Maria
Eagle: On that point, so I do not forget to deal with it
in my reply, the Office for National Statistics does not collect that
precise figure any more, so we cannot base earnings on a figure that it
no longer collects or publishes. It is as simple as
that.
David
Howarth: That explains why the changes have been made.
Does the Minister know what effect they are expected to
have? On
the whole, I welcome the new scheme. Perhaps I welcome it in a fairly
negative way, because it avoids certain proposals in the consultation
paper that ought to be avoided. However, I am glad that it does so, and
as the Minister said, there are other small and valuable changes to the
detail of the
scheme. 5.10
pm
Maria
Eagle: We have had the sort of short, sharp debate that is
always interesting for Committee members to hear and for Ministers to
respond to. I will do my best to answer the questions that have been
raised. First,
I agree with the hon. Member for Cambridge and disagree with the hon.
Member for Enfield, Southgate on the purpose of the scheme. From what
the hon. Gentleman said, it was not totally apparent what he thought
the scheme was for. It was quite clear what the hon. Member for
Cambridge thought the scheme was for and I agree with him. The scheme
does not make the state liable for injuries caused to people by the
acts of others. It is not equivalent to a civil court that compensates
a victim for all the effects of an injury. It is a recognition of the
public feeling of sympathy and solidarity with blameless victims of
violent crime. Since 1964, the state has sought to provide a monetary
award on behalf of the community that is not compensation for all of
the injuries suffered, but a recognition of that solidarity, fellow
feeling and
sympathy. The
scheme has some advantages over a court action. Although it can pay out
less for serious injuries, it is a tariff-based scheme and is therefore
risk free. The victim of violent crime who applies knows that if they
meet the criteria, they will get the payment. There may be issues about
when the payment will be received because of individual circumstances
or the administrative capacity, which has varied from time to time
during the existence of the scheme, but they know that they will be
paid and do not face the uncertainty and potential cost of a court
action, which can create stress and difficulty. A number of Committee
members are lawyers and we know from experience what a court action can
do to an individual, particularly if they are already having a bad time
because they have been attacked or suffered a violent crime. The scheme
does not aim to provide individually tailored compensation packages
covering each and every type of damage that might be awarded in a
successful civil suit. Anybody who thinks that it does misunderstands
the nature and purpose of the
scheme. I
welcome the support from the hon. Gentleman in not pursuing the
elements of the 2005 paper that he found objectionable, negative though
that support may be. We decided not to do so pretty much for the
reasons that he set out. We decided that focusing the scheme more on
the serious end was not the right way forward. As I said in my opening
remarks, the new scheme is designed to meet the requirements of the new
tribunals legislation for appeals. We are also using the opportunity
presented by having to make those changes to make some other helpful
tweaks to the scheme, rather than any major
changes. The
hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate asked how we are doing with getting
swifter police and medical reports. As he mentioned, that is one of the
reasons why
claims and payments can be delayed. We have worked closely with the
Association of Chief Police Officers on this matter and have drawn
attention to the requirement in the new victims code of practice that
the police should try to respond swiftly to such requests. Performance
in that area has improved considerably, which is indicated by the
increase in cases resolved by the CICA from 59,000 in 2006-07 to 65,000
in 2007-08. That indicates that things are moving more swiftly. There
were 76,000 outstanding cases on 31 March—the end of this
reporting year—for the CICA, which is the lowest figure for
nearly 20 years. In one way or another, that shows that the flow of
police and medical reports is slightly swifter than it has been and
that we are making progress. Of course, I fully intend to ensure that
we continue to make more progress. I hope that he welcomes that
improvement. The Home
Secretary has written to all chief constables to emphasise that she
believes that this matter needs to be focused on and that improvements
need to be made. The Office for Criminal Justice Reform, which works
across the criminal justice agencies, has been working closely with all
police forces to try to understand better the reasons why there can be
delays. The OCJR has been trying to get across the implications of not
responding as swiftly as we might hope to those forces. We hope that
there will be improvement in that
respect.
Mr.
Burrowes: Does the Minister know whether the target of 30
days is being
met?
Maria
Eagle: I cannot tell him off the top of my head whether
that target is being met by every force, but I am happy to drop the
hon. Gentleman a line and let him know precisely what the figures are
from force to force. The improvements in performance show that
improvements are taking place throughout the case working process, some
of which are definitely in respect of a swifter receipt of medical and
police
reports. The
hon. Gentleman also asked about what the Government are doing to try to
assist those who are injured abroad. He accepted that perhaps the CICA
scheme was not the right way in which to assist such
people—although they sometimes find their injuries and the
consequence of their injuries difficult. The CICA is an assisting
authority in relation to the European Union directive on assisting
applicants to claim. It therefore does what it can to provide expertise
and knowledge of other schemes in order to try to ensure that Britons
who are injured abroad have some information about how to claim and
make the best of whatever schemes are available in those countries.
There is work going on in relation to
that. The
hon. Gentleman asked about the national disaster charitable scheme. A
compensation fund has been set up for terrorist-related attacks that
occur overseas and affect British citizens. The Government have
contributed some £1 million towards the schemes start-up. The
scheme pays out an immediate award to victims to assist with any
immediate needs, and I think it is administered by the Red
Cross—although officials will wave at me if I have got that
wrong. The
hon. Gentleman also made some points about the victims toolkit. The
toolkit has been published, so he has obviously missed it—it is
out there and online. The toolkit was delivered in 2007 following its
procurement
through various bidders who wanted to do the work for the Department.
Perhaps he needs to try some different words in the Google search. It
is out there, and if he has any trouble finding it, I would be happy to
send him a
copy. The
hon. Gentleman also asked about the victims surcharge and payouts in
respect of that. In 2008-09, the Government paid £14 million
directly to victims services—£2.6 million to witness care
units; £2.6 million to independent domestic violence advisers;
£7 million to Victim Support Plus; and
£1.75 million to sexual violence, murder, manslaughter and hate
crime organisations. That is in addition to the £16 million
allocated the previous year. If he is interested, I am happy to write
to him with the full details of how that money has been spent. However,
it has been put on the record.
The hon.
Gentleman asked about loss of earnings, although I think he understood
that it is not the policy of the Labour party to change the rules about
having to wait for 28 weeks. We are not planning to change that feature
of the scheme at the moment. I understand his point about the way in
which having to wait might be seen to disadvantage those who are
incapacitated. I think he made an analogy with statutory sick pay.
Looking back, one generally finds that one can make analogies between
the origins of these kinds of rules and either benefit rules or
insurance arrangements. We do not propose to change those rules at
present. The
hon. Member for Cambridge suggested that because the Department was
bigger there might be a bigger budget. He is definitely right about
that, but there are also bigger issues, bigger problems and bigger
demands on spending. He asked if there was more money to move
around—
David
Howarth: This is simply the old administrative point that
the bigger the budget the bigger the absolute amounts of the slippages,
but the amounts required for this particular policy are small in global
terms.
Maria
Eagle: The hon. Gentleman is right, and I can assure him
that nobody in the Ministry of Justice is more assiduous than I am in
going around trying to find bits of money to do good things with. I can
give him every assurance that I am known for that. I bear in mind what
he says. The point that he made about the cap not having kept pace with
civil damages and the
share of the burden borne by victims therefore increasing, is generally
correct. There is no doubt about that. However, at present we are not
in a position to look at increasing the cap, partly for the reasons
that he approved of earlier, about not refocusing the scheme on
seriousness. I can assure him that I am forever on the look out for
extra money to do good things with, and increasing spending for the
scheme would obviously be a good thing in general, simply because the
scheme represents solidarity and sympathy between the community, the
taxpayers and those who through no fault of their own find themselves
injured and suffering problems arising out of violent
crime. The
hon. Gentleman made a couple of particular points and asked me a couple
of detailed questions, one of which was about loss of earnings. The
change of the loss of earnings calculation, from one type of Office for
National Statistics figure that is produced or is no longer to be
produced to another, had the effect of changing the arrangements from
mean to median. We think that the practical effects are negligible,
since most victims do not earn one and a half times the median gross
weekly earnings. Individuals may be affected, but we are affected by
the practical problem of not having the figure that the ONS used to
produce to keep things in line with how they previously
were. The
hon. Gentleman also asked about paragraph 35(1)(d)(iii) on care costs.
As I said to the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate, these provisions
often have something in common with previous benefits legislation. Our
amendment on care costs, which the hon. Gentleman picked up on, follows
the wording of section 72 of the Social Security Contributions and
Benefits Act 1992. So, it has taken us a while to catch up with that
wording. The intention is to make existing practice clear, and that is
that only core personal care costs are covered; dignity-based help that
people need if they have been incapacitated, not social care costs or
peripheral costs such as arrangements for having housework or gardening
done. We see the amendment as a clarification rather than a change in
emphasis. I hope that that reassures the hon.
Gentleman. I
think that I have answered most of the questions, and on that basis I
commend the new scheme to the
Committee. Question
put and agreed
to. Resolved,
That the
Committee has considered the draft Criminal Injuries Compensation
Scheme
2008. Committee
rose at twenty-four minutes past Five
o’clock.
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