Oral Answers to Questions

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Tuesday 14th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Alex Chalk]

I thank my hon. Friend for being so assiduous in raising this important matter on behalf of her constituents. We are investing heavily in the family system to deal with precisely these issues. If something has gone wrong in that specific case, perhaps she will be kind enough to come to see me so that we can discuss it further.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

T7. There are 2,796 prisoners with indeterminate sentences for public protection languishing in our prisons, 705 of whom are 10 years over their original tariff and 112 of whom had a tariff of less than two years and are now over tariff by 15 years or more. The MOJ’s refreshed IPP action plan clearly is not working, so what does the Secretary of State plan to do to fix this dire situation?

[Alex Chalk]

The total number of IPPs is slightly higher than that but, looking into the data, the really significant factor is that, whereas there were some 6,000 IPP prisoners in 2012, the number who have not been released is down to around 1,200. Our action plan tries to address that. Our reforms are designed to ensure that, when IPP prisoners are released, they do not face a licence period of 10 years, which can lead to them being recalled at any time. Reducing it to three years is a humane and sensible way of trying to erase this stain on the conscience of our justice system.

Family Court Reform and CAFCASS

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd March 2023 Westminster Hall

[Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service and family court reform.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mrs Cummins.

Family breakdown is never easy. Disputes are inevitable and often bitter. Children are caught in the middle of a tug of war between parents. In those conflicts, the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service, or CAFCASS, plays a key role. Child arrangements orders, prohibited steps orders and a host of other key rulings in the family courts often hinge on the reports provided by CAFCASS and the assessments carried out by its workforce. CAFCASS is in desperate need of reform, and it requires funding to protect children subject to care proceedings.

The Criminal Justice and Courts Services Act 2000 stated clearly the role of CAFCASS. First and foremost, it has a duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of children affected by family courts proceedings, yet it is falling far short of the standards required. In 2020, the Ministry of Justice published a damning report on the performance of CAFCASS. The findings were shocking, including failures running deep into every area of the organisation’s work, poor handling of domestic abuse allegations, wilful disregard of children’s voices and an obsessive pro-contact culture that puts unfit parents’ demands ahead of children’s best interests. That was the Government’s own verdict.

The reality is that that is simply an exacerbation of a problem that has engulfed the family courts since 2010. The Government’s cruel decision to remove legal aid from the majority of such cases has led to ugly and disordered scenes in courtrooms nationwide, as parents are forced to represent themselves without sufficient support or understanding of how the system is supposed to function.

Diminishing access to legal aid has only caused further delays in the courts, and denies victims justice. To address the backlog, the Government should properly fund civil legal aid and restore legal aid for early advice for family cases, so cases can be resolved more efficiently.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

There is often a financial disparity between parties. Sometimes, parties use the issue of parental alienation to drag things out longer and to add more expense to the disadvantaged party in those proceedings. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is time that CAFCASS, the courts and judges were better trained in the issue of parental alienation and how it is used as a tactic to prevent court cases dragging on longer than they need to?

[Taiwo Owatemi]

I absolutely agree, and parental alienation is an issue I will come to later in my speech. Reform is desperately needed.

Will the Minister outline what steps the Ministry of Justice is taking to increase the funding of legal aid? Will he update us on when we can expect the civil legal aid review?

--- Later in debate ---

[Taiwo Owatemi]

Absolutely. Proper legal representation needs to be available to everyone in the United Kingdom.

The large backlogs in the family court are creating delays and uncertainty for families and, most alarmingly of all, for vulnerable children. No child should have to witness this sort of conflict, anger and grief played out before a judge. The children caught up in these cases are now suffering as a result of constant failings in leadership from Ministers in this Government.

The most damning aspect of our family court system is false accusations of parental alienation. Too often, as my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) says, a wealthy parent can, in effect, purchase custody of a child through certain legal loopholes. Denounced by the United Nations as a “regressive pseudo-theory”, parental alienation is an argument whereby one parent claims that another is making false abuse claims or is otherwise manipulating the child’s view out of hostility towards their ex-partner. The concept has little to no evidence to support it, but is none the less often accepted, resulting in children being placed with an abusive parent.

I pay tribute to the team at the University of Manchester, whose recent research has revealed the dark and rotten roots of that commonly employed tactic. It was invented 40 years ago as a means of aiding perpetrators to cover up the physical and sexual violence to which they had subjected their spouses and children, yet in Britain the strategy is being given free rein in our family courts. Not only are utterly unqualified individuals being allowed to testify as supposed experts in such cases, but CAFCASS has overseen the rise in such false allegations.

I have spoken with many constituents about their treatment by the family courts. One case summarises everything that is wrong with CAFCASS: the dangers of parental alienation and the risks posed by a blind insistence on contact even when a parent is evidently unfit to have any responsibility over a child. My constituent married a foreign national a decade ago. They had one son, who is now eight years old. Until recently, he was being brought up by his mother in the comfort of a loving, caring home alongside his extended family. Having had the courage to escape the sexual and physical domestic abuse inflicted by her ex-husband, my constituent was granted sole custody of her son. Occasional contact with the father was enforced by the court and complied with by my constituent, despite the clear distress that those sessions caused to the child, yet, when the arrangements broke down, the father was able to launch false alienation proceedings against his ex-wife to remove the boy from her custody. That was supported every step of the way by CAFCASS. He has now succeeded in depriving my constituent of her only child, despite the rigorous investigations by social services at Coventry City Council that concluded that she was an exemplary mother.

Thanks to the deeply imbedded pro-contact culture of CAFCASS, long since identified but allowed to run unreformed for years, an eight-year-old boy is now in the clutches of a man who beat and sexually assaulted my constituent throughout their marriage. Despite mountains of evidence proving his unfitness to have custody of the child, everything was pushed and CAFCASS took his side, placing the blame on the boy’s mother.

What is perhaps most concerning is that despite the child’s distress, a litany of domestic abuse and the detailed reports compiled by Coventry City Council in support of my constituent’s parenting were all cast aside in the family courts. Deploying parental alienation allegations as his chief legal tactic, the boy’s father has now won sole custody, leaving my constituent utterly bereft.

[Bambos Charalambous]

The interests of the child should be paramount—that was written into the Children Act 1989, many years ago—but there seems to have been a clear failure of that policy. Allegations of parental alienation often cause great distress not just for the parent, but for the child at the centre of the case. Does my hon. Friend agree that in cases such as the one she describes, CAFCASS needs to return to focusing on the paramount interests of the child?

[Taiwo Owatemi]

Absolutely. The role of CAFCASS is to protect the child during family proceedings, but it seems to be failing in that role.

The tragedy is being multiplied in the thousands nationwide. A self-reported survey suggests that allegations of parental alienation are made in up to 70% of family court cases in England and Wales. The scandal has been allowed to go on for far too long. It is time for CAFCASS and the family courts to be held accountable. When will the Government legislate to bar unqualified so-called experts from the family courts? When will guidance be published for judges on the admissibility of family alienation allegations as evidence in these cases?

Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Thursday 6th January 2022 Westminster Hall

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship for the first time, Ms Ali. I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on securing this important debate, which seems to have prompted the Government to make today’s announcement about the opening of the Afghan citizen resettlement scheme. I welcome that, but I believe it should have happened months ago. The announcement of the opening of the scheme still leaves many questions unanswered, and I hope that the Minister can answer some of them when she responds.

There are three Chevening alumni scholars who have a connection to my constituency and who were eligible for the emergency evacuation by the Foreign Office back in August, but given the chaos that ensured at Kabul airport and the lack of response from the Foreign Office, they were unable to board the flights to the UK. The three Chevening alumni scholars remain in Afghanistan and have been lying low to avoid the Taliban, and I am pleased that the Minister has stated that there will be a third route to the scheme that will prioritise Chevening alumni and others, but I would welcome the Minister’s explaining to me how the scheme will work in practice to locate the alumni, and whether it will also allow those who are eligible to bring their families with them. During the statement, my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) stressed the need for family reunion to be part and parcel of the resettlement scheme, because the one thing that we do not want to happen is to see family members embarking on dangerous crossings to the UK in order to be with their families who have secured places on the resettlement scheme.

In August and September, some people felt that their lives were threatened by the Taliban due to their roles as activists for women’s rights or in law enforcement, or because they were from religious minorities or were part of the LGBTQ community. They managed to escape to third countries. They, too, will need to access the ACRS, but from a third country. Could the Minister let me know whether they will be able to access the scheme from third countries? I note that in her statement earlier today, she spoke about the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees playing a role in referring refugees in need of resettlement who fled Afghanistan, but I am interested to know how that would work, because some of them may have fled to places such as Tajikistan, Iran and other countries, where it may be a bit more difficult for UNHCR to assist them.

If the scheme is to be a success, the Government also need to consider what they need to do to ensure that there is integration when people have been settled in the UK. I note that Barnardo’s has advised that there is a need to help children to be resettled in the UK. It has advised that children should be given a particular focus when considering integration, because the needs of refugee children, and the impact that they have on the entire family, must be considered in order to ensure that integration is successful. Families need to be supported in the environment in which they are most comfortable—for instance, key workers can best build relationships with refugee families in informal settings, such as their home environment. Things like that also need to be considered.

Barnardo’s also argues that integration is a two-way process, so local communities must be encouraged and supported to better understand the nature and trauma of those seeking asylum and resettlement in another country. I ask the Minister to take into account the expertise of organisations such as Barnardo’s in dealing with resettlement, particularly of children. I note the references that the Minister made in her statement earlier today about integration, but I would welcome her thoughts on the issue of integrating children into the system.

Local councils will also be at the centre of supporting communities and people who have been resettled under the scheme. They cannot be left alone to deal with the challenges of the scheme without proper support—both financial and strategic—from central Government. I would very much welcome information from the Minister about how local government will be supported in hosting communities and vulnerable individuals through the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme.

In August and September, many of us received emails, telephone calls or visits from constituents in relation to their concerns about family members in Afghanistan. Although we were able to give responses with the information we had had from the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Defence, those updates stopped in September. I have already had a couple of inquiries from constituents who are concerned about their family members. I invite the Minister to advise us on what support will be received from the Home Office, the Foreign Office and the MOD, so that we can respond to those inquiries from constituents whose family members may be eligible for the scheme. That needs to be addressed.

I have made only a short speech because I thought the debate would be oversubscribed, but clearly the earlier statement has dealt with a number of concerns that people have about the resettlement scheme. I will end by saying that the chaotic scenes during the UK’s withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021 must be one of the lowest points of the Government’s foreign policy. We now have a moral duty to support those who have helped the UK and who have a strong connection with our nation. Although I welcome the opening of the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme, it has to be implemented properly so that it does what it was intended to do. I am very keen for the scheme to be a success because we must not let the Afghan people down again.

Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Monday 25th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

I can certainly provide my right hon. Friend with that assurance. We want to get this right, which is why it is taking us a bit of time. I understand the concerns of colleagues, and also, as she said, the real concerns of Afghans already in this country. I have met many, and every one has raised concerns about their families and friends left behind. I understand that, but it will take a bit of time, and I ask the House to bear with us while we try to ensure we get it right.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

I echo the concerns raised so far. It has been two months since the Kabul airlift, and as we know, many of those who needed to be evacuated, having been accepted as high risk, were left behind in Afghanistan and now face persecution under Taliban rule. I share the frustrations of many about the slow progress of the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme, and we are still waiting for details from the Home Office about how that scheme will operate in practice. The Government’s website offering guidance on the scheme has not been updated since 13 September. At the same time, there have been increasing reports of violence against women and girls, and members of the LGBTI community in Afghanistan, and efforts must be made to step up help for those in desperate need.

The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) mentioned Chevening scholars, and my office has raised concerns on behalf of Chevening scholars who remain at high risk in Afghanistan due to their links with the UK. They were eligible for evacuation but were not called forward, and since raising those cases I have had no response from the Government. Will the Minister provide an update on the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme, and inform the House what measures have been taken to ensure that those most at risk are guaranteed safe passage and access to neighbouring countries? What support will former Chevening scholars who are a priority for assistance and still in Afghanistan be eligible to receive, and through which mechanism? I am not sure whether the Minister answered the question about whether they will be guaranteed a place under the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme. What steps will she take to speed up the community sponsorship scheme to help those in Afghanistan who may not qualify for the Afghan citizens resettlement scheme?

[Victoria Atkins]

I can deal with the hon. Gentleman’s point on Chevening scholars. The scheme has not been launched yet. We want to get this right, so I am afraid that I will have to give him the holding answer, which is that we are working on the scheme. I know that he would not expect me to give details, thoughts or running commentary on how the policy is being developed before we have, as a Government, come to a collective agreement on it so that we can best ensure that the policy meets the very real needs that many in this House have raised.

I imagine that only today, we will hear not just about Chevening scholars but, for example, about religious minorities, about people who are LGBT+ and about extraordinary women who have done extraordinary things in Afghanistan in the last 20 years in pursuit of equality and the rights of women before the law. Those are all categories of people that we have set out in the policy statement that we want to help, but we have to do this in a managed and measured way so that we get the scheme right and, over the coming years, it delivers the sorts of changes and help that everyone in the House expects.

Prisons (Substance Testing) Bill

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate 2 December 2020: House of Commons
Wednesday 2nd December 2020 Public Bill Committees

The first is after coming into prison from the community. We know that 90% of people who come into prison from outside and who go on to access treatment are into the treatment programme within three weeks, and 61% access it immediately. That sounds to me like a good statistic, but among people who are moving from one secure setting to another the numbers are a little worse: 41% of those who eventually access treatment after a transfer took more than three weeks to do so, which cannot be good, and just 15% started treatment immediately after their transfer. There is clearly a problem, and I really would like to hear from the Minister what she feels can be done to improve things.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

[Ms Brown]

The hon. Lady asked what we will use the evidence we gather for. The key objective of the mandatory drug testing programme is to provide a means of identifying prisoners with ongoing drug problems to ensure that they are offered the appropriate treatment, and I would like to detail some of the work that we are doing on that. However, it is also right, as highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury, who has such experience, that we need to tackle those who traffic, distribute and use illegal and illicit drugs, and prison governors should have appropriate sanctions available to them to discourage such offending. The hon. Member for West Ham is right that we need to treat people with drug use, but prisons must take a balanced approach that is consistent with that, and it is important that they have the tools available to them in appropriate places.

[Bambos Charalambous]

[Lucy Frazer]

Prisons (Substance Testing) Bill

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2020 Public Bill Committees

The first is after coming into prison from the community. We know that 90% of people who come into prison from outside and who go on to access treatment are into the treatment programme within three weeks, and 61% access it immediately. That sounds to me like a good statistic, but among people who are moving from one secure setting to another the numbers are a little worse: 41% of those who eventually access treatment after a transfer took more than three weeks to do so, which cannot be good, and just 15% started treatment immediately after their transfer. There is clearly a problem, and I really would like to hear from the Minister what she feels can be done to improve things.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

I had the pleasure of visiting HMP Cardiff a couple of years ago with the Welsh Affairs Committee and the Justice Committee. That prison was getting prisoners from Bristol visiting them who were under different regimes—under a different nation’s schemes. That had an impact on the prisoners from Bristol and other areas. Does my hon. Friend agree that there needs to be a more joined-up approach in dealing with this?

[Ms Brown]

I absolutely do. It is quite clear that once someone is on a treatment programme it needs to continue seamlessly, because we all want people, when they leave prison and go back into our communities, to be able to do so free from drugs and addiction, and to start a fresh life. My hon. Friend is right, and I am grateful to him for bringing that to our attention.

I gently suggest that the statistics, and Government policy more broadly, might be improved if we stop pretending that prisoners do not start taking drugs while in prison, rather than always going into prison with an addiction. That is the truth of it. The whole system at the moment seems to be geared to discovering who has a pre-existing dependence on drugs and ensuring that they are in treatment, which is good. Do not get me wrong, that is essential, but for drugs such as spice, which has been very common in prisons, it is not the whole story.

There is a third pathway to treatment that we need to ensure is available: a pathway for those people who did not have a drug problem when they entered prison but who, tragically and unacceptably, acquired one while inside. They are the people the system is failing most—the people for whom the boredom and difficulties of prison life are alleviated by short oblivion through illicit drugs obtained inside. I am genuinely hopeful that the Bill will enable treatment for those people. If it does, that will be a massive benefit to communities and families.

I will quickly explore one other issue. The transition between custody and community is often a revolving door, especially for those with drug abuse problems. It may be especially important for spice users. It is very evident that spice is disproportionately used by two populations: prisoners and rough sleepers. We know from last week’s Public Health England substance misuse statistics that in 2019 almost half of those entering treatment for misuse of an NPS had a housing problem—the highest proportion for any category of substances. I suspect that if we accounted for those who use spice but who are not in treatment as well as for those who are, the proportion with a housing problem would be even higher. It is incredibly difficult to hold down a job, maintain positive relationships and a family life, and to keep the mind and body healthy while living on the street. That contributes to higher levels of imprisonment among those who sleep rough.

Homelessness for prison leavers, and what the charity Nacro calls cell, street, repeat, is a priority for us, and I am led to believe that it will be a priority for the Government to reduce reoffending rates in coming years. However, we need to understand how these issues are connected; how many people come into prison with a history of rough sleeping and associated use of spice in a year; how many receive treatment for substance misuse while inside; how many are still accessing spice or other harmful substances while they are inside; how many of these people, when released, go straight back to rough sleeping; and how many are going straight back to spice use if they managed to get clean inside. I hope the Minister will offer to take this issue away and consider whether there is a need for further research, which the Ministry could commission, and how it might best be achieved.

The other important transition is when people leave prison. We need to ensure that leaving prison means starting a new, changed life. It is good for the whole of our community that prisoners, when released, do not come out and reoffend. It is also important for the prisoner that they get a true second chance. Substance misuse treatment is a massive part of ensuring that that can happen. We need to ensure that information about people’s needs travels with them as they leave prison and that treatment is immediate and consistent when they arrive in the community.

There is, unfortunately, little point in people getting clean or stable inside prison if they immediately relapse when they are out, without enough support, in the chaos and confusion of the outside world again. In fact, as we know, after release is the most dangerous time for those using illicit drugs, with appalling proportions of overdose deaths occurring in the first few days after leaving prison, just when we are wanting people to have a sense of hope and rebirth. A Norwegian study found that 85% of all deaths in prison leavers in the first week after release were due to overdoses. A US study found that the risk of an overdose death was 12.7 times higher for a prison leaver in the first two weeks after release from the general population.

Most of these deaths after leaving prison are the result of opiate use—heroin, or even more, drugs such as fentanyl—rather than an NPS. People in prison with an opiate dependence are generally on a regulated dose of a replacement drug as a medication, but when they come out, if they do not have immediate access to continue that treatment, they turn to the black market. At that point, much higher and less reliable doses are sold, which can quickly overwhelm the body, and people die. So getting transitions from custody to community right is a matter of life and death for some, and an essential part of treatment.

A few weeks ago, I met with some amazing NHS staff who work with armed services veterans in custody at HMP Wandsworth. I was delighted to hear that the staff in the substance misuse team leave the prison when those in their care are released, and go with them to their first appointment for community treatment. That is exactly the kind of integrated working that we need, but we all know that it is far from universal.

Can the Minister tell us more about what the Government are doing to improve treatment through the gate, following the recommendations in the report from the Advisory Council for the Misuse of Drugs on custody to community transitions last year? I fully appreciate that she is unlikely to have detailed answers to all my questions at her fingertips, but I think that we, as parliamentarians, could do with them to help to design and monitor effective policy on issues that mean enough to us that we are sat here this morning.

This is an excellent Bill, whose purpose we support, but if it is not accompanied by effective, well-resourced Government policy its benefits will be limited. I am fairly certain that the right hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham would not be impressed by that at all. I will say more when we come to the new clauses.

--- Later in debate ---

The hon. Lady asked what we will use the evidence we gather for. The key objective of the mandatory drug testing programme is to provide a means of identifying prisoners with ongoing drug problems to ensure that they are offered the appropriate treatment, and I would like to detail some of the work that we are doing on that. However, it is also right, as highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury, who has such experience, that we need to tackle those who traffic, distribute and use illegal and illicit drugs, and prison governors should have appropriate sanctions available to them to discourage such offending. The hon. Member for West Ham is right that we need to treat people with drug use, but prisons must take a balanced approach that is consistent with that, and it is important that they have the tools available to them in appropriate places.

[Bambos Charalambous]

The Minister mentioned having a multifaceted approach to substance abuse in prison. A couple of years ago her predecessor mentioned that there was going to be a £10 million investment in scanners and other equipment to detect drugs going into prison—that is the other side of the equation. Could she give us any updates as to what the Government are doing on that? I am sure that is something we would all be interested in hearing about, because we want to make sure that drugs do not get into prisons in the first place.

[Lucy Frazer]

I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman has raised that point. As he repeated, we do have a multifaceted approach, including limiting the supply—the measures he identified are to do that—limiting demand and providing treatment. He is right that we did a pilot programme in 10 prisons, and as a result of that and other work, we have put forward a £100 million security package, which includes the airport scanners to detect drugs that have been ingested before being brought into prisons. We also have enhanced gate security for visitors and staff, we have mobile phone blockers and we have beefed up investment in the investigation of crimes, so that we can bring people to justice if do the things the hon. Member for West Ham talked about so passionately. We need to stop the crime of supply within our prisons.

The hon. Member for West Ham rightly focused on how we limit demand and actually treat people in our prisons. We have a number of initiatives on that. She will know about Holme House—our first drug recovery prison. It is a £9 million project jointly funded by the Ministry of Justice and the Department of Health and Social Care. I am pleased to say that that programme will be evaluated early next year; the early signs are good, but the formal evaluation will take place next year. We also have that on a small scale in a number of prisons. We have enhanced drug-free wings. The hon. Lady rightly says that we should not be punishing and that we should be encouraging, and these drug-free units encourage and incentivise people to live a drug-free life. That is something we are very committed to increasing.

Treatment is very important, as the hon. Member for West Ham mentioned, and we need to help people get on treatment programmes. She rightly said that 90% of people coming into prison, where they are on those programmes, do have access to treatments within three weeks. In fact, 53,193 adults accessed drug and alcohol treatment services within prisons and secure settings between 2018 and 2019. I am pleased to say that 27% of those who were discharged after completing their treatment were free of dependence. The programmes that we are putting in place, having detected people who have problems, are therefore working, and I am pleased to say that that figure is an increase from the 24% who were successfully free of drugs two years earlier.

The hon. Member is right to point out that people sometimes turn to drugs in prison, when they have no hope and not much else to do. That is why we are committed to ensuring that we increase purposeful activity that will get people jobs when they come out. As evidence of that, she will know about our £2.5 billion spending programme for prison builds. We are absolutely committed to providing spaces where people can do good work and have good education in prisons.

Of course, we need to help those who unfortunately become addicted in prison. I do not shy away from the fact that that happens, but the measures in the Bill and all the other measures that I have identified will help us do that.

The hon. Member rightly talked about rough sleepers, and the link between them and prison. Around 60% of rough sleepers have been in prison in the last year, so there is a clear correlation between offending and homelessness. I have spoken previously about the close work that my Department is doing with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to ensure that we take people out of rough sleeping and into homes. That will have an impact on turning around the lives of those people who would otherwise come into our institutions.

In the spending review, the hon. Member will have seen the commitment to £237 million that the Prime Minister announced for accommodation for up to 6,000 rough sleepers. She will also have seen a further £144 million for associated support services and £262 million for substance misuse treatment services, which, when fully deployed, are expected to help more than 11,000 people a year. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, through our joint work, is not only taking people off the street, but giving them the treatment they need for their addiction. That spending is a 60% increase on the 2019 SR.

The hon. Member talked about other transitions into the community and between prisons. She is right to identify those points. We are already doing a significant amount of work on transitions into the community. She mentioned the important work that is being done in Wandsworth. That is not one of our RECONNECT programmes, but she will know that we have a RECONNECT service that the NHS is rolling out across the country. That is doing exactly what she identifies: ensuring that those who leave prison engage with community health services and supporting them to make that transition easier. Having spoken to the NHS and the Department of Health and Social Care regularly, I know they are committed to rolling that out in the coming years, in full, everywhere and to every prison in the country.

I agree that there is more work to do on transferring between prisons. That relates to healthcare, NHS records and the work that we need do in prisons, but we are committed across the board to joining up the prisoner journey, not only in healthcare, but in other areas such as education.

The hon. Member mentioned naloxone. That point rightly comes up often, because it is important that, when we release prisoners who are addicted, there are no drastic consequences. Public Health England monitors the number of eligible prisoners who are given naloxone. Currently, 17% of those who have an opiate dependency get naloxone, which is up on previous years. I recognise that it could be more and I know that PHE is doing a piece of work at the moment to monitor performance in relation to take-home naloxone across all prison establishments and to identify best practice. I have spoken to them and they have an ambition that everybody will get it.

I hope I have addressed the hon. Member’s points. The Government are pleased to support the Bill that my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham promoted and that my hon. Friend the Member for North West Durham introduced today, and I commend it to the Committee.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Frazer]

We are taking a number of approaches, of which I shall name just one: the rolling out of the NHS Reconnect service, which ensures that those having treatment in prisons can continue that treatment when they go into the community on release. The service includes assistance in making referrals and also provides peer mentoring services. It will ensure that, as my hon. Friend said, offenders permanently stay off drugs on their release.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

What steps he is taking to help ensure access to justice.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

What steps he is taking to help ensure access to justice.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Alex Chalk)]

Access to justice is a fundamental right and the Government are committed to ensuring that individuals can get the timely support that they need to access the justice system. In 2018-19, we spent £1.7 billion on legal aid for those who needed it. In response to the destruction caused by covid-19, we have introduced measures that include scheduling more than 100 additional Saturday court sittings each month; providing funding to not-for-profit providers of specialist legal advice, such as law centres; and rolling out the cloud video platform to enable remote hearings in all civil, family and criminal courts.

[Bambos Charalambous]

The Government have failed to provide any significant additional support for legal aid practitioners. The breaking point for many firms is likely to come in 2021, especially as the volume of completions in the Crown court remains low. Many legal aid firms and practitioners urgently need financial support to survive, so will the Government announce new measures to support legal aid lawyers over the second national lockdown?

[Alex Chalk]

Legal aid lawyers do a magnificent job of ensuring access to justice. I am pleased that the Government have been able to roll out support through furlough and so on, but it is also important that in this second lockdown the courts are continuing. It is really important to note that the magistrates courts are dealing with more cases than they are receiving, and the Government have accelerated CLAR 1, the first criminal legal aid review, which means that defence solicitors, for example, are being paid to review unused material—something that did not happen under a Labour Government.

Ministry of Justice: Legal Aid Spending

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Thursday 22nd October 2020 Westminster Hall

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McDonagh. I will be as brief as I can.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) who chairs the Select Committee. It was a real pleasure to serve under him for the two years I was on the Justice Committee.

I start by pointing out—as already mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter)—the cuts to legal aid since 2010. The budget was cut from £2.6 billion to £1.7 billion. For criminal legal aid, that figure dropped from £1.4 billion to approximately £897 million today. That is a huge cut. Those cuts were made by the coalition Government under the guise of austerity, which underpinned LASPO. The guiding principles of LASPO were to discourage unnecessary adversarial litigation at public expense, to target legal aid towards those who needed it most, to make savings to the cost of the scheme, and to deliver better overall value for money for the taxpayer. Only one of those objectives was achieved, and that was saving money. That money was obviously swallowed up by the Treasury because it was not reinvested in justice and legal services.

Moving whole areas out of scope, such as family, employment, immigration, welfare and benefit law, has led to more litigants in person. As the hon. Member for Newbury (Laura Farris) said, that has caused huge problems in various proceedings. I recently read “Fake Law: The Truth about Justice in an Age of Lies” by The Secret Barrister, and it draws an analogy about litigants in person attempting to navigate legal proceedings with someone trying their hand at removing a gallbladder for the first time. The author says that it would take far longer and create more of a mess than if it were carried out by a trained professional. That is true. The expertise is needed to make sure that things are done properly in the legal sphere.

Although I welcome the £3 million made available to support litigants in person, it is woefully inadequate when we consider the £900 million that has been taken out since 2010. We do need more money in that area. The book gives various examples of people in circumstances that are not in scope, who do not get the legal aid help they need with their cases. Rachel was fleeing domestic violence and a sexually abusive husband. She had to deal with his legal proceedings to have contact with the children. Florence was bought to the UK as an undocumented minor by her mother, then abandoned and made homeless. At 16, she was taken into care, and on reaching the age of 18, she faced detention and deportation unless her status was regulated. Jenna had life-changing 50% burns to her face and body following an acid attack, leaving her housebound and unable to work. She needed help to appeal the decision of the Department for Work and Pensions to strip her of her disability benefits. Those people would have been helped had legal aid been available.

The Bar Council reported that, among their members in 2018, 91% of respondents found a significant increase in litigants in person in family law, and 77% found an increase in civil cases. My hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Karen Buck) referred to advice deserts, and the Chair of the Select Committee referred to criminal legal aid being a problem.

The Law Society has noted that there is an existential threat to criminal legal aid firms. Shockingly, there are 124 fewer legal aid firms in 2020 than there were in 2019, which in turn was far fewer than the 1,861 there were in 2010. The Law Society has also highlighted a number of instances of criminal legal practitioners being in decline, and it has highlighted the existential threat. It believes that in five to 10 years’ time there will be insufficient numbers of criminal duty solicitors in many regions, leaving many people vulnerable, in need of legal advice and unable to access justice.

I know that the Minister understands that because he and I served on the Justice Committee when we produced the report on criminal legal aid and the need for more support for practitioners. I ask him to listen to the Law Society and Bar Council’s call to fast-track the criminal legal aid review, particularly on legal aid fees, and promise the significant investment in the criminal justice system that is desperately sought. Post the implementation of LASPO, there was also a promise to look at the pilots for early legal advice in civil legal aid by autumn 2019. That is way behind and we very much need to see it take place now.

As the Secret Barrister puts it:

“Without legal aid, without access to the knowledge and the skills by which we can enforce our rights, we are voiceless.”

It is therefore up to us to ensure that those voices are heard.

Sentencing White Paper

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Wednesday 16th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight the difficulty caused by having a generic starting point for all young offenders, irrespective of age and maturity. It is far better to have a sliding scale that allows the courts, using their discretion, to reflect the differing maturities and age ranges of the serious offenders before them. Although the welfare of young people has to be our primary concern, he is right that when it comes to the most serious offences, we cannot, I am afraid, stint from our duty to protect the public and to ensure that the punishment fits the crime.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

I welcome aspects of this White Paper, especially paragraphs 239 to 242, which acknowledge the role that homelessness plays in reoffending. Being released on a Friday makes it difficult for offenders to access public services, which leads to increased reoffending. What steps is the Secretary of State taking to reconsider people being released on a Friday?

[Robert Buckland]

The hon. Gentleman, who speaks with experience as a practitioner, is right to highlight that issue. I have considered whether we should just ban release on a Friday, but that is probably the wrong answer because, frankly, services need to be there every day of the week. There should be no distinction between what happens on a Friday and what happens on a Wednesday. That is why proper cross-government work has been done to ensure that accommodation and potential jobs are identified when an offender is released and to ensure the benefits system is working if no job is available. That is at the heart of what I am trying to do.

Probation Services

Bambos Charalambous Excerpts

Thursday 11th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

I am very grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend, who served with distinction in the Department I now lead. He is right to make that point that this is not about blind ideology, but about people and the shared values we have across the sector. That is very much within the CRC. I will make this point, and he will remember this: it was this Government who finally created licence and supervision periods for people on short-term prison sentences. That was a singular omission from the system that the previous Government failed to address.

[Bambos Charalambous (Enfield, Southgate) (Lab)]

Two years ago, the Justice Select Committee, on which I served, produced its highly critical report, “Transforming Rehabilitation” on the performance of the privatised probation service. One of the criticisms was how those contracts were measured on outputs, not outcomes. Will the Secretary of State confirm that sufficient funding will be available to tackle the issues of heavy caseload, poor IT systems and the need to work with specialist services and the voluntary sector to ensure that probation officers can deliver a decent service and help reduce reoffending?

[Robert Buckland]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who I know has a long interest in these issues, but I remind him of what I said a few moments ago about the £155 million uplift in this current financial year that we secured as part of the highest increase in the Ministry of Justice revenue budget in more than a decade. We will continue to match that in the years ahead with more investment, and he can be confident that that will translate not only into reduced workloads, but increased sophistication and development when it comes to the harnessing of new technologies and better ways of working. We have learned a lot from the current crisis about how we can do things even better.