Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Baroness Hamwee Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, I am sorry to strike a slightly different note on this matter but I should like to ask the Minister a question or two. The list in the Bill to which she referred as “unamended” is a list of procedural matters relating to how the chief constable is to undertake his or her duties, rather than the subject of those duties. We debated this on a different amendment at the previous stage. I do not for an instant suggest that the matters to which the Minister and the noble Lord have referred are unimportant—they are of huge importance—but my concern is about singling them out. I used the example of trafficking adults as well as children—a matter which I think is appropriate for the strategic policing requirement, dealt with later in the Bill. My concern and my question to the Minister is whether singling out this subject in some way diminishes the responsibility that the chief constable has to exercise every other duty imposed on him or her by legislation. It seems to raise issues when one part of the very wide and varied responsibilities of the chief constable is included in a list which is qualitatively different. As I said, that is not for a moment to suggest that child protection is not important—of course it is —but I merely question how it is dealt with in legislation.

[Lord Laming]

My Lords, does the noble Baroness agree that many, many crime Bills have been taken through this House? Over the years, the Home Office has been remarkably good at producing Bills of this kind. However, Parliament has also produced a range of very important children Acts, and those Acts need to be enshrined in developing legislation.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, Parliament has indeed produced a lot of Acts and, in my view, one of the problems is repeating bits of legislation time and again. A piece of legislation should be good enough to stand on its own and not require repetition or reference in other legislation.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I was very interested in the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. She will know that lists are often proposed in amendments, not least from her own Benches. If you list certain duties and responsibilities, there is always the problem that you might detract from other important duties and responsibilities. One has to use one's judgment. We certainly support the government amendments and I am sure that the noble Baroness will be able to confirm that, by listing the Children Act matters in the way that the Government propose, that does not exclude many other important matters from the chief constable's responsibilities.

I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Laming, on his success in persuading the Government today to bring forward this amendment. This is a significant day for him as he has been elected Convenor of the Cross Benches. I wish him future success in bringing forward further amendments to which the Government will no doubt respond.

I have one question for the noble Baroness. When we debated this matter in Committee under a number of amendments, at col. 1428, the debate concerned the Children Act and the Human Rights Act. I wondered whether there was a reason why the Government have brought forward an amendment in relation to the Children Act but not in relation to the Human Rights Act. Referring to the question of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, does focusing on the Children Act detract from responsibilities under the Human Rights Act?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington]

Certainly not. The two most successful Home Secretaries that I know of in history is the one who is sitting opposite, the noble Lord, Lord Howard, and the second—you would never get the name out of me if you tricked me—was Jack Straw. He of course would be represented in Labour. How about that for an apolitical comment?

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, I was going to go back to the Roman Empire. With all this talk about Roman emperors, I wondered whether I should claim for myself the role of Caesar’s wife, but I think I ought to leave that for the Minister.

I have two amendments in this group and was very persuaded by arguments made at the previous stage by noble Lords who spoke in support of the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Harris. When the Government objected to the term “shall”, I asked whether “may” would be more acceptable. It was almost before the words were out of my mouth that I knew that I was going to be challenged by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, who quite rightly made the point that police and crime commissioners who do not understand the need for robust governance arrangements are the ones who most need them.

My Amendments 4 and 18 break my own rules about providing for more regulation-making powers for the Secretary of State, but I have worded them in that way because I am not quite convinced that Amendments 3 and 20 quite capture everything. I have added to my list, in what would be new subsection (4B),

“provision for arrangements to ensure probity”.

Financial matters are within that, but probity covers a wider area.

I spotted what some might regard as a flaw in my amendment by providing for consultation with police and crime commissioners, or their union as it might be, before their coming into being, but I have assumed, for the purposes of this argument at any rate, that the transitional arrangements might give time for this as well as consultation with local authority representatives. That is because of the important role of panels, police authorities and local authorities in this area.

My noble friend Lord Wallace spoke in Committee of the importance of personalities and personal relationships, and a willingness to co-operate. He was quite right, but I would say, “Yes, but”, or maybe, “Yes, therefore”.

There was also concern about how much detail should be in the Bill. Well, there is quite a lot of detail in it, so I would like to see some that I would be comfortable supporting. My noble friend also talked about the roles undertaken by the chief executive and the chief finance officer. He said that they would ensure that propriety and that:

“They will be subject to established public authority duties, as are their equivalents in police authorities and elsewhere”.—[Official Report, 18/5/11; col. 1466.]

They do have those duties, but that is not the same as governance in the round. I would say to the noble Lord, Lord Howard, that the police and crime panels, with their limited checks, are not governance. Most of their duties are to be carried out in arrear. They do not have a contemporary role and that is what governance is about. If it is to be their function, the Bill needs a lot of amendment and I for one would be very happy to see that, but the check, balance and scrutiny role in police and crime panels is a different role from governance.

There have been major developments in governance in public life recently. Many of your Lordships will be involved in charities where hugely different arrangements have had to be put in place over recent years. It is proper that there are such standards in public life. This is another such position. I am not convinced that the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Harris, is spot on and I am sure that he and the Minister will say that mine is not either, but something needs to be provided that surrounds, supports and controls this new office.

[Lord Condon]

My Lords, the amendment put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Harris, and supported by the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, gives us some comfort and takes us in the direction of more reassuring corporate governance than the Government's current proposals. Like the noble Lord, Lord Harris, I accept that the Government will probably be successful in reinstating their provisions for elected police and crime commissioners, but there remains an element of the doctrinaire in their proposals. There is a feeling that the election by the public of a single person who is then unencumbered by advice, support or challenge is the only way forward. I fear that the only people around the elected police commissioner offering expert advice could well be sycophantic staff whose very livelihood relies on the elected police and crime commissioner.

The dilemma is that we are in an either/or situation. Either police and crime panels with an independent element must be given greater strength and authority than is currently proposed—and I was reassured by the Minister that we are moving a little way that direction—or we should have the model offered by the noble Lords, Lord Harris and Lord Stevens, of a board of non-executive directors.

I have spent 10 years in the private sector as a deputy chairman and non-executive director of one of the biggest companies in the world and I know the value of non-executive directors. The Government also know their value, because under their proposals this week for reform of the defence of our country the individual service chiefs will be removed from the Defence Board and replaced by non-executive directors. The Government know in their heart of hearts the value of non-executive directors.

I hope that the Minister will give us some comfort that we are moving away from this doctrinaire notion about the purity of the electorate electing the police and crime commissioner and the commissioner not being encumbered by any advice other than that which they choose to hire themselves. I am not sure that I could wholly support the amendment put forward by the noble Lords, Lord Harris and Lord Stevens, but we need either that or stronger police and crime panels, and words of comfort from the Minister.