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Local Government (Disqualification) Bill
Wednesday 1st December 2021
(3 years ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Local Government (Disqualification) Act 2022 Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chair
Before we begin, I have a few preliminary reminders. Members are reminded to use masks and face coverings, and to maintain distancing as far as possible, in line with current Government guidance and NHS advice and that of the House of Commons Commission. Please also give each other and members of staff space when seated and when entering and leaving the room. People coming on to the estate are supposed to be tested twice a week—there is a testing venue in Portcullis House. Please switch electronic devices to silent. Our colleagues at Hansard would be grateful if Members sent speaking notes to hansardnotes@parliament.uk.
My selection and grouping for today’s meeting is available online and in the room. No amendments were tabled. We will have a single debate covering all six clauses.
Clause 1
Members of local authorities in England etc
Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)
We are particularly delighted to see you in the Chair, Dr Huq.
Sir Paul Beresford
We were tempted to chair the Committee ourselves, but we were ruled out of order.
Sir Paul Beresford
Absolutely. We were tempted to move the Bill formally, just to save you the trip, but there was an objection.
Sir Paul Beresford
I am delighted that we are putting the clauses together so that we can discuss them quickly. I think there is universal support for the contributions that follow to be short. I am aware that a number of supporters, on both the Government and the Opposition side, are keen to leave as soon as feasible, so I will be quick.
Like many people, I was very surprised to hear that there is a loophole in the legislation on disqualification of local government elected members who are convicted of a sexual offence. That conviction means that they are subject to the relevant notifications commonly known as the sex offenders list. If the individuals are subject to a custodial sentence, they are automatically disqualified from their elected post. If they are not subject to a custodial sentence, even though they are put on the sex offenders list, they are not automatically disqualified. That really took me by surprise, as it did other people.
The reality, therefore, is that such individuals can stand in an election to become a local government member, and in a few cases over the past few years that has happened. I believe that is absolutely unacceptable. It is degrading. It means that people who should be looking out for the vulnerable, especially children, are in a position where one might doubt that they are actually doing so.
This tiny but somewhat complex Bill will remove that loophole. To hasten proceedings, I have sent all Committee members a copy of the Bill and the explanatory notes, so that they already have the matter covered.
The grounds for disqualification are set out in clause 1, which is entitled
“Members of local authorities in England etc”,
to whom this change will apply. Similarly, the Acts to which the changes will apply are set out. Clause 2 applies to Mayors of combined authorities. Clause 3 applies to the Mayor of London and London Assembly members. The supplementary and final provisions are set out in clauses 4 to 6. Clause 4 contains references to Channel Islands or Isle of Man legislation. Clause 5 deals with transitional provision. Clause 6 addresses the extent, commencement and short title.
Having quickly summarised the Bill, I must thank and congratulate the Minister and her officials, who put together this small but extraordinarily complex Bill, covering all the bases of local government legislation in England and Wales.
Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)
I shall be briefer than I think I have ever been in Parliament and simply say that I and the Labour party fully endorse the Bill, and we congratulate the hon. Member for Mole Valley on his efforts in bringing it forward. In my view, it is important that this change is made in relation to all representatives, but with a special focus on those who act as corporate parents. The Labour party supports the Bill.
The Minister for Levelling Up Communities (Kemi Badenoch)
I have a very long speech that I am keen for all members of the Committee to go through with me over the next 25 minutes.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) for picking up this private Member’s Bill and helping us to close this loophole. It has been an absolute pleasure to work with him in progressing the Bill to Committee stage, and I look forward to supporting it over the upcoming legislative hurdles, of which no doubt there will be very few for what is a common-sense and necessary measure for the statute book.
It is clear that people must be given confidence that the individuals they elect to represent them are of good character, worthy of trust and beyond reproach. Mayors and local councillors are responsible for the delivery of vital services, including for children and vulnerable adults, and good character in the people making decisions about such services should be the minimum expectation.
It goes without saying that the vast majority of councillors and Mayors are driven by a deep sense of public duty, and they deserve our respect for the excellent job they do. However, perhaps inevitably when there are 120,000 councillors serving all tiers of local government in England, there are rare occasions when the behaviour of individuals falls below the standards that the public rightly expect.
Two such cases have shone a sharp light on the need for reform, including a particularly notorious incidence that involved a parish councillor downloading indecent images of children soon after their election to public office. Despite being placed on the sex offenders register, this individual refused to do the decent thing by stepping down and he then went on to serve his full term. This intolerable situation was made possible by our current legislation on disqualification not having kept pace with our sentencing regime, as our rules disqualified someone only if they received a custodial sentence of three months or more.
My hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley has already described the clauses that are to stand part of the Bill, so I will not repeat them, but it is important to mention the devolved Administrations, as they are not represented in the room. There is a commitment to support Northern Ireland implementation, and clause 6 sets out that the Act will come into force two months after the day on which it is passed. The clause also confirms that the provisions apply to England only.
Local government functions are devolved, which means the Bill is specifically for England. That being said, the Welsh Government have recently legislated on the matter and the Scottish Parliament may wish to make corresponding provision, because the UK Government, unlike in the devolved nations, retains general responsibility for local government elections. The Government will work with the Northern Ireland Executive to seek to extend these measures to Northern Ireland in a comprehensive package, addressing candidates and sitting councillors.
This Government believe that it is absolutely right for councillors, Mayors and members of the Greater London Assembly to face consequences if they fall short of the behaviour we all expect in an inclusive and tolerant society. This private Member’s Bill will help us uphold standards in public life and deliver on our commitment to legislate on this issue. Updates to the disqualification criteria are timely and, many would say, long overdue, and I am pleased to commend the Bill to the Committee.
Sir Paul Beresford
I am delighted but not surprised that there is general support. I am conscious that Members want to get out of here, so I will be very quick. Before you put the question, Dr Huq, I wish to thank you and all who have attended, having been dragged out of the coffee room. I ask the Minister to convey my thanks to her officials who put the Bill together, because it is much more complicated than it looks—I remember struggling with local government legislation when I was a local government Minister. I thank those who have spoken for being succinct, and I also thank those who did not speak.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clauses 2 to 6 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Bill to be reported, without amendment.
Local Government (Disqualification) Bill
Friday 14th January 2022
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Local Government (Disqualification) Act 2022 Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Consideration of Bill Amendments as at 14 January 2022 - (14 Jan 2022)
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
Before I call Sir Christopher Chope, it may be useful to Members if I set out the differences between Report and Third Reading.
Report is also known as “consideration”, and provides an opportunity for the whole House to consider what has been done in Committee. Members may table amendments either as probing amendments to elicit more information, or because they want to make changes to the Bill. The scope of the debate is restricted to the amendments that have been tabled. Third Reading provides the final opportunities for Members to pass or reject the whole Bill; Members can speak about the Bill as a whole, and the debate is much wider. Members may wish to consider that, and then decide at which stage they want to try to catch my eye.
New Clause 1
Members of local authorities: disqualification relating to drink and drug driving offences (England)
“In the Local Government Act 1972, after section 81 insert—
“81A Disqualification relating to drink and drug driving offences etc (England)
(1) A person is disqualified for being elected or being a member of a local authority in England if the person is subject to—
(a) a conviction for driving or being in charge with alcohol concentration above prescribed limit contrary to section 5 of the Road Traffic Act 1988;
(b) a conviction for driving or being in charge with concentration of specified controlled drug above specified limit contrary to section 5A of the Road Traffic Act 1988.
(2) For the purposes of subsection (1) a person shall not be regarded as having a conviction until—
(a) the expiry of the ordinary period allowed for making an appeal against the conviction, or
(b) if such an appeal is made, the date on which it is finally disposed of or abandoned or fails because it is not prosecuted.””—(Sir Christopher Chope.)
Brought up, and read the First time.
Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
New clause 2—Members of local authorities: disqualification relating to controlled
drugs offences (England)—
“In the Local Government Act 1972, after section 81 insert—
“81A Disqualification relating to controlled drugs offences etc (England)
(1) A person is disqualified for being elected or being a member of a local authority in England if the person is subject to a conviction relating to controlled drugs contrary to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971.
(2) For the purposes of subsection (1) a person shall not be regarded as having a conviction until—
(a) the expiry of the ordinary period allowed for making an appeal against the conviction, or
(b) if such an appeal is made, the date on which it is finally disposed of or abandoned or fails because it is not prosecuted.””
New clause 3—Members of local authorities: disqualification relating to anti-social behaviour sanctions issued by the Court (England)—
“In the Local Government Act 1972, after section 81 insert—
“81A Disqualification relating to anti-social behaviour sanctions
(1) A person is disqualified for being elected or being a member of a local authority in England if the person is subject to a civil injunction made under section 1 of the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014.
(2) For the purposes of subsection (1) a person shall not be regarded as being disqualified until—
(a) the expiry of the ordinary period allowed for making an appeal against the civil injunction, or
(b) if such an appeal is made the date on which it is finally disposed of or abandoned or fails because it is not prosecuted.””
This new clause would disqualify persons subject to an anti-social behaviour injunction from serving in local government in England, as consulted on by the Government in 2017.
Amendment 1, in clause 1, page 1, line 6, after “authority” insert “(except a parish council)”.
This amendment excludes parish councils from the provisions of Clause 1.
Amendment 2, page 2, leave out line 2.
This amendment (and Amendment 3) remove being subject to a sexual risk order from the list of reasons for disqualification from serving in local government in England, as consulted on by the Government in 2017.
Amendment 3, page 2, leave out lines 7 and 8.
See explanatory statement for Amendment 2.
Amendment 4, page 2, leave out lines 42 to 48.
This amendment is consequential on Amendment 1.
Sir Christopher Chope
This is an important Bill, and I think everyone supports it in principle, because it is designed to ensure that those in local government who fall short of the behaviour expected of them in a civilised society are disqualified from being able to participate in local government. My problem with the Bill at the moment is that it is very selective. It deals only with sexual offences, and does not extend to other offences which I think are equally important, particularly in the context of local councillors who have responsibility for road safety, for example, and also for social services and dealing with the scourge of illegal drug taking.
New clause 1 contains the first such addition that I want to make. It accords very much with the strategy of the Bill, which was set out by the current Chancellor of the Exchequer when he was the Minister for local government. In his ministerial foreword to the response to the consultation on updating the disqualification criteria for councillors and mayors, published in October 2018, he wrote:
“The Government considers there should be consequences where councillors, mayors and London Assembly members fall short of the behaviour expected in an inclusive and tolerant society… Elected members play a crucial role in town halls across the country, and are the foundations of local democracy. They are community champions, and have a leading role to play in building a better society for everyone.”
My view, reflected in new clause 1, is that councillors who fall below the standards expected in relation to drink and drug driving offences should be included in the category of those who are disqualified from being able to serve as councillors and mayors. I think that they fall four-square within the Government’s definition of having been convicted of behaviour which everyone in a right-minded society would say was intolerable. Why should people who are in that position be allowed to continue as councillors while other councillors who have been convicted of a different set of antisocial offences are excluded? That is the essence of new clause 1. If someone is convicted of driving or being in charge of a motor vehicle with excess alcohol or a controlled drug, they should not be able to hold office as an elected councillor in this country.
Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak for the Opposition on this important Bill. I commend the hon. Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) for using his precious private Member’s Bill to close this concerning loophole.
As for the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope), there is of course an important discussion to be had about what should disqualify one from being able to run for office, as there is about behaviour while in office. I note that the hon. Gentleman quoted the Prime Minister and his views on what would be needed for higher standards in office for councillors. Given the votes of no confidence being tabled across the country by Conservative associations, I would hazard a guess that not even Conservative councillors are in the mood to take lectures from the Prime Minister about the standards that people should uphold.
What has been missed by the amendments is that the Bill would close a loophole that allows sex offenders in positions where they should be protecting the vulnerable: it is not an opportunity to rewrite the law entirely. I genuinely do not know why the hon. Member for Christchurch is so against protecting some of the most vulnerable people in our society.
Sir Christopher Chope
The hon. Lady has just made a ridiculous assertion that is not backed up by anything I have said or anything I believe in. Will she withdraw that?
Sarah Owen
I may be new to this place, and particularly new to the spot I am standing in, but having watched previous debates on closing loopholes on female genital mutilation and upskirting, and now this specific Bill about protecting young children, that is the evidence that I have for making the comments that I made, and I do not see a reason to withdraw them.
Sir Christopher Chope
Just as a matter of record, because the hon. Lady obviously has not read the record, I supported both the pieces of legislation to which she referred. All I did was to try to ensure that they were debated in the House so that they did not pass without any debate.
Sarah Owen
The hon. Member supported them so much that he managed to talk them out so they could not be passed. This time, I ask him to give those tired antics a rest and allow this uncontroversial Bill to pass. I do not think anyone in this place would condone antisocial behaviour or driving under the influence. Any changes to the disqualification criteria such as those he proposes deserve a much longer debate in their own right. The amendments threaten to weaken the specific point of the Bill. I suspect that he knows that, and will not be surprised that we will vote against them if pressed.
Jo Gideon (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Con)
I rise to speak to the amendments all together. Before I came to this place, I was a councillor for many years, and I absolutely uphold the principles of the Bill and of the Nolan principles of conduct in public life. I also believe in redemption. I have dealt a lot with issues relating to county lines and there is nothing more powerful than seeing somebody who has been involved as a victim but who is none the less convicted because at a very young age they were involved in something over which they had very little choice. The thought that in later life that person might be disqualified from serving in public office is wrong, and it is my understanding that that would happen if we included these amendments. We need to reflect on the fact that people in public office need to have experience and sometimes that experience may be in areas where they need to advise people of their past mistakes. Safeguarding is a different issue and I absolutely support the Bill in that regard. As a result of that, I will not support the amendments if they come to a vote.
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)
I have known my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope), as he said, for some considerable time; we were both on a south London council. Although we are on the same side of the House, sometimes we agree and sometimes we do not. This afternoon, although I have sympathy with what he is plugging for, I do not think this is an appropriate Bill for what he is proposing. It is a Bill that is answering one small point, on which there has tremendous pressure, because there has been evidence of it and of the loophole being abused. As has been said, the loophole is child protection and the relationship with elected councillors. There has been wide consultation with local government before this Bill on the specific issue. The measures it contains are very deliberate and not retrospective. They are also de facto time-limited by the nature of the current legislation relating to the sex offenders list.
It would be fair to say that the new clauses came as a bit of a surprise, although I should have anticipated them because I have known my hon. Friend for some considerable time. I did ask him whether he would like to serve on the Committee, because I knew he would have issues to raise, but he declined to do so. These new clauses will have a draconian effect on local government. I am not a lawyer, but it seems to me that they will be retrospective all the way back to 1971 for drugs offences, to 1978 for drink-driving offences and to 2018 for social disorder offences. There is no time limit for this disqualification and no consideration given to the nature of the offence or the length of the conviction. This is a retrospective, one-strike-and-you-are-out proposal.
If the proposals were put to local government as they are on the Order Paper, I suspect the response would include the far from unreasonable request that such disqualification laws should be applied to Members of Parliament as well. I am sure my hon. Friend has no distant conviction, so there will be no difficulty for him, but if he has, I suspect he may not be alone. More to the point, I would strongly argue that any such purely hypothetical conviction from decades ago would have no bearing on his ability or that of any other hon. Member to discharge their duties in this place.
The same applies to most, if not almost all, of our hard-working colleagues in local government. When I looked at the amendments and new clauses, I had visions of some poor councillor who had the misfortune to be convicted in the late 1970s for a minor drink-driving offence when a student—I remember my life as a student; I got away with it—driving their battered Mini around the university campus. This person may have gone on to serve as a councillor or even as a mayor for decades, rendering great service to their community, but they would be disqualified at a stroke by the conviction many years ago, thereby forcing a by-election. It is worth mentioning a point that will have crossed the minds of some hon. Members. The inevitable and aggressive partisan trawling for past convictions to be used as a tool to unseat councillors will be particularly horrendous should these new clauses be accepted. Certainly, we will see minor, irrelevant incidents from the councillor’s past dredged up and used as weapons to force the resignation of people who have given huge amounts to their local community. That cannot be right on the basis of the brief discussion that we have had on these amendments today.
Sir Paul Beresford
I have listened to my hon. Friend, so I would rather not.
The measure, in my view, only undermines the primary aim of this Bill, which is to protect children. I was on the Committee for a Labour Government Bill in 2003 that brought this through, and we went backwards and forwards on this issue. Ultimately, I supported it then, and I do so now. This is a uniquely important issue, and I do not believe that it should be conflated with broader arguments over what should or should not disqualify an individual from participating in local government, as, regrettably, these new clauses do.
The Minister for Equalities (Kemi Badenoch)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) for taking the time to engage with the legislation. I know that he is keen to ensure that Ministers have thought things through, and I am impressed that he has actually gone through the consultation document from 2018. I disagree with his amendments and I hope that I can convince him from the Dispatch Box that we are doing the right thing. I also wish to put it on record that I disagree with the rather unpleasant accusation that the hon. Member for Luton North (Sarah Owen) made from the Labour Front Bench.
New clauses 1 and 2 would have the effect of creating a new form of permanent disqualification criteria for individuals convicted of a narrow group of offences under section 5 or section 5A of the Road Traffic Act 1988 or offences under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. There are a number of reasons why the Government are resisting these new clauses. The first is the fact that they propose that the disqualification would be permanent. As my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) has said, this runs counter to the principle and expectation that underpins our justice system that offenders serve their time and are then rehabilitated into society. It would have the effect of creating a permanent bar to individuals contributing to public life in their local communities for this limited category of offences. So, singling out this narrow group of drink and drug offences for permanent disqualification is disproportionate.
Secondly, the Bill legislates to capture not only local councillors but mayors and London Assembly members. However, my hon. Friend’s new clauses apply only to local councillors. Thirdly, serious drink or drug-driving offences are already covered by the existing local government disqualification criteria, which bars anyone from standing or holding public office in local government for five years if they have had a custodial sentence of three months or more.
Amendments that create new, punitive measures to permanently disqualify those receiving a conviction for certain limited drink or drug-driving offences or controlled drug offences are really not the purpose of the Bill. The Bill specifically seeks to update disqualification criteria in line with modern sentencing measures available for registered sex offenders. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Jo Gideon) said, these amendments would permanently bar, for example, an individual from standing for local office if, perhaps, at 18 they had had a glass of wine too many and were convicted of being slightly over the limit. Forty years later, they would still be unable to stand, which is a bit draconian.
The Bill is appropriately comprehensive, as it catches all those individuals subject to notification requirements for sexual offences but not subject to custodial sentences. The core purpose of this legislation is to prevent those convicted of sexual offences from having a role as a local elected official that could include access to children and vulnerable adults, and the length of their disqualification would be the length of time that they are subject to the notification requirement.
We also resist new clause 3. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch has identified that we did consult on disqualifying individuals who had been issued with antisocial behaviour injunctions in 2017, and the original consultation was focused in scope. This Bill does not include civil injunctions, on the basis that they represent only a partial selection of the injunctions and behaviour orders available to the courts. The Government support this Bill because, as I said earlier, we are legislating comprehensively to disqualify individuals convicted of sexual offences from local office. This Bill responds to calls for changes to the law to disqualify sex offenders who are not given a custodial sentence but refuse to stand down, so we want to bring the disqualification criteria for councillors in line with the modern sentencing practice. The current criteria require updating to reflect changes to the law: the courts have tools that they did not have previously, and the disqualification criteria must reflect that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch mentioned my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. New clause 3 may have been supported by the Chancellor in his foreword when he was serving in this role, but he is not the Bill Minister—I am—and I believe that Bills such as this should be specific, targeted and focused. This private Member’s Bill focuses on addressing those concerns raised by specific cases where councillors made subject to the notification requirements for registered sex offenders did not resign. Those cases highlighted the fact that those registered sex offenders pose great concern to our communities.
I will now move on to amendments 1, 2, 3 and 4, which all amend clause 1, and which we resist for the following reasons. Amendments 1 and 4 would selectively remove parish councils from the list of local authorities subject to the new disqualification criteria. This would be a significant and troubling reduction of the purpose, intent, and comprehensiveness of the Bill. Parish councils are already subject to the existing disqualification criteria, and rightly so, as there are 10,000 parish councils and approximately 100,000 parish councillors in England. It is vital that the large number of individuals who hold this important position—the grassroots of our democracy—are also subject to the new disqualification criteria introduced by the Bill. People must be given confidence that the individuals they elect to represent them at all tiers of local government are of good character and beyond reproach.
Amendments 2 and 3 would exclude sexual risk orders from the updated disqualification criteria for members of local authorities in England. As my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch has helpfully pointed out, the Government did consult on the inclusion of sexual risk orders in 2017, and we committed to legislate to disqualify persons subject to such orders from holding local office. Individuals are subject to sexual risk orders because they are found by a court to pose a serious risk of harm to the public in the UK and/or children and vulnerable adults abroad. When issuing a sexual risk order, the court needs to be satisfied that the order is necessary to protect the public, or children and vulnerable adults, from sexual harm, and the Government believe it is right that anyone subject to a sexual risk order should be barred from standing for election or holding office as a member of a local authority.
My hon. Friend asked why we changed our mind—why this Bill covers more than the sex offenders register. I should clarify that the 2017 consultation responses regarding the matter of sexual risk orders were mixed: some 39% of respondents were in favour of prohibition, and 45% were against. However, my hon. Friend is not correct to say that the Government have changed their mind regarding the inclusion of sexual risk orders in this Bill. In our response to the consultation, we stated that having considered the responses we received, the Government believe that where an individual is subject to a sexual risk order, they should be prohibited from standing for election. This Bill delivers on that commitment.
My hon. Friend also asked about enforcement—how local authorities will know that a councillor is on the register or has received an order for a sexual offence. A candidate must declare anything that might disqualify them from standing for, or holding, local office. Not doing so is a criminal offence, and this Bill will update those disqualification criteria and therefore ensure they are captured by this requirement.
Sir Christopher Chope
Does that provision apply to people who stand as police and crime commissioners but already have a conviction that should have disqualified them? Does it mean that the gentleman who was elected in Wiltshire as a police and crime commissioner is now the subject of criminal proceedings?
Kemi Badenoch
This is not retrospective, so it will apply from now onwards. I hope that is helpful.
I hope I have been able to convince my hon. Friend not to press his amendments. They are not trivial, but this Bill is not the right place for them.
Sir Christopher Chope
This has been a useful debate. When we hear from the Minister that the Bill will apply to 100,000 councillors, one can see that this is an issue of significance. As always, she delivered a charming and, dare I say, almost seductive response. She referred to the importance of having people in local government who are of good character and beyond reproach. All three of my new clauses are designed to build on that.
As has happened over many years, the Government have managed to find a technical defect in my new clauses that does not alter their substance but makes the Government able to say that they do not agree with them. My new clauses, if they were accepted, would be subject to the transitional provisions set out in clause 5. For drafting purposes, I did not go into a lot of detail, but the essence is that there should be transitional arrangements so that the new clauses would not disqualify people who were convicted before the Bill became law.
The intention of these new clauses is that they should fit into a Bill that already ensures there is no retrospective provision. That technically affects all the new clauses, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) said, but the substance is whether the Government believe that somebody who has committed an offence under the Misuse of Drugs Act should or should not be disqualified from serving as a councillor, bearing in mind the importance given to the “From harm to hope” White Paper and bearing in mind recreational drug use.
We are even told that recreational drug use may be taking place within the Palace of Westminster. What a bad example that would be, as it would be if recreational drugs were being used in our town halls up and down the country, when the Government and, I think, the people are committed to trying to eliminate the scourge of illegal drug use and all the harm that comes from it. If we are serious about cutting crime and saving lives through the “From harm to hope” White Paper, do the Government intend to include consequences in legislation for those who are convicted?
Kemi Badenoch
My hon. Friend raises an interesting point. I am not a Home Office Minister, so I cannot speak to that Department’s policy. He might find it interesting that the Government have an outstanding response to the Committee on Standards in Public Life on the very things he is talking about in relation to local government and local councillors, and that might be a better place for us to address these points. We are thinking about these issues, but perhaps not in the fora he expects.
Sir Christopher Chope
That was a helpful and constructive contribution. I look forward to seeing the Government’s response in due course, but I am delighted to hear that they are working on the issue.
I do not know whether I should disclose this, but I recall sitting in the Members’ Lobby with my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley and discussing whether or not I would go on to the Committee, because he was desperate for someone to do so. I said that I would be happy to go on to the Committee, but in the end I was not selected to do so. That is an issue between us, but as it seems to be the subject of a point, I thought I should correct the record.
Sir Paul Beresford
I beg to move, That the Bill be read the Third time.
I will be very succinct, because having looked at the rest of the day’s agenda, I am aware that there is a taxi behind me tooting its horn.
This Bill is a tiny, specific response to heavy demand from a number of Members and a number of councillors. It is intended to deal with circumstances in which an individual has been able to stand or remain as a councillor despite being on the sex offenders list, because they have not been put in jail. Today we will pass the Bill on to another place, where, my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) will be intrigued to know, the third former leader of Wandsworth Council to serve in this building will pick it up and take it forward.
I think the Bill is important. It is short, but it meets a need in ensuring that what applies to councillors who are on the sex offenders list and go to jail also applies to those who, as a result of some quirk, do not go to jail but remain outside, and are therefore able to remain as elected members.
Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)
I refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I am still a councillor in Charnwood Borough Council, and I am also the chairman of the all-party parliamentary group for district councils.
Essentially, I am going to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford), and essentially I am going to say that I agree with him. I will take a little more time than that to do so, but not much more.
Sexual offences are some of the most heinous crimes that a person can commit, particularly when they involve children. It absolutely cannot be right that an elected representative who has been convicted of such an offence can remain in office and—as my hon. Friend said—have influence over policy for vulnerable people and contact with them. Those convicted of such offences are harmful to the people they represent, are not acting in accordance with the Nolan principles, and have no place in a position of influence. That is the crux of the matter.
The issues at stake are safeguarding, trust, and —this was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope)—a leading role in society. Those three elements together back up this Bill, and although, as my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) said, it is small and technical, it is also important, and I support it today.
Sarah Owen
When my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips) spoke about the Bill in Committee, she said she was going to be briefer than she had “ever been in Parliament”. I do not doubt that was the case, and I hope I will not take much longer because Labour fully endorses the Bill. I pay tribute again to the hon. Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) for promoting this important Bill. As has already been said, it is very specific and very small, but it will have a huge impact.
As it currently stands, sex offenders who avoid a custodial sentence are not disqualified from running for local government positions in England and Wales. We know that people often seek out elected representatives when they are at their most vulnerable and in deepest crisis, and for thousands of people, councillors are a vital backstop day in, day out. It is only right that the people elected to carry out those important roles are fit and proper to do so. It is unacceptable that a small loophole in existing legislation means that people who should be looking out for the vulnerable, especially children, are in a position where we might doubt that that is the case. It is important that the change to disqualification criteria is made in relation to all representations, with this special focus on those who ac as corporate parents. That is why Labour supports the Bill.
Gareth Bacon (Orpington) (Con)
I join colleagues in what I think is unanimous support for the Bill, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) on his admirable work in progressing it to this stage. I spent 23 years in local government, initially as a councillor, and latterly as a member of the London Assembly, and I feel that the action being taken to address this anomaly is long overdue. I pay a sincere tribute to the aims of the Bill, and I do not believe that a great deal can be said against the proposals.
The Bill will apply to individuals subject to notification requirements under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, known as the sex offenders register, as well as the sexual risk order that my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley mentioned. It will apply to local authorities and the Greater London Authority. Councillors are champions of their local communities, and they have so much contact with a variety of groups, not least the vulnerable and children. It is therefore completely right that this change is made, even if for no other reasons that those of safeguarding. The Bill is necessary because, as my hon. Friend set out in Committee, there is a loophole whereby a councillor who is convicted of a sexual offence but avoids a custodial sentence is not automatically disqualified, despite being placed on the sex offenders register. That is clearly not right.
Let me mention a few potential criticisms of the Bill, although they are few and far between. The Local Government Association has indicated that it is supportive of the Bill, but pointed out that it applies only to councillors, Assembly members and mayors. Police and crime commissioners, and indeed parliamentarians, are not affected by the Bill, and that is a serious omission. After all, if a sexual offence would bar someone from sitting on a local council, it would seem odd to allow the same person to sit as a police and crime commissioner. Perhaps my hon. Friend will address that point when he sums up the debate. However, as we heard from the Minister, the proposals in the current Bill have been consulted on for several years, and the Bill should not now be sunk into a quagmire about what it does not do. We should not make the perfect the enemy of the good, and there is a great deal in the Bill that is good.
As the Minister set out in Committee, there are more than 100,000 local councillors in England, virtually all of whom give up their time and are prepared to put their heads above the parapet in the name of public service. Unfortunately, the Bill is still needed, not only to draw parity between the sentencing guidelines, but to have proper rules in place for those rare instances when something does go wrong.
The most appalling example I have seen, and a case that I suspect contributed significantly to much of the motivation behind introducing this Bill, is that of a parish councillor, who I shall not name, in Saddleworth. He was convicted of 16 counts of downloading indecent photographs of children. He avoided a prison sentence, but was given a community order for 24 months and sent on a programme for sex offenders. Despite that, he continued to sit as a parish councillor on Saddleworth Council, which was officially unable to intervene. It did not have the necessary powers to remove him, because he had not been given the requisite prison sentence of three or more months. As I understand the situation, several other councillors took it upon themselves to see whether it would be possible to call a referendum, but, to make that passable, every member of Saddleworth council would have to be re-elected. That would have been an excessive administrative exercise when there should have been the much more straightforward remedy that the Bill will provide.
I know that we are pushed for time and want to get on to other business, but finally, as local government is a devolved matter, I want to talk about how the Bill should be implemented across the UK. I am unashamedly a passionate Unionist and, although the Bill extends only to England, I noted with interest the Minister’s comments in Committee about commitment to support implementation in Northern Ireland. She stated:
“The Government will work with the Northern Ireland Executive to seek to extend these measures to Northern Ireland in a comprehensive package, addressing candidates and sitting councillors.”––[Official Report, Local Government (Disqualification) Public Bill Committee, 1 December 2021; c. 5-6.]
I warmly welcome that. More widely, the Bill matches rules across the country as the Parliament in Wales recently legislated on the matter. It would be most welcome if similar measures could be enacted in Scotland so that we would have a shared commonality of rules for public representatives across the whole of the United Kingdom. I think that people across the whole United Kingdom would welcome that. For those reasons, I will support the Bill. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley on bringing it to the House.
Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
My speech will be very short. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) for bringing the Bill to the House, which, following both policy debate here today and Government consultation several years ago, is close to addressing an important issue regarding our local democracy.
I strongly support clause 1, which will insert a new and important section 81A into the Local Government Act 1972. I have so much that I would like to say, but will not. However, people who commit sexual offences should rightly be disqualified from holding positions in local government, be that the Mayor of London, a charter trustee or a parish councillor such as in the numerous villages in my constituency. With the passing of the Bill, I am confident that another small barrier will be put in the way of those who may consider committing a sexual offence to be acceptable. More generally, as is set out in the code of conduct for councillors, the Bill speaks to the broader need for those elected or co-opted to local government positions to be held to the highest standards of conduct, consistent with the Nolan principles, including objectivity, openness and leadership.
As a councillor in Rother before I was elected to this House by my constituents in Hastings and Rye, I firmly believe that, in more ways than one, local government office holders are a stalwart and integral part of the country’s fine democratic tradition, which has developed over the past several centuries. When considering those who commit sexual offences, the current rules clearly do not go far enough in ensuring that that is always the case, because disqualification essentially has an expiration period of five years, and I know from constituents who write to me that the victims of sexual offences often suffer from these crimes for much, much longer. It can therefore only be right that the rules surrounding disqualification are strengthened in law. The Bill will at last do just that two months after the House passes it, and I offer my full support for it.
Craig Williams (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
Like colleagues, I will not speak for long—no doubt, they will be surprised and delighted to hear that. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) on his choice of private Member’s Bill, the fashion in which he introduced it and the way in which he moved the motion. As a former county councillor, I very much welcome the loophole closure. I reflect that I am a former county councillor from Wales, and I therefore very much welcome the Minister’s commitment to work with the Northern Ireland Executive in further rolling out this measure, presumably through a legislative consent motion or engagement with the Executive. I also welcome the work that the Welsh Government have done to date in closing such loopholes. However, it strikes me that there is an anomaly with the Scottish Government’s disqualification orders.
In my contribution, which will end shortly, I want to reflect on whether the Minister could pull together devolved administration counterparts. Without slowing down the Bill—my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley will be delighted to hear that I am not suggesting a new clause—I wonder whether she could bring the DAs together to look at disqualifications more broadly, whether for a Member of Parliament, county councillor, police and crime commissioner or Member of the Welsh Parliament, and bring a universal element to them. That would be outside the scope of the Bill, so I hope I am in order saying that in the Chamber.
My Montgomeryshire constituency is a cross-border part of the world, and many walks of life, whether they are public sector, private sector or delivering at a county council level, do not see the border, so I would appreciate a comment from the Minister on whether we could bring some universal element to the disqualifications as the United Kingdom. I thank and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley and wish the Bill speed.
Julie Marson (Hertford and Stortford) (Con)
I rise to support the Bill in its aims and in its practice. I speak as a former councillor and a former magistrate. Those who put themselves forward for elected office often do a brave thing. It is not something that anyone is trained to do or that anyone can practise to do, so I pay tribute to those in our communities who do it, because they form the backbone of our elected system.
The pandemic has shone a light on the importance of local frontline and community responses in keeping us safe. Most often, the response has been organised through brilliant local government networks, including in my constituency by Hertfordshire County Council, East Herts District Council and all our town and parish councils. We should be grateful to them, because we are so reliant on them.
That reliance on local government in our lives gives it the power to infiltrate our lives for good or bad. That is particularly true of the most vulnerable groups in our communities, including children and young people, who rely on service provision locally as much, if not more, than many others. We place an enormous amount of trust in the system and in those people as a result. As a system and a wider culture, we must ensure that we are worthy of that trust and live up to it, because the consequences of an abuse of power within local government can be catastrophic.
As a magistrate, I reflect on the purposes of sentencing. Punishment, deterrence and a public observation that certain behaviours are not acceptable in our society are part of that, but protection of the public is too, and that is where the Bill comes into its own. It will protect the most vulnerable in our society and I commend it for that. I will leave it there, but it has been a pleasure to contribute to the debate.
The Minister for Levelling Up Communities (Kemi Badenoch)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) on his outstanding work in progressing the Bill. I am pleased to reiterate the Government’s support for the legislation.
The Government are backing this private Member’s Bill because it addresses a critical issue pertaining to people’s faith in their elected representatives and in local democracy. It is an issue that affects communities the length and breadth of the country. It will serve to prevent registered sex offenders from standing or serving as councillors, mayors or London Assembly members.
I am grateful to the Opposition Front-Bench team for supporting this important Bill. I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Loughborough (Jane Hunt), for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart) and for Hertford and Stortford (Julie Marson), all councillors or former councillors, for their thoughtful contributions. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington (Gareth Bacon), who was on the London Assembly with me when I was deputy leader and he was leader. I am pleased that he and I continue to work together in this place.
To answer some of the questions, I am grateful for the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Montgomeryshire (Craig Williams) about working with the devolved Administrations. He will know that the Secretary of State is the Minister for Intergovernmental Relations. I am sure that if my hon. Friend wrote to the Secretary of State formally with a request, it is something that the Department could look at.
More broadly on how the devolved nations are taking corresponding provisions forward—this was also raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington—Wales has already implemented similar provisions via the Local Government and Elections (Wales) Act 2021, and Government officials have been in contact with Scottish counterparts. It is entirely within the remit of the Scottish Parliament to make corresponding provisions, but my officials stand ready to assist in any way possible. For those who want to know, the Northern Ireland Executive could make corresponding provision regarding sitting councillors, but the UK Government retain responsibility for elections in Northern Ireland. We will work with the Northern Ireland Executive to seek to extend these measures to Northern Ireland in a comprehensive package addressing both candidates and sitting councillors.
There was a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington about MPs and police and crime commissioners. The answer is that standards and conduct for MPs and police and crime commissioners are governed under separate regimes with their own mechanisms to disqualify or sanction against unacceptable behaviour. As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) on Report, this Bill is very specific and focused, and that is why we have not included other measures; we would not necessarily even have been able to do so.
Local councillors are part of the democratic fabric of this country. Throughout the pandemic, we all bore witness to the critical role of local authorities in supporting our communities and the most vulnerable in society. It is hard to imagine a time when local government has mattered more, or indeed when people’s faith and trust in it has mattered as much as it does today. People must be given confidence that the individuals they elect to represent them are of good character, deserving of trust and beyond reproach. Mayors and councillors are responsible for the delivery of vital services, including for children and vulnerable adults, and they are empowered to make decisions on a whole range of issues that people care deeply about. Good character in the people making these decisions should be the minimum expectation.
It goes without saying that the vast majority of councillors and mayors are driven by a deep sense of public duty, as we have seen from those of them who have come to this place, and they deserve respect and praise for the excellent job that they do. Perhaps inevitably when there are 120,000 councillors serving all tiers of local government in England, however, there are rare occasions when the behaviour of individuals falls below the standards that the public rightly expect.
Currently, anyone who is convicted and given a custodial sentence of three months or more, suspended or not, is disqualified from local government for five years. These rules date to the Local Government Act 1972. While the existing law may have been effective in addressing serious cases of criminal behaviour, it does not take account of the non-custodial sentences that courts now issue for sexual offences. Those concern individuals who are on the sex offenders register and are subject to the notification requirements to manage sex offender behaviour, because they pose a risk to children and all vulnerable adults.
This Bill is important because it will bring the current disqualification criteria for local authorities in line with modern sentencing practices. Clearly, no community should have to tolerate a convicted sex offender standing or continuing to serve as their local representative. This update to the law governing who can stand as a fit and proper person to represent their community is long overdue and will serve to protect the most vulnerable members of our society, while upholding the high standards expected of locally elected officials.
Finally, may I take this opportunity to say that it has been a great pleasure to work with my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley in taking this much-needed step towards updating the local government disqualification criteria. I look forward to the Bill’s successful passage through the Lords.
Sir Paul Beresford
I will be very succinct. I have mentioned the taxi cab, and I can hear it behind me—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. The hon. Gentleman might like to ask the leave of the House.
Sir Paul Beresford
My apologies, Madam Deputy Speaker. After all this time, I should have remembered that. I ask the leave of the House to say a few words.
I thank the Minister for her support, and I am grateful for the support from right across the House. Even my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) is behind the Bill, although he was going to add all sorts of thorns to it—much, I think, to the dismay of local government. My hon. Friend the Member for Orpington (Gareth Bacon) and the Minister mentioned MPs. If my hon. Friend had spent some time on the Standards Committee, he would have heard of the ghastly accusation of bringing the House into disrepute. That would apply to any MP in this situation, and the door would be shown to them.
I thank everybody again, and I hope that the Bill will progress swiftly through the other place, led by another ex-leader of Wandsworth Council.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.
Local Government (Disqualification) Bill
Monday 17th January 2022
(2 years, 11 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Local Government (Disqualification) Act 2022 Read Hansard Text Amendment Paper: Consideration of Bill Amendments as at 14 January 2022 - (14 Jan 2022)
Local Government (Disqualification) Bill
Friday 4th March 2022
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Local Government (Disqualification) Act 2022 Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Consideration of Bill Amendments as at 14 January 2022 - (14 Jan 2022)
Lord Udny-Lister (Con)
My Lords, I am reminded of the fact that the strength of your Lordships’ House is when we can come together to improve legislation and close legislative loopholes in an attempt to strengthen our democracy and protect the citizens of our country.
In this Second Reading, together we have the opportunity to prevent sex offenders serving in local government. As someone who, like many noble Lords present, started their public service at the coalface of politics by serving as a local councillor—I did so for 35 years—I was surprised, in fact horrified, to learn that a loophole exists in our legislation that allows sex offenders to avoid disqualification from local office.
When we consider the role of local councillors in the community, we must think of the position of trust that they hold and the work that they do, often with the most vulnerable members of our society. I do not need to go into depth on this point, as the duties undertaken by our local representatives, while perhaps not celebrated enough, are well known to noble Lords present. However, I reiterate from my own experience as both a former councillor and a former council leader that, every day, councillors and those holding local office across the country work closely with children and vulnerable adults. We must therefore do everything we can to ensure that those who are convicted of a sexual offence are barred from the privilege of serving their local communities on a local authority.
The loophole that exists is found in the legislation that covers disqualification from office in local government. Noble Lords will be aware that, if someone is subject to a custodial sentence, they are automatically disqualified from their elected post. However, bizarrely, when a sex offender does not receive a custodial sentence but is still deemed to be that much of a threat that they are placed on the sex offenders list, there is nothing in law to prevent them taking up office in local government.
The fact that someone who has committed offences of the most grotesque nature can then be allowed to stand for election and occupy a position of trust and responsibility in their community is an outrageous flaw in our electoral law and something which I hope that noble Lords will help to correct with the passage of this Bill. In observing the proceedings and passage of the Bill through the other place, I was appalled to learn that due to this legislative loophole, individuals on the sex offender register have been able to retain their seat after refusing to resign. This is simply outrageous, as holders of office in local government should, as the majority of them are, be people who embody the values of public life and abide by the laws of this land. This loophole casts an unsavoury shadow of doubt over the security of the vulnerable, especially children, and we therefore have a duty to come together, not only to strengthen our law but to strengthen trust, integrity, and confidence, in our system of local government.
We have before us a relatively short yet slightly complex Bill, which seeks to remove the loophole I have just described. The Bill is not intended to reform the complexities of other areas of electoral law, nor should it be seen as an opportunity to bring about wider disqualification clauses. The Bill is about acting swiftly to safeguard the vulnerable. It will update the disqualification criteria for local government members, including councillors, mayors of combined authorities, the Mayor of London, and London Assembly members, who are subject to relevant notification requirements or orders due to their sexual misconduct, preventing them not only standing for office but remaining in office. If they have already been elected to serve, we are aiming to fix the current as well as the future.
In this country, our system of local government is deeply rooted in having strong local representation of people who are of good character, worthy of trust and beyond reproach. Through the Covid-19 pandemic, I witnessed first-hand a resurgence of the role and duties carried out by our local officeholders on the ground, and I can foresee the duties of our locally elected representatives only being extended in the future. Therefore, we must ensure that only those with integrity can stand to serve. Those holding office in local government today are tasked with making decisions on behalf of children and vulnerable adults. Therefore, it is obvious that those trusted to make decisions should be of irreputable character.
Our local representatives deserve our utmost respect. The vast majority work tirelessly to strengthen the country and are the very foundation of our democracy. However, sadly, there are rare occasions when the behaviour of some falls below the standards that the public expect, and when cracks appear in the foundations of our democracy, we in this place must strive to seal the gaps.
It should be noted that the Local Government Association, in its quest to ensure that the highest standards of integrity and conduct are present in public life, supports the objectives of the Bill. The Bill received cross-party support in the House of Commons and arrives in your Lordships’ House with the support of Her Majesty’s Government. I thank Sir Paul Beresford, who championed the Bill through the House of Commons, and the Government and opposition parties for their support so far. I further pay tribute to the officials who have combed through the complexity of our electoral legislation to help ensure that the Bill is sufficiently primed to close the loophole mentioned.
I hope your Lordships will look favourably on affording the Bill a safe passage through this House, so that together we can close a loophole and thus strengthen our democracy for the better. I beg to move.
Baroness Goudie (Lab)
My Lords, I welcome the Bill. Like many others in this House, I was in local government and found it wonderful to be there, and I find it wonderful to know that today we are trying to reform these kinds of loopholes. I thank Sir Paul Beresford for bringing the Bill forward and the Labour Party for giving it its full support.
We must ensure the highest standards of conduct and integrity in local government. I hope this will be reflected in elections with a higher turnout than we have seen in the last few years. I look forward to seeing a better turnout. That is the object of the Bill. The Local Government Association supports it. I support it. It sets out grounds of disqualification for members of local authorities in England, including parish councillors, members of combined authorities, the Mayor of London and London Assembly members.
The Bill asserts new grounds of disqualification relating to sexual offences, expanding the criteria to include being on the sex offender register or being subject to a sexual risk order under the Sexual Offences Act. These individuals should not be able to run for public office or retain their seat if already elected. Recent cases have restated the need for reform.
I have one criticism: the Bill does not go far enough. It should also include Members of this House, Members of the House of Commons and the police and crime commissioners, and it should be extended throughout the United Kingdom.
Lord Hayward (Con)
My Lords, I approach the Bill from a somewhat Janus point of view. I welcome its contents but, rather like the noble Baroness, Lady Goudie, I am concerned about its nature, in that it does not cover other elements. When I spoke at the Second Reading of the Elections Bill, I identified—the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman picked up this—that there are 25 major pieces of legislation relating to elections. Our election law is a mess. Unfortunately, this piece of legislation just adds another point to it. A matter that I will return to in Committee on the Elections Bill is precisely this point: we are passing a piece of legislation to exclude certain people from certain elected offices, but we are not excluding those same people from other elected offices. There is a complete mess in relation to those banned from local councils, those banned from standing for office as police and crime commissioners and those banned from being in this House or the House of Commons. It is somewhat ironic that there are fewer restrictions on people being elected as Members of Parliament than as police and crime commissioners and councillors. Somebody could therefore become Prime Minister with far fewer restrictions imposed on them than if they were to be a local councillor.
In conclusion, I add one other observation. It is not directly relevant to the Bill but it relates to a frame of mind. There is a tendency in this day and age for all parties to disown candidates who have made comments on social media that are regrettable but were often made when they were youngsters. Then, in the haste and fear of an election, the candidate is disowned and dropped. All parties should address this issue. It is not relevant to the Bill, but it is well worth all parties giving serious consideration to how they cope with the content of social media which in many cases people made in their youth.
Overall, I welcome the Bill but regret the circumstances under which it is coming forward because, as the noble Baroness, Lady Goudie, said, there should be other similar disqualifications and a general review of disqualifications for all elected offices.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, I shall be brief and begin by confirming that the Labour Party fully endorses this proposed legislation. I also pay tribute to Sir Paul Beresford for promoting this important Bill in the other place and to the noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, for sponsoring it in your Lordships’ House. As my noble friend Lady Goudie just said, it is also supported by the Local Government Association.
As we have heard, as it currently stands, sex offenders who avoid a custodial sentence are not disqualified from running for local government positions in England and Wales. We know that people often seek out elected representatives when they are at their most vulnerable and in deepest crisis. Those of us who have held such office, whether at council level or here, know that we see more vulnerable people than we would really like to and, importantly, we can vouch for being that support and backdrop for thousands of people, day in and day out.
As legislation, the Bill is very specific and small but, if passed, will have a huge impact because it will close the loophole that allows sex offenders to hold respected positions where they will have contact with these vulnerable people. I am particularly concerned about children in care, whom councillors are expected to protect. The noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, rightly said that, if this goes through, it will strengthen our democracy.
I also pick up the important point made by my noble friend Lady Goudie and the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, about needing consistency across all elections when we are choosing our representatives. It is only right that the representatives elected to carry out these important roles are fit and proper people. As the noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, said, they should embody the values of public life. It is unacceptable that a small loophole in existing legislation means that people who should be looking out for the most vulnerable are in a position where we might still doubt that that is the case. It is important that the change to disqualification criteria is made in relation to all representations, with a particular focus on those who act as corporate parents, as councillors often do. Labour fully supports the Bill and is pleased that the Government are taking it forward.
The Minister of State, Home Office and Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Lord Greenhalgh) (Con)
I thank noble Lords, in particular my noble friend Lord Udny-Lister, for sponsoring this Private Member’s Bill. I also congratulate the honourable Member for Mole Valley, Sir Paul Beresford, for all the work he has done to progress this Bill through the other place. The two of them share one thing in common: they were both leaders of Wandsworth, which is known, by them at least, as “the brighter borough”. I served for 20 years in Hammersmith and Fulham, and learned an awful lot from them and from what they achieved for their local residents. My noble friend has an unrivalled record, certainly when I compare it to mine. As he said in his speech, he served as a councillor for 35 years, with great distinction, and—I do not know how he survived it—19 years as leader of a London borough. That requires some survival instinct; it is quite incredible. Beyond that, he served five years in City Hall, along with the then mayor, Mayor Johnson, before completing the pyramid with two years in Downing Street. It is great that this Bill is sponsored by my noble friend, whom I very much consider a mentor.
The Government support the Bill for three main reasons. First, preventing registered sex offenders from either standing or serving as councillors, mayors or London Assembly members will strengthen communities’ faith and confidence in their elected representatives. Secondly, the Bill delivers on the Government’s stated commitment to bring local government disqualification into line with modern sentencing practice for sexual offences. Thirdly, the electorate has a right to expect that the people who stand and serve to represent them and their local communities are of good character.
The current disqualification criteria for local government candidates and councillors will automatically disqualify anyone for five years if they are convicted of a custodial sentence of three months or more, suspended or not. This rule dates back to the Local Government Act 1972. However, while the existing law is still effective in addressing serious cases of criminal behaviour, it does not take account of the non-custodial sentences the courts now issue for certain categories of sexual offences. This means that some individuals who are convicted and who ought to be disqualified do not meet the current threshold and can therefore slip through the net.
Noble Lords have indicated that they agree with me and the Government that it is quite intolerable that people deemed by the courts to pose a risk to children and vulnerable adults are not barred from serving as members of local authorities. The Bill rights that wrong by updating the law to ensure that only fit and proper persons can stand or serve as locally elected officials. We know, of course, that the vast majority of local authority members serving their communities are of good character, worthy of trust and beyond reproach. But, with some 120,000 councillors in England, there have inevitably been cases in which the behaviour of elected officials has fallen well below the standards the public expect and deserve.
Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)
The noble Lord, Lord Hayward, referred to two excluded categories. Why were they excluded, as this is probably an off-the-shelf Bill?
Lord Greenhalgh (Con)
I was going to come to that; I was not going to finish my speech without addressing that point, but I will bring it forward a paragraph or two. The answer to why this does not apply to MPs, as was raised by my noble friend Lord Hayward, or to PCCs, as was raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Goudie, is that standards and conduct for MPs and PCCs are governed under separate regimes, with their own mechanisms to disqualify or sanction unacceptable behaviour. There is currently the power to recall a MP, under certain circumstances, if at least 10% of the constituency electorate signs a petition. I take the general point: this Bill tidies up this issue, but there is another regime in place. I think my noble friend alluded to that point.
I had better resume from where I was. We know that the vast majority of local authority members serving their communities are of good character, worthy of trust and beyond reproach. That is one of the reasons why, in 2018, the Government responded to a consultation to update the local government criteria with a commitment to legislate on this matter. This was, in part, in response to an infamous case in which a parish councillor, shortly after being elected, was convicted of possessing indecent images of children. He was placed on the sex offender register but not given a custodial sentence. Despite repeated calls for him to resign, he refused to stand down and actually remained a parish councillor for the full term. The law as it stands allowed him to continue to do so, but this Bill would prevent such circumstances occurring again.
These new disqualification criteria will protect our communities by barring such individuals from holding office while they remain subject to the notification requirements for sexual offences or subject to a sexual risk order. Where offenders pose such a severe risk to the public that they are subject to indefinite notification requirements, communities can feel safe in the knowledge that such individuals will remain disqualified from elected office for the entire duration.
On its remit with regard to the devolved Administrations, I should state that the Bill applies to England only, as much of local government is devolved. The Scottish Parliament can make corresponding provision and the Welsh Government legislated on this matter last year. That said, since the UK Government retain the responsibility for elections in Northern Ireland, we will work with the Northern Ireland Executive to extend these measures there too, with a comprehensive package addressing the rules that govern both candidates and sitting councillors.
The Government strongly believe that there should be severe penalties for locally elected councillors who break the bonds of trust that hold local democracy together. This Bill puts that principle into practice, while ensuring that local government can continue to command people’s faith and trust, both now and in future. The Government are therefore delighted to support the Bill.
Lord Udny-Lister (Con)
My Lords, I say thank you very much to the noble Baronesses, Lady Goudie and Lady Hayman, the noble Lord, Lord Hayward, and the Minister for their support for this Bill. In particular, I thank the LGA, which has been very supportive on its journey. I fully understand the arguments about why this should be widened to other groups, but an argument has been clearly made by the Minister about why that should be done by other mechanisms in another place. This will deal with the problem in local government and I urge you to support it. I also thank the Minister for his kind words.
Local Government (Disqualification) Bill
Monday 21st March 2022
(2 years, 9 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Local Government (Disqualification) Act 2022 Read Hansard Text Amendment Paper: Consideration of Bill Amendments as at 14 January 2022 - (14 Jan 2022)
Lord Udny-Lister (Con)
My Lords, I understand that no amendments have been set down to this Bill and that no noble Lord has indicated a wish to move a manuscript amendment or to speak in Committee. Unless, therefore, any noble Lord objects, I beg to move that the order of commitment be discharged.
Local Government (Disqualification) Bill
Friday 1st April 2022
(2 years, 8 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Local Government (Disqualification) Act 2022 Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts Amendment Paper: Consideration of Bill Amendments as at 14 January 2022 - (14 Jan 2022)
Lord Udny-Lister (Con)
My Lords, in moving that the Bill do now pass, I thank noble Peers across the House for their support for this small but, I believe, important piece of legislation. I am grateful to the Legislation Office and the Minister at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities for all the help and support I have received on the Bill’s journey. I also thank Sir Paul Beresford in the House of Commons, who took the Bill through there. I beg to move.
Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)
My Lords, we welcome this legislation. I pay tribute to Sir Paul Beresford for promoting it in the other place and to the noble Lord, Lord Udny-Lister, for sponsoring it here. It is a small but important piece of legislation and we very much welcome it.
The Minister of State, Home Office and Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Lord Greenhalgh) (Con)
My Lords, I want to add the Government’s support. I once again thank my noble friend—and my political mentor in many ways in local government—for all his work in sponsoring this Private Member’s Bill. I pay tribute also to the Member for Mole Valley, Sir Paul Beresford, for taking the Bill through the ballot and for the diligent work he has done. Obviously, the Government fully support the Bill, which closes an important loophole.
Royal Assent
Thursday 28th April 2022
(2 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text