Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Baroness Fookes Excerpts

Lords Hansard - Part 2 & Lords Hansard - part two & Report stage
Wednesday 15th December 2021 Lords Chamber

82: Clause 125, insert the following new Clause—
“Discretionary early discharge of prisoners
In section 23 of the Criminal Justice Act 1961, after subsection (3) insert—“(3ZA) A Minister of the Crown may by regulations establish pilot schemes under which, where a prisoner is to be discharged on a Friday or the day before a bank holiday, they may at the discretion of the governor of the prison be discharged up to two working days earlier than the day on which the prisoner would otherwise be discharged, provided that—(a) it would be helpful for the prisoner’s reintegration into society, and(b) the prisoner has served a custodial sentence of more than 30 days. (3ZB) The power to make regulations under subsection (3ZA) expires after the period of two years beginning with the day on which this Act is passed, and any pilot scheme must have concluded within that period.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would enable trials of schemes for early discharge from prison which would reduce the bunching of releases on Fridays to take place during a two-year trial period.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Fookes) (Con)]

There is a slight mistake on the Marshalled List. It should read “After Clause 125”.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 82 is concerned about Friday prisoner releases, or perhaps I should say the bunching of releases of prisoners on Fridays. I place on record my thanks for the support that I have received from around the House, from the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and the noble Lords, Lord German and Lord Ramsbotham, and from NACRO, which has done a lot of work and research on this subject over many years.

There is always the danger at this stage of a Bill’s proceedings that you just rehearse familiar arguments and regurgitate facts that have been introduced before. I want to avoid that tonight and instead state briefly the central thesis that concerns me and my fellow supporters; state how we have changed and amended it to meet the points made by the Government at the earlier stage of the Bill; and then explain why we have retabled it in this new form today.

The basic thesis is that when you are sentenced, the court sets a calendar date for your release, not a day of the week. If that calendar date falls on a Saturday, a Sunday or—if it is a bank holiday—a Monday, the prisoner will be released on the previous Friday. A quick bit of mental arithmetic will show noble Lords that some three-sevenths of all prisoners are likely to be released on a Friday. Equally, it is clear to us all that Friday is the last day of the week and so, as the afternoon wears on, the local authority and voluntary services begin to wind down. Because a greater number of prisoners are being released, inevitably they are reaching the places where they can access those services later, so they are even more likely to be closing down. Added to that, the prisoner may well have been released from a prison that is some way from his home town, and in the event perhaps he has no home anyway.

Wrap all that together with the discharge grant, which has now been raised from £46 to £76, a sum on which he or she has to live for two or three days, after allowing for any travel expenses that may have been required. The result is that prisoners who may have no accommodation or support, facing the challenges of freedom after a period of incarceration, are having to do so on very limited financial resources. I suggest that it would be hard to construct a set of circumstances in which the temptation to reoffend could be greater.

In Committee, we argued that giving prison governors five-day flexibility on the day of release could help to tackle this issue of bunching and so improve the opportunities for rehabilitation and reduce the chances of reoffending. In his response, my noble friend Lord Wolfson, while recognising the force of the amendment and that it had a core kernel of truth that needed to be addressed, argued—quite persuasively, in my view—that the amendment was deficient in three ways. First, he said that efforts to avoid the effects of Friday bunching needed to be focused on prisoners where the chances of rehabilitation were greatest—a fair point. Secondly, he said that a five-day release window was too long—I understand that. Thirdly, he said that was particularly significant in the case of short custodial sentences. So we sharpened our pencils and tabled a revised amendment to meet those criticisms.

--- Later in debate ---

Amendment 83 agreed.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Fookes) (Con)]

The noble Baroness, Lady Harris, will take part remotely in the next debate.

Amendment 84

Moved by

Domestic Abuse Bill

Baroness Fookes Excerpts

Wednesday 21st April 2021 Lords Chamber

As I think I have said previously, when the Minister gets up to respond, will she remember that it is not only we who are listening but the families of the victims? In particular, there are a large number of people who, perhaps wrongly, had their hopes and expectations inflated as they rejoiced at what they thought was going to be the creation of this all-singing, all-dancing national database. It now turns out that that is not quite the case, but it behoves us all to be aware that an awful lot of people are listening very carefully to what we are saying, and will listen very carefully to what the Minister has to say, and I hope and pray that what she says will give them some sense of peace and optimism for the future.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Fookes) (Con)]

I have received requests to speak from the noble Lord, Lord Polak, and the noble Baroness, Lady Sanderson of Welton. I call first the noble Lord, Lord Polak.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, I am pleased to follow the noble Lord, Lord Russell, who I have had the pleasure of working with on different areas of the Bill. He is very wise.

Let me congratulate the Government on reaching this important moment, as the Bill will soon finally become law. I pay tribute to so many people who have made this happen, in particular my noble friend Lady Williams, who as the Minister has dealt with such sensitive and important issues in a sensitive and caring manner. In fact, she seems to have been surgically attached to the Dispatch Box for months. I will always be grateful to my noble friend for her help and advice on the specific areas that are of concern to me in relation to children and the importance of the provision for community-based services. Let me also pay tribute to Claire Stewart of Barnardo’s for her help and professionalism.

As we have been told, we are in the middle of National Stalking Awareness Week and I was pleased to see the video message from the right honourable Robert Buckland, the Lord Chancellor, which has been mentioned. He said in that video:

“Our job is to raise awareness of this wicked crime, to increase support for victims”


and address the perpetrators. As the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, said, he ended by saying:

“We need to call it out. We need to stamp it out. We need to do all we can to deal with the menace of stalking in our society.”


The Lord Chancellor is right and the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, the noble Lord, Lord Russell, and the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, make strong arguments that I will not repeat.

I have had discussions with my noble friend Lady Newlove, who is unable to be in the Chamber. She asked me to convey the following message: “Sadly, the Government voted for Amendment 42 to be quashed out of the Bill. I am ashamed. Why? Because, despite many conversations through the usual channels, MAPPA category 3 will still have so many gaps it resembles a string vest. The response from the Government of proposing more guidance is not worth the paper it is written on. Treating those families whose loved ones have been needlessly taken with lack of respect and dignity—the Government is proposing more guidance—has not worked over the years. What is it going to take in order for Government to stop this pattern of behaviour in order to protect innocent lives taken by the hands of offenders of coercive controlling and stalking? Government rhetoric serves only to shamefully value human life after the horse has bolted and to protect those accountable by these two insensitive words ‘lessons learned’, instead of saying ‘enough is enough’.”

We can all understand my noble friend’s frustration. While it is clear that Nicole Jacobs supports the principle of this amendment, she also understands that ViSOR and MAPPA are overloaded systems. I seek the Minister’s help. We are all on the same side and we all know where we want to reach. As the Lord Chancellor said about stalking, we all want to call it out and we all want to stamp it out.

I noted the welcome announcement in the Minister’s speech about the upgrading of ViSOR and MAPPA. On the one hand we are told that putting stalkers on to a register is problematic but, on the other, we are told that putting them on to a register can save lives. Can the Minister persuade me why I should not vote for this amendment?

Criminal Justice and Courts Bill

Baroness Fookes Excerpts

Monday 28th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulks]

An applicant now may fail at the permission stage if the outcome would be inevitable, given the putative departure from lawfulness on the part of the public authority. It is precisely the same calculation that an applicant has to make whether the test is inevitable or highly likely, that the result would be the same. Both are directed at whether there is essentially a technical departure with no real substance. As I said, the only difference is whether the matter is a very low or a slightly higher bar. The position is that all claimants in any form of litigation will have to consider the real merits of their case and decide whether it is worth pursuing.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Fookes)]

Would the mover of the amendment confirm that he is seeking leave to withdraw it?

[Lord Woolf]

Yes.

Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Baroness Fookes Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Phillips of Sudbury]

My Lords, with reluctance I want to speak against the proposition of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff. Before I do so, I reiterate all that my noble friend Lady Miller and others have said in this mini-debate about the worth of the efforts of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and indeed about how exemplary the combination of her efforts and those of others in this House as well as in outside bodies has been in bringing about the change in government policy that we have heard about today. That really is democracy in action.

However, there is one practical issue here that may not be sufficiently understood. I speak as one who at the start of his legal career was a coroner’s officer and indeed, on occasion, sat as a deputy coroner. The change we are making in creating the chief coroner post is, I believe, fundamental, and I think that it will have more ramifications than many realise. There is positive merit in waiting to see how it pans out over the next few years. Surely we do not want to rush into the creation of a new appeals mechanism without having the benefit of the experience of that changed situation. For that reason, if no other, I think that the position to which we have come—that is, acceptance of the chief coroner but at this stage not approval of a brand new appeals mechanism, especially in view of the fact that coroners’ juries find as to fact—may be the right one for the time being.

[Baroness Fookes]

My Lords, when I last spoke in this Chamber it was on the occasion of the debate in advance of Remembrance Sunday introduced by my noble friend Lord Selkirk. In that debate, I expressed my grave dismay at the then prospect of the duties of the chief coroner being distributed between departments and various officials.

I spoke, and speak now, from a very precise position. I am honoured to be the president of the War Widows Association of Great Britain. Its members know above all others what it is like to suffer the loss of loved ones and to go through military inquests. Over the years, they told me in no uncertain terms how difficult it was if a coroner was inexperienced in dealing with inquests, the nature of the war scene and the military ethos. To put it bluntly, the Ministry of Defence could pull the wool over the eyes of coroners not experienced in wartime matters. As time went on and certain coroners became expert, life became very much easier. My concern when the last Bill, now an Act, went through was that there should be coroners who had experience and had been properly trained to deal with this particular aspect of the coroner’s duties. Therefore, one can imagine my dismay when this was apparently thrown out of the window and it was decided not to take it further.

I am therefore very pleased indeed that wiser counsels have prevailed, and I know that many have been involved in the persuasion. I am grateful to the Government for largely, if not entirely, rescuing the whole coronial system. I think it would be churlish not to offer my sincere thanks for this particular mercy. Since I feel I am getting a bit aged to be a rebel, I am also relieved that I have been spared that tonight.