Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Beith

Tuesday 9th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

Everyone else who has spoken so far seems to have explained my amendments, and I am grateful to them. I tabled new clause 1 and amendment 11 because there is now a sense of urgency about dealing with this matter. I speak as the secretary of the National Union of Journalists group in Parliament—a group of MPs drawn from various political parties in the House. Throughout proceedings on RIPA and DRIPA and now this Bill, we have been discussing this issue. To put it simply, this House has always recognised in legislation the need to protect journalists, because we see journalism as one of the bulwarks of democracy in this country. Although we may not be enamoured of journalists or individual newspapers at times, we believe they play a vital democratic role in exposing what happens, particularly in regard to the behaviour of public authorities, Governments, corporations and others. That is why over the years we have written into legislation protection for journalists, as well as for other professions where there are issues of confidentiality, and the House has accepted that in all the debates so far.

[Sir Alan Beith]

It might be better expressed as “protection for sources”, because the primary concern is not to give a special elevated status to the journalist, but to avoid a situation in which the questions are asked, “Who told him and how can we get him?”

[John McDonnell]

Exactly. I was not arguing for preferential status for journalists—God forbid that I do that here. I was coming on to that point: this is about the ability to make sure a source is protected—as we all know, sources are often whistleblowers, blowing the whistle on abuses by public authorities and others—but it is also relevant to the protection of journalists themselves. We have seen across the world how, when the confidentiality of journalists’ sources is undermined, journalists become just as much a target as their sources, and in recent years large numbers of journalists in various countries have died as a result of persecution. What I am trying to say is that it is critical that we protect the role journalists play and enable them to undertake their work.

We have legislated in accordance with that principle—in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, for example. I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Mr Howarth) that it is always difficult to find the mechanism, but the mechanism under PACE was the ability of the court to determine whether a production order should be made. We gave it over to the courts to determine that. What was important about that is that the journalist was notified of the application and could contest it before the court, and a decision would then be made that commanded the confidence of all those involved. The classic case since then is when the police failed to get an order under PACE and then used RIPA to obtain an order against a journalist to get information relating to articles that were being written, including the sources of that information. I think it was generally felt in the House that that was not what we intended when we passed PACE and was not in the spirit of RIPA. We have for some time consistently tried to get Government and this House—the responsibility falls on the shoulders of us all—to do exactly as my right hon. Friend said and to find an appropriate mechanism.

I tabled new clause 1 because I cannot find an effective mechanism other than the use of the courts at some stage. My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) asked whether it is a mechanism to enable the court to determine whether due process has been followed or the merits of a case. I have left that open for now because I welcome the discussion, but in my view, it is both.

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell]

My right hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley says that my local parish priest rather optimistically describes me as a lapsed Catholic. The secrets of the confessional need to be included; otherwise, there might be an excommunication.

The hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) makes a good point about journalism. I would like the definition to be membership of the NUJ, but there you are. These days, I would have the widest interpretation, but if it is to be contested, I would like to see a court make the decision on the basis of the evidence before it.

[Sir Alan Beith]

It is important that we distinguish what we are talking about here—the protection of the conversations that take place between lawyers and their clients and between doctors and their patients, discovered by entirely different processes. We are looking at the identification of the person who tipped someone off or provided some information. There may be good criminal law reasons for finding out who that person is, but I agree that some kind of measure is needed to ensure that those who warn a journalist or perhaps a Member of Parliament that something serious is going wrong have protection.

[John McDonnell]

Let me give one example of where RIPA was used. The case of Kirsty Green was in the evidence presented to the Home Affairs Committee by Michelle Stanistreet, the general secretary of the NUJ. Kirsty was a former regional newspaper journalist. Derby council spied on her meeting with local authority staff in 2009. Two Derby city council employees watched her when, as Derby Telegraph’s local government correspondent, she met four current and former council employees in a Starbucks coffee shop. The local authority said that RIPA was used to get surveillance authority for officials because they were protecting the council’s interests. The consequences for those individuals was a risk to their job in the local authority.

It is important that communication is protected, but names and sources also have to be protected, especially for whistleblowers, as we have seen when social workers have come forward in child abuse cases. The right hon. Gentleman makes the point well, but to me it emphasises even further the need for some judicial process in the oversight of access to the data and the way in which the legislation has been proposed.

Criminal Justice and Courts Bill

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Beith

Monday 12th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[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.

Women Offenders and Older Prisoners

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Beith

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.

Crown Dependencies

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Beith

Thursday 16th January 2014 Westminster Hall

[Sir Alan Beith]

I gave the hon. Gentleman a guarded answer earlier, because both of the points he mentioned are not matters that the Committee considered. Speaking personally, however, I have a great deal of sympathy for what he said, not least in relation to remembering what happened in the second world war. All the dependencies, but especially the Channel Islands, have every reason to remember—they remember with gratitude, of course, their eventual liberation—and we in the United Kingdom have every reason to be reminded, as we have been by a lot of television coverage in the past year, of the dreadful experiences that the islanders went through at the time. It is something that we should not forget.

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

I did not want to miss the opportunity to speak, lest my silence be taken as support for the Crown dependencies. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, I have just joined the Committee—the Labour Whips have been so careful not to overburden me for the past 17 years that I have not served on any Committee. Some of us retain concerns about the use of the dependencies as tax havens and may well wish to return to the matter at a later date.

[Sir Alan Beith]

That sounds like an ominous warning from a new member of my Committee. However, should the Committee in a future Parliament return to the matter to monitor progress, as we recommend they should, the hon. Gentleman will have the opportunity to visit the islands and to question officials of the islands and others in the financial services industry there. He will be able to satisfy himself fully on how the islands seek to manage and regulate the very considerable financial services that are administered from them.

Offender Rehabilitation Bill [Lords]

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Beith

Monday 11th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[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.

Public Forest Estate (England)

Debate between John McDonnell and Lord Beith

Wednesday 2nd February 2011 Commons Chamber

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

It is difficult to follow that. Let me be as brief as possible. I commend the hon. Member for New Forest West (Mr Swayne) on referring to the staff of the Forestry Commission. It was a shame, however, that the Secretary of State never said a single word about the staff; indeed, it was more than a shame—it was a disgrace. The staff of the Forestry Commission are extremely loyal and they have built up expertise over time.

I chair the Public and Commercial Services trade union parliamentary group. I have a representation from the president of the PCS branch at the Forestry Commission. It is worth our while listening to what he wanted Parliament to hear. He says that the staff

“have spent their entire careers, a lot of them, in the FC and are deeply traumatised at the prospect of losing their jobs.”

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

I very much endorse what the hon. Gentleman says about Forestry Commission staff, but as a constituency MP, I have seen the Forestry Commission in Northumberland shed good quality, experienced staff over many years, and whole villages that were built for forestry employees no longer have a single Forestry Commission employee living in them.

[John McDonnell]

I understand the right hon. Gentleman’s point and I have shared his concerns over the years as well.

The PCS president continued:

“For many there is no prospect of picking up other work because the economy is in such a poor state that there simply isn’t work as all of the other public services also have to make cuts…Staff in the FC are unique; they regard their jobs as vocational. They are amongst the most loyal and committed that I have ever seen.”

Most of us would share that viewpoint and want it to be placed on the record. Where we have loyal staff, I believe they deserve some loyalty from us, as their employers, as well.

The current position has been mentioned, but not as starkly as I am about to put it. The 25% cuts from the comprehensive spending review mean that from a staff of 1,400, between 300 and 350 will lose their jobs. About 29% of the cuts relate to Forest Enterprise, which manages the estate. Already 256 jobs are notified as being lost in that section. Moreover, in the Forestry Authority and Forest Research, at least 40 to 50 and possibly more jobs will be lost as the 19% cuts takes place. The organisation is structured in those three elements: Forest Enterprise, Forestry Authority and Forest Research. Expertise, however, has been built up in the whole organisation so that one feeds information to the other and the expertise becomes interchangeable. By breaking up the organisation, as the Government propose, the bulk of the work within Forest Enterprise will be sold off either to the private sector or to charities and others. The expertise will therefore be cut off from the regulatory authority section of the Forestry Commission as well as from the research element.