Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to reform judicial review.
Answered by Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
The Independent Review of Administrative Law made recommendations for reform and the Government consulted on these and other proposals. We are considering the responses to the consultation before deciding on the measures to take forward but the Government will introduce legislation in the current session.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to increase minimum sentences for perpetrators of violence against women and girls.
Answered by Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
The government keeps offences and penalties under review, including those in relation to violence against women and girls. Minimum sentences are rarely used; there are currently no plans to introduce minimum sentences in this area.
The government is committed to keeping people safe from all forms of sexual violence. In 2020 we legislated to end the automatic halfway release of serious violent and sexual offenders who receive a standard determinate sentence (SDS) of 7 years or more. The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will extend this change further by ensuring certain serious violent and sexual offenders who receive a SDS of between 4 and 7 years will also have to spend two thirds of their sentence in custody, demonstrating how seriously the government takes this type of offending.
The government will also be publishing a new cross-government “Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy” later this year which will help further transform the response to these crimes, from prevention and raising awareness, to ensuring perpetrators are brought to justice.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to improve support in the justice system for the victims of violence against women and girls.
Answered by Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
Protecting women and girls from violence and abuse, and supporting victims, are key priorities for this Government. These crimes are extremely serious and have a huge impact both for those subjected to such violence and more broadly on our economy, health services, and the criminal justice system.
In 2021-22, we will provide just under £151m for victim and witness support services. This includes an extra £51m to increase support for rape and domestic abuse victims, building on the emergency funding already provided to help domestic abuse and sexual violence services meet Covid-driven demand. This compares to a total budget of £48.5m in 2010-2011.
This funding includes £27m for 700 Independent Sexual Violence and Domestic Abuse Advisers and £20.7m for local sexual violence and domestic abuse services.
We continue to work closely with the Home Office on the development of the Government’s forthcoming Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy. The new Strategy will focus on prevention, drive forward improvements in the effort to target perpetrators, respond to the changing nature of crimes against women and girls and, most importantly, will continue to put victims at the heart of our approach.
In addition, the forthcoming Victims’ Bill, which we will consult on later this year, will ensure that all victims are supported, and their rights are recognised, at every stage of the criminal justice system and beyond
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to tackle (1) violence, and (2) self-harm, on the youth secure estate.
Answered by Lord Wolfson of Tredegar
We are committed to reducing violence in youth custody. Whilst there are fewer young people in custody than ever before – those in the youth estate are a cohort with complex needs. Children and young people (including 18-year olds) serving sentences for violence against the person offences accounted for more than half (55%) of the youth custody population in 2019/20.
We are investing in staff, education, psychology services and mental health support, alongside a package of interventions within the Behaviour Management Strategy that address the needs of children and young people through early intervention and multi-agency work. This is underpinned by ‘SECURE STAIRS’ - the framework of integrated care jointly led by the NHS and Youth Custody Service (YCS), which provides the foundations as to how the YCS works with children – which has adapted its approach during the COVID-19 pandemic to take into account the vulnerabilities of children at this time. In addition, the YCS has been progressing work with a focus on some of the most vulnerable and challenging young people in custody alongside NHS colleagues through the Critical Case Pathway. This provides a greater level of oversight and support to professionals working with children who self-harm, and those with the most complex needs to ensure effective assessment, planning and co-ordination. Additionally the ‘COVID-19 Support Plan’, a less intensive and physically distanced version of the Custody Support Plan (which provides children with a named officer to work with on a weekly basis) is also being delivered, to maintain key relationships between staff and children.
The roll out of the youth justice specialist roles has continued with funding provided for every prison officer to take up a degree level qualification in youth justice. As of March, there were 201 youth justice specialist officers already in post. A further 319 staff are currently signed up or undertaking the learning, with the last cohort due to start in October 2022 with up to 110 more frontline staff participating.
We are continuing to look to further open up regime opportunities in a manner that is safe and sustainable, to provide further support to children. Given the uncertainty this period has presented, it has been encouraging to see that levels of self-harm have fallen during the pandemic with - the annualised rate of self-harming per 100 children falling by 56% in the three months to December 2020. We are also carrying out work to ensure that lessons learned from the COVID-19 period are taken into account going forwards, and the YCS has commissioned a programme of research, in collaboration with academics, to evaluate these lessons with the results used to further inform recovery planning.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the sustainability of publicly funded criminal defence.
Answered by Baroness Scott of Bybrook - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
The Legal Aid Agency monitors capacity across criminal legal aid contracts and where issues are identified acts to ensure there is ongoing availability of criminal legal advice for the public.
In August we announced that we would be taking forward the policy proposals that practitioners told us mattered most for the Criminal Legal Aid Review (CLAR) accelerated areas. These areas were:?unused material, cracked trials, paper-heavy cases, sending cases to the Crown Court, and?pre-charge engagement. These policies allowed us to inject up to £51 million into criminal legal aid to further strengthen the market.
As part of our response to the Criminal Legal Aid Accelerated Areas consultation, we also announced that the next phase of the review would include an independently led review of the market, to ensure it can meet demand now and into the future, provide an effective and efficient service that ensures value for money for the taxpayer, and continues to provide defendants with high-quality advice from a diverse range of practitioners. Alongside this we continue to look at the current fee schemes to ensure they keep pace with wider reforms across the justice system.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of a reduction in the provision of the Standard Monthly Payments to criminal legal aid firms on the number of criminal defence lawyers.
Answered by Baroness Scott of Bybrook - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
At present, 17% of all crime accounts are paid under the Standard Monthly Payment (‘SMP’) model. The remainder have opted for Variable Monthly Payments, which pays the actual value of the claim submitted each month. Firms can elect to be paid by either model, according to which may be most advantageous to them. SMPs relate to Controlled Work services only, and therefore reflect a proportion of a Provider’s total revenue.
The number of those accounts paid via SMP which have seen a reduction in payments since July 2020 represents 6% of all crime accounts. Where a reduction is necessary, this takes effect following the Legal Aid Agency notifying providers of this in advance. Firms facing financial hardship can discuss payment options further with their LAA Contract Manager.
The LAA have been in contact with providers to assess the impact on their businesses and can confirm that no Criminal Defence Providers have exited the market as a result of a reduction in SMPs.
The LAA has implemented several changes to maintain cashflow to firms and to allow firms to be paid more quickly – through these changes we can inject up to £51 million per year into criminal legal aid. We have begun a review into how criminal lawyers are compensated for their work and there is more information about this here: https://consult.justice.gov.uk/criminal-legal-aid/criminal-legal-aid-review/
In addition to the support schemes offered by the government, we have continued to pay providers on time and introduced a number of measures to speed up payments to providers. All of the measures taken by the LAA are set out on our gov.uk page and there is further information about this here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-legal-aid-agency-contingency-response#financial-relief-page