisions on eligibility easier for the applicant to understand and less likely to be the subject of legal challenge, as my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes) made clear a moment ago.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jack Dromey]

I have given way three times and have been more than happy to do so, but let me continue now.

For all the reasons I have described, Labour tabled an amendment on Report in this Chamber and then wholeheartedly backed the amendment in the name of Lord Pannick in the other place, which would ensure that compensation should be paid only if the new or newly discovered fact showed conclusively that the evidence against the defendant at trial was so undermined that

“ no conviction could possibly be based on it.”

That clearly provides a statutory definition and greater certainty in this area of the law, while adhering to the age-old principle for which I have argued so strongly. When the Court of Appeal has quashed a conviction, it is simply wrong then to require the defendant also to establish beyond reasonable doubt that he or she is, to all intents and purposes, innocent. Such a provision is incompatible with the presumption of innocence.

The framework for which I am arguing already applies in the Supreme Court, where it was brought in by the then President, Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, who strongly supported the Pannick amendment in the other place, and indeed in the European Court of Human Rights. Indeed, the Joint Committee on Human Rights has said:

“in our view requiring proof of innocence beyond reasonable doubt as a condition of obtaining compensation for wrongful conviction is incompatible with the presumption of innocence which is protected by both the common law and Article 6(2) ECHR.”

It is worth stressing again that the amendment from the other place is not about giving people more compensation automatically or making it easier for people to get off on technicalities and then to claim compensation in all circumstances; it is about serious and rare cases in which it is entirely appropriate that the victims should receive compensation. As our amendment makes clear, asking people to prove their innocence beyond reasonable doubt is an affront to our system of law, and denying compensation to those who have been wrongly convicted is an affront to a decent society. Many Members of this House, including my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan), have campaigned for many years on miscarriages of justice.

The simple fact is that our legal system is not perfect, and cases do go wrong. It is a tribute to our legal system that miscarriages of justice are rare, but when they do happen, it is simply wrong to expect those who have suffered to prove to all intents and purposes that they are innocent beyond reasonable doubt—it is adding to the injustice that they have already suffered.

As I argued at the start of my contribution, miscarriages of justice lead to ruined lives. Families are destroyed. People leave while their partners sit wrongly behind bars. Jobs and homes are lost and people’s reputations are left in tatters. The mental despair and anguish are never fully resolved, which is why victims of miscarriages of justice need real help on their release. People’s lives can never go back to how they were. That is where we, as a decent society, have to make amends, and that is what our amendment does.

In conclusion, I urge all Members of this House to support a rigorous and fair justice system that sticks up for its founding principle of people being innocent until proved guilty; that rejects the notion of “beyond reasonable doubt” to obtain compensation; that ensures that where a serious miscarriage of justice has happened, innocent people receive fair compensation for all they have suffered; and that reflects rulings already set out in the Supreme Court and the European Court of Human Rights. In short, we want a justice system that is serious about putting right serious injustice.

[John McDonnell]

To be frank, I am absolutely confused about where we have got to. I am confused over the difference of interpretation between innocence and “did not commit”. If someone wants to intervene on me at this stage I would be really grateful, because I cannot see the difference.

My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) has explained the implications of the proposal with regard to the Birmingham Six and Guildford Four. Let me put the situation in context following my involvement in the case of the Guildford Four. A number of people are locked up for many years. When they come out, they have nothing—no accommodation and no employment. The financial compensation they receive is relatively minimal compared with the suffering that they have gone through, and it is desperately needed to ensure that they have a chance of some form of normal life in the future.

In the case of the Guildford Four—it was the same in the case of the Birmingham Six—we found that not just the prisoners but whole families were devastated. There have been suicides in the family of Paul Hill. As my hon. Friend the Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) knows, the lives of Errol and Theresa Smalley have been permanently damaged. The whole family network has been damaged as a result of that case. Gerry Conlon admitted it when he came out of prison. He was addicted to drugs, because that was the only way he could cope. The state pays compensation to try to do whatever it can to remedy the injustice that took place.

The cases of the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six went to court and were quashed because the forensic evidence demonstrated that confessions were made under duress and that documents were tampered with. When they left court, it was on the basis that the system had failed in due process to prove that they had committed the crimes for which they were brought to court. We then went through a negotiation process, which was quite bizarre; I did not realise that, under the existing compensation arrangements, their compensation would be reduced to pay for accommodation charges while they were in prison. It was a real struggle to get that compensation. The Minister says that this is not the case, but under the proposed system, if a case is quashed on the basis of that type of evidence, the defendants will have to go to another level of proof to get any compensation. They will have to demonstrate not that the process was faulty in the first place and that they should never have been caught, but that they did not commit the crime, which is having to prove innocence. That is almost impossible, for any of us. Trying to prove that negative is contrary to everything in English law, and practically impossible to do.

[Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)]

rose—

[John McDonnell]

Let me just finish this point, then I will give way; I welcome the intervention.

In the cases of the Birmingham Six and the Guildford Four, the media very quickly started to say. “Well, they might have got off, but maybe they did it anyway.” A campaign then started in the gutter press. It did not matter how good the evidence was, they still came at us. They tried to damage the reputations of those individuals. What worries me is that a Secretary of State determining that a higher level of proof is required to gain compensation will affect the atmosphere that is created.

[Mark Field]

I must admit that I have quite a lot of sympathy with what the hon. Gentleman is saying. He expresses a specific concern about high-profile miscarriages of justice. However, is there not a concern that this new test of a convincing case brings a whole lot more uncertainty into the law? I dare say that it will be an absolute boon for the lawyers as to precisely where that comes into play. Although I have sympathy with what the hon. Gentleman says, the benefit of what the Minister is saying is that we at least have a certain test that is already set in English law.

[John McDonnell]

In my view, the Government’s test is faulty. I am not convinced of the need for this additional test anyway. At least the House of Lords edges towards some greater level of fairness. I would rather give up on this attempt to redefine.

The hon. Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Rehman Chishti) raised the case of Barry George. There has always been an ability in our system for the court awarding compensation to take into account whether the person contributed towards their plight. That has an effect on compensation levels or even whether compensation is awarded at all. By seeking to arrive at some definition in legislation, we are digging ourselves into a very complicated and costly hole, and that cost will be on the individuals who are desperately trying to ensure that they get some compensation for the ill that they have experienced as a result of the state’s failure to live up to a proper process. Additionally, it will be extremely costly for the state. As a result of the weakness in the definition proposed by the Government, we will see case after case being dragged through the English courts and then the European courts. In trying to remedy some form of perceived ill, we will create greater damage to those who have suffered enough.

In addition, the process that is under way at the moment risks making a laughing stock of the Government. As we have heard today, there will be arguments over the difference between “do not commit” and innocence, between “conclusively” and “beyond all reasonable doubt”. The lawyers will make a fortune. I plead for a common-sense approach. The compensation arrangements at the moment are not absolutely perfect, but at least we have managed to secure some compensation for those cases that have been quashed as a result of the state’s failure, and this is about the state’s failure to act accordingly.

There are many other cases. Susan May recently passed away, unfortunately, but her case is still being pursued to demonstrate her innocence, and I think that, rather than it being proved in the long run that the evidential base was the problem, it will be demonstrated that police processes were not adhered to and it will be another case that is eventually quashed. I hope that the Criminal Cases Review Commission will posthumously provide some proof that she should never have been taken through the courts, but again, the case has been dragged out over years, demonstrating how difficult it is, even when trying to prove the failure of due process, to secure not just a decision but any compensation. The new process will make it even harder to get compensation, drag the decision-making processes out for even longer and prove to be basically unfair.

I support the Lords amendment, because at least it moves us a little further forward, although I think even it will be open to significant challenge in the courts.

[Mark Durkan]

I rise to support Lords amendment 112 and oppose the Government’s amendment in lieu. The Minister told us that the Government were moving to allay the concerns raised by the use of the word “innocence” and its abuse in the Bill as originally drafted. Of course, many of us argued that the wording used in the original Bill changed all the normal presumptions about innocence under the rule of law and that it was tilting things to say that because someone had not proved their innocence they could remain guilty, even though they had been released on a quashed conviction. We were concerned not just about the word “innocence” but about the fact that the burden of proof would be reloaded for cases subject to review on the basis of new evidence that could lead to a quashed conviction. We were concerned that the question of compensation would be tested by altering the burden of proof so that new evidence had to prove someone’s innocence. The onus was being put on that person and their legal team to show the strength of the evidence.

The Government’s response to the Lords’ fairly reasonable and measured amendment is to say that they have solved the problem of innocence by using the term “did not commit” about the offence. The Minister was asked again and again to tell us the difference. A brand of soup—I cannot remember which—used to be advertised by the slogan, “The difference is in the thickness.” We are being told that there is a big difference and the Minister is emphasising its importance, but he cannot explain, specify, spell out or measure in any way the difference between whether someone can show that the evidence proves that they are innocent of an offence or whether they can show that it proves that they did not commit the offence. Even some of the interventions from the Government Back Benches seemed to rest more on whether there was evidence that an offence had been committed than on whether there was evidence that the person had actually committed the offence.

There are cases, of course, in which we know that gross and horrible offences have been committed, but that is very different from saying that that proves that a person who was charged and convicted of that offence has committed it. At other times, offences that might or might not have been committed are subject to questions and conjecture. We might consider our experiences in this House, as we might be thrown into the spotlight of public judgment about whether or not we did something. If we consider “did not commit” and “innocent” in that context, we might start to tease out some of the differences.

If as MPs we were arrested on the basis of some allegation, the fact that we were not charged and nothing more happened would show that we were innocent, but would other people necessarily say that it proved that no offence had been committed and nothing had happened? Things might be different; there can be a difference between “innocent” and “did not commit”. As the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) said, it is hard to prove a negative. We know from recent events of major publicity and political import in which allegations were made that someone had spoken to and treated police officers in a particular way, leading to consequences and all sorts of sweeping media and public judgments—although thankfully not court judgments—that that person was put in the position of having to prove a negative. They were asked to prove that they did not say what they were meant to have said and that they did not behave in the way that they were meant to have behaved.

We need to think not only about the hard and serious cases when we consider miscarriages of justice in this jurisdiction; some of the questions about the difference between “innocent” and “did not commit” can be asked closer to home about cases that do not necessarily reach the criminal courts. If we are conscious about language and the standards, judgments and measure of such things, it might help us and make us a wee bit more sensitive about how we word things as legislators.

The Lords amendment is designed, I believe, to meet the problem that the Government were seeking to address in the Bill. The Government said that they did not want to create a situation whereby the quashing of a conviction led either to the automatic fact of compensation or to the automatic assumption or expectation of compensation. They felt that some other test or qualification was needed. That was what the Government decided; it might not have been the starting point for some of us who have campaigned on miscarriages of justice cases such as those of the Birmingham Six and the Guildford Four. Long after the latter conviction was overturned, I worked with Gerry Conlon and his mother to try to ensure that there was an apology that fully vindicated them and voiced their innocence, because many people in the system and the media were still trying to hide behind the pretence that it was a technical quashing of the conviction but that the conviction itself was due and proper. For them, the issue is not compensation but the absolute assertion of innocence. That was why offence was taken at the use and abuse of the term “innocence” in the original Bill, but that was not the only issue. The burden of proof was altered and an attempt was made to allow in the system for someone who had been convicted and imprisoned for a long period not to be entitled to compensation, because they could not prove beyond reasonable doubt that they did not commit the offence or their innocence.

Lord Pannick’s amendment accepts the Government's premise that there needs to be a definition and bases that definition on many issues that have been tested in other cases, including, as we have heard from the Minister, the Adams case. Based on the working and practical use of the law, the Lords amendment is wise and considered in its suggestion that a new or newly discovered fact should show conclusively that the evidence against the person at trial is so undermined that no conviction could possibly be based on it. That is not a hard test, as it does not open up things to conjecture. It basically allows courts to do what many appeal courts and more senior courts often have to do in considering the material evidence that would have been in front of a lower court and to make a judgment on that basis.

The Lords amendment would simply allow someone, after their conviction has been quashed, to pursue compensation on the basis that the quality of the new evidence shows that there would not have been a conviction in the first place. By refusing that, the Government are basically seeking to return to a situation in which the courts, the police and the prosecution service could be seen as part of a nexus of pursuing and achieving a miscarriage of justice. The beauty of the Lords amendment is that it would clearly take the lower court out of the frame, because it states that had the lower court known about such evidence, it would never have achieved the conviction.

Shrewsbury 24 (Release of Papers)

John McDonnell Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2014 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I shall give the last word in this debate to the person who cannot be here, which is Dessie Warren. Dessie went into the dock against the advice of his lawyers. They advised him, “Dessie if you go in, you will most probably be sentenced double,” and that is most probably what happened, but he addressed the central question we have asked here today: was there a conspiracy? Let me use Dessie’s words:

“Was there a conspiracy? Ten members of the jury have said there was. There was a conspiracy, but not by the pickets. The conspiracy began with the miners giving the government a good hiding last year. It developed when the government was forced to perform legal gymnastics in getting five dockers out of jail after they had only just been put there. The conspiracy was between the Home Secretary, the employers and the police. It was not done with a nod and a wink. It was conceived after pressure from Tory Members of Parliament who demanded changes in picketing laws.”

He was asked about the law. He said:

“the law is, quite clearly, an instrument of the state, to be used in the interests of a tiny minority against the majority. It is biased; it is class law, and nowhere has that been demonstrated more than in the prosecution case in this trial. The very nature of the charges, the delving into ancient Acts of Parliament, dredging up conspiracy, shows this to be so.”

Then he was asked about intimidation. He said:

“The jury in this trial were asked to look upon the word ‘intimidation’ as having the ordinary everyday meaning. My interpretation is ‘to make timid’, or ‘to dispirit’, and when the pickets came to this town to speak to the building workers it was not with the intention of intimidating them. We came here with the intention of instilling the trade union spirit into them, and not to make them timid, but to give them the courage to fight the intimidation of the employers in this area.”

That is the spirit that has been instilled in us for the past 30 years, all the way through this campaign. It is also the spirit that has been instilled in all those others, including Ricky Tomlinson, Eileen Turnbull and the others who have been campaigning over this period. In that spirit, we will not let go until the truth is revealed, until we have full openness and transparency, until those people’s names are cleared and until it is accepted that this was a class attack. It was a class attack involving the intimidation of a group of workers to ensure that others did not fight in what was, and is, a class struggle to improve wages and conditions and, yes, to assert some sort of power and control over people’s working conditions. I support that struggle; that is what this debate today is all about.

Women Offenders and Older Prisoners

John McDonnell Excerpts

Thursday 16th January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Sir Alan Beith]

The right hon. Gentleman makes a very good point and gives highly relevant figures.

In 2012, we decided to undertake an inquiry to review progress since the Corston report and to examine current strategy and practice. We held five oral evidence sessions. We visited prisons and women’s centres. We received more than 60 pieces of written evidence. We reported in July 2013, and the Government published their response in October. We visited HMP Styal, where the six deaths that prompted the Corston report had occurred, but in the inspection report on the prison published two years ago, Her Majesty’s chief inspector of prisons commented that it was

“disappointing to find, and to be told of by the governor, too many cases of women, some of whom were clearly mentally ill, serving very short prison sentences which served little purpose except to further disrupt sometimes already chaotic lives.”

During our visit, we saw a new unit that has been created in an effort better to meet the needs of these women, but questions were raised by our witnesses about why women with such complex needs continue to be sentenced to custody. However, those of us who visited Styal saw some genuinely good work going on there. Styal has featured so much in this history that I would not want the impression to be given that there is not some very good work indeed taking place there.

The fact that we were holding an inquiry at all seemed to stimulate the Government to take a number of positive steps to prioritise the requirements of female offenders. After we had announced the inquiry, the Government allocated ministerial responsibility for female offenders to the then Minister in the Department and former member of our Committee, the hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant). They announced a review of the female custodial estate, published a statement of four high-level strategic priorities, and created an advisory board to oversee the work streams stemming from those priorities.

Our report was very wide ranging, and I cannot pick up all the threads, but let me start with the overall governance of these issues. We said in the report:

“It is regrettable that the Coalition Government appears not to have learnt from the experience of its predecessor that strong ministerial leadership across departmental boundaries is essential to continue to make progress, with the result that in its first two years there was a hiatus in efforts to make headway on implementing the important recommendations made by Baroness Corston”.

We in the Committee were particularly struck by Baroness Corston’s own evidence that under the previous Government it was not until a group of women Ministers worked together to take issues forward that that Government made significant progress in this area. We welcome the fact that the hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald was appointed, but of course she has now moved to another ministerial position. I hope that this Minister will clarify, when he responds to the debate, just how overall leadership will be achieved in this area.

We say in our report:

“We welcome the production of a set of strategic priorities for women offenders but they need to be given substance”.

In the Government response, we were told that there would be further progress towards meeting the strategic objectives, and that there would be a report to Parliament on that in March this year, so we are getting quite close to that.

We say in our report:

“We do not consider that substantive changes to the…sentencing framework would be helpful…and recommend that emphasis is placed on ensuring a greater consistency of provision to the courts to enable them to sentence from a range of options specifically appropriate to women, including robust alternatives to custody.”

We say:

“We welcome the Sentencing Council’s inclusion of primary child caring responsibilities as a mitigating factor in sentencing guidelines”.

However, more than half the women sentenced to custody still receive short sentences. There appear to be several explanations for that: the absence of adequate and available community provision, the court perhaps not knowing whether there was adequate provision locally, or the court not being confident that the community provision was appropriate or acceptable to wider public opinion by being sufficiently robust. We were concerned that the agenda on that had not progressed sufficiently quickly.

We questioned women offenders and ex-offenders—they came before the Committee—who made it clear to us that they had preferred prison to community sentences. In at least one case, they had committed further offences because prison was easier than a community sentence that challenged them to change their life and also, of course, offered some support to enable them to do so.

Our report says:

“Women’s community projects are central to providing a distinct approach to the treatment of women offenders. They offer a challenging environment for women to serve their sentence as well as a broad range of practical and emotional support”.

Those projects, often delivered through women’s centres, offer a range of services and courses of the kind that Corston recommended: a punishment element; probation; community payback; addressing offending behaviour; anger management; domestic violence; drug awareness; supporting women who have offended, including in relation to housing and issues with children; parenting courses; social services; and a crèche.

A woman who attended Eden House in Bristol said to us in evidence:

“The sort of women coming here, if they went to prison they would only get a couple of weeks, or a six month sentence and serve half. That’s not enough time to make a difference. They just carry on as they did before. But with Eden House, you get structure, a variety of things to do, and the help and support of staff. These are all things you don’t get inside”.

We found evidence such as that very persuasive.

A lot of data have been collected by the National Offender Management Service in the past year about women who have been referred to women’s community services. Those data will be analysed, I think, this summer, and we look forward to seeing the results.

We say in our report:

“We are unconvinced about the extent to which the approach set out in the Government’s strategic priorities for women offenders is…integrated”

across Government and across Departments. We wanted the advisory board to

“map the confusing array of Government initiatives that”,

if brought together,

“have the potential to benefit vulnerable women and girls at risk of offending and specify how these should integrate with the strategy for women offenders.”

We drew attention to the fact that successful women’s centres were ensuring that some women on the periphery of the criminal justice system were being diverted away from crime, to the benefit of the community.

We note the inclusion in the Offender Rehabilitation Bill of the requirement for arrangements for supervision or rehabilitation to identify how they meet the needs of female offenders. The Government say in their response to us that they have produced guidance for new providers on gender-specific services, and that contractual arrangements are in place to ensure that those needs are met. We very much welcome that.

We made recommendations about the custodial estate. We are to conduct a more general inquiry into the prison estate, and we will look further at the provision for women offenders when we do that.

NOMS’ stocktake of women’s community provision was very positive in tone and concluded that

“services for female offenders for 2013-14 have been strengthened and that there will be greater access to gender specific services across the country.”

I am not sure that the picture painted by our witnesses was quite as positive as that. In any case, a stocktake looks at what is there, not at what is missing and still needed. A further analysis may be required to establish an evidence-based approach to the issue.

In general, the Government’s response to our report was thorough and constructive and set out clearly how our concerns could be addressed. The key question remains how real leadership will be provided—across Government, not just in the Ministry of Justice—to maintain momentum and put in place a range of services and interventions that can change the lives of women and girls who offend. Our constituents will benefit if, instead of paying the bills for the punishment of offences committed by women, we greatly reduce the number of those offences and offenders.

I want to talk about older prisoners, because this group is growing in the prison population and seems likely to continue to grow. It was no part of our report to argue that these are not people who should be in prison. It is very obvious, from what we know about the reasons for that growth, that for very many if not all of these people, there are very strong reasons to keep them in custody. I am referring to people with a record of violent offences.

However, older prisoners are and will continue to be a growing group. This population is added to, of course, by prosecutions in relation to historical sex offences. Older prisoners present a real challenge to the Prison Service. Some prisons are making substantial efforts to adapt their facilities to meet the needs of older prisoners, but of course for some prisons that is almost impossible because of the nature of their buildings. They may be multi-storey buildings. There may be a cell in which two beds cannot be put, but there are two prisoners, neither of whom can climb into an upper bunk. Physically, the facilities may not be suitable.

We thought that NOMS needed to ensure that all prisons have a policy that provides age-specific regimes. More prisons should establish day centres and regimes that provide for the needs of older prisoners, without necessarily segregating them entirely. We found problems with older prisoners’ access to health care services. We found, as in other areas of prison life, a large unmet need in relation to mental health and that there should be more consistent awareness training for prison officers about that.

We wanted prison and community health care IT systems to be better connected to minimise disruption. There was one really serious problem, which the Government have tried to address: the lack of provision for essential social care for older prisoners, and confusion about who should be providing it. We had a situation in which it was not clear whether a prisoner with acute social care needs was the responsibility of the authority from which they came, if that could be identified, or the authority in which the prison was located. The Government have dealt with that in clause 75 of the Care Bill, but we still need clarification on what happens to local authorities with a large prison population, because meeting that requirement will place considerable demands on their social work provision. Some places, such as the Isle of Wight, have gone some way to recognising that, but they will have total responsibility in this area under the new legislation.

We want good liaison with local authority social care teams. In the Isle of Wight, we saw that there had been good experiences as a result of placing social workers in prisons. That is not a luxury; serious problems can result from prisoners with serious personal care needs and limitations becoming excessively dependent on either prison officers—who have other responsibilities to carry out—or other prisoners. That is a dangerous situation in a prison.

We also looked at issues that arise when prisoners are terminally ill. We found that perhaps too little discretion had been given to experienced officers over when handcuffs might reasonably be removed from a terminally ill prisoner in a hospital bed, or when a governor, with the Minister’s approval, might grant release to a palliative care unit when no such facility existed in a prison.

We found problems with resettlement. Many long-term prisoners will be released at some point, and by the time they are released, they may have no contact with their home at all. The nature of their offence may have led to a complete break with their family. Where should they be placed if they are not to be at risk of committing further offences? We have asked the Government to do further work on a number of aspects of that problem. It was alarming to find that older prisoners were still being released to no fixed abode, which is neither acceptable nor in the interests of public safety and the community. The growth of the older prisoner population suggests to us that there ought to be a national strategy, but the Government did not accept that recommendation.

The Government response generally engages seriously with each of our recommendations, however. The Government agree that a formal analysis should be undertaken of prison accommodation to assess its suitability, and they have committed to doing that by the end of the year. They have committed to adapt prison regimes, and serious consideration is being given to improving health care. There is an acceptance of minimum social care needs and the care passport system. However, the response does not address the real concern about how local authorities will deal with large numbers of older prisoners for whom they acquire social work responsibility. The statement:

“It will be for each local authority to consider how best to meet need within a prison, and the role that social workers will play”

does not really tell us anything at all. In relation to the use of restraints, the response states:

“NOMS’ escorts policy is currently under review”.

The response on meeting accommodation needs on release does not promise a lot either. The outright rejection of the recommendation to introduce a national strategy on the grounds that it is “not possible to generalise” about the needs of older prisoners ignores the fact that there are common problem factors among most groups of older prisoners, as we saw when we visited several prisons. A strategy that worked its way through the prison system might be of considerable benefit, not only in managing prisoners more effectively but in making the prison system work more effectively. I commend our report to the House, and recommend that for both reports, hon. Members look carefully also at the Government response.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

With regard to the report on older prisoners, I understand that the Committee considered only prisons, not detention centres. I raise that because of a case in my constituency that the prisons inspector reported today involving a gentleman with dementia who was released within hours of his death, and who died with handcuffs on. Is there a prospect of the Committee wanting to look at detention centres, in view of the lessons learned from the previous study?

[Sir Alan Beith]

I had concluded my remarks, but I will pretend that I had not done so in order to answer the hon. Gentleman. Although the chief inspector of prisons quite rightly inspects detention centres—I am glad that he does—it is a Home Office responsibility, which means that the Home Affairs Committee ought to look at the matter. He is quite right to draw attention to some of the serious issues that the chief inspector has raised, which many hon. Members heard him speak about on the radio this morning. We see the chief inspector regularly about his prison work, which we very much respect.

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I will be relatively brief, Mr Amess. I want to ask a few questions about the Government’s response to the report, but first, as I raised the issue of detention centres earlier, I hope that the Minister will pass on to his Home Office colleagues the importance of addressing the report today from the chief inspector of prisons. I raised the Harmondsworth detention centre incidents in the debate on the Immigration Bill on 22 October, and referred to the visitors’ report published last year. I continue to be concerned; we need to deal with the concerns regularly expressed by the visitors. There was also a separate report on mental health in particular, published just before Christmas by Detention Action.

I have some questions about progress in relation to the Government’s response to the Select Committee report. The Secretary of State said:

“I have considered the Committee’s recommendation to develop a strategy for older prisoners. I accept the suggestion that a national, consistently applied approach is needed across prisons and prison staff.”

I am not completely sure what the difference is between a strategy and a consistently applied approach, but the Government’s response to the issues raised by the Select Committee seems to include action on a number of fronts, which is helpful.

As to the categorisation of older prisoners, the Government responded:

“We will not look to categorise prisoners as old by their age, but we will look at the possibility of automatic consideration of possible age related issues…We will undertake analysis of offender needs by age to help understand at which age it would be best to do this.”

It would be useful to have a time scale on that, and a progress report in due course. Perhaps the Minister can advise us what is happening.

The Government promised a review of the suitability of the prison estate. They agreed that

“a formal analysis of the estate is required”

and said they would

“develop a process for conducting an assessment of current accommodation”

to be completed by “the end of 2014”. I know it is early, but some form of publication of the way that is being undertaken, and in what stages—whether it is being done geographically, region by region, or category by category—would be helpful, particularly in the light of the reorganisation of the Prison Service under the Government’s new proposals.

The Government said:

“As far as possible, NOMS will ensure that older prisoners are not allocated to an establishment that cannot meet their needs. We are grateful to the committee for their recognition that this will be subject occasionally to operational difficulties”.

It will be useful to see how the Government will monitor the occasions when operational difficulties have an impact on the appropriate allocation of a prisoner to a specific site or prison.

On another matter of progress, the Government responded to what the report said about the health and social care of older prisoners, saying:

“We agree that better management of health appointments is desirable. To support this, NOMS will work with NHS England on the possibility and suitability of increasing the use of video link technology.”

It would be useful have information—not necessarily today, but perhaps in writing—about the programme and the time scale for implementation. Some idea of cost would be useful as well.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on what he is saying; I know how passionately he feels about the issue. As to social care, a similar point was made to me by Professor John Williams of Aberystwyth university. He said that one of the biggest obstacles for social care services for older people was the ordinary residence rule. What is the ordinary residence of a prisoner? Is it where they come from, the location of the prison, or where they will go after release? Local authorities can play that card to avoid responsibility. That needs to be clarified.

[John McDonnell]

I fully agree. I was going to come on to that point, but the hon. Gentleman has covered it for me. Local authority funding is a key issue, particularly for those with prisons nearby.

The Government responded to a proposal about the incorporation of awareness training with regard to the elderly. They said:

“NOMS will look to work with NHS England developing training packages.”

I should in due course welcome the Minister’s detailed response about how that is being approached, including the progress being made, the cost, and the consultation that is being undertaken, particularly with the Prison Officers Association and the POA’s involvement in designing and promulgating the package.

I am extremely concerned that we secure a clear financial base for local authorities in the new role that they will play in social care. As the hon. Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Rehman Chishti) said, we need clarity about who is responsible, and what the cost burden in the locality will be. The Government said that they were “currently refining” the estimates

“through a survey of prisoners.”

That obviously relates to scale of costs. They also said:

“Funding provision that recognises the additional costs will be provided to Local Authorities.”

It would be extremely helpful to know what progress had been made in the negotiations with local authorities, and the estimates that had been bandied about—I know those are a matter for negotiation, as that is something I did in another life. It would be useful to know how the consultation is being undertaken, whether agreement is reached in due course about the scale of the costs and how they will be administered. That will come down to a detailed formula at some stage, but it would be helpful to have early information and some understanding of how any difficulties will be resolved.

The Committee raised the question of the age trigger, and the Government said that they would re-examine it. They said that

“an assessment of the costs and benefits of an age trigger for health and social care assessments would be needed before any commitment to an automatic age trigger for either health or social care assessment”

would be entered into. It would be useful to know how that assessment was being undertaken and, again, the time scale for and manner of its report to the Committee or the House.

The Select Committee raised the issue of restraint, in relation to escorts in particular; some members have found restraint a difficult matter. The Government responded:

“NOMS’ escorts policy is currently under review and this issue will be explored further as part of that.”

It would be useful, again, to know the time scale for that and how it will be reported. Will there be opportunities to examine the policy in more detail as the Government develop it?

As to resettlement, there is guidance to be published with the new Bill, with respect to NOMS working

“with their partners in local authorities to see how prisons can support this.”

It would be useful to know from the Minister whether that guidance is in draft form already, when it will be published and how it will be agreed in due course. The relationship with local authorities will clearly be a key matter.

The Government response also stated that

“NOMS will explore the possibility of making some small-scale improvements to Approved Premises.”

It will be useful to have some details of the assessment undertaken and of the time scales for implementation.

Finally, the Government response also dealt with the transit of prisoners between areas and how that would be clarified:

“This work should be completed alongside the launch of the Care Bill in 2015.”

It will be useful to have some detail about how that is being examined—who has been involved in the consultations and discussions, and again whether some of the issues have been dealt with or are being overcome in those discussions.

Offender Rehabilitation Bill [Lords]

John McDonnell Excerpts

Tuesday 14th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jenny Chapman]

But those are lead bidders, and I understand that none of the contracts will be taken on by one organisation alone. There is nothing to prevent G4S and others from being involved in the provision of probation services when the contracts are awarded. The other reason this information is relevant to probation is that it reveals that the quality of the supervision and enforcement of contracts by the Ministry of Justice is not quite what we would like it to be.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

The statement that was made to the House a couple of weeks ago was explicit about the possibility that G4S and Serco would form parts of consortia. I think that the Minister should make the position absolutely clear.

[Jenny Chapman]

That is certainly my understanding, and nothing that the Minister has said so far contradicts it. Unless we hear something more definitive from G4S, the Ministry of Justice or the Minister today, I think that that must remain our assumption.

The MOJ tends to take its eye off the ball as soon as a contract has been signed, so new clause 5 helpfully provides for a longer-term regular check on the performance of probation service providers. Its scope is really quite limited: it merely requires the Secretary of State to report to both Houses of Parliament on the performance of all providers that are contracted to manage offenders. In particular, the report must include an assessment of the transparency of each provider, and must specify what information it is making available to the public and how reliably it is responding to freedom of information requests submitted to the MOJ. It must also update both Houses on what measures were included in the contracts to ensure that poor performance could be penalised, and on whether any have been invoked.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Llwyd]

I agree entirely with the hon. Gentleman. That feeling is held widely across the House, and not just on these Benches. The hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh) referred to ideology. The Bill is a victory for ideology over common sense. That by itself is ridiculous enough, but the inherent dangers of it make it even more insidious.

To avoid treading over old ground, I will not talk about the risk register. None the less, it still alarms me that the risks were seen as so high at the commencement of this exercise, and I have no reason to believe that they have changed for the better since.

Briefly, let me refer to new clause 4. The impetus behind it is to ensure that we do not rush headlong into implementing these reforms without first having a pilot, which would be independently evaluated and reported on to both Houses of Parliament. I notice that the esteemed Chair of the Justice Committee, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), is in his place, so I must be careful about what I say. Over the past few weeks, we have taken evidence from many sectors involved in probation and rehabilitation. A considerable amount of it was from people who had been involved in previous Government privatisations. Surprisingly, they were saying, “Don’t do it. Don’t rush in. It is not proven. It may not be cost-effective and it could cause huge problems.” Such people are surely aware of the risks involved and they came before the Committee to give their opinion. It is not simply a matter of one political divide against the other. Some of those people presented as being more in sympathy with the Government than with anybody else, but they said not to do it because it is unproven and could be dangerous.

The probation service has prior experience of the damage that can result from privatisation. Building management, for example, has been contracted out to the private sector, which has resulted in a great deal of waste and inefficiency. I have heard of an engineer being sent from Liverpool to Cardiff to fit a carpet tile even though, ironically, there is a carpet shop opposite the Cardiff probation office—you could not make it up.

In 2007, the running of bail beds was outsourced to a company called ClearSprings, which had no experience in the criminal justice sector. Numerous complaints were made about antisocial behaviour and drunkenness and the contract had to be removed. We know about Serco and G4S, so I will not go there again. Clearly, there is a significant prospect of disorder and possible dangers if the plans do not prove to be sensible. As for the Government’s risk assessment, time is short so I will not go there.

The restructuring will mean that there will have to be an entirely new operating model with 21 new government companies; that staff will have to be allocated to new roles in community rehabilitation companies and the national probation service; that no fewer than 18,000 staff members will be transferred to new employers; and that up to 250,000 offender cases will be reallocated. It would be foolhardy indeed to proceed without some guarantee of success.

It would not be unheard of for new measures being introduced to the justice system to be piloted nationally. Recently, pilots on payment by results have been held at HMP Peterborough and Doncaster, albeit voluntarily, while in recent years Governments have held pilots on satellite tracking, the domestic violence 28-day prevention order and drug reduction schemes. Piloting is not unheard of.

This is not a question of reputational risk for the MOJ. We are all concerned about the safety of the public more than anything else. A further risk register produced by the probation employers last November of last year warned of a high risk of

“a failure of the programme to be delivered either in scope or within the timescale set by ministers”.

At this eleventh hour, I plead with the Minister and his colleagues to give the scheme a chance and to give us all a chance to evaluate it. We might come back one day saying, “Yes, it was right,” or, “No, it was not.” If the answer is no, many people will suffer. Those members of the public are the people whom it is our duty to protect.

[John McDonnell]

I apologise to the House for the fact that I will leave after my brief remarks, because at 3 o’clock I have a meeting, which I have been seeking for a couple of months, with the Secretary of State for Education, about a school in my constituency. I hope that I will be back in time for the Minister’s response.

Let me pick up on the point made by the hon. and learned Member for Harborough (Sir Edward Garnier). We have all been pressing for some time, under the previous Government and this Government, for the supervision of offenders with sentences of less than 12 months, but we all expected that to proceed normally—that is, with a proposal being made with a budgetary paper attached that the existing system would be challenged to meet—so that we could plan the development of the probation service. If there were to be additional funds, some of us would have lobbied the Treasury while others would have argued that the service should swallow its own smoke and keep the budget within its existing budgets. That was what we expected.

I think that clause 1 was inserted in the Bill in the other place because none of us expected the use of the previous legislation to introduce proposals for the wholesale privatisation of the probation service—that is what this means for 70% of the service going forward. When that legislation was going through, I opposed it and I warned those on my Front Bench that it could be abused in such a way. I was assured that the legislation, which was supported on both sides of the House if I remember rightly, would ensure that the third sector, voluntary sector organisations and others could participate in rehabilitation, and that it would introduce flexibility to the system. A number of organisations lobbied for that, particularly in the drugs rehabilitation field. That is why I think that this is an abuse of process. It is an abuse of the previous legislation, which was never intended to be used in this way, and I think that is why the other place inserted the clause.

I have been angry and have shouted about the subject in this House, and it is not good for my health. This is, however, a leap in the dark, and I am fearful for my constituents. As with other privatisations, there is a financial risk, but that is nothing in comparison with the risk to life and limb. As a result of this leap in the dark, there could be safety problems that will bear down on Ministers in the future.

I warn the House that if we allow this Bill to go through and any of our constituents suffer and are harmed in some way as a result of an offender not being properly supervised, we will, quite properly, be held responsible. The hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh), my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) have made exactly this point: why not ensure that the alternatives proposed by the Government are properly tested? Setting up pilots and then ending them without taking any account of them seems extraordinary and completely illogical.

In previous debates, we seized on the risk register because advisers to the Government were saying that there were risks. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd has said, there is an 80% risk of failure in some instances. The Secretary of State argued that the risk registers are only there at the beginning to point out a range of issues that will then be addressed, so we asked, “Why not publish the risk register and make it completely public, and why not publish those mechanisms you have put in place to address the specific risks? At least then we could be assured that they have been properly addressed and, perhaps, overcome.” As my right hon. Friend has said, we are walking into the dark and putting our constituents at risk as a result.

As other Members have explained, the experience of privatisation in the justice service has given us sufficient warnings that we need to tread very carefully. I do not want to go over those again, but many of us have had experience of the justice system over the years and I have never seen the system so vulnerable as a result of private interventions. There are riots almost monthly, and concerns expressed within our prison system. The introduction of the Serious Fraud Office into investigations of companies that provide services within the justice system is ironic, to say the least.

I support the amendments tabled by my hon. Friends on the Front Bench, which are supported by the chair of the justice unions parliamentary group and by the group overall. We have also tabled a number of other proposals that are somewhat bureaucratic but, I think, important: new clauses 10, 9, 11 and 13, which are all in my name. They are simple suggestions. First, if the Government are going down this path let us have full and open transparency. The new clauses suggest that the contracts should be fully published. The Minister has said that the draft contracts should be published, but I think that it is important that the full contract should be published so that we can all see it, in particular the elements of the contract that include the requirements and expectations of the providers’ performance. It is important that in future the National Audit Office can investigate and assess the effectiveness, economy and efficiency of the implementation of the contracts.

One change that I have suggested is just common sense: no company that has been investigated for fraud should be able to bid for the contract. I do not wish to see sleight of hand, with the suggestion that such companies will not be the primary providers but can be part of a consortium. They will play a key role within those consortia because of the resources they have.

New clause 9 suggests that companies that are the prime contractors for the Work programme in an area should not be able to bid, and I say that because there is a potential conflict of interest. If one company is implementing the Work programme at the same time as the new probation system for those with sentences of less than 12 months and there is a sanction, the Work programme will lose out. That introduces a conflict of interest within the system. What worries me is that a number of companies will bid for a range of contracts in an area, across the piece, with the result that mini-monopolies will be built up in particular geographical areas.

My new clauses are simply administrative amendments. New clause 13 says that we need an annual report to Parliament and I know that that is a standard amendment that we table for a range of legislation, but in this instance it is vital. I want to know from an annual report from the Government exactly how the contracts are being performed against, how safe my constituents are, how safe the offenders are and how successful the implementation of the new system is.

I do not want to go over everything I have said before. I am extremely worried and I will hold Ministers to account if any of my constituents are injured as a result of the Bill. I have said that twice before. In fact, the late Paul Goggins advised me that I was threatening Ministers and I said, “Yes, I am actually, because they are threatening my constituents with this legislation.” I hope that today we will be able to defeat it or at least pass some amendments that will stabilise the system and enable us to gain some accountability. If not, I hope that the other place will say no and introduce an element of common sense to the debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Wright]

The point I am making is that the rules, which pre-existed this Government by the way, are very clear: investigation is not the same thing as conviction. We have made it very clear, however, that we have initiated our own investigations. I have warned the hon. Lady before that she is sitting in a very large glass house and that she should think before throwing stones. This is a contract negotiated by her Government and substantially abused, it would seem, during her Government’s term in office. That abuse was discovered by this Government and acted on by this Government. She is hardly in a position to suggest that we have behaved in any way improperly. In any event, I remind the House that both organisations, Serco and G4S, are not on the list of lead providers.

The hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington raised the question of whether those organisations could act in a supporting role. The answer is that we will want to look very carefully not just at the process of corporate renewal those companies are undergoing at the moment but at the specific bids they are making. However, they are not on the list of lead providers. I remind Opposition Members that we were told not so very long ago that the proposals could never work without G4S and Serco, that no one would be interested in bidding. We have a list of 30 different bidders, comprising 50 different organisations at lead bidder level. The Opposition are simply wrong about the level of interest.

[John McDonnell]

I just want to get this absolutely clear and on the record. What the Minister is saying is that the two organisations that the Serious Fraud Office is investigating will be allowed to bid as part of a consortium for some of these contracts. In addition, I see that also on the list are A4E, which, if I remember rightly, was forced to hand back money to the Government as a result of its failure on contracts—in fact, some fraudulent activity on contracts—for the Department for Work and Pensions. We are opening up this whole network to a group of villains.

[Jeremy Wright]

The hon. Gentleman needs to be very careful with his language. He needs to understand that someone being investigated is not the same thing as someone being found responsible for poor conduct. It is important for a Justice Minister, in particular, to recognise that distinction. I assure him that in relation to each and every bid we receive we will look very carefully not just at the bid but at the organisations making the bid. He has heard me say on many occasions that we will not be awarding contracts to any organisation we think unfit to hold them.

Let me make the point, because it has been raised, that all the bidders on our list have experience of either working with offenders or across the wider criminal justice system. This is exactly the broad market that we want to see deliver these services. Below the community rehabilitation company level, we want to ensure that smaller organisations from the voluntary community and social enterprise sectors are able to play a key role in delivering rehabilitation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Wright]

I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman’s characterisation of the Work programme, and anyway, as he might have heard me say more than once, this proposal is not a clone of that programme. It is a different proposal, as it must be, because the criminal justice system is a different entity. It is important to recognise that.

On smaller voluntary organisations, about which people have understandable concerns, the House might be interested to know that along with the 30 lead providers that have passed the competition’s first stage, a further 800 organisations have expressed an interest in playing a role as part of the wider supply chain, with more than 550 voluntary sector organisations among them. In the process of contract management, we will want to manage properly the relationships between the larger and smaller players to ensure that those relationships are sustainable in the long term.

[John McDonnell]

Let me explain to the Minister why some of us feel strongly about this matter and why some of our language is strong. The Government awarded the contract for unpaid work in Greater London—so this affects our constituencies—to Serco. I will briefly set out some of the problems that have occurred: works shops have been closed, shutting down placements for women high-risk offenders; offenders recently complained to a probation officer in north-west London—my area—that no supervisors were available onsite; and rival gang members have been placed on the same scheme and transported in the same way. In addition, a known sex offender was alleged to be on the same placement as a victim. That is why we are angry.

[Jeremy Wright]

I understand the hon. Gentleman’s concern, but I do not agree with his characterisation of Serco’s contract. As he would expect, we have looked closely at its performance under the contract and, again, I assure him that we will look closely at all those who bid for this work. As with all competitions, the decision to award each contract depends on our being satisfied that bidders can meet our standards in respect of quality of service and price and, in this case too, on our being satisfied about the financial risk being taken to reduce reoffending and ensuring good value for the taxpayer. If we are not satisfied that overall bidders can meet our requirements, we will not award them contracts.

Hon. Members have raised the issue of the management of high-risk offenders, so let me make it clear exactly what will be involved. We are creating a new national probation service to manage directly all offenders who pose a high risk of serious harm and any sexual or violent offenders subject to multi-agency public protection arrangements. After an offender has been sentenced, the NPS will make an initial assessment of an offender’s risk of causing harm, and all offenders assessed as posing a high risk of serious harm will be the responsibility of the NPS. For low and medium-risk offenders, CRCs will be required to manage any risk of serious harm that the offender might present and to have appropriately trained staff and robust procedures in place for the management of cases where the risk of serious harm escalates to high during the offender’s supervision. They will also be contractually required to refer cases back to the NPS if they consider that the risk of serious harm might be escalating. In the end, the decision will be taken by the NPS.

New clauses 5 and 13 deal with reports by the Secretary of State to Parliament and the public on the impact of the reforms we intend to make. I want to reassure the House that the Government are already committed to acting in the spirit of those amendments. We are already considering how we can provide information about reoffending rates broken down by CRCs and the NPS. As Members will know, the MOJ already publishes reoffending statistics, not just annually but every three months, broken down by probation trust, prison and upper and lower-tier local authorities. I am happy to commit to the House that, in the future, the reports will break down reoffending rates for the different CRCs and the NPS. Indeed, as a first step, we have already published on the MOJ website a set of indicative figures to show what reoffending rates and cohort sizes in each contract package area would have looked like had the new structure been in place for the 2005-10 period. We are also piloting the justice data lab, about which I have spoken before, which will give providers the opportunity to match the performance of their cohort with something comparable.

On freedom of information, CRCs will be required in contracts to assist the MOJ in discharging its obligations under the Freedom of Information Act—very much along the lines of what my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), the Chairman of the Select Committee, outlined earlier, and in accordance with his Committee’s reports and conclusions.

On penalties, we are developing a performance framework that will include financial penalties for services not delivered to time or to quality. Contracts for CRCs will reflect that and, as I have said, the House will be able to see that this is the case when we publish those contracts in draft. I do not want to lose sight—nor should the House—of the major prizes here: first, expanding support for offenders released from short sentences and, secondly, developing a through-the-gate system for offenders released from prison. I think that that commands a broad measure of support.

That brings me to new clause 6, tabled by the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd). I want to reassure him that as part of our reforms there will be a new resettlement service provided in custody for all offenders before their release. This will be tailored to the individual’s needs, but is likely to include support in finding accommodation, family support, mentoring and financial advice. Services in custody will be underpinned by the changes to the way in which the prison estate is organised. That will mean that, in most cases, the same professional can work with offenders in custody and continue their rehabilitation work in the community.

As the right hon. Gentleman would expect, the Ministry of Justice and the National Offender Management Service are working closely together to ensure that the Prison Service is well prepared to implement these proposals. Right from the outset of these reforms, we established a joint working group on this topic that reports to senior officials and ultimately to Ministers. The working group has commissioned an analytical model of prisoner flows through the prison estate. That allows us to test the impact on prisoner flows and locations from implementing the resettlement prison allocation model. Furthermore, I can reassure the right hon. Gentleman that the Prison Service is undertaking a full review of facilities and staffing levels at all proposed resettlement prisons. Together all these things will ensure that the changes we are proposing are deliverable and sustainable, which I think is exactly his concern.

On new clause 4, I understand that the case of Opposition Members is that this is a huge leap in the dark and that no testing of what we are doing is or will be going on. That is not the case. Let me set out to the House the key elements that make up our reforms, what we are doing to test them and the steps we have built in to assess how effectively they are working at key stages of implementation.

First, there are the reforms at the heart of the Bill: the extension of licence and supervision to offenders released from short custodial sentences. There are lawyers among Opposition Members, and they will know, and ought to appreciate, that with a change to the sentencing framework of this magnitude, it cannot be desirable to introduce it one part of the country but not another. To do so would risk postcode justice, with some offenders getting different sentences from others.

To expand supervision to the under-12-month group, as we all say we want to do, we need to make the changes at a national level. That means funding those changes at a national level. The savings to fund the changes come from two sources; first, the efficiencies generated by competing supervision of low and medium-risk offenders and, secondly, the back office savings from moving to 21 from 35 CRCs, along with a single national probation service. Competing services in only one area of the country, if that is what is being proposed—I have heard little detail as to what sort of piloting is being proposed here—would extend supervision to short-sentenced offenders but, in every other respect, we are carrying out extensive local testing of the reforms in no fewer than 14 probation trusts. There is also the testing we are carrying out on the new operating model for the CRCs and the NPS. Those tests will enable us to inform how the new processes will operate once implemented. The first round of tests has already started and will continue over the coming months.

Secondly, there is the important fact that the 21 CRCs that we are creating will remain in public sector ownership for some months after their creation until the conclusion of the competition. This gives us further opportunities to carry on testing and to refine the system. Caseloads will not all necessarily transfer at the point the NPS and CRCs come into being, and we have made it clear to trusts that where there is a case for doing so, we will give greater latitude to allow for caseload transfer to operate more slowly than the people transfer process. That will avoid disruption and the type of dangers that that might create, which Opposition members have described.

Thirdly, there is the testing that we are carrying out of our approach to payment by results. We have consulted extensively on this and there are also pilots under way to test different approaches to payment by results. Opposition members would have us believe that there has been no piloting and that there is no piloting. Neither of those two things is true.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rory Stewart]

I thank the hon. Lady very much for her offer and I would love to take it up.

On the penultimate intervention, the provision of mobile phones is a simple example of a very important point that every Member has raised so far: what we do know about veterans who offend and reoffend is that the military provides a very powerful possible support network. Unlike other sectors of society, it provides an instrument or lever that could be incredibly helpful and supportive to backing people in their recovery process. Trying to make sure that we get the very best out of institutions that already exist will be the key. We have an obligation to the individuals who offend and reoffend; we have a particular obligation towards the military; and we have an obligation towards society as a whole.

[John McDonnell]

I add my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis) and, in particular, to the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd). I attended the first session he held in Portcullis House about two and a half years ago, which was also supported, I think, by the ubiquitous Harry Fletcher, and we were shocked at the scale of the numbers of ex-military who were in prison and at the scale of the trauma they were experiencing. I welcome the review. It will be useful to get clarity on time scales and on how the recommendations will be dealt with by the Government at a later stage. I appreciate that.

I want to speak to new clause 12, which stands in my name and relates to domestic abuse. The scale of domestic abuse and the figures involved are always shocking. Last year, 7% of women reported some form of domestic violence or abuse against them. Two women a week are killed by partners or lovers, and the number of sexual assaults is about 70,000.

The existing probation service established national programmes in response to the issue. There is a 30-week programme in which perpetrators are placed, but there are concerns that it will be lost as this privatisation rolls out. I therefore suggest in my new clause 12 that programmes for tackling domestic abuse on which offenders are placed should remain with the national probation service. That would give the assurance that such work will continue and that there is consistency of approach. It would also allay several fears. I do not want to make this a contentious point, but one of the fears that has been excited relates to the unpaid work programme that Serco has taken over, in that some women’s workshops have been closed as a result of that privatisation. We do not want that to be experienced by such important programmes as those currently provided by the probation service, but they would be laid waste if privatisation took place.

The new clause is fairly straightforward. It would ensure consistency of approach, as well as the maintenance of such programmes, and the best way to do that is to retain those programmes within the state sector.

Offender Rehabilitation Bill [Lords]

John McDonnell Excerpts

Monday 11th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sadiq Khan]

The 2007 Act was permissive. It gave the Justice Secretary powers that could be used if probation trusts were failing. Probation trusts were supposed to commission services; I will come on to how the Act works in practice. As far as the Bill is concerned, if I were in a fit of pique, I would be an ideologue and do what my gut told me, but I look at the evidence on what works. That is what I will look at when I become Justice Secretary on 8 May 2015.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

For the record, it was made explicit in debates on the 2007 legislation that it would allow the flexibility to introduce the voluntary sector in particular, not the wholesale privatisation of the probation service.

[Sadiq Khan]

My hon. Friend reminds me that there are examples of probation trusts around the country that work with the private and voluntary sectors, and with charities. What the 2007 legislation was not about was a control freak Justice Secretary deciding from his desk in Whitehall who runs probation in different parts of the country. That is why there is a reasoned amendment in my name and the names of other right hon. and hon. Members. If the Justice Secretary has his way, in less than a year, there will be a system in place to deliver the measures in the Bill that is massively different from today’s. As the House will know, there is considerable alarm among experts, management, staff, the police, and MPs in all parts of the House at the proposed restructuring of the probation service.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Alan Beith]

There are complex legal reasons that I will not try and go into now, but I cannot imagine that this House would want a company that is currently the subject of a serious criminal investigation to be awarded a criminal justice contract. Both companies, of course, have contracts in criminal justice in other areas of activity or other parts of government, and they have perfectly satisfactory ratings on some of those. It is a difficult issue to deal with.

[John McDonnell]

As the right hon. Gentleman said, we should be clear about satisfactory ratings. He should refer to the press this morning because G4S has been referred for prosecution as a result of the forgery of documents that allowed the deportation of a prisoner.

[Sir Alan Beith]

I think I have made myself clear about what view the House would take if a company that was the subject of a serious fraud inquiry were to be awarded a bid in those circumstances. I do not think Ministers are in any doubt on that point.

My point about the market was generally much wider because we must take proper account of whether the Department has the capacity to manage that market. Indeed, it has been said on at least one occasion that the Department wants to draw new entrants into the market and cultivate new capacity, but has it got the capacity to do that? We must consider that important question.

On finance and timing, the Government have not made publicly available any assessment of the financial risk of not delivering the programme to the agreed time scale, quality or cost. The risk register apparently suggests there is a 51% to 80% risk that the reforms will fail to deliver the promised scale of savings.

--- Later in debate ---

[Paul Goggins]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that intervention. The truth is, of course, that because the Justice Secretary started with a model of how he wants effectively to privatise 70% of what the probation service currently delivers, he has to squeeze all that risk into that larger majority of the work. This top-down model simply will not relate to or reflect the kind of risks that many offenders pose.

[John McDonnell]

The point made by probation officers —my right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) identified it, too—is the issue of professionalism in identifying the trigger that takes place and pushes the risks to a higher level, even from those on shorter sentences.

[Paul Goggins]

I agree with my hon. Friend, who is a great expert on this issue. I am happy to admit that he and I have not always agreed on every point about probation over the years, but he well understands that service, what happens on the front line and the difficult judgments and assessments that probation officers have to make when faced with people who can often be dangerous and difficult in the context of the chaotic lives that many of them lead. I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s intervention.

Reference has been made to the concerns of police and crime commissioners. This is interesting, because these are the new people elected under this Government’s reforms, yet they, too, are expressing concerns. They are doing so because they understand the importance of local partnerships for reducing crime and managing offenders. They are deeply worried that this Government’s proposals will erode those relationships, weaken them and put public safety at risk. That is why they are expressing their concerns.

Another major issue is that two of the major private sector providers, which are the most likely bidders for the work on offer from the Ministry of Justice—G4S and Serco—are under criminal investigation, following allegations of their over-charging for services that they are already contracted to provide for the MOJ. I give credit to the Justice Secretary, because when he found out about this, he came to the House to make a statement and has taken appropriate action since then. I commend him for that, but the implication of his robust approach is that these two companies should be sidelined from the process of contract allocation at this stage. I say that not as someone who is ideologically opposed to the private sector having a role in this sphere—quite the reverse.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kate Green]

We have clearly heard the same rumours. It is important that we understand what the new risk assessment tool will look like, what the implications will be for the overall risk profile of this cohort of offenders, and whether we can expect to see some significant shifts in the way that the level of risk is identified and assessed.

[John McDonnell]

This is getting barmier by the minute. The transaction costs need to be assessed. The transaction costs of the reassessment of offenders with the new risk assessment tool will be massive. In addition, there will be the transaction costs of monitoring the flow of money as offenders move between the risk categories.

[Kate Green]

Perhaps I am overcomplicating what is being proposed by the Government, but it seems to me that the whole financial structure and the way in which that relates to risk assessment is very unclear to Members—certainly to Opposition Members. It would be helpful, during the passage of the Bill, for the Government to make that clear to us so that we can understand the true financial as well as the risk consequences of what is proposed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lorely Burt]

It is above my pay grade to comment on the Minister’s thoughts about the complex circumstances with regard to a specific contractor. He has, however, heard what I said and the “Hear, hears” of my honourable colleagues.

To return to the widening of the service, the Government’s answer is that introducing the private sector and competition to the market will drive down costs, which will release the money to widen the service to those shorter-term offenders who get little or no supervision at present. I hope that that equation will work. We are not privy to the analysis the Government have used. I am prepared to go with it, because I want this new system. I want short-term prisoners to be looked after on release and to have the opportunity to turn their lives around, and I want society as a whole to benefit from reduced reoffending.

What sort of organisations will they be? What does the private sector know about finding homes and jobs and helping ex-prisoners build new lives? My understanding is that the new organisations will probably be consortiums of private businesses, charities and not-for-profit organisations. A lot of tonight’s debate has been about whether the probation trusts will be able to tender for private sector contracts, but I understand that it is not appropriate for them to do so, because they are Government funded and such contracts involve risk. However, could my hon. Friend the Minister explain under what circumstances existing probation trusts or, indeed, existing probation officers could join consortiums, because their expertise will be in great demand and highly valued?

There are other concerns about whether the private sector will manipulate the system for gain. It is, after all, in it to make a profit. I hope that my Government have learned from the past failures of other privatised schemes under, perhaps, both Labour and Conservative Governments. I hope that grass-roots organisations will not be pushed, as the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) has said, into less-than-good deals for the delivery of their part of the programme.

The programme must deliver real results. We know that the best schemes of this nature have achieved up to a 12% decrease in offending rates, and I hope that consortium bids will approach that best-in-class target. The percentage of the payment at risk is also very important. It must be a substantial proportion of the fee in order to drive the consortiums into putting everything into working together so as to enable offenders who want to turn their lives around to be able to do so.

Finally, I want to dwell on the repercussions of the changes for those who work in the probation service, because they are anxious that they will find themselves either under the constant stress of having to deal with high-risk offenders or, potentially, out of a job altogether. I am assured that the need for our excellent probation officers will be greater than ever and that there will be more work for them to do, not less. Those who do not want to work with high-risk offenders will find that their skills and expertise will be welcomed in the community rehabilitation centres to which they can be transferred. Will my hon. Friend the Minister outline the scheme under which those transfers will take place? I understand that it is a Cabinet Office scheme that is at least as good as the TUPE transfer, but I would be grateful for any clarification.

[John McDonnell]

The unions involved have consistently asked that that be inserted directly into the Bill itself. Does the hon. Lady support that?

[Lorely Burt]

I understand that the Government have already done a fair amount of consultation. I am not aware of the exact way in which the unions are feeding into Government, but I know that the Government value the unions very much and will take into account their points and their wisdom.

The probation officers who elect to stay will find that not all their work will involve high-risk prisoners. Forty per cent. of their work is based in the courts and in inspecting approved premises. In some models, the work of probation officers is divided, so some of them already do the vast majority of their work in supervising high-risk offenders. As long as they are not forced into such work, that seems fair enough.

In conclusion, I hope that I have been helpful. I am listening carefully to the concerns being raised and I look forward to working with organisations associated with the probation service and with the unions in order to ensure that once the Bill has been through Committee, it will be as robust and effective as possible.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Wood]

The hon. Lady referred to “noise in the system” and I was beginning to understand what she meant. She has already made her speech.

I was suggesting that rather than being motivated by the wonderful new system of being paid only by results, the companies, will find a way to operate in which so-called results are unimportant in determining how much profit they make. That might be difficult for the hon. Lady to accept, but we ought to consider the kind of companies that the Government are talking to and that will be central to the new way of organising the probation service.

Many attempts have been made to downplay that point. The hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate, among others, said that we cannot make judgments about G4S on the basis of minor indiscretions because it has 74,000 employees. Companies that engage in Government contracts and then defraud the Government, that make claims for transporting prisoners who are dead or for providing services to people who have long since left the system, and that are under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office are not the kind of companies that the Government should consider offering further contracts to. Although the Minister was offered the opportunity earlier to tell the House that the two companies that are under serious investigation will be debarred until cleared, he has failed, yet again, to give that assurance. Apparently, companies that behave in that disreputable and dishonest fashion will be considered perfectly acceptable to play a part in the new system. I find that completely unacceptable.

As recently as today, we have heard more evidence of the performance of G4S. Three of its members falsified documents and were guilty, as far as I can see, of perjury. Judge Mostyn said:

“The three officials behaved disgracefully”.

He added:

“When agents of the state falsify documents it undermines, if not fatally then certainly very seriously, the trust of the people in the operation of the rule of law. It makes no difference if, as here, the agents are private contractors to whom the secretary of state has outsourced her powers. Corruption by state officials is insidious and corrosive.”

That was this week’s horror story; last week’s was about the torturing of prisoners.

[John McDonnell]

It is important that we are aware of what happened today. The judge found that G4S had redacted papers that took out information and evidence that the person had been tortured and that therefore that person was eventually deported back to a place that had put his life at risk.

[Mike Wood]

Absolutely. We are talking about people who collude in torture, and allegations that people are torturing prisoners in their care. Apparently, however, those people are perfectly acceptable and might play a part in privatising our probation service out of existence. We could, of course, also look at Serco, which is one of the other main contenders.

In spite of what the hon. Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson)—who is no longer in his place—said earlier, the experience of Serco in managing the London unpaid work scheme is instructive. Reports from that scheme and other parties working, or hoping to work, in partnership with Serco—partnership is crucial in this area of our service—state that they have huge difficulties getting through to Serco’s helpline when they need to speak to it about any issue relating to an individual offender. They also said that Serco has failed to provide adequate information to offenders and probation staff, leading to unnecessary costs to the taxpayer through breach orders and subsequent court costs, and that previous good relations in partnerships have been destroyed by the actions of that private company. In spite of attempts to downplay such issues, those are the kinds of company that will win these contracts should they be let in the way that we are told they will be. We will have G4S responsible for probation, and Eddie Stobart responsible for legal aid.

The hon. Member for Solihull again used the R-word when she assured the House that both parts of the coalition are up for this revolutionary change. We need not revolutionary change, however, but testing, piloting and evaluation, and we need a far more cautious approach for two reasons, the first of which is the danger to the public, which has been mentioned extensively during the debate. I am in the Chamber representing 120,000 people —men, women and children—in my constituency, just as every other Member is doing. I have a responsibility to look to their safety, and these proposals will lessen that safety. My constituents will be more likely to become victims of crime as a result of dangerous, volatile, difficult-to-predict, sometimes professional criminals and offenders being supervised by untrained, unqualified, poorly paid, temporary, unmotivated, so-called probation staff. There is an enormous danger to the public inherent in and right at the heart of these proposals.

Secondly, I think that so far in the debate—I have been here since the beginning—no one has mentioned the danger to the criminal justice system. There is the idea that we can take on work with at least another 60,000 offenders a year and that the whole system will not become swamped, even though we are cutting resources at the same time—well, we are told that it will be within the same cost envelope, but that is 40,000, 50,000, 60,000 or 70,000 extra offenders a year to be dealt with within that same cost envelope. I am trying not to say that this does not add up, but it does not add up, does it?

We need a much more cautious approach because the Bill is being introduced with the lie that it is about high-minded aspirations to provide a service for petty offenders, those on short-term sentences and the like. We know, however, that the proposals are a blatant attempt to take public money and transpose it into the coffers of private companies. We also know what happens if we introduce legislation on that basis. Think of the Child Support Agency. How many years has it taken to get the CSA—which was introduced by the previous Tory Government, on a lie—back to something fit for purpose? How many lives have been ruined? How many injustices caused? Yet that is exactly what is being proposed in the Bill.

I have considerable concerns about the Bill, and to conclude I would like to place on record a few of the issues that cause me particular concern. First, the Government’s own impact assessment is one of the most vacuous documents that I have read for a long time. There is no costing anywhere in it: “We don’t have to cost it; we know what the cost will be, but we are not going to tell you. If we told you, the private companies involved might know.” There are estimates and guesstimates about the implications for the number of offenders, including those in breach of an order or going back to prison—the spectrum is so wide that it is rather like the weather report: “Tomorrow, there’s going to be weather.”

We are told that 600 extra prison places will be needed —we are talking about a new prison. We were told as recently as last month that in a prison estate of 85,000 places, there were 800 vacancies on the day in question. In fact, earlier in the debate, we were told that the figure is now down to 600. Is every one of those places to be filled by someone in breach of an order under the proposals? Surely not, yet that is the logic of 13,000 to 17,000 extra breaches leading to 600 extra prison places being needed. Any suggestion that that will be achieved by the expenditure of £15 million of extra public funds is, as again we all know, nonsense.

The proposals on drugs and drug testing deserve a debate of their own. We have heard an enormous amount of nonsense about what will be achieved by drug testing, and by the requirement to appear and private organisations that can drug test if they choose to. They will, of course, have to bear the cost, so we can be fairly sure that they will not choose to test very often. A Government Member has said that extending testing to class B drugs was to catch people who are on cannabis. That might be a laudable aim in all kinds of ways, but to what effect in terms of reoffending? The Blenheim project in London—a drug and alcohol project—has said that the measure seems

“to be based on a misplaced belief that comparatively widespread use of cannabis amongst prisoners indicates a strong link to offending behaviour”,

yet the UK Drug Policy Commission—no less—reports that

“users of other drugs have much lower rates of offending than those who use heroin and crack and are less likely to have committed a crime to get drugs or when under the influence of drugs”.

If we are not careful, petty offenders who have been released from prison on licence and who have amended, or who are coming to grips with, their offending behaviour, will be caught out by testing for cannabis. It will be found in their system and they will go back to prison. How does that save money? How does that improve the situation for that offender or for society?

If the Minister had read any one of the three volumes of prison diaries of his erstwhile colleague, Lord Archer, he would know that what happened in the prison system when it introduced mandatory drugs testing will happen outside the prison system. If a prisoner has a drug in his or her system that can be discovered for four weeks, they will move to a drug that cannot be discovered in that time. That is what has happened in our prison system where, as was reported recently, it is easier to get crack cocaine than a bar of soap. Prisoners have opted to move from cannabis to heroin. That is what will happen outside. What on earth is that about?

DrugScope, which has been referred to and which is probably the leading independent centre for drug expertise, has expressed enormous misgivings, as has just about every other organisation involved with drug addicts. They work daily to achieve results. The Government will not listen to probation trusts or probation officers, but those organisations are another group of experts doing the job that the Government believe they know better than.

We are told that a national probation service will be formed. We should remember that it will be responsible for the most serious 30% of offenders—the murders and rapists and the like to which the hon. Member for Solihull has referred. It will be responsible for multi-agency public protection arrangements and for breaching, yet it will be based regionally. We are going to tear the heart out of the relationship between officers and the serious offenders. The larger geographic area will make a difference.

I have been a probation officer and can tell hon. Members that getting a probationer to appear in my office was the first part of the job. What if I move the office 50 miles or 100 miles further away? Does anyone believe that that would improve the chances of the probationer appearing? Does anyone consider that it will lead to less offending? It will not. Let us not forget that such offenders are not petty offenders, but dangerous people. I therefore have grave doubts. Are we setting up the so-called national probation service—the public part that picks up the bits that the private sector does not want, cannot handle, has failed with and so on—to fail?

The Ministry of Justice has said that the Bill encapsulates

“a complex, large-scale change programme to be”

introduced and

“completed within an aggressive timetable.”

The situation is that what works will be replaced by what will not work, on the basis of an ideological hunch from the Secretary of State. Here in the House on 9 January—do hon. Members remember?—he said:

“Sometimes we just have to believe something is right and do it”—[Official Report, 9 January 2013; Vol. 556, c. 318.]

The Secretary of State himself told us that that was the basis and justification for doing away with the two pilots that would have given him an evidence base. Even though he was new to his job, he knew in the first week that they would not have given him an evidential basis for anything of the kind.

In last week’s debate, several Members recited the number of incidents of reoffending in any one year, and one of them said, “Something has to be done.” That is the cry of the impotent and the powerless the world over. It has now apparently become the watchword of the Government with regard to the criminal justice system. That just will not do. We deserve much better, and the public need and deserve much better. The Government have to rethink this proposed legislation radically.

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend the Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Paul Goggins) referred to my long expertise in this field. Well, my expertise goes back to 1997, and I have dealt with successive Ministers. I am also the secretary of the justice unions group, of which the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) is the chair.

Having dealt with probation officers for all that time, I can say that I have never known morale to be so low. There is real fear and anxiety among them and their families about the future. Hon. Members need to recognise that. The strike has been mentioned. People do not go on strike lightly—certainly not in this service. These are dedicated professionals. The National Association of Probation Officers have been pressing for years to be able to supervise those on short-term sentences, and the irony is that that will be used to privatise their jobs. The tragedy is that probation officers have delivered on everything that has been asked of them, and not just on a wing and a prayer—piloted studies have demonstrated their effectiveness.

I refer Government Members to the briefing from London Councils and the Mayor of London, which demonstrated the local partnerships that had been working in London, as well as the other work that had taken place. I refer also to the briefing on the integrated offender management service, which has been independently evaluated by Sheffield Hallam university. This is where the police and probation and local authorities come together and work with offenders with a high risk of reoffending. Sheffield Hallam’s independent study showed that in 2012-13 the service reduced reoffending by 52%, one of the highest success rates for any scheme. It found that the scheme was economically viable: over five years, for every £1 invested, there was a saving to the taxpayer of £1.59, and over 10 years that would go up to £1.79.

The Sheffield Hallam university study is not like the Peterborough study. I have a lot of respect for what is going on in Peterborough, but that is a voluntary scheme. People are referred to the Sheffield Hallam university scheme, almost on a mandatory basis. To be frank, we were waiting expectantly for the full results and evaluation of the Peterborough scheme next year. That is what we were promised: an objective assessment of what worked, and evidence-based policy making, which seems to have gone out of the window. It is not that the probation service is not willing to change, reform or expand; it is just that the Government refuse to allow the one organisation that has a proven track record of success to become involved in the supervision of the offenders we are talking about.

On privatisation, I do not want to go over what has been said about Serco, G4S and the rest of it; I like the example of the privatisation of the court interpretation service. People turned up who could not speak the relevant foreign language. One would have to invent something really creative to enable that to happen. The London community payback scheme has been mentioned; in my area, we have lost invaluable staff and volunteers as a result of the scheme’s mismanagement. Hostel accommodation was privatised but had to be brought back into the public sector because it was so bad. If the question is what happens to staff in future, we should look to the prison privatisations: wage rates in privatised prisons are 23% lower than in state prisons, and the conditions—there are issues with the level of training and high staff turnover—are undermining the service.

The Chair of the Justice Select Committee mentioned our fear that the market does not exist at the moment. The Opposition are being criticised on the issue of energy because there are six major players in that field, and that is not an acceptable market. In the probation market, we may be down to two players. If the Serious Fraud Office’s investigation keeps going, two will almost certainly be taken out of the game, and we will be left with two or three big players. That is not a market; that is not competition. And the argument that competition will find us all the savings is like a belief in Santa Clause or the tooth fairy.

I heard the argument about mutuals. Probation officers come into the profession not to manage a company but to manage offenders. I like the example of the Government mutual that was set up to administer the civil service pension scheme. The day the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General came to the House to announce that change, the staff who were supposed to be participating in it were outside on strike, because the move was imposed on them, rather than being allowed to evolve.

I am concerned about costs, because it is quite clear that there is no real prospect of finding the savings through competition; that has been demonstrated in the case of other services. Where will the money be found to pay for the supervision of at least 50,000 to 70,000 additional offenders? There will potentially be 600 in a new prison. I think that there will be significantly more breaches than has been suggested, because we are dealing with people with chaotic lives. More and more people will be banged up. I remember the projections that the professionals gave us for prison growth: we were told that the number would never go above 60,000, but then it reached 80,000.

Where is the money to be found to pay for all that? I do not think it will come from savings through competition. It will come from where it always does: job cuts, pay cuts, the deskilling of the job, and the undermining of conditions of employment, including the pension. Reference was made to TUPE principles having an effect. We have had this debate time and again. To give assurances to staff, the last Government put a commitment to TUPE in some of their legislation, and that is what we would expect to find in this Bill to reassure professional staff.

We are requiring probation officers, and possibly private sector staff, to operate in a completely different environment. I welcome some elements of the legislation relating to supervision of those dependent on drugs, and other provisions, but to be frank, we met drug organisations in the drug and alcohol forum last week, and it reports exactly what we have heard in discussions with the Department for Work and Pensions. With the devolution of budgets to a local level, drugs services are being cut. Probation officers or private sector staff supervising offenders and seeking to get them off drugs will refer them to services that no longer exist.

One of my hon. Friends talked about how women will be affected. Reports are coming back from area after area that women’s centres and women’s services are being cut dramatically. We are setting up a system to fail. What does that mean in reality? My hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen (Mike Wood), who is a former probation officer, hit the nail on the head. We are setting up a system to fail, and in this case failure does not mean that something will not run on time or something may not be delivered on time. This failure puts our constituents at risk and it puts individual offenders at risk as well. I shall give one example from my constituency.

Feltham detention centre has been mentioned. When people come out of Feltham, there is a search by social services departments, probation and so on for accommodation for them. That accommodation is now managed by individual private sector organisations. In my area they have leased individual properties and put young people in those properties, largely unsupervised. One of them that I have been dealing with over the past fortnight is supervised for only three nights of the week. Only last Friday the police were called out twice. A month ago a neighbour had to take one of the young people living in the accommodation into her property because that person had been stabbed by another ex-offender—there is no supervision whatsoever.

When a system is set up which relies on the private sector and it does not deliver, in this area we are not talking about minor failures. We are talking about significant risk to life and limb of individual ex-offenders and of the general public. I repeat what I said last time and I am deadly serious about this: if any of my constituents are injured or harmed in any way as a result of this legislation, I will come for individual Ministers. I will seek to ensure that they never hold public office again.

Every warning has been given in this House, time and again by us and by professionals. I remind Members what was said by Liz Calderbank from the inspectorate. She said:

“Any lack of contractual or operational clarity between the public and private sector providers will, in our view, lead to systemic failure and an increased risk to the public.”

As chief inspector of probation, she said that

“the scale and pace of the change is considerable and we are concerned as an inspectorate that it is taken forward and implemented without any drop in performance”.

When such professionals warn a Government, their warnings need to be taken seriously. I worry, I fear for the safety of my constituents as a result of this legislation.

[Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)]

Before I start, may I pick up on a point made by the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell)? May I humbly say that this is a debating Chamber, not a Chamber to make threats to those on the Front Bench on either side of the House? Perhaps we should stick to talking, rather than threatening people.

[John McDonnell]

What happens when one of the hon. Gentleman’s constituents is injured, maimed or murdered as a result of lack of supervision by a private company as a consequence of this Bill? Who does he blame?

[Richard Drax]

I should be as upset as the hon. Gentleman or any other Member would be if such circumstances were to arise, but I do not believe that threats should be made to individual Ministers. I have made my point and I shall continue.

I praise the Dorset probation service, which is outstanding. I agree with many of the points that have been raised. I spoke in the Opposition day debate and I agree with many points made by the Opposition and by one or two Members on the Government Benches. The probation service has made comments to me about privatisation and the 70% that has been suggested in the House tonight, and there are concerns about this. Will people fall through the gaps? What about careers, as has been asked? There are serious concerns about whether this proposal from the coalition Government will work. All I would say is that something is better than nothing, as we have heard from several good speakers on the Government Benches. We must do something because the reoffending rate is unacceptable.

Perhaps the situation has become so serious that we should be even more radical than the Government now are. At the young offenders institution on Portland, Sir James Spicer, who was the MP for West Dorset—I am sure some in the House will remember him—has introduced an initiative called the Airborne Initiative. The young men from that young offenders institution are taken out to Dartmoor and for five or six days they are taken day and night across the moors to navigate and learn about team spirit, camaraderie, friendship, discipline—all the things that these reoffenders and many young men and, dare I say, young ladies need.

Will the private sector and all these good intentions solve the problem? Has it got to such a point that the state needs to be even more radical? Perhaps I could lodge an idea in the minds of those on the Front Bench. How about a third force? I am not talking about making people join the armed forces, because as an ex-soldier myself I know that that clearly would not work, but I have trained young soldiers for two years, and some of them—not all—have arrived at the barracks in a similar state of mind to many young men who are in jail today. But six months later, after the training and the discipline they have received, and the friendship and camaraderie that have been engendered, these are young men one would be proud to die with. The system works.

So why do we not have a third force in this country? Why do we not put the Border Force and Customs and Excise all under one cap badge, run it on a militaristic basis and into that organisation put young men and women who, on a third warning in the magistrates court—call it what you will—rather than being sent to the young offenders institution in Portland, are given a chance? They can spend two years in the third force or go to jail. If they go to the third force and make a mistake, they end up in jail. Those who are coming to the end of a sentence of, say, six or seven years, are told in year five that they have a choice: two more years in jail or two more years with the third force.

The third force would be manned by volunteers who made a career on the sea, in the air and on the land—manned to a large extent by ex-service personnel. Rather than give second or third-hand ships to countries like India, those ships can be kept in this country and used for that purpose. Aircraft that may have outlived their usefulness on the front line can be used in the air. Those who have served in the Army can join the third force and represent the third force on the land. I know, because I have seen it work, that when young men and women are given a structure, discipline and hope, they can be turned around. Will all the good intentions of the private sector and the probation service, which, as I said, in Dorset is exceptional, work? The problem we have heard today from my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) costs £7 billion to £10 billion a year. If we can grab just 30% or 40% of these young people and turn them around, which I believe we could do, when they leave the third force they can go on to contribute to society. They learn what it is like to be selfless, to give, to work together with other people, and to contribute to their country.

I very much hope that all these good intentions work, and I welcome something being done to cut the reoffending rate, but we could go much further and be far more radical with the future of our young people, many of whom have no structure at all in their lives. As a Conservative, I do not like the state to get involved, but perhaps the problem is so big that the state must get involved to cut the bill further. The state has the power and the money to provide something that these young people can be put into and given a chance. If the light is turned on, it is so simple. I have seen it happen. People with no hope are given a simple task to do, the structure and discipline within which to do it, and their lives are changed.

The police, ambulance and fire services ran an experiment with 12 young people aged 14 to 16 years old, out on one of the moors. They had four baddies, let us call them, four who were pretty okay, and four goodies, and they put them all together to spend the night out on the moor. The first task was run by a huge barrel-chested ex-Royal Marine. He said to them, “Right, your first task is to put up your tent.” None of these people had ever seen a tent. It was one of those old ones, with lots of bits and bobs, made of canvas. They stood there looking at it with hands in pockets and phones ringing. Their whole attitude was, “What the hell am I doing here?” Then one of them said, “Staff, could you come and help me?” The sergeant-major said, “Gentlemen, and ladies, gather around. What is the first lesson in life?” They looked at him perplexed. He said, “You’ve just done it: if you don’t understand, you ask.” Within an hour the tent was up.

The next day I watched all three groups go round quite a challenging assault course. They put the two bad boys with the two ladies and sent them around. The two young men who were the worst offenders—they clearly came across as the worst—were the best at it, and when they finished they went back, without being asked, to help the ladies, who were struggling. They finished the assault course and stood with their shoulders back, inspired. They had been gripped, disciplined and they had achieved something. I am utterly convinced that if that small glimmer of light was pursued they would have a chance in life.

It is nothing new. It is not reinventing the wheel. I believe that the Government’s intentions are honourable and good, as are the Opposition’s, but will it work, because the problem is so serious? I am afraid that my answer, from my experience of life and from looking around—I have been around a few years—is that it will not, and certainly not to the degree that it should and could.

Someone said from a sedentary position, “Put them in the Army.” I am not saying that we should put them in the Army; I am saying that many of those young people need what the Army and those sorts of careers engender. The hon. Member for Barnsley Central (Dan Jarvis), who is sitting on the Opposition Front Bench, is a distinguished former officer of the Parachute Regiment. He knows exactly where I am coming from, and I suspect that in his heart he knows I am right. We can reach lots of young people if we are more radical and daring and go back to the old-fashioned way of helping people who are in trouble and need our help. I leave that thought with Members on the Front Bench.

I will support the Bill tonight and hope that it works but, on behalf of the probation service in Dorset, I have some doubts about whether it will be sufficient. As many Members across the House have said tonight, there are genuine concerns that people will fall through the net. That is what worries me. That is the risk element. We have to accept that there is an element of risk, but there is risk in whatever we do. Have we balanced the whole argument to ensure that the risk is as minimal as possible? In this case—I do not like using this expression—only time will tell. I hope for all our sakes that it works.

Probation Service

John McDonnell Excerpts

Wednesday 30th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

Forget my speech; I just want to make a couple of points so that other Members can get in. I am the secretary of the justice unions parliamentary group, and the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) is its chair. Over the past eight years, that group has enabled us to work with probation officers, prison officers and police officers, as well as members of the Public and Commercial Services Union, to gain some understanding of what is happening in the service. To be frank, I did not vote for the previous Government’s legislation. I know that the intention was not for it to be used to roll out privatisation in this way, but I was worried that it would be.

I went to a lecture at the weekend by Angela Davis, the 1960s radical who is now a university professor. She has done research into what is called in America the “prison industrial complex”, in which every prisoner under supervision is a profitable asset—someone who people can make a profit from. I fear that that is where we are now going with this roll-out of privatisation. As others have said, we are talking about a 70% privatisation of this probation service, which is so successful at present and was about to welcome the roll-out of management of offenders with less than 12-month sentences and was rising to the challenge.

We have looked at how privatisation of the justice system has worked. Perhaps we should reflect on Oakwood prison, where a report last week told us it was easier to get drugs than a bar of soap. Privatised companies have made profits in prisons by reducing wages by 23%. That is the prospect held out to probation officers—professionals who are committed and dedicated to their task. If these people are saying—they are front-line staff who know their job—that the public will be put at risk, for God’s sake let us start listening to them.

Finally, let me send out this warning to Ministers. We have heard so much advice about the risk posed by this privatisation to my constituents and members of my community, so if Ministers go ahead irresponsibly without heeding those warnings, they will be held responsible for every member of the public who is harmed, hurt or murdered as a result of these ill-thought-out reforms. This is a warning from me: if any of my constituents are harmed, I will hold Ministers responsible and I will seek to ensure that none of them ever holds public office again.