Prisons: Deaths of Young People

Earl Cathcart Excerpts

Thursday 6th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulks]

My Lords, we have been working hard to improve support for women in prison. We have issued gender-specific standards in all areas of prison regimes, including training for staff working with female offenders in prisons, which has now been extended to service providers in the community. New search arrangements ending routine full searching for women prisoners have also been introduced. The House will know that there are six mother and baby units in England and Wales which provide an overall capacity of 64 places.

I am slightly surprised at the noble Lord’s statistics. He is right that my research into this matter shows that women are disproportionately more likely to self-harm than men, relative to their occupation of prisons. Fortunately, the self-harm, compared with men’s self-harm, does not tend to be as serious, and does not usually require hospitalisation, although I do not suggest for a moment that any self-harm is not a significant factor. The statistics that I have been given do not indicate that women form a large part of those who have been responsible for self-inflicted deaths. I will write to the noble Lord with statistics. I hesitate to bandy them across the Dispatch Box but I do not think he is quite right.

[Earl Cathcart (Con)]

My Lords, will legal aid be available following a death in custody if there is an inquiry?

[Lord Faulks]

My noble friend identifies a statutory source of inquiry that is of great importance to the inquest, which very much expanded following the application of Article 2 of the European convention. The House will know of the establishment of the post of chief coroner, who gives directions as to how these inquests should be carried out. Although the Government, because of the restricted financial circumstances, have had to make various cutbacks in legal aid, I am glad to say that the scope of exceptional funding under Section 10 of the LASPO Act allows the Director of Legal Aid Casework to provide legal aid in circumstances where Article 2 is engaged and there is a convention right. The Lord Chancellor’s guidance to the director makes it clear that,

“It is … likely that an arguable breach of the substantive obligation will occur where the individual has died in State custody other than from natural causes: for example, killings or suicides in prison”,

so it is highly likely that legal aid will be available.

Public Bodies Bill [HL]

Earl Cathcart Excerpts

Monday 7th March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Judd]

My Lords, I have a brief observation to make. We heard a very enthusiastic speech from the Prime Minister in recent days about regenerating the imaginative drive of British industry. We are good at the creative arts and we are good at universities. Why do we have this generalised bureaucratic approach to sweeping legislation instead of getting down to the task—the real discipline—of looking specifically at each of these sectors and the things that are happening in them and devising the strongest possible arrangements to support them in maximising their success? Their success is beyond doubt and it is absolute madness to have been through an episode in which the talent that had got together and that was fulfilling the job so convincingly has been undermined, demoralised and fragmented by what has been proposed. How on earth does this relate to what the Prime Minister was talking about at the weekend? I ask the Government, even at this late stage, not just to try to patch up what has happened and try to find some acceptable solution but to look at the whole thing again and ask how they can really ensure that they have the strongest possible and most dynamic arrangements in place to enable the film industry, and indeed the universities, to succeed as they should.

[Earl Cathcart]

My Lords, I was not going to speak in this debate, but two things strike me. Here, I ought to declare my interest in that, in my past life, I was the chairman of a film production and distribution company.

First, my gut feeling about the merger is that it would be much better to have one body speaking to the British film industry and combining all the functions of the two existing organisations. This would reduce overheads, produce greater efficiencies and allow the new body to focus on the important issues for the film industry—in other words, to be one strong voice for the British film industry. Before these amendments came before us today, I asked one or two noble friends who are in the business for their views. I am told that not all but many eminent practitioners think that the Government in this instance have got it just about right.

Secondly, I am not 100 per cent sure why these amendments are being discussed today in our deliberations on the Public Bodies Bill. I did not think that either the UK Film Council or the British Film Institute were public bodies. They are not statutory bodies, so as excellent and as passionate as this debate has been, surely it should have been conducted outside the confines of this Bill.