Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Coussins Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 18th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Coussins (CB)]

My Lords, I welcome the Bill’s provision to bring the victims’ code into primary legislation and want to flag up a few points relating to the first principle listed in the code, which is the victim’s right to understand and be understood, with access where necessary to interpretation and translation services. I declare my interests as co-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Modern Languages and vice-president of the Chartered Institute of Linguists.

The noble and learned Lord, Lord Bellamy, may remember that he was kind enough to meet me during the Brexit process, when I wanted to make sure that the Government retained the right to interpreting and translation for people suspected or accused of an offence, which was established by an EU directive in 2010 and subsequently transposed into domestic law. Happily, I was reassured. Since then, the MoJ has launched an independent review of the qualifications and experience required by court interpreters, which I hope will soon be published. The Bill provides another much-needed piece of the criminal justice jigsaw as far as language services go.

A victims’ code already exists, but as we know only too well from other areas of public services, non-statutory codes or guidance do not always guarantee the type or quality of service needed or intended—or even if they do, we do not necessarily know whether they do. For example, I asked a Written Question recently to try to find out who was responsible for monitoring compliance with the NHS England guidance on interpreting and translation services in primary healthcare. The answer was “No one—we do not monitor compliance”. It is a very welcome step forward that, in this Bill, not only will the code be statutory but there will be a duty on relevant bodies to promote awareness of it and a compliance monitoring framework.

However, it is not enough just to declare a right of access to language services if needed. As specified in the original EU directive, they must be of an appropriate professional quality. In other words, public service interpreters, or PSIs, must be qualified and experienced. They are specialist professionals and not a casual nice-to-have. There is little point engaging someone with a tip-top level 6 diploma in public service interpreting for a complex court case if they have never set foot in a court before and are unfamiliar with procedure or terminology. There is a well-known case from many years ago, which I am sure the Minister will recognise, that provides a good example of such danger. A woman was wrongly convicted of murder because it emerged on appeal that the so-called interpreter, who was inexperienced, had not known the difference between murder and manslaughter. It is also self-evident that an interpreter with the right languages should be engaged—and not someone turning up with fluent Latvian when Lithuanian is needed, or Punjabi instead of Gujarati. I am not making these examples up—they have all happened.

There will also be situations where the victim needs an interpreter whose professionalism and qualifications are combined with empathy and sensitivity. This might be provided only by someone of the same sex, given the intimacy of what that victim needs to describe in cases of sexual violence or exploitation. A requirement that interpreters should be on the National Register of Public Service Interpreters is also worth considering as a guarantee of standards. There must be no more situations in which a neighbour, friend, teenage child or court usher is asked to play the interpreter in lieu of a properly qualified and suitable professional.

I hope the Minister will say a little more about the compliance monitoring framework. Flexibility for bodies to choose how they meet the duty to promote awareness could easily result in unacceptable discrepancies from one area to another. I would prefer to see minimum standards and expectations clearly spelled out and specific reference to interpreting and translation services in the Bill.

An excellent precedent for setting standards and consistency is the police approved interpreters and translators scheme, or PAIT, launched in 2020. Instead of a hotchpotch of different police forces operating different systems, now most police regions in the UK mandate the same terms and conditions, and external provider agencies are monitored and regulated. I was therefore concerned to find out that the national manager for the PAIT scheme has not been involved in or consulted on the development of this Bill. I strongly urge the Minister to ensure that this happens. We must avoid a situation where different parts of the criminal justice system deal with language services in different ways and with different standards, criteria and guidance.

We will need better data collection, and swift updating and strengthening of the code and all the accompanying detailed regulations. All promotional materials, as well as the code, must be produced in a variety of languages. This would be an excellent topic for the joint thematic inspections envisaged under the Bill; I ask the Minister to consider that as soon as possible. If the Bill and the current review of courts and tribunals are to have the desired effect and lead to more consistent and effective language services, the MoJ will need urgently to put energy and resources into a serious campaign to improve the supply chain of public service interpreters, or this victims’ right will be nothing more than an empty shell.

Thousands of PSIs have left the profession because of poor levels of pay and conditions. Added to this, the post-Brexit Immigration Rules, especially with the new salary threshold, act as a major barrier to the PSI pipeline, most of whose practitioners are freelance. Will the Minister speak to his colleagues in the Home Office about this specific group of professionals? I look forward to his comments on all the issues I have raised.