Drug Driving (Assessment of Drug Misuse) Bill

Debate between Lord Hanson of Flint and Nigel Evans

Friday 18th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Weaver Vale (Graham Evans) on bringing this measure before the House. It will have the Opposition’s support today, but I wish to raise a couple of issues about the Bill’s practicality and implementation, so that they can be considered in advance of any Committee stage.

As the hon. Gentleman said, the Bill would close a gap in existing law in respect of individuals being investigated for the commission of offences relating to driving while under the influence of drugs. I think I am the only Member here who had the good fortune to serve earlier this year on the Committee of the Crime and Courts Bill, whose drug-driving provisions we also supported. Today’s Bill would enable the police and courts to require drug-drivers who have tested positive for a specific class A drug to be required to attend up to two assessments with drug workers. I take the point from the hon. Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) about why this was not part of our discussions on the Crime and Courts Bill, but let us put that to one side for the moment.

The principle behind the Bill is in line with the previous Government’s policy of referring people for drugs treatment in the criminal justice system, which we did through the National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse, but the agency has now been scrapped and funding is no longer ring-fenced. We will need to test that. We also funded drug prevention and rehabilitation work directly through community safety partnerships. So the principle behind the Bill is sound—namely, that someone who is caught having a drug-driving experience should be referred by the police for treatment.

The Bill raises a number of questions, however. The Department for Transport’s assessment estimates that about 8,800 additional prosecutions a year could take place under the new drug-driving offence in the Crime and Courts Act 2013, but the hon. Member for Weaver Vale has said that we do not yet know which drugs are to be included in the new offence. Similarly, the Department has not yet published the regulations, following the public consultation on this matter. I would therefore be interested to learn how police forces will be expected to interpret the hon. Gentleman’s Bill, given that we do not yet know the details of the legislation that has already been passed.

If the Department eventually publishes the guidance and sets out the boundaries for drug testing, we will need to be told who will fund the drug assessments, who will employ the drug assessment workers, and what assurances the Minister can give us that the necessary resources will be made available to police forces to allow them to offer these services. A police force such as West Midlands, for example, might have a large number of health bodies in its area. How will the treatment programmes be co-ordinated in such an area? What negotiations will take place between the relevant bodies to ensure that that is done in a positive way? The Bill suggests that it will be for local areas to decide whether to carry out and fund assessments. This is therefore an enabling Bill, providing powers at national level, but it will not mean anything unless local police forces and health bodies in England and Wales have the resources, the capability and the willingness to implement them.

The Minister of State, Home Department, the hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker), will need to reflect on those matters, and I would like to know his estimate of the costs involved. I have heard a figure of £128 million a year. Is that a genuine figure? If so, how have the Minister and his team arrived at that costing? Who will be expected to pay for this, at a time when we have already seen a 20% reduction in policing budgets? Like it or not, there are also now greater freedoms in the health service in England, and the devolved Administration in Wales, to whom the Bill will presumably apply, could make their own judgment on drug treatment in Wales.

Paragraph 25 of the Bill’s explanatory notes states:

“There were 129,584 police officers in England and Wales on 31 March 2013. As this Bill provides for an enabling power, police officers have discretion on whether to use it. Therefore there should be a de minimis impact on police officer time.”

That is a very broad statement, because police officers would have that discretion. Have the Minister, the hon. Member for Weaver Vale or officials in the Department asked police and crime commissioners whether this would be a priority for them? Introducing an enabling power is fine, but the Bill’s own explanatory notes give the lie to any expectation that the service will be delivered in all parts of England and Wales. They state, as I have said, that police officers will have discretion on whether to use the power, and that there will be a de minimis impact on police officer time.

I would particularly welcome an indication from the Minister as to whether he has solved the problems of the Crime and Courts Act. I am still not clear—that might be my fault; I might just have missed something—whether any assessment has been made of the equipment required to ensure that drug testing can be properly undertaken. I am not sure whether an assessment has been made of the level of drug use and the types of drug that might be present in blood. I am not sure whether people taking drugs for medicinal purposes could be caught by the legislation. That subject was debated fully during the passage of the Crime and Courts Act, but the matter was not resolved.

I am not sure what the unit cost is for any equipment required for testing. I am not sure yet whether police officers have roadside testing equipment or whether they are bringing people from the roadside to medical or police facilities to undertake the drug testing. I am not sure what training police officers have undertaken in drug testing and related areas or which police forces have indicated they wish to sign up to drug testing. I am not sure whether the Minister intends to leave this discretionary, as it appears to be in the Bill, or whether at some point he intends to make it mandatory. I am also not sure what assessment he has made of prison sentences for drug-driving offences as well as of the proposals for mandatory testing that the hon. Member for Weaver Vale has brought forward today.

I want to give this Bill a fair wind. I really do want to make sure it has potential for reducing drug driving, for preventing deaths through drug-driving, and for making sure that people who have taken drugs while driving can have treatment for their drug addiction or use. I have a lot of admiration for the hon. Gentleman, so I say this with the greatest respect: this whole package appears still not thought through. Drug testing for drug-driving has not yet been thought through in detail, although there is the legislative capacity for it, but what we have before us today is a Government-supported Bill allowing treatment for people who have been caught drug-driving through the use of testing equipment.

While I give this Bill a fair wind, I think the hon. Gentleman needs to go back one whole stage and say, “Is the technology being used? Is it in place? Will it be used? How is it being used? What are the regulations? What are the drugs? Where will this be undertaken? Which police forces will do it?” Then we can worry, on top of that, about what happens in terms of drug treatment orders for people who are caught and require drug treatment, which I fully support. This is full of holes, therefore.

[Mr Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Ind)]

Assuming the equipment is there—and I cannot believe any area does not have equipment that it is using for drug testing—does the right hon. Gentleman believe this may be an ideal situation for the introduction of a pilot to ensure the testing equipment and the services are rigorous enough to be able to take these provisions forward once they are enacted?

[Mr Hanson]

I am grateful for that positive suggestion. Drug-testing provisions were agreed in the Crime and Courts Bill Act 2013. Today’s Bill is about treatment when people are caught through drug testing, yet I know—I would be grateful if the Minister would confirm this—that as of now the drugs covered by the offence in that Act are not yet specified, the limits for the drugs in the body are not yet specified, the consultation by the Department for Transport has not yet been published and, dare I say it, the equipment has not yet, in my view, been sufficiently tested to ensure convictions are possible even if the levels and the drugs were set.

We are putting in place a vehicle, but I do not think we have yet put fuel in the tank, and my plea to the hon. Member for Weaver Vale is to think with the Minister and with the Department about how this will work in practice, because at the moment, although it is a good idea, there are still a number of policy areas that need to be developed and determined.

Finance (No. 3) Bill

Debate between Lord Hanson of Flint and Nigel Evans

Wednesday 4th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I call Mr Hanson.

[Mr Hanson]

Good afternoon, Mr Evans. Can I welcome you to the Chair of this seemingly unending Committee, which has been going on for the past couple of days?

I have listened very carefully to the Minister, but I think that the amendment is very modest: we are asking for a report in 18 months’ time, in October 2012, on the impact of the changes. We ask for that, because my right hon. and hon. Friends retain an element of concern that the cut in manufacturing capital allowances will damage some manufacturing sectors. Based on those concerns, we wish to continue to reflect on those matters, and I therefore wish to put the amendment to a Division, so that we can place on the record our concerns about the capital allowance cuts and state that we wish to review the matter very clearly in 18 months’ time, in October 2012.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hanson]

If I may, Mr Evans, I shall try to touch briefly on the wider policies to which my hon. Friend refers. I am conscious that clause 35 is specific to higher-rate tax relief—

[The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. I am delighted that Members mention clause 35 from time to time, but it is really quite specific. This is not a general debate on child care or indeed on other policies. Perhaps we could focus more on the provisions contained in clause 35.

[Mr Hanson]

We have known each other since our elections to the House on 9 April 1992, Mr Evans, and as ever, I shall try to keep to your strictures as the good Chairman that you are. You will note that amendment 8, which you did not select, would have prompted a wide-ranging discussion on the impact on child care. I am trying to focus on clause 35 and not to stray into amendment 8 or the issues that my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) touched on. However, those issues are important when we are looking at the impact of clause 35 on a particular group of people, because that same group of people will lose child benefit and a range of other child care support measures because of their income, and that will shatter the principle of universality that my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris) mentioned.

The Opposition will listen to the debate on clause 35, but we might oppose it. However, there are important points to be examined and answered in detail today. First, how do we use the resource? Secondly, how do we implement the policy? Thirdly, will the Minister answer the challenges made by external bodies about the operation of the clause in practice?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hanson]

As I mentioned in my speech—it is further confirmed by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales—the provision in clause 35 is based on an estimate of whether the employer will have earnings that exceed the higher rate limit on a particular payday. That causes some difficulties with fairness because there will be people who work part time, who change circumstances or who are on maternity leave for part of the year and the implementation of this is as potentially worrying as the policy—

[The First Deputy Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. The shadow Minister is talking about the schedule, which, as he knows, will be discussed in the Public Bill Committee.

Terrorist Asset-Freezing etc. Bill [Lords]

Debate between Lord Hanson of Flint and Nigel Evans

Tuesday 14th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hanson]

I beg to move amendment 1, page 15, line 25, leave out ‘a person’ and insert ‘the Independent Reviewer of Terrorist Legislation, as appointed under section 36 of the Terrorism Act 2006.’.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment 6, page 15, line 25, at end insert—

‘( ) A person may not be appointed under subsection (1) unless—

(a) the Secretary of State lays a report before both Houses of Parliament which recommends the person and sets out the process by which he was chosen,

(b) a Minister of the Crown tables a motion in both Houses to approve the report laid under this subsection, and appoint the person, and

(c) such a motion is agreed by a resolution of both Houses of Parliament.’.

Amendment 7, page 15, line 31, leave out ‘send the Treasury a’.

Amendment 8, page 15, line 32, after ‘report’, insert ‘to Parliament’.

Amendment 9, page 15, line 34, leave out subsection (4).

Amendment 10, page 15, line 37, at end add—

‘( ) Appointment under subsection (1) shall be for a non-renewable term of five years.’.

[Mr Hanson]

We had a good debate on this issue in Committee. It is my contention that if we are to create a post to review the operation of this Bill once it achieves Royal Assent, it makes eminently logical sense for the person who is appointed by the Treasury to review the legislation to be the same person as the one appointed by the Home Office under section 36 of the Terrorism Act 2006 to review terrorist legislation and its impact from the Home Office perspective. As the House will know, Lord Carlile is currently appointed to that position. He is independent of government; he has an office outside the Home Office as well as a secure office in the Home Office; and he provides an independent review of a range of issues, including control orders and other legislation under the 2006 Act. Clause 31 of this Bill allows for an individual to be appointed by the Treasury. In Committee, I tested the Minister on whether he had discussed with the Home Secretary the possibility of appointing the same person under clause 31 to review part 1 of this potential Act as is currently appointed by the Home Office to review legislation under the 2006 Act.

Whatever our agreements in Committee, there is also, I hope, an agreement that we do not want to see duplication of these roles. The role of reviewing whether a designation has been made fairly and is being operated fairly is the same as that of reviewing whether an individual’s control order has been judged and operated fairly. I accept that there are differences, as alluded to by the Minister in Committee, but in broad terms an individual appointed under clause 31 to review part 1 of this potential Act will be dealing with similar issues and similar evidence—sometimes evidence supplied by agencies within government—and undertaking similar assessments of the effectiveness and fairness of the operation of the legislation.

The current reviewer, Lord Carlile, will finish his tenure in that role very shortly. Mr David Anderson QC will be the new independent reviewer of terrorism legislation from, I think, 1 January next year. He has expertise in the European Union, in public law and in human rights. He is a Queen’s counsel of more than 10 years’ standing, and he is a recorder and a visiting professor at King’s college London. The skills that are required to review control orders under the 2006 Act are, in my view, the same as those required to review the provisions in this Bill. I am making this proposal because there could be synergy between the two posts.

I am equally interested—I know that the Minister will have a wry smile at this—in the costings and the operation of the parallel regimes in the event of the Minister appointing somebody different to review the provisions of this Bill when enacted. The Home Office supplies the reviewer with administrative facilities, office support and research support as needed. He has an independent private office in central London as well as secure rooms in the Home Office that he uses to deal with information to help him in his task. I question the need to establish a parallel regime with a separate person being appointed through a separate recruitment procedure and having separate offices inside and outside the Treasury, given that very often, and potentially even more so in this current age, the individual may be reviewing activities that impact on the same small group of people who are seeking to do harm to our citizens in the United Kingdom as a whole.

I would welcome an update from the Minister on my suggestion and on whether he has had an opportunity to talk to the Home Secretary about this matter. Has the Minister had an opportunity to consider whether the person who will be appointed under clause 31 should be the same person who is appointed by the Government to review Home Office legislation under the 2006 Act?

My amendment has been unduly twinned with the rest of the amendments in the group, which were tabled by the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert). They relate to the method for appointing the reviewer—whether they are appointed as under my proposal or as under the Bill. The hon. Gentleman has again drawn on the report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights in proposing that the House of Commons should ultimately be the appointing body for the independent reviewer.

Unusually, I think that I will find myself agreeing with the Minister. Whatever my views on a range of issues, I cannot accept amendment 6, because the post of the independent reviewer must ultimately be a Government appointment. It reports to and supplies information to Ministers, and it is ultimately funded by the Government to provide that information. It is crucial, however, that the post is independent of Ministers. It reports to them, provides them with information and is funded by them, but it ultimately acts independently of them. It advises them and can cause difficult issues for them, because of its independence. If the post was appointed and supported by a resolution of both Houses of Parliament, it would be in a very different position from an independent reviewer of legislation.

Lord Carlile was independent. Never once did he ask me for information that he could not access appropriately. Never once was he compromised by Ministers, of whatever hue, in relation to his jurisdiction and duties. He has provided a fair assessment of the operation of the legislation to date.

I hope that the Minister reflects positively on amendment 1. I suspect that he will not support amendments 6 to 10, which were tabled by the hon. Member for Cambridge, because the independence of the post is crucial. If we tie it to the Minister or to the House of Commons, we will betray that independence and do a disservice to the role. If the Minister cannot give me good news on amendment 1, I hope that he can encourage me generally on the appointment. I look forward, also, to hearing the hon. Member for Cambridge speak to his amendments.