Paul
Goggins: Perhaps a good place to start would be with the
final comment from the hon. Member for East Antrim, who reported to the
Committee the feelings of revulsion that that professional had in the
face of the people whom he had to manage. That takes me back to my
first point, which was to pay tribute to those who do that work on our
behalf. When one contemplates what some people do to children and
vulnerable people, one realises that it is a disgusting thing to have
to think about, but we need people who are committed to dealing with
and managing those people and reducing the risk that they pose. I am
sure that the whole Committee will agree with that.
I shall try
to respond to the points that were raised in the time left. This has
been a good debate and as I said at the outset, this issue seizes the
minds of all Members throughout the House, and particularly those of
Northern Ireland Members with regard to this afternoon’s debate.
The hon. Member for Tewkesbury praised the work of the criminal justice
inspectorate and I join him in that. The inspector frequently causes me
to pay attention to matters of concern to him, which is helpful in
developing appropriate systems and structures. The hon. Gentleman asked
about the extension of the MASRAM arrangements. It is true that we are
seeking to extend those, first, by putting them on to a statutory basis
and then by extending them to include violent offenders. Of course, we
have to do that in a phased way. We cannot put all violent offenders on
this system because that would overload it, so it needs to be done
carefully. We will start with the most serious violent offenders first
and introduce them in a phased, managed
way. I
am confident that the new public protection arrangements for Northern
Ireland—PPANI—will be robust and will provide the same
measure of reassurance in respect of violent offenders that we have had
and are developing in relation to sex offenders. In the last full year,
seven interim and two full risk of sexual harm orders were made, and in
the same period 14 interim and 53 full sexual offending prevention
orders were made. So those orders are being used as civil orders to
prevent offending, which is precisely what Parliament intended when
introducing
them. The
hon. Gentleman mentioned the parole board’s being an important
aspect of managing offenders coming back into the community,
particularly when judging when the time is right for them to come
back—when the risk has reduced—and overseeing their
return to prison if they fail in relation to conditions that are set.
He also asked about supervision of those convicted of paramilitary
offences. That is an old chestnut in Northern Ireland. There is a view
that those convicted of such offences are not suited to the supervisory
arrangements available through the probation service, for example. My
conclusion is that that assessment is correct. However, that does not
mean that the statutory agencies do not take any interest in such
people. The Security Service and the police are very interested in
those who have engaged in such criminal activity in the past—to
ensure that, should they do it again, they can be brought to justice. I
can assure the hon. Gentleman that, even if those people do not get a
probation officer, others still pay close attention to
them. The
hon. Gentleman mentioned ViSOR, which is an important database
containing information about those who pose risks. It is now making
good use of new technology and new systems to ensure that, wherever
people are in the system, they can be spotted if they are likely to
pose a
risk. The
hon. Gentleman spoke about the awful murder of Attracta Harron, as did
other hon. Members. I am pleased to say that, just a few weeks ago in a
Committee room just up the corridor, we put in place the new criminal
justice order to do away with automatic 50 per cent. remission.
Mr. Harron was able to watch those proceedings and he spoke
to a number of hon. Members afterwards. He felt vindicated in his own
personal campaign, seeing the wrong that was done to his wife put right
so that others could at least be protected better in future. I
am sure that all hon. Members who met Mr. Harron on that and
other occasions know how pleased he is with the reforms that he has
done so much to promote out of his own bitter
experience. The
hon. Member for Upper Bann mentioned the awful case of Patrick Coleman.
Nothing can ever turn the clock back, although sometimes we wish we
could do so. However, I reassure the hon. Gentleman that the agencies
involved have learned a great deal from that experience and from
handling that case. We can only learn from tragedies such as that and
try to improve the work of the agencies for the
future. The
hon. Gentleman skilfully made a connection between our debate and
pre-charge detention and the debates last week. I shall not stray too
far into that, although I welcome his support on that measure, and that
of his colleagues. In respect of risk assessments of sexual offenders,
including of those who may not have a conviction but who might pose a
risk, civil orders are in place—the sexual offences prevention
order and the risk of sexual harm order—that we can use to
pre-empt and prevent such activity. The people involved can therefore
be made subject to strict supervision and conditions. Of course, if
they break those conditions they can be sent to prison, because
breaching a sexual offences prevention order is a criminal offence.
Under the new legislation, somebody who breaks those conditions might
get an indeterminate sentence and go to prison indefinitely. We are
putting in place the kind of pre-emptive measures that can, hopefully,
prevent
offending. There
is not a standard, one-size-fits-all assessment for every case. There
is a standard approach to assessment. In the arguments that the hon.
Gentleman put forward, he may have had in mind particular cases where
assessments have been carried out. I cannot second-guess in this
Committee the assessments carried out by the agencies; the agencies
have to make those assessments. Clearly, however, in the case of
anybody who is high-risk, who moves into a household where there are
vulnerable children and who has committed offences against children in
the past, the agencies involved will take extremely close interest in
any move of that kind and they will take the necessary action. That
action might be child protection measures taken by a social services
department to protect the children, or it could be a sexual offences
prevention order to prevent that individual from going into that street
or neighbourhood, for example. So there are measures in place that
could be used, but I will not comment on individual assessments; that
is not my appropriate role. However, I can assure the hon. Gentleman
that any move such as that from somebody who is a highly dangerous
person would be taken very
seriously. Regarding
day release from prison, there are escorted and unescorted day release
arrangements. Those arrangements are made after very careful scrutiny
and assessment, but the hon. Gentleman raised an important point and
again it is about risk management. Sometimes people might think,
“Well, why are we allowing these people out of prison at
all?”, but we have to manage their reintroduction to the
community because if we do not—if we just release them without
any preparation—we could be posing a greater risk to the
community by doing so.
All these
arrangements are subject to very careful assessments. Of course, we
then place licence conditions on people coming out of prison. At the
moment, unfortunately, that is only the case for those who are placed
under licence conditions because of sexual offences or because they
have received a life sentence. In future, all prisoners coming out of
prison will be subject to those conditions, and I think that that will
mean that we can manage them even more effectively.
We have had
a debate this afternoon about levels of reoffending by those who have
committed sexual offences. In fact, the level of reoffending for those
offences is relatively low compared with other forms of offending such
as burglary, car crime and so on, for which there are much higher
levels of reoffending. Of course, that is not to say that those people
who have committed offences no longer pose a risk; many of them do, and
that risk must be managed. I will address some of the comments made by
the hon. Member for East Antrim shortly.
The level of
reoffending for these offences is relatively low, but where I agree
with the hon. Member for Upper Bann absolutely is on those who abuse
children—paedophiles. I share his view that there is no cure for
those who unfortunately have that predisposition. We can help to manage
their behaviour and they can help to manage their own behaviour, but
there is no ultimate cure for that predisposition. It is something that
must be managed and I strongly agree with him on that.
The hon.
Member for East Antrim made the important point that, wherever we can,
we need to have those sex offenders compliant and working with the
authorities to manage their own risk and to be in a position to alert
people when they feel that they are losing control of their own
behaviour. That is extremely
important. My
hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, South was pre-empted in some of his
comments by the hon. Member for Upper Bann, in relation to south
Belfast, but I think that there is general recognition of the
particular issues that my hon. Friend faces. Of course, he briefly
described his constituency, including the universities within it. There
is a high level of privately rented accommodation and two of the
hostels are in his constituency, which adds to the number of people in
his constituency and to some of the issues that he
raised. I
say to my hon. Friend that I am happy to meet him outside the
Committee, with senior representatives of the MASRAM arrangements, to
talk about the specific issues that he faces in his constituency. I say
that because he made a very fair and balanced speech about managing the
risks against giving people an opportunity, after they have served
their sentence, to come out of prison and lead a law-abiding life. He
could not have been fairer in what he said, so if my meeting him will
be of some help, I am more than happy to make the arrangements and
ensure that we have that meeting to take account of the specific issues
that he
raised. I
say to my hon. Friend and to other members of the Committee that some
licence conditions that can be put in place when somebody is released
from prison after they have committed a grave sexual offence are very
detailed. They can include, for example, a requirement to attend sex
offender treatment programmes. They can relate to accommodation or
prevent the use of alcohol, association with children or going into
particular areas. They can include a requirement to register with a GP.
All manner of conditions can be put in place and there
are consequences if they are not kept. Conditions are not placed
flippantly or with undue care by the authorities. They are thought
through and put in place as
required. I
was pleased that the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute underlined the
structure of the MASRAM arrangements. He mentioned communications,
which I pay particular attention to because it is important that the
public are well informed about what is happening so that they can have
confidence in the arrangements, rather than being afraid of them. That
is something that I want to improve under the new
arrangements. One
of the advances in the new arrangements will be the role of lay
advisers. It is important that amidst all the professional judgment and
assessment, which are considerable, we also have the voice of the
community and an understanding of the impact on the community of the
behaviour of such individuals. It is important that lay advisers will
now form part of the new
arrangements. Several
hon. Members referred to co-location of key professionals, particularly
the police and the probation service. We will have in place from
October new co-location between the police and the probation service,
which will, in a very active way, improve the management of sex
offenders in the
community. The
hon. Members for Argyll and Bute and for East Antrim asked about sex
offender management in the Republic of Ireland and the interplay
between the two systems. There are similarities but there are also
differences. It is worth reflecting on the fact that the UK and the
Republic of Ireland are among only four countries in the world that
have a registration system, so we are part of a very small group and
even among ourselves there are some differences. I have regular
meetings with the Irish Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform.
The last meeting I had was with Mr. Lenihan who, of course,
has now changed his role. Sex offender management was the No. 1 item on
our agenda and we discussed the whole range of
issues. There
are some practical issues that we could, perhaps, fruitfully spend more
time considering. I hope to do that in due course with colleagues in
the Home Office and in Scotland, because we obviously need to do things
on a UK-wide basis where we can. We can consider other ways of
improving how information is shared and passed
on. However,
I can reassure the hon. Member for East Antrim that if police in
Northern Ireland become aware that somebody has committed an offence in
another jurisdiction that would require registration had it been
committed in Northern Ireland, they may go to the court and get a
notification order, which has precisely the same effect. That measure
is in place, so if the police have information and concerns, they can
act in that
way. The
hon. Member for Argyll and Bute asked about hostels. Five hostels in
Northern Ireland are approved for providing accommodation for sex
offenders; four of them are in Belfast. Obviously, part of my
responsibility is to ensure that they do their job effectively and that
there is sufficient capacity. I pay close attention to that, because as
we identify more sex offenders and more come out and are subject to
registration and conditions, we will need the right number of hostel
placements to be available if the authorities are to manage them. I do
not deny that.
Funding was
raised by several hon. Members. The costs of co-ordination of the
MASRAM arrangements and the new arrangements for public protection
fall to my Department, and we meet them and the communications
costs mentioned by the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute, but the bulk of
the resources for the management of offenders is within the main
agencies that do the work. The Prison Service, the probation service
and the police are resourced to be able to do that work. The Department
provides resources for co-ordination. I am happy to say that we are
putting in sufficient resources to ensure that it is done
properly. The
hon. Member for Strangford began her remarks by referring to Ian
Huntley, and it is true that his horrendous crime gave rise to
substantial improvements in how information is recorded and
shared—improvements that, I am pleased to say, extend to
Northern Ireland. The recent launch of Access Northern Ireland will put
in place far more robust systems for ensuring that all information on
UK police databases and Government agencies’ and
Departments’ lists about unsuitable people is shared across the
United Kingdom and with all employers in Northern
Ireland. Further
improvements will follow next year with the introduction of the new
safeguarding arrangements that will take over from the area child
protection committees, which the hon. Lady also mentioned. Although
that case was horrendous, we have learned from it and improved our
systems. The
hon. Lady mentioned the issue of a time bar. I want to reassure her
that a time bar can be applied to civil cases, but not to criminal
ones. It does not matter how long ago a criminal offence was
committed—if the evidence is there, a conviction can and should
be
brought. I
thought that the hon. Lady would inevitably touch on the issues of the
sex offender order and the age of consent. I was pleased that she
prefaced and concluded her remarks by voicing strong support for the
vast majority of measures in the order, because they will substantially
strengthen the arrangements and send out a very strong message that if
people prey on children or seek sexually to abuse vulnerable people,
there will be a higher price to pay in terms of the punishment to be
faced. We
started our review of sex offences in Northern Ireland from the basis
that we would look for a level playing field with the rest of the
United Kingdom, unless we saw compelling reasons for creating a
difference. That is why we began with the assertion, and concluded,
that 16 should be the age of consent. In arriving at that decision,
which we did not do lightly, we took into account the evidence from
Barnardo’s, the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty
to Children and the majority of Northern Ireland’s health and
social services trusts, which all supported 16 as the age of consent.
Their overriding concern is to remove barriers between advice that they
can provide and the young people who need it. That is very
important. In
relation to the Assembly’s strong recommendation, the wording of
the resolution was “strongly recommends”, but the vote in
the Ad Hoc Committee was split five to three, and indeed the Committee
Chairman agrees that 16 should be the age of consent. I acknowledge the
sincerity of the hon. Lady’s views, but in all conscience,
having looked at all the evidence, I think that 16 is right.
I agree with
the hon. Lady that it is a shame that such a huge piece of legislation
is being taken through by Order in Council. As a Home Office Minister,
I took through the Sexual Offences Act 2003, and there is no comparison
between the time spent considering that Act on Second Reading, in 18
Committee sittings, and on Report and Third Reading and the one and a
half hours spent debating the Sexual Offences (Northern Ireland) Order
2008. However, she knows the solution—I shall say no more than
that. Mr.
Peter Robinson (Belfast, East) (DUP): There is a
solution—introduce the measure in primary legislation rather
than under the Order in Council procedure. The simple devolution of
such matters is not the only solution. Other solutions would be equally
adequate.
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