Oral Answers to Questions
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
No. It is for the courts to pass sentences. It is for our prisons and probation service to deal with the matter. The national probation service will focus on the most dangerous sex offenders. Our prisons are managing increasing numbers of historic and current sex offenders. We now have a number of prisons that specialise in that and are doing excellent work with those offenders. Let us hope that those numbers do not continue to rise, but if they do we will be ready to tackle that problem.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
T10. As a former prison assistant governor, I take a great interest in the rehabilitation of ex-offenders, so I am very proud of my constituent, Jason Turner, a former drug addict who is today launching his film, “Making your past pay.” He turned his life around after 22 years of crime and addiction, and the film features Benjamin Zephaniah aiming to show offenders how they can turn their lives around. Does my hon. Friend agree with my constituent Jason that offenders seeking to rehabilitate should never allow themselves to be defined by their past?
Andrew Selous
My hon. Friend is rightly proud of her constituent, and the objective of the Ministry of Justice is to make sure that people do turn their lives around, as her constituent has done. All credit to him, and we believe our transforming rehabilitation reforms will do that for many more people.
Offender Rehabilitation Bill [Lords]
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(10 years, 10 months ago)
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Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
On the pilot, some of us in the House expressed our concerns. I have now looked into the matter a bit further, and it seems that it would take three or four further years properly to conduct a pilot. Would that not be three or four years during which a continual problem would remain unaddressed?
Jenny Chapman
The hon. Lady might want to reflect that had the Secretary of State not cancelled the pilots already taking place, we might now have had a year’s worth—the pilots would not necessarily have to last three or four years—of evidence, information and lessons learned that might have proved invaluable to the Minister as he proceeded with his programme.
Lorely Burt
My understanding is that within the CRCs there will be skilled professional people whose job it will be continually to asses the risk factor of low and medium-term prisoners. Would that not indicate that those issues are being covered?
Jenny Chapman
I would hope that there will be someone working in a CRC who could assess risk. The point is that whenever we have a transition between organisations, there will be different systems. The relationships will not be so strong and there will be scope for communication failures and for information not to be passed on. That gets to the nub of the concern felt by us and by those working in the sector about where the problems will arise with what the Government are proposing.
The Government have made much of the fact that new and inexperienced providers will only manage those who are low and medium risk. But the Minister knows that low and medium risk includes offenders who have committed sexual assault, burglary, violence against the person, domestic violence and other quite serious offences. All of them will now be under the supervision of companies that have no experience of managing this kind of risk. Alarm over this lack of experience of providers is part of a wider concern not only that the proposal is not fit for purpose, but that some of these potential providers are not properly fit to deliver it either.
The Government are, I know, painfully aware of the MOJ’s record on procuring services and managing contracts. After the somewhat infamous saga—here is the mammal bit—of the language services contract, the PAC concluded that the Ministry of Justice
“was not an intelligent customer”
and the Chair of the Justice Committee reported that “serious flaws” were exposed in the Ministry’s procedures and policies and that the process was a “shambles”. The NAO concluded that the Ministry
“underestimated the project risks when it decided to switch from a regional to a national rollout”
and allowed the contract to be operational before it was ready. I do not need to spell out the extent of the risk to public safety if these sorts of failures are allowed to occur in this exercise.
Perhaps because of all these problems, Ministers have pinned all their hopes on the payment mechanism. They assure us that success is guaranteed because providers will be paid by results. But Members will recall similar claims being made about the Work programme, in which every provider started by failing to meet its targets. Ministers have also so far been unable to tell Members exactly how much of a fee will be paid by results and how much the provider will get up front, regardless of their performance. My hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) made an excellent point in Committee, when she said that when universal credit had been bailed out the original structures were still in place to provide services that the reforms could not. There was at least some sort of continuity. Given that the Secretary of State is planning to abolish every probation trust in a matter of months, what will be in place to protect the public? Should a provider fail or the entire roll-out have to be halted because of poor performance, nothing would be in place.
The performance of providers and the very real concern about failure brings me to new clause 5, which deals with contract management. It is designed to ensure better performance from providers and much better management of contracts by the Ministry of Justice than we have seen in recent years. I know the Minister will accept that this is needed. Now we come to the bit about the rabbit! The MOJ paid for a rabbit to be licensed as a court interpreter—the commissioning car crash, as it was called, meaning the language service’s contract. The Chairman of the Justice Select Committee concluded that the Ministry’s naivety at the start of the process appeared to have been matched, once the new arrangements came into operation, by its indulgence towards underperformance against the contract.
We will disagree today on how well the Secretary of State and his Department can manage this kind of process, but I am sure that the Minister would agree with the Opposition Front-Bench team at least on the fact that we must not tolerate underperformance if and when these contracts come into force. We cannot allow these problems to happen again in the future. Neither the Ministry’s nor the Government’s records are particularly encouraging on this front. The Justice Select Committee in its review of the budgeting structure of the MOJ reported—astutely, I think—that the Department has a tendency to focus on policy creation rather than implementation. The recent independent review of MOJ contracting reported in December that there were long-standing and significant weaknesses in contract management at the Department. It found that the focus on contracts lessened significantly after the initial procurement and, in some cases, there appeared to be a lack of appetite for continuous improvement. The review concluded that opportunities to mitigate risks and optimise services were being missed.
We have seen first hand the damage done when the Ministry’s attention span fails to keep track of a contract. Our new clause 5 attempts to support the Government to get a bit better on that. Contracts for two major providers and potential failures in probation bidding are currently under investigation by the Serious Fraud Office, after the taxpayer was overcharged by millions for the tagging of offenders who were dead, had been released or, in some cases, had left the country. The prisoner escort contract with Serco has been referred for investigation by the Metropolitan police, and the Ministry’s own review of contracts has led to two more G4S contracts being referred to the SFO. It should not be necessary to mention how unhappy Members on both sides of the House would be if a company under investigation for fraud were to be permitted to bid to manage public protection, so I am sure the Minister will want to assure us that that will not be the case. So far, the Government have not done so.
Opposition Members have proposed a number of safeguards in new clause 5, which we believe should be included to improve the quality of the Government’s reforms. If the Government are hellbent on going ahead, new clause 5 would provide at least some kind of oversight and scrutiny for this House. We want them to pilot the proposals and seek parliamentary approval, which we have discussed. We tabled in Committee a number of measures to help improve the quality of contracts. These included ensuring that all providers of this key public service would be subject to freedom of information requests, that contracts would last for a maximum of five years so that a Government were not able to make decisions binding the entire Parliament that follows them, and that taxpayers’ money should be protected by the inclusion of break and clawback clauses in all contracts.
Sarah Champion
I agree that it is unacceptable that those people are not getting support now. I would like to go further and start their rehabilitation in prison. I would like there to be a complete system, so that when people come out they will be able to engage much better in society and will not reoffend.
Sarah Champion
I should just like to tell the House what the hon. Member for Reigate said. After the probation service as a whole won an award for excellence in 2011, he stated:
“This prestigious award recognises the professionalism of probation staff and the excellence of their work. This very public recognition of not just what they do but, perhaps more importantly, how well they do it, will be a source of pride for probation staff.”
The existing probation trusts are doing an excellent job, and that is being recognised. They are not broken.
Lorely Burt
I do not think that anyone in the House would dispute the fact that the probation service does an excellent job. However, during the last 10 years of the previous Government, the cost of running the service rose by 70%. The hon. Lady says that she does not disagree with the use of private providers or with the aims of the Bill. Can she explain how on earth it would be possible to realise those aims without taking these steps?
Sarah Champion
Unfortunately, I cannot explain that, because the plans have not been put before us. I am therefore unable to scrutinise them or to change them to the degree that I would like. I am supporting new clause 1 because I would like the House to be able to debate those matters, but we are not being given the opportunity to do so.
Another assumption that is being presented to us is that probation trusts are failing to reduce reoffending rates, yet reoffending rates are falling. The latest statistics published by the Ministry of Justice show that the probation service reduced reoffending by a further 5% below the target figure. This continues the downward trend in reoffending rates witnessed over recent years, and reoffending by all adult offenders in the community subject to probation supervision is now at its lowest since 2007-08. The probation service has achieved that while making the considerable budgetary savings asked of it. In South Yorkshire, the figures are even better, at 12.77% lower than the target figure.
Reoffending rates are important, but they are not the only criterion for success in this area. The probation service can also boast that victim feedback has been positive in 98% of cases; that targets for completions on domestic violence interventions, and for court report timeliness, have been met and exceeded; and that completion targets were also met or exceeded on the vast majority of probation programmes. The probation trusts are doing a superb job, and they should be allowed to continue to do so.
Another assumption that keeps being mentioned in the debate is that the only way in which supervision for people serving a sentence of under 12 months can be afforded is through privatisation. However, the proposals will necessitate the wholesale reorganisation of the probation service and a lengthy and complex national tendering and contracting process, all of which will require significant investment before we even get to the meat of doing the job. There is huge concern over the lack of information on the cost of the proposals. We have asked for that information, but it has not been presented. Despite the publication of several impact assessments, the Ministry of Justice has yet to set out the cost of the reforms and the way in which they will be funded. This is a fundamental point. If we are expected to take this leap in the dark, at least we should be chucked a lifeboat so that we can get into it.
The current budget for probation is approximately £800 million a year, suggesting a 10-year budget of £8 billion. The House of Commons Library has broadly estimated that the 10-year value of outsourced probation would be between £5 billion and £20 billion. That is in addition to the budget for the remaining public sector probation service. That suggests that a significant increase in costs is being predicted, contrary to Ministry of Justice claims that the reforms are a cost-saving initiative. In addition, there would be the unknown percentage resulting from performance-related pay.
Now it starts to get surreal—not that it was not already. The Government say that the probation service cannot tender because of the performance-related pay aspect, so why do they not just drop that element? The probation trusts have been saying all along that they would like the opportunity to support people serving short-term sentences. They are clearly the best trained and most skilled specialist people to do that work, but they are not even being allowed to tender for it. I find it incredibly challenging that the main stumbling block to retaining the status quo in that area is that the Government will not drop the performance-related pay element.
I support new clauses 5 and 11, but other people want to speak so I shall not say any more about the companies that are tendering for the work. Nor will I go into the whole data protection issue that will result from state, private and voluntary organisations sharing information. My hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Jenny Chapman) has already mentioned the logistics of reorganisation and the risks incurred during a transition period. Those risks are enormous. We are not talking about people not getting paid for a week. We are talking about people being out in the community without the necessary supervision, and the potential for the data to collapse around them so that we would not even know where they were.
In conclusion, new clause 1 would prevent the Government from being able to sell off or restructure the probation service unless their proposals had first been laid before, and approved by, both Houses of Parliament. The Government have not given Parliament any opportunity to scrutinise their plans to privatise probation, claiming instead that they can use existing legislation to push the plans through. The only time we have debated this topic is during Opposition day debates. That cannot be democratic. The way in which this has been handled has shaken me to the core.
Lorely Burt
I originally intended to make a full contribution at this stage, but a great deal has been said and I shall not detain the House by going over ground that has already been covered.
Let me make a point about the pilots in Peterborough and Southampton, which have had encouraging interim results. The hon. Member for Darlington (Jenny Chapman) suggested that pilots had been concluded and stopped, but the pilots for Peterborough and Doncaster have not been cut, and as I say the interim findings have presented encouraging results, although we will have to wait and see the full results. The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) asked whether the pilots were precisely comparable; notwithstanding that, it looks good.
I am not content to wait another four or five years to get the full results; we need to make progress now. I understand that the Opposition believe that there are flaws in the Bill, but I believe it will bring about a great improvement. I regret the fact that when in government, Labour made provision for a Bill but did not bring it into practice when it had the opportunity. We have wasted too much time already. The previous Government facilitated the legislation eight years ago, and now is the time to get on with the job. I am delighted to support my coalition colleagues in doing that.
Offender Rehabilitation Bill [Lords]
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(11 years ago)
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Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
The Bill will enact the provision set out in the coalition agreement to
“introduce a ‘rehabilitation revolution’ that will pay independent providers to reduce reoffending”.
It is supported by both partners in the coalition. I think that it is an ambitious Bill, and one that is sorely needed.
The offenders who are most likely to reoffend on release from prison are precisely the ones targeted in the Bill—those serving 12 months or less—but until now those people have received no help at all: they are just let out of the prison gates with the princely sum of £46 in their pocket. They need support. They need somewhere to stay, gainful employment and a dedicated professional concerned with their welfare.
The power to make contractual arrangements with any person or body to provide probation services was set out in the Offender Management Act 2007, but the previous Government never saw fit to bring it in. What a pity. How many lives could already have been turned around since 2007 if more offenders could have had the kind of support we are bringing in only now?
The basics of the Bill have already been outlined by the Secretary of State, and I certainly do not intend to go over them again. I will use the time available to address some of the concerns that have been put to me, and which I in turn have put to the Secretary of State and his team.
The Secretary of State has already explained that the provisions set out in clause 1 had already been debated and agreed under the previous Government in relation to the 2007 Act. If this Government are happy to accept those provisions, I am unable to see why, when we have consensus on both sides of the House, we need to legislate again. We are using the powers already given to us by the previous Labour Government to unlock resources from the private, charitable and voluntary sectors while opening up support to offenders who have served prison sentences of less than 12 months. Even if we were to accept the clause, I do not believe it would be particularly helpful. It is drafted very widely, and my understanding is that even if we were to accept as it as drafted, many subsequent small changes would need the approval of both Houses of Parliament.
On drug testing, I have been approached by DrugScope, which is concerned that by imposing drug testing under supervision for a 12-month period for short-term offenders we are
“setting them up to fail”,
because they will have more opportunities to fall foul of the system, be re-incarcerated and start the whole cycle all over again. That could be the case, except for two factors. First, magistrates will have a wide range of options open to them, including taking no action at all. However, drug testing will alert supervisors to the problem so that remedial help can be given. Secondly, they would normally have to fail a test several times before action would be taken against them. It is understood that drug addicts have lapses, and the aim is to help, not hinder, their progress under rehabilitation. That is already a condition of the existing licence, so it is not a material change.
Concern has been expressed about the inclusion of class B drugs in the testing regime. After all, many people who take drugs such as marijuana do not offend just to feed their habit. The fact is that there is still a strong correlation between ex-offenders who go on to reoffend and the consumption of class B drugs. For example, people might go back to their old haunts to obtain them and take up associating with other offenders. Some 48% of offenders who go on to reoffend use class B and C drugs in the month before custody, compared with 30% who never used drugs before imprisonment. Why tempt fate?
Another area of concern relates to the assessment of risk, which a number of hon. Members have mentioned. The fact is that risk can fluctuate wildly at times of chaos in someone’s life. There seems to be a belief in some quarters that community rehabilitation companies will be assessing the risk category of murderers, rapists and paedophiles. My understanding is that that is not the case. All those categories will remain the responsibility of the new national probation service. Furthermore, the oversight of all risk assessments in the low and medium-risk categories will remain the overall responsibility of the national probation service. A condition of tender acceptance is that the organisation has properly qualified people in place to assess changing risk.
Many concerns have been expressed about who will run the system, who the bidders will be and what real value they will be able to add to what is already an exceptional probation service for longer-term offenders. Let me say that now I would be dismayed if my Government contemplated considering a bid from any organisation that was under investigation for defrauding the taxpayer on other outsourced services. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] It is a fair question: if the existing probation service does such a good job, why introduce other players into the field? Why not just extend the existing service?
Jenny Chapman
The hon. Lady is making a very carefully considered speech, and the Minister has also heard her concern about G4S and Serco and their ability to compete for contracts. Will the Minister take this opportunity to confirm that they will not be able to bid for those contracts?
Lorely Burt
It is above my pay grade to comment on the Minister’s thoughts about the complex circumstances with regard to a specific contractor. He has, however, heard what I said and the “Hear, hears” of my honourable colleagues.
To return to the widening of the service, the Government’s answer is that introducing the private sector and competition to the market will drive down costs, which will release the money to widen the service to those shorter-term offenders who get little or no supervision at present. I hope that that equation will work. We are not privy to the analysis the Government have used. I am prepared to go with it, because I want this new system. I want short-term prisoners to be looked after on release and to have the opportunity to turn their lives around, and I want society as a whole to benefit from reduced reoffending.
What sort of organisations will they be? What does the private sector know about finding homes and jobs and helping ex-prisoners build new lives? My understanding is that the new organisations will probably be consortiums of private businesses, charities and not-for-profit organisations. A lot of tonight’s debate has been about whether the probation trusts will be able to tender for private sector contracts, but I understand that it is not appropriate for them to do so, because they are Government funded and such contracts involve risk. However, could my hon. Friend the Minister explain under what circumstances existing probation trusts or, indeed, existing probation officers could join consortiums, because their expertise will be in great demand and highly valued?
There are other concerns about whether the private sector will manipulate the system for gain. It is, after all, in it to make a profit. I hope that my Government have learned from the past failures of other privatised schemes under, perhaps, both Labour and Conservative Governments. I hope that grass-roots organisations will not be pushed, as the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) has said, into less-than-good deals for the delivery of their part of the programme.
The programme must deliver real results. We know that the best schemes of this nature have achieved up to a 12% decrease in offending rates, and I hope that consortium bids will approach that best-in-class target. The percentage of the payment at risk is also very important. It must be a substantial proportion of the fee in order to drive the consortiums into putting everything into working together so as to enable offenders who want to turn their lives around to be able to do so.
Finally, I want to dwell on the repercussions of the changes for those who work in the probation service, because they are anxious that they will find themselves either under the constant stress of having to deal with high-risk offenders or, potentially, out of a job altogether. I am assured that the need for our excellent probation officers will be greater than ever and that there will be more work for them to do, not less. Those who do not want to work with high-risk offenders will find that their skills and expertise will be welcomed in the community rehabilitation centres to which they can be transferred. Will my hon. Friend the Minister outline the scheme under which those transfers will take place? I understand that it is a Cabinet Office scheme that is at least as good as the TUPE transfer, but I would be grateful for any clarification.
John McDonnell
The unions involved have consistently asked that that be inserted directly into the Bill itself. Does the hon. Lady support that?
Lorely Burt
I understand that the Government have already done a fair amount of consultation. I am not aware of the exact way in which the unions are feeding into Government, but I know that the Government value the unions very much and will take into account their points and their wisdom.
The probation officers who elect to stay will find that not all their work will involve high-risk prisoners. Forty per cent. of their work is based in the courts and in inspecting approved premises. In some models, the work of probation officers is divided, so some of them already do the vast majority of their work in supervising high-risk offenders. As long as they are not forced into such work, that seems fair enough.
In conclusion, I hope that I have been helpful. I am listening carefully to the concerns being raised and I look forward to working with organisations associated with the probation service and with the unions in order to ensure that once the Bill has been through Committee, it will be as robust and effective as possible.
Mike Wood
The large case loads of probation officers is a continuing concern. There is concern across the board about the proposals, but the work load for probation officers and probation trusts is a matter of record, as is the fact that they have in the recent past cut their costs. They have become more efficient, not less.
There are other problems with the proposals. They are untried and untested. The Secretary of State is now at his banquet and we all hope that he enjoys it enormously. In the first week that he was in post—before he even knew where his desk was—he cancelled out of hand the two planned pilots, which would have given us the evidence base by which to judge the proposals.
Payment by results, which has been lauded this afternoon, is unique in criminal justice systems throughout the world. By definition, therefore, we have very little evidence on the efficacy or potential of such a system. We do know that when it has been researched, it has not come out too well. For example, the Social Market Foundation, a cross-party think-tank, has said that even if the private companies reduce reoffending rates by more than 3% and achieve the payment-by-results reward, that would be limited to a reduction of 5% as anything more than that would require huge investment in rehabilitation programmes. It states that most companies would make their profit by cutting costs on staff and interventions, allow reoffending rates to rise by 3%, if necessary, and rely on the fee for service to produce their profits.
The myth has been perpetuated today that payment by results will have an enormous enervating and driving effect on the private companies who take part. We know that that is nonsense. The Government started with the intention that 30% of the fee should be related to results. We know that in the so-called negotiations, that was reduced to less than 10%. As the think-tank points out, the companies will earn a vast amount of their money by winning the contract. That is how they will make their profit. To extend the payment beyond that would be a bonus. Any suggestion that payment by results can have that effect therefore flies in the face of what will actually happen.
Lorely Burt
I admire the hon. Gentleman’s visionary understanding, because I have no knowledge of the reduction to less than 10%. I put the example of the 3% straw man to the Justice Secretary and his colleagues. That percentage was described to me as “noise in the system”. In other words, 3% either way would not be indicative of strong work. Should the targets not only not be met, but go backwards, my understanding is that there would be—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Order. Interventions must be very short. The hon. Lady has made a speech already, and I am bothered about the time.
Probation Service
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(11 years ago)
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Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
The Liberal Democrats want a rehabilitation revolution. We want to toughen up community sentences and make them a genuine alternative to custody, to embed restorative justice throughout the justice system and to open up rehabilitation services to a wider range of providers to ensure that the most effective and innovative measures are available.
It is clear from the comments of hon. Members from both sides of the House that the justice system, as it stands at the moment, is not working. Nearly half of offenders reoffend, but the figure for short-term prisoners is even worse, at 60% and they are the ones who currently get no help with rehabilitation at all. The result is a huge cost to society and to the economy. We need help for all ex-offenders to enable them to build their lives on release and not fall into the same traps that got them into trouble in the first place. That is why I welcome our current proposals to change the law to ensure that all offenders released from custody, regardless of their sentence length, will receive at least 12 months of supervision on licence. It is to be done by making probation cost-effective, by extending the service to lower-risk offenders on a payments-by-results basis. That additional help that offenders receive should, literally, pay for itself.
I am a member of a Select Committee considering prisoner voting, and I can tell hon. Members that when it comes to the issues that will determine the amount of reoffending, the right to vote, although that is an important human right, is way down the list. The important factors are having somewhere to stay, meaningful work, training and education, supportive personal relationships, a mentor, continuing health care and so on. Ex-offenders will now have the opportunity to access such things through a structured programme of help. The private and voluntary sectors as well as those who now work in probation trusts can bid for the care of those low-risk offenders.
Mr Kevan Jones
I do not disagree with the hon. Lady about the excellent work done by many voluntary organisations, as I certainly have one such organisation in my constituency. I am being told, however, that such organisations cannot bid for the contracts, as they will not take that financial risk, but, ironically, some of the big private sector companies are asking them to be on the sub-tender list. The idea being suggested is that such organisations will come forward, but that will not be the case.
Lorely Burt
I am sure that the hon. Gentleman was listening very carefully when the Secretary of State made his remarks on that point. I can only concur with the Secretary of State’s comments—they worked for me.
The importance and value of probation officers in protecting the public and helping offenders reintegrate into society should not be underestimated. We are clear that we need to obtain the skills and expertise of probation professionals as we move into the new system, which is why we are establishing a national probation service.
I want to address a phrase in Labour’s motion that is, I feel, misleading. It states that it is a
“fact that under the Government’s plans supervision of dangerous, sexual and violent offenders may be undertaken by inexperienced and unqualified staff and by companies without any track record in this area”.
I believe that the important factor is whether they are “high risk”. The Justice Secretary has explained very clearly how the system would work. The established probation service will handle all high-risk ex-offenders and to imply that they would be entrusted to inexperienced and unqualified people is, in my view, scaremongering. Let us have none of that.
Natascha Engel
How does the hon. Lady account for the fact that although some individuals might be low-risk or medium-risk offenders, a fluctuating condition might mean that something happens in their lives—as she has said, some of these people often live very chaotic lives— and they suddenly, overnight, become high-risk? That is the situation that we are worried about.
Lorely Burt
I am sure that the hon. Lady is right that such people live chaotic and fluctuating lives and things can change, but the Justice Secretary explained that the people making the assessments would always be on the job and would be in the same room as the other people who would be involved.
There are some legitimate questions for the Minister. I have seen payment by results work well in job searching and I know that there are good voluntary and private organisations with skill and experience that could be put to good use in rehabilitation. There are also private companies, however, that have failed spectacularly to handle work that has hitherto been carried out by the public sector. Whenever the profit motive comes into play, the desire will be to maximise profit and minimise risk and effort. How will the Government ensure that private companies, in particular, do not simply come along and pick the low-hanging fruit? How will we ensure that a very important Liberal Democrat principle is adhered to—[Laughter.] The right hon. and hon. Gentlemen on the Opposition Benches are having a laugh, as they say, but a decision on this very important principle was passed at the last Liberal Democrat conference—[Interruption.] If hon. Members care to listen, they will find out what we think is really important. The principle that we would adhere to is that all ex-offenders should receive appropriate help, even when the risk of reoffending is high. So how will that happen, and how will the costs be factored? After all, many ex-offenders will leave prison never to reoffend, all on their own. Will there be some form of incentive to encourage voluntary sector or private providers to take on the hard cases—people with addictions, low educational attainment and poor or even non-existent employment records?
Lorely Burt
I have taken two interventions. I am sorry.
How we will ensure that everyone gets the help that they need to become a real stakeholder in Britain today? I look forward to the Minister’s answer.
Oral Answers to Questions
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(11 years, 1 month ago)
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Annette Brooke (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)
4. What recent progress he has made on improving women’s prisons.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
13. What recent progress he has made on improving women’s prisons.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Jeremy Wright)
We are committed to improving standards across women’s prisons to meet the needs of women offenders. We have recently conducted a review of the women’s custodial estate, the results of which will be announced in the near future. The review will inform future policy development and improvements in how the female custodial estate is configured.
Jeremy Wright
I will certainly have a look at the campaign to which my hon. Friend refers, but we believe that there are women who need to be imprisoned, having committed offences that justify imprisonment, and for whom, for reasons of punishment and public protection, imprisonment is appropriate. It is of course important to recognise that they have different requirements from male prisoners and to ensure that the female custodial estate reflects that. She is also right that rehabilitation is crucial. I hope she can be a little more patient and wait to hear what we have to say about the women’s custodial estate. I think she will be pleased to hear what we have to say about the need to put rehabilitation at the heart of everything we do.
Lorely Burt
I recently visited Downview prison, and I am surprised now to learn that it is being reroled—as the term goes—into a male prison. Will my hon. Friend assure me that the resulting savings to the women’s estate will be reinvested in prevention and community alternatives for women, as the Justice Secretary promised the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) on 2 July?
Jeremy Wright
Again, I hope my hon. Friend can be a little more patient and wait for the results of the review. When she sees those results, she will see that when it comes to resources, we think it is extremely important that we invest in rehabilitation, both for those women in the custodial estate because they need to be and for those women who could be better accommodated in the community. It is important that we recognise, however, that it is for the judiciary and magistrates to decide who needs to go to prison and who does not. It is our job to provide the capacity necessary. On Downview, we calculated that that capacity could be better used for the male estate than the female estate, but as I say, when she sees the results of the review, she will see that we have in mind many of things she has mentioned.
Interpreting and Translation Services
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(11 years, 5 months ago)
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Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the excellent report produced by his Committee. The summary says:
“There was significant concern revealed in the consultation process that quality standards could be diminished by the imposition of a tiered system to enable a wider pool of interpreters, and by the introduction of lower levels of pay.”
Does he share my concern that that is evidence of trying to deliver an important service at the potential expense of quality? Does he think that his hon. Friend and mine, the Minister, should review and be prepared to revoke the system if it continues to be proven not to work?
Sir Alan Beith
I will return to how we proceed from here. I am tempted to comment that people always say that when it is proved that standards fell after big changes and that some of the predictions were fully justified. That should be a warning to the Government, as they engage in a number of other contracts. I will come back to that as well.
It is worth pointing out that the problems encountered by the Ministry in contracting for the work, while serious in themselves, also have implications for wide swathes of its other activities. The Ministry is putting out to contract 70% of rehabilitative services under the transforming rehabilitation proposals, £450 million in custodial services over the next six years and a large part of criminal legal aid, all of which will be the subject of contracts. I do not need to spell out that if things go wrong in those areas as they have in court interpreting, we face a multiple-train crash. Does the Ministry really have the capacity to do the kind of contracting on which many of its policy proposals are based? I am not arguing about whether it is a good or bad idea to contract out those things, but the Ministry must have the capacity to do so well and properly.
Before I turn to the substance of the report, I will mention another point of considerable concern to my Committee: the Government’s insistence that they acted reasonably in discouraging court staff from taking part in the online forum that we set up as part of our inquiry to seek personal experiences of interpretation standards in court. That was a retrograde step. We did something similar with prison officers. Many contributed to our online forum, and as a result, we produced a much better-informed report than we could otherwise have done. We did the same thing with court staff, but they were strongly pressed by the Government not to co-operate. That is deplorable. We shall continue to use such mechanisms where appropriate in our inquiries, not with any intention of getting civil servants to question policy, but to get a proper understanding of how it is working on the ground. If Departments repeatedly give that kind of non-co-operation injunction to their staff, they may find themselves in contempt of the House, and the whole House may seek to do something about it.
On the substance of our report, we recommended that the Ministry of Justice audit the amounts being expended on interpreter pay and travel and said that it might be necessary for the rate of pay for tier 1 interpreters —the most highly qualified—to be increased. We also said that the MOJ and Capita should prove that the framework agreement could attract, retain and deploy an adequate number of interpreters to meet the requirements of the courts and other agencies. We called on the professional interpreter community to work flexibly with the Ministry to find an acceptable way to restore their services to the justice sector.
In response, the Ministry introduced, with effect from May, a number of changes to the system of remuneration for interpreters, which it says amount to an average 22% increase in rates. Those changes involve mileage payments, cancellation fees, payment in 15-minute blocks rather than by the minute, payment in accordance with the qualification tier of the interpreter and a daily fee for incidental costs. We welcome those changes, but it is not yet clear that they will be enough to encourage many more interpreters to undertake work under Capita’s auspices, given the breakdown in relations between the Ministry and interpreters and the fact that many interpreters cleave to the view that the framework agreement is fundamentally flawed and cannot be salvaged.
The Ministry says in its response that it has met Professional Interpreters for Justice since late 2012, but goes on rather ruefully to say that it
“accepts that it will not always be possible to agree with the Professional Interpreters for Justice Group but seeks to maintain ongoing dialogue.”
I am not surprised that my hon. Friend the Minister should try to establish better relations—I would expect no less of her in going about things—but a lot more work clearly needs to be done if the professional interpreter community is to be won back.
The group has a different slant on the dialogue. It says that it was invited to a meeting with the Ministry’s interpretation project in March, at which it was presented with a package of proposed changes. It says that changes proposed at separate meetings by interpreters registered with Capita were rejected, and it does not accept that the Government’s changes will attract and retain interpreters.
The dialogue has been inauspicious from the outset. We commented that the Ministry
“did not have a sufficient understanding of the complexities of court interpreting work prior to initiating the procurement of a new service.”
We endorsed the NAO’s conclusion that the MOJ did not give sufficient weight to the concerns and dissatisfaction expressed by many interpreters, even though having sufficient numbers of skilled interpreters was essential to the new arrangements’ success, to return to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Lorely Burt).
A constructive dialogue requires both sides to participate with good will. When we published our report, we were encouraged by the Minister’s commitment to repairing relations, but can she explain why she thinks relations between her Ministry and the main organisations do not appear to have improved? On what evidence or other basis did the Ministry choose to make the changes on which it lighted? How does the Ministry plan to monitor those changes to ensure that they bring about the desired improvements in the service?
On the quality of interpretation, we agreed with the NAO that the tiered system should be independently evaluated and that interpretation quality standards should be independently reviewed. The MOJ said that it would take that forward and report back to us on progress. The Minister gave us some more information in a letter dated 18 June. I am grateful to her for that. In the letter, she says that steps have been taken to “scope and initiate” the quality assessment and, following discussion with interpreter groups, Capita and others, will commission the advice and report back to my Committee in the autumn. Perhaps that should have been got on with a bit quicker, because it is a pretty fundamental prerequisite for improving the service. I urge swifter progress.
The Ministry has claimed that the changes to terms and conditions that it has made
“will increase the number and availability of Tier 1 and Tier 2 interpreters and therefore reduce the need to use Tier 3 interpreters”.
In her letter of 18 June, the Minister says that it is too early to say whether this is happening, although she notes that Capita says that there is an increased interest in accepting bookings from their existing pool of interpreters. I should like the Minister to report back to my Committee in the autumn on the extent to which the expectations have been satisfied.
We noted in our report problems with performance data being compiled to demonstrate the effectiveness of Capita in fulfilling courts’ requests. This is fundamental to a contract: there must be adequate performance data. Again, this reads across to some other contracts that the Ministry will have.
There were ambiguities about, for example, what constituted a customer cancellation, which is an ambiguous category. Professional Interpreters for Justice subtracts cancellations from the total number of requests, as well as failures by the contractor to deliver, to arrive at a figure of 80% of requests having been fulfilled by Capita, which is way below the contract requirement.
Even on the Ministry’s figures, performance is falling well short of the 98% target, and it tailed off markedly in January. That cannot be regarded as satisfactory. It is clear that, despite the substantial extra investment that the company has made since taking over from ALS, Capita continues to perform below the required standard under the contract.
Oral Answers to Questions
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(11 years, 11 months ago)
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Chris Grayling
I think the hon. Lady misunderstands the position. The Government are putting a huge effort into tackling the problems in troubled families, with work taking place in the Departments for Communities and Local Government and for Work and Pensions. I hope that we can make a real difference by reducing offending. The contribution of restorative justice will make a difference, and our rehabilitation revolution will help to ease pressures on our criminal justice system.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
T2. Last week, the Public Accounts Committee published its report on the Ministry of Justice’s language services contract. It concluded, among other things, that Applied Language Solutions does not have enough interpreters available to meet demand, and that the interpreters who are provided do not all have the necessary qualifications. Does the Secretary of State intend to implement the Committee’s recommendations to address those pressing issues?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mrs Helen Grant)
Interpreting services in court are at a 95% success rate, and the National Audit Office has said that we should go on and implement the proposals fully. The contract is saving us £15 million a year of taxpayers’ money, and as long as we continue to work with interpreters—we have already had an important meeting with them—the new system will be more sustainable, effective and transparent than the old one.
Points of Order
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(11 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
That is not sub judice; it is a relatively unusual way for the Secretary of State to voice the Government’s thinking on this matter. I thank him in the spirit in which his comment was made. There is no doubt that if the Government have got further and better particulars on the matter, at some point that will become clear. We will leave it there and I thank him.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I have never raised a point of order before, but I feel that I must today. I tabled a question for today’s questions regarding the family justice review. The question was approved by the Table Office and successfully drawn as No. 5 in the ballot, but it was withdrawn by the Ministry of Justice, because it deemed it to be irrelevant to its Department, despite the fact that it had been corresponding with me on this matter since last June. My constituent, Mr Neil Brotherton, who is trying to improve children’s access to their family when their parents separate, was to have been here today to hear the Minister’s answer. Will you advise me, Mr Speaker, on what course of action I may now pursue, not just for Mr Brotherton, but for other constituents?
Mr Speaker
I am happy to oblige the hon. Lady. I am sorry that it was her first point of order, but I am quite certain it will not be her last. My response to her point of order is twofold. First, my understanding—I do not wish to be pedantic, but I think it is factually correct and an important point—is that the question was not, as she put it, withdrawn, but transferred. Secondly, on how she should proceed, I would say that she is an ingenious Member and will know that there is plenty of scope for tabling questions, seeking Adjournment debates and raising matters during oral questions, and there are also the auspices of the Backbench Business Committee, so there are plenty of facilities open to her.
Although the Table Office seeks to advise hon. Members where there is a risk of an oral parliamentary question being transferred, the prediction of the allocation of ministerial responsibility is not an exact science. It is for the Government to decide where responsibility lies for answering a question, and I do not intervene in such decisions. I recognise that they can be the source of frustration or irritation, but they are not matters for the Chair. Furthermore, for the hon. Lady’s benefit and that of the House, I must make the specific point that nothing disorderly has occurred.
Family Justice (Transparency, Accountability and Cost of Living) Bill
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(12 years, 1 month ago)
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John Hemming
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
It is indeed a privilege to propose legislation in a private Member’s Bill. When I found out, through the usual process of an immediate torrent of lobbying phone calls and e-mails, that I had the opportunity to promote the sixth private Member’s Bill this Session, I was certain about what I would like to propose. I spent some time considering it, however, and was pleased to receive an offer of assistance from Ron Bailey, who has considerable experience of private Members ’ Bills and assisted me greatly in a number of ways, particularly in meetings with groups outside Parliament. I also declare an interest as chair of the Justice for Families campaign, which campaigns for improvements in this policy area.
My conclusion was to propose legislation that would improve life for children and families. I was aware that there is a serious problem with the quality of expert evidence in family court proceedings, so that had to be part of the Bill. I was also aware that there are problems with the treatment of children in care, so that issue had to be included in the Bill. Additionally, I have for years been concerned about the impact of increasing energy prices on families, and that is also part of the Bill. I am concerned about how certain procedural aspects and judicial proceedings assist public authorities in covering up malfeasance by public officials, so in one sense this Bill could be called the “No more cover-ups Bill”.
When I tabled the name and short title of the Bill, I was unaware of events and issues that have arisen over the summer and make the urgency of this Bill much greater, and I will come to those points later.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
Does my hon. Friend agree that in putting together three elements in the Bill, he seeks to use this opportunity to get three bites of the cherry?
John Hemming
This is about justice for families in the wider sense. Our society should be based on making life better for families in this country, and making people’s lives easier through better judicial proceedings, fewer cover-ups and cheaper energy bills is all about justice for families.
Over the summer, I worked mainly outside Parliament to consult bodies interested in these matters. As a result of those consultations, I aimed to compromise and ensure that, in a very contentious area, my Bill had support from a broad swathe of opinion. I managed to do that; the only collective group set in opposition is the Association of Directors of Children’s Services.
John Hemming
I accept that the Government are progressing issues. To be fair, I have been working on these proposals with bodies outside Parliament, so I have not gone into the minute details of the Government’s proposals. My concern comes back to the issue of academic scrutiny, although other aspects come into it as well. I wish to see progress in this area, but I am not too bothered about how we achieve that. I would prefer it if the Bill were considered in Committee. If a lot of the clauses are dropped in Committee because that seems appropriate, so be it. What is important is that we achieve the outcome of a reliable judicial system with decisions taken on the basis of the best academic knowledge available at the time. That is not what we have at the moment. It is the outcome I am focused on—getting a better system—and I am not particularly bothered about how we do that.
If the Government are to oppose the Bill, they need to explain how they can ignore the serious concerns of other countries. In June, we were aware of the maltreatment of girls in care and the prosecutions that had resulted. However, the true enormity of the magnitude of abuse of children in care over many decades, not all by Savile, had not been revealed at that point. I was personally aware of the cover-up at Haut de la Garenne, and I highlighted that in September when I referred to the banning of the US journalist, Leah McGrath Goodman, who had been excluded from the UK in an attempt to stop her reporting on the saga at Haut de la Garenne. I did not, however, know exactly what had been covered up. The Government may try to argue that the existence of the independent reviewing officer means that there is no urgency about making any changes. However, the cases in Rochdale and Rotherham, as well as the case of the children in A and S v. Lancashire county council, demonstrates clearly that the existence of an employee of a local authority who is called “an independent reviewing officer” is not sufficient to protect children from abuse while under state control. Can we really accept that there is no urgent need to ensure that children in care are listened to? The recent report from the children’s rights commissioner revealed that children in care had been running away—and one was living in a cave—because they had not been listened to.
A further issue, which has arisen since June, is the revelation of the cover-up at Hillsborough. I would not claim that the Bill would definitely have prevented that: however, the provisions on judicial review will make it easier for more ordinary people to ensure that public authorities do what Parliament has said they should do and facilitate the revelation of cover-ups at an earlier stage. Making it an offence to threaten and prevent people from talking to regulators or elected representatives would help to prevent cover-ups, many of which succeed because people are intimidated into not reporting things to the appropriate authorities.
Lorely Burt
We understand that more public figures are to be questioned in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal. Does my hon. Friend agree that his Bill might have been a great help in this instance? Had it been around, the children might have been listened to, not punished for reporting the abuse?
John Hemming
Indeed, some of the children were punished for complaining; that is the scandal. If one aspect of the Bill would prevent cover-ups, it is the part that would make it an offence to punish or threaten somebody to prevent them from talking to their MP or going to the police. In America, that is an offence, but in England it is not, and that allows bullies to use all sorts of techniques to prevent people from complaining.
We should protect people’s right to complain. Interestingly, a key clause in the first amendment to the US constitution is the right to petition all aspects of the state. It means that the courts cannot prevent people from talking to elected representatives. That sort of provision is perhaps in article 5 of the Bill of Rights, but we do not really enforce it in law. We have many situations in which people are intimidated in an attempt to prevent them from complaining. Yes, some complaints are wrong, but it should be for the police to decide if a report is wrong, not for somebody else to decide to punish children for complaining about their maltreatment.
John Hemming
The idea is to move in that direction over time. In Committee, I might accept that we could stick with the Government’s limited objectives—[Interruption.] Yes, without subsidy. The key objective is to do this without a subsidy. The Bill does not require additional public funding; its aim is to improve the lives of families and family justice in the widest sense.
Lorely Burt
The Bill requires the aim to be achieved by 2020. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be a sad thing, with all the innovations that are being worked on at the moment, if we were unable to move as far as code level 6 by then?
John Hemming
I thank my hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. This issue will clearly need detailed discussion in Committee.
Jim Dobbin
That is certainly an important question that people are asking. The difficulty is that many of the staff involved have retired, as these cases arose a number of years ago. Recently, the head of the department concerned resigned, so things are happening there, but at present the local authority is reviewing the whole process. It still has another report to come out; after that, it will be fair to accept that members of staff may well lose their jobs because of the affair. That is a possibility, but I do not want to pre-empt the decision of the local authority.
I have referred to better staff training. Partner agencies, such as the police, community groups and schools, must be better co-ordinated. Criminal justice organisations should be encouraged to support young people who have been exploited, throughout the entire process—when reporting the crime and making statements; in pre-trial preparation; when they go to court; and after the trial. The recommendations refer to holding
“Regular multi agency information sharing meetings”
to ensure that possible victims and abusers are identified, and proper responses are developed; at present, none of that is happening anywhere, as I understand it. The Rochdale case is not the only one; this is a problem across the country—and indeed the globe, as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley, said.
I illustrate the need for this Bill by referring to a constituency case. A constituent, Mr X, came to one of my surgeries to complain that the local social services children’s unit was threatening to remove the youngest of his five children. The child had cerebral palsy. The other four children were well looked after and were doing very well at school. The department refused to accept that the child’s cerebral palsy was the reason for his unhappiness at school. Even though a consultant paediatrician, with whom I was acquainted, diagnosed cerebral palsy, the diagnosis was questioned by the department and the professionals. They had to bring in an independent paediatrician to verify that the child had cerebral palsy. That was verified, but even then there were question marks. I knew that the parents were a caring, loving couple.
The social worker complained to the family court judge that Mr X was seeking my intervention. The judge ruled that Mr X could no longer seek any help from his Member of Parliament. I raised that issue in the Chamber with the then Solicitor-General, who appeared to support what I said, and thought that the ruling was wrong. When she checked, she found that the judge was within his rights to rule as he did. That is why I am pleased that that issue is tackled, as I understand it, in the Bill. Eventually, the department backed off, but not before Mr X had a massive heart attack and died. It is my view that the worry about the threat of his son being removed, and the possibility of his other four children being removed, caused his death.
Members may remember the perceived satanic abuse cases that suddenly appeared on a council estate in my former council area. That followed similar episodes in the Orkney islands a number of years ago. Professionals were encouraging a theory that some families were involved in satanic abuse. A number of children were removed from their families. The courts tackled the issue, and eventually ruled that there was no evidence to prove the claims, and the children were allowed back to their families.
I use those local experiences as examples of why I support the Bill. I am convinced that there is a need for changes in departments that are responsible for the protection of children, and that family courts need to respond to these challenges in parallel; that is most important. I am absolutely amazed that the Association of Directors of Children's Services opposes the Bill. I hope that it will eventually see the error of its ways and bring itself into the 21st century.
Lorely Burt
My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) was a little coy when he was invited to speculate on why that august body did not support his Bill. I wonder whether the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Jim Dobbin) has any idea why it does not.
Jim Dobbin
I can only guess. I feel that the ADCS is absolutely acting as a protective body, and it is protecting its membership; I think that is the only reason it has made that statement. We will not know otherwise until it clarifies why it has taken that stance.
I have been appointed the United Kingdom’s delegate to the “One in Five” campaign, which is a sub-group of the Council of Europe’s Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development. It is to hold a major conference on trafficking and child abuse.
Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)
I support the Bill. I will speak mainly about clause 1, but first let me say that clause 2’s provisions are based on the personal experience of my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming), who campaigns tirelessly and fearlessly on behalf of his constituents and others. I know how angry he was when a constituent was threatened over even speaking to him. To say he feels passionately about injustice—especially when perpetrated against those least able to fight for themselves, such as children—is an understatement.
Madam Deputy Speaker, you missed a wonderful explanation of thermodynamics, which I am sure will be to your eternal loss. We do not need an explanation of thermodynamics, however, to understand that making energy-cost savings of £1.1 billion by 2020 is an extremely laudable aim.
We are living in strange times. The Savile scandal is not only still rumbling on, but there are now suggestions that more public figures will be exposed. The press is reporting that we are now trying to substitute transparency for trust, because people no longer trust our public institutions. It seems that trust is becoming an old-fashioned word. The foundations of trust are shaken to the core when the actions of well-loved figures are uncovered—unfortunately, discovered too late for many people—and that is why this Bill is so important. We cannot have trust without transparency, and that is very pertinent to elements of the Bill.
A particularly helpful aspect proposes family group conferences which would give the extended family a say in resolving problems in a consensual manner instead of decisions being made in what can appear to be a rather high-handed manner by people who are not specifically involved with the family. Section 1 of the Children Act 1989 enshrined the rule that the court must treat the welfare of the child as the paramount consideration. Under the care and supervision proceedings in the Act, the child concerned can be taken into care only if they are
“suffering, or…likely to suffer, significant harm; and…the harm, or likelihood of harm, is attributable to…the care given to the child, or likely to be given to him if the order were not made, not being what it would be reasonable to expect a parent to give to him; or…the child’s being beyond parental control.
The Act goes on to state:
“Before proceeding with an application, the local authority should always obtain and consider legal advice on whether, in the circumstances of the case and in the light of the available evidence, the court is likely to be satisfied”
that the conditions I quoted are met
“and that an order is in the best interests of the child and that making a care order would be better for the child than making no order at all.”
However, that is not always the case, because sometimes, as we have discussed, the expert evidence is based on opinion, which cannot be challenged. The purpose of my hon. Friend’s Bill is to ensure transparency so that the reasoning behind the opinion can be tested. He cited the example of an expert opinion in a case where a child was taken away from their mother because she took the view that the child—a baby—should be fed on demand. It is scandalous that someone could give that opinion without any kind of challenge.
The provisions on proceedings in the family court and the Court of Protection would clarify the role of the friend and/or the McKenzie friend. They would also ensure that grandparents and other members of the wider family may have a say and offer their own perspective. Grandparents have knowledge of the situation and an interest in a positive outcome. They feel strongly about family break-up, but as things stand, although they do not have any say in the family court, they are often literally left holding the baby. The McKenzie friend system assists parents in the family court, who are often in need of a legally trained friend of the family or someone who has a little more expertise and advice to give. Not every parent can afford to have a lawyer in the family court, and that is against the spirit of what it is supposed to provide. Such psychological support, whether it is practical or results merely from the person being there, can be extremely valuable.
Mr Jim Cunningham
The hon. Lady is making a very good case, and I totally agree with her. In many cases, the authorities can pay for their legal advice but the appellant cannot. She is therefore right to advocate the increasing use of McKenzie friends, if possible.
Lorely Burt
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. We see examples of this in many walks for life. I have been involved with a group called the Association for Shared Parenting, which provides the McKenzie friend system for parents who have been separated from their children and are trying to regain access to them. In the spirit of the big society, we should allow that sort of thing to be permitted much more widely.
On clause 2(5), it is very important that children in whose best interests it is to be in care should be placed locally where there is good reason to do so. We saw tragic examples in Rochdale of what can go wrong. In that context, the contribution by the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Jim Dobbin) was most welcome. If children are placed locally, they still have their local connections and are not so isolated and prey to the apparently flattering but ill-conceived intentions of people seeking to groom them for all kinds of nefarious activities which can ruin the rest of their lives. Under the current system of independent scrutiny of children in care, children can complain to the perpetrators. For example, if the body they complain to is the local authority, and the body responsible for the care that they are given is the local authority, I see no logical reason for opposing the possibility of separating out the two in the interests of fairness and transparency. Earlier I told my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley about the schoolchildren who complained about the molesting activities of Jimmy Savile and were actually punished for doing so. These children must be able to go to somebody independent to whom they can complain.
As we have heard, there can be prejudice against children in care and after they have been in care. It is absolutely scandalous that a child can be branded and disadvantaged for life through, usually, absolutely no fault of their own. They need the protection that my hon. Friend offers in clause 3, subsection (4) of which addresses the prejudice that he described. The protected characteristics to which he refers, which are defined in the Equality Act 2010, are age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, and sex and sexual orientation. It is sad that someone’s having been in care in their younger life should be added to that list, but unfortunately I can see why he thinks so. It is important that any child can make its way in the world without additional discrimination of that kind.
Part 3 contains measures on the cost of living to achieve lower fuel bills. It would require a strategy to be produced by the Secretary of State that would help to end the misery of cold homes for millions of people. I suggested earlier that my hon. Friend was seeking three bites of the cherry, but given the rarity of one’s name coming up in the ballot, we want to address all the burning issues—if you will pardon the pun, Madam Deputy Speaker—that we have been thinking about for a long time. We want it all, basically.
The Bill would provide that the Secretary of State must
“by 2020…require any replacement heating system”—
that is, boilers. Apparently, 1.3 million boilers give up the ghost every year, and they are the ones we most need to replace with the best quality boilers that can be envisaged. I say “envisaged” because we are talking about 2020. We are making improvements in the quality and efficiency of boilers all the time, so I do not think—contrary to what the hon. Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood) said earlier—that a band 6 boiler is necessarily too big an aspiration.
Mr Jim Cunningham
The hon. Lady makes an important point, particularly now, as we are hitting the winter, with the change in climate, the bad weather and so forth. She is quite right, because whichever way we put the argument—and without wanting to get too political—one of the issues is that the price of fuel and heating continually goes up, but it never goes down. She is therefore making a valuable point. Most of the families concerned cannot always afford to get their boiler put right, so she has hit on a sensitive issue.
Lorely Burt
The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I am sure he will welcome the fact that by that time we will be in a position to use green deal funding, so as not to be a burden on the taxpayer. Although some of the technologies are not quite ready yet, the fact that we can aspire to that is an important aspect of this Bill.
In conclusion, I do not understand the laws of thermodynamics, but I do see that the energy innovations of combined heat and power, and flue gas will make a major difference to household bills in the UK, and I commend all of this Bill to the House.