Oral Answers to Questions

Russell Brown Excerpts

Tuesday 17th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Simon Hughes]

I do not have all the details, but I will ensure that the right hon. Gentleman has a detailed answer, which I will put in the Library. Yesterday, when I was visiting a women’s prison in Yorkshire, I was looking at how we might improve the way in which we detect drugs. It is difficult because they are often hidden in very private places. We are absolutely determined to stop drugs coming into prisons over the wall, but also to stop them coming in on the person, which is a serious issue. I will give him the detailed figures on what progress we are making.

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

I, along with a small group of colleagues from the House, visited Brixton prison towards the back end of last year. We saw the benefits of the work that is being undertaken in two facilities there: the Clink restaurant and the Bad Boys bakery. Those benefits include a reoffending rate of only about 3%. That is the kind of work that short-term offenders need to give them the chance to restart their lives in a positive way.

[Simon Hughes]

Within the Department, I have particular responsibility for all female offenders. I have visited every single female prison and I am clear that the schemes that rehabilitate people through engaging with them and planning for training, work and housing are absolutely central. We are committed to using such schemes. May I also take this opportunity to say that there are some phenomenally excellent leadership teams in all our prisons, as well as many other people who are assisting with this project? The hon. Gentleman is right to suggest that we need to give people incentives so that they can see their route out of prison and understand that life outside is better. That will give them hope for the future.

Oral Answers to Questions

Russell Brown Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Hugh Robertson]

I certainly congratulate Sport England, which deserves particular credit for the way in which it runs the “Places People Play” fund, which I suspect was responsible for the first of the improvements that my hon. Friend mentioned. That fund could not have been put in place without the increase in funding that sport got from the national lottery in 2010.

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

Does the Minister share my concern that survey after survey shows that fewer and fewer children are participating in sport in school?

[Hugh Robertson]

I am not sure that that is entirely right. If one talks to many of the big sport governing bodies, such as British Cycling, one hears that huge numbers of people who are cycling are not picked up by the exacting criteria on which the surveys are based. As the hon. Gentleman knows, starting this September—this was the point of yesterday’s meeting—the new primary school sports premium means that £150 million will be shared by every primary school in the country. Each school will receive between £8,000 and £10,000 specifically ring-fenced to spend on sports. I would be very disappointed indeed and there would be real questions in the House if that did not produce a substantial upturn.

--- Later in debate ---

[Maria Miller]

The hon. Lady is right to highlight the challenges that women from BME communities face. The activities we are undertaking to improve access to child care and training will play an enormous part in ensuring that these women play their full part in growing our economy.

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

5. What recent progress she has made on promoting equality for disabled people.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Esther McVey)]

Recent progress includes our cross-Government disability strategy, “Fulfilling Potential—Making it Happen”, which was published on 2 July, and the launch of our two-year Disability Confident campaign on 18 July, engaging employers and giving disabled people more opportunities in business. I am pleased to say that key measures and indicators show reduced inequalities and improvements in key outcomes.

[Mr Brown]

In recent years, I have on three occasions stepped in when disabled people were on the receiving end of verbal abuse. Recent polling indicates that 17% of disabled people have had such an experience, and that 7% have been physically abused or attacked. What are the Government doing to tackle disability hate crime?

Oral Answers to Questions

Russell Brown Excerpts

Thursday 18th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

My hon. Friend was absolutely right: just like our rural broadband programme, my answer was well ahead of schedule. I simply echo what I said, but add that I will meet my hon. Friend at 4 o’clock this afternoon to discuss the issue.

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

The Minister has said in the House before that money has been allocated to the devolved Government in Edinburgh. Has there been much discussion since the allocation of that funding on how broadband is rolling out in rural areas in Scotland?

[Mr Vaizey]

We have allocated £100 million to the devolved Administration in Scotland. We have regular discussions, not just between the Minister responsible and me but among officials. We signed the highlands and islands enterprise agreement, which was one of the most difficult to sign because of the extremely rural nature of the area. I understand that roll-out plans continue apace, but I will certainly re-engage with the Scottish Minister at the earliest opportunity.

Claims Management Companies

Russell Brown Excerpts

Thursday 8th November 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price) on bringing this matter to the attention of the House. Yes, she saw me with my BlackBerry. Like most hon. Members here, I receive three or four text messages a month stating that I can claim PPI back. My good lady keeps me in check, so I know fine well that I am entitled to nothing and I have never had any claim for PPI.

I want to draw attention to a different element of claim management companies. I will not beat about the bush: I want to expose a company that is, thankfully, now defunct. It was licensed through the Ministry of Justice and used that licensing as a selling point to commit fraud and rip people off. The company Kerobo Claims, was initially based in Sale, Cheshire, and rented office space through Ravenstone UK. It advertised in local newspapers and on radio programmes and, unfortunately, one morning a constituent of mine heard an advertisement on local radio asking people if they had a loan of any description, and were they sure it would be enforceable in a magistrates court, because if not, Kerobo Claims were the people to deal with it—they could cancel that loan.

That is how my constituent was hooked. He approached the company, and said that he had a loan from Barclays. However, because it was not taken out prior to April 2007, the company could not handle it. He engaged in discussion with it and revealed that he had another loan, which was taken out prior to April 2007, and the company said that it thought it could help. Unfortunately for my constituent and his brother-in-law, as I will divulge, he did not have a credit card that predated April 2007 either, so his brother-in-law offered to help. He did that because the company said that when it had sorted the matter out, instead of sending out a cheque and asking my constituent for reimbursement, that would deal with it more quickly. Alarm bells should have rung, but they did not.

My constituent engaged his brother-in-law, who granted permission for my constituent to use his credit card. Kerobo then contacted the owner of the credit card, and said, “By the way, we think we could help you with any balance on your credit card.” He said that he had a balance of only £20, and asked what help the company could offer. Within 72 hours of the contact and the credit card details being given, Kerobo put a charge of £2,200 against the credit card for my constituent who had originally contacted it. Then, because the balance on the credit card had crept up to over £2,200, it put a charge against the credit card owner. All in all, within 72 or 96 hours, it had a charge of some £3,000. Hon. Members will understand that such a situation is embarrassing for people, so I will not divulge my constituent’s name, but I wonder how many people out there have suffered the same problem, accepted it as a bad experience, and said nothing.

I tried to contact the company by phone and e-mail, but nothing came back. I then saw a copy of the credit card statement and, surprisingly, the amount that had been taken out had gone to an account in the name of Ravenstone UK, the company renting the office accommodation to Kerobo Claims. That was somewhat strange. Some months later, I discovered that the money was being transacted through that account. The credit card company, MBNA, wanted nothing to do with it. I became suspicious, because soon afterwards the company moved to another address—Atlantic street, Altrincham. I was incensed by that and when I happened to be in the area three or four months after I had first been contacted, I went to the company’s so-called premises, which were nothing more than a mailing address. The lady there was helpful to the extent that she was apologetic, but I was only one of probably several hundred people who had called. I explained who I was and what was happening but although she was apologetic, she could do nothing.

I made further inquiries at other locations, and it became more and more obvious that the chances of getting the money back for my constituent and his brother-in-law were extremely limited. I had the names of a number of people, but they had not responded to my telephone calls and e-mails. I also had the name of Kevin Rogers-Davison, and his address and telephone number. I telephoned him and, strangely, during the whole conversation lasting seven or eight minutes he never once asked who I was. I merely said that I was phoning on behalf of the owner of the credit card. He said that he no longer had anything to do with the company and that it no longer existed. I had taken the opportunity to check his address on Google Earth, which showed a splendid, brand new, three-storey townhouse with a superb blue, two-seater Porsche outside the door. I congratulated Mr Rogers-Davison on his house and his car, and he immediately asked me whether I was threatening him. I told him that if he could see who was on the other end of the phone, he would realise that I am of no size to threaten anyone.

People like that should not get away with such activities, but I know that Kevin Rogers-Davison has gone on to other things. The hon. Lady has given clear indication of some of those who have been caught up—all sorts of people—and the tragedy is that those who ripped people off have gone on to PPI claims, and will move from that to something else. All I want to do today is draw attention to the sort of activity that has been going on.

I do not blame the Minister or the Ministry of Justice, but it needs to be recognised that all this has gone on in the name of the Ministry. The wider public out there see that as some kind of guarantee and think, “If this goes badly wrong, there is a Government Department there to back me up,” but that is not the case. When I first became involved in the case, the company had already been suspended and it had been given a period of time to put its house in order. It did not do so, and eventually it lost its licence. I will say to the Minister that the Ministry was as helpful as it possibly could be. I was in touch with the monitoring and compliance unit in Burton upon Trent. People there tried to help, but they were as frustrated as I was, and probably not half as frustrated as my constituents.

[Jackie Doyle-Price]

The hon. Gentleman is giving a powerful example of how some of these companies are deliberately set up to get rich quick and move in and out of the industry swiftly. We have a regulatory regime that allows them to set up something that is nothing more than profiteering. Would he, as I would, like to see more powers for the Ministry to suspend and de-authorise firms more quickly, because the difference is blatant when somebody is legitimate and when someone is preying on consumers?

[Mr Brown]

Absolutely, and I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. If it were at all possible, when such companies need a licence, I would give them one for a short time in order to test the water and see how good they are. I would ask them to supply details to the Ministry of Justice of some of their customers and whether those people have been satisfied with the contact they have had. It is, however, undoubtedly a get-rich-quick system and unfortunately it has left distraught families in its wake.

On this occasion, the two brothers-in-law involved had to go to another member of the family and borrow the money to pay off the credit card balance. It is a salutary tale of sheer exploitation and people who have no conscience, no mercy and who are not interested in what they do to others. I suspect that people out there will have got into such a state that they have done something untoward—perhaps a crime to get the situation dealt with and get the money back. I even suspect that, in some cases, a person may have taken their own life. I have heard of examples of that without being able to verify whether it was true. It is a sad situation, and one that I hope the Government can do something about.

Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme

Russell Brown Excerpts

Wednesday 7th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Karl Turner (Kingston upon Hull East) (Lab)]

I am grateful to be called to speak in this important debate, and to follow the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt). He worked hard when he was in the Ministry of Justice; I did not always agree with him, but I know that he was committed to his brief.

I received briefs from all sorts of organisations in preparation for this debate, one of which was the RMT. Its general secretary, Bob Crow, is a very good friend of mine, but I did not expect to be reading a brief from the RMT and imagining a situation in which Bob Crow agreed with the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood). It beggars belief because the right hon. Gentleman is not known for his left-wing tendencies.

It was disappointing—although not surprising—that on 1 November a motion on the Draft Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme 2012 was passed by a narrow majority in the Seventh Delegated Legislation Committee, despite many Tories having rejected those cuts some weeks before. Tories on the First Delegated Legislation Committee—which included, as I have said, the right hon. Member for Wokingham—accepted that taking compensation away from innocent victims was a line too far. Sadly, however, the Government simply rejected that advice which, as I said, came from across the political spectrum. They went away promising good things, but, in my respectful submission, that was only so they could beef up the Committee with loyalists and Parliamentary Private Secretaries.

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

On that point, Government Members who sat on the First Delegated Legislation Committee yet supported the Opposition have disappeared from the Chamber. Of those who sat on the Seventh Delegated Legislation Committee last week, the only ones on the Government’s side who are left are the Minister, the Whip and the Parliamentary Private Secretary, the hon. Member for Ilford North (Mr Scott). Everyone else has flown the scene of the crime.

[Karl Turner]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, and do not think I need to comment further as he has made the point perfectly well.

The statutory instrument was brought back to Committee unchanged, but presented to a less vocal composition on the Government side. Without any shadow of doubt, that was simply to ensure that it went through under the radar. It is disappointing to think that the Minister, a family practitioner who has practised law and is bound to have come across victims of crime, would behave in such a terrible way. As right hon. and hon. Members know, the criminal injuries compensation scheme is the very last resort for innocent victims of crime, and I understand that it helps between 30,000 and 40,000 victims every year who genuinely have no other recourse to compensation.

I will restrict my remarks to reiterating what the Government proposals will do. Terror victims, people injured in violent dog attacks and many hard-working shop workers will lose out on compensation that is intended to put their lives back to where they were before any injury or loss. Almost half the victims who apply for compensation for crimes in bands 1 to 5 will no longer be eligible for a compensatory award. Bands 1 to 5 include injuries such as permanent speech impairment, partial deafness that lasts more than 13 weeks, multiple broken ribs, post-traumatic epileptic fits, and burns and scarring causing minor facial disfigurement.

To be ready for the Government’s defence, I today spoke to a colleague in civil practice to check whether that is the position, and was told that it is—according to that solicitor, we are certainly not talking about the least serious injuries. Rates for bands 6 to 12 will be slashed by between £1,500 and £2,500, or 60%. Injuries in that category include significant facial scarring, permanent brain injury resulting in impaired balance and headaches, and serious injury to both eyes.

I also spoke today to Mr Andy Parish, a postman and constituent. He is concerned about postal workers who have been attacked by dogs, many of whom are scarred and disfigured for life. He told me that many have lost fingers in terrible, unprovoked attacks by dogs. I am very worried that those workers, who have been permanently injured while trying to make a living, will no longer be able to receive compensation.

Rape Defendants (Anonymity)

Russell Brown Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Blunt]

No.

Shortly before John Worboys’ trial, the police appealed, with the assistance of the media, for further victims to come forward. The appeal identified 70 to 85 further complainants—to use the right hon. Lady’s numbers; it is 81 according to the briefing that I have received—who recognised his modus operandi. However, none of those was central to his conviction as the police already had sufficient evidence, and had he been granted anonymity until conviction, it would still have been possible to identify those further complainants, and he would still have been convicted. So to understand the issues as perfectly as possible, if the right hon. Lady, and all those who have helped her to prepare, can identify cases where anonymity until conviction would have prevented an initial conviction being secured, I would be anxious to learn of them.

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Blunt]

No, if the hon. Gentleman will forgive me.

If the right hon. Lady and others have further examples, it will come down to a question of balance. That is why we have said that we intend to reflect on the provisions carefully before we bring forward legislation.

Probably the most commonly encountered criticism is that defendant anonymity inhibits the reporting of criminal trials, but one might say the same of any anonymity for the parties to criminal proceedings, including complainant anonymity in rape cases and cases involving other sexual offences. The question is where the balance properly lies. We have no difficulty with full and robust reporting of defendants convicted of rape. That is entirely proper. But we believe that because the possibility of pre-emptive vilification of those accused of rape is so great, the stronger arguments are in favour of anonymity.

The related argument is sometimes made that defendants suspected of, or charged with, a wide range of offences may experience discomfort even if acquitted. For example, people working in the City—the right hon. Lady alluded to some of these points—and charged with fraud could also argue that they are likely to suffer fundamental reputational damage. That is true, but it overlooks the particular vulnerability of rape defendants to vilification to which I have already referred. It is that vulnerability, and the unique statutory anonymity for complainants, that distinguishes rape from other crimes.

Some people argue that defendant anonymity in rape cases would imply that the Government, and perhaps by extension the criminal justice system as a whole, felt that complainants were unreliable and so deter complainants from coming forward. I absolutely and robustly reject that argument, as did my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister during Prime Minister’s questions last week. The justification for defendant anonymity in rape cases is the stigma attached to an accusation of rape. It has nothing to do with the likelihood or otherwise of acquittal. There is no implied view in our proposals of the prevalence or otherwise of false allegations in rape cases.

In conclusion—