| Sexual Offences Bill [Lords]
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Sandra Gidley: I have some sympathy with the case study and the general thrust of the arguments advanced by the hon. Member for Woking. However, I have a problem reconciling those arguments with the amendment because it does not reflect them. Based on the sentiments that he has expressed, if the hon. Gentleman would like to revisit the matter on Third Reading I would probably be more sympathetic. My interpretation of amendment No. 22 is that there are occasions on which the situation could be as the hon. Gentleman describes and there is some doubt. However, there are also occasions where a relationship breaks up and one partner is very aggrieved, does not want the relationship to end and may not react in a totally rational way. On those occasions a rape may involve injury, force or significant physical harm to the woman. Surely on those occasions the sentence suggested in the amendment is not sufficient. I am glad that the amendment is not being put to the vote because I could not have supported it. There needs to be a greater link between what is proposed and the information given to back it up. Several hon. Members rose—
The Chairman: Order. I have now had an opportunity to study carefully all the amendments that have been debated this morning, and I have taken the Clerk's advice. My understanding is that the clause has had full and thorough debate. I think that it is fair to say to the Committee that unless I am offered a compelling reason to think otherwise, I shall be minded not to allow a stand part debate. If any hon. Member feels that something has not been already Column Number: 043 discussed and wishes to raise it, it would be advisable to do so now.Vera Baird (Redcar): I, too, welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Gale. I will take the amendment in the spirit in which it is clearly intended—the hope to grope toward a solution. I always regret using the word ''grope'' in the context of sexual offences and I will not do so again. The proposal, which amounts to giving a shorter sentence for a rape that has occurred between people who have had a previous sexual relationship, has been considered by the Law Commission, the sex offences review and the Sentencing Advisory Panel during the past decade. The latter two organisations consulted on the proposal very extensively and it has been rejected. It has been considered comprehensively. I do not accept the model proposed by the hon. Member for Woking. He suggests that juries strain at the sinews to acquit defendants because they are sympathetic to young men in that position, because much depends on the facts. The figures that he quoted are compelling, but they are not as bad as those that I had heard for 2001. In the debate in the other place, Lord Falconer stated that there were 9,008 rapes in 2001 and that there were guilty findings in 5.8 per cent. of those cases. Some 1,267 such cases went to court, which is fewer than the hon. Gentleman's figures. I do not know which figures are right. Mr. Malins: I was quoting the previous year. Vera Baird: And I was quoting 2001. I suppose that we must conclude that the situation is not getting any better. Both sets of figure make it clear that the biggest fallout occurs long before trial, because only a small percentage of cases come to court. There are, of course, many reasons for that, but I shall not repeat what the inspectors of constabulary and the inspector of the Crown Prosecution Service found in their report last Easter, namely that there were manifold failings in the way in which investigations are carried out, the support given to complainants and so on. It is a horrifying prospect to go to court, to talk in public about intimate things and to face cross-examination alleging that one wanted it all the time. A person in that position needs support, which the criminal justice system, of which my profession is part, has simply failed to provide. The huge drop-out rate must be tackled, and a number of measures have been introduced to try to help. In truth, some of the measures to try to increase the number of cases that get to court will also increase the calibre of the prosecution. Such measures include better investigation, more support and more sexual assault referral centres, where there are expert doctors who can be quickly brought to a rape complainant and who can give supporting expert evidence that is far more compelling than that provided by a forensic medical examiner who has been called out to a police station in the middle of the night. Such measures will result not only in a higher number of people staying in the race until the end, but in a better quality of prosecution when cases come to court. We must examine such measures to improve the conviction rate. Column Number: 044 A previous sexual relationship should not be acknowledged in a sentencing provision such as this—I appreciate that the hon. Member for Woking does not want fully to acknowledge it. A lower sentence for a rape by a former intimate would send the message that it is a lesser offence, and there is no way of getting round that. Some research suggests that rape by a former intimate is more of a blow to an individual than rape by a stranger. It has longer and more profound effects because the victim learns to distrust not only men, but herself for having engaged in the relationship in the first place. Mr. Malins: The hon. and learned Lady is right and I am wrong so far as the last part of her argument is concerned. I am not wrong in the sense that my aim is to highlight an issue, but my solution would not be appropriate. However, I am still striving for a solution, and anything that we can do to reach one would be appreciated. Vera Baird: I appreciate that that is the spirit in which the amendment was drafted. Briefly, the amendment is hopelessly impractical. It refers to an offence after an ''acknowledged sexual relationship''. How does one define an acknowledged sexual relationship? If the definition were that the woman acknowledges it, it would leave her free to dictate the defendant's sentence. If she says, ''Yes, we had a sexual relationship'', the sentence would be down to five years. If she were to deny it, the sentence would remain high. What if there was an issue about whether there had been a sexual relationship? Sometimes people have five kids and it is obvious that they have had a sexual relationship. On other occasions, the man would allege that there has been a sexual relationship in order to put himself into this category. Mr. Malins: I did my best. [Laughter.] Vera Baird: The real point is that we must explain to the public that real rape is that, as well as rape by a stranger in a back alley at night. As we discussed earlier, the definition of rape will have to move on. The Minister for Citizenship and Immigration (Beverley Hughes): I completely accept that the amendment has been tabled with the best of intentions, in the belief that such a change could help to address the low rate conviction in rape cases that the hon. Member for Woking has outlined for us. That belief stems from the assumption that juries are more reluctant to convict in so-called acquaintance or date rape cases because the defendants do not fit the stereotype of the stranger rapist. His case study illustrated that very well. It is suggested that because juries know that a guilty verdict could result in a very lengthy period of imprisonment, they choose to acquit the defendant. The thinking behind the amendment is that introducing a lower penalty, or a lesser offence, for cases in which the two parties are, or have previously been, known to each other in an acknowledged sexual relationship would encourage juries to find more defendants guilty because they could be sure that any sentence of imprisonment would be comparatively Column Number: 045 short. The argument is that the conviction rate would therefore increase.However, despite the hon. Gentleman's good intentions, there are some dangerous flaws in his line of argument. As he said, the cases in which people know or have known each other are very difficult for the jury. Such cases are inherently difficult. Not only am I not convinced that going down the road that he suggests would achieve the outcome that he wants, but I think that it would potentially take the jury away from grappling with that inherent difficulty and the judgment that it has to make in any individual case. The statutory provisions that the Bill introduces on consent as a whole are designed to help juries to reach fair and just decisions in such cases. The first aspect of the hon. Gentleman's argument that concerns me is the suggestion that juries might be more likely to convict someone if there was a lower penalty, because—I cannot draw any other conclusion from his line of argument—they would apply a lower standard of proof when dealing with these apparently less serious offences. In other words, they might say, ''We are not actually sure who is telling the truth here. These people have known each other and the complainant is saying that she has been raped. We are not quite sure what the situation is, but he'll only get up to five years, so we'll go with it.'' Clearly, whether the complainant and defendant know each other, whether they have known each other, or whether they never knew each other at all, the jury must still apply the same standard of proof as in a case of stranger rape. It must be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt in cases in which people do not know each other and in those in which they do. I do not think that we can take that problem away from juries. The provisions in the Bill, including the reasonableness test, try to redress the current imbalance, which the hon. Gentleman acknowledged. However, it is inherent in the cases in which people know each other that there is a difficult decision to be made. That is one of the main reasons why I counsel against going down the route for which he argues. A further reason relates to some of the statistics to which the hon. Gentleman referred, not so much on conviction rates as on incidence. He acknowledged that in the British crime survey—which people accept is a valid account of the incidence of different kinds of crime—only about 8 per cent. of people who say that they had been raped say that they were raped by someone who was not a current partner or whom they had never known. Therefore, if we accepted the amendment, we would be instituting a lesser offence for the vast majority of incidents affecting people who complain that they have been raped.
3 pmThe amendment raises a matter of serious principle. It implies, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Redcar (Vera Baird) has mentioned, that being raped by somebody whom one knows or whom one has known in an acknowledged sexual relationship is less serious than being raped by a stranger or casual Column Number: 046 acquaintance. Victim testimony—our own thinking might help us to understand—is that that simply is not true. Rapes can be different but equally serious. Being raped by somebody whom one knows or whom one has known intimately can be equally violent and traumatic. Not only does such a rape violate a person physically, but the trust, the relationship, and the judgments that have been made about the other person are shattered. Often there are also practical difficulties which do not arise with a stranger, such as avoiding future contact with that person in the course of one's daily life.The fact that the parties are known to each other cannot automatically mean that an offence is of a less serious nature. I hope that the hon. Member for Woking will accept the points that I have put to him. We agree that the decisions are difficult, and we hope that the Bill will help juries to grapple with them slightly more easily and redress the balance. A route that implies that, if one is raped by somebody one knows or has known, it is not as serious, is wrong. None the less, I welcome the opportunity that the hon. Gentleman has given us to have the debate and to put our reasons on the record.
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