Modern Slavery Bill

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Monday 1st December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

My Lords, our amendment is not as precise in the changes it proposes as the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord McColl of Dulwich. Our amendment provides for the Secretary of State to,

“undertake a review of the links between prostitution and human trafficking and sexual exploitation in England and Wales”,

and sets out the issues that must be considered in that review; namely,

“the extent to which the current legislation governing prostitution in England and Wales acts as an effective deterrent to demand for sexual services from exploited persons … the extent to which the current legislation governing prostitution in England and Wales enables effective enforcement action against those trafficking people for sexual exploitation; and … the extent to which alternative legal frameworks for governing prostitution adopted by other countries within the European Union, including Northern Ireland, have been effective at reducing sexual exploitation and the number of people trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation”.

Delving into the world of buying and selling sex reveals a complex web of abuse, control, money and power. Last year the Home Office estimated that the trade in the human trafficking of women to be sexually exploited in the United Kingdom was worth at least £130 million. One example was of a woman who came to our country from Uganda to get away from her abusive husband. She was told by a friend that he could find her a job in a catering company. When she arrived, however, she was driven to a house in Manchester, locked in a room, raped, beaten and forced into prostitution. After a few months, she managed to escape.

It has been estimated by the Home Office that 80,000 people in the UK, mainly women and girls, are involved in prostitution. The reality is that there are thousands of women in our country who are living in sexual slavery. They get there by different routes—pimped by people they know or trafficked by organised gangs—and many are extremely vulnerable, having been abused in the past. As the noble Lord, Lord McColl of Dulwich, said, a report published last summer by the Serious Organised Crime Agency showed that sexual exploitation was the most likely type of exploitation for people trafficked into England and Wales. There is growing evidence that many of those in prostitution began to be involved in this work before they were 18 and Home Office research has revealed that approximately 50% of women in prostitution became involved before reaching that age.

The physical and psychological consequences for those exploited through prostitution can be severe. The Journal of Trauma Practice found that once they have become embroiled in the trade, nine out of 10 women report wanting to exit but feel unable to so do. They do not know where to get support or do not believe that other work is available to them. The Home Office’s own figures suggest that more than half of the women involved in prostitution have been victims of rape or sexual assault.

We need to look at how countries elsewhere may have reformed their laws to protect women, developed effective exit strategies, reduced the number of people trafficked for sexual exploitation, reduced violence and reduced the market for buying sex, which traffickers and pimps exploit and from which they profit, as we know. That is why we have put forward this amendment to require the Government to carry out a detailed review, with the ultimate objective of seeking measures to keep more women safe.

Of course, we should not make changes without fully understanding the impact they might have. There are differing views on possible courses of action, as I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Browne of Belmont, would accept. We need to be sure that any changes will not push women into even more vulnerable and dangerous situations, and we need to consult and seek a wide range of views. However, we surely cannot continue as we are. This amendment, with the provision for a review of the links between prostitution, human trafficking and sexual exploitation, seeks to provide a considered and appropriate way forward. I hope it will find favour with the Government.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I waited until I had heard the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, before expressing any views on these amendments. I entirely understand the admirable motivation behind the proposal made by the noble Lord, Lord McColl, but one has to bear in mind that prostitution is one of the oldest trades over hundreds of years, if not thousands.

Something somewhat similar was proposed in the other place by Fiona Mactaggart MP. I certainly received a large number of e-mails about it from the various associations of women prostitutes. They were very much opposed to the sort of legislation which has now come before this House, although I understand that it is not exactly the same as that which was proposed by Fiona Mactaggart. Having said that, there is undoubtedly a real problem, because some of those who are prostitutes are certainly trafficked.

I recall going to a small town in Holland where, as noble Lords will know, prostitution is legal. I saw women sitting in the windows in what was quite a small town. The curtains were open if they were not working, and they were all on their mobiles talking to the pimps. There is no doubt at all, from what the local mayor told me when he took me round, that he knew that a large proportion of these women were actually trafficked, although they could not tell him that and they were all registered for business purposes, if you can believe that. He arranged for his staff to ask them whether they had come as victims of trafficking, but none of them would say so because they could not afford to do so.

There is a very major problem in this country, as well as in Holland and in other countries. I strongly support the amendment tabled in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser. The time has come to look at prostitution right across the board, but particularly at its impact on women who come into this country—or are already in this country—who are in fact the victims of slavery, and who are not doing this work voluntarily.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, I am most grateful to noble Lords for speaking so eloquently to Amendments 31 and 31A. I am grateful to my noble friend Lord McColl, who has given us the chance to look at this difficult and controversial issue of prostitution law. He highlighted the difficulties of exploitation and, indeed, the work of the APPG. Prostitution raises strong moral and ethical questions, but the Government’s overriding priority in this context is the safety of people involved in it. Existing legislation regarding buying and selling sex is already focused on minimising the harm and exploitation that can be associated with prostitution. Of course, not everyone involved in prostitution has made an independent and free choice to do so. We need the law to protect the vulnerable and punish the perpetrator, but when considering these amendments, we must consider carefully whether we are confident that they support the safety of the people involved in prostitution.

My noble friend set out the approach of Sweden and some neighbouring countries, often referred to as the “Nordic model”, which his amendments seek to emulate. We are also aware of recent legislative developments in Northern Ireland, alluded to by the noble Lord, Lord Browne. We are mindful of the reservations expressed by the Northern Ireland Minister of Justice about the value and effectiveness of this approach. This is of course a devolved matter, so it is for the Northern Ireland Assembly to take the approach that it feels is most appropriate for it, but we know that the Northern Irish Minister of Justice opposed the adoption of the Nordic model for the same reasons that the coalition Government oppose it: it is far from clear that the change would make a vulnerable group safer and may do the opposite. We certainly would not seek to create any unintended consequences that made life more difficult for the people involved in this difficult area. As the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, has indicated, submissions received from organisations such as Women Against Rape and the English Collective of Prostitutes have shown that such an approach can encourage the sellers and buyers of sex to operate further out of sight, exposing them to a greater risk of violence.

At this stage, we do not believe that there is sufficient evidence of the value of such significant changes to the legal and moral position of buying sexual services in reducing harm to those involved. We can well understand the principles behind my noble friend’s proposed amendments to the criminal law on prostitution. We have heard from around the Committee strong opposition to all violence against women and a common desire to protect them. However, as regards prostitution, it is important to reflect that there is an alternative view, as expressed by a variety of organisations that represent people involved in it. This challenges the position that all paying for sex is by definition violence. Before legislating, we should have a full debate on these important moral issues, as a number of noble Lords have indicated.

On exiting prostitution, raised by the noble Lords, Lord Hylton and Lord Rosser, the amendment also sets out a requirement to publish an annual strategy for assistance and support to those who wish to leave prostitution and it is absolutely right that they should be supported in doing so. The Policing and Crime Act 2009 took steps to improve the safety and support available for individuals involved in prostitution through the introduction of Section 17 engagement and support orders. That legislation provides the courts with an alternative to fining those convicted of loitering and soliciting: a requirement to attend meetings with a court-appointed supervisor. Engagement and support orders came into force on 1 April 2010. This is deemed to be an effective tool in providing support and access to services that might otherwise be out of reach, including medical care, housing and drug/alcohol dependency programmes. The right reverend Prelate mentioned the connections with other forms of drug and alcohol dependency. This is considered to be a more constructive long-term approach.

Such an approach is fundamental to our focus on minimising the harm that can be associated with prostitution. As such, it is part of our broader approach to violence against women and girls—an action plan that is kept under constant review. We support emphasis being put on supporting those who wish to exit prostitution, but legislation is not necessary to achieve this worthy aim.

Amendment 31A would place an obligation on the Government formally to review any links between prostitution and human trafficking and exploitation, including the legal frameworks around prostitution both here and overseas. Contributions to this debate have emphasised the importance of evidence and consultation. Legislation on this difficult and sensitive topic needs to be approached judiciously to ensure that our shared aim, harm reduction, is being served.

The coalition Government are committed to tackling all forms of violence against women and girls, and are pursuing a range of measures to improve protection, reporting, and prosecution. Our progress is constantly reviewed via the cross-government action plan on violence against women and girls. We are in regular dialogue with the relevant policing leads and the Crown Prosecution Service to ensure that legislation and its enforcement remain as effective as possible.

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[Lord Warner (Lab)]

My Lords, if I may, for the convenience of the Committee, I will group my Amendment 33 with Amendment 32 as my amendment is meant to help fill the pot that the noble Lord, Lord Alton, wants to distribute. I am sorry that I did not group it at an earlier stage.

My amendment is much less ambitious than the noble Lord’s amendment. It follows on from an amendment that my noble friend Lady Smith moved to the Serious Crime Bill. I was a member of the Joint Committee on the draft Modern Slavery Bill. We were concerned to maximise the confiscation of resources from perpetrators of slavery that could go to help victims much more than had happened in the past. Indeed, the confiscation of criminal assets under SOCA had not been one of the most glorious bits of public administration in this country, as I think was recognised by the Government following a PAC report. Therefore, we need to strengthen this.

I am the first to recognise that the Government went some way towards meeting the recommendations from the Joint Committee in this area and I am very grateful to the Government for moving some way. For example, I am glad that the Government have reduced the legislative requirement for a restraint order from reasonable cause to believe to reasonable suspicion. However, I remain concerned that they have not gone further and accepted the committee’s recommendation to remove the test that there must be a risk of dissipation of assets before action is taken by the prosecutor. Frankly, the advice that the Home Secretary seems to have been getting on this issue is a bit fanciful. The characters we are talking about in this area have a track record of dissipating assets. They move very quickly when it is known that they are going to be charged and prosecuted. I think that hanging on to the idea that they need to be protected from gung-ho prosecutors by actually keeping the intention that they have to show that they will dissipate their assets is rather fanciful. The Government need to look again at that area.

I will not spend very long at this late hour talking about the areas where the Government said they were going to look further at two or three of the other recommendations in paragraph 210 on page 97 of the Joint Committee’s report. Rather than detain the House now, perhaps the Minister could write to us about how things have progressed in those areas that the Government were reviewing further.

What I want to do on this amendment is to persuade the Government that it would be useful to have a consultation to look further at strengthening the arrangements around this very technical area. I understand the difficulties of actually finding technical solutions and I am not someone who is going to try to move complicated technical amendments to the Bill at this late stage in its passage. However, I think the Government need to have another look at this so we can maximise the confiscation of assets to produce the kind of fund that the noble Lord, Lord Alton, is talking about. It is no good having a grand scheme for distribution if there is nothing in the pot to distribute. We have to work a lot harder. The kind of consultation that we are proposing in this amendment is meant to be helpful to the Government so that we can move on and strengthen this area of confiscation to the maximum advantage of victims.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I should like to make a short point on these amendments. I consider the proposals put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool, to be extremely interesting. The idea that the proceeds, if there are any, should go not only to victims but to other organisations is one which, as the noble Lord, Lord Alton, has said, attracted the Home Secretary. I would particularly like to refer to the idea that 25% of proceeds should be distributed to organisations whose purpose is to prevent slavery. One example is that of the Bedfordshire police who spent an enormous amount of time and effort, and a great deal of the police budget, in managing to bring the Connors family to justice. They were the Gypsies who had a large number of men living in appalling accommodation. They had recruited them from homeless units or soup kitchens by offering them money but then treated them in the most appalling way. They eventually took a great many of them to Sweden, trafficking them from the UK to Sweden, where they were living in caravans again and working 18 hours a day on construction sites without receiving a single penny. They in fact came back to England but I am not sure we looked after them very well when they came back. The Bedfordshire police did an extremely good job and it cost them a great portion of their budget. Andrew Selous MP has raised this issue on various occasions and I am happy to raise it again in this House. That is the sort of organisation which ought to be compensated to some extent for the use of its budget—way beyond what is normal—to get a prosecution of a large group of very successful and very wicked traffickers.

Of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Warner, has said, unless you have the money you cannot give it out to anybody else. The Government are to be congratulated on adding criminal lifestyle offences to Clause 7, taking the provisions from the Proceeds of Crime Act. I suggest to the Government that they really ought to look at civil proceedings before the arrest has been made. If the intention is to make an arrest, knowing that the lifestyle of a particular person makes them likely to be a trafficker and therefore likely to be prosecuted, you want to catch the money before he is arrested because otherwise the minute he is arrested he will get it out of the country. Anyone can get money out of the country extremely fast. Therefore, there should be some provision in the civil courts—by which I mean the High Court in particular—that where there is sufficient evidence to be able to make an arrest there should be not a confiscation but a freezing order. Freezing orders are perfectly well known right through the civil courts. If you can get a freezing order a few days or weeks before the actual arrest is made, you may take the trafficker unawares. That is where you get the money to get the pot of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, sufficiently filled. There is no question that this is either the second or third most profitable criminal enterprise in the world. It is worth something in excess of $30 billion, quite a lot of which comes through this country. It does not stay long enough, but if we can get it in the civil courts, it can fill the pot that the noble Lord, Lord Alton, wants.

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, is very interesting, particularly, as has been said, as it identifies the work done by organisations and the need for them to be funded to support individuals, as distinct from compensation going directly to an individual. It is complicated work, and in many cases very long term. However, I am sure the noble Lord would agree that nothing this might provide should let the state off the hook of its responsibilities. I am not sure about naming the organisations in regulations, but that is a detail.

As regards the work of the police—the noble Lord mentioned ARIS, and the noble and learned Baroness mentioned the Connors case—I am aware of another case where a different force put together a hugely detailed and complex plan for multi-agencies to be available when they raided premises and rescued a number of individuals. That must have cost an enormous amount of money. It was very important that those who were found in forced labour—I do not think that the case has come to trial yet, but I suspect that it will be forced labour—are received in a sensitive way and helped from the very beginning. That is intrinsically important, and it is important to ensure that they are in position to give the evidence that the police need to be able to proceed and do not disappear into thin air, as sometimes happens in these cases; facing authority, they do not want to have anything to do with it. Therefore, I am very pleased that the noble Lord has brought this to the attention of the House.

I will make one other small point on organisations that do this work. It sometimes seems that the smaller and less formal organisations are the most successful, because they are less likely to be perceived as authority by those whom they seek to help.

On the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Warner, my view remains the same as when we discussed the matter in the Serious Crime Bill. Of course we should assess and evaluate the impact of the changes made by the Bill—which is still a Bill—and be prepared to make changes. I was worried that it was not sensible to have a consultation that runs in parallel with the introduction of some changes that were being made by the Bill, which might be rather confusing. April 2015 is very close—there will not have been much experience, if any, of the changes included in that Bill; I am not sure when it is likely to be commenced. Therefore, the point about review and assessment and evaluation and consultation in general is good; I am worried about the timing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Bates]

The noble Lord says, “Not guilty”, but he should be proud of the measure because it tightened the loopholes to which he referred. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, also mentioned that in the Serious Crime Bill we have introduced the criminal lifestyle element which is a tougher test for extracting an appropriate amount of funds. We are also providing for the deployment of asset recovery advisers to priority jurisdictions as part of the asset recovery strategy. In general terms, that is what we are trying to do to tighten the regime so that we get more funds in under the asset recovery incentivisation scheme. The noble Lord, Lord Alton, asked me to set out where those funds are currently located. I will come back to that in a second but effectively they are divided between key areas—namely, the police, the prosecuting authorities and the courts. But ahead of those, of course, are the victims. It is the victims who are compensated first. That is what is contained in the Bill for the reparation orders. The reparation orders will ensure that the victims, who are the ones who have suffered, are compensated first.

The noble Lord’s argument, as I take it, through his amendment—he rightly picks up the tone of my letter to him on this subject—is not saying that we do not recognise that there could be a role for this fund in providing some support to other organisations that are aiding victims. That is not something that we are ruling out. In fact, there is a ministerially-chaired Criminal Finances Board review of the asset recovery incentivisation scheme going on at this precise time. It will report in December. I offer this undertaking to the noble Lord: officials have been listening very carefully to what he said and the arguments that he has made, and which other noble Lords have made. Those arguments will be fed into this review to be put forward.

I also believe that in this response, the use of funds, which, of course, we expect as a result of the tougher measures and the greater sanctions that we have available under the new laws that are coming into effect, will result in more prosecutions and greater funds coming into this scheme. We fully expect those funds to increase. I am sure that the Independent Anti-slavery Commissioner-designate, as we must still say at this stage, will have an eye on how those funds are used to best ensure that we get more prosecutions, and help more victims. As we have heard time and again—the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, I think, referred to this as well—much of the evidence that we have of the mistreatment and the case examples are as a result of the excellent work of those charities and organisations that are out there meeting the victims and getting them to feed into the national referral mechanism, leading, it is hoped, to prosecutions.

I am sure that that is not as far as either noble Lord would like us to go, but I hope a couple of steps there will offer the noble Lord, Lord Alton, whose work in this area we all acknowledge, the opportunity to consider withdrawing his amendment.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

Before the noble Lord sits down, I do not want to waste time, and I understand the point that the Minister is making about not alerting a potential trafficker so that he might skip the country, but what you can do, for instance, is get a without notice order in the civil court to freeze the assets and then arrest immediately afterwards. You do not have to alert the trafficker in order to freeze the assets. However, I am not sure that the powers for freezing assets would include people who are traffickers. That is the point that I want to put to the Minister.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

Before the Minister sits down, is he going to reply to my noble and learned friend first, or may I also put a point to him?

Modern Slavery Bill

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Monday 17th November 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as co-chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Human Trafficking and Modern-Day Slavery, and as a trustee of the Human Trafficking Foundation.

I do not want to weary the House but I might add to what the Minister has said about slavery. Approximately 29.8 million people—men, women and children—are trafficked and enslaved across the world, more than the entire transatlantic trade 200 years ago. Slavery and trafficking is the second most valuable illegal business in the world, at least $150 billon a year, which includes prostitution, forced labour, domestic servitude, begging, thieving, debt bondage and benefit claims. So far, as noble Lords have already heard, very few traffickers and slave owners have been convicted of these crimes, which is why the Bill is now before the House. In my view, its Second Reading is a historic and exciting moment. The Prime Minister and the Home Secretary are to be congratulated on bringing it forward, and I am aware that both of them are passionate about it.

The background is that in October 2013, the Home Secretary asked Frank Field MP to set up an informal inquiry as a prelude to drafting the first draft of the Modern Slavery Bill. He, John Randall MP and I heard evidence and provided a report. That report and the evidence were incorporated into the evidence of the Select Committee of both Houses, of which Frank Field was chairman and I was a member. We had a lot more evidence, and in our report we bravely, or rashly, drafted our own version of the Bill. Not surprisingly, the Government version did not adopt all our suggestions, but there have been further discussions and more changes made in the other place.

Where have we got to? In my view this is a good Bill, but, of course, in several ways it could be improved. I feel that this Bill is the start of a process, and as we see how it works, we can in the future press for improvements. I therefore suggest that we should not be too ambitious with this Bill. I should like to make a few comments about the contents, but inevitably more issues will arise in Committee, many of which the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, has already referred to.

It is good to have all the major offences under one umbrella, but I am not entirely happy with the wording in Part 1. There is considerable momentum to include in Part 1 a clause defining child exploitation as a separate set of offences. This, in principle, may seem appropriate but there are certain difficulties which need to be overcome. Proof of the age of a young person under 18 in the criminal courts can be a long, drawn-out and possibly distracting exercise. One needs to bear in mind that the sentence in the Bill for the most serious offences against adults is life imprisonment. You cannot get more than life. There is the possibility that it may make prosecutions more difficult and consequently reduce the protection of child victims. The Home Secretary at Third Reading in the other place spoke of unintended consequences. I am a bit concerned that the offence of child exploitation without some restrictions on its interpretation is too wide.

I am, therefore, now somewhat ambivalent about whether a clause especially for children is really necessary or appropriate. The issue of consent does not arise in Clauses 1 and 2 for adults as I read them. I sought the assistance of a number of former Supreme Court judges who have taken the same view. However, there is strong support for a child clause, and I was strongly in support of it myself at one stage. I am not actually opposed—as I say, I am ambivalent—so I look forward to future more careful consideration in Committee.

As has been said, the sentences for slavery and trafficking in the Bill are increased to life. It will therefore be important for the judiciary in the Crown Court to have some sentencing guidelines. In a recent case in Sussex, a sentence of four years, reduced to two and a half, on a trafficker of 70 women appears to be on the low side. So far, the Proceeds of Crime Act has been less than effective in this area of criminal law. I hope that the changes in the Bill will make a difference and that the assets of alleged traffickers will be frozen at an early stage of the investigation. Equally, reparation for victims is an important part of doing justice to the victims.

It is excellent that the post of commissioner is in the Bill. The word “independent” has just been inserted into the title of the appointment clause. There is a strongly held view, set out already by the noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, that this word alone will not make him sufficiently independent and that his duties should be more directed towards the protection of victims. I think that we should wait to see how the first commissioner, just appointed, carries out his duties. Kevin Hyland, who I have the good fortune to know, is an excellent choice. We shall have to see whether he will find himself constrained or others will find his duties are too narrowly expressed. If that proves to be so we can press for changes in future legislation.

There is a pilot scheme for child advocates with a statutory requirement to act in the child’s best interests, an issue close to the hearts of the noble Lord, Lord McColl, and myself, and the important requirement to report on the pilot to Parliament. I naturally hope that this will form part of future legislation.

Clauses for protection of victims include a partial defence of victims against prosecution, and I agree that there must be exceptions as set out in Schedule 3. We need to see how the defences work out, and whether any of the exceptions prove to be unfair to a victim. If they prove to be unfair, and the victim faces prosecution when the offence was directly the result of slavery, this will need to be revisited. Again, however, it is hugely to the credit of the Government that they have accepted the need for that degree of protection of victims.

There are special measures to help witnesses in criminal proceedings, which is a most important aid to getting victims to give evidence. Very much to the credit of the Government, who have listened to advice, is the requirement for companies to investigate their supply chains, but I find the wording of the supply chain clauses somewhat overelaborate. Two excellent reports have been published on the national referral mechanism which propose the improvement of the system for identifying victims. I hope that those recommendations will be taken up and put into effect. I would like to see in the Bill an enabling clause that gives the power to the Home Secretary to put the NRM on a statutory basis without requiring any further primary legislation.

I turn very briefly to the support for victims, most of which is not appropriate for primary legislation but which is the most important part of the battle against traffickers and slave owners. There are two reasons, one moral and one practical, why this country should put in place adequate and continuing support towards those identified as needing that help. The moral reason is obvious: we have a duty to look after those men, women and children who have been brought into this country to be slaves, and those within the UK who are also enslaved. Indeed, the girls in Rotherham were slaves. The practical reason underpins the main purpose of the Bill, which is that the Government naturally want to improve the number of successful prosecutions. To a very great extent that depends on victims being prepared to give evidence.

In this country we comply with the Palermo agreement, the Council of Europe convention and the EU directive by offering accommodation and support for those going through the identification process. The UK offers 45 days—more than the minimum requirement of 30 days—and for some people a longer period. However, prosecutions may take over a year to be heard in the Crown Courts. So far, many if not most victims who would be witnesses are not given sufficient help after 45 days by way of accommodation, financial support and many other much needed services such as counselling and access to mental health help, which are so badly needed by many utterly traumatised people. After 45 days many go missing, some are retrafficked and some are living on the streets. Read the excellent final report of Jeremy Oppenheim on the NRM. He sets out the plight of those people in clear terms and describes our manifest failure to give sufficient help in all sorts of ways which I do not have time to set out today—and I apologise for going a minute over. The USA and Taiwan have statutory requirements which would be well worth considering. The way in which the strategy policy of the Government and local governments is implemented will define and judge the United Kingdom as a caring or non-caring country and will have a marked effect on whether we achieve the level of successful prosecutions that the Government are seeking to achieve by introducing the Bill.

Serious Crime Bill [HL]

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Wednesday 5th November 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland (CB)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Harris. I will not go through all the arguments that have been made already. The Minister can easily read the NSPCC submissions, which are extremely pertinent. I will make three very different points.

I know that the Minister is extremely concerned about child abuse generally, and child sexual abuse and its prevention in particular. We are about to embark on a huge inquiry. We have discussed whether an inquiry looking at past abuse might obscure what is happening today. What we must do—I am repeating this and will continue to do so—is spend our time preventing abuse now. The lessons that we can learn from the past will help us, but it is crucial that we prevent abuse now.

I declare an interest as the vice-chair of the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, where grooming was first defined and understood. In relation to grooming, any of the experts will tell you that the perpetrator clears a number of hurdles to reach the full stature, if you like, of a paedophile. The first thing that they do is test whether they can gain the confidence of a child just through kindness, relationship and involvement. As I understand it, none of the current statutes would intervene at the point where a perpetrator sent a message saying, “I am really fond of you, I would like to see you topless or in your underwear”, or “I would like you to talk about sexual things”, or, as in one recent case, “I would like you to do something to your sister in front of me, so that I can see and understand how your relationship is going”. It gets worse as time goes on. As the perpetrator finds that they can cross one hurdle, they then discover that they are enabled to cross the next one, and the next one, until they are meeting children, and until they are fully abusing larger numbers of children. That is the history of grooming; it is how grooming works.

If we are serious about prevention, we need to prevent at that very first point. What the Minister will hear from the police—I am quite sure that he is in discussions—is that they find it quite difficult to sort out how they move forward among the enormously confusing entanglement of present legislation. I simply hope that the Government will have a look at this. I am not a lawyer; I only know what I experience in my day-to-day contact with the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, the NSPCC and other children’s organisations. They feel that not enough is being done, that one single law is needed to make it absolutely clear that we are serious about protecting our children, and that we should have an amendment—if not this one, something like it—to be able to act at the very first point.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, there appears to be a gap in child protection for the reasons that the noble Baroness has just given. I do not want to repeat them because everything she said was entirely accurate and always worrying. One has only to look at the stories that we have been getting around the country, not of historical abuse but of current abuse and abuse in the recent past—not just in the north but in other parts of the country. Sexual communications and the opportunity to encourage children to behave in a way that they think that they are doing to their peer group, is something that really needs to be sorted. I am no expert in this area of criminal law but if this area is not covered, as I understand to be the case, it is a serious matter that should be covered. I therefore ask the Government to look again, whether by means of this amendment or amendment of other legislation. It is not a matter to push into the long grass; it is urgent. If it is not covered, then it is urgent to cover it.

Another matter arises when a child finds that an adult is involved. If, say, this is stopped and the child finds that they were communicating not with a friend but with a grown-up, the embarrassment and distress to the child of having shown a tantalising photograph of herself or himself—remember boys are also vulnerable —has led children to commit suicide.

[Baroness Smith of Basildon (Lab)]

My Lords, those who have a sexual, and therefore illegal, interest in children know the law. They know the gaps and complexities in the law and rely on them, given the difficulty and lack of clarity, to set themselves on a path that may not start with, but certainly ends in, abuse. After a typically thoughtful, understated and well argued case from my noble friend Lord Harris of Haringey, I was rather surprised that the Government did not bring back an amendment today, following the meeting with him.

However, today the point was made with absolute clarity across the House: there is a gap in the law; a point is missing. The noble Baroness, Lady Howarth of Breckland, referred to communications between young people. On Report, I referred to a case of which I was aware, in which an 11 year-old girl was communicating with someone she thought was another 11 year-old girl, and sharing the kind of confidences that 11 year-old girls share when embarking on and discovering their own sexuality. However, she found out later that it was a 30-plus year-old man who was communicating with her when the relationship was developed.

There clearly is a gap in the law, which needs to be changed. It needs to catch up with what is happening today. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, made the point that abuse is happening now and there is an opportunity here to make changes to the law and do something that will make a difference and protect children today, tomorrow and the day after. I am disappointed that we do not have a new government amendment before us, but I hope that either the amendment from my noble friend Lord Harris will be accepted or we will hear a commitment from the Government to bring something back that addresses this problem, as the noble and learned Baroness said, very quickly indeed.

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[Baroness Meacher (CB)]

I am most grateful to the Minister for tabling Amendment 7, which enables me to speak briefly about the need to create an offence of encouragement of female genital mutilation, which we discussed on Report. I want to thank the Government for agreeing to have further discussions about the new amendment, drafted by Dexter Dias QC, and about the new evidence from our QC adviser. To be frank, that evidence is extremely powerful and it is a pity that we did not have access to these arguments earlier in our debates. I hope the Government will table the Dias amendment, or something very like it, in the other place, but I understand that they are in no position to make any commitment of that kind at this stage.

I will not repeat the arguments we rehearsed on Report in favour of focusing attention upon those who encourage the practice of FGM rather more than upon the families who practice this appalling form of child torture. I want to put on record only that the Dias amendment would provide an effective legal intervention because it is modelled on what is known to work: comparable powers used to combat the dissemination of encouragement to commit acts of terrorism. FGM is of course an entirely different crime from terrorism but the model for the two types of crime is similar.

The Dias amendment recognises the awful social pressure that parents are placed under by some communities. In traditional societies, which are intensely hierarchically structured, elders and preachers exert enormous influence. I think that most of us are not familiar with that or have not experienced it. We believe that the encouragement amendment will complement the important community work being done to dissuade preachers from encouraging FGM.

Mr Dias QC refers to our international obligations, which more than justify the creation of an offence of encouragement of female genital mutilation to cover anyone who makes a statement that is likely to be understood by some or all of the members of the public to whom it is published as direct or indirect encouragement or other inducement to them to mutilate the genitalia of a girl. That is the essence of his amendment. These international obligations include: the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women of 1979; the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child of 1989, under which the UK has positive obligations in international law to ensure that children are not subjected to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment; and, finally, the UN Convention Against Torture of 1984, which has been ratified by the UK.

Mr Dias presents four pages of powerful arguments in support of the amendment he has drafted, which I hope very much that the Government will consider most seriously, as I have indicated. I will not repeat all these arguments here today—this is, after all, Third Reading—although I believe that your Lordships’ House would find them extremely persuasive. The only remaining point I want to make is that I am advised that our strong international obligations justify overriding Article 10 of the Convention on Human Rights, the right to freedom of expression. This is a very important point, particularly because we all wish to preserve that right whenever it is appropriate. All that we are saying is that in this very specific case, it is appropriate to override it.

Again, I give my thanks to the Minister for providing this opportunity for me to reiterate certain points. I hope that the Minister can confirm to the House today the Government’s agreement to have further discussions on this important issue.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, had the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, tabled this amendment I would have put my name to it. I do not want to take up time at Third Reading to repeat what the noble Baroness has said, but I ask the Minister to be in touch with those in the Home Office who will be dealing with the Bill in the other place, and not to disregard what she has said. It is really worth having a further look at this serious matter. There are communities which, as the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, has said, are different from most of us and where there is a degree of not just influence but power among certain elements of those communities. That leads to this appalling FGM taking place on children in this country. I am also supportive of what the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, said. This is a good part of the Bill and the Government are to be congratulated on it. However, they could do better.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, the Government have made enormous progress in addressing the legislation so well, to the extent that a Government can in practice respond to FGM. Like others, I encourage the filling of a gap which seems to have been identified. I do not want to say more this afternoon but I wanted to put on record my support for the noble Baroness and my admiration for her keeping going on this issue.

Serious Crime Bill [HL]

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Tuesday 28th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lester of Herne Hill]

That is a very good question, but I cannot really answer it. My reading of government Amendment 46G indicates that there is a copying in of what had happened with forced marriage. Furthermore, paragraph (7) of the proposed new schedule in the amendment amends the Family Law Act and gives jurisdiction to the family court. I may be talking complete rubbish and I may be corrected, either by the noble Baroness or by the Minister. I am simply trying to get across why the civil route is so important and the use of family courts is so important.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

I shall pick up that point. It is perfectly obvious to me as a former president of the Family Division that it does not matter which piece of legislation it is as long as the work done in relation to female genital mutilation is allocated to the single family court and heard either by High Court judges or circuit judges who are ticketed to try family cases. This is really not for the ordinary civil judges in what was the county court.

I am interested by this talk about the High Court or the county court. We should actually be talking about—I say this respectfully to the Government—the single family court. It does not matter whether it goes into the Family Law Act as is suggested in the excellent opposition amendments, which I largely support. What matters is who actually tries it. Just as with forced marriages and every other child protection issue, we have here issues of crime, but we know perfectly well that there has not yet been a single conviction of anyone who has done this. It is a question of culture, too. One has to train people in this country that this is not an acceptable practice. The Government are to be enormously congratulated for working on that—as were the previous Government when introducing the 2003 Act—but nothing has gone far enough.

I totally agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lester. I would like to see what is good in each set of amendments put together. Therefore, I hope that the Opposition and the Government will get together after Report and thrash out what would be the best of everything and get that into one list that could go into Third Reading. I do not think that the Government go quite far enough. A great deal of what the Opposition are saying is exactly what we need, but it all needs to be put together. Certainly, the most important thing is that it should go to the single family court and be tried by High Court or circuit judges who have specialist family experience.

[Baroness Hughes of Stretford (Lab)]

My Lords, I very much agree with the noble and learned Baroness. In doing so, I ask the Minister to give thought to taking away the government amendment to come back at Third Reading with a composite amendment that deals with the two issues that my noble friend related in moving the amendment. The issue of definition is as important as the issue of where this matter is located in law. There is concern out there that the definition that we have may not comply with the World Health Organization definition; even if it does, the way in which it was formulated in the 2003 Act, because of where we were then, is not clear enough to the whole range of professionals. As my noble friend identified, a number of health bodies, even in their own guidance, are telling their practitioners that reinfibulation does not come within the definition of female genital mutilation in the current Act. That has to be dealt with. I welcome the Government’s approach to looking further at what we need to do in the Bill. We have an opportunity here to ensure that we get things right, and the definition is one important issue.

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[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I intended to put my name to this amendment, which I support. It seems to me that it is more important as a deterrent than probably for prosecutions. Among the various groups that exist—one hopes that they are a really small minority—as the noble Baroness just said, it is very important that the English law is made absolutely clear, as well as the law of Islam. Of course, as the noble Baroness, Lady Tonge, just said, this occurs across other religions. That deterrent has, in other areas, quite a useful effect on culture, and that seems to me the most important part of this. I suspect that there will be very few prosecutions, but what is said in English law may permeate through a number of groups where those who disapprove of this already would then be able to point to the fact that it was also contrary to English law, and those who might want to get involved in this would be deterred from actually supporting it. I, too, support this amendment.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, towards the end of her speech, the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, referred to what was troubling me, which is whether we are talking about general encouragement—if I can put it that way—or encouragement to commit a specific offence. Like, I suspect, those in the conversations she had just before coming into the Chamber, I am puzzled by the presentation of the amendment as meaning general encouragement, because I do not read it that way either. With the wording, “to commit an offence”—a specific offence—I thought that the noble Baroness was getting to grips with what is meant by “promotion”, which was the bit that I found difficult to get my head around in terms of its application in the predecessor amendment. However, the noble Baroness told us that it is the reference to “the other or others”—in the plural—which changes that. Bluntly, I do not follow that. I hope that, when she winds up, the noble Baroness will be able to convince me. The offence of FGM might surely and not unusually be committed by more than one person in the case of a single girl. That was certainly how I read this. It is not about committing offences; I read the provision as being about a particular, specific victim.

Of course, I do not take issue with the noble Baroness about the cultural problems and so on. However, I hope that my noble friend will convince the House that this is covered by the Serious Crime Act 2007, with its Part 2 on encouraging or assisting crime. There are extensive provisions in that part. If that applies, then I would not be particularly keen on having a specific offence when it should be covered by the general provisions. It is better that the general should apply to all criminal offences and not have something separate which actually does not amount to anything different. It is the difference that I am looking for.

Serious Crime Bill [HL]

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Tuesday 14th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, welcome my noble friend to his position. It must have come as quite a facer in the middle of his holiday to be told what a workload he was going to be coming back to.

Before I come to Amendment 4, I would like to say a word about part of the wording of Amendment 1 and indeed Amendment 14—and this point crops up elsewhere. I suspect that we are looking at a bit of modernised style, because we are told to have in mind the concept of the court “thinking”. There are a number of places now where the court “thinks”. We are quite used to words like “considers”. The Minister himself, in introducing the amendment, used the term “believes”, but one might “suppose”, “imagine” or “suspect”—one could go on for quite a long time.

I am a little concerned that we should be cautious about using modernised language without being very clear about what it means, particularly when similar concepts have been introduced in other legislation using different, and perhaps more “old-fashioned”, words. English is a rich language, and its richness covers a lot of subtleties. I just wanted to get that off my chest because I might come back to it on other legislation.

However, most of the debate so far—and we will hear more—is about the effectiveness of the restraint and confiscation regime. I share the outrage of other noble Lords about criminals salting away the proceeds of their crime. We used to discuss it quite a lot in the context of legal aid: that there were recipients of legal aid who were suspected of having a good deal of cash if only one could find it. Now, in the context of the Modern Slavery Bill, as the noble Baroness said, we could do better.

I hesitate to support the amendment going into legislation. The changes which it appears that we are all agreed should be made to the regime will barely have been in force before April 2015, which is the proposed end of the consultation period. Of course we should be assessing and evaluating the impact of the changes made by the Bill—in themselves, in the wider context and continually—to the confiscation regime. We should be prepared to make changes. Is it sensible to have a consultation running in parallel with the introduction of some alterations? Indeed, are we always talking about legislation that needs changing or about practice? I suspect that quite a lot of the problems are in the area of practice.

The noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Holbeach, explained in Committee that a couple of the proposals were, in the Government’s view, unnecessary; I do not want to anticipate what my noble friend will say. Indeed, as the noble Baroness reminded the House, on the recovery of costs, the noble Lord said that the Government would consider capping legal aid rates. However, without for a moment wishing to suggest that the concerns regarding the application of the Modern Slavery Bill are not important—they are immensely important—it seems that without the amendment there is nothing to preclude both consultation about the application of the provisions of that Bill and the bringing forward of more legislation. Conversely, consultation does not solve the issues which have been raised during the passage of the Modern Slavery Bill—which, like other noble Lords, I am very keen to see being effective.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, the Proceeds of Crime Act has been inadequately applied. There is no doubt that it could be better dealt with. As far as they go, the Minister’s amendments are to be supported—but they by no means go far enough. As a member of the Joint Committee on the Modern Slavery Bill, I strongly support the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Warner. However, it goes further than that. The Modern Slavery Bill is an important part of getting the proceeds of crime, but all of us in this House want to see criminals dispossessed of their assets. The Proceeds of Crime Act and all of the amendments go further than the Modern Slavery Bill. We do need something.

I am not entirely certain, having listened to the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, that we need it in Amendment 4, but we certainly need either this amendment or a very strong undertaking from the Government that—side by side with implementing the government amendments to the Bill—they will consult. If there was a strong commitment to consultation before the Modern Slavery Bill comes in—bearing in mind that it is much broader than the Modern Slavery Bill—I would be content with that. However, if the Government are not going to give a strong commitment, I would find myself supporting Amendment 4.

[Lord Bates]

My Lords, first, I thank the noble Baroness and also my noble friend for their warm welcome to me in this role. I will do my very best to try to ensure that I answer as fully as possible the very serious points which they made.

I will commence with the points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Warner, and to some extent the points raised by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, in relation to the Modern Slavery Bill. As these Bills were drafted and conceived, and as they move through the legislative process, they are seen very much as two parts of an attempt to address the problem of human trafficking and the gangs that seek to profit from that. They also seek to ensure that those gangs are unable to hide away the funds which they amass from the misery they afflict on others. On that we are absolutely united. I would also say to the noble Lord, Lord Warner, that we set out a number of points in a detailed letter which was drafted and sent to his noble friend the noble Baroness, Lady Smith of Basildon, on 7 October. A copy has been placed in the Library but it might be helpful, as part of my response to the debate, if I place some of the remarks from it on the record in this House.

In responding to Amendment 4, let me first say that we share the objective underpinning this amendment— namely, to further strengthen the effectiveness of the asset recovery regime provided for in the Proceeds of Crime Act. It is also worth noting at this point that, under this Government, more than £746 million of criminal assets have been seized through all four current methods of recovery, which in itself is a record amount. I know it is not getting anywhere near to addressing the full scale of the problem but it shows that the law enforcement of the courts is having some effect. Of course we want to do even better. One of the aims of the Government’s serious and organised crime strategy is to crack down on those who do not pay their confiscation orders. As part of this, the criminal finances improvement plan aims to look at ways to improve the recovery of the proceeds of crime.

The amendment calls for consultation on ways to strengthen the legal framework as set out in the Proceeds of Crime Act. Part 1 of this Bill is the product of just such a consultation. It already includes significant reforms to the asset recovery regime. I do not for a moment suggest that these provisions are the last word in terms of changes to POCA—if I may use that acronym for the Proceeds of Crime Act. We remain open to further constructive suggestions, which was very much what the noble Baroness asked us to do. We remain open to suggestions and to having a constructive dialogue over what improvements can be made with, among others, the National Crime Agency, police forces, the Crown Prosecution Service and Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service.

Let me turn to the specific proposals contained in Amendment 4. First, the amendment calls for a change in the test for securing a restraint order. Clause 11 already reduces the legal test for obtaining such an order from “reasonable cause to believe” that the alleged offender has benefited from his criminal conduct to “reasonable grounds to suspect”. This was a point that the noble Lord, Lord Warner, also touched upon. That will enable restraint orders to be secured earlier in an investigation. We remain at this stage unpersuaded of the case for removing the requirement to show that there is a real risk that the defendant will dissipate his or her assets. Such a test goes to the heart of the purpose of a restraint order. If there was no such risk, there would be nothing to be gained from seeking a restraint order.

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[Baroness Walmsley (LD)]

My Lords, I wish to speak to Amendment 41 in my name in this group. I welcome Clause 65 and the Government’s amendments to it, but I have tabled this further amendment, the purpose of which is twofold. First, it would delete the limitation in Section 1(1) of the 1933 Act that only people with responsibility for a child or a young person can be prosecuted for child abuse. This means that anyone could be prosecuted for such offences—for example, clergy, pastors, friends, relatives, neighbours or lodgers—not just parents or people acting in loco parentis. It is unclear to me why Section 1 was ever limited in this way. I ask the Government to explain why, particularly since we have seen in the recent Rotherham scandal how many children are abused by people who are not responsible for them. Secondly, it would clarify the meaning of “ill-treats” in order to make it clear that any allegation, by word or deed, that a child is possessed by an evil spirit or has harmful supernatural powers is unlawful because it amounts to serious emotional abuse of the child.

This amendment was debated twice on the then Children and Families Bill at the end of last year and the beginning of this year, and was followed by correspondence with my noble friend Lady Northover. Further to that correspondence, it is clear that the Government now accept two important facts that were not recognised before these debates. First, they now recognise that possession accusations are child abuse, regardless of what is done to the child as a result. Secondly, they accept that neither criminal nor civil law on child abuse can be used to take action on such abuse if it is perpetrated by someone who is not a parent or acting in loco parentis. Thus neither Section 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 nor the Children Act 1989 can be used in such cases.

However, the Government did not accept the need for the change that I was proposing, pointing to various other criminal statutes that could be used where someone had caused a child injury by making a possession accusation: the Public Order Act 1986, the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 and the Serious Crime Act 2007—my noble friend mentioned all of these in the correspondence. Those other statutes are not appropriate for three reasons. First, the point of my amendment is to protect children from knowing that they are believed to be possessed by evil spirits or to have supernatural powers, whereas using those statutes would entail the child having to give evidence that they were harmed by the allegations—thus precisely obviating the protection that my amendment is seeking.

Secondly, the primary aim of the amendment is not to prosecute but to prevent this kind of abuse. This can be done only if the law explicitly states that a possession accusation constitutes an offence against children—which, I reiterate, would not make a belief in evil spirit possession an offence, just the communication of that belief to the child or those known to the child. It is not my intention to get in the way of people’s seriously held religious beliefs. I hope I made that clear the last time I raised this point.

Thirdly, none of the cited laws has ever been used to charge anyone for alleging that a child has supernaturally evil powers, which is not surprising. It is extremely unlikely that any prosecutor would agree to a wholly speculative prosecution that balanced having to prove a child’s psychological trauma against the expression of strongly held religious beliefs, in the absence of direction from central government on this issue. I invite the Minister to seek the opinion of the Director of Public Prosecutions on this point if the Government are going to rely on these various statutes.

The numbers of children killed or seriously physically injured in this country by this form of faith-based abuse are not great—probably still under 100, although of course even one is too many. However, we do not know how many children are psychologically scarred for life by being told that they are possessed by evil spirits, that they are responsible for causing supernatural harm to their loved ones and that they are an object of hatred, fear and revulsion. Members of the National Working Group on Child Abuse Linked to Faith or Belief estimate that that number could run to many hundreds.

Are we failing to take action on this horrible torment of children because we are reluctant to challenge, in this instance, the religious practices of minorities? If the Government believe, as they say they do and I know they do, that possession accusations are child abuse, they should prohibit the practice specifically as they have every other form of significant harm to children. I ask my noble friend again to consider the wisdom of such an amendment.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for giving me the opportunity to discuss with him his Amendments 39 and 40. I am extremely grateful to him. I am happy with Amendment 39; it takes us a long way along the road that I have been battling for under the Children and Young Persons Act 1933, and I think it goes far enough. I thought that Amendment 40 was unnecessary. I have now been convinced by the Minister that it is not unnecessary, so I am also happy with that.

On what the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, has said, I suspect that the offences that the police and social workers did not deal with in Rotherham, for example, were so serious that the first part of Amendment 41 would not be necessary. However, I see the point that the noble Baroness is making and it is, with respect, a good one. Her point is that most, but not all, cases come under other legislation, and that is a point well worth taking away.

I agree with the noble Baroness’s point about evil spirits and witchcraft. We in this country underestimate what goes on in relation to witchcraft. It is an extremely serious and worrying, though limited, problem in relation to children, and it ought not to be ignored. There are those who, sometimes under the guise of an obviously totally debased form of religion, are trying to exorcise children through really appalling child cruelty. The noble Baroness is raising that area and, again, with respect, the Government ought to look at that rather more carefully.

[Lord Swinfen (Con)]

I am not sure that I heard my noble friend correctly but he talked about child cruelty when someone was, first, in possession of drugs and, secondly, under the influence of drugs. I understood him to say that they were actually under the influence of the drugs of which they were charged with being in possession. Purely for clarification, what is the position if they are in fact under the influence of a different drug? I ask this because barristers are on the whole extremely clever. I would like to make certain there is no escape clause in the Bill.

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Moved by

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

42: After Clause 65, insert the following new Clause—
“Child abduction warning order
In section 2 of the Child Abduction Act 1984 (offence of abduction of child by other person), after subsection (3) insert—“(4) A chief officer of police may issue an order under this section (a “child abduction warning order”) in respect of a person (“A”) if it appears that the following conditions are met—
(a) A is over 18; and(b) A has without lawful authority or reasonable excuse been found in the company of a child (“C”); and(c) C is reported missing and is found on two or more occasions to be in the company of A; or(d) there is reason to suspect that C’s behaviour is, by reason of association with the defendant, giving significant cause for concern.(5) An order under subsection (4) prohibits A from being in the company of C.
(6) A person who, without reasonable excuse, does anything that he or she is prohibited from doing under a child abduction warning order commits an offence.
(7) A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable—
(a) on summary conviction, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 6 months or a fine (or both);(b) on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 5 years.(8) The Secretary of State must issue guidance to chief officers of police in relation to the exercise by them of their powers with regard to child abduction warning orders.
(9) The Secretary of State may, from time to time, revise the guidance issued under this section.
(10) The Secretary of State must arrange for any guidance issued or revised under this section to be published in such manner as the Secretary of State considers appropriate.””

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I am moving again the amendment relating to child abduction warning notices which I raised in Committee. I do not want to go through everything that was said on that occasion. I was supported by the noble Baronesses, Lady Walmsley and Lady Howarth, and the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, who also supports my bringing this amendment before the House again. The problem is that the police do not have adequate powers to deal with grooming of young girls at the point at which the girl is in the process of being groomed but has not yet been taken off and sexually abused, raped or whatever. It is at a relatively early stage, but if it is not stopped it will carry on, as we know from a number of cities around the country.

The quite simple point, as was very neatly expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, in Committee, is that the current notice that the police have leads to no action being taken unless the threshold of an abduction threat has been met. This applies to the stage before the actual abduction threat. I am not happy about what the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, said. I understand his concern that the police might have a power greater than they have in other powers but something needs to be done, which is why I have raised the matter again. I beg to move.

[Baroness Walmsley]

This proposal came out of a parliamentary inquiry co-ordinated by Barnardo’s and chaired by Sarah Champion MP. Two of my noble friends, my noble friend Lady Benjamin and my noble kinsman Lord Thomas of Gresford, and I were both on that inquiry. We heard first-hand what others have been able only to read: the evidence for making this change to the law. It was very interesting and moving to hear the evidence of the victims. It was also moving to hear the evidence of the police who are committed to protecting children but feel that they do not have sufficient tools to do so.

Our focus should be on prevention or at the very least on the earliest possible intervention. The police are asking for this power to be made statutory so that they can enforce it at an earlier stage of the grooming process. It was made very clear that many of these young girls are quite willingly in the company of older people who eventually abuse them. One young person who gave evidence to us said that she genuinely thought that these people were her friends and the only people who cared about her in the world. That indicates that these young people are not there because they have been physically abducted; they are there willingly. Very often, in a prosecution, they are not willing to give evidence that they have been abducted.

Passing this amendment, or something very similar, would strengthen young people’s confidence in the police. Currently, the approach has a further damaging effect because it erodes the confidence of victims and their families in the ability of the police to protect them when they see that an abuser has broken the terms of a child abduction notice but no action is taken. That is why we need to make it statutory.

[Lord Bates]

My Lords, I thank the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, for tabling this amendment and for giving me the opportunity to put on the record some of the developments that have occurred over the summer, since my noble friend Lord Taylor addressed this issue in Committee on 15 July. I also congratulate my noble friend Lady Walmsley on the work of the committee that produced the report. I have had an opportunity to see and to review it. It produced some disturbing material and we need to get that material and that evidence into the policy process. I will set out what we are doing in response in my remarks.

We can all agree that child sexual exploitation is a horrendous crime; the Government are determined to stamp it out. We have seen this from the dreadful events in Rotherham, as highlighted by Professor Alexis Jay’s report, where there were appalling failures by the council, the police and other agencies to protect vulnerable children. We were all sickened to read about the victims in Rotherham and the horrific experiences to which they were subjected. Many have also suffered the injustice of seeing their cries for help ignored and the perpetrators not yet brought to justice. Our priority must be the prosecution of the people behind these disgusting crimes. Where there has been a failure to protect children from abuse, we will expose it and learn from it. I am grateful to the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, for again articulating the case for putting child abduction warning notices on a statutory footing. We note that there is support for this position from the police, legal experts, children’s charities and others.

Police forces are tackling child grooming for sexual exploitation. This is clear from the increasing number of these cases before the courts and the significant sentences being handed down to perpetrators. There will always be more to do. The Home Secretary has written to all chief constables to ask them to take on board the lessons from the Jay report into the failings of Rotherham, and from the rolling Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary inspections into how forces are protecting children.

Amendment 42 is an important contribution to this debate. The existing non-statutory child abduction warning notices are issued by the police. That is entirely appropriate where breach of a notice is not, of itself, a criminal offence. As the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, reminded us, in Committee, my noble friend Lord Taylor undertook to examine further the case for placing child abduction warning notices on a statutory footing. I am grateful to the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, for affording me this opportunity to update the House.

Over the summer, Home Office officials have worked with policing colleagues to examine the issues in more detail. Discussions have taken place with colleagues representing the National Policing Lead for Child Protection, the national policing co-ordinator on child sexual exploitation, the CEOP—Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre—command of the NCA and the College of Policing. While, in some cases there may be merit in the statutory offence of breaching child abduction warning notices, it has become clear through these discussions that the effectiveness of the current system is in its simplicity and non-bureaucratic process. Such notices are intended to disrupt predatory behaviour and stop access to a vulnerable child. They are often a useful step along the path towards more formal orders, and it is suggested that the immediacy of these notices could be inhibited by the need to apply for an order from the court.

Existing non-statutory child abduction warning notices are issued by the police. That is entirely appropriate where breach of a notice is not, of itself, a criminal offence. As my noble friend Lord Taylor indicated in Committee, it would be an unusual step to invest directly in the police—rather than in the court—a power to impose what amounts to a restraint order or an injunction, breach of which is a criminal offence. Compare, for example, restraining orders under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, which are granted by the courts. Other civil preventive orders such as serious crime prevention orders and gang injunctions, which are dealt with elsewhere in the Bill, are also subject to judicial oversight. We will continue to consider carefully with policing colleagues their views on the potential use of a statutory notice and whether, in their view, further changes are required better to protect children.

It is important to note here the wider work taking place across government to protect children. The Home Secretary is chairing meetings with other Secretaries of State to look at what happened in Rotherham. We will consider the findings of Professor Jay’s report and consider what the state at every level should do to prevent this appalling situation happening again. The meetings will build on the existing work of the Home Office-led national group to tackle sexual violence against children and vulnerable people, which is bringing the full range of agencies working in this area together better to protect those at risk and create a victim-focused culture within the police, health and children’s services. In July, the Home Secretary made a Statement about the sexual abuse of children, announcing the establishment of an independent inquiry panel of experts in the law and child protection to consider further whether public bodies and other non-state institutions have taken seriously their duty of care to protect children from sexual abuse. The inquiry panel will be chaired by Fiona Woolf.

Given what I said, there is still more work to be done on this issue to find a position that balances the need of police forces to be able to take appropriate, effective and timely action when required and the need for safeguards, including appropriate judicial oversight. On this point, we still need to be convinced that making the change does not affect the simplicity, speed and unbureaucratic nature of the existing process. I hope and expect that we will have completed our consideration of this proposal before the Bill completes its passage through the House of Commons. I will, of course, notify the noble and learned Baroness and other noble Lords who have spoken in this debate of the outcome of our consideration of this issue. Indeed, I would add that, given the level of expertise in this House, it would be extremely useful if interested noble Lords would join me in a discussion with officials and other representatives so that they can see some of the responses we have already had about data, and the number of notices that have been issued and their effect, soon after the conclusion of our deliberations today, and certainly in the next few weeks. That will ensure that we can draw on the input and expertise of this House.

I know that the noble and learned Baroness would have liked to hear something more definitive in my response today, but I ask her to bear with us and accept that the intentions of Her Majesty’s Government are those of all noble Lords: we are absolutely resolute in respect of this heinous crime. I hope that she will agree to withdraw her amendment at this stage.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I thank all those who have taken part in this short debate and the Minister for setting out the thought processes of the Government, together with those who have been advising them. I am not entirely happy, as the Minister would expect. Perhaps I may start by saying that it is not the police in Rotherham who I was talking about because they failed the children. It is the police who do not fail children in other parts of the country and are issuing the child abduction notice who are concerned about its ineffectiveness. That, I think, is the point. I understand the advantages of an immediate notice and I can see that it is a disadvantage that an immediate notice necessarily has a statutory backing. But I wonder if the Minister could take away what I was thinking about while I listened to what he said. It may be that if the notice is immediately disregarded, one ought then to be looking at some sort of statutory notice that would make it a requirement to go to the magistrates’ court because it would be the second time. What you want to do is catch the groomers before they become child abductors and rapists. It is this early stage that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, and I are particularly concerned about. However, I would welcome the opportunity to take part in any discussions, as I am sure would the noble Baroness—she is nodding—so do please ask us to take part. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 42 withdrawn.

Serious Crime Bill [HL]

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Tuesday 15th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Speaker (Baroness D’Souza)]

My Lords, I should perhaps remind your Lordships that if the amendment is agreed to I cannot call Amendment 40BZC by reason of pre-emption.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, to a considerable extent I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, but want to go rather further. I thank the Government for, and indeed welcome, Clause 62 as far as it goes. I should like to give particular thanks to the previous Minister of Justice in the other place, Damian Green MP, who has always been open to listening to Action for Children, for which I am largely speaking; I am also speaking for the NSPCC. He has been extremely helpful in giving us an opportunity to put our points of view to him. It is largely due to his diligence that the clause is in the Bill, so I thank him very much.

Clause 62, as far as it goes, is good but does not go far enough. The purpose of my Amendment 40BZB—supported particularly by Action for Children, and warmly supported by the NSPCC—is to update and bring into the 21st century Section 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933. I have to tell noble Lords that 1933 was the year in which I was born, and it really is about time that we had 21st-century legislation. I am a relic of that period but the law should not be. I am supported in this amendment by the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, and the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, whom I thank very much.

The purpose is to identify in criminal terms serious neglect and emotional abuse. “Neglect” is in the 1933 Act but does not include the effect of neglect on children and all sorts of emotional abuse that children suffer. Neglect is the most widespread and potentially most serious of all forms of abuse because it is, in itself, largely neglected. It is not seen. There are appalling stories where the police have identified a problem and discovered that they could not take any action by, for instance, threatening the family with some sort of criminal proceedings because the abuse and neglect that they see does not include the emotional abuse of things such as frozen awareness. Some noble Lords may know what I mean by that—for example, a child aged two sitting in a corner, not moving because of the way in which they have been treated. The police, who may come into a family, see and understand this but have to go away and tell the social workers, who may or may not take family proceedings in the magistrates’ court but are not obliged to do so. The police cannot warn the family that if they do not mend their ways they may become the subject of criminal proceedings.

The purpose of this updated legislation is not to put families in the criminal court but to try to push them, by a combination of threat and cajoling, into behaviour that will save the children who are in their care. My amendment, therefore, puts in modern wording such as,

“physically or emotionally ill-treats, physically or emotionally neglects”,

and removes altogether the words “unnecessary suffering”. I totally agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, that “unnecessary” should not be there, but “suffering” is not the word we use nowadays. In the Children Acts and other adoption and child-related legislation we talk about “serious harm”, “substantial harm” or some such phrase. One should get rid of “unnecessary suffering” and get this legislation to join the rest of legislation on children by using “serious harm”. As regards the criminal side of this matter, we then need to explain what “serious harm” means. Proposed new subsection (6) in my amendment sets that out.

It is with some hesitation that I do not entirely agree with the noble Baroness on proposed new subsection (6)(b). I have to say that having battled with the Minister in the other place over inserting “recklessly” instead of “wilfully”, and being told that there was a firm view against doing that, Action for Children, the NSPCC and I, together with some MPs from the Commons, believed that we should explain what “wilfully” means. That is why we have put in,

“that a person with responsibility for a child foresaw that an act or omission regarding that child would be likely to result in harm, but nonetheless unreasonably took that risk”.

That allows the word “wilful” to remain, since the Government seem to want it, but also explains it so that everyone—particularly the police, and indeed people who ill treat their children—understand exactly what it is about.

I very much hope that the Government will now listen to what is being said in this House, although they failed to do so in the other place. I very much urge that this should be looked at again.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 40BZC, which is in my name. I, too, welcome this clause. My amendment, which is promoted by the Children’s Society, finds a different way to address the same issues we have already debated in this group. As the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, said in her introduction, there are currently a number of inconsistencies in the law. My amendment finds a particular way to try to address them.

The amendment changes the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 to increase the age of a child victim of cruelty and/or neglect from under 16 to under 18. I argue that it is a simpler approach than some of the other amendments in the group. It would bring the criminal law into line with the rest of child protection legislation and would send a signal that 16 to 18 year- olds should be protected in the same way as children who are younger than 16.

The latest statistics, with which I was supplied by the Children’s Society, show that, in 2013, 14,290 children aged over 16 were children in need because of either abuse or neglect. A further 1,110 children aged over 16 were recognised as children at risk of significant harm and placed on a child protection plan. Of those, some 290 children had emotional abuse listed as the main category of their abuse.

As some members of the Committee will know, I sit in family court, youth court and adult court as a magistrate. I can clearly say that the most disturbing of those three jurisdictions is family court. You deal with some extremely vulnerable people—and some extremely vulnerable young people. It would be no surprise to anyone who works in either the youth or family jurisdiction that 16 and 17 year-olds are among the most vulnerable groups we deal with. I believe that they should be given the same protections as those aged under 16.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, the proposal to have mandatory reporting has many attractions. I think, however, that even with the exceptions that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, has suggested, it may be too simplistic. There are already many organisations involved with children that have the obligation to report. For instance, the safeguarding of the Church of England requires people to report. The safeguarding of the Roman Catholic Church certainly does. I was vice-chairman of the Cumberlege Commission, in which we advised the then Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster how the clergy and members of the diocese of the Roman Catholic Church of England should be reporting, among other things. Our report was approved by the Vatican.

Obviously, there are the police, social services, the health services and so on. As the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, said—and I endorse her words of wisdom—we need to look at this with a great deal of care because it is the issue of culture as much as the issue of prosecuting for failure to report which lies behind the problems we have. I hope the Minister will go away taking with him not only the understandable suggestions of the right reverend Prelate and the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, but also the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, as to what really needs to be looked at. I hope he will take all that away before coming to a decision on whether there should be mandatory reporting. I strongly support the caution that the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, has put forward.

[Lord Rosser]

I will raise one question, to which I hope the Minister will be able to respond. The right reverend Prelate has referred to the indication given in the Commons last week by the Prime Minister that the Government were looking at whether we should change the law so that there will be a requirement to report abuse and it will be a criminal offence not to report it. Can the Minister be more specific than he appeared to be on the last group of amendments about the timescale within which the Government expect these deliberations to be concluded?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Meacher]

The amendment is intended to ensure that anyone encouraging or assisting in the promotion of the practice of female genital mutilation will face an investigation and, if found guilty, a conviction. We propose that the penalty for those offences should be severe: a maximum prison sentence of up to seven years for a conviction on indictment.

Local councils have a role in tackling the issue as a result of their duties to safeguard children and they are well placed to work with the relevant communities in their area where FGM is practised in order to reduce the number of women and girls at risk of that mutilation. It is appalling to contemplate that 20,000 girls and women in this country are currently at risk of being subjected to FGM. Professionals and third-sector experts believe that the practice will be eradicated only through a change in custom and culture in the communities where it happens. We will not do it through individual charges.

We can be encouraged that there are many members of communities with a history of practising FGM who are now willing to make the case against it. However, we also know that there are community and faith leaders who promote and encourage the practice of FGM. This amendment would make it absolutely clear that authorities can, and indeed must, step in to prevent the community and faith leaders perpetuating this practice. The approach of these faith leaders is likely to be through generating pressure on families who might otherwise turn away from FGM for their daughters.

Currently, anyone inciting the carrying out of FGM can be prosecuted for incitement, regardless of whether the underlying substantive offence is committed or attempted, under Sections 44 to 46 of the Serious Crime Act 2007. I understand that the CPS believes that there is no need to create a new offence on the basis that legislation already exists to criminalise incitement. However, the purpose of this amendment is to clarify the law to make it clear that even indirect promotion of FGM by community and religious leaders could be dealt with under the law. It is not difficult to imagine how religious leaders might stop short of incitement but nevertheless through general persuasion and comments as leaders of these communities might indeed lead families to be fearful if they do not comply with the religious standards of their history.

It is relevant to note that the Local Government Association strongly believes that there is a case for this amendment and for bringing the offence of promoting or encouraging FGM into the 2003 Act so that it sits alongside the offence of practising FGM itself. This would help law enforcement officers and legal practitioners with no prior experience of FGM to locate the offence. It is no good if some offence is there if the key people are not aware of it. We know that the Modern Slavery Bill has the similar aim of consolidating and clarifying the relevant legislation. I think it is a very good example to follow.

I hope very much that the Government will agree that this is such an important and yet difficult area of law that our amendment is justified. I beg to move.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I had intended to put my name to this amendment, but I am afraid I was rather busy last week and did not in fact remember to do so. I strongly support the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher.

Perhaps noble Lords will permit me to tell a short story. Yesterday evening I was one of eight judges for the “Speak Out” competition for 15 year-olds across the whole of London and Essex. We had 15 brilliant 15 year-olds, and each had to speak between one and three minutes on the subject of their choice. One girl of 15 stood up and talked about female genital mutilation. It was an absolutely brilliant speech. Unfortunately, she did not win, but it was absolutely breathtaking that a 15 year-old could be telling us what we should be doing about it. She was utterly shocked that we were not effective in stopping this happening—this absolutely abhorrent crime, which is hitting so many young girls nowadays in this country because they are being taken to other countries, or even it is being done here.

Anything—absolutely anything—that can encourage the public who are part of this system, or who know about this system, to be reminded that it is a crime should be taken forward. Anyone who might be involved in this in any way, perhaps as a member of a family where one member may be considering taking the girl to Sudan or to South Sudan or wherever else it may be, should now say, “Just be very careful, as this is something that is not acceptable in this country, either for those living here or those coming in or out”.

I do hope that the Minister will see that this has all sorts of values. That is to say that it has the value of actually dealing with the offence of encouraging or assisting the promotion of this abhorrent practice and, secondly, it would send out a powerful message that those who are around those who do it are possibly in danger of criminal offences themselves. I really hope the Government will pick this one up.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Meacher]

The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, introduced his amendment extremely effectively and has said all that needs to be said, but I would hate the Minister to think that there was no support for it. Therefore, I simply say that we need these charges to be investigated and pursued, and if victims are not given anonymity, it seems an impossible task. I hope that the Minister will be able to support the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, as well as my amendment.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

I also support the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Rosser. I meant to say so earlier, but forgot.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

40CB: After Clause 64, insert the following new Clause—
“Offence of abduction of child by other person
In the Child Abduction Act 1984, in section 2(1) (offence of abduction of child by other person), for “sixteen” substitute “eighteen”.”

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, we move to a different subject, that of child abduction. There are two separate amendments. The first one, Amendment 40CB, deals with an anomaly—that there are two separate Acts, which deal differently with children or young people. If the child is in care, and the care order goes beyond the age of 16, under Section 49 of the Children Act 1989 the offence of abduction runs to the age of 18. But under the Child Abduction Act 1984, which incorporates the Hague convention of 1980, the age goes to 16. There is therefore an anomaly. The point of the amendment is simply to have parity, and the parity should go up rather than go down.

The second amendment, Amendment 40CC, will take a little longer to explain. It deals with what is called a “child abduction warning order”. This was once called a “harbouring order”. It has been a very useful, but inadequate, tool of the police. In particular, where they have seen a teenager being groomed, they have gone to the man concerned, and they have explained to him that he must obey an order not to have anything to do with the girl. However, if he breaks that order, they have absolutely no powers at all. Consequently the police are very anxious that their useful order to try and interrupt a grooming process for young girls, in particular, should in fact have a statutory backing. The next stage is an arrest under either Section 49 of the Children Act 1989 or Section 2 of the Child Abduction Act 1984.

However, there is a gap between the police telling someone, “Lay off this girl, you’re grooming her and you mustn’t do it”, and the point at which the girl has either been detained or taken, when it is quite simply too late. What is therefore needed is the police power—which they use—but put on to a basis that they can then enforce. If the man concerned does not desist from his grooming of the girl, he can then be dealt with under a statutory order. One of the problems about the words in the two Acts of “detained” or “taken” is that quite often it is a psychological or emotional relationship between the girl, who is often much younger, and the man, which is not capable of being treated as coming within either of the two relevant sections. Therefore the warning order could do a lot of good, and it would be useful. I hope the Government will take this away and look at it. It is definitely what the police want, it would give a real bit of power to them and it would fill a serious gap in the possibility of young people being abducted, particularly by older men. I beg to move.

[Baroness Walmsley]

My Lords, I support both these amendments. I recently sat as a member of a Back-Bench inquiry into the legislation used to tackle sexual exploitation, which was supported very ably by Barnardo’s. We took oral evidence from a number of police forces. There was unanimous support for putting these child abduction notices on a statutory footing, which formed part of our recommendations. At present they form no more than an administrative procedure for the police—useful, I am told, for collecting evidence for the future, scaring perpetrators and letting them know that the police are watching them but, in and of themselves, pretty toothless.

Of course, there is existing legislation for child abduction offences. Sometimes, perpetrators who breach warning notices are prosecuted under this other legislation. But the current legislation is often not useful for cases of grooming, because it requires that the adult has taken or detained the child, implying physical control or restraint. We know that psychological and emotional manipulation are the main tools used by perpetrators to control and groom vulnerable children. The Crown Prosecution Service is therefore not always able to take prosecutions forward, due to the child seeming willingly to remain with the offender, when the offender makes no act physically to detain the child. Creating an offence of breaching a notice would address this issue and allow the police to intervene earlier, rather than having to wait for a more serious offence to occur when, of course, what we want is for them to be able to intervene early.

While the police find child abduction warning notices a valuable tool, their lack of a statutory basis leads to an unfortunate consequence. Police told the inquiry about occasions when they issued notices as a deterrent but were then unable to act once they were breached. If they are to have any power in these situations, all concerned need to know that the police will and can act when their instructions are clearly ignored. Instead, the current situation erodes victims’ confidence in the ability of the police to protect them— and they have told us that. Of course, perpetrators’ fear of consequences will diminish when they see police unable to act. So we need to put this on a statutory basis.

In relation to bringing the age into parity between children in and out of care, the point was made by the children who spoke to us that children’s vulnerability is not determined by their membership of a particular group or their legal status. There are many profoundly vulnerable children who are not in the care system and who need the protection of the law. We heard from some of those girls and boys. Indeed, there are many more victims of sexual exploitation who are not in care and have not been in care than there are within it. During the course of the inquiry, we met some children who have been through some appalling things who had never been in care. While it is too late for them, we need to make sure that other profoundly vulnerable young people who happen to be living with their parents have the same protection as those under the state’s care.

The Government have shown real engagement with the inquiry’s findings so far, and I am delighted that they have adopted one of the inquiry’s recommendations by tabling an amendment to the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill on the topic of grooming. It is clear that these amendments on abduction would be another strong step towards giving the police the tools that they need to prevent some truly vile behaviour.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

Again, this has been an interesting debate, and I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in it. Child exploitation is an abhorrent crime and we are determined to tackle it in whatever form it takes. The findings of a recent parliamentary inquiry, of which noble Lords will be aware, chaired by Sarah Champion MP and supported by Barnardo’s, have been very helpful in contributing to the ongoing work being done by the Government to tackle child sexual exploitation. The recommendations of that inquiry will be crucial in helping to inform our policy and improve our understanding of this form of offending and, indeed, what more we should be doing about it. Specifically, the inquiry received significant evidence relating to child abduction warning notices and, as a result, this issue featured prominently in their report and is now the subject of these two amendments.

It might help if I updated noble Lords on government thinking in this area as at present. This Government have already taken clear action to tackle child sexual exploitation. As the Committee will recall, as part of the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, we are introducing a number of new police powers. First, we are providing for more effective civil prevention orders, namely the new sexual harm prevention order and the sexual risk order. Secondly, new powers will allow the police to require hotels and similar establishments to provide information about guests whom they believe may be involved in sexual exploitation. Thirdly, we are bringing in strengthened powers for police to close premises associated with child sexual exploitation, a provision championed by the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, who cannot be in her place today but for whose support on this matter I am very grateful.

With regard to child abduction warning notices, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, for articulating the case for putting these notices on a statutory footing. The Government note that proposals to strengthen the impact of these orders have the support of the police, legal experts, representatives of local agencies, young people who have been affected by sexual exploitation, children’s charities and others. As part of the work of the National Group on Sexual Violence against Children and Vulnerable People, my ministerial colleagues have given assurances that the Home Office would look at the effectiveness of the existing child abduction warning notices and, in liaison with police colleagues, examine how best this tool can be used in future. In doing so, we will consider carefully the operational benefits of putting these notices on a statutory footing and how such a statutory scheme might operate. We are currently consulting carefully with policing colleagues to seek their views on the potential use of a statutory notice and whether, in their view, further changes are required to better protect children.

Amendment 40CC is an important contribution to this debate. The existing non-statutory child abduction warning notices are issued by the police. That is entirely appropriate where breach of a notice is not, of itself, a criminal offence. But it would be an unusual step for the police themselves to impose what amounts to a restraint order or injunction, breach of which is a criminal offence. If we made it statutory, we would have to consider that. Compare, for example, restraint orders under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 which are granted by the courts. Other civil preventive orders, such as serious crime prevention orders and gang injunctions which are dealt with elsewhere in this Bill, are also subject to judicial oversight. We would need to see how that played in with the current arrangements of non-statutory warning notices.

Other issues that we need to consider are the test for the grant of an order, the prohibitions or restrictions that may be attached to an order and the penalty for breach. I note, too, that the amendment requires a child to have been found two or more times in the company of the person to be made the subject of an order. Elsewhere, the inquiry proposed amending the grooming offence in Section 15 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 to remove the requirement for a second contact with the child. The Government have now tabled an amendment to the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill to that end, as my noble friend Lady Walmsley said. We need to consider whether the approach taken in child abduction warning notices should mirror that in the amended grooming offence.

Amendment 40CB seeks to raise the age threshold from 16 to 18 years for the child abduction offence in Section 2 of the Child Abduction Act 1984, bringing it into line with the summary offence in Section 49 of the Children Act 1989 of abducting a child in care. Children in care are particularly vulnerable and that is why the Children Act 1989 makes it an offence to take any child who is in care, including a 16 or 17 year-old, away from the person responsible for them without lawful authority or reasonable excuse. However, while we recognise the arguments made for consistency, there are contrary arguments and difficult issues raised. Young people aged 16 and 17 can live independently of their parents and, in many respects, are able to make their own decisions about how they live their life, including their sexual relationships. It is in recognition of this that the Child Abduction Act 1984 applies only where the child is under 16 and the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction ceases to operate when the child reaches the age of 16 years.

However, we are committed to examining the case for placing child abduction warning notices on a statutory footing. The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, has made a reasoned case for doing so and it deserves serious consideration. All speakers tended to favour the idea that statutory footing for the child abduction warning notices should be considered. While Report stage is some three months off, I cannot say to noble Lords that we will have completed our review by that point. I can undertake to update the House on progress and, of course, noble Lords are free to bring back the amendment, or a variation of it, at the next stage. I hope that I will be able to update noble Lords on how the Government have progressed arguments. Clearly, the debate we have had today will be helpful.

I cannot say the same in connection with Amendment 40CB. That amendment would have significant wider implications and for the reasons I have given I am not persuaded of the case for that particular change. However, given what I have said, I hope that the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, in proposing the amendment at the beginning of this debate, will feel free to withdraw the amendments tabled in her name and that I will have the opportunity when we return to this subject of updating noble Lords accordingly.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, first, I thank everyone who has spoken in this short debate. It has been extremely helpful. Perhaps I might ask the Minister whether he thinks my contribution on warning notices was as helpful as that of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser—because it was actually my amendment. Not to worry, but I could not resist saying that.

Secondly, on the warning notice, I am well aware that it would be extremely unlikely that the police would have the power to issue a criminal notice of that sort—although in other circumstances, of course, they issue cautions, which have a very significant effect without ever going through a court. However, if an offender does not accept a police notice and continues to groom, I could see the advantages of a very speedy application to the magistrates’ court. That seems to me to be the answer to that particular problem. The magistrates could then issue the appropriate order, which the offender would have to comply with. That might be the right way round—I did not go in to all that.

As for the age of 18, having spent many years on the Hague Convention, I am well aware that on international abductions the age of 16 applies right across the world. Nearly 200 countries have signed up to that, including of course ourselves. However, this is abduction of a rather different sort, within the United Kingdom. It is just as dangerous and just as worrying as international abduction. We only have to look at the press reports of the cases in Rotherham and Rochdale, without going into Luton or Oxford or other places where there was grooming of girls, to know that a considerable number of those girls were not in care. Some of the girls and some of the parents were seeking help; and some of the girls probably were over 16. Therefore the vulnerability of the young is not limited to those within the care system.

I can see very well that it would be quite wrong to change the 1984 Act to include international abduction. However, I ask the Minister to reflect on whether that would not meet some of the really shocking issues that have occurred across not only the north of England but the Midlands and, relatively, the south of England. The vulnerable children there may need help beyond the age of 16. It is not beyond the wit of parliamentary draftsmen to put in an amendment to the 1984 Act dealing with grooming in England and Wales that may lead to abduction and not going across the international child abduction arrangements, which of course we follow in exactly the same way as every other country. Having made those points, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 40CB withdrawn.

Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Thursday 12th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I am delighted to do so. I also congratulate my noble friend on seeing some seven years’ campaigning in this House brought to success in such a Bill. It is definitely a matter in which the Home Secretary herself is very much involved. I am sure that all noble Lords will welcome the Bill when it arrives here later in the year.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I, too, congratulate the Government on the Bill, but will they reconsider their omission of the supply chain from its contents?

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I do not want this to be a self-congratulatory Question, but the noble and learned Baroness has been instrumental through her leadership of the pre-legislative scrutiny in presenting the Government with opportunities to consider aspects of the Bill, many of which have of course been incorporated. Yesterday, the Home Secretary met representatives of the British retail industry. It was a very successful meeting. As the noble Baroness will know, we believe that the best way of tackling supply-chain abuse is through a code that all retailers will sign up to.

Immigration Bill

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Monday 12th May 2014 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

As an amendment to Motion A, at end to insert “but do propose Amendment 16B in lieu”.

16B: Before Clause 60, insert the following new Clause—
“Report on provision of child trafficking guardians for child victims of trafficking in human beings
Within twelve months of the date of dissolution of the current Parliament, the Secretary of State shall report to both Houses of Parliament on the provision of child trafficking guardians for child victims of trafficking in human beings.”

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I put down this amendment during a period of intense discussions last week in order to make it possible to continue the discussions with the Minister, the Home Secretary herself and the lawyers in the Home Office. I am absolutely delighted with the prospect of these pilots; the sooner they come into effect, the better. I am entirely happy with what the Minister has said: it covered every aspect of what my amendment says, but in the right place. I recognise that it is much better to have this enabling clause, together with a report by the Home Secretary in the modern slavery Bill, when it comes before both Houses of Parliament.

With that, I thank first the legal team in the Home Office, particularly the senior legal member of that team, Harry Carter, who could not have been more helpful to me. I am very grateful for the discussions with the Home Secretary and was particularly grateful to get just the e-mail I needed over the weekend from the noble Lord the Minister from Lincolnshire. With all of that, I beg to move and shall subsequently beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon (Lab)]

I wish to speak on this amendment—forgive me for being so tardy—as I just wish to place certain things on record.

I support the amendment tabled by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and am deeply disappointed and irritated by the amendment tabled by the Minister. While the noble Lord has just set out his reasons for not accepting the original amendment tabled by the noble and learned Baroness, the only reason given by the House of Commons was one of financial privilege. As has been said on other occasions, when the Government use financial privilege as the reason for rejecting amendments in the Lords, it too often looks as though the Government simply do not have sufficiently strong arguments to counter the just and moral reasons given by the Lords. Yes, I well understand that it is the Speaker who decides whether or not financial privilege should be applied, but the Government could have asked the House to waive financial privilege and chose not to do so.

This is frustrating for us but, more importantly, it has real implications for the small number of vulnerable children who are subjected to the evils of trafficking. These children have suffered the worst kind of traumatic experiences and they are desperately in need of a guardian, appointed on a statutory basis, to accompany them,

“throughout the entire process until a durable solution in the best interests of the child has been identified and implemented”.

On the subject of financial privilege, I ask the Minister to provide us with the Government’s computation of the predicted costs of the amendment that was rejected in the Commons.

Again I place on record my thanks for the extraordinary diligence and dogged determination of the noble and learned Baroness and the noble Lord, Lord McColl of Dulwich, to get justice for trafficked children. I also say to the Minister that I still do not understand why the Government have been so reluctant to act before now, why they could not have agreed to amendments in earlier Bills and why there was no provision for guardians in the draft modern slavery Bill. I know that pilots have now been announced, but if that has been the Government's intention for some time, why was there not an enabling clause in the draft Bill? I am pleased that the Government clearly now intend to introduce an enabling clause by amendment, but they could have done so much more.

In the absence of the amendment passed by this House, an enabling clause in the modern slavery Bill is welcome, but what would trigger that enabling power? Despite what the noble Lord just said, I am still slightly concerned about the statutory basis for the scheme. I want to be absolutely clear that, when a guardian feels the need to give instructions to a lawyer where a child is incapable of doing so, that lawyer will have the statutory basis to be empowered to represent the views of that child. Can the Minister give that assurance?

I also have a question about the timings. Could the Minister confirm that the trial will start on 1 July? Could he further tell the House when the pilots are due to end? As he would understand, it would be unacceptable if, when it came to the report that is in the amendment of the noble and learned Baroness, the Government were able to say that they had not had time to assess the outcomes of the pilots. I want to ensure that the timescale works.

The Minister in the other place said that the trial would cover 23 local authorities. Will all trafficked children be placed within those authorities, so that all trafficked children are covered by the trial?

I will mention one thing that may seem a bit pernickety. I was slightly concerned by some of the reasons given by the Minister in the other place for rejecting the noble and learned Baroness’s earlier amendment. He said one reason was that it dealt only with children under immigration control and that he wished in the modern slavery Bill to craft provisions covering all trafficked children. Of course, there was nothing to prevent the Government accepting the amendment and then repealing the provision if necessary when replacing it with a clause in the modern slavery Bill.

As I said, I welcome the fact that the Government are now introducing an enabling clause, but I am frustrated that it has taken such a long time. I am also rather frustrated that, in the end, the Government took the advice from the Speaker that financial privilege should be attached to this specific amendment. Sometimes, of course there are questions of money but in this case the money is negligible. Sometimes there are questions of politics but this issue has had cross-party support throughout. I am just frustrated that it has taken so long to get to where we are. Of course, I trust what the Minister said. I just seek clarification on the various questions I asked.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I will certainly recommend that that is the case. It seems essential that we make sure that we know how the trials fit in with people who, under existing arrangements, carry out responsibilities connected with this area. They are diverse, as my noble friend points out. The border agency, the police and local authorities are all involved in this area, and getting them to work in a proper and co-operative fashion to make a success of this project is essential.

I thank all noble Lords for their contributions today, inside and outside the Chamber. We are bound to return to this issue in detail as time goes by. In the mean time, I hope that the noble and learned Baroness will agree to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, for the second time this afternoon, I apologise to the House, and particularly to the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, for trying to cut short any discussion—it has been extremely interesting and very constructive.

I will say two things about the Government. First, I am very glad that we got so far; that seems to me to be a real step forward. I thank the Minister and the Home Secretary for the fact that the dreaded issue of finance being raised in the Commons did not frustrate us in having a really constructive discussion with which finance had absolutely nothing to do. The Government are therefore really to be congratulated for being prepared to talk to the noble Lord, Lord McColl, and myself despite that issue having been raised in the other place. I am very grateful for that.

Immigration Bill

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Monday 7th April 2014 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

55A: Before Clause 64, insert the following new Clause—
“Child trafficking guardians for all potential child victims of trafficking in human beings
(1) If a relevant child has arrived in the United Kingdom and is a potential victim of trafficking in human beings, an independent child trafficking guardian shall be appointed to represent the best interests of that child.
(2) The child trafficking guardian shall have the following responsibilities to—
(a) advocate that all decisions relating to the child are made in the child’s best interest;(b) ascertain the child’s wishes and feelings in relation to those decisions;(c) advocate for the child to receive appropriate care, safe accommodation, medical treatment, including psychological assistance, education, translation and interpretation services as required;(d) assist the child to access legal and other representation where necessary, including, where appropriate, to appoint and instruct legal representatives on all matters relevant to the interests of the child;(e) consult with, advise and keep the child informed of legal rights;(f) keep the child informed of all relevant immigration, criminal, compensation, community care, public law or other proceedings;(g) contribute to identification of a plan to safeguard and promote a durable solution for the child based on an individual assessment of that child’s best interests;(h) provide a link between the child and various statutory and other bodies who may provide services to the child, accompanying the child to any relevant meetings; (i) assist in establishing contact with the child’s family, where the child so wishes and it is in the child’s best interests;(j) where appropriate liaise with an immigration officer handling the child’s case in conjunction with the child’s legal representative;(k) accompany the child to all interviews with the police, the immigration authorities and care proceedings;(l) accompany the child to any court proceedings; and(m) accompany the child whenever the child moves to new accommodation.(3) A child trafficking guardian must have completed the training required in subsection (7) and may be—
(a) an employee of a statutory body except for an employee of a local authority;(b) an employee of a recognised charitable organisation; or(c) a volunteer for a recognised charitable organisation.(4) A person discharging duties as a child trafficking guardian shall not discharge any other statutory duties in relation to a child for whom they are providing assistance under this section.
(5) Where a child trafficking guardian is appointed under subsection (1), the authority of the child trafficking guardian in relation to the child shall be recognised by any relevant body.
(6) In subsection (5), a “relevant body” means a person or organisation—
(a) which provides services to the child; or(b) to which a child makes an application for services; or(c) to which the child needs access in relation to being a victim of human trafficking; or(d) any court or tribunal that a child engages with.(7) The Secretary of State shall by order—
(a) set out the arrangements for the appointment of a child trafficking guardian immediately after a child is identified as a potential victim of trafficking in human beings;(b) set out requirements for the training courses to be completed before a person may exercise functions as a child trafficking guardian;(c) set out the arrangements for the supervision of persons discharging duties as a child trafficking guardian;(d) set out the arrangements for the provision of support services for persons discharging duties as a child trafficking guardian; and(e) designate organisations as a “recognised charitable organisation” for the purpose of this section.(8) A person’s appointment as a child trafficking guardian for a particular child under this section shall come to an end if—
(a) the child reaches the age of 21; or(b) the child leaves the United Kingdom.(9) In this section, a child is considered to be a “potential victim of trafficking in human beings” when a referral has been made to a competent authority for a determination under the identification process required by Article 10 of the Trafficking Convention (Identification of Victims) and there has not been a conclusive determination that the individual is not such a victim.
(10) For the purposes of subsection (9), an individual will not be considered to have received a conclusive determination that the individual is not a victim of trafficking in human beings if—
(a) an individual is appealing or seeking judicial review of the conclusive determination; and(b) the appeal or judicial review is not completed.(11) In this section—
“competent authority” means a person who is a competent authority of the United Kingdom for the purposes of the Trafficking Convention;
“relevant child” means a person who is under the age of 18 and who—
(a) requires leave to remain in the United Kingdom whether or not such leave has been granted; or(b) is a national of an EEA state other than the United Kingdom;“the Trafficking Convention” means the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings (done at Warsaw on 16 May 2005);
“trafficking in human beings” has the same meaning as in the Trafficking Convention.”

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, as your Lordships will see, I have formidable names supporting me on this amendment. I should declare that I am a trustee of the Human Trafficking Foundation and the co-chairman of the parliamentary group on slavery and human trafficking.

We all know that slavery and trafficking of victims are wicked crimes. When the victims are children and young people under 18, the horror of those crimes reaches a new dimension. Amendments 55A and 62A are designed to alleviate to some extent, but never entirely eliminate, the consequences of the effect of being trafficked into this country or through the United Kingdom. Children are particularly vulnerable to exploitation. Children of all ages, from babies to teenagers, are brought into this country by traffickers, who use them or pass them on to other traffickers. Kent Police, for instance, prevented several foreign children being exported to France. Girls and boys are exploited in the sex trade—as I say, it is boys as well as girls. There are children working a seven-day week as domestic servants or begging on the streets and the Tube, having been trained, Fagin-style, to thieve. Some of the boys who I saw running up and down the Edgware Road were, I was told by the Metropolitan Police, called mobile surfers. Your Lordships might tell your children and grandchildren, “Don’t leave your mobile on the table because a child will run in and pick it up, come out and throw it to someone else”. They are the ones called mobile surfers. There are Vietnamese boys cultivating cannabis farms, of which there are 7,000 to 8,000 in the United Kingdom, and there are other forms of forced labour.

The United Kingdom has signed up to the Council of Europe convention and the European Union directive against the trafficking of human beings. The previous Government, and the present Government, have put in place strategies for helping victims and the proposed modern slavery Bill will, I hope, make a breakthrough in the conviction of traffickers and the support of victims. It is, however, a sad reflection on successive Governments that the help for foreign children brought to the United Kingdom and identified as victims is less appropriate and less effective than it is for adults. They are treated as unaccompanied children and looked after under the provisions of the children legislation. A few are subject to care orders, which would involve a CAFCASS guardian for the period of the court hearings only. Most are accommodated under Section 20 of the Children Act 1989 and the local authority with which the child is placed does not have parental responsibility for the child. Moreover, a teenager over 16—many of them are brought into this country—is above the age for a care order.

These children and young people under 18 have been removed from their own country, family and home to a foreign country where most of them do not speak English. Some do not even know which country they are in. If they are lucky, they will be picked up by UK Visas and Immigration at the airport or port. However, others who are found later, particularly the Vietnamese boys who look after the cannabis farms, are treated by the police and the CPS as criminals and not as victims. Trafficked children are vulnerable to being retrafficked and a distressing number go missing before the social workers have even identified them as trafficked victims, so most local authorities do not even know which of their missing children are victims. These children have presumably been removed by the traffickers and many do not get found again.

Many children will have been subjected to the worst kinds of abuse imaginable. They may be traumatised, confused, disorientated and facing a bewildering variety of people who do not speak their language. Yet they are expected to cope with immigration officers, the police, social workers and other agencies, including the law. Some of them are groomed by their traffickers to give a false story. There are also cultural as well as linguistic barriers, a suspicion of public authorities and an unawareness of their rights. They need support, sympathy, continuity of care and, almost certainly, counselling or therapy or other medical and psychological care. Most need schooling. They are pushed from pillar to post, telling their story again and again in order to access welfare, medical and legal assistance. No one person—no identifiable friendly face—is there to whom they can turn throughout this period of their ordeal.

The purpose of these amendments is to give these children that one person who can be mentor, friend and support and a stable person in the lives of these unhappy, traumatised and ill treated young people. The first amendment sets out the duties of a child trafficking guardian. There are certain basic requirements. The guardian must be appointed as soon as the child is identified as a potential victim of trafficking and not 24 or 48 hours later, when the child may already have gone missing. The same person must be there until the conclusion of all the inquiries and the child is settled. The guardian must be the link for the child with all the agencies and make the arrangements in the best interests of the child. Perhaps most important of all is the requirement that the guardian has statutory authority in order to have the right to information about the trafficked child from, for instance, the police, social services and the NHS. It is also important to bear in mind that the role defined by Amendment 55A is not that of a social worker. Quite apart from anything else, the international best practice that defines the role of a guardian makes it clear that this role must be discharged by someone who is not involved in providing statutory services to them beyond the child trafficking guardian advocacy services. This makes the role quite different from that of a social worker.

The number of children involved is quite small compared with the 66,000 who go into care. There were 372 such children in 2012, according to the national referral mechanism. It would therefore not need a large number of guardians or a great financial outlay. However, the cost may not now be a major consideration in the light of the current government proposal for child specialist advocates, to which I now turn.

--- Later in debate ---

On the request of the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, that my noble friend Lord Attlee write to interested Peers to explain which elements of these amendments would be covered by the specialist independent child trafficking advocates, on 26 March he wrote a letter, which a number of noble Lords will have received, setting out the roles and responsibilities of the specialist advocates.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

I did not get it.

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I am sorry if that was the case. I was hoping that all noble Lords here would have seen it. A copy of the letter was placed in the Library.

I can say that these roles are almost all entirely aligned. The specialist advocates that we are trialling from July will be a consistent point of contact for the child. They will accompany the child to meetings and support the local authority to assess the child’s needs, and promote the child’s safety and well-being. They will support the child in relation to children’s social care, immigration and criminal justice systems and, importantly, they will play a role in key decisions relating to the child trafficking victim.

There are, however, two important suggestions. First, our proposals go further. Child trafficking is child abuse. It is vital that we ensure that all victims, who deserve to be helped to recover from the trauma of this hateful crime, receive the support that they need. The Rochdale and Oxford cases have shown that the trafficking of children extends its vile reach much further than purely those being trafficked across borders. I hope that noble Lords will appreciate that. I assure my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe on this. That is why the trial of specialist independent advocates goes wider than the proposed amendment. The support in the amendment will be given only to those trafficked across borders; under our proposals, the support will be not only for those children but for those trafficked internally in the UK as well. Secondly, our advocates will support children, as I have said. Under the amendments before us, these guardians will support adults up to the age of 21 and would not therefore be focused on the needs of the child as our advocates will be.

I assure noble Lords that progress on setting up the trial has been swift. We will be in a position later this week—it is a pity it is not today; I am having to argue with the knowledge that the situation will be made clearer during the course of this week—to announce which organisation, which I am sure will be well known to noble Lords, will be delivering the child trafficking advocacy service, which will commence on 1 July 2014 across 23 different local authorities.

There are differing views on and evidence about the best way to support these incredibly vulnerable children, and we have heard some of those discussed this afternoon. To ensure that we take the right action to deliver the best outcomes for these children, we consider it essential that we are given the opportunity to assess whether the introduction of the specialist child trafficking advocates will make the difference we hope and believe it will, but we need evidence in order to discuss how to roll the project out. That is why we are commissioning an independent evaluation of the trial. An evaluator will be in place by June and will report six months after the trial commences, and again when the trial concludes.

As my noble friend Lord Attlee made clear on 19 March, this will enable us to consider the impact of the specialist independent child trafficking advocates, as well as how the scheme worked, during the passage of the modern slavery Bill, which should be before one or other of our two Houses of Parliament. The modern slavery Bill is a much better place to make these changes. I think most noble Lords understand that that is a Bill that is specifically about this issue. The trafficking of children is not just a migration issue. By making amendments to this Bill, we risk conflating the whole business of immigration with the issue of trafficking and creating a gap for children who are trafficked within the UK.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

No, we will not have information on the trials within a few days. We will have information about how the trials are being set up and the evaluation of the trials. That is what we will have available within the next few days. It is important that we wait until then before we make a decision on this matter, but I assure noble Lords that they will be informed when an announcement is made. It cannot be made at the moment because of the ways in which the Government actually organise these affairs, but it will be made very shortly. It will be this week, and within the next few days.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I do not doubt the good intentions of the Government. I should like to have seen that letter before I prepared what I was going to say to your Lordships’ House. I did not know that the letter existed, so I did not go to the Library to ask about it. I suspect that there are others in the same situation. That really does put us in grave difficulties when we are putting forward amendments.

However, perhaps much more importantly, I am a member of the Joint Committee on the Draft Modern Slavery Bill, and three different government Ministers came to speak to us, together with endless government officials at different times, but nobody told us about this. The first I knew of it was the press release. The Joint Committee was sitting until the end of last week and yet, oddly enough, we were not even told about it last week. We knew through the press release. You might have thought that it was relevant for the Joint Committee on the Draft Modern Slavery Bill to be told about it, but we were not told. I read the press release that dealt with care proceedings in immigration. It did not deal with any of the other matters that the Minister told us about. I do not doubt his good intentions, but it is interesting that we have it on Monday this week, rather than last week.

If I may respectfully say so, it looks as though the Government are scrabbling a bit to meet this amendment. If this really matters to the Government, it is odd that there is nothing in the modern slavery Bill, not even enabling powers, to allow for the production of statutory guidance, if that was the appropriate thing. The statement that there will be a statutory guardian does not have to be in the Bill, but the words that the Secretary of State could provide for such a guardian could be included. That did not come to us last week. I ask noble Lords to reflect on what is going on here when today is the first day I have heard about it, the Select Committee has never heard about it and even the press release had only part of what we are told today, although it was quite a long press release.

What is the real difference between what the Government are offering and what the amendment is saying? The difference is the statutory power. We were told again and again in our Select Committee about the absence of a statutory power for an advocate or a guardian. The word is unimportant and the title does not matter; it is the job that matters. The job is being offered by the Minister, but the Select Committee was told that if you have no statutory power, there is no obligation on any agency—social services, the police, the CPS for the Vietnamese boys who are being prosecuted or the NHS—to deliver to that advocate the information the advocate needs. The advocate will not have any powers in going to advise in immigration procedures or to talk to the UK Human Trafficking Centre, and so on and so forth.

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I do not wish to interrupt the noble and learned Baroness, but I made it quite clear that advocates would have those powers. For these trials, they do not require a statute. They will have the right to represent that child at any meeting—immigration, criminal or of any description. I have tried to make that quite clear.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

My Lords, I hesitate to disagree with the Minister, but where do the powers come from if there is no statutory basis? He referred to Scotland. The Select Committee heard very interesting evidence from a number of people from Scotland. They told us that in Scotland all the trafficked children are in Glasgow. There is one police force which works very closely with the local authorities. They can make it work in Glasgow. They told us very clearly, particularly one of the MSPs, that they did not think it would work in England because England is not one place. England is a lot of rural communities, urban communities and big cities where the police may not have heard of this, so when the advocate who has no statutory power goes to the police somewhere in the north-east of England they will say, “Get lost”. I can very well see it. In the absence of statutory powers, I do not see what good intentions will do. If the Government would accept in principle what we are asking for, there is no reason why the other place cannot improve it on such matters as the Secretary of State, who is not in the amendment, but we need to have the House with us to get the very basics.

I remind noble Lords that children are worse off than adults at the moment. We are not talking about English children from Rotherham, Rochdale, Luton and Oxford. We are talking about foreign children who are trafficked into this country without the language and not even knowing which country they are in. Many, if not most, of the children do not go through the care system. If they are only accommodated, the degree of social work help is limited. A CAFCASS guardian is not appointed. They do not go through the court system. Consequently, these children are outside the system. These children need the help that those who go through the care system get.

I recognise the points that the noble Baroness, Lady Howarth, whom I treat as one of my closest friends, is making. I would prefer to see one of the major charities take this on, rather than independent volunteers, because that would have a basis of efficiency that would make me feel a lot happier. She is right about a mentoring or supervisory system for guardians: I should like to see that. Those things are important but they are details that one could put together once it is on the statute book.

The noble Lord, Lord Quirk, pointed out the interesting issue of domicile, which I had almost forgotten about. It arises in divorce, where it hardly ever matters, but to my recollection—and that of the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan—it does not arise in the Children Act 1989 or any other child legislation where there is an issue of residence. Consequently, the answer is that if a child leaves the country they are no longer resident.

I see no difficulty in a legal guardian or advocate—I do not mind about the word—working with social workers. CAFCASS, which is an independent, nationwide organisation run by the state, works perfectly well with social workers. Why can an independent child trafficking guardian system not do the same, so long as it has the statutory basis that the social workers have to treat it seriously?

I could make a great many other points but we are, as the noble Lord, Lord McColl, will remember, being asked for the fourth time not to pursue this. Why is this? It is because of half measures. I would prefer it in the modern slavery Bill but the Government are not offering it there. Let us, consequently, get it into some legislation. If the Government accept it, they can put it into the modern slavery Bill and we do not have to have it in the Immigration Bill. We need the view of the House that this is what should happen. I beg leave to test the opinion of the House.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Baroness Butler-Sloss]

62A: Clause 73, page 57, line 7, after “58” insert “, section (Child trafficking guardians for all potential child victims of trafficking in human beings)”

Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill

Baroness Butler-Sloss Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scotland of Asthal (Lab)]

My Lords, I commend the noble Lord and the Government on their efforts on forced marriage—particularly the Minister for having taken the trouble to go and see the Forced Marriage Unit, with which I am sure he was impressed. I also thank the Government for listening so carefully to what has been said on this side of the House about this offence, which all of us understand can be of the most heinous nature, particularly when it involves those who lack capacity.

What guidance on implementation, which the Minister spoke about, will prosecutors receive on how to prosecute the offence of forced marriage? The noble Lord will remember that in Committee I raised a number of issues regarding how the prosecutions would take place. I regret that I was not here on Report to continue those questions, but perhaps the Minister could answer some of my questions today—not least because I have now had the advantage of receiving a note on prosecutions which was kindly sent to me. The note simply outlines how any prosecution may be undertaken. It would first go to the police; the police would then refer it to the prosecutor who would apply the two prosecutorial tests, et cetera. I absolutely understand the generality of prosecution, but perhaps the noble Lord will allow us a greater degree of specificity about how this offence will be prosecuted. I know that that is very much awaited among many of the NGOs and others, which are still worried and perplexed. They are concerned not only that the prosecution of these offences will entail the proof of the substantive offence—which would amount to coercion, violence or threats—but that there would be the additional barrier of forced marriage with a lesser offence. I know that the Government take that very seriously.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, as chairman of a forced marriage commission I thank the Government very much and congratulate them on adding this provision. We have been very concerned, from some of the evidence we have received, about the position of vulnerable people, adults as well as children. This is a good step forward. I also add my congratulations to the Forced Marriage Unit, which has over the years done some extremely good work, some of which I happen to know about. I hope that it will continue to get a great deal of support for the work it is doing.

[Lord Hope of Craighead (CB)]

My Lords, I add my appreciation of the work that the Minister has done with the Scottish Government to provide an amendment which is compatible with Scots law. Having read it carefully, I think that it is a very valuable addition to the armoury in Scots law to deal with this very difficult and obnoxious problem.