Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Tuesday 8th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I do apologise. I think we nearly missed the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David). We must hear from the hon. Gentleman first; let’s hear the feller.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

You are very kind, Mr Speaker. Thank you very much. May I return to the issue of Scotland and human rights? Clarity on that issue is now extremely important. The Deputy Leader of the House said that human rights were

“reserved for the UK Parliament and not a devolved matter.”—[Official Report, 15 June 2015; Vol. 597, c. 132.]

Will the Minister say quite clearly that she was wrong?

[Mr Raab]

I have made the position very clear; we have consistently made it very clear. Only the UK Government can revise the Human Rights Act, but the implementation of human rights issues in many areas is already devolved.

Criminal Cases Review Commission (Information) Bill

Wayne David Excerpts

Friday 4th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

My comments will be brief, because the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (William Wragg) has set out the case for the Bill and its contents very clearly. The Opposition will support this modest but important Bill. I very much hope that the Government will respond positively to what we have heard today and indicate that they will support it.

As the explanatory notes make abundantly clear, the Bill will extend the Criminal Cases Review Commission’s power to obtain documents and other material so that it can acquire them from a person who is not employed by or serving in a public body. In other words, it will extend the commission’s powers to include private organisations and individuals. As has already been said—it is worth emphasising—this situation already exists in Scotland. As a shadow Scotland Office Minister, I think it is excellent that the House is learning from the good example that has been set in Scotland—almost a case of devolution in reverse, hopefully.

The proposal is particularly important as far as the Forensic Science Service is concerned. The Opposition’s view is that the Forensic Science Service was unnecessarily privatised. There was no difficultly when it was a public body, but it is now in the private sector. It is important that the current unnecessary delays and wasted resources are eliminated so that there is a smooth process when it is necessary to access critical information in certain legal cases. That is precisely what the Bill will do.

We have the important report from the Justice Committee, which stated in clear and unambiguous terms that

“it should be a matter of great urgency and priority for the next Government”—

meaning the current Government—

“to bring forward legislation to implement the extension of the CCRC’s powers”.

I listened carefully to what the hon. Member for Hazel Grove said about his discussions with the CCRC. Again, I very much hope that the Government will take on board its informed professional comments, as well as the hon. Gentleman’s. I hope that the Bill will receive Government support and become law in due course. The Opposition will support it.

Court Charges (Access to Justice)

Wayne David Excerpts

Tuesday 17th November 2015 Westminster Hall

[Tulip Siddiq]

To pick up where I left off, the Government are attacking the principles of Magna Carta. I am relatively new to the House, but other Members will have been concerned about previous legal reforms by this Government. The focus of the debate is criminal court charges, which have attracted widespread criticism from all parts of the legal world, from magistrates to the Lord Chief Justice.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend has mentioned magistrates; does she share my concern about the fact that at least 50 magistrates have resigned since the implementation of the charges?

[Tulip Siddiq]

My hon. Friend has anticipated a point I will come on to. As he said, 50 magistrates have resigned, and in one case highlighted by the Howard League, a magistrate felt inclined to pay the court fee from his own pocket because of his sense of injustice.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tulip Siddiq]

I will touch on that later, but there is a lot of anecdotal evidence, as I have said. The Howard League and other organisations have highlighted that people on benefits or people who rely on social security are being expected to pay fines that we know they will not be able to pay. It is unrealistic to expect those people to pay these charges, and administratively, it probably costs taxpayers more.

[Wayne David]

The figures I have seen underline the point my hon. Friend just made. My understanding is that some £5 million in court charges has been issued, but less than £300,000 has been collected. Does that huge gap not show how ridiculous this policy is?

[Tulip Siddiq]

Absolutely. If we look at the money we have managed to claw back, it shows why this policy should be scrapped. It should not take three years to review it, because we have the evidence, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer) said.

I rarely agree with Conservative Members of the House, but I agree with the Chair of the Select Committee on Justice, the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), who said on Radio 4 that the charge

“does seem to be distorting the way in which people behave in court…defendants might plead guilty to save the cost of the charge when otherwise they would not have done”.

That is from a member of the Conservative party. I could not agree more with him.

In 21st-century Britain, we should be appalled by the miscarriage of justice, especially when defendants are foregoing their freedom due to financial constraints. To pick up on a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen, in some magistrates courts about 80% of defendants are dependent on state support to meet basic living costs, which makes this issue even more pressing. The charge means that poorer defendants are likely to make a different decision from the one they would have ordinarily made. That means we risk their voice being at best constrained, and at worst shut out from our justice system.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Raab]

I thank the Chair of the Justice Committee. We will be engaging in full consultation, but I hope my hon. Friend will not mind if I do not trail the precise terms of that at this moment.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

As we have heard, the Human Rights Act is fundamental to devolution in Scotland and there are different legal views about how changes might be introduced. The Act is also fundamental to Wales, and it is the cornerstone of the Good Friday agreement in Northern Ireland. Do the Government recognise that abandoning the Human Rights Act may have consequences that they had initially not thought of?

[Mr Raab]

We have engaged in consultation and taken a pause at this stage precisely to ensure that we work through all the different points. The hon. Gentleman mentions Scotland, and he will know that in 2014 and 2015 YouGov polling showed consistent Scottish support for a Bill of Rights to replace the Human Rights Act. On that specific question, in 2011 YouGov found that 61% of Scots wanted the UK Supreme Court and this Parliament to have the last word in this country and across Britain, rather than the European Court of Human Rights.

Transforming Rehabilitation Programme

Wayne David Excerpts

Wednesday 28th October 2015 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Kinnock (Aberavon) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered implementation of the transforming rehabilitation programme.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Nuttall. It is now almost 12 months since the formal creation of the 21 community rehabilitation companies and the establishment of the new national probation services. It has since become clear that fundamental flaws in the former Secretary of State’s thinking are beginning to impact on service delivery. The CRCs were initially created to address new work arising from probation supervision being extended to clients leaving prison after serving less than 12 months in custody. The probation service supported extending statutory support to this group with adequate funding. Had a consultation taken place on how that could be best achieved, I have no doubt that genuine alternative methods could have emerged, but it was unfortunately evident from the outset that the Secretary of State’s predecessor was fixed upon the payment-by-results outsourcing model.

Prior to the reorganisation, probation trusts were highly successful, with a good record of reducing reoffending. They had won European-wide awards for public service and all the trusts had been recognised as either good or outstanding by recent inspections. Trusts had established good local partnerships with other agencies, including in the private sector, that had been producing excellent results. In a number of trusts—for example, West Mercia and the Willowdene project—these partnerships have extended into innovative work with the third sector, addressing and supporting the same group of clients whom the transforming rehabilitation reorganisation targeted. Indeed, a major review by the third sector review group indicates that the procurement process was incoherent and meant that third sector providers who were supposed to have opportunities to engage in TR were disfranchised.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

It is not only politicians who have opinions on this subject, but the voluntary organisations themselves. The National Council for Voluntary Organisations sent us a briefing for this debate, which made the point that, despite the warm words of the former Justice Secretary, there is very little voluntary sector involvement.

[Stephen Kinnock]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. The purpose of a consultation is to listen to the experts. In this case, the experts have described themselves as being used as “bid candy” to dress up the bids, rather than being involved in a truly engaged fashion. I agree entirely with my hon Friend’s point.

Significant challenges were immediately obvious. First, the marketplace was not interested in taking over the management of high-risk offenders for the limited profits associated with managing that target group. Further, the Ministry of Justice had been heavily criticised by both the Public Accounts Committee and the National Audit Office for its poor management of previous contracts in courts, community payback, electronic monitoring and the quality of some provision in private prisons and detention centres. There was therefore limited political support for privatising the whole lot, hence the “split” solution.

Several probation experts argued that splitting the probation service into two distinct groups was a far riskier solution than selling all the service to private providers. The split in the service creates challenges, some of which, with great patience, effort and commitment from all stakeholders, could be managed, but a world full of good will is not going to address the insurmountable structural flaws arising from the split. These include, but are not limited to: local service delivery and management of clients; bureaucracy and inefficiency, with additional processes generated to manage the allocation of cases and accountability; substandard internal communications, especially those founded upon outdated and unstable technology within the National Offender Management Service; and inefficient management of staff due to internal competition, which undermines morale and professional unity.

However, the greatest flaw was rushing the whole programme through to meet a strict political timetable without any adequate testing or piloting. The MOJ also failed to establish workable, sustainable contracts with the CRCs. These are already the subject of significant challenge from the new CRC owners. Equally, in its haste to successfully establish the CRCs, all efforts and energy were focused on the contracts share sale, and very limited evidence emerged of any serious planning or risk assessment of the future management of the newly nationalised National Probation Service.

With no piloting or credible assessment of what the new work meant or involved, the allocation of budgets and staff was largely guesswork. Initially, NOMS stated that 70% of work was expected to be transferred to the CRCs as only around 30% of total clients would be classified as high risk. This was not a scientific experiment, and it quickly became evident that it did not translate. The staffing split soon became 50/50, with ongoing confusion about where some work should sit. Current staffing levels and reliance on expensive agency staff are simply not sustainable, nor value for money for the taxpayer. A case needs to be made to the Treasury for emergency support for the NPS.

--- Later in debate ---

[Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Nuttall. I congratulate the hon. Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) on securing the debate, as do my colleagues on the Justice Committee. It is a pleasure to see the hon. Gentleman here, because his predecessor but one was a great friend and mentor to me as a young barrister. I am glad that the tradition of an interest in the justice system is being kept on in that constituency.

As Chair of the Justice Committee, I had the pleasure last week of speaking about the progress in transforming rehabilitation to a conference of providers. There were people from a range of providers, including NOMS, the NPS, some of the CRCs, to which I spoke afterwards, and a number of voluntary groups. There was not a word of ideology in the discussion. Although people were frank about some of the work that needs to be done—that work has quite properly been referred to today—I say with every respect that I think the discussion was more nuanced in the picture it painted of the work on transforming rehabilitation, and I think it was fairer.

[Wayne David]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Robert Neill]

I will make a bit of progress first. In the previous Parliament, the Justice Committee published some work, which I imagine some Members have read, that flagged up some issues. I was interested in discussing those issues at that conference and listening to the feedback. Against that background, I will happily give way.

[Wayne David]

If the hon. Gentleman believes that there is no ideological motivation behind the introduction of this system, why does he think it was introduced so quickly?

[Robert Neill]

First, because if one spoke to any sentencer, for example, they would say that the need to have a better approach to those being released from short sentences into statutory supervision was real and pressing. Those people are immediately at risk of recidivism, which leads to lost opportunities for life in every case. Secondly, the need to improve the “through the gateway” services was real and immediate. That is not to say that we should not review and improve the programme as things go along. Of course, that is right and sensible. The Select Committee recognised that point on a cross-party basis, and I think the Minister does, too.

When we drill down into the evidence and talk to practitioners on the ground, although there is recognition that things can be improved, there is also recognition that the scale and objectives of the programme are valuable and, when delivered, represent a real improvement. There is progress on the ground, and we should recognise that as well as the challenges and places where more needs to be done.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kate Osamor (Edmonton) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) for bringing this debate to Westminster Hall. Effective rehabilitation must be at the heart of the UK’s prison system. The chief inspector of prisons, Nick Hardwick, said in his most recent report that prisons are in their worst state for 10 years. We lock up more people than any other western European country and have a reoffending rate of more than 50% within a year of release. We need a more effective rehabilitation programme.

The recent changes were a missed opportunity for effective reform. I am deeply concerned about the programme’s implementation, including the fact that the changes were rushed through, the model was untested with no evidence provided to support it, and the service appears fragmented. To quote the probation inspectorate report of December 2014, “Transforming Rehabilitation—Early Implementation”, splitting one organisation into two created

“process, communication and information sharing challenges that did not previously exist.”

Many will remain a challenge for some time to come.

I will focus on staff retention and morale—

[Wayne David]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Kate Osamor]

May I first make a bit of progress, please?

On 8 September 2015 my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Jenny Chapman) raised in the House the issue of Sodexo laying off 600 staff, many of whom were experienced in providing offenders with suitable skills and learning placements. I am concerned that offenders are now not being adequately supervised, risk-assessed or monitored. Sodexo is the biggest provider of probation in the privatised service, and has been attacked by Napo for the staffing cuts.

It is not an underestimate to state that staff morale is at an all-time low. There was an overwhelming lack of support for the policy change among staff before its implementation. In September 2014, results from a survey showed that 98% had no confidence in the plans. According to an article published in The Independent, at least 1,200 staff will have left by the end of the year as a result of redundancy, retirement or a career change due to disillusionment. As Frances Crook, chief executive of the Howard League, has stated, there were only 9,000 probation officers to start with, so such a severe reduction in numbers raises important questions about the safety of the public—for example, victims of domestic violence.

Following the changes, I am concerned in particular about the morale of black, Asian and minority ethnic staff, 74% of whom were women. In May 2015 Napo’s national online survey of BAME probation service staff highlighted an alarming fall in confidence levels and morale: 80% of respondents experienced a decrease in their confidence in the probation service and 83% reported a decrease not only in the morale of staff, but in the service. A third of respondents believed that the probation service breached official guidelines during the transforming rehabilitation assignment process.

Radical and effective reform does not come through privatisation and autonomy. To prove that, we only need to look at the state of the national health service and education in this country or at a report by New Philanthropy Capital which shows that 28% of charity projects have reduced reoffending, compared with 19% of private companies.

I am deeply concerned about the impact of the changes on staff morale and the effectiveness of the rehabilitation programme as a whole. I call on the Government to respond to such concerns.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jenny Chapman]

The point I am trying to make is that the Minister needs to answer some serious criticisms about programme’s implementation. It behoves all of us, from whichever side of the House, to make problems known to him, although I have to give him his due. These are not problems of his making: he inherited the programme, and I like to think that he would not have liked to have seen this nonsense implemented, because I know he cares deeply about what happens in the community and what happens to offenders, and he cares about victims, too.

[Wayne David]

I agree that it is important to learn lessons from the process we have embarked on, but is not one of the key lessons to learn that, when we approach such issues, we must put dogma to one side and look empirically at what works? If that had been done, we would not face many of the problems we do now.

[Jenny Chapman]

That is absolutely right. There was an opportunity to trial the programme. Labour was in favour of pilots, in which so many lessons could have been learnt and problems avoided. Everyone said that there would be a problem with IT—it does not take a rocket scientist to spot that. That was so predictable and so avoidable. With time and training, we could have avoided the problems we are now experiencing.

We cannot just say, “We’ll sort it out as time goes on, but it’ll take a couple of years to put it right.” Problems are being caused now, and problems in probation are a risk to public safety. The Minister needs to get his head around those issues urgently. If necessary, he needs to put in resources to deal with them—because, my God, he will be putting in resources if things go wrong! Let us not wait for that to happen.

My hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) powerfully outlined the folly of splitting the service. The inspectorate agrees with her, and says that the speed of transition has left staff feeling that they have not been informed about new working processes. Many still do not understand the rationale behind those processes. To their credit, the workforce are hugely motivated and experienced, and have the very best values. They will work incredibly hard to make the changes work, but we haven’t half made their jobs that much harder by going about it in this way. There is only so much that even that workforce can take. I urge the Minister to address the problem of staff morale quickly.

My hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Gerald Jones) was right that time is being wasted because new tasks are not being integrated with old systems. Staff in court do not have access to the information they need. Things are having to be done on paper and uploaded later, creating extra tasks and unnecessary administration. Information is having to be inputted repeatedly in different places. All that nonsense could have been avoided. Heaven knows, the IT was bad enough before we started this process and needed to be addressed, but imposing a new structure on a system that was already feeling the strain was simply reckless and unnecessary. The Minister could have got the same outcomes in a safer, better way.

There are significant staffing gaps, but efforts to fix them have been too slow. It is shocking that the service can be restructured at breakneck speed, but the hoped for gains, such as involving the voluntary sector and providing proper, meaningful supervision for short-sentence prisoners, appear to be happening incredibly slowly—so slowly that we cannot see them.

Many new processes simply take longer and are more complicated than the previous arrangements. Every serious case review I have ever read has looked at communication problems as a factor leading to that serious case arising. In probation, communication is not a luxury or something it would be nice to get right; it is at the very heart of it all, and probation officers, workers in the CRCs and anyone else working with an offender must be excellent at communication. They therefore need to be given the right systems and support, but that is not happening. That is dangerous, and the Minister needs to get on to it straightaway.

This debate is not simply a rehashing of previous debates between me and the Minister about how ridiculous this whole project was—it is not our greatest hits. Rather, it is about problems with implementation. The decision on the transforming rehabilitation programme has been taken, so now we must make sure that, however chaotic the system is, we can support the workforce to make the programme work and make it safer for our constituents.

I have asked the Minister many times—as I asked his predecessor, the current Attorney General, when the Offender Rehabilitation Act 2014 was in Committee—about co-location. I have had many assurances that NPS and CRC staff will be co-located. I thought that would be a good way of dealing with some of the problems with communication, as in the past those supervising an offender would have shared an office or have had a good relationship because they would have been used to dealing with one another. Will the Minister say how often co-location is not happening? I suspect that it is more the norm that staff are sited in differed locations. How quickly does he intend to address that? It is perhaps the key to making the system safer.

There are many current problems. Inspectors often find that they are identifying the same challenges now as in earlier inspections, and that the work to put those right, as was identified in the Minister’s letter to the Chair of the Justice Committee, is not having the desired impact. The Government need to do more than they have already said they will to put those problems right. The pre-allocation stage is not streamlined and so is too time consuming. What will the Minister do to streamline that stage, which is a crucial part of the process? There are now, effectively, two risk screening tools, the case allocation system and the offender assessment system. Many staff in both the NPS and the CRCs are expressing serious doubts about the value of completing the risk of serious recidivism tool at the pre-allocation stage.

That issue has been raised repeatedly with Ministers, including when the 2014 Act was in Committee. Unfortunately, at that stage Members were given no information about the new risk assessment tool and were forced to take it on trust that it would be workable and that we would not need huge investment in training on it. I am not convinced that we were given the most candid or well-informed responses in Committee. The Minister needs to add looking urgently at that risk assessment tool to his to-do list.

My hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) quoted Ian Lawrence, the head of the National Association of Probation Officers—we never know, he might just be listening—on staff morale, which my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton also talked about. Morale is at an all-time low. The system is under huge pressure, with 98% of staff saying that they have no confidence in the Government with regard to administering the programme effectively. That cannot make the Minister feel too good about himself. I am not here to add to his woes, but he needs to consider the burden he is placing on staff in the sector. They have a breaking point, and I do not want to see any more good, experienced staff leaving the service because they have no confidence in the Government’s intentions on responsible supervision of offenders in the community. Will the Minister address those points?

Despite the gloss that the Chair of the Justice Committee placed on the mood in the voluntary sector, the National Council for Voluntary Organisations seems to see things slightly differently. The largest membership body for the voluntary sector, it has conducted a survey of how its members feel. We need to take the evidence of that survey very seriously. It found that the pace of change has been slow. Organisations have not been involved, leaving them unsure about whether they will be involved in service delivery at all, and so unable to plan strategically or make decisions on staff. Few voluntary sector organisations have said they have been able to secure contracts to deliver services, which is especially the case for smaller ones. All is not as it seems, and it is certainly not as was promised.

The Government promised to put the third sector at the heart of probation, but the promise was obviously false, as that has not happened. Will the Minister therefore let us know what he is doing to put that right and ensure that the voluntary sector plays a significant role? We want to get the benefit of all the talent in, and experience of, working with offenders that we have up and down the country, but many people who could offer a great deal are, frankly, being shut out. They were not shut out before, because trusts went to great efforts to work with smaller local providers.

I must ask the Minister to respond to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) about Askham Grange prison. I have visited it myself. The best governor I have ever met is running the prison, along with another prison, and is getting tremendous outcomes. We should support that establishment, expand its work and share the good practice there more widely. To close it would be an absolute travesty.

On freedom of information, there is one question the Government have not answered. During the legislation’s Committee stage, the Opposition argued for the Government to bring contracted providers within the ambit of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. We know how the Lord Chancellor feels about FOI, having shifted responsibility for it to the Cabinet Office, but I would be interested to hear the Minister’s thoughts. In moving an amendment in Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) said we needed extra scrutiny via FOI, but sadly the Government voted that amendment down. Has the Minister considered whether the issue needs to be looked at again and whether these organisations are making themselves as open and transparent as possible? I would suggest they are not.

To conclude, I want to pray in aid the words of my hon. Friend the Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn), who, to his credit, has showed huge interest in all things related to justice. He was a member of the Justice Committee, and he had some quite insightful things to say about the Government’s programme. He said:

“The losers are the ex-offenders, the community…all of us…who must pay the costs in reoffending, more prisons and more sentencing. Surely, there is a better way to go about this—one that would show some respect for those who have given their lives to the probation service and who in a decent and professional way try to improve people’s lives, rather than working solely for private sector companies whose main interest is making money out of the system.”—[Official Report, Westminster Hall, 13 January 2015; Vol. 590, c. 236WH.]

That was his way of putting it, and I would add that the system we have is simply chaotic. We knew things would take time, but it is dangerous to let too much time to go by without intervening. The plans were poorly conceived, and they have been irresponsibly executed. I therefore encourage the Minister to respond to my questions and to the seven or eight suggestions and requests made by my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Selous]

I disagree with the hon. Lady that it could have been done within existing budgets, because it meant 45,000 extra offenders a year having probation supervision. That is why we needed to bring other players to the table.

The Offender Rehabilitation Act 2014 made a number of changes to the sentencing framework, most notably by providing that everyone released from short sentences will now receive 12 months of supervision in the community, which did not happen before. That, as I mentioned, represents some 45,000 offenders, so we needed to make significant structural changes to both the probation and prison services. Offenders who pose a high risk of serious harm to the public, or who have been convicted of the most serious offences, are being managed in the public sector under the National Probation Service, which sits within the National Offender Management Service. Medium and lower-risk offenders are being managed by the 21 community rehabilitation companies, which remained in public ownership until 1 February, when eight new providers took ownership of them and began running them.

The CRCs are being run by a diverse group, including a range of voluntary sector providers with experience in rehabilitating offenders. Those providers will be remunerated via a system that rewards them for reducing reoffending: payment by results.

[Wayne David]

Will the Minister give way?

[Andrew Selous]

I want to make a little progress, but if I have time later I shall willingly give way.

There was also substantial reform of the prison system. To support improved rehabilitation outcomes, the prison estate was reorganised to facilitate a through-the-gate model, whereby offenders are given help and support from within custody into the community that they will return to on release. We established a network of 89 resettlement prisons in what has involved a large-scale reorganisation and reconfiguration of the prison estate. Short-term prisoners and prisoners in the last 12 weeks of their sentence are being housed in those prisons where CRCs provide a through-the-gate resettlement service, including support to offenders for accommodation needs, employment brokerage and retention, finance and debt advice and support for sex workers and victims of domestic violence.

How is the new probation system performing? We have heard a lot of attacks on it this morning. Members will know that the transition took place on 1 June last year. Based on the wide range of information that we published this July, performance is broadly consistent with pre-transition levels. Probation staff in both the NPS and the CRCs have worked hard to implement the reforms and we will continue to support them as the new ways of working become embedded.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State has said of tribunal fees that

“there is no evidence yet that the bar being set at a high level has meant that…claims…aren’t being heard.”

If the review produces such evidence—as I believe it will, if properly conducted—will the Minister give a cast-iron commitment to abolish the fees system?

[Caroline Dinenage]

I cannot of course pre-empt any of the findings of the review. We will be making recommendations at the end of the year and, in the meantime, we will be very happy to receive all Members’ views.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Lady makes a very important point. As we discussed earlier in this questions session, there is often a link between circumstances of deprivation and a propensity to offend among young people. Sadly, far too many people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds grow up in homes where they do not have the stability, support and love that all of us think every young person should have. We need to do more to intervene long before young people fall into the hands of the justice system. Working with the Department for Education, I hope we can improve the way in which we support families, support the family courts and support the care system to look after damaged and fragile young people.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

Consistently, Labour Members, along with charities such as the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, have argued that the idea of a secure college for young offenders is fundamentally wrong. Will the Justice Secretary indicate whether he has yet decided to drop his plans?

[Michael Gove]

They are under review.

[Wayne David]

An interesting and pithy response, but it does not take us forward, does it? We all agree that education should play a central role in rehabilitation, but spending £85 million on a new prison of this kind is not the best way to help young offenders. The Chancellor of the Exchequer has expressed misgivings about these plans, so will the Justice Secretary tell us, here and now, whether the project will be cancelled?

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Gentleman makes some characteristically effective points, and of course I was listening very carefully.

Oral Answers to Questions

Wayne David Excerpts

Tuesday 9th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vara]

I will come back to the hon. Gentleman with the precise figures.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

As the Minister says, the Ministry of Justice is consulting on the closure of Caerphilly court in my constituency. The proposal from the MOJ is, frankly, back-of-the-envelope stuff. It will create enormous inconvenience for my constituents, and what is more, the local MP has not even been consulted. Is that acceptable?

[Mr Vara]

There has been a consultation of which the local MP is aware, and he, like anyone else, is entitled to give his view in that. We are constantly reviewing the courts estate to ensure that it meets operational needs. If any decisions are to be taken on the hon. Gentleman’s particular court, I hope that he will have been active in making his views heard.

Police and Crime Commissioners (Wales)

Wayne David Excerpts

Wednesday 6th November 2013 Westminster Hall

[Nick Smith]

I heard about that case. It is up to the Minister to look into the issue of the residency of the North Wales PCC. It is important, and has been raised at various times by colleagues.

Six months on, Mr Johnston has produced no statistical evidence that the impressive crime figures that we heard about in Gwent were not accurate. Instead, in a letter to me, Mr Johnston has said that he had heard reports from members of the public

“that officers seemed preoccupied with numerical targets and talked about a limit on the number of crimes that could be recorded each day”,

and found

“that the Chief Constable was pursuing a numerical target driven culture that focussed on the volume of crime.”

An internal review of crime recording has been set up since the chief constable’s retirement, but I am not convinced that that is sufficient. In the meantime, through press articles and the questioning of the Select Committee on Home Affairs, a picture was painted of a difficult working relationship between Mr Johnston and Ms Napier.

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the problems thrown up by the Gwent saga is the fact that the PCC has been intervening in what are effectively operational police matters? He has seen himself as a chief constable in waiting as well as a PCC, which points to a weakness in the legislation. There is not a clear definition of what is strategic and what is operational.

[Nick Smith]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I will ask the Minister about the Government’s and MPs’ scrutiny of PCCs and their role.

Everything is coming out in dribs and drabs, and it has threatened to undermine the public’s confidence in Gwent police, and the voters’ confidence in the PCC role. Our PCCs must appreciate that although they are in a position of authority, they are not above authority. They must face tough questions, too. The furore around policing in Gwent is reducing, and a new chief constable, Jeff Farrar, has been appointed. Having seen his work on Operation Jasmine, an investigation into terrible care home abuse, I am confident that he will be an asset as the head of Gwent police.

As we move forward, I propose three things. The lines of communication from the PCC must be as open and detailed as possible. In Gwent, having to drag out information from the PCC has been a painful process, and that cannot be right. It benefits no one if information is hard to obtain. That was the old system, which we should be moving away from. That is particularly relevant, given that police forces face Conservative cuts of 20%, which go too far, too fast.

The Welsh Labour Government are doing all that they can by funding 500 new police community support officers during their Assembly term, and by protecting the community safety budget, but it may not be enough. A PCC who is open and transparent could go a long way to help staff and the public understand the difficult decisions that will be taken at this difficult time.

Secondly, from a Gwent perspective—this is the nub—we need confidence in the data collection and performance measurements used to review our police. We have all heard constituents’ concerns that the figures do not translate to what they see on the streets. As their elected representative, Mr Johnston needs to look into the public’s concerns and regain the confidence of all of us. Let us see whether the Gwent police internal review of crime recording ever comes to anything.

Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary’s visit to Gwent as part of its national crime data integrity programme would be a perfect opportunity, once and for all, to look into the claim that crime reporting was being capped in Gwent. Will the Minister consider that?

Finally, let us measure PCCs against criteria such as victim satisfaction levels within the justice services in the coming year.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nick Smith]

My hon. Friend makes a very powerful point on something that needs to be taken on board not just in Wales, but across the UK. We and the public will judge the PCCs on their roles in the years to come.

[Wayne David]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one lesson that must be learned from the developments in Gwent during the past 12 months is that the PCCs have incredible powers? In Gwent, the chief constable was in effect dismissed in a way that was legitimate according to the law, but which negated any kind of natural justice. She was basically told to retire: “If you don’t retire, you’ll be sacked.” What is more, that was without any established employment procedures or practice at all. Again, that was done under the legislation, but it does create a big question mark, because I do not think that any other post in the public sector has as much unaccountable power as a PCC.

[Nick Smith]

Yes. My hon. Friend makes the point very powerfully. That is what happened in the Gwent area, and I think that we still need to unpick what happened on that occasion. That is why we need to have that extra, important look at crime data recording in Gwent and get to the bottom of that question, which is at the core of Ms Napier’s resignation. It is now up to the Government to detail how they will scrutinise the role of PCCs in Gwent and across the country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

The point about the IPCC—the clue is in its title—is that it is independent. It is not for me or any Minister to intervene in its investigations. It is independent. It looked into that complaint, and I have just read out its verdict.

[Wayne David]

Regarding the situation in north Wales, surely the Minister will agree that it is at least morally wrong that a Liberal Democrat candidate was elected but never declared that he was a Liberal Democrat. That was the case with Mr Roddick.

[Damian Green]

What candidates choose to describe themselves as at elections is, perhaps happily, not a matter for Ministers. I merely observe a point that has been made by many others after people have claimed that being an independent means that one is not a politician: being an independent means that someone is a politician who will not tell people what their politics are, which is what I have always believed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

I regularly meet all the PCCs. I have met the PCCs in Wales as a group. They are, as all people are, energetic in pleading their own cause. I always listen as sympathetically as is sensible.

It is interesting to note the change in the amount of public correspondence that the PCCs receive. Some have reported a fiftyfold increase in public correspondence over the year to date compared with the old police authorities. The public are engaging with the PCCs, and the PCCs are becoming key local leaders across the whole criminal justice system.

I should deal with the case of Carmel Napier, because that was an important part of the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent’s speech. First, I should, as I am sure others who know her would want to, thank Carmel Napier for three decades of service to the police and for her leadership—not just in Gwent, but at a national level—on improving the police response to violence against women and girls.

It is clear under the legislation that it is for police and crime commissioners, not Ministers or Members of Parliament, to make decisions about appointing, suspending and removing chief constables. The process for a PCC to remove a chief constable is set out in legislation and, contrary to some of the points made earlier, includes strict safeguards. There is a police and crime panel, which has a wide remit to review or scrutinise decisions made by a PCC.

As has been mentioned, the PCC has the power to appoint a new chief constable, and has done so in Gwent this week. It is for the commissioner to determine who is best placed to lead the local constabulary. That is provided for in legislation. For the first time, there are confirmation hearings and proper public scrutiny of the event, which in the past happened behind closed doors and in secret.

[Wayne David]

Will the Minister give way?

Probation Service

Wayne David Excerpts

Wednesday 13th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Wayne David (Caerphilly) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Crausby. It is also pleasing that many Opposition Members are here to attend this important debate. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East (Mr Mudie) on securing it and on providing us with such a comprehensive opening speech, which flagged up very effectively many of the major issues that I and other Members have touched on.

Most Members who have contributed this afternoon recognise the hard work and high degree of professionalism in the probation service. It is worth pointing out that in October 2011 the probation service was awarded the British Quality Foundation’s gold medal for excellence, which was an eloquent tribute. The then Minister with responsibility for probation, the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt), said

“This prestigious award recognises the professionalism of probation staff and the excellence of their work… This very public recognition of not just what they do but, perhaps more importantly, how well they do it, will be a source of pride for probation staff.”

That was an important statement and an important award.

My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) underlined the fact, as did others, that real improvements have been made on reoffending rates. We all recognise that there should be no complacency, and we need to ensure that those reoffending rates are significantly reduced. We believe that the way to do that is to build on the work that is being done, not to undermine it with a set of proposals that are untried, untested and a leap in the dark.

I would suggest that payment by results is ideologically driven. If we are going to improve the probation service and tackle reoffending rates, it is absolutely vital that improvements are based on empirical evidence objectively collected and that we have a well tested plan for improvement on which to work.

It worries me that two pilots were established, as my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Andy Sawford), for example, pointed out—there was one in Wales and one in Staffordshire and the west midlands—yet both were scrapped by the new Justice Secretary within weeks, I think, of his taking office. I would like to know why that happened. Why did the Government not believe it necessary to collect objective information and then plan properly their response in relation to the work that still needs to be done on reoffending issues? He seems to have based his thinking on his experience as a Minister of State in the Department for Work and Pensions and what has been experienced so far in the Work programme. That is seen as the model, but it is worth pointing out that only 3.5% of people on the Work programme are in work after six months. When that goes wrong, it is bad for the people who are unemployed, but it is extremely worrying when potentially dangerous offenders may go without proper support and monitoring because this scheme is based on that scheme, which is certainly not succeeding. That is bad for the individuals involved and for society as a whole. The bottom line for many people is that there is not a great deal of public confidence in G4S. In many ways, that is stating the obvious.

Other questions have been raised by hon. Members. My hon. Friend the Member for Corby, for example, posed a number of important questions, and I will be one of the Members who leave this room today and go to the Library to get a copy of his report, “Primary Justice”. I am sure that it is well worth reading. My hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) also posed a number of important questions. I would be more than pleased to hear the Minister’s response to those questions.

I would like to ask five questions in particular. They are in part an elaboration on what has already been stated. First, it is a very real problem if there is a division of responsibility between the private and public sectors. We must acknowledge that the risks can change, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central said. Prisoners are not the same individuals always; the risks can change. That is a genuine concern, but the Government’s proposals will lead to a lack of co-ordination between the private and public sectors. There is an inherent incoherence, therefore, in the Government’s proposals.

My second concern is about resources. To be fair, I think that it is good that resources will be allocated for those on sentences of under 12 months. It is good that they are being catered for—let us be clear about that—but where is the extra money coming from? We are talking about cuts in the public sector generally and in this area in particular, so where are the extra resources for this important work to come from?

Thirdly, what we have in the Government’s consultation document is a highly centralised approach. It is very much being driven and will be driven from Whitehall, and it does not recognise the important co-operation and networking that exists at grass-roots level, at local level, among the private sector, the public sector and, indeed, the voluntary sector. Moreover, this is happening at a time when probation trusts in England and Wales are being reduced in number. There is bound to be—it is inevitable—tremendous turmoil. To introduce these changes at the same time as that fundamental change in the structure of trusts is very worrying indeed.

Fourthly, a very big question to be answered is how success will be measured. It has been suggested by some—I think by some of the Government’s own Back Benchers—that full payment will be given to private companies only if individuals commit no more crimes within a given period. Is that the case? Will the Minister confirm that or state the position otherwise? That would be welcome because mixed messages are coming from the Government on that point, which is central to their proposals. We want coherent answers, at least, to be provided, so that everyone knows where they stand. The Government must do something to address the very real risk that the private sector will cherry-pick; it will seek to work with the offenders who are easiest to rehabilitate, not the rest.

My final question is about the sharing of information, which is central to tackling reoffending. At the moment, the police and the probation service share information. Generally, they do that very well indeed. What will happen when the private sector has a large stake in the system? Will the police and G4S, for example, share information on the same basis? If the answer is yes, certain implications stem from that and they need to be addressed by the Government.

In essence, the consultation document that the Government have produced is not sound. It is essentially based on dogma. It is motivated by abstraction rather than hard facts. I very much hope that, even at this late stage, the Government will listen not only to what has been said in the debate but, more importantly, to what has been said by people who are actually involved with the probation service from day to day. I hope that the Government will listen to those comments, display some common sense and think again about this programme.