Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Baroness Meacher Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 14th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Meacher (CB)]

My Lords, this is indeed an important piece of legislation, which has some useful proposals but could do so much more to reduce crime. Instead, it could deepen existing problems within the criminal justice system. In these few minutes, I want to touch on just a few issues.

On crime reduction, the worst aspect of the Bill is the absence of any attempt to prevent serious crime through radical reform of our drug laws. There is also the absence of any reference to the need to extend the use of restorative justice. These are two huge gaps in the Bill.

To refer to a key innovation in the Bill, I share the considerable concerns of the interested NGOs and many noble Lords about the proposed serious violence reduction orders. I understand that serious violence certainly needs to be tackled more effectively than at present, but it should not be as proposed in the Bill. At our recent meeting, the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which others have mentioned and of which I am a member, expressed concern about the powers delegated to the Secretary of State to issue guidance on the exercise of police functions in relation to these orders. Such guidance could increase the risks of harm to innocent individuals and yet have no parliamentary oversight. As the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, set out, we have other concerns about the delegation of powers in the Bill. I want only to endorse our excellent chairman’s comments.

The gaps in the Bill are so serious that they cannot be deemed just baubles that we are trying to put on to a Christmas tree Bill; they are huge issues, with huge potential. We know that a majority of prisoners have an addiction to or problem with drugs, which undoubtedly lies behind their crimes. We also know that the proportion of inmates who report developing a drug problem in prison almost doubled to about 15% in five years. This will of course lead to more crime.

It is clear that our drug laws are dramatically increasing rather than reducing crime. We have the most draconian drug laws in western Europe yet the highest level of hard drug addiction. If this country looked at the evidence on how best to reduce drug addiction and drug harms, therefore reducing crime, this Bill would be full of drug policy reforms; instead, the topic is entirely absent. Switzerland has shown that providing legal, clean heroin in a therapeutic setting can lead to two-thirds of heroin addicts leading perfectly legal lives within 18 months. The Swiss research shows that heroin addicts typically commit 80 crimes every month. I would have thought that is the sort of reduction we would want. Portugal has shown that decriminalisation of drug use can reduce teenage addiction, increase the number of those in treatment and reduce the prison population. If we want to reduce crime even more, we should, I suppose, go even further and regulate cannabis, separating it from the hard drug market and smashing the profits of the drug dealers and criminal gangs while massively reducing crime.

The APPG on Restorative Justice has just completed an inquiry report which shows, among other very positive results, that 96% of offenders taking part in restorative justice said that the process directly increased their motivation not to reoffend—again, reducing crime. If we are serious about reducing offending, this highly cost-effective approach should surely be mainstream. One study showed that for every £1 spent on restorative justice, criminal justice agencies saved £8. The Government-commissioned Shapland reports found that restorative justice has an 85% satisfaction rate for victims. I hope the Minister will respond to these few points.

Many other issues need attention: aggressive anti-abortion protesters; hit-and-run drivers; the issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, of non-consensual, intrusive photography of women—to mention just three. We have a great deal to debate in Committee.