Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Wednesday 25th April 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blair of Boughton]

My Lords, I lent my name to the first iteration of the amendment put forward by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Scotland. I want to speak again for a moment about this. I accept and, as has the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald, I praise the Minister for the movement that the Government have produced. However, in my experience of 35 years of dealing with these kinds of cases, there is something very specific about a certain category of offender, including the offenders of child abuse, domestic violence, stalking and partner rape—namely, their deviousness and the control that they exercise on their victims. Therefore, I strongly support the idea that we should not let down this group of victims by imposing an arbitrary limit on the time in which the evidence can be produced in a way that will provide legal assistance to those victims.

Some of your Lordships will be experienced enough to remember the great Erin Pizzey, who was the first founder of women’s refuges. Her book had the most staggeringly accurate title about the kind of man who would commit these offences. I do not mean to say that there are no women who do this but we are primarily talking about men. The title of that book was Scream Quietly or the Neighbours will Hear. I think that we should say, just one last time, will the Government please look at this time limit again, because this group of offenders works in a completely different way from most other criminals?

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I wish to speak about the time limit as regards the abused children who come under paragraph 1 of Schedule 1. The noble and learned Baroness referred to these children. I have been approached by the Grandparents’ Association and Grandparents Plus, which have expressed their deep concerns about the time limit. For example, in the case of a mother who is a drug addict, child protection proceedings may be started. The mother may enter prison or disappear from the scene for some time and the grandparents step in to care for the child. The mother may return to the scene but is not be happy with the situation and wants to have her child back. The grandparents would need to apply for a special guardianship order or a residence order.

It would be helpful if the Minister would be prepared to go even further as regards paragraph 11 of Schedule 1 and lift the time limit in order that those grandparents who provide such an important role do not risk having to invest their life’s savings in trying to protect their relationship with the grandchild for whom they are caring.