Oral Answers to Questions

Kate Green Excerpts

Thursday 18th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

Absolutely not. Our work under universal credit to increase access to child care for women working fewer than 16 hours represents the first time that such support will be in place. We should be championing universal credit as a way of making sure that more women can stay connected to the labour market at a time when they also have caring responsibilities.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Many working women lose out when they have a baby. Last month, a survey by the lawyers Slater & Gordon showed that more than one in seven women returning from maternity leave do not have a job to go back to, yet the Government are not even bothering to collect proper data on pregnancy-related redundancy. The Slater & Gordon research showed that two in five new mums were refused flexible hours and nearly half said that the job they had gone back to was less good than the one they had left. What are the Government doing to get a grip on pregnancy discrimination?

[Maria Miller]

I am sure that the hon. Lady will be pleased to know that I recently met many of those who are looking at the issue, which, like her, I take seriously. I want women not to have a false choice between having a family and staying in employment; they need to be able to do both. That is why by changing the culture in our workplaces so that businesses look at how they can accommodate women—not just in respect of their statutory duties, but more fully than that—we can make sure that women can not only have their family responsibilities, but continue in their jobs.

Claims Management Companies

Kate Green Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Nic Dakin]

The hon. Lady makes an excellent point. We have a situation in which claims management companies can never lose, however vexatious the claims they pursue, while businesses targeted by those companies always lose. She is right: it is time to balance the risk in a different way.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I am glad that my hon. Friend has initiated this debate. Does he agree that some of the Government’s policies that will mean people are no longer able to access lawyers—the fast-track small claims procedure, for example—will mean that claims management companies are able to expand their businesses? People will not be able to go it alone, but neither will they be able to access proper legal advice?

[Nic Dakin]

My hon. Friend draws attention to a very real danger in the current changes.

In his letter to me, Mr Broadbent drew attention to the following unsatisfactory way in which the FOS acted. After downloading the FOS standard PPI claim form, a client completed it. He answered the questions honestly in the form of tick boxes, and stated that he did not recall the sale process. The claim was declined, yet nine months later a CMC made the same complaint on behalf of the same client. In this case all the boxes were ticked, stating that the client had a clear recollection of the sales process and how the product was mis-sold. That was not considered a vexatious complaint and it is being considered by the FOS. It says that it must ignore the original complaint and review it on the basis of the claim submitted by the CMC. That will not strike anyone as a sensible, fair or efficient way to proceed.

The FOS does good work resolving disputes in many areas, but its ability to deal appropriately with PPI disputes is compromised by the sheer volume of complaints it receives. Last year, complaints about PPI made up 60% of all complaints dealt with by the FOS, yet CMCs made no contribution to the running costs of the FOS. Greater control over CMCs, and a system where they will be charged for making unsuccessful claims, would help free up the FOS to deal more effectively with other matters in its inbox.

The Ministry of Justice is to be applauded for making some headway in its control of CMCs, but there is more to do. The ban on referrals in personal injury cases, which is due to come into force in April, will hopefully reduce harassment of members of the public who have been involved in accidents. The flipside of that is that claims management companies may focus more on PPI claims and look to diversify into new areas of vexatious claiming. Indeed, there is already some evidence that they are turning their attention to mortgages.

The Financial Services Authority acknowledges that there has been no wholesale mis-selling of mortgages, yet some claims management companies are already sending template letters to businesses, claiming that mortgages were mis-sold. The letters are easily produced but take a lot of time to answer—sometimes as long as 10 or 12 hours—because of the complexity of the mortgages.

The claims management regulator set up by the Ministry of Justice regularly shuts down CMCs that deliberately submit vexatious claims, but the number of claims companies is too high for the regulator to keep up. The number of companies is rising—it has doubled in the past two years to more than 3,000. The competition between them results in more vexatious claims and ever more aggressive tactics. In the years 2011-12, the regulator undertook only 150 visits and audits of firms, which is fewer than 5% of authorised CMCs.

I would be grateful if the Minister responded to a number of questions in her reply. Does she support the call of Which? for improved regulation of CMCs? Will she take steps to ban cold calling and cold texting? Will she take action to ensure that, in any advertisement, CMCs make clear to the client the benefit of their taking their claim directly, without intermediary, to the FOS? Will she place a duty on CMCs to ensure that the claims they submit contain accurate information? Claims companies should be required to exercise due diligence and must reasonably believe that there is a possibility of a valid claim. They must not be allowed to continue to fish for claims with very little consequence.

CMCs play an influential role in the UK’s compensation and redress regimes. They are responsible for almost half the complaints sent to the FOS, but make no financial contribution to its operating costs of around £107 million. In the light of that, will the Minister explore how CMCs can make a financial contribution to FOS running costs? For example, CMCs could be required to pay the £500 FOS case fee when they have not undertaken adequate checks to ensure there is a policy in place. The FOS dismisses charging for CMCS in “Charging for our work: modernising our case fee arrangements”, saying that charges will be passed on to customers. A simple solution would be to ban the collection of up-front fees and cap the percentage of a claim that a CMC can take. That would prevent their passing on to customers the reasonable charges that I argue should be levied on the industry.

Will the Minister take steps to ensure that CMCs accept leads only from organisations that are also regulated by the claims management regulator, organisations that are exempt introducers, or organisations that are regulated by another body, such as solicitors? There is concern that the FOS is insufficiently independent of the regulator, which is currently the FSA. Can that be scrutinised? Can appropriate action be taken to ensure a clear separation of powers and responsibilities? It seems unreasonable that a business must adhere to the adjudicator’s findings without a right of appeal and with no knowledge of the adjudicator’s qualification for making a decision. Can that be looked at with a view to equalising the playing field?

Finally, can steps be taken to ensure that the Ministry of Justice and the CMR have sufficient powers and capacity properly to regulate the business in a way that is fair to consumers and businesses? After all, we should support businesses such as Mr Broadbent’s. His business lends to other businesses and helps them to expand, fuelling the growth of the economy.

Claims companies are making huge amounts of money and filing huge numbers of claims against whatever businesses they can, regardless of whether they have mis-sold or even sold a PPI. At their worst, CMCs do not help the consumer, and damage businesses and clog up the regulators. Their proliferation must be stopped.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mrs Helen Grant)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) on securing this debate on claims management companies, which remain topical. Clearly, there are serious conduct problems among a minority of CMCs, but it is worth remembering that some provide a useful service in identifying consumers who have suffered loss and supporting them in obtaining redress when they would otherwise receive nothing. While we have made good progress since the start of regulation, I acknowledge that there is more that can be done and should be done to improve the conduct of CMCs, and to strengthen consumer protection across the claims management industry. To that end, the Ministry of Justice claims management regulation unit remains committed to providing a stable and robust regulatory system that the public can trust. I am glad that the hon. Gentleman acknowledged the good work that the CMR unit is doing. It is stepping up its approach to improving CMC compliance and strengthening enforcement action through a range of measures.

The CMR unit has established a specialist compliance team to deal with poor practices used by some CMCs when handling claims for mis-sold payment protection insurance. In the past year, the compliance team has conducted more than 100 audits of CMCs assessed as high risk, issued warnings, and taken other forms of enforcement action where problems have been found. This work continues and includes targeting CMCs that are submitting poorly prepared or spurious claims, charging up-front fees and operating call centres, to ensure that sales calls are compliant.

On the problem of nuisance calls and text messages, we fully support the work of the Information Commissioner’s Office in enforcing the legislation that protects individuals from this form of direct marketing. We also recognise the benefits of a joint approach to tackling the problem. Before I go further, however, it is important to point out that spam texts that market claims services are generally not sent by CMCs, but by other organisations that generate leads for other businesses, including CMCs. The CMR unit is working with the ICO to investigate and take enforcement action against CMCs accepting leads or claims from this type of marketing.

Within the personal injury claims sector, most of the issues relate to businesses or organised groups attempting to defraud the insurance industry. The CMR unit contributes valuable intelligence and expertise, and has worked with a range of organisations and agencies to tackle fraud, including the Insurance Fraud Bureau, and police forces on a number of operations throughout the year. Those operations have resulted in arrests, charges and convictions. Much has therefore been achieved at a time when resources are limited. Since regulation began in 2007, the CMR unit has removed the licences of more than 900 CMCs across the sector. More recently, a major crackdown resulted in more than 400 CMCs being warned, suspended or having their licences cancelled. That has been done with no impact on the public purse, as regulation is self-financing.

So far, I have covered the good work that the CMR unit is doing to drive out malpractice. What I want to do now is to look further ahead to the programme of reforms we are introducing this year. Our reform plans give us all huge opportunities to do things better and to ensure that the regulatory framework continues to deliver effectively. This year’s reform agenda includes four main measures. Following a consultation exercise, we are proposing to tighten the conduct rules for CMCs. Most critically, we are proposing that contractual agreements between CMCs and consumers must be signed by clients before any fees can be taken. CMCs will only be permitted to refer to being regulated by the claims management regulator, rather than by the Ministry of Justice. CMCs will have to inform their contracted client of any variation or suspension of their authorisation. We intend to publish our response to the consultation shortly and, subject to the relevant Government clearance processes that can take some time, we expect implementation of the proposed changes to follow this summer.

Last year, we ran a public consultation on imposing a ban on CMCs offering financial rewards, or similar benefits, to potential claimants as an inducement to make a claim. The ban will come into effect from 1 April. Also from 1 April, we are implementing the primary recommendations contained in Lord Justice Jackson’s review of civil litigation costs, including in particular a ban on the payment and receipt of referral fees in personal injury cases and fundamental reform to the no win, no fee conditional fee agreements. That will include, in particular, a ban on the payment and receipt of referral fees in personal injury cases and fundamental reform to the no win, no fee conditional fee agreement.

[Kate Green]

I am aware of the changes being made to referral fees, but is the Minister aware of the concern that, because they will be brought within the ambit of the conditional free arrangements, CMCs will be able to use those CFAs as a means simply of replacing referral fees?

[Mrs Grant]

I think that our reforms have looked into these issues carefully and we have anticipated many of the issues to which the hon. Lady is alluding. I was going to touch on this in my speech anyway. We feel that our reforms have been carefully considered and are proportionate, appropriate and balanced, and that we now have to start to attack our compensation culture, which has been building up for many years. Obviously, the reforms will be reviewed within three to four years, and if further changes need to be made in order to create further balance and fairness, of course that can be considered.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kate Green Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

Those who are sentenced to less than 12 months certainly have a higher propensity to reoffend—57% as opposed to 47%—but the length of a sentence is dictated by the seriousness of the offence. A failure in the current system, which the scheme that we are introducing will address, is that those who come out after a shorter sentence have no rehabilitation. We will provide that under the new system, and we hope and expect that that will bring down the reoffending rate among precisely the group he complains about.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Will the Minister acknowledge that preventing reoffending among women requires the provision of specialist and specifically targeted and designed services to meet their holistic needs within the context of the criminal justice system? What steps will Ministers take to ensure that the payment-by-results model will protect that specialist provision for women?

[Damian Green]

The precise point of the payment-by-results system and of bringing new people into the system will be to allow providers with specialist skills—for example, in dealing with women offenders—to bring those abilities, skills and experience to bear so that we have much more targeted and tailored rehabilitation than in the past. Specific groups, including obviously women offenders, will be rehabilitated more effectively in the future.

Probation Service

Kate Green Excerpts

Wednesday 13th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Mudie]

My right hon. Friend raises a number of points that I hope I will have time to touch on. They are all valid, not because they are in my speech but because they are important points about the attack on the probation service.

Any real scrutiny of the Ministry of Justice figures demonstrates that the reasons for our disappointing reoffending rates are complicated and numerous, but it is wrong and unfair to place them at the door of the probation service. As I have said, a major proportion of reoffending is outside the statutory remit of the probation service. I pay tribute to the proposal in the White Paper to bring it within the probation service’s responsibilities for the first time. It is one thing that I straightforwardly applaud.

Although I wish for improvement, due to those facts, and because of the quality and professionalism of the probation service, I am not convinced that there is a pressing need for the upheaval suggested in the consultation document, or for the pace and scale of change. I want to make it absolutely clear that reoffending figures should unarguably be improved, and that the proposals to address short-sentence prisoners are long overdue and welcome. I have no dogmatic opposition to the use of the private and voluntary sector in rehabilitation. My concerns are overwhelmingly about public safety, protecting the existing good work of the probation service, questioning the suggested and untested payment-by-results methods that will be introduced to the private sector, ensuring that management and structure changes are sensibly modified to suit the proposals and, importantly in this age of austerity, ensuring that the costs are acceptable. As my right hon. Friend pointed out, the costs are starting to worry the Treasury.

Against that backdrop, it is critical that these large-scale reforms of our rehabilitation and probation policy are well thought through, investigated from all angles and brought together on a basis that puts evidence first. What is before us is none of those things. It is hasty, ill thought through, dogmatic, cobbled together and risky. I have indicated my concerns, and I will expand on them.

First, the Secretary of State describes the approach as revolutionary, but there is a clear need to demonstrate that the policy changes are evidence-based. The former Secretary of State, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), started a number of pilot schemes in that area of work, which were abandoned within days after the present Secretary of State took office. When questioned by the Select Committee on Justice, the present Secretary of State admitted that he was unable to provide MPs with any evidence to support his change in policy. He excused his peremptory ending of the pilot schemes by stating that it

“will take us much of the rest of this decade to see through to a conclusion, evaluating the data and coming up with an analysis. We are talking about the core principle of trusting the professionals and making them take a bit of the risk themselves”.

We are less worried about the professionals than about the public taking the risk of the proposals.

When pressed by the shadow Secretary of State to produce evidence to justify, for example, the controversial payment-by-results proposal, the Secretary of State derided what he termed the Opposition’s obsession with pilots, saying revealingly:

“Sometimes those in government just have to believe in something and do it”.—[Official Report, 9 January 2013; Vol. 556, c. 318.]

That warms the heart, but it worries us to death.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend not agree that it is especially concerning that the Justice Secretary has decided to proceed without gathering the evidence, given that perhaps the best example of a similar programme under this Government—the Work programme—seems to be performing spectacularly badly?

[Mr Mudie]

I agree with my hon. Friend; this is a bad example of a politician and a Department feeling right in proceeding on such a sensitive matter involving so much public risk. If the Minister feels that I am being unfair, the Select Committee and I would welcome it if he produced the evidence to justify the risks inherent in the policy changes.

The more the proposals are scrutinised, the more apparent it becomes that giving the majority of work to the private sector is the major objective. To my mind, it is also a major cause of the opposition to the proposals and of some of the difficulties in the consultation paper. I said earlier that I saw nothing amiss in involving the private and voluntary sector—it is, of course, already involved, and such arrangements have grown and are appreciated—but the scale and spread proposed are entirely different. The proposal to hand over 70% of the work load of existing probation officers so quickly to firms untrained in and unused to the work raises obvious questions.

The division of the work distribution—low and medium-risk to the private sector, high-risk to the probation service—looks clear on paper but ignores what professionals in the service say happens in real life. Medium-risk individuals can move dangerously quickly to being high risk. If the signs are not spotted immediately, high risk may escalate into dangerous behaviour with harm to individual and general public safety. That is a reality that experienced probation officers live with every working hour, and it is a tribute to their skill and dedication that it does not happen on a wider scale.

It would be wiser to introduce the private sector, if it must be introduced on this scale, to deal initially with the low-risk group alone. Even if that were seen as weakening the proposals’ profitability for the private sector, it would have the opportunity to take on the new work load of prisoners serving less than 12-month sentences. That would create a clear division and stop the overlap, which will certainly cause a problem. It could also help with the vagueness of the relationships and objectives of the differing cultures.

The private sector has the responsibility to ensure that court or licence agreements are adhered to. Obvious situations arise when individuals are in breach, and they are processed by the probation officer, but in areas of work where trust and relationships are all-important, the probation officer will have to accept the judgment of private sector personnel and haul the offender back to court. On the one hand, we have a public servant—a professional—who has no monetary motivation and whose only objectives are public safety and working with integrity with the person on probation. On the other hand, under the proposals, we will end up with large private companies tied to a scheme of payment that will pay largely on results.

Is it impossible that, to protect or maximise payment, the person on probation who could be a difficulty and a danger to that payment might necessarily be passed back to the probation officer? The probation officer would then have to pick up the relationship and process the matter through court.

If the Minister does not accept that argument, he should at least consider the divisions of the responsibilities proposed. A more distinct role for the private sector is needed, but one that allows distinct accountability, which is paramount in this sector. Every day, there is the possibility of something going wrong, and any ambiguity in responsibility is unwelcome.

Another reason to suggest that privatisation is uppermost in the Secretary of State’s mind is the winding up of the 35 trusts. Why are they being wound up? They have just been praised as excellent; they have been doing the job for 10 years; they have built themselves into the area and built up their relationships; but now they are being converted into 16 or perhaps six geographical areas, with all the dangers to the relationships that lie with that. Can the Minister spell out the reasons for cutting the trusts and the agreed criteria for the number of replacements?

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Sawford]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I want to talk about how such local organisations are working to good effect in Northamptonshire and about my concern that that will be disrupted. As my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East made clear, our concern is that payment by results in the criminal justice system is untested. The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, the right hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), was responsible for the Work programme, which is, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland Central has said, a contradiction in terms. Will the Minister explain why the Government are rushing headlong into the changes and ignoring the pilots, rather than learning from them and developing reforms from them?

Our probation service does a good job in difficult circumstances and on stretched budgets, and the Government rated the performance of every probation trust as good or exceptional in 2011. After the proposed changes, probation will deal with an extra 60,000 offenders a year. Will there be additional funding or will the current money be spread even more thinly, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East suggested? Poorly resourced support for rehabilitation will not effectively help to reform offenders, and that poses a serious risk to our constituents’ safety.

The proposals have been strongly and widely criticised. The National Association of Probation Officers said that they were

“being rushed through without proper thought to the consequences.”

NAPO pointed out:

“Although these offenders are deemed medium and low risk of harm, they include…offenders at high risk of reoffending, such as prolific burglars, chaotic drug users and gang members…who require professional expertise in their management.”

In Northamptonshire, such offenders currently receive that professional expertise. The Howard League for Penal Reform calls the proposals “untested and opaque.”

[Kate Green]

Does my hon. Friend share the concern that has been expressed about the Government’s plans? If contracted providers carry out supervision, but probation takes the final decisions where there is a breach, probation officers will be taking decisions about whether there has been a breach, and how to respond to it, without having had the benefit of a long-standing relationship with the offender. To some degree, they will be making such decisions in the dark.

[Andy Sawford]

I agree with my hon. Friend. One problem with the reforms is that they will threaten the co-ordination and the relationships that different agencies and professionals in the probation system have built up.

I want to share the views of three of my constituents who are officers in the local probation service. They are

“shocked to hear that the Justice Secretary intends to put out to tender the majority of the Service’s core work”.

They are “astonished”, particularly because

“the probation service is currently performing extremely well”.

They also believe there is “no evidence” that the payment-by-results scheme will deliver, and they feel that the decision

“has been made on purely ideological grounds”.

One of the probation officers stated:

“I am fearful that if this plan proceeds it will be chaotic and will compromise public protection”.

The probation service is operating in the context of serious budget cuts, and we have to bear those in mind as we consider the potential additional costs of the reforms. The budget allocated to probation trusts was cut from £820 million in 2011-12 to £814 million in 2012-13. That is part of a 23% cut to the Ministry of Justice over the spending review period. Probation services face serious cuts, and the total number of staff fell from 19,000 in 2010 to 17,800 in 2012. The Chancellor of the Exchequer confirmed yesterday that another spending review is looming on the horizon, and we expect staff numbers to be squeezed further.

I am concerned that, as public bodies, trusts will not be allowed to bid on their own or with partners for commercial contracts for the delivery of probation services, because they will not be able to bear the financial risks involved in taking on a payment-by-results contract. The financial objects of trusts specifically forbid them from taking on such a financial risk. I have spoken to the Minister about that, and I look forward to his response. Trusts have worked on the assumption that they could get around that impediment by setting up arm’s-length commercial vehicles to take on the financial risks involved, but now I understand that the National Offender Management Service has told trusts that that is ultra vires. Will the Minister clarify whether that is correct? Under right-to-provide legislation, individual staff may bid if they can set up an independent mutual, but such a mutual would have to compete alongside other providers. As I understand it, probation trusts may not take the lead in the development of a mutual. Will the Minister tell me whether that is correct?

I have a number of specific questions, on which I will write to the Minister. However, will probation trusts, as public bodies, be permitted to bid, either on their own or with partners, for commercial contracts? Can they set up special-purpose vehicles? Can they set up mutual delivery organisations? Staff, including those in my constituency, are proud of their probation service. They want to know what future they have, and whether they will have opportunities to work around the reforms to sustain the good work that has been done. If probation staff were to set up their own mutual delivery organisation to bid for commercial contracts for the delivery of probation services in the community, would they have to resign from their employment with the probation trusts to take part in the competition?

According to informed estimates from various commentators, the reforms will result in the contracting out of about 70% of the work of a local probation trust. The Ministry of Justice claims that there will be a role for a surviving public probation service, but will that not be a tiny outfit of perhaps 3,000 staff—similar to the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service, for example—which will operate as a courts and public protection service? I am concerned that a rump of 3,000 staff will simply become a national agency of NOMS, and the probation service as we know it will disappear.

Finally, I want to touch on the success story in Northamptonshire. The Minister will be aware of the high performance of Northamptonshire. I do not want to dispute the claims that my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland Central has made about the performance of her probation trust, so let us just say that they are both excellent. The Northamptonshire probation trust is small, and it provides offender management services for the benefit of people across Northamptonshire. It excels against the Ministry of Justice performance targets, and the county has one of the lowest reoffending rates in the country.

The trust has certain features that are worth highlighting. The staff work very effectively in partnership with other local organisations. For example, operational probation and police staff work closely in the Northamptonshire integrated offender management team to monitor the most prolific offenders and to intervene where necessary. The trust’s strong working relationship with the police is reflected in the multi-agency public protection arrangements, and issues relating to the most serious offenders are well managed in Northamptonshire. There is strong strategic partnership working with the local authorities, with health providers and in areas such as housing and education. The offender management approach in Northamptonshire, which is working by reducing reoffending, is about really strong local partnership working, and that points the way to the approach for the future. The hon. Member for Witham mentioned reform, which we all agree is needed, and I believe we need to build on the incredible, strong local success story in Northamptonshire.

My time is running out, but I point the Minister to proposals that I made in a publication called “Primary Justice”, on which I worked with several Members of Parliament, including the right hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert), as well as Lord Ramsbotham and other eminent professionals in the area. That report, which I believe was excellent, proposed a model that would build on a public sector success story. It would be far better to adopt that model than to proceed with the current proposals, and I commend it to the Minister. I look forward to his answers to my specific questions.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to be able to take part in the debate under your chairmanship, Mr Crausby. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East (Mr Mudie) on securing this important debate and on his comprehensive critique of the Government’s proposals. I am sorry that several pages of his speech were lost, owing to interventions, but that shows the strength of concern about the proposals.

My speech will be relatively brief, and I want to focus on some of the concerns of the South Yorkshire. Without wanting to compete with those of my hon. Friends who commented on the trusts in their areas, I will mention the fact that it recently received a five-star accreditation in the British Quality Foundation’s Recognised for Excellence programme, on the strength of its organisational performance. I hope therefore that regard will be paid to its views. We can all agree that we need to increase rehabilitation levels, to support a reduction in reoffending, but the South Yorkshire probation trust’s concerns deserve proper consideration.

The trust points out that although the Justice Secretary is looking for improvements in the reoffending rate, such improvements are already being achieved by the probation service. According to the Ministry’s figures, performance in relation to offenders under statutory supervision has improved year on year over the past decade. The data show that adult proven reoffending was 3.1 percentage points lower in 2010 than in 2000; 66% of offenders subject to statutory supervision by the probation service do not go on to reoffend. Those include a range of offenders with a mixture of complex and demanding needs who are assessed as being at low, medium or high risk of both harm and reoffending. Conversely, according to National Audit Office figures, 60% of offenders who are not subject to statutory supervision by the probation service—those who receive a prison sentence of less than 12 months—go on to reoffend.

A key concern of the South Yorkshire probation trust about the new proposals is the proposal to split responsibility for offenders between public and private providers, depending on the level of risk. Its concern is that that could introduce a dangerous, artificial divide, which would fail to take account of how risk levels fluctuate. It sees the management of medium-risk cases in particular as a “fundamental threat” and points out that there seems to be a belief that medium-risk cases are assessed as such on the basis of the seriousness of the current offence. However, that is not always the case. Medium-risk offenders have already caused, or are assessed as having the potential to cause, “serious harm”. They can include those on life sentences, individuals who have a history of domestic abuse, members of gangs, and individuals who pose a risk to children.

The proposed model fails to recognise that circumstances can change abruptly. Thus, someone who is deemed to be of low or medium risk could subsequently become high risk, and the staff in the contracted organisation might not be equipped to recognise that. Even if they did, they would then presumably need to arrange a hurried transfer back into the public sector. That would clearly be nonsense, and a bureaucratic nightmare.

[Kate Green]

Does my hon. Friend agree that as well as being nonsense and a bureaucratic nightmare it would be a financial disincentive for a private provider?

[Paul Blomfield]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. It is a significant financial disincentive, which underlines what nonsense the proposal is at every level.

The South Yorkshire probation trust also considers that the proposals show a failure to understand the complexities of accountability in the criminal justice system. If a judge or magistrate has concerns about the supervision of a contracted-out court order, with one or more organisations involved, whom should they ask to appear before them? Information sharing, particularly with the police, will become complicated and relevant information in relation to risk issues will be lost. Only a qualified probation officer should be the offender manager of medium-risk cases: that is how the trust operates, and it believes it is a reason for its high performance. I would underline the importance of learning from high performance to reduce reoffending. The model that the trust believes fully supports the Government’s plans to bring other sectors together is based on the approach of the offender manager and offender supervisor relationship; it builds on current successful practice in working with many agencies from the public, private and third sectors, often in the same premises, to manage difficult and dangerous offenders in the community.

Like many of my hon. Friends, I am concerned about the proposal to reduce the number of trusts. South Yorkshire had also raised that matter. My hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), who is no longer in his place, talked about the importance of local anchorage. The proposals for a reduced number of trusts would make it more difficult for the probation service to retain local links and a local profile, and what my hon. Friend called anchorage. Those changes to structures, coming at the same time as changes to who provides services, and how they provide them, will be such an upheaval that it will put the success of the Government’s scheme at significant additional risk. I ask the Minister to listen not only to all my hon. Friends but to the professionals in the field; to take account of the responses to the consultation; and not to rush through changes that would increase the risks to public safety.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to speak in this important debate, Mr Crausby. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East (Mr Mudie) and thank him for the opportunity to speak on a subject about which I care deeply. I have cared about it for many years, having served as a magistrate from 1993 to 2009, when I got to know probation officers closely. I am concerned that the Government’s proposals are based on no evidence that a payment-by-results model will work in the context. By contrast, Greater Manchester probation trust, which supervises offenders in my constituency, has a good track record. Other hon. Members have also spoken about the successes of their probation trusts this afternoon. The Justice Secretary himself has, indeed, recognised Greater Manchester’s innovativeness, and has said he wants to consider the lessons learned there. I hope that that is sincere.

As others have pointed out, we need first to be clear about who is currently supervised by probation, and about the fact that we cannot assess the service’s performance in relation to offenders whose supervision was never in its remit. The probation service does not supervise those who leave custody after receiving sentences of less than 12 months. That group of offenders has been missed by public policy to date. The Government are right about that, and I welcome their intention to introduce new supervision for that group. However, the Minister will be interested to know that Greater Manchester probation trust has already experimented with a programme to look after that group of offenders. The Choose Change programme, a through-the-gate initiative for those serving shorter custodial sentences, offered support and supervision before and after release.

The evaluation of Choose Change shows the scale of the challenge in dealing with prisoners who have had short custodial sentences, on release. They were people with long histories of offending behaviour, and often chaotic lives. It is clear to me that one reason why Choose Change was less successful than we all hoped was that it was necessary to intervene much earlier in those offenders’ lives. For those with 10 or 15-year histories of offending behaviour it was far too late to start looking at through-the-gate solutions. However, we should also recognise that Choose Change offered support to an extent that was both intensive and costly. It is not clear to me that such intensive through-the-gate supervision can be made attractive to the private sector. In the absence of any wide-scale national provision against which to measure it—that group of offenders has not been supervised on a national scale to date—I am curious about how the Minister intends to specify the provision, and about the sort of pricing model that he envisages, to make it viable for commercial providers.

Secondly, Greater Manchester probation trust has led the way in important initiatives such as intensive alternatives to custody and integrated offender management. Crucial to those programmes and, indeed, to Choose Change, as other hon. Members have said, has been effective inter-agency working, founded on long-standing close relationships. I visited the Spotlight team at Stretford police station, shortly after I became a Member of Parliament, where police, probation, the local authorities, social services and so on are co-located. Workers are very effective and are a well targeted, integrated team that spotlights—as the name says—follows, tracks and intervenes constantly on offenders who are either living during or post-sentence in the community. It is absolutely vital that the success of that programme, which is founded on those inter-agency relationships, is protected. I know already that Greater Manchester police are expressing concern that those relationships could be disturbed by the roll-out of the Government’s proposals. I would be grateful if the Minister could say how he envisages those inter-agency relationships being sustained and protected when new private providers appear on the scene.

Thirdly, we would all rightly acknowledge the importance of employment in preventing reoffending; it is well understood to be crucial in keeping offenders out of trouble in future. I very much welcomed the Government’s decision to introduce “day one” entry to the Work programme for those leaving custody, but we have to acknowledge that the Work programme has not, so far at least, been a roaring success.

By contrast, the Achieve programme, developed by the Greater Manchester probation trust, has proven very successful both with those on community sentences, who make up 70% of the Achieve caseload, and with those leaving custody, who make up the other 30%. Achieve is a programme that works with partners such as Procure Plus, which is a social enterprise based in my constituency, to offer real work and real wages to offenders. It has been very successful in getting offenders into sustained employment. Some 13.5% of those going through the Achieve programme have remained in employment. As I think the Minister would agree, that is a much better result than we have seen from the Work programme, and we want to build on that. As my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Andy Sawford) said, we are now deeply uncertain about the future for programmes such as Achieve.

The Secretary of State for Justice has talked of probation staff forming co-operatives or social enterprises, and, as my hon. Friend said, probation trusts—including Greater Manchester probation trust—have been anticipating, over the past 12 months or so, the need and opportunity to create separate non-public sector provider organisations, but with the probation element integral to their success. It seems now as though probation services, such as GMPT, that have created those models will not be able to use them to bid for contracts, and we really need to understand from the Minister whether that is right, and if so, why on earth is it right? There is a situation of total confusion out there now. We do not know whether it is considered anti-competitive for those bodies to bid, or whether them bidding is considered ultra vires, as my hon. Friend mentioned. We do not understand why the Justice Secretary seemed to be so positive about it but now seems to be rowing back. I would be really grateful if the Minister—I am glad that he is shaking his head—could put it on the record clearly this afternoon that they will have the opportunity to bid.

Fourthly, the Minister will not be in the least bit surprised that I want to raise concerns about programmes for women in the contracted-out model, because as he is well aware, they have special needs and circumstances in the context of the criminal justice system. I welcome the appointment of his colleague, the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, the hon. Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant), as champion for women in the criminal justice system. I very much regret that this afternoon, we see the Government rejecting the amendment that was passed in the House of Lords to the Crime and Courts Bill, proposing that there is a champion for women at the heart of the criminal justice system. I am very pleased that the Select Committee on Justice is conducting an inquiry into women in the criminal justice system, and I encourage the Committee to look at how payment by results would work for women offenders, because that is not at all straightforward.

In Greater Manchester, we have developed the Women MATTA programme, which is a partnership between the Pankhurst centre and Women in Prison. It offers holistic support for women offenders or those at risk of offending, and it has been able, by wrapping holistic support around those women, to deliver substantial savings to the public purse. Again, it is founded on a network of carefully developed relationships between different non-governmental organisations, but it is very hard to see that that voluntary approach would fit easily into the payment-by-results model, and I worry that that very good, specialist work could be lost.

The problems are that the number of women in the criminal justice system is relatively small, as everyone knows; their needs are high and often very complex; they are often mothers, so there are extra dimensions to the support that is needed, because children are involved; and they have often also been victims of crime and abuse over a very long period of time. We can already see services to support women offenders and women’s centres being squeezed. Ring-fenced funding that had been provided by the Ministry of Justice is now being spread more thinly across more women’s programmes.

The conclusion I draw is that it could be very costly for private providers to develop the kind of dedicated programmes that are necessary to meet the special needs of women. There is a real concern, therefore, that they will not do so and instead, we will see women shoehorned into the standard offer. I am sorry to draw yet again on the analogy of the Work programme, but that is exactly what is happening there, where we can see particularly poor outcomes for lone parents, because again, their special needs as women and mothers are simply not being regarded in that programme.

I am really grateful for the opportunity to raise those concerns at this early stage, as Ministers are considering how they intend to roll out the model. My concerns are very real, in terms of holding on to the good practice that we have. Nobody in Greater Manchester probation trust is against competition, or against the appropriate involvement of the private and third sectors, but I know that the Minister will not want to choke off successful initiatives and programmes that already exist. I am very concerned that top-down, large-scale, nationally let contracts will prove especially problematic, in relation to the very effective local programmes that have been developed. The voluntary sector will be squeezed out, as has happened again in the Work programme, and the outcomes will be poorer as a result.

I urge Ministers to proceed with their plans with great caution. We are proud of our track record in Greater Manchester, and Ministers must provide us with the assurance and the evidence that the private sector payment-by-results model will do better. It is not good enough to say that it will do okay, because we are not at all clear at this stage that that evidence exists.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Wright]

I very much hope that the kinds of projects the hon. Gentleman describes are successful, but we do not believe that the funding necessary to do what we are discussing will be released quickly enough in this case. The best way to do it is to engage in exactly the course of action we have set out. Payment by results is not, as some believe, ideological at all. It is very practical. It is about paying for what works and investing taxpayers’ money in it. After all, taxpayers expect us to invest their money wisely in effective outcomes. In this case, the outcome is simple: the reduction of reoffending. That is what we are after. It means fewer victims, less misery for communities and lower costs to the taxpayer.

An argument has been made about pilots. Why not pilot? Why not spend more time exploring and experimenting? It is a myth that we do not already have learning on payment by results—we do. We have learning from pilots undertaken and stopped early. It is not the case that one can learn nothing from a pilot unless it runs its full course. It is equally not the case that one can learn nothing from a pilot unless it succeeds; sometimes you can learn as much from what does not work as you can learn from what does.

I shall change the subject entirely. The Work programme has also been mentioned. Of course, I do not accept that the Work programme is a failure in the way it has been characterised, but it is true the programme is a source of learning for this project. We do not intend to lift the Work programme from the Department for Work and Pensions and deposit it into the Ministry of Justice, because it is different. There are differences because we expect those who take on the work to carry out the orders of the court and meet licence requirements, which is why such contracts, under any payment-by-results arrangement, will not be 100% payment by results.

[Kate Green]

I suggest, in passing, that it might be sensible to wait for the Work programme to demonstrate its successes before using it as a helpful model to run ahead with this programme. Some Work programme providers will undoubtedly bid for contracts for probation provision and supervision provision. Given that we have identified employment as a key way out of offending behaviour, are those providers likely to be paid twice, once as an offender’s Work programme provider and a second time for providing their criminal justice supervision?

[Jeremy Wright]

In our system, we will look for justice outcomes under the payment-by-results contracts. We will be interested in whether people have reoffended. I shall come back to some of the difficulties with metrics, which were mentioned, in a moment. The Work programme is different in that providers are rewarded for getting people back into work. On the hon. Lady’s first point, I must say that if we should wait two years to find out whether the Work programme is a success, she should wait two years before she deems it a failure. Until we wait for those two years, she cannot say what Opposition Members have been saying loudly for some weeks.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kate Green Excerpts

Thursday 10th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that many churches already offer the opportunity for couples who are in same-sex relationships to have their marriages blessed in church. These are matters for the Church to deal with, whether they relate to the performance of marriages in church or to blessings. The Church must deal with these issues itself.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Is it not unfortunate that the Minister has said that same-sex marriage will be “illegal” in the Church of England and the Church in Wales, when the incoming Archbishop of Canterbury has said that he will carefully consider his stance on the issue and the archbishop of the Church in Wales has said that there is no single Christian opinion on the matter? Will she ensure that, should those Churches wish to marry same-sex couples at some time in the future, she will have legislation prepared to enable them to do so without the need for further primary legislation?

[Maria Miller]

The hon. Lady is right to raise the issue of the role of the Church of England and the Church in Wales. Our stance throughout has been to protect those organisations to enable them to make their own decisions. We are talking to them on an ongoing basis about the best way to do that. As to her question about whether they would be able to undertake these duties in the future if they decide to do so, the answer is absolutely yes.

Transforming Rehabilitation

Kate Green Excerpts

Wednesday 9th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I intend to legislate in the near future to ensure that, when we do this, the court has the power to require people who have short sentences to go through rehabilitation programmes. It is important that we have a system whereby if someone who has a drug problem has a short sentence and is released from jail having started rehab there, that rehab will carry on and they will be required to do it. That will be the case.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

The Justice Secretary will be well aware of the special experiences and needs of women in the criminal justice system. There are already some excellent programmes supporting women offenders, such as the women matter programme in Greater Manchester. Will the Justice Secretary assure me that he will use the consultation period to reflect carefully on how a payment-by-results method will need to be adapted to meet the particular needs of women offenders?

[Chris Grayling]

I can give the hon. Lady that assurance. The Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant), who has responsibility for women in prisons, and I are looking at the issue. There are different challenges for adult males, young people and women in prisons, and we need to be careful and ensure that we approach each of those groups with an appropriate understanding of the different circumstances in which they find themselves.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kate Green Excerpts

Tuesday 18th December 2012 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

1. What the Government’s policy is on the use of indeterminate sentences for public protection.

[The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Grayling)]

The widely criticised indeterminate sentence of imprisonment for public protection was abolished on 3 December. It has been replaced by a new regime of mandatory life sentences, which apply to anyone who is convicted for a second time of a very serious sexual or violent offence, and tough extended determinate sentences.

[Kate Green]

In a written answer published on 19 October, I was informed that 193 prisoners over the age of 60 were serving indeterminate sentences for public protection. Approximately 25 elderly high-risk prisoners are expected to be released in Greater Manchester, some of whom will have higher than average social care needs as well as a need for specialist supervision. What discussions have been taking place with local authorities about where those individuals are to be accommodated, and who will bear the cost?

[Chris Grayling]

As the hon. Lady will know, the probation service regularly engages in detailed discussions with local authorities to try to establish the right ways of dealing with individual offenders. In many parts of the country there is integrated offender management, which is designed to ensure that we provide the best possible support. My plans for a rehabilitation revolution will step up the support provided for such people, and will, I hope, ensure that we address issues such as where prisoners are to live after leaving prison.

Church of England (Women Bishops)

Kate Green Excerpts

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

This evening’s debate has been full of eloquent and incredibly passionate speeches. I pay tribute to everybody who has participated, particularly my right hon. Friend the Member for Exeter (Mr Bradshaw), who secured the debate. It has been clear this evening and over the past couple of weeks that there is widespread agreement in this House—I accept it is not unanimous, not even this evening—that what was arrived at in General Synod a couple of weeks ago is not acceptable to Parliament. Today’s debate has also highlighted the prevailing view here that the Church should take speedy action to rectify the matter. It is also clear that the mood in this place is that if the Church does not act, Parliament should and will.

There might be some—my right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Paul Murphy) referred to this—who see that suggestion as unwarranted interference in the Church’s affairs or as undermining freedom of religion, but the Church of England occupies a special constitutional position as the established Church. That brings with it specific responsibilities, including making the law of the land. As has been noted, 42 diocesan bishops are entitled to sit in the House of Lords as Lords Spiritual, with 26 permitted to sit at any one time. As my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) said, surely our Parliament must at every level be reflective of the society it represents. That is not compatible with the reservation of places in our Parliament that could only be open to men. Further, whether we like it or not, Parliament’s role in relation to the Church’s decisions cannot be brushed aside. Although the Church enjoys legislative initiative, decisions of the General Synod must be approved by Parliament. It seems clear that there would be no hope whatever of last month’s decision receiving the approval of this House. A rethink is therefore essential. The Church really has no option, as it has recognised.

If that threatened uncontained confrontation between Parliament and the mass of Church membership, we might of course be concerned about a brewing political and constitutional crisis. However, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Exeter and others pointed out, it is important to remember that the majority of Church of England members want to see women bishops in the Church. That was the majority vote in all three Houses of the Synod. Only in the House of Laity was the requisite two thirds majority not secured.

This is not a situation where Parliament is pitted against the will of the majority of Church members. Indeed, many Church members, along with hon. Members today, have highlighted the special value they place on the contribution that women bring to the Church and the priesthood. They argue that it is right that women should also have the opportunity to bring their personal style and quality of leadership to the role of bishop. Those Church members point to the fact that the head of the Church is a woman—and not for the first time in its history. For those who care deeply about the status of the Church of England in the eyes of the country at large, there is regret and concern that the decision to refuse women bishops serves to present the Church as wholly out of step with society and remote.

The mood here is that action must be taken swiftly. Most hon. Members of this House have made it clear that they would not find it acceptable to wait until 2015 for the Synod to begin revisiting the matter with a view to moving forward. That urgency also appears to be recognised by the Church. As parliamentarians, we urge the Church to take the most rapid steps to resolve the issue. I particularly hope that the Second Church Estates Commissioner, the hon. Member for Banbury (Sir Tony Baldry), will be able to enlarge on how the Church might approach that.

We on the Labour Benches will not accept any solution brought forward by the Synod that entrenches discrimination against women bishops. It will be important that in finding a new solution, the currently exclusively male House of Bishops consults extensively with women in the Church of England—in the clergy, in the House of Laity and, importantly, as hon. Members have said, in the parishes themselves.

If the General Synod fails to make progress, we on these Benches will support the Government to take the necessary action to ensure that the introduction of women bishops is not held back further by those—a minority—who do not reflect the views of the modern Church. We all hope that that will prove unnecessary, and that the Church itself will find the solution that is sought in this House, in wider society and, indeed, among the majority of members of the Church.

Policing

Kate Green Excerpts

Wednesday 24th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hanson]

I have known Lord Prescott for 37 years, since I went to Hull university. I would trust Lord Prescott with any public service provided in Humberside. He is one of the finest members of the Labour party.

If the Minister does not believe me, perhaps he will believe the former chief constables of Dyfed Powys and of Gloucestershire, who have been extremely critical of the policing cuts. We proposed 12% cuts in funding. As the Policing Minister, I took that budget through with my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), but our proposals would have saved £1 billion for policing, which would have been invested in policing, instead of the present cuts.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Right across the political spectrum in Trafford there is concern about the disproportionate impact of police cuts, as we are facing the largest percentage cut in Greater Manchester. Does my right hon. Friend agree that one of the concerns about the way these job losses are falling is that more experienced officers, disillusioned, for example, by what has been decided about their pensions and their pay, are choosing to leave the force, so we are seeing not only a numbers problem, but an experience problem?

[Mr Hanson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. Many superintendents at senior management level, who bring a great deal of experience to policing in this country, are being squeezed and losing their posts. This level of cuts is pushing forward a privatisation agenda, and I feel that we need to say clearly—let us be blunt—that we do not want private companies patrolling the public streets of Britain. We want police officers and police community support officers doing that job. The Government should have learned the lessons of G4S during the Olympics rather than rushing forward with plans for large-scale contracting out. Although public-private partnerships are valuable, we must ensure that new contracts pass tough key tests on value for money, resilience and security, transparency and accountability, and policing by consent.

Sentencing (Female Offenders)

Kate Green Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2012 Westminster Hall

[Philip Davies]

Absolutely. It looked at every category of offence. For every single category, women are less likely than men to be sent to prison.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this important debate. I hope that at the end of it we will not be peddling myths, but facts. Will he comment on the fact that although 70% of men are in prison for a non-violent offence, 81% of women are, which suggests that although some statistics may favour women, that one most certainly does not.

[Philip Davies]

It does not mean that at all. The figures that the hon. Lady quotes, which groups are fond of quoting, show the exact opposite of what they think the figures show. They show that women are treated more favourably by the courts. If she will let me continue with the speech, that will become evident to her, I hope. If she still has queries towards the end, and if the figures do not make sense, I will happily give way to her again. I am sure that the figures will make perfect sense, even to the hon. Lady. I will continue with the quote from the Library:

“In 2009 58% of male offenders who entered a guilty plea for an indictable offence were given an immediate custodial sentence compared to 34% of women. For each offence group a higher proportion of males pleading guilty were sentenced to immediate custody than females.”

The Ministry of Justice’s publication, “Statistics on Women and the Criminal Justice System”, published in November 2010—it is produced to ensure there is no sex discrimination in the system—states:

“Of sentenced first-time offenders (7,320 females and 25,936 males), a greater percentage of males were sentenced to immediate custody than females (29% compared with 17%), which has been the case in each year since 2005.”

People have had a briefing from the Prison Reform Trust, which tries to persuade them that women with no previous convictions are more likely to be sent to prison than men, but that is categorically not the case, as the Ministry of Justice’s own publication makes abundantly clear.

--- Later in debate ---

[Philip Davies]

I will come to the issue of women looking after children. As it happens, a large number of mothers who are sent to prison are no longer looking after their children when they are sent to prison. None the less, my hon. Friend makes a reasonable point. There may well be good reasons for women to be treated more favourably in the criminal justice system in the courts than men. That is a perfectly legitimate argument to follow. If people want to use the facts to prove that women are treated more favourably than men and then actually give reasons why that should be the case, I am perfectly content for them to do so. What I cannot allow to happen is for the myth to perpetuate that women are treated more harshly in the sentencing regime than men, because that palpably is not the case. If we can start having a debate along the lines that my hon. Friend suggests, I would be perfectly happy, but we are a long way from even getting to that particular point.

In addition to the undeniable evidence that women are less likely to be sent to prison than men is the fact that their average sentence length is shorter than that of men, too. Again, I refer to the Ministry of Justice’s own published figures of November 2010. “Statistics on Women and the Criminal Justice System”:

“In 2009, women given an immediate custodial sentence for indictable offences received shorter average sentence lengths than men (11.0 months compared to 17.0 months for males).”

That is not a minor difference. The figures show that the average male prison sentence is over 50% more than the average female prison sentence. That is something that those who allege to be so keen on equality should think about.

[Kate Green]

It is important to understand some of the factors behind those figures. For example, a substantially higher proportion of women in prison are first-time offenders—29% compared with 12% of men. Naturally, therefore, we would expect the sentencing for first-time offenders to be set at a lower level than for those with a pattern of offending behaviour. I am not suggesting that that explains all the difference in the figures, but it is important that the hon. Gentleman gives us the full analysis and not just the headlines.

[Philip Davies]

It is equally important that the hon. Lady listens to what I am saying rather than wrapping herself in her brief from the Prison Reform Trust. We have all heard it once but I will repeat it for her benefit. The Ministry of Justice’s own publication, “Statistics on Women and the Criminal Justice System” says:

“Of sentenced first-time offenders (7,320 females and 25,936 males), a greater percentage of males were sentenced to immediate custody than females (29% compared with 17%), which has been the case in each year since 2005.”

To suggest that more female first-time offenders are more likely to be sent to prison than men is not the case. The hon. Lady says that a higher proportion of women in prison are first-time offenders, but that is because they are less likely to be sent to prison unless they commit particularly serious offences and leave the courts no option but to send them to prison. It is a complete distortion of the facts, and the Ministry of Justice publication makes that perfectly clear.

--- Later in debate ---

[Philip Davies]

I am elated, because we now appear to have a consensus in Westminster Hall, which is an acceptance at last that men are more likely than women to be sent to prison. What we are now hearing from a variety of people are reasons why that should be the case. Those reasons may well be true—that is a debate for another day—but at least we are getting to the nub of the purpose of this particular debate that I have secured, which was to show that men are more likely than women to be sent to prison.

I will come on to discuss the women who are in prison and perhaps my hon. Friend might like to explain which of the women in prison he would like to see released; perhaps other Members could do the same. However, that is the second myth; I will just finish off on the first myth that I am discussing.

All other MOJ figures confirm that men are treated more harshly by the courts than women, and that there is quite a disparity. In the past few years for which the figures are published, women had 50% more chance than men of being released from prison early on home detention curfew. So it is perfectly clear that on the likelihood of being sent to prison, on the length of sentence being handed out and on the proportion of sentence served, women are treated more favourably than men, and that applies to all ages and all categories of offences, in Crown courts and magistrates courts. At least we have made that particular point clear.

The second myth that I want to discuss, and my hon. Friend the Member for Pendle (Andrew Stephenson) may well be interested in hearing about it, is that most women are in prison for petty or non-violent offences, and are serving short sentences. Many campaigners say that far too many women are in prison and should not be there; that instead, they should be serving their sentences in the community.

We can take a snapshot of the sentenced female prison population at a moment in time. The last figures that I have are for June 2010. Let us just look at the detail of all these “poor women” who are serving prison sentences and who—apparently—should be out and about. Which of these women prisoners do those who advocate reducing the female prison sentence want to let out? Frances Crook, the director of the Howard League for Penal Reform, was quoted in The Guardian in 2007 as saying that

“For women who offend, prison simply doesn’t work. It is time to end the use of traditional prisons for women.”

Perhaps she might explain which of these particular women she would like to see out and about, and not serving a prison sentence. Maybe it is the 211 women serving sentences for murder; maybe it is the 135 women in prison for manslaughter or attempted homicide; maybe it is the 352 women convicted of wounding; maybe it is the 142 women convicted of serious assault or other violence against the person; maybe it is the 58 women imprisoned for cruelty to children; it could be the 83 women who are in for rape, gross indecency with children or other sexual offences; maybe it is the 272 women who are in for violent robbery, or the 151 women who are in for burglary; or maybe it is the 398 female drug dealers who should not be in prison. The total of those figures is about 1,800, which is a figure often bandied around as the target for women offenders in prison. Maybe people would say, “Those people should be in prison; it is the others who shouldn’t be in prison.” As I have indicated, there are some people who say that no women should be in prison at all, but that argument is just so ridiculous that I hope nobody here is in favour of it.

[Kate Green]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will agree that prison serves a number of purposes. One is the protection of the public. Another, though, is of course to rehabilitate offenders and prevent reoffending. It is pretty clear that prison is not doing a very good job at those things—for all sorts of reasons—both for women and for men. And the protection of the public could be better achieved through dedicated secure units for women rather than putting them into a system that is predominantly designed for a male lifestyle and male behaviours, and therefore incarcerates them in masculine-led regimes.

[Philip Davies]

These women are in women’s prisons, which are not “masculine regimes”. They are in female prisons, for goodness’ sake.

--- Later in debate ---

[Philip Davies]

Hold on, hold on. If my hon. Friend and other people are suggesting that the 5,442 women who are sent to prison each year for up to six months should not be in prison, presumably they must also be saying that the 51,588 males who are sent to prison each year for less than six months also should not be in prison.

[Kate Green]

indicated dissent.

[Philip Davies]

The hon. Lady may well send me a copy of her election address at the general election. If she would like to go round her constituency emblazoning the message that those who are sentenced to up to a year in prison—that is 70,000 people each year—should not be sent to prison, I will look forward to her issuing a leaflet to that effect. If she will not do that, I may well do it for her.

[Kate Green]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, I represent a Manchester constituency where we have been piloting intensive alternatives to custody. In other words, those people who would otherwise meet the custody threshold and receive a short prison sentence of less than six months are diverted to community penalties. I must tell him that not only is that approach producing lower reoffending rates but it is very popular in Manchester, so he should not make a simplistic assumption that my constituents are not prepared to look at the deeper arguments about when custody works.

[Philip Davies]

I will make an offer to the hon. Lady today: I am happy to go to Manchester and debate sentencing with her, any time that she wants to fix up a debate, and we will see what the majority of her constituents think. I think that the point that she makes is nonsense, but if she wants to argue it, that is perfectly fair. However, the point is that those things apply to men more than women, so this argument that this is all about women is complete nonsense. All of these issues relate to men just as much as they do to women.