Justice: Women’s Centres

Baroness Fall Excerpts

Wednesday 12th September 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fall (Con)]

My Lords, I echo others who thanked the right reverend Prelate for drawing our attention to the important contribution that women’s centres make in society today. I would also like to congratulate my noble friend on an excellent maiden speech; she will bring great energy and experience to this House.

We have around 3,800 women in our prisons, the vast majority held for non-violent offences. Many of them are serving short-term sentences; many go on to reoffend; and many are mothers. It is a destructive and costly cycle for the victims, the women involved, their children and society as a whole. The reoffending rates alone are truly shocking. The Prison Reform Trust says that 48% of women are reconvicted within a year of leaving prison, and that rises to 61% for sentences of less than 12 months. Many of the women we speak of are among the most vulnerable in our society and face a range of problems: financial trouble, homelessness and debt dependency. Some 60% have experienced domestic abuse; 66% are also mothers, many in sole charge of their children. What happens to those children when their mothers are sent to prison? Kate Paradine of Women in Prison suggests that only 5% of them remain in their own home, so a sentence for a mother often spells a broken home for her dependants. Evidence shows that the children of offenders are often more likely to go on to offend themselves, thus entrenching the problem for future generations.

There will always be a balance between punishment, protection of the public and rehabilitation in the criminal justice system. In the case of these women, we seem to be failing on all fronts. It is right, therefore, that we ask ourselves how best to break the cycle. That is a question the Government’s female offender strategy rightly seeks to answer. I commend its ambition and welcome its support for women’s centres. I also look forward to hearing more from my noble friend Lord Farmer on the strengthening of family ties, where fresh thinking would be welcome.

What are the solutions? I certainly agree that short custodial orders should be a last resort, that we must seek alternatives in the community where appropriate and that, in an ideal world, we would see fewer women come into the justice system in the first place. To make this a reality, we need to build a support structure around these women, especially when they are at their most vulnerable. For many women that is at the point of release, when they may have no job or home to return to. Women’s centres have a great deal to offer here. No doubt they could do more, providing support on a wide range of issues, including sensitive ones such as mental health, about which women often feel reluctant to share too much with the criminal justice system.

Evidence shows the worth of women’s centres: recent Ministry of Justice data shows a 5% reduction in reoffending rates among women who have used them. However, if we are to lean on women’s centres, we need to get behind them. We must ensure that they offer a consistently high standard of care across the country and are joined up with the criminal justice system, so that referrals are made and best practice is shared.

With this in mind, I was greatly impressed by the Government’s proposals to pilot five new residential centres; 24/7 support of this nature may well help women at their most vulnerable. Do these pilots include provision for women with infants, who may also benefit from support at this crucial time? Overall, I believe that we should do more to support women who are caught up in the criminal justice system or on the verge of being so, especially those with dependants. Through women’s centres and other schemes, we should give them and their families support in the community where we can, try to keep them out of prison in the first place and support them if we fail. We should try to break the destructive cycle for their sakes, for those of their family and for that of society as a whole.

Queen’s Speech

Baroness Fall Excerpts

Wednesday 28th June 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fall (Con)]

My Lords, we gather once again in this Chamber after a difficult few months. There has been murder on our streets and tragic death in the heart of our London community. An election that was called to unite a country has instead revealed a divided one. Our gracious Queen is right to say there is a sombre national mood.

A year ago we voted on whether we should remain as members of the European Union and I strongly believed that we should. I did so because I believe our nation’s interests are best served as part of an open, tolerant, outward-looking, strong and patriotic Britain within the European Union—a Britain that cares above all for people’s jobs and livelihoods. But my side lost. The British people voted for out with a small though decisive majority, with a large turnout of people across all walks of life, ages and communities. I for one respect that decision, which is why I walked through the Lobby in support of Brexit earlier in the year. I believe it is our duty as a nation to unite to secure the best outcome for our country and build a strong future together.

But the decision to leave the European Union was an answer to a yes/no question, not a decision about how to leave or about what our future should look like. In the aftermath, I had hoped, as many in this Chamber did, that we would have a national conversation about what sort of country we wanted to build—a conversation that put people’s jobs and livelihoods at the top of the agenda, but also weighed up the difficult issues around immigration in our country and the sovereignty of our institutions—in the knowledge that there are many complex issues to grapple with and paradoxes at the heart of what we want for our country.

Let us take immigration. It can be true both that immigration is a force for good in our nation and essential for our economy, and that some communities feel overwhelmed by the lack of control over the seemingly large numbers involved. How to square this circle? Look too at the decision to move away from the jurisdiction of the ECJ. We all know that with any new trade deal there will have to be an adjudicator, and if not the ECJ it will have to be something else. We also know that with just 20 months left to secure a deal we are unlikely to agree arrangements across all sectors, so there will need to be some sort of transition arrangement. What might this look like?

These are difficult issues which should be weighed up and discussed, but unfortunately there has been little debate. Instead we are simply told, “Brexit means Brexit”, “Hard Brexit is the only option” and that no deal is better than a bad deal. Anyone who put forward another suggestion was in some way a traitor to the people—the sort of lack of respect for balanced debate that I find troubling in a country that is supposed to be a beacon of liberal tolerance and the mother of democracy.

I am deeply troubled too by the sense that rushing head first into the so-called hard Brexit is ideologically driven with little thought for the damage it might have on people’s lives. This strikes me as a “means justify ends” argument of the type that I studied at school when we learned about the French and Russian revolutions, thinking smugly that the British always had more sense than to subject their citizens to such misery in the name of a so-called greater good.

Now the British people have spoken again. What are they telling us? This too is a matter of interpretation and I am not going to pretend I have all the answers, but in the 2010 general election the country voted in a similar fashion, giving no party an overall majority. The message we took away from this was that the nation wanted politicians to put their party disagreements to one side and work together in the national interest. Five years on we had turned round the economy and put 2.5 million people back into work. Last month an election was called for Brexit and it gave an uncertain result.

I urge this Government to listen to the people and to move forward towards Brexit in a more considered and consensual way, looking at other options, including a longer transition period resting maybe in a Norway-style agreement, or face a very real danger of dividing our country for decades to come while our economy goes into freefall. I urge the Government to reflect on the need to build consensus between parties, nations and communities—not drive at full speed off the cliff like Thelma and Louise with the nation in the back of the car, but move towards our future cautiously and purposefully as one nation.