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12.8 pm
Mr. David Maclean (Penrith and The Border): I congratulate the hon. Member for Stourbridge (Ms Shipley) on her success in the ballot and on selecting this excellent measure with which to proceed. I shall make a short contribution, which will concentrate on some worries provoked by the Bill. That is not because I am opposed to the measure--I welcome it--but because the length of the statement and number of hon. Members who wish speak mean that it would be unfair of me to cover all the issues that I wish to talk about. I shall concentrate on the few issues of concern that I have, but that does not mean that I am generally critical of the Bill. I am condensing my remarks for the sake of time.
The concerns on which I want to concentrate are those flagged up by the organisation Liberty. As an avid supporter of that organisation, at least since 1 May 1997--[Interruption.] I hold up my hands, which is more than my successor at the Home Office did earlier. I hope that, when he replies to the debate, the Minister, who is an honourable colleague and a decent man, will deal with the concerns expressed by Liberty.
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett (Denton and Reddish):
Will the right hon. Gentleman stress that the brief from Liberty makes it clear that that organisation "welcomes the overall aim" of the Bill?
Mr. Maclean:
I am delighted to do so. I have the full text of that brief in my notes, but I will not need to refer to it as I also have an excellent short summary.
The process for initial inclusion in the list is administrative, rather than judicial. Liberty argues that that could contravene the European convention on human rights, which the Government have incorporated in our domestic law. The convention provides for fair and impartial hearings by an independent and impartial tribunal, for the purpose of the determination of civil rights and obligations. Article 6 of the convention states that a person is innocent until proven guilty. It could be argued that the inclusion in the list of unsubstantiated information is in breach of the convention. That is a small point and not an especially strong argument, but I should welcome some reassurance on it.
My hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) made an excellent speech, in which he said that the threshold for a person's initial inclusion in the list could be too low, as information that has not been tested by any formal disciplinary procedures will be allowed to be included. It is possible that people will have little or no protection against employers or, colleagues who refer them on malicious or inaccurate grounds. It is not too far-fetched to believe that a malicious member of staff--in, say, a social services department or some other organisation--with a grudge against a colleague could use the list as a way to destroy or severely disadvantage that colleague's career. I do not
know the solution to that problem. Perhaps the judicial process should be put before the administrative process, although I appreciate the enormous difficulties and extra costs that could be created.
My hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge also noted that the basis for inclusion in the list is not confined to sexual or other intentional abuse; individuals will also be referred for incompetence or misconduct that places a child at risk. However, the Bill contains no criteria on the seriousness of that incompetence or misconduct. I believe that in one of the pieces of legislation that I have studied there is a definition of what is to be considered as harm that places a child at risk. In the absence of guidelines, if the Minister proposes to make regulations about incompetence and misconduct, there is a danger that different definitions will appear in different parts of the country.
The example has been given of a person who takes a child for a walk and who does not guard that child properly, so the child is placed at risk when he or she runs on to the road. Does that amount to incompetence or misconduct? If so, every parent--unwittingly and accidentally--faces the risk every day, and such accidents can happen to everyone. Of course, no one condones such accidents when they happen under the supervision of a social worker or in an organisation charged with child care, but we must be careful to ensure that well-meaning people who love children and want to protect them are not included, because of a slip-up, in the list of dangerous paedophiles, which the press will no doubt call the perverts list.
To a large extent, it will be such a list. The list will include dangerous people who are child abusers and paedophiles. I urge the Minister, and the hon. Member for Stourbridge, to think about dividing the list so that that it may contain, of course, the names of child abusers and paedophiles, but does not allow those who love children properly and who are not paedophiles or abusers, but have made a mistake, to be branded by the press and by potential employers as child abusers.
Ms Moran:
I accept the right hon. Gentleman's point about definitions, but does he accept that part of the problem could be dealt with in the code of conduct for implementation of the Bill? It is important that bad practices, such as persistently shaking a child or inappropriate restraint, should be defined as misconduct, and should fall within the remit of the Bill.
Mr. Maclean:
The hon. Lady refers to child abuse that is almost as bad as paedophilia and other sexual abuse. Shaking a child or being violent is definite abuse, but it is not incompetence. It does not compare with the incompetence of which we heard in the example of a person who takes a child for a walk. That could happen to any schoolteacher at any time. All the time in London, one sees teachers taking a crocodile of a dozen children for a walk. How those teachers manage to guard those children every minute of the day is beyond me. I certainly could not cope.
If someone makes a small mistake which puts a child at risk, that person surely should not be on the same list and under the same heading as child abusers, paedophiles
and those who shake, beat or hit children. Such people should not be perceived by every potential employer as falling into that category.
I accept the point made by the hon. Member for Luton, South (Ms Moran) that a code of practice could deal with my concern. A code could help authorities and other child care organisations to determine what is incompetence, or what the levels of incompetence are. If, however, the person involved is placed on a single list--it will be regarded as the paedophile list--we may do an injustice to people who, it should be admitted, are not totally competent to look after children, but should not be considered to be as vile as paedophiles and others who sexually abuse children.
I had intended to raise a few more points brought up by my friends at Liberty. However, I have taken slightly longer than I intended, and I do not want to delay an important Bill. I may write to the Minister and to the hon. Member for Stourbridge with those concerns. I may even be forced to serve on the Committee.
Mr. Tony McNulty (Harrow, East):
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Ms Shipley) on introducing an important Bill. Like the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean), I am happy never to have come anywhere near the top of the list during the past two years.
The Bill is extremely worthy, and I am privileged to be one of its co-sponsors. Apart from the ugly interregnum between 11 am and noon, on which I shall not dwell, I commend the Conservative Members who have spoken today for seeking constructively to help the Bill become a good law.
The House will know that the Bill is rooted in the Utting report. It may be less well known, however, that there was considerable debate on the subject during the Standing Committee's discussion of the General Teaching Council introduced by the Teaching and Higher Education Act 1998. Both sides of the Committee then highlighted the need for the long overdue consolidation of lists.
Consolidation makes perfect sense and is entirely logical. My hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge has been honest in saying that the Bill does not provide the one-stop list which we all want, and which is essential. As a former councillor, I well remember the inordinate length of time--rightly in one regard--that it took to carry out police checks. Vital posts in child care were not filled, which caused its own problems because of the time that it took to pursue all the assorted lists and track down all the police authorities involved to check up people's records. The fact that we are moving a step closer towards overcoming that problem must be very welcome.
Strangely, as a co-sponsor of the Bill, I want to dwell on some aspects that we must explore further in Committee. My hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge will be the first to admit that the Bill is not perfect in many ways. Second Reading should be, and is, about the principles of the Bill. Happily, I have heard no one dispute
the principle behind it and the fact that it should and must get on the statute book. The concerns that will be raised, which I will mention now for the record and with which we will deal in Committee, are not many in one sense, but they are of importance. What has been said about the low threshold for inclusion on the list is fair and I hope that we can tackle it. Taking the administrative rather than the judicial route has been mentioned, and that is a fair point, but, if the appropriate safeguards are in place when the Bill becomes law, it is not one on which we need dwell.
I see that the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean)--the new-found friend of Liberty--has left the Chamber. I am sure that he would have even more to say on its behalf if we were talking about a judicial list--one that an individual would get on or off with extreme difficulty and only through the judicial process. There is a fear that, if we went solely down the judicial route, there would be a grey area--many people who would rightly be on the list proposed in the Bill would not find themselves on a judicial list.
The right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border made a point about incompetence. Although he did so rather clumsily and laboriously, it was a fair point. If we are serious about a consolidated list being effective and preventive in tenor, as well as simply prescriptive--so that people will fear being put on it and will keep away from work with children in which they should not be involved--the criteria of incompetence and putting children at risk must be tightly defined. Being on the list must reflect the concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge in promoting the Bill.
The hon. Member for South-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Paice), who has now left the Chamber, made an elegant speech about the voluntary sector. He spoke of how we could widen the Bill so that we get what we all want and include that sector, but not restrictively.
In Committee, we must also explore the notion that there will be no legal aid for the appellant. The notion, which is a real advance in terms of human or civil rights, of a statutory tribunal and appeals process for those who were on the Department of Health list or List 99 of the Department for Education and Employment will be further served if the Bill or the code of practice contains a much sharper and clearer definition of the rights of appellants and whether they can have legal aid.
We must also consider the notion of malicious or vexatious referrals by informants. It is not covered to any extent in the Bill and needs to be considered far more readily--I am sure that it will be dealt with in Committee.
I was pleased that hon. Members mentioned extending the provisions to those over 18 who have mental incapacities or learning disabilities. It would not be over-broadening the scope of the legislation if, as some have suggested, we explored in Committee whether it could go as far as covering the elderly and mentally infirm at the very least, if not more general abuse of the elderly in the care sector.
I promised to be brief and, unusually when I am on my feet in this place, I mean it today. None of those concerns, which are all genuine and raised in a constructive spirit, detracts from the Bill's validity. In choosing this Bill, my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge wanted to explore those and other matters in Committee. I hope that no one will block it.
As Jim Harden, director of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, said in the foreword to a recent book:
"one of the most challenging child protection issues of our time has been the realisation that children can be more vulnerable to abuse in the places where they ought to be safest".
That is sad, and one might add, "Among the people with whom they should feel the safest."
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