 House of Commons |
Session 2006 - 07 Publications on the internet General Committee Debates Offender Management Bill |
Offender Management Bill |
The Committee consisted of the following Members:John
Benger, Committee
Clerk
†
attended the Committee
Public Bill CommitteeThursday 11 January 2007[Mr. Hugh Bayley in the Chair]Offender Management BillClause 1Meaning
of “the probation
purposes”
Amendment
proposed [this day]: No. 24, in
clause 1, page 2, line 25, at
end add—
‘(6) This section
applies to—
(a) the
functions of the Secretary of State;
and
(b) the functions of
providers of probation services and their officers so far as they are
exercised for the purposes set out in this
section.
(7) In exercising
those functions the person concerned must have regard
to—
(a) the protection
of the public;
(b) the
reduction of reoffending;
(c)
the proper punishment of
offenders;
(d) ensuring
offenders’ awareness of the effects of crime on the victims of
crime and the public;
(e) the
rehabilitation of offenders.’.—[Mr.
Garnier.]
2
pm
Question
again proposed, That the amendment be
made.
Mr.
Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con): On a point of order, Mr
Bayley, and I apologise to my hon. and learned Friend for interrupting
him. In our discussions this morning on the motion to admit written
evidence, the Minister was kind enough to say that the Home Office
would transcribe the evidence taken yesterday by several members of the
Committee and others from Lord Ramsbotham, Sir David Green and Martin
Narey. I have the compact disc here and, with your permission, I pass
it to the
Minister.
The
Chairman:
That is not a point of order for the Chair. The
hon. Gentleman can, of course, do what he likes with his CD and appears
to have done
so.
Mr.
Garnier:
I always like to start an afternoon sitting with
a degree of happiness. May I welcome you to our deliberations,
Mr. Bayley? I was coming to the end of an anecdote about
public confidence and how it related to a particular case I sat on as a
Crown court recorder. The point that I was making does not need to be
repeated. In essence, I was struck by what the hon. Member for Stafford
said. In a moment I will try to relate what he said to what the
Minister said.
Before the
Minister spoke, the hon. Member for Cheadle was good enough to support
broadly the case that I was mounting in favour of our amendment. He and
his colleague share our concerns and our desire to ensure that the
Bill, if it is to work at all, works in a practical way. I therefore
will not damage his arguments
by attempting to paraphrase or repeat them. Suffice it to say that what
he said can be read in the Official Report tomorrow. I am
grateful to him and his hon. Friend for their presence and their
support for the
amendment.
The
Minister referred to the National Offender Management Service strategy,
which was not published but was circulated within the Home
Office—
The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department
(Mr. Gerry Sutcliffe):
It was
published.
Mr.
Garnier:
It was published—in early 2006. I cannot
remember whether Helen Edwards was the chief executive at that stage. I
think that she was pretty close to the senior levels of NOMS at that
stage. That is fair enough. If the strategy is a published document and
accessible by the public, that is fine. But it is not legislation and
it is capable of being ignored. It is not owned by other providers of
probation services. It is important that if the non-strategy is to have
any practical effect and to be carried out in an orderly fashion, it
should more closely reflect what is in the
Bill.
I became a
little concerned when the Minister started talking about what he called
the interface between statutory obligations and contractual
obligations. One of the concerns of some Labour and Liberal Democrat
Members is the provision by non-state operatives of a criminal justice
function, namely the provision of probation services. If the non-state
actors—the third sector, the charities and the private
companies—are not to be tied closely into the obligations that
the Bill places on the probation services, they, and certainly I, would
need to be convinced that the contractual terms enforceable not simply
at law through tedious and lengthy court proceedings, but by means of
ministerial direction or other order. That is why I was concerned when
the Minister seemed to think that there might be room for a difference
between the statutory obligations and the contractual obligations. If I
am wrong about that I am happy to be
corrected.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
I apologise if I confused the hon. and learned
Gentleman; it was not my intention to do so. He makes a fair point.
Returning to what my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford said, I was
slightly concerned that we might be causing confusion about the
interface between relationships with the private or the voluntary
sectors. We do not want to increase the risk to the public. I hope that
that explanation helps the right hon. and learned Gentleman, although
it may not do so.
I want to
draw on some of the Minister’s remarks when, having listened to
the hon. Members for Stafford and for Cheadle and to me, he said that
he was happy to reflect on what had been discussed this morning. Often,
that is code for “Thank you for your remarks. You have taken up
the whole morning’s sitting and I wish you wouldn’t take
so long. Yes, there will be a Report stage, but frankly you
shouldn’t think that
anything you have said will find its way into the Bill, even though
I’ve said I will reflect on
it.”
However,
I have a suspicion that we are dealing with a different sort of
Minister, who wants to keep his word. When he says that he will
reflect, what he means is that he will take the ideas presented by the
hon. Gentlemen and me back to his Department and think about them.
Given the tone in which the Minister responded to us, I suspect that he
would very much like Government amendments to be tabled and debated in
Government time which will have the support not just of what I think is
called the payroll vote, but of members of his party such as the hon.
Member for Walthamstow, who represents the purest form of support for
non-contestability within this aspect of public policy. I complimented
the hon. Gentleman on Second Reading and it was genuinely
meant.
I think that
the Minister wants to return on Report with a well thought-out and
crafted Government amendment that reflects the concerns that the hon.
Gentlemen and I have expressed. When the Minister says that he will
reflect he does not simply mean that he will squirrel away what was
said in the debate and ignore it; he means that he will do something
positive about it.
I
do not know what the hon. Member for Cheadle and his hon. Friends will
want to do, but I am taking the Minister at his word, and I will advise
my hon. Friends that I am prepared to ask the leave of the Committee to
withdraw the amendment. However, before doing so I will give the
Minister the opportunity to intervene so that he can clarify precisely
what he intends to do and what he means by “I will
reflect”.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
The hon. and learned Gentleman is quite right.
I have worked with him and his hon. Friends on previous Bills and he
knows that my way of working is to reflect on what can be done with a
view to tabling amendments on Report, if that is appropriate, and, if
it is not, to write to members of the Committee to let them know that
that is not
possible.
I genuinely
believe that there are grounds for us to consider the matter, judging
by what has been said by not only the hon. and learned Gentleman and
the hon. Member for Cheadle but my hon. Friend the Member for
Stafford.
Mr.
Garnier:
It is extremely helpful to know that in this
context “reflect” does not mean simply that the Minister
will bounce back the light beams that have been shone at him from all
around but that he will absorb them and then send out information. I
beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment.
Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn.
The
Chairman
, being of the opinion that the principle of the
clause and any matters arising thereon had been adequately discussed in
the course of the debate on the amendment proposed thereto, forthwith
put the Question, pursuant to Standing Orders Nos. 68 and 89, That
the clause stand part of the
Bill.
Question
agreed
to.
Clause 1
ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 2Responsibility
for ensuring the provision of probation
services
James
Brokenshire (Hornchurch) (Con): I beg to move amendment
No. 4, in clause 2, page 2, line 43, leave out ‘or will
be’.
May I pass
on my welcome to you, Mr. Bayley? I look forward to working
under your chairmanship.
Subsection (1)
states:
“It is
the function of the Secretary of State to ensure that sufficient
provision is made throughout England and
Wales”
for fulfilling the
purposes of probation that we debated under clause 1. In so doing, he
may make provision for probation services under clause 3. However,
subsection (3) provides a carve-out in relation to that duty, and that
is what the amendment addresses. The subsection states that the
Secretary of State will not be required to take action or make
provisions under subsections (1) and
(2)
“if it appears to him
that appropriate provision is being or will be made by any person
acting otherwise than in pursuance of arrangements made under section
3.”
A number of issues
arise from that. First, if there is a gap in provision, as seems to be
envisaged in the subsection, is it right for the Secretary of State to
be able to say merely that he is happy that provision will be made?
That prompts the question how long he can be satisfied that that will
happen. More fundamentally, is it acceptable that there should be a gap
in provision?
We have
heard clearly from the Government that their intention is to cut
reoffending and protect the public. It would therefore seem odd if the
Secretary of State could sit back and say that he was satisfied that
something would be provided in due course. The amendment is intended to
limit his assessment by specifying that he may rely on the exemption in
subsection (3) only if appropriate provision “is being
made” rather than if it “will be
made”.
It is
important for us to understand the Government’s thinking on how
the clause will be applied, because it is fundamentally about a
responsibility to ensure the provision of probation services. It takes
us back to the list of purposes of probation, which we discussed this
morning and which underpins the Bill by assisting the courts in passing
appropriate sentences and ensuring that offenders are properly
monitored and helped. It is important for us to be clear what we are
talking about and what discretion the Secretary of State will be able
to exercise in making an assessment under subsection (3). Appropriate
provision must be engaged and the Secretary of State should not be able
to rely on an exemption based on his looking into the
future.
2.15
pm
The other point
upon which the amendment touches is the last part of subsection (3),
which states that the carve-out will apply if it appears to the
Secretary of State
that
“appropriate
provision is being or will be made by any person acting otherwise than
in pursuance of arrangements under section 3.”
That raises various questions in my mind
about what those other arrangements might be. As we understand it,
probation is to be provided through the mechanism in clause 3—in
other words, the Secretary of State contracting with various bodies,
agencies or companies, or making provision directly. That is the
backdrop, and we shall obviously debate in much greater detail—I
am sure that the Minister is pleased to hear this—the
acceptability of that whole structure and the issues that have rightly
been raised outside and inside this House about its appropriateness and
the Government’s
intentions.
Coming
specifically to the amendment and subsection (3), it would certainly be
helpful to understand what the other provisions might be. It may be
that I have misunderstood the intended structure, but subsection (3)
refers to
“pursuance of
arrangements under section
3.”
That prompts a
question, given the breadth of clause 3, about what such arrangements
might be. The approach is potentially vague.
One of the criticisms that we
have levelled—I can see the Minister smiling—concerns the
amount of vagueness and uncertainty. There is a thread of argument
about the language and drafting that applies all the way through the
Bill, which leads us, and many other members of the Committee, to be
uncertain about the Government’s intentions. One specific aspect
of that uncertainty concerns what other arrangements may be in
contemplation. Maybe the Minister will say that the other arrangements
will be introduced in a staged way, and that they will involve existing
provision through probation boards and other agencies and
organisations.
The
amendment deals with that lack of certainty and addresses the ambits of
what has been set out and the Secretary of State’s approach. We
shall certainly come on to more aspects of that when we move on to the
next group of amendments. We must understand as clearly as we can what
room for manoeuvre the Secretary of State has in assessing the
provision. In understanding what other arrangements may be in
contemplation, we will at least more clearly understand the
Government’s approach to this part of the
Bill.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
I add my welcome to you, Mr. Bayley.
We look forward to your support in helping us to get through the Bill
this afternoon and beyond.
I also welcome the hon. Member
for Hornchurch to his Front-Bench responsibilities. I do not wish to be
rude to him, but he has consistently accused the Government of
vagueness, generality and misunderstandings. That may be part of his
style of operation, but I do not accept those contentions. We have been
very clear about what we are trying to achieve in this Bill.
This morning, I explained that
these discussions have been taking place since the Carter report in
2003. There may have been differences of opinion about how we are going
to get there, but I think that people understand the
Government’s intentions. This amendment is probably more of a
probing amendment than anything else, but we will have a crack at
trying to help the hon. Gentleman and see how we go. He is right to say
that, under the current legislation, the statutory function for
ensuring that sufficient provision is made for a probation service rests
with the local probation boards. The purpose of clause 2 is to transfer
this function to the Secretary of State to enable a greater range of
providers to deliver services in a more flexible way which better meets
the needs of offenders and communities, which are the main driving
force that we talked about this
morning.
The
key is that the provision is about providing a better service, so
subsection (3) does not require the Secretary of State to make
provision, if it appears to him that appropriate provision can be made
through other
means.
Mr.
Garnier:
The Minister has said that the Secretary of State
will provide services better to meet the needs of communities. It may
not be directly relevant to this particular amendment, but that was an
interesting expression. Surely the communities themselves are better
able to understand their needs than the Secretary of State. Rather than
the top-down arrangement that the Government are asking us to
accept—we are dealing with communities in England and Wales and
have a Scottish Member of Parliament as Home Secretary—would it
not be better to have a bottom-up arrangement, or have I wholly
misunderstood the
situation?
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
The hon. and learned Member for Harborough has
wholly misunderstood our intentions. At the moment, the powers lie with
the probation boards, and the Secretary of State will take those powers
to give them to commissioners. I am sure we will discuss in great
detail later in the Bill whether that is centralisation, whether that
is privatisation and what the approach should be in local areas. I
certainly want to see local communities involved and, as I said this
morning, it is clear that we need to get ownership by local communities
of how we deal with reoffending and its impact on them and the wider
country. It is about changing the relationship from the current
monopoly held by local probation boards into the Secretary of State
having the means to get the
provision.
The
Secretary of State will not reach his conclusions in isolation. We will
shortly discuss the commissioners’ roles, who the commissioners
will be required to consult and who they have already been consulting.
There is a great deal of evidence from the consultations with the
regional offender managers, and we will get on to that matter later in
the debate.
The point
of subsection (3) is to ensure that the Secretary of State is not
required to take action in circumstances where it is unnecessary for
him to do so. Just as we do not want him to have to take action where
appropriate alternative arrangements are already in place, so we do not
want him to have to take action in circumstances where such
arrangements will be made, because we believe that that would be a
waste of resources, which could create a possible duplication of effort
and deter alternative provision from being made. The amendment would
restrict flexibility and local autonomy and force the Secretary of
State to intervene. We do not believe that any of that is desirable,
and it would not meet the hon. Gentleman’s requirements. Given
that we are going to get on to a wider discussion about the roles of
the commissioners, I hope that that explanation is acceptable and that
he will withdraw his amendment.
James
Brokenshire:
I have heard what the Minister has said. He
is right to say that we will get on to other, wider details, such as
the arguments about the top-down approach, competition and so on.
However, I still feel that we have not really gained any clarity on
subsection (3). I have heard what the Minister has said about what the
Government are trying to achieve in relation to the clause and his
comments about not making provision where it is deemed unnecessary. Our
purpose in tabling the amendment and raising the issue in Committee is
to get more clarity on what is unnecessary or otherwise, which would be
helpful. I can see that the Minister would like me to give way, and I
shall do so in the interests of
clarity.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
I apologise for not having quoted the example
that the hon. Gentleman asked for. The other reasons relate to the
voluntary sector. If a charity were run from premises in an area, but
not by way of a contractual arrangement, there would be no need to use
the powers relating to approved premises under the Bill. We are arguing
that there is no need for the Secretary of State to be heavily involved
in intervention at all times, so the hon. Gentleman is arguing against
what he wants to achieve by asking for
that.
James
Brokenshire:
The Minister’s clarification on that
particular aspect of what I have put forward is helpful in that it
gives us a clearer understanding of what that other provision would be.
We would certainly not seek the unnecessary or increased involvement of
the Secretary of State in the provision of services that are, in many
ways, best provided locally. It is helpful to understand that what we
talking about is in many respects a direct provision on the ground in
the community, which we welcome.
We have not had any real
clarity about how the Secretary of State would consider sufficiency
when looking forward, which relates to the “or will be”
that the amendment would delete. However, I shall note and review
carefully what the Minister has
said—
James
Brokenshire:
And reflect on it, in a genuine and honest
way, which I am sure that the Minister will do, too. On the basis of
his comments, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave,
withdrawn.
Amendment proposed: No.
31, in clause 2, page 3, line 1, leave out
‘such persons as he thinks
fit’
and insert
‘representatives
from—
(a) the
judiciary;
(b) local
authorities;
(c)
providers of probation
services;
(d) the
Youth Justice Board for England and
Wales;
(e) the
voluntary sector;
(f)
the Parole Board for England and
Wales;
(g) officers of
a provider of probation
services;
(h) trade
unions and professional associations;
and
(i) any other such
persons as he thinks fit’.—[Mark
Williams.]
No. 5, in
clause 2, page 3, line 3, at
end insert—
‘(4A) In
carrying out his duty under subsection (4) the Secretary of State must
consult representatives
of—
(a) the
judiciary;
(b) local
authorities;
(c) providers of
probation services;
(d) the
voluntary
sector.’.
No.
6, in
clause 2, page 3, line 3, at
end insert—
‘(4A) The
Secretary of State shall report annually to Parliament on the
consultation he has undertaken under subsection (4) in respect
of—
(a) the results of
the consultation, and
(b)
priorities for the probation service for the forthcoming
year.’.
Mark
Hunter (Cheadle) (LD): May I add my welcome to you,
Mr. Bayley, as our Chairman, and say how much I am looking
forward to debating the
Bill?
I will start by
stating the amendment’s objective, which is to create a legal
duty on the Secretary of State to consult the judiciary, local
authorities, providers of probation services, the Youth Justice Board,
the voluntary sector, the Parole Board, officers of a provider of
probation services, trade unions and professional associations and
others. That is a fairly comprehensive list of people whom we are
looking to involve in consultations with the Secretary of State. Why do
we think that that is needed? Whichever way we try to appraise the
Government’s intent, the consequences of the Bill seem
clear—if it is passed as it stands, it will take the probation
service out of the hands of the local community and put it into the
hands of the Secretary of
State.
It is my
contention that those working at a local level understand better than
the Secretary of State what resources are available and what is needed
in their areas, and they can give advice about how to fit probation
services to the individual needs of their areas. I am not convinced
that the Secretary of State can perform tasks such as the resettlement
of ex-prisoners into the local community as well as they can. I give
that example, because the difficulty that ex-prisoners experience in
fitting into communities is, among other indicators, reflected in the
suicide rate for that group compared with that for the general
population—male ex-prisoners are eight times more likely to
commit suicide and female ex-prisoners are 36 times more
likely to commit suicide than a member of the general population, which
is a staggering
statistic.
2.30
pm
Bad
commissioning decisions by the Secretary of State could end the
carefully forged links between the voluntary sector, local authorities
and the probation services, and could stop the effective flow of
information that allows good end-to-end offender management. I am sure
that we would all agree that that is crucial. If the structure is to
change, it is vital that commissioning and planning decisions made
nationally and regionally are informed by those who
know the local problems in detail. Consultation between those groups and
the Secretary of State should be frequent and close.
As has been said, the judiciary
needs to be aware of demand for different types of sentencing, and to
inform the Secretary of State of it. It needs to be fully involved in
the process, to have the confidence of the probation system and to
ensure the success of community sentencing. Local authorities are
closely involved with the probation services and have a good
understanding of the needs of their local areas. The Youth Justice
Board has specialists who can advise on what can be done to improve
youth justice in individual communities. People in the voluntary sector
know their areas best, and that is where their expertise can best be
used. They can advise on how they can get more
involved—
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
I do not want to stop the hon.
Gentleman’s flow, and I agree with many of his points. He
mentions the role of the voluntary sector, and that is crucial; we will
come on to it when we debate providers.
The voluntary sector could do a
lot more. The hon. Gentleman proposes a list of those people who need
to be consulted, and I agree with much of it. However, why does he want
to include it in the Bill? There might be others who can provide
support. Why does he want to limit it to that
list?
Mark
Hunter:
I thank the Minister for his intervention. It is
clear from the groups that I mentioned and the fact that the final one
is
“any other such
persons as he thinks
fit”
that the prerogative
that the Minister seeks to give to the Secretary of State is covered,
so I do not understand his point. He indicated that he accepted some of
the issues that I have
mentioned—
Mark
Hunter:
He agrees; that is even better. I hope that that
means that he will give similar favourable consideration to this
amendment, in the spirit of co-operation that we have heard so much
about in this debate.
The voluntary sector knows the
areas in which its expertise can best be used, and can advise on how it
can get more involved in the probation service. It can also advise on
how it would co-operate with the groups already involved at local
level.
I should like
to dwell for a moment on the role of the voluntary sector. The Minister
has said how important it is. Among the many representations that all
of us have had on the Bill, I have one from the YMCA, not normally
noted for its militancy on such matters. It
says:
“There is
a significant role that voluntary sector organisations can play,
particularly in the rehabilitation of persons charged with or convicted
of offences, and also in the supervision thereof. YMCA England welcomes
the proposed intention in the Bill to increase scope for further
provision. We work to prevent young people from engaging in anti-social
behaviour and crime and we work with young offenders in the criminal
justice system, in prisons and in resettlement into the
community.”
So far, so good. However, it goes on to
say that it is
“concerned that the scope for such
relationships is limited in the Bill by a narrow vision of the
voluntary sector. The Bill simply places the sector alongside others
for services to be merely transferred, neglecting the particular
contribution that a voluntary relationship has on preventing
re-offending.”
Let me
make one more comment on the functions of the Secretary of State. There
is scope in the Bill for the Secretary of State to ensure that
sufficient provision is made throughout England and Wales. The
explanatory notes state that these arrangements will normally involve
the making of contracts with the provider of services, but there is
also the possibility of non-contractual arrangements. The clause
appears to convey substantial power to the Secretary of State, while
encouraging the involvement of additional providers. The YMCA
said:
“We need
reassurance that the Secretary of State will exercise his powers to
ensure provision without compelling the voluntary sector to make this
provision.”
The parole
board, like the judiciary, needs to be fully integrated within the
system so that when it decides to release prisoners into the community
it can be assured that the public will be safe. Officers of the
providers of probation services, trade unions and professional
associations such as the National Association of Probation Officers are
best placed to know if there are problems in the service and to advise
the Secretary of State on whether the system is
working.
NAPO, the
Prison Reform Trust and the Local Government Association support our
proposal and are very enthusiastic in their wish to ensure that the
service keeps its local links to provide for the needs of the local
area. Without the amendment, there would be a “one size fits
all” situation in which local needs would not necessarily be met
and which would result in increased reoffending, and the poor
rehabilitation and reintegration of ex-prisoners into the community,
which is the opposite of what we are trying to achieve.
James
Brokenshire:
As the hon. Gentleman said, the amendments in
this group deal with the issue of transparency. They would require the
Secretary of State, to consult certain persons in exercising his
function to ensure the sufficient provision of probation services. The
amendment is essential in enabling us to know who the Secretary of
State will consult, and who will therefore inform the decision on
whether there is sufficient provision of probation services and on the
manner in which they are to be provided. That is an important aspect of
what we are trying to achieve in introducing transparency and clarity
to the Bill.
I noted
the Minister’s comments that a list might be limiting, but I
take the contrary view: not having a list would narrow the field of
people that the Secretary of State could consult. To take it to its
most absurd limit, without the amendment there is nothing in the Bill
that will require the Secretary of State to consult anybody, even his
officials. That amendments are important because they make the
consultation of certain people
explicit.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point.
The reason for moving from probation boards to probation trusts is that
at present the representation—who sits on those boards—is
pretty specific. I want
wider representation on the trusts. Sometimes, when there is a list, the
people on it are consulted but, unintentionally, somebody may be
missed. I know that the amendment contains the catch-all
phrase,
“any other such
persons as he thinks
fit”,
but what will tend
to happen is that only those on the list will be consulted. I hope that
the hon. Gentleman agrees with
me.
James
Brokenshire:
I hear what the Minister says, but it is more
likely that someone will be missed out if there is no list or
parameter. I understand his argument for rejecting the amendment but it
is an important proposal, especially in the context of what he said
about his approach, which is to sweep away probation boards and the
ingrained personalities who are wrapped up in them. There is nothing in
the Bill about who should be involved in assessing the breadth,
suitability and ambit of the probation services. The list provided in
amendment No. 31, which supplements our amendment No. 5, includes the
main players—the key personalities and parties that we want to
be consulted in the assessment of provisions that the Secretary of
State is to carry out each year.
I find it slightly strange that
the Minister argues to the contrary. I hear his argument that a list is
prescriptive and the choice should be left completely to the discretion
of the Secretary of State but, while I trust the judgment and integrity
of the Ministers in the Committee, we must consider legislation for the
long term—not just the duration of this Government but that of
the next one and the one after. We all know that we are making
legislation that might last many years, and we must consider all the
potential problems.
I
see no harm in prescribing a list of potential consultees in the
assessment of the probation service. Indeed, I hope that the Minister
agrees that those identified in the amendment should be consulted by
the Secretary of State in the proper carrying-out of his consultation
as set out in subsection (4). There is a need for transparency and
confidence in the exercise of the Secretary of State’s function.
It is important that the agencies and parties listed be involved in the
process, and the most effective way to ensure that is by specifically
including them in the Bill, for the reasons given by the hon. Member
for Cheadle.
Subsection (4) must not be
regarded as some sort of sop to the general duties of the Secretary of
State identified in subsection (1) or the manner in which he is to
perform them set out in subsection (2). In many ways subsection (4)
provides a check and balance to ensure that the Secretary of State
fulfils his duties properly, but it is crucial that we examine it
closely to ensure that the proper balance is provided. He is given
discretion within his duty in subsection (1) to ensure that sufficient
provision is made throughout England and Wales. We need to be satisfied
that he makes his judgments on as informed a basis as possible. I hope
that the Minister shares that aim.
I see no harm in providing some
clarity for agencies and organisations by showing that there is there
is a positive obligation on the Secretary of State to consult them or
at least to consult bodies that they know. Even if an organisation was
not a direct consultee it could then feed its thoughts, concerns and
views to a
particular body to ensure that they were properly reflected in the
annual consultation and fed through into the exercising of functions by
the Secretary of State under subsection
(1).
2.45
pm
On
transparency, which I have mentioned and which is covered by amendments
Nos. 31 and 5, it is important to include in the process of
consultation and the annual examination of the extent, suitability and
ambit of the probation service some sort of annual report of the
conclusions, which would provide a framework for what is being debated
and discussed with those parties. That would allow further external
scrutiny of the Secretary of State’s decision-making process,
which is why amendment No. 6 states
that
“The
Secretary of State shall report annually to Parliament on the
consultation he has undertaken... in respect of (a) the results of
the consultation, and (b) priorities for the probation service for the
forthcoming year.”
We
have talked about the lack of clarity, which I have highlighted through
previous amendments, and I am sure that the Minister will be pleased to
know that I may return to that point fairly regularly during these
proceedings. I certainly see the role of the Opposition and the
Committee as achieving as much clarity as we can on the meaning of the
Bill so that people outside, when examining the Bill thereafter, can
have as good an understanding as possible of the Government’s
intentions.
Those
involved in the provision of probation services need clearly to
understand the objectives, rationale, strategy and approach of the
Secretary of State on the assessment of probation services and
probation functions. Having an annual report to show who has been
consulted, what those parties have said and what conclusions the
Secretary of State has drawn, and therefore what the priorities of the
probation functions and probation services should be moving forward,
would not be a particularly onerous or arduous undertaking and would
assist everyone
involved.
We heard
criticism on Second Reading about the lack of a business plan in
advance of the Bill and the lack of clarity about what the Government
intend. While we may not have a business plan, at least through this
model we would have a clear annual direction and strategy drawing
formally on the consultees, the consultation and the representations. I
should have thought that that would be a very helpful thing to have.
Mr.
David Kidney (Stafford) (Lab): I spoke this morning about
shifting targets from year to year. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that
while knowing what has happened in consultation and what the outcome
has been is desirable, an annual report about that consultation is in
no way an adequate replacement for a proper business plan over a number
of years rather than just the next 12
months?
James
Brokenshire:
I wholeheartedly agree with the hon.
Gentleman. The desire for clarity, certainty and the business plan has
been highlighted by outside groups and by hon. Members on both sides of
the House on Second Reading. I do not see the annual report as in any
way a replacement for a proper business model and business plan. It
would help in drawing up a business plan and understanding what is
happening to the provision
of probation services if an annual report were presented to Parliament.
In that case, the House would have the opportunity to take up issues
that may have been highlighted by consultees, but which the Government,
perhaps reasonably, have decided not to follow through. We would have
the opportunity to scrutinise the decisions that they have taken and
better understand the approach and the manner in which the Secretary of
State intends to exercise his duties in ensuring that there is
sufficient provision of probation services across England and
Wales.
The hon.
Member for Cheadle has highlighted the concerns of the YMCA. I am sure
that all members of the Committee have received the YMCA briefing,
which highlights the issue of the transfer of powers to the Secretary
of State. In its briefing notes, the YMCA seeks reassurance that the
Secretary of State will exercise those powers to ensure provision
without compelling the voluntary sector to provide it. The voluntary
sector seems to be concerned that, rather than providing the
opportunity to get different parties involved to provide a greater
spread and depth of provision, it will be in some way put upon. The
YMCA comments in the briefing notes that that would be an abdication of
responsibility on the part of the
Government.
It would
be helpful if the Minister were to address that point directly. Certain
parts of the voluntary sector that are currently involved in the
provision of probation and other services for offenders would value
some feedback and clarity about the Government’s approach. The
Government should not be seeking merely to put the voluntary sector in
the frame and to abdicate their responsibility. We should ensure that
we properly address issues of reoffending and the protection of the
public in the extent and ambit of the probation services and in how
they are delivered.
An ancillary point arising from
the amendments, which goes to the crux of clause 2, is that it is for
the Secretary of State to ensure that sufficient provision is made. We
heard in the run-up to the Bill—the Minister said this when he
launched it—that the focus would be on reoffending. I take from
that that the measurement or criteria that the Secretary of State may
take into account, or the approach that he may use in assessing whether
provision is sufficient—I use those words in the context of
subsection (1)—will be based on those factors. That is my
assumption, but there is no clarity in the Bill on which criteria would
be applied in assessing whether sufficient provision has been made for
probation. It would be helpful if the Minister were to clarify the
Government’s intentions on the criteria that will be applied
properly to assess whether that function has been
fulfilled.
Clause 2
covers a lot of important ground on how it is intended that the
Secretary of State will carry out his responsibilities. I hope that the
Minister will respond favourably to the points that we have raised and
that he will consider the amendments in his customary way. The issue is
serious, and whatever he may say, some clarity, framework and structure
would be appropriate. I hope that he will consider the amendments in
the names of my hon. Friends and the hon. Members for Cheadle and for
Ceredigion appropriately and in the spirit in which they were
tabled.
Mr.
Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent, South) (Lab): May I add my
voice, Mr. Bayley, to those who have said that it is a
pleasure to serve under your chairmanship? This morning, my hon. Friend
the Member for Stafford, who is a good friend, set out to help my hon.
Friend the Minister to fine-tune the Bill. In that spirit, may I also
make some brief comments?
It is often
hard to set up a structure to consider consultation and ways of doing
things in future years. It is extremely difficult in the space of a
couple of brief subsections to achieve the objective of the amendments.
The requirement on the Secretary of State to consult at least once a
year suggests the possibility of a rolling programme or some sort of
wider consultation. I leave the thought with my hon. Friend the
Minister that he might make a statement in Committee on considering a
mechanism for a rolling programme, whereby at any time throughout a
year, interested parties could put forward their views if it becomes
apparent that something is not working well and should be changed. That
would remove the need for amendment No. 6, as a rolling programme would
make an annual report difficult. The Bill seeks flexibility, and the
more flexibility that can be achieved, the
better.
I
have looked carefully at amendments Nos. 31 and 5—amendment No.
5 is a subset of amendment No. 31. One would have to decide which
categories various groups would fall into. For example, would
councillors fall under the heading of “local authorities”
in proposed new paragraph (b) in amendment No. 31? Councillors might
argue that they are separate from local authorities in some respects,
but their views, which come from the offices of a local authority, are
important. Academics might feel that they fall within the voluntary
sector in some respects but not in others. Paragraphs (a) to (h) are
prescriptive, while paragraph (i) mirrors the draft Bill in specifying
“such persons as” the Secretary of State “thinks
fit”.
I suggest
that my hon. Friend the Minister re-examines the provision and
considers whether it should be worded to leave it open for all
interested parties to have an input, but so that certain organisations
have a statutory duty to take part when they have an influence. Such
organisations could include the housing department of the local
authority through to the Parole Board, in which case statutory bodies
would have a duty but there would be wider scope in the Bill for people
to have an input. I do not want to take up the Committee’s time
by making a long speech to reiterate my points, but I hope that my hon.
Friend will take on board the issues that I have raised.
I have sympathy with the lists
mentioned by the hon. and learned Member for Harborough and the hon.
Member for Cheadle. The question of who is required to be consulted
must be much more open, but the format used in the clause is a better
way of achieving that.
Mr.
Kidney:
It is a delight to serve under your chairmanship,
Mr. Bayley, because you are so reasonable, so knowledgeable
and so pleasant with
it.
Mr.
Kidney:
As we are Members of Parliament, it is inevitable
that we will press the Minister to provide a list, because the
alternative is to present him with a blank cheque and to leave the
Secretary of State and his successors to choose whom they consult and
whom they do not. It would be foolish for Parliament to leave itself in
the position of not knowing what the future holds having not tied down
an institution of government, rather than an individual. As others have
said, the Minister is a very nice man, whom I trust entirely, but he
will not be in his job for ever, no matter how much he would like to be
in it for a long time. We are right, therefore, to want legislation
that gives us an idea of what we can expect from consultation in the
future.
On
amendment No. 31, the hon. Member for Cheadle has rightly said that
some probation services are focused on a locality. Much of the service
is local, so there must be links with local providers and local
partners, which need to work together in strategic ways. However, the
trade union for probation has exaggerated the point, because other
aspects of the work of managing offenders are not local. For example, a
person who is sent to prison is going to be taken away from where they
used to live and, when coming out of prison, may or may not return to
the same place. During the prison sentence, they are away from that
area anyway, and they may have several moves in prison. All that is
much more regional or even national rather than local, and we ought to
bear that balance in
mind.
3
pm
Nevertheless,
the point that much of this is locally driven is a good one, so why
will there not be local consultation? The shopping list before us
refers to the judiciary but it does not mention local criminal justice
boards. It refers to the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales but
does not mention local youth offending teams. It talks about the Parole
Board for England and Wales but does not mention the police locally,
who have a great deal of interest in people who are released from
prison on parole.
There is
something of a mixed message in what the hon. Gentleman says and what
the list says. If the Secretary of State personally is conducting the
consultation at a national level, we could say that the Secretary of
State will consult with, say, the Youth Justice Board for England and
Wales and we can trust it to collect information from all the local
youth offending teams. As I understand the explanatory notes, however,
the Secretary of State is going to consult through regional offender
managers at a regional level. One would not expect a dozen or so ROMs
all to consult with the national Youth Justice Board to find out what
was going on in local areas in youth offender teams; one might think
that they should consult with the youth offender teams.
Although I accept the hon.
Gentleman’s argument, I think that there are flaws in the logic
of his list. There are things missing from the list. The last entry
is
“and anybody else
that he thinks fit”.
The
hon. and learned Member for Harborough, as a practising judge, can tell
us that judges sometimes perversely, in our view as parliamentarians,
interpret lists like this as saying that if it says at the end of a
determined list “and anybody else”, that cannot have a
very open-ended meaning; rather it means somebody
related to or similar to the ones that are in the list. I hate using
latin phrases, but ejusdem generis is the term that they use. So
it does not follow that because the list says at the end “and
anybody else”, it means that the Minister can consult many other
people.
The Minister
is right to ask, “Why do you present this list and stop me from
consulting with others?”. There are some very important people
missing from the list. Something like half the money spent on
offenders’ training and their supporting accommodation now comes
not from probation or offender management service funds but from the
Learning and Skills Council and Supporting People, so is it not
important to consult them? Many offending issues relate to drug abuse
or mental health, so what about drug action teams and mental health
trusts? Are they not important,
too?
James
Brokenshire:
The hon. Gentleman is making a good point in
highlighting the concept of consultation taking place at the regional
level. Does he share my concern that, if consultation does take place
at the regional level, that is where it may stop, and we may not get
the proper feedback from the ground, which he has properly identified a
need for in his
contribution?
Mr.
Kidney:
I am nervous about regional consultation because
my constituency, Stafford, is quite a long way from Birmingham, the
centre of the universe for the west midlands, and we often feel that we
are left out of debates about regional issues, so I understand that
danger. I am sure the Minister will have something to say about how he
will ensure that does not happen, but our job is to say who we think
should be consulted.
There is one more glaring
omission. People will remember from this morning that I did not exactly
promote the private provision of services and mentioned some of the
dangers of it. Given that the intention behind the policy is that there
will be private providers as well as public and voluntary sector
providers, it does seem odd to me to produce a list that does not allow
for consultation with people who might become providers in the future,
unless of course the list’s promoter hopes not to allow it. That
is a fair enough point. The providers are the people who won the
contract, and I am thinking more widely about including the private
sector as a consultee as it wants to win the contract. That is an
obvious point to make.
We need to
ask ourselves how we square the circle. Do we leave the Minister to
decide entirely for himself who he consults for ever into the future,
or tie his hands with a list that is set in stone and cannot be
diverted from or changed in the future? How can we do things
differently? This is not an original idea, it is in the briefing from
Rainer that I mentioned, but perhaps there should be a formal
arrangement for an advisory group drawn from among those at national
and local level, the trusts, if they are set up, and the probation
service that exists today. We should provide for a pool of
organisations and people from whom the members of the advisory group
can be drawn, and then we should legislate to say that we expect
consultation to be with that pool. I suggest that that is how we might
move from where we are to where I think we ought to be.
On amendment No. 6, although I
agree, as I said in an intervention, that it is entirely right that if
there has to be consultation there should be an account of who was
consulted and what they said, I would not like that consultation to be
the engine driving the future direction of probation or offender
management services. The idea that I mentioned this morning of taking a
coherent, strategic approach to where the service is going is different
from using the results of consultation. Clearly, the results of
consultation should inform future decisions, but I would not want
anybody to think that the service would lurch between plans from year
to year, depending on the outcome of consultations in the 12 months
beforehand.
Mr.
Nick Hurd (Ruislip-Northwood) (Con): I join those who have
welcomed you to the Chair, Mr.
Bayley.
I wish to make
two brief points to the Minister. First, against the background to the
Bill, of which he is well aware—a real concern about the
centralist tendency of the Bill and its consequences in terms of
dilution of local accountability—can I press him further on what
would be the downside of a list? He suggested that some people might be
left off the list. I put it to him that that is a tiny and manageable
risk compared with the upside of sending a signal from this place to
the key stakeholders in the process that their voices will be heard in
future.
As my hon.
Friend the Member for Hornchurch said, the duty to consult is not
enough. I break the news gently to the Minister that, certainly in my
constituency, the words “Government consultation” and
“sham” have become inextricably linked. We have reached
the point in our democratic process at which, in terms of public
acceptance and expectation, the duty to consult is not enough. We now
need a duty to report on the consultation and a duty to expose
ourselves in power to external scrutiny of the responses to that
consultation. My hon. and learned Friend on the Front Bench described
that as helpful. I would go further and say to the Minister that it is
absolutely necessary to the fundamental health of our
democracy.
Mr.
Neil Gerrard (Walthamstow) (Lab): I welcome you to the
Chair, Mr. Bayley. As the Minister knows, I would argue, and
will do so when we reach later clauses, that we should look at a
different structure in any case. The decisions should not all be made
by the Secretary of State. To a degree, the debate as to whether the
Secretary of State had consulted with anybody would then become
redundant. Some of the points that have been made relate more to the
debate that we will probably have at some length on clause 3 about what
work is done and what the role of the voluntary sector is. The concern
of the YMCA about being compelled to do or not do certain things should
be discussed in a separate debate about who does what, rather than
during one on who is
consulted.
I do not
think that anybody would disagree that consultation has to happen. It
would have to happen whatever the structure. Whether the Secretary of
State or someone else is in the driving seat, it is clear that if the
probation service’s functions are to work properly a wide range
of people must be involved, as they are now.
The probation service itself—which is clearly from the
not-for-profit sector—is involved, along with the Prison Service
and many other players in the field that have to be
consulted.
I am not
sure whether the amendments would achieve what it has been suggested in
ensuring local consultation. There is a contradiction in what happens
at different levels of the service. I am sure that my hon. Friend the
Minister will say that he agrees with the principle of consultation. It
is included in the Bill and referred to in the explanatory notes, which
include a list of sorts, although it is in broad, general
terms.
Will the
Minister expand on what is written in the explanatory notes about the
consultation being undertaken at a regional level? If the structure of
the probation service changes in the way that he intends, the regional
offender managers will be some of the key people in the commissioning
process. However, the other bodies that the explanatory notes suggest
should be consulted—sentencers, other criminal justice agencies,
local authorities and so on—are not necessarily organised
regionally or by the same regions as the offender managers. I can see
problems there: if consultation is regional, who will be talked to and
at what level?
I
understand the argument that we should know who is to be consulted, but
I am a bit dubious about putting lists in Bills because there could be
a problem in future if it is decided that a list needs to be changed.
We would have to make primary legislation again to make any changes. I
was attracted by the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Member for
Stafford that it would be helpful to draw up a list but to establish a
structure for doing so. The mechanism could be a requirement to make
regulations spelling out the details rather than just a power of the
Secretary of State. That would create a system that would be much
easier to amend than if it were necessary to introduce primary
legislation. If the Minister considers how changes can be made, he
might see that as a way
forward.
As my hon.
Friend the Member for Stafford pointed out, once a list has been drawn
up it does not take long before people start to think of other bodies
that should be included. For example, before coming to the Committee
this afternoon I was with some colleagues who were meeting the
Disability Rights Commission. We were talking about the new disability
equality duties, placed on public authorities since December, to
produce proposals to promote equality of opportunity for disabled
people, eliminate discrimination and so on under the Disability
Discrimination Act 2005. I cannot remember which public authorities are
exempt from the requirements of that Act—I recall that there are
one or two—but some probation work may be covered by its scope.
Another obvious group of bodies to be consulted is therefore the
Disability Rights Commission and other such organisations. That is the
real problem with lists in Bills—they become inflexible even if
there is a catch-all at the end of them. My experience, and that of a
lot of other people, suggests that such a catch-all does not always
succeed in bringing in people who should be
consulted.
3.15 pm
Part of the difficulty in
trying to discuss what happens about consultation at national level is
that it tries to marry two incompatible things. We are
discussing decision making at national level, when many of us believe
that we should be considering local structures. We would prefer
decisions to be taken through the probation boards, as they are
now.
I agree with my
hon. Friend the Member for Stafford about reporting. The key issue is
that there is no long-term business plan, which is needed so that we
know where the service is going over a period of years and so that
targets can be measured and reported on. There is a clear and important
role for the Home Affairs Committee in monitoring and examining what
happens. However, I am not sure that I want a report on consultation. I
want a report on what is actually happening in respect of achieving
targets and in relation to the business plan, rather than getting
bogged down in arguments about the consultation process. I understand
perfectly the reason for tabling the amendments—the Committee
and the House should know who will be consulted, which should be
clear—but I have some doubts whether sticking that in the Bill
is the way to do it.
Mr.
Garnier:
I agree with much of what the hon. Gentleman has
said, but we must consider the amendment in the context of the Bill as
drafted. Subsection (4)
states:
“The
Secretary of State shall at least once in every year consult such
persons as he thinks
fit”.
If we cast our
minds back not too far, we saw the sort of people whom the Secretary of
State thought it appropriate to consult in designing the Bill. Members
of the Committee may remember that there was a consultation process and
that 748 people responded to it. Only 10 of them agreed with the policy
behind the Bill, but—surprise, surprise—we got the Bill.
The Secretary of State thought that he should consult 10
people out of 748. I appreciate that consultation does not mean
guaranteed agreement, but when there is such a disproportionate
response—only 10 people out of 748 were in favour of the
scheme—one is entitled to be a little sceptical about whom the
Secretary of State might think it fit to
consult.
On 7 November
2006, the Home Secretary thought it appropriate to enter into a
consultation exercise. He went to Wormwood Scrubs prison and addressed
himself to an involuntary audience, namely the prisoners. In paragraph
54 of his speech, he
said:
“You’re
the experts on
this.”
What was
“this”? It was the future of the probation service, and
up to a point that was right. However, it is interesting that the
Secretary of State, to whom the Bill gives the power to consult such
persons as he thinks fit, thinks it is proper to ignore 738 consultees
and to seek the advice of the residents of Wormwood
Scrubs.
With that
background, it is entirely appropriate for the Committee to want to
include amendment No. 31 or amendment No. 5 in the Bill. Without that
spur, I suspect that the Secretary of State will just wander round the
prisons of England and Wales consulting. I am not entirely sure that
that is the way to run the future of the probation service, either with
a capital P and S or a small p and s. I trust that I will be able to
catch your eye, Mr. Bayley, in a stand part debate, if that
is appropriate—
Mr.
Garnier:
In that case, I invite the Minister to consider
what he thinks the expression “such persons as
he”—the Secretary of State—“thinks
fit” really means in the context of this
Bill.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
I thank the hon. Member for Cheadle and other
hon. Members for discussing the amendment in the way in which they did.
Indeed, I am grateful for all the contributions. In the spirit of
generosity and consensus that we discussed earlier, I have many things
to take away to think about in greater detail. I shall respond to the
amendments now, and I hope that we can make some progress and get to
where we all want to
be.
I am grateful to
my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford for pointing out some of the
exemptions and gaps in the list in the amendment. Hon. Members have
accepted that the police, the learning and skills councils and, as my
hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow has pointed out, the disability
bodies are not mentioned. I hope that hon. Members understand that we
cannot accept the amendment in its present form, because the list does
not meet the requirement to give different weights to different bodies.
I also have to tell my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford that
Birmingham is not the centre of the universe—it is, of course,
Bradford and in particular Bradford, South.
A great deal of concern has
been expressed about the role of the regional offender managers, not
just this afternoon but on Second Reading. I want people to understand
what we have got. There are nine regional offender managers and one
director of offender management in Wales. Because they are regional,
and national in the context of Wales, it is not envisaged that we are
talking only about regional consultation. As I said this morning, we
want to be in a position to meet our objectives, which are to reduce
reoffending, to raise the profile of offending behaviour in the widest
sense in terms of our communities and to make sure that there is a
wholehearted community response to what we are trying to
achieve.
We have also
said that there is no big bang here. As we move on to discuss the Bill,
which will hopefully be enacted so we can create the first trust in
2008, we will build on the existing good practice. The regional
commissioners have already been in place for some time, and the
regional commissioning plans will be published next week. I asked for
an indication of those whom the ROMS have consulted. Lo and behold,
although I told the hon. Member for Cheadle that I could not accept the
amendment but that I agreed with many of the people on his list, they
are the very people whom we have consulted.
We have
talked to local and regional partners including the public, private and
voluntary sectors. They have been looking at sentences, regional
reducing reoffending partnership boards, local criminal justice boards,
local authorities, local area agreements and local strategic partners.
Those are all the people who would want to be consulted in addition to
the learning and skills councils and the disability organisations. We
want to talk to them about tackling reoffending. The Government are not
attempting to reduce consultation in any way or to
compel the voluntary sector to provide services. There is no question,
as the hon. Member for Hornchurch has suggested, of abdicating
responsibility, which is not what this is about. The provision is about
innovation—we need to do something different, because what
exists now is not working in the way that we would all hope to
see.
I respect the
work that the YMCA does, but I do not accept that this Bill has a
narrow vision—quite the reverse. It is a wide, visionary Bill,
and it has an objective that we all want to achieve. The YMCA has a
role to play, if it wants one, at the various levels at which it wants
to be involved. In direct answer to the hon. Gentleman, there is no
prospect of the Government wanting to compel voluntary sector
organisations to be involved, and there has been no attempt to include
only some parts of the voluntary sector.
One of the concerns of the
smaller, voluntary sector organisations is that they cannot compete on
a larger scale because of their size and direction of
travel—perhaps they are small organisations that provide
particular services. We want them to continue to be involved. This is
not about excluding smaller voluntary sector organisations; it is about
innovations that might offer us the opportunity to reap the benefits of
the route that we all want to go down, namely to cut the reoffending
rate.
This morning,
my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford mentioned the charity Rainer. I
have a lot of sympathy with it and commend it and the National Council
for Voluntary Organisations on their publication, which many members of
the Committee have seen, in which they talk about what their
contribution could be if they were only allowed to play their part.
That is what we are trying to do in considering maximum
consultation.
I
am not going to be taken down the route of the Home Secretary’s
position and his Wormwood Scrubs speech. In subsequent speeches,
including on Second Reading, he has acknowledged and accepted the role
of the probation service and the dedication of the professionals who
work in it. I understand why the trade unions have used the tactic of
attacking the Home Secretary through the suggestion that he is somehow
denigrating the probation service. However, he is not doing that and
has not done so—he said on Second Reading that he recognises its
dedication. We want to enhance the role of the probation office by
maximising the opportunity for
providers.
I believe
that including the list in the Bill will cause the problems that my
hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow has mentioned. However, I agree
that there is a need to do something, whether it is to take up the idea
of my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford of an advisory body or
whether it is to consider secondary legislation. In the spirit in which
I said that I would consider the previous issue, I shall consider
this—
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
Reflecting in a positive way. I am not,
perhaps, persuaded as much as I was on the previous amendment to look
at what needs to happen.
The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department
(Mr. Vernon Coaker):
Considering.
I understand the
concerns. All of us have said in Committee, as well as in public
debates and in the House, that these are matters about which there is a
great deal of concern. I acknowledge the concern of the people who work
in the probation service, because the Bill is about their future, where
their service is going and what their contribution is to be. Our
consultations and discussions—not only the consultations
connected with the Bill but the other discussions that will have to
take place on how we formulate the trusts and how we move forward on
the services—will include the trade unions. I have always
believed that we will not get change if we do not take people with us.
We have to take the work force with us, because if we do not do so, we
will not achieve that change. We have important things to
do.
In the spirit of
what we are trying to achieve, I hope that the amendment will be
withdrawn. I will then go away and consider how to develop the measure
in a more positive way, so that we do not miss anybody out. That is not
our intention, and I know that it is not the intention of Opposition
Members. We have to find our way through this, because ensuring that we
maximise the consultation is a key
area.
On the
annual report, again it is important to publish the consultation. We
will come to the responses to the previous consultation, which were not
all in opposition to what the Government were trying to achieve,
because people accepted some elements of it.
The Bill has changed from
the initial Bill introduced in 2005. For example, we have listened to
what people have said about the structure of NOMS, which has changed
dramatically since its inception. I have explained the position as much
as I can, but in the spirit of moving forward, I shall take the issue
away and see what further amendments we can introduce in Committee. I
hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw his
amendment.
3.30
pm
Mark
Williams (Ceredigion) (LD): The Minister started his
remarks in the spirit of good will. I am not sure whether I should
expect that in these proceedings, as I am a new member of the
Committee, but on that basis, I, too, welcome you to your place,
Mr.
Bayley.
The background
to this matter was succinctly put by the hon. Member for
Ruislip-Northwood, who said that it was about confidence in a system.
Manifestly, that confidence, not least because of the remarks made by
the hon. and learned Member for Harborough about earlier consultations,
is not there. When the legislation originated, there were serious
concerns and doubts about the capacity of Ministers to listen, although
I genuinely respect what this Minister is trying to do. There has been
some scepticism about the extent of the list and its capacity to cover
all sectors, but I do not think that we should minimise the
significance in proposed new paragraph (i)
of
“such persons as he
thinks fit”.
The Minister
should have no fear about that. It concerns his capacity to talk to the
voluntary sector
and build the positive relationship with it that he desires. None the
less, he said that he will return to the matter.
The Minister talked more
specifically, on the basis of what his hon. Friend the hon. Member for
Stafford said, about the building of regional structures and advisory
panels. Certainly, as a Welsh Member representing a rural area of some
size, I can say that there are concerns in Wales about the structure in
which we have one regional director covering a huge
area.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
It is not a regional director in Wales; it is a
director, because Wales is a national
country.
Mark
Williams:
I appreciate that. That will go a long way to
reassure some people in Wales. The point is that there is a structure
out there that needs to respond to the region or, in our case, the
country in question. I really do not understand why the Minister fears
the notion of a list. That is the crux of the matter. It is
sufficiently open-ended to give confidence to the wider community and
for him still to have flexibility. On that basis, we on the Liberal
Democrat Benches would like to test the opinion of the
Committee.
Question put, That the
amendment be
made:—
The
Committee divided: Ayes 6, Noes
9.
Division
No.
1
]
AYESNOES
Question
accordingly negatived.
Question proposed, That
the clause stand part of the
Bill.
Mr.
Garnier:
I will not be too long, I hope. I wish to
highlight some of the problems that the clause will cause for the
shared desire of end-to-end management of
offenders.
First,
there is an attitude problem from the Government. In his speech at
Wormwood Scrubs on 7 November, to which I referred a moment
ago, the Home Secretary said, and we must bear it in mind that this was
in a
prison:
“To the
probation service my message is: ‘Never forget that your job is
to protect the public—and what the public wants is
outcomes—less crime, safer streets—not an outdated
ideological debate about inputs and who delivers
them.’”
That is an
interesting remark for that particular individual to have made, bearing
in mind his political history, but I am sure that the hon. Member for
Walthamstow will have had close discussions with him about that. I am
concerned that the Home Secretary thought it appropriate to lecture the
probation service from inside a prison.
One of the
problems that the service faces is that it is overwhelmed with cases
and under-staffed—it is well below establishment. I believe that
the London probation service is about 150 officers below establishment,
and that figure is replicated proportionately across the country. Why
is the service so overwhelmed with cases? Because the prisons are
overcrowded, with more than 80,000 people in them at the moment. When
the Government came into office in 1997 the prison population was about
58,000. The prison estate is now officially overcrowded, testimony that
comes from Operation Safeguard, which one of the Home Office Ministers
signed into operation—I do not know whether it was the Minister
present or one of his colleagues. The prison ship fiasco continues, and
we know about the fiasco of the number of prisoners being moved from
the secure estate to the open estate who voluntarily remove themselves
to our streets, towns and villages. It is a pretty shambolic state of
affairs and derives from Marsham
street.
The
Chairman:
Order. May I remind the hon. and learned
Gentleman that we are debating the control and management of the
probation service, not of Prison
Service?
Mr.
Garnier:
You are precisely right, Mr. Bayley.
We are considering the responsibility for ensuring the provision of
probation services, and one reason why the probation service is under
such strain, and why I suggest the clause is not apt to deal with the
current problems including the one that I am describing, is that the
prison system is so overcrowded and the probation service cannot cope.
Why can it not cope? Because, as I have said, a huge number of
prisoners who ought to be looked after and rehabilitated by probation
officers in prison are churned.
I expect that you know what
churning is, Mr. Bayley. It is the constant movement of
prisoners from prison to prison unaccompanied by their prison records,
probation officers’ reports, sentence planning or
rehabilitation, training and education planning. They move from prison
to prison and cannot be reformed or supervised by the probation
service. They cannot be treated and looked after by the wider Prison
Service or the educational system. That is an extremely dangerous and
damaging state of
affairs.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
The hon. and learned Gentleman discusses
educational services. What evidence has he, or what organisation has
told him, that the educational service’s interventions in
prisons have not been
completed?
Mr.
Garnier:
I suspect that I have been to more prisons than
the Minister in the past 12 months. I was appointed shadow spokesman on
prisons in December 2005, since when I have visited a number of
prisons. I have no doubt that the local learning and skills councils,
which are providing teachers, trainers and others to assist in the
training of prisoners, are doing the best that they can. The problem is
that because of the overcrowded prisons, people queue up to get on a
training course, to see the parole board, or to see the probation
officer who is planning their sentence and their release plan, but they
cannot get to the top of the
queue. Before they get to the top, they have to move to another prison,
because the governor has to release them to another prison or to the
open estate to provide places for the people coming in.
About 500 prisoners are
legitimately released every working day. I am concerned that in the
absence of proper consultation and planning, and in the current state
of affairs—that is to say a woefully and dangerously overcrowded
secure prison estate—those people cannot be received by
probation service care, still less released from it in a planned,
sensible way. I want that to happen because it is good for the
prisoners; there is a good moral case for improving the state of
prisoners, who need to come out in a better state. I also have a
self-interested case to make, as both a taxpayer and a citizen. We
spend £37,500 each year on every adult prisoner. A prisoner who
is inside for three years costs approximately £100,000. We are
failing the taxpayer if the dividend is a high reoffending rate and the
individual is back in prison within two years, which happens to
approximately 67 per cent. of those who are released. We are also
failing our constituents, who are the victims of the crimes.
There are three points that I
ask the Minister to bear in mind when he considers the clause. Is he
setting up the probation service to fail? Is he placing upon it an
unbearable burden? Is he setting those who will provide probationary
services a task which cannot be achieved, by virtue of the fact that
this Government have arranged sentencing and prison-building policies
that do not match? We have overcrowding. Prisoners cannot get access to
probation officers, whose job it is to provide sentence planning and
supervision of prisoners, in addition to pre-sentence reports and
aftercare. If we cannot achieve those things, the Bill is a waste of
time and is creating a false expectation among the public that
something is being done.
This is the third reform of the
probation service since 1997. Each time that it has been reformed, the
Government have claimed that it is the answer to every maiden’s
prayer, so why are they back here at the church porch yet again? They
are back because they have not thought it through; they have failed
properly to consult those who know about the subject; and they are
overly exercised by the need to create headlines. A headline gives the
impression of activity, but it is not the implementation of policy or
of a plan that has been thought
through.
I desperately
want to be persuaded, but I make these remarks as a taxpayer, a citizen
and a Member of Parliament who represents people who want to see the
security of their homes and streets improved. I want to see from the
Minister some understanding of the gap in understanding between the
Department, which is under his political leadership and that of the
Home Secretary, and the needs and concerns of the public. If I may say
so, those are not crude trade union job-protection concerns but the
concerns of professional individuals in the probation service and those
who wish to offer themselves as volunteers or contractors in the
probation world. The Minister knows that my party has no argument with
the Government about putting this proposal out to competition, but he
must bear it in mind that there are
individuals who are desperately worried that the Government are building
a regime that will cause damage. It will not provide the protection for
the public that the Home Secretary, in his speech to the prisoners in
Wormwood Scrubs, said he was so desperately keen to
achieve.
3.45
pm
We need to be
more thoughtful and to ensure that the Government do a little more
talking and thinking before they rush to legislate. We are on the 60th
criminal justice Bill since 1997, and I am not sure whether any of them
has increased the security of the public in reality or in terms of
their perception. I urge the Minister, when he reflects, to think
carefully about what I have said this
afternoon.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
Let me say at the outset that I do not doubt
the sincerity and sensitivity of the hon. and learned Member for
Harborough, or his expertise in the legal profession as a judge.
However, I strongly disagree with his analysis, which is not surprising
considering the political differences between us. What is important to
me as a taxpayer, as a member of the public and as a Minister is that
we should deal in facts, not fiction. We should deal with the reality
of what is happening and not with the perception of it that some people
are trying to
engender.
On becoming
Home Secretary in May, my right hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and
Shotts (John Reid) said that he needed time to reflect on what was
going on in the Home Office. He said that he needed 100 days to
introduce plans for reform, which he did—they were published in
July, and we are proceeding with them.
The hon. and learned Gentleman
has talked about the prison population. Yes; there are too many people
in prison in the UK. I think that we all agree that it is wrong that we
put more people in prison per head of population than any other country
in western Europe, but that is where we are, and our role should be to
protect the public by ensuring that there is sufficient capacity. The
hon. and learned Gentleman is right about Operation Safeguard, which
the Home Secretary has said was not satisfactory but which needed to be
implemented to protect the public. To suggest that that situation has
evolved only over the period in which this Government have been in
office is
nonsensical.
The hon.
and learned Gentleman, who was elected to the House in 1992, will
remember, as I do, the issues raised in respect of previous Home
Secretaries in his party—for example, those concerning the right
hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr.
Howard), the Prison Service and Mr. Lewis. Prison capacity
has been a problem for successive Governments.
We must consider the
relationship between the sentencing policies under successive
Governments and where we are now. We have put in place the capacity to
protect the public. We announced additional places in July and have
subsequently announced further work on that issue. We have met the
requirements in terms of
capacity.
I was in the
hon. and learned Gentleman’s position in opposition, and one
wanted to heap on to the Government as many problems as one could when
the
Government appeared to be having difficulties. However, that approach is
not appropriate if one is not dealing in facts. The hon. and learned
Gentleman has given me the opportunity in this debate to challenge some
of what he has said. He has talked about education programmes in
prisons, and he is right about people being moved around, but I asked,
and I continue to do so, about the impact on educational provision.
That is why I asked him for evidence, and I shall continue to ask for
evidence, not only from Opposition parties but from trade unions that
say that things are happening in our prisons.
I want such comments to be
evidence-based. If they are, we will act on the evidence that is put to
us. However, I want to see the evidence, whether it is from NAPO or the
Prison Officers Association. I do not want the public to be put in a
position of fear and panic about things that are not the case. I hope
that we can have a debate on the views of the hon. and learned
Gentleman that is based on the facts. Listening to him, one might think
that nothing had improved in areas such as probation. However, there
has been tremendous improvement in, for example, unpaid work, which
more offenders are doing and which is gaining greater acceptability.
More offenders are being taught basic skills.
The hon. Member for Cheadle has
talked about the impact of community sentencing. There has been an
improvement in what is happening in our prisons, which is due to the
dedication of prison staff and probation officers. I do not accept that
we are not thinking things through. Everybody who has spoken to me
about end-to-end offender management says that it is right and that it
is the appropriate thing to do.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
What is controversial is the means of achieving
that improvement. At the moment, although progress has been made, we
are not achieving what we want to achieve, which is why the Bill is
necessary.
This
morning, I mentioned the timescale of the evolution of this Bill from
the Carter report in 2003 to where we are now. We think that we have
the balance right and that we are offering the probation service an
opportunity to develop further through the flexibility of trusts and to
look at wider providers. That is the context in which the Bill is
before us today and in which clause 2 is set
out.
Mr.
Blunt:
I have two prisons in my constituency, one of which
is High Down, which is being expanded by 360 places. I wish to focus on
whether the probation service has the opportunity to succeed in the
terms laid out in clause 2. At that prison, two new wings are being
built with a capacity of 360, and the governor is already planning to
put more than one prisoner per cell into those wings in order to
relieve overcrowding elsewhere. I suspect that, as the population
pressures on the prison service show no signs of abating, those wings
are going to be as overcrowded as the existing prison is now, with
three men to a cell designed for one. Can the Minister give the
Committee any comfort that the relentless pressures on the prison
service, which then make themselves felt on the probation
service—the subject of the clause—show any signs of
abating, so that things can get back into
balance?
The
Chairman:
Order. Before the Minister replies, I must
remind all hon. Members that we are here to debate the probation
service. Although the hon. and learned Member for Harborough eloquently
explained why overcrowded prisons make the work of the probation
service more difficult, it is the impact on the probation service that
we must debate in relation to this
clause.
Mr.
Sutcliffe:
I thank you for that advice, Mr.
Bayley. In answer to the hon. Member for Reigate, risk assessments as
to appropriateness are undertaken in relation to all extensions to
prisons and all the capacity issues that we have considered. It is
important to us that the programme that we have introduced meets the
requirements of those risk assessments. The hon. Gentleman will know
about the announcements that have been made in the House in a number of
statements by the Home Secretary. If he wants to develop that
discussion further, I shall be happy to meet him outside the Committee
to talk about his area and High
Down.
Let me return to
the probation service. On the clauses that we have discussed today, we
have seen a genuine willingness to try to come to some conclusions.
Politics will always play its part, as it must in our democratic
society, but I would be alarmed if there were scaremongering or if
claims were made without evidence. As the Home Office Minister
responsible for such matters, I shall pursue that, because I do not
want to be involved in making the public ever more fearful of
situations that they might face.
On that note, I hear what the
hon. Members are saying and look forward to our further discussions. I
hope that the Committee will support clause 2.
Question put and agreed
to.
Clause 2
ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Further consideration
adjourned.—[Mr. Alan
Campbell.]
Adjourned
accordingly at four minutes to Four o’clock till Tuesday 16
January at half-past Ten
o’clock.
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