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Mr. Hawkins: Once again, as was often the case in Committee, we make common cause with the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath) and his hon. Friends. On new clause 3, dealing with circuits, like those hon. Members, especially the hon. Member for Winchester (Mr. Oaten), I have had approaches about the matter. I know the strength of feeling among members of the judiciary and members of the Bar. I am delighted to hear that members of the judiciary have even been attending the surgery of the hon. Member for Winchester. The strength of feeling was reinforced for me when the matter was raised with me by a member of the Bar last weekend while I was at a family wedding. In addition to the views expressed by members of the judiciary and senior members of the Bar, the fact that matters are raised at surgeries and even with Members at social events shows the strength of feeling.
I know Winchester well from my own time in practice. More recently, I had the privilege of sitting with some of the judges there while doing my training for consideration for possible appointment to a recordership, so in relatively recent times I have met some of the judges, just before the proposal was published. Knowing the exceptionally high quality of the judges who sit at Winchester, I understand their concern.
I very much share the extremely strong views expressed by the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome on the lack of logic of making this change simply to fit into what in any event Conservative Members would regard as a rather artificial grouping of areas in a Government office area. I could not agree with him more strongly that there is no logic in saying that a circuit area must match the area of operation of a Government office. Often in Committee, on this Bill
and on other legislation, I have attacked the Government's mania for change for change's sake and the belief that modernisation is somehow a god that they must aim at in every possible way. This proposal would simply cause damage where there is no positive benefit to be gained whatever.As the hon. Gentleman rightly said, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." I would say, "If it is not necessary to change, it is necessary not to change." This is one of those occasions on which it is necessary not to change. It would be far better for the administration of justice in Winchester and the surrounding area if the Government backed off from this ill considered proposal. The hon. Gentleman says he hopes that the die is not yet cast and that the final decision has not yet been made. I devoutly hope that too.
I remember the angst on my old circuit, the historic Midlands and Oxford, when similarly, not all that long ago, Oxford was removed. There was great concern and sadness about that, but this would be an even worse decision. I am therefore pleased to add the views of Conservative Members to the strong views expressed by the hon. Gentleman. I suspect from the presence in the Chamber of the hon. Member for Winchester that we may hear more about this from him in a while.
Liberal Democrat amendment No. 56 is, in effect, a replacement for the more modest Liberal Democrat amendment No. 2—we will hear about that in due course from the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes)—and we have tabled amendment No. 51 to similar effect, which seeks further security that the court areas should not expand. We debated that at length in Committee, but we and the Liberal Democrats are trying to back up the same concept here.
As the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome rightly said, our names appear with those of Liberal Democrat Members on their amendment No. 3 because we agree that clause 5 must provide for a review of what the Lord Chancellor is really up to. We think that it should be clear in the legislation that he must consult lay justices properly under clause 21. For the same reasons as we do not have a great deal of faith in the Government's agenda and their reliability on these matters, we think that this part of the Bill would be a great deal stronger if that provision were written into it.
Liberal Democrat amendments Nos. 57 and 58 are specific London-based amendments to schedule 1. I am rather cynical about the Liberal Democrats' last-minute replacement of their original amendments with some of these London-based proposals. I suspect that it might be to do with the demotion of the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey to being only the future failed Lib Dem mayoral candidate. It must be so depressing to know that he is going into something in which he can only ever come a poor third. Nevertheless, Liberal Democrat amendment No. 59 is a sensible measure on consultation with local authorities. That is well worth while.
There is a general theme to these proposals—backing up the concept of putting in the Bill safeguards to ensure that the Government do their consultation with the lay magistracy properly and that they do not
tinker with circuit areas for no good reason. I hope very much that the Minister can respond positively to some of the serious concerns expressed by the Liberal Democrats and me.6.15 pm
Simon Hughes (Southwark, North and Bermondsey): I am happy to speak in particular to amendments Nos. 56 to 59 and I am grateful for the Minister's courteous response outside the Chamber to the proposal in principle. I look forward to what he will say in response to the amendments standing in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath).
These proposals would have been on the amendment paper whether I had continued with the full panoply of responsibility for home affairs, whether I was responsible for London matters for my party in this Chamber or whether I was responsible for neither. The issue came to my attention earlier in the year from people in my constituency and elsewhere in London as important for London. In a moment, I will turn to why the amendments have been tabled and why I hope that they find support among Labour Members.
May I add a word in the context of the wider debate, which my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome introduced? For the record, in my practising years I, too, was a member of the midlands and Oxford circuit. The traditional circuits are not, of course, theologically based or divinely inspired. They were a practical development of a grouping that was convenient for people in terms of carrying out legal work. If people in Hampshire, and in particular in Winchester, feel that they are more naturally linked to their colleagues in the western circuit, it seems to me that they must know best. They do the job day in, day out, week in, week out and year in, year out.
I hope that the Minister will be positive about the joint pleas from my hon. Friends the Members for Somerton and Frome, for Winchester (Mr. Oaten) and for Mid-Dorset and North Poole (Mrs. Brooke) and Conservative Front Benchers. I hope also that we do not go down the road whereby everything always has to follow exactly the same boundaries simply because somebody once decided that they were administratively convenient for something else.
On the London proposals, may I make remarks to the Minister by way of introduction and to explain where they come from? I share with the Government the view that if the criminal justice system is to be accountable, the ordinary people of England and Wales need to be able to have access to it not only when they are defendants, witnesses, called to sit on the jury or as magistrates or, sadly, are victims, but when they want to know whether the system is working.
From the Liberal Democrat Benches, my hon. Friends and I have argued that just as we are coming to a consensus in Parliament that the police should be accountable locally in the boroughs, districts, counties and council areas that we all live in, so it is only right that the other bits of the criminal justice system—the probation service and the Court Service—should also be accountable locally. The courts understand that.
The other day, I went to a very good open day at the Southwark Crown court building by HMS Belfast on the edge of the River Thames. It was a Saturday and there was a very large turnout of people who were seeking to ensure in part that the Court Service is more accessible in that way. I also mean that the public often want to know why certain decisions were made. For example, when the police catch someone who has stolen a car for the fourth time, why do the magistrates or the Crown court pass a sentence that might release that person back into the community perhaps to commit the same offence for a fifth time? It seems to me that such accountability has to be achieved when the accountability of the police and the probation service, as well as that of custodial institutions such as prisons or young offenders' institutions, is being addressed.
One way in which we need to think of the structures is in terms of how the Court Service can be seen to be growing in confidence in respect of the community. The second is how the people who run it relate to those who are their customers day in, day out. The proposition behind our original proposal—amendment No. 2—also stands in amendments Nos. 56 to 59, which were tabled by me and my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome. It is simply that London, which has three times the population of the next biggest police area in England and Wales, will not be served appropriately by a courts board with the same limited number of representatives—12—as can be found in the smallest police area and all those in between.
I am not making special pleading because London is the capital city, although that might be relevant, nor am I saying that there might be a special case because we have the central criminal court and the law courts in the Strand as well as the Judicial Committee here and the future supreme court, but I am saying that we have far more courts at all levels in our 33 local authorities. It is just not possible for them to be represented by 12 people. With the best will in the world, it is just not possible. That is not only my view; it is the view of those who share my local bench at Camberwell Green and Tower Bridge.
I have given the Government two options, amplifying the original proposals of my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome. Amendment No. 56 asks for five areas; in fact, it states that there shall be five areas. My hon. Friend originally proposed that London should not be required to be a single area, but I want to ensure that we have five areas. The alternative contained in amendments Nos. 57 to 59 would make the courts board for London much bigger and therefore more representative. I have simply allowed for three times as many members as the Government, because London is three times as big as anywhere else.
Amendment No. 58 says that there must be at least three members who are judges, at least six members who are lay justices, at least six with relevant experience and six who are representative of the community. That at least gives the huge diversity of communities in the north, south and east, and in central London—people with all sorts of backgrounds and faiths, of all ages and from all walks of life—a chance to begin to be represented. The system will not be perfect, but there will be that chance. Specifying 12 members gives people out on the Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire borders,
down on the Kent and Surrey borders, and on the Essex borders, as well as those from inner-London boroughs and the City, no chance of representation.At the time of the last census, the population of outer London was 4.4 million and that of inner London was 2.766 million. Next came the West Midlands police area with 2.5 million, followed by Greater Manchester with just under that, West Yorkshire with just over 2 million and Merseyside with 1.3 million. Obviously, I did not pluck those figures out of the air; I talked to people about the best possible number of areas for London.
I understand that both the Crown Prosecution Service and the Greater London Magistrates Courts Authority currently divide London into five regions. The London organisation of the CPS has a central criminal court section, and sections for the south, west, centre and north and east combined. Confusingly—this is why we need to rationalise and co-ordinate the arrangements—the Greater London Magistrates Courts Authority has five different regions owing to its historical genesis: the north-east, north-west, south-west, south-east and central regions. Both bodies, however, have concluded that five is the right number.
I think that this should be the subject of the consultation that will follow the paper produced in September. January is the deadline for responses. I hope that we can then secure some agreement. It may be considered logical to have north, south, east, west and central areas for the courts, reflecting the way in which people move. The central area could involve the central criminal court and the law courts in the Strand, for instance.
Amendment No. 59 proposes consultation with local authorities in London—the 32 boroughs and the City. They are proper stakeholders, and I feel that they should be able to understand and be comfortable with the operation of the courts—they are, after all, responsible for increasing amounts of criminal justice under legislation relating to crime and the police that was enacted in the late 1990s. Liaison between police and local government is much better than it was, and I think the same should apply to local government and the courts.
There is one last way out for the Government if they resist the idea of five areas, or the idea of a board three times as big to reflect the population—of the two, I prefer the five-area model—which is the introduction of an overarching board, a sort of supreme court of courts boards, with five subsidiary areas acting as sub-committees. I hope it is deemed helpful rather than confrontational of me to tell the Minister that people I have talked to who are in the know and doing the job think that such a model could work. They would prefer five separate areas, but there is logic in the notion of five sub-committees, as it were, feeding into a central courts board.
This may sound dry in relation to the exciting political issues of our day, but the administration of the courts is all about what we read in the newspapers, once a week if not more often—about people taken to court, people found guilty, people being sentenced. It is all about access to justice locally. It is all about people feeling that they can go to the civil courts easily, and obtain expeditious justice. It is all about whether people feel that justice is delivered on their doorsteps. In a great
metropolitan area such as London, the doorsteps of those living in Sutton, Croydon and Bromley are not in Barnet, Hillingdon or Havering. They need to feel that the justice system is working for them, and that the courts they read about in their local paper that are imposing sentences are administered by people whom they know, can choose and can influence.I ask the Minister to accept that this is about making the Court Service properly accountable in the metropolitan area, just as it will be—I hope—in the rest of the country. People need to feel that they can influence the running of the service, and can tell those in charge if the courts are in the wrong place or open at the wrong times, if there is not the right public transport, or if the provision of probation officers, facilities for the public, magistrates or the right mix of magistrates is not adequate. All that matters hugely to the functioning of the service.
I hope the Minister will assure us that London will be treated differently because of its large size. Above all, I hope we shall have a structure reflecting the diversity of London and allowing it to be reflected in one of the most important parts of the criminal justice system.
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