The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Henley)
My Lords, the Crime and Courts Bill represents the next stage of our reform of the justice system. Last Session, we legislated to strengthen public accountability of local policing by introducing directly elected police and crime commissioners and by bringing forward reforms to reduce reoffending and put the legal aid system on a sustainable path. However, we need to do more to protect the public and to improve further the efficiency, responsiveness and transparency of the justice system. This Bill is directed to those ends.
Part 1 will establish the National Crime Agency. Organised crime costs this country between £20 billion and £40 billion a year. It manifests itself in street corner drug dealing, in the trafficking of men and women forced into modern-day bonded servitude or prostitution, in the online sharing of horrific images of sexually abused children and in cyber-enabled scams that deprive people of their life savings. With some 7,000 organised crime groups operating in this country, we need a more effective response if we are to tackle the human misery they inflict.
The question—why do we need a new agency when the Serious Organised Crime Agency has only been operating for six years?—has quite rightly been posed. I pay tribute to all those working in SOCA. They have had many successes and have earned a high reputation in their dealings with overseas law enforcement agencies, but the threat posed by serious and organised crime is changing and our response needs to adapt and evolve if we are to counter the threat effectively.
The National Crime Agency will have a wider remit to tackle serious and organised crime at the borders, fight fraud and cybercrime and protect children from sexual exploitation. For the first time, the agency will produce a single, authoritative intelligence picture on organised criminal gangs and their activities that will provide the basis for a co-ordinated national response.
Working in collaboration with other law enforcement agencies, the National Crime Agency will prioritise resources and ensure a joined-up approach to the activities undertaken at the local, national and international level to disrupt organised crime gangs and bring their members to justice.
The National Crime Agency’s relationship with police forces and others will be based on a partnership, with the mutual exchanges of information and the provision of two-way operational support. Importantly, however, the Bill provides that the director-general should, in exceptional circumstances, be able to direct police forces in England and Wales to undertake a specific task, for example to take action against a particular criminal gang based in the force area.
I fully expect that this power will be rarely used, but it is a necessary back-stop to underpin the strategic policing requirement that supports chief officers and police and crime commissioners in effectively balancing local and national priorities.
In addition to its core crime reduction and criminal intelligence functions, Clause 2 enables the Home Secretary to confer counterterrorism functions on the National Crime Agency. With the creation of this powerful new crime-fighting agency, it is sensible that we build in flexibility to confer on the NCA counterterrorism functions if, in the future, there is a compelling case for doing so. This is not the time for a review of counterterrorism policing. For the present, we need to focus on delivering a safe and secure Olympics and on firmly establishing the National Crime Agency in fact as well as in law. I recognise that any decision in this area should be subject to particularly careful consultation and scrutiny, and that is why we have made this order-making power subject to the super-affirmative procedure.
The National Crime Agency will be headed by a director-general, operationally independent but accountable to the Home Secretary and, through her, to Parliament. The director-general will first and foremost be an operational crime-fighter, and for that reason the Bill provides a mechanism for the director-general to be vested with operational powers.
Given the breadth of the agency’s remit, including its central role in leading the operational response to serious immigration crime and preventing the importation of drugs and firearms, the director-general and NCA officers will in appropriate cases need to be able to exercise the full suite of powers of a police, immigration and customs officer. In all cases, this will be subject to proper training.
As a law enforcement organisation operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, it is essential that the agency remains operationally effective at all times. We cannot be faced with a situation in which public safety is put at risk by operational NCA officers taking industrial action. NCA officers who are designated with operational powers will therefore be precluded from taking strike action in the same way as police officers are. Our preference is that we can reach a voluntary no-strike agreement with the NCA staff and their representatives, and in that event the statutory no-strike provisions can be put into abeyance.
The provisions in Part 2 will further our reforms of the courts and tribunals system so that it is more responsive to the needs of users, more transparent to the public in how it operates, more representative of the communities it services and more efficient and effective in its use of resources.
Responsiveness to users is the driving force behind the creation of the single county court and the single family court. The current structure of 170 geographically and legally separate county courts, some dealing only with routine civil cases while others also handle more complex areas of the civil law, is both confusing to litigants and an inefficient use of resources. There is a similar confusing set of arrangements for dealing with family proceedings, with different types of cases being dealt with in the High Court, county courts and magistrates’ courts.
County court users will be able to issue their claim at the court that best meets their needs. That may still be their local court, but equally it could be the nearest to where they work or where waiting times are significantly shorter. It will enable the court estate and the available judicial resources to be utilised more efficiently to facilitate the quicker resolution of cases across the board.
Similarly, the creation of the single family court will make it easier for users to navigate their way through the system, and enable cases to be allocated to the appropriate level of judiciary without the need to transfer proceedings to a different level of court, thereby reducing costs and delays.
Our proposals to introduce greater flexibility in the deployment of members of the judiciary seek to secure a similar outcome in improved efficiency. The deployment of the judiciary is properly a matter for the Lord Chief Justice and the senior president of tribunals. The Bill does not change that, but it affords them greater flexibility by expanding the list of judicial office holders who are capable of sitting in each court or tribunal. Such flexibility will enable the available pool of judges to be used to best effect, thereby further contributing to the quicker resolution of cases.
Our judiciary has a worldwide reputation for integrity and independence. This, in no small measure, is down to the process by which judges are appointed. That process was the subject of significant overhaul with the passage of the Constitutional Reform Act and the creation of the Judicial Appointments Commission. Those reforms have led to increased public confidence in the appointments process by making it more independent and transparent, but after six years of operation it is right that we take stock of the new regime to see where we can make further improvements.
One such area relates to judicial diversity. Progress has undoubtedly been made over the past decade. Ten years ago, little over 10% of judges were women and around 2% were from a black or other minority ethnic background. Today those figures are 22% and 5% respectively. That is welcome progress, but we need to do better to ensure that the judiciary fully reflects the communities that it serves.
Of course, further legislation on its own is not the answer, but there are some useful measures that we can and should take to promote greater diversity. In particular, the Bill will facilitate greater opportunities for part-time working at the most senior levels of the judiciary by providing for the statutory limits on the number of High Court, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court judges to be expressed in full-time equivalents. We are also providing, where two candidates are equally meritorious, that it will be possible to select the candidate from an underrepresented group.
We are also taking the opportunity to achieve a better balance between executive, judicial and independent responsibilities in the appointments process. The Lord Chancellor has a legitimate role to play in ensuring the efficiency, effectiveness and integrity of the appointments process as a whole. This does not mean that the Lord Chancellor needs to have a hand in all judicial appointments. Accordingly, the Bill transfers to the Lord Chief Justice and the Senior President of Tribunals the Lord Chancellor’s responsibilities for the appointment of some judges below the High Court.
However, when it comes to the appointments of the president of the Supreme Court and the Lord Chief Justice, we believe it is right that the Lord Chancellor should have a meaningful role in the process, given that the holders of both these offices have a significant influence on the administration of justice. We do not consider that this change will politicise these appointments. They will continue to be made solely on merit, and the Lord Chancellor will be one among five or more on a selection panel. Furthermore, where he sits on the panel, the Lord Chancellor will lose his current right to reject the panel’s recommendation.
Fines are the most common form of sentence imposed in the criminal courts, accounting for nearly two-thirds of all sentences. As with other non-custodial sentences, the public must have confidence in this form of disposal. Significant improvements have been made in the enforcement of fines in recent years, but we need to do more. This is why the Bill provides that, where an offender defaults on the payment of a fine, the additional collection costs fall to the offender rather than to the taxpayer, thereby providing an added incentive to offenders to pay their fines on time.
As I have indicated, it is vital that the law-abiding public should have confidence in all non-custodial sentences. While there are some good examples of effective community sentences that reduce reoffending, all too often such sentences fail to command public confidence as a punishment. That is why we are consulting on proposals to improve the effectiveness of community disposals, including ways of ensuring that there is a clear punitive element in every community order. The current consultation runs to 22 June. Subject to the outcome of that consultation, I give notice to the House that the Government will bring forward amendments to the Bill in Committee as part of the next stage of our sentencing reforms.
Lastly, this part also contains an important provision that will help to increase public understanding of the justice system. Most members of the public have no direct personal experience of what goes on inside a courtroom. Their perceptions will be derived from TV dramas that more often than not give a distorted view of reality. Allowing the broadcasting of judicial proceedings will help to demystify the workings of the justice system and increase public confidence. Of course, there is a balance to be struck between increased transparency and the safeguarding of the proper administration of justice. To this end, we want to start by allowing the broadcasting of advocates’ arguments and judgments in the Court of Appeal before extending this to sentencing remarks in the Crown Court. However, I can assure the House that there is no question of victims, witnesses, defendants or jurors being filmed.
Part 3 of this Bill makes two changes to the immigration appeals system. First, we are removing the full right of appeal against the refusal of a visa to visit family members in the United Kingdom. No other category of visit visa attracts a full right of appeal, and in the Government’s view it is a disproportionate use of taxpayers’ money. Moreover, the family visit visa appeal right no longer serves its intended purpose. It is very expensive to administer, costing around £29 million a year, and has lengthy processing times, taking up to eight months to conclude an appeal. In many cases appeals are successful because new evidence has been submitted by the applicant. If an applicant has new evidence in support of a visa application, we believe that the proper course is to submit a fresh application and not to seek a new decision through the appeals system.
Part 3 also removes the in-country right of appeal in cases where existing leave has been cancelled in line with a decision to exclude a person from the United Kingdom on the grounds that their presence is not conducive to the public good. A decision to exclude a person on such grounds is taken personally by the Home Secretary on the basis that their presence in this country presents a risk to national security or public safety. It is anomalous that in such cases the excluded person should be able to enter, and remain in, this country pending the outcome of an appeal against the cancellation of their leave. The current arrangements undermine the intended effect of the exclusion decision, and the Bill will rectify this. We are not removing this appeal right, but in future it will be exercisable from outside the country.
Finally, Clause 27 introduces a new, specific offence of drug driving. Figures for 2010 identified impairment by drugs as a contributory factor in nearly 1,100 road casualties, including some 50 deaths. We also know from studies that the extent of the road casualty problem is a lot greater than these reported statistics suggest. We need to do more to tackle this scourge and to protect road users. There is already an offence of driving while being unfit through drugs, but there are few convictions because of the requirement to prove impairment. The new offence is modelled on the analogous drink-driving offence, where it is not necessary to prove impairment but simply that the driver had a concentration of alcohol in his or her body above the prescribed limit.
A person will be guilty of the new drug-driving offence if found to have in his or her body a concentration of a specified controlled drug in excess of the specified limit for that drug. The maximum penalty will be the same as for the analogous drink-driving offence: namely, in the case of a person driving or attempting to drive a vehicle, six months’ imprisonment or a £5,000 fine, or both, and disqualification from driving for at least 12 months. The new offence will, we believe, make a significant contribution to road safety and is one that has been widely welcomed by road safety campaigners. The objectives underpinning this Bill are, I think, ones that the whole House can support. The provisions themselves are equally deserving of your Lordships’ support, and I commend the Bill to the House. I beg to move.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord McNally)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, for that offer at the end. That is exactly how we wish to approach the Bill. I am grateful for the broad welcome that has come from all parts of the House about the thrust of the Bill and I recognise that, in a limited time, people are bound to raise the points that they do not like rather than emphasise the points that they do like.
The noble Lord was a little modest in his introduction. He is a very distinguished lawyer and, as he knows, I am not. In the two years I have been in this job, I have got used to saying very quickly to people, “I am not a lawyer”. I have now abandoned that mantra because my noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford took me for lunch the other day with a very distinguished professor of law from the University of Yale. I used my usual defensive opening, “Well, I am not a lawyer”, and he leant forward and said, “Then I’ll speak very slowly”.
However, I share the view of the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, that we have benefited from a debate in which we have been able to hear a wide range of people with tremendous depth of experience about the issues under discussion. We have heard from some of our most distinguished judicial representatives: the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, is a former Lord Chief Justice; my noble and learned friend Lord Mackay, is a former Lord Chancellor; the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, is a former Law Lord; and the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, was President of the Family Division. It is always a great pleasure to hear their contributions. I always have some mixed feelings about the interventions from my noble and learned friend Lord Mackay because he says things in such a gentle voice that I am convinced that he is on my side but at about two o'clock in the morning I wake up and realise that he has delivered the most devastating critique of what I was hoping to do. So I shall wait for that 2 am moment some time tomorrow morning.
This has been a very good debate. I fully take on board that we have a task in Committee to look at these proposals. Some of the issues that have been raised will have to be explained, debated and discussed, and how we propose to do things will have to be weighed against alternatives. That is certainly how my noble friend Lord Henley and I will take this forward. I would also like to put on record our thanks, particularly for Part 2 of the Bill, to the Constitution Committee for its contribution: a very timely report. With her usual courtesy, the noble Baroness, Lady Jay, explained to the House, and to me separately, why she could not be with us for the wind-ups tonight. I know that she will play a full part when we reach Committee.
I will try to cover a range of the issues raised during the debate. Although we will be returning to them all in Committee, it is right that I also try deal with them tonight. A large number of people—the noble Lords, Lord Ramsbotham, Lord Harris and Lord Prescott, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Smith and Lady Doocey—raised the question of whether there was an incipient conflict between the accountability of the PCCs and the National Crime Agency. I am not sure. I think that the best answer probably came from the noble Lord, Lord Dear, in his recognition that there will probably be a certain tension in these roles but not a destructive tension.
Somebody mentioned that there has been a debate since 1929 about how national and how local a police force should be. It is true that in this country we have had policing that has done both, but as fresh challenges have come up, successive Administrations have sought to create agencies that can meet the wider challenges that go beyond localism without losing the benefits of localism. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Dear, that this is not a slippery slope towards an FBI. It will be a powerful agency, and again I hear what the noble Lord says about the importance of the power of direction if it is going to be effective. However, that is something that we can look at in Committee.
I move on to the powers of the director-general to direct a police force in England and Wales to perform a particular task, and whether that conflicts with the chief officer’s accountability to the local police and crime commissioner. The power of the director-general directly to task a police force will be a very limited backstop measure, used only when co-operative arrangements cannot be agreed on and where it is essential for the national effort against serious and organised crime that action is taken by that police force. This power does not cut across the responsibility of police and crime commissioners to hold their chief constables properly to account for the totality of policing in that force’s area, including tackling cross-boundary policing challenges such as organised crime, terrorism, public disorder, civil emergencies and cyberthreats. This includes the responsibility of police and crime commissioners to ensure that their chief constable co-operates effectively with the National Crime Agency.
Noble Lords asked whether this would be done within a reduced budget. We are clear that the National Crime Agency, like SOCA, will need to live within its spending review settlement, which will be based on the respective budgets of the precursor organisations. The agency will deliver more through its enhanced intelligence capability, capturing a single national picture of the threat presented by organised crime. It will also have more effective tasking and co-ordinating arrangements, enabling more effective prioritisation and smarter use of its own and others’ assets.
Lord Berkeley
The noble Lord twice mentioned organised crime. Will he explain what disorganised crime is?
Lord McNally
Not at 9.35 pm after six hours of debate. We will leave that for another day.
The noble Baronesses, Lady Hamwee and Lady Smith, asked whether CEOP would retain its identity. CEOP will keep its ability to create and maintain the innovative partnerships that are so valuable. It will keep its independent brand and multidisciplinary workforce, and it will have a ring-fenced budget, operational independence within the NCA and independent governance.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and the noble Lords, Lord McColl and Lord Dear, raised the question of human trafficking. The National Crime Agency will have a key role in building on the existing arrangements for tackling human trafficking by using its enhanced intelligence capabilities and co-ordinating functions to target organised criminal gangs involved in human trafficking, wherever they are. The UK Human Trafficking Centre will move into the National Crime Agency as part of the precursor transfer of the Serious Organised Crime Agency. This will ensure that human trafficking continues to receive the priority and attention that it deserves.
My noble friend Lord Alderdice raised the important and particular issue of how the National Crime Agency will operate in Northern Ireland. The NCA will be a UK-wide agency. In framing the provisions of the Bill and developing the operating model on the ground, we were acutely conscious of the fact that policing is devolved in Northern Ireland, and of the need to work with the grain of existing police arrangements. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary worked closely with the Minister of Justice, David Ford, to ensure that the legislative framework properly respects the devolution settlement. The provisions were designed not to interfere with the important accountability arrangements for policing in Northern Ireland. In accordance with the Sewel convention, it will be necessary for the Northern Ireland Assembly to agree a legislative consent Motion in respect of the provisions in Part 1 of the Bill. I am sure that the Assembly will debate the matter robustly, and we will welcome any proposals for strengthening the partnership working between the National Crime Agency and the Police Service of Northern Ireland.
The noble Baronesses, Lady Doocey, Lady Hamwee, Lady Harris and Lady Smith, and the noble Lords, Lord Dear and Lord Condon, raised the question of counterterrorism functions. We have made it very clear that decisions on the future of counterterrorism policing should not be taken until after the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games, and after the NCA has been fully established. Only then will counterterrorism policing be considered, and decisions taken on what role the NCA might play. Without prejudice to any further decision on the issue, Clause 2 will enable the functions of the NCA to be extended by order to cover counterterrorism policing. Any such order would be subject to super-affirmative procedures to ensure full parliamentary scrutiny. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Dear, that we do want any turf wars. Just as we will set an example in this House of constructive examination of the cases, I hope the various police authorities will do the same.
The noble Baroness, Lady Smith and my noble friend Lady Harris raised the question of whether the new agency will be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act. I am the Minister responsible for freedom of information and I have given this considerable thought. At the moment SOCA is covered by the Freedom of Information Act. The question I had to face was whether it was cleaner simply to make the larger body exempt. It is a matter that can be well examined in Committee. We are committed to making the National Crime Agency open, public-facing and transparent. Careful consideration was given to whether the National Crime Agency should be brought under the Freedom of Information Act, which was not the case with the Serious Organised Crime Agency. We want the public to have access to a wide range of information about what the agency is doing, how it is performing, its internal procedures and the latest assessment of the threat from organised crime. The measures in the Bill, such as a duty to publish information, will ensure that this happens. The National Crime Agency will handle large volumes of sensitive information, including intelligence material which could have a critical impact on national security. If the National Crime Agency were subject to the Freedom of Information Act, there is a risk that international and private-sector partners would be more reluctant to share information with the agency. Intelligence shows that organised criminals will seek to exploit any avenue, including freedom of information requests, to further their criminal activity. As I said, it was a matter of a judgment. I am very happy to revisit it in Committee. Perhaps when we do so, the Opposition could tell us why SOCA was exempt from the Freedom of Information Act and we could explore their thinking at that time. I suspect it was not very far from the thinking that we have gone through when looking at the setting-up of this agency.
The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, and the noble Lord, Lord Condon, asked about the National Policing Improvement Agency functions. The wind-down of the agency is well under way with some functions already transferred to the Home Office and others to the Serious Organised Crime Agency as an interim step to their new home in the National Crime Agency in 2013. A programme of further transfers to other successor organisations, such as the new police professional body and the new police information and communications technology company is being managed in conjunction with the National Policing Improvement Agency. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary has already set out the details of these transfers in two Written Ministerial Statements. The future destination of all remaining National Policing Improvement Agency functions will be announced in due course.
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, the noble Lords, Lord Elystan-Morgan and Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, and my noble friends Lord Thomas of Gresford and Lord Dholakia asked about changes to the county and family courts. There is no secret agenda for further court closures. That is a separate issue that will be debated, discussed and decided on its merits at the time. In both cases this will give greater flexibility and efficiency, and in the main the practitioners involved in those courts have welcomed the move. I was particularly pleased to hear the endorsement that the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, felt able to give, although I suspect that, once again, we will examine this carefully in Committee.
An issue that is of concern to my noble friend Lord Dholakia and the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, as well as the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, is whether the role of magistrates will be diminished in the new single family court. I can assure noble Lords that the Government have no intention of diminishing the importance of magistrates in the family justice system. Magistrates will continue to play a vital role in the new family court, but on the specific question of whether a lay magistrate would sit alone in these cases, the answer is no.
There was a full and informed discussion on the merits of diversity. One of my tasks in the Ministry of Justice is to promote diversity. To a certain extent I accept the point made by my noble friend Lord Thomas that, particularly at the top end, the shape of our judiciary reflects the Bar of 30 years ago. However, I have said before from this Box that when people ask me what the biggest difference is on returning to Whitehall after a 30-year gap, it is that the Civil Service has managed to diversify in a most remarkable way over that period. Although I might have started life as a Fabian, I am not convinced that the inevitability of gradualness is going to produce the diverse judiciary that a 21st century functioning democracy deserves. I am in nothing but awe of both the intellectual calibre and the integrity of our judiciary. Wherever I go, I realise what a great national asset we have in it. However, I do not think that its merit cannot be produced from a more diverse source that better reflects our society.
I look forward to discussing these issues in Committee and I hope that we will see broad cross-party support in this House for what we are trying to do. We are not proceeding recklessly, rather we are building on some worthwhile reforms. We have listened to much of the advice given by the Constitution Committee and I think that we are on the right track. However, I also agree with a point that was made a number of times, which is that if we are going to get diversity, it is not a matter for government alone. The professions and the judiciary have to buy into it. The noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, asked particularly about the Judicial Diversity Taskforce. The work of the taskforce on diversity is crucial and I can provide a reassurance that it will continue to drive progress in this area. I certainly made it clear when I became Minister that one of my priorities was attending meetings of the taskforce and making sure that we kept up the pressure and commitment from the various parts of the system that are recommended on that force.
The noble Baronesses, Lady Neuberger and Lady Prashar, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, queried the involvement of the Lord Chancellor in the appointment process. Obviously, we will return to this. I have sat in on some of the discussions and it certainly is not any kind of power grab by the present Lord Chancellor. In fact, like me, he is rather an enthusiast for the separation of powers. In the discussions, the opinion came from a number of sources that the relationship between the President of the Supreme Court, the Lord Chief Justice and the Lord Chancellor was absolutely crucial to the effective working of justice and therefore making sure that they were a cohesive group was very important.
As has been pointed out, at the moment the Lord Chancellor has a veto, which is a pretty large intrusion into any selection process. In these proposals, that veto is dropped and he becomes one of a committee. It will be very interesting to tease this out in Committee. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, will confirm, these are not only judicial offices but considerable administrative offices—perhaps they regret it—particularly for the Lord Chief Justice, and their relationships with the Executive and Parliament have to be managed properly to reflect the realities of those relationships. Looking over at the Cross Benches, I can see that noble Lords are keeping their powder dry for Committee.
The noble Lords, Lord Touhig and Lord Ponsonby, raised the issue of the enforcement of fines. The issue of fines enforcement and the vulnerable is important. Fines are a criminal sentence and taxpayers should not be subsidising those who deliberately avoid payment. Under our proposals, if the offender provides accurate means information at the outset of their engagement with the justice system and keeps to the payment plan set out by the court, enforcement action will not take place.
We heard a number of very interesting comments on court broadcasting from the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, who is much influenced by Scottish experience. Again, let us have a good Committee session on that.
On community sentencing, I would make a virtue of the fact that it is only a holding clause at the moment. It is also an opportunity. We heard my noble friend Lady Linklater and the noble Lords, Lord Ramsbotham, Lord Judd and Lord Dholakia, eloquently putting the case for constructive community sentencing. We are in consultation; this is the opportunity to use that consultation to make that case.
On drug-driving, I draw the House’s attention to the fact that my noble friend Lord Attlee has been here throughout this debate precisely because he is going to cover those clauses in the Bill. He even whispered to me that if any noble Lords wished to nobble him and talk to him before that, he is ready to receive them.
It would only be fair if I said that we could leave other matters to Committee. I understand the concerns expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, and the noble Lord, Lord Judd, about family visa cases and, again, we will make our case in Committee.
On the timetable that the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan, asked about, I am afraid that I cannot help. The Bill will be the first steps in the reform of the family court. There are significant changes in store that will take some time to implement, so I cannot at this time give a timetable, but we will do so when we are able.
The noble Lord, Lord Henley, and I look forward to exploring these and other issues in Committee. I believe that this Bill will greatly enhance the national response to serious and organised crime while delivering a swift, more transparent and effective courts and tribunals system. I warmly commend it to the House.