Oral Answers to Questions

Patrick Hurley Excerpts

Tuesday 19th May 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lammy]

The hon. Gentleman left us with a prison capacity crisis. The last Government had success in reducing the number of young people in prison—he knows it, and the record is there—and I worked with Michael Gove and David Cameron as they set out on that mission. The strategy we published yesterday puts public protection first. There will always be young people who have to be in custody, but we are determined to reduce the number of young people on remand in particular by working with the most vulnerable.

[Patrick Hurley (Southport) (Lab)]

9. What progress his Department has made on a new victims code.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Catherine Atkinson)]

The Victims’ Commissioner will deliver a new, strengthened victims code. We have engaged with victims, support services and criminal justice professionals in a consultation that closed on 30 April, and we are now taking time to consider nearly 200 responses. We will issue a public response ahead of finalising the new code and bringing it into force.

[Patrick Hurley]

In my constituency, an acknowledged victim of violent crime is being alleged to be contributorily negligent in the civil courts. That is retraumatising, and appears to be contrary to natural justice. Will the Minister meet me and my constituents to discuss this further, and see what measures can be put in place to address concerns about how the civil law system deals with such cases?

[Catherine Atkinson]

The new victims code will ensure that victims know what services, support and information they are entitled to in the criminal justice system, but our civil and family courts should never be used to perpetuate the trauma that victims have suffered. I would be happy to meet my hon. Friend, or to arrange a meeting with the relevant Minister, so that we can better understand the case that my hon. Friend raises, and what his constituent faces.