Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse
Lord Mann Excerpts(1 day, 13 hours ago)
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Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)
I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, for those comments. I think she will know that the Government want to put victims at the heart of the response to the recommendations. We debated mandatory reporting on Friday in this House, and it was clear that victims carry the pain of their victimhood through into adult life and beyond. It scars individuals. My noble friend Lord Mann mentioned the many victims who do not reach adulthood because they self-harm and commit suicide. We need to address how we involve the experience of victims to ensure we do not create future victims. I see the noble Baroness, Lady May of Maidenhead, in her place. The inquiry she established had a number of recommendations on how we can help support victims, and we will look at those between now and Easter. It takes time, but we will look at how we can respond to those recommendations in the best way, so as not to lose the knowledge that the noble Baroness, Lady Berridge, mentioned.
Lord Mann (Lab)
My Lords, process is clearly very important in relation to statutory inquiries and to giving the recommendations some kind of parliamentary scrutiny and holding them to account. On Friday, the Minister identified that the Home Office was responsible for “four” of the 20 recommendations. Which member of the Cabinet will be responsible for leading on this inquiry and its recommendations? Will the Minister take it from me that there would be a lot of delight—widely across the House, I suspect—if he were to take responsibility among Ministers in this House for leading on reporting back progress on this inquiry?
Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)
I say to my noble friend that my right honourable friend the Prime Minister takes a keen interest in the progress of these reports, and he will monitor and hold to account Ministers in government on that delivery. But the very fact that I am standing here today, and that my right honourable friend the Home Secretary was standing in the House of Commons, shows that we are responding on behalf of the Government to the IICSA response. That is where the lead and responsibility lie: with the Home Office. But we do not have the direct implementation of a number of recommendations, which require the engagement of the Department for Education, the Department of Health and Social Care, and other departments. We have set out the timetable to meet those 17 other recommendations; we have accepted the four, and we are already implementing some. Very shortly, other legislation will be published by the Home Office that will give effect to the recommendations we have accepted. It is our job to see that through and to do so, I hope—putting out the hand of friendship—with the support of the Opposition Front Bench.
Regulated and Other Activities (Mandatory Reporting of Child Sexual Abuse) Bill [HL]
Lord Mann ExcerptsFriday 17th January 2025
(4 days, 13 hours ago)
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Lord Mann (Lab)
My Lords, I entirely back this Bill—the spirit of it but also the detail. The Government would be foolish not to do likewise.
When I got elected as an MP, the first thing that I did was to convene an inquiry into heroin addiction in my own area. I spoke personally to more than half of the 600 heroin addicts whom I represented as their MP—over half—and every single one had suffered some form of major trauma in their early years. That is a separate issue, but my point is that the consequences of any form of child abuse are major and, indeed, well beyond that child when they become an adult.
There is one pertinent point that has been rather lost in the last few weeks. The term “survivor” has been used. My experience is that very many who were badly abused as children have not survived; either they are not alive, or they are in a position where they are really not capable of doing anything coherent in advocating for themselves. When I took up issues relating to child abuse as an MP, which I did—I spent 30 days representing people at that inquiry—I dealt with people who were incapable of knowing exactly what had happened to them, because the trauma had been so great. I dealt with people whom I was unable to see, because of how the trauma had impacted on how they are, who were being cared for by others, sometimes by the state and sometimes by private institutions. I dealt with people who had been inside prison because the actions that they had taken—and they were evil actions sometimes—had a direct correlation with what had happened.
So this is not some kind of minor issue, and this Bill deals with only one of the 20 recommendations of that inquiry. If the Government—any Government, including this one—fail to implement those 20 recommendations, they will be held to account, and they should be. I will be one of those holding any Government, including this Government, to account.
Four minutes is not a long time, but I shall make a couple of other points that need to made, because they may not be made by others. There is a lot of talk about girls; I dealt with boys as well. On the definition of children in sports, including in football, one thing that I found—and I think I had an influence, although I am sure that football would say that it did it itself and it was just a coincidence of timing—was about the grooming of 16 and 17 year-old girls by football coaches. That was another issue that I had to deal with. Age is also important, and that was one of the complications of that inquiry—the 16 to 19 year-olds, and who is and is not a child. That is fundamental, and certainly everyone aged 18 and under needs to be incorporated into everything.
Finally, I knocked on doors, electioneering, and people would say to me, “John, can I have a word?”. They would tell me what had happened to them, and they would say, “I’m not going to do anything about it”. These were people who had been married for 40 years and had not told their partner, but they told me. They said, “We’re telling you, because you’re doing something about it, and this can be of use to you”. They were not isolated examples. That was more the norm than not the norm, where I was the first who was told, and they said, “We’re not going to do anything about it—we’d like you to do something about it”. That is our responsibility.
Child Sexual Abuse Inquiry: Recommendations
Lord Mann Excerpts(1 week, 6 days ago)
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The Minister of State, Home Office (Lord Hanson of Flint) (Lab)
I start by paying tribute to the 7,000-plus victims and survivors who shared their experiences and helped shape the work and focus of the inquiry. Since taking office in July, this Government have worked to deliver an ambitious programme of activity, responding to the inquiry and on child sexual abuse more broadly. As the Home Secretary announced to the House of Commons on Monday, this includes delivering a new mandatory reporting duty in the upcoming crime and policing Bill.
Lord Mann (Lab)
My Lords, I hosted over 400 child abuse survivors in this building, and I spent 30 days representing many at the inquiry, IICSA. I share their impatience with how quickly the 20 recommendations are being implemented. On recommendations 9 and 10, on DBS checks, does the Minister agree with me that Parliament should take a lead and that every parliamentarian should be required to have a DBS check, in line with those recommendations? On recommendation 19, on having a single redress system, does he share my anguish and anger that my friend Terry Lodge, who was given a public apology seven years ago—he was imprisoned and enslaved as a 10 year-old and forced to spend his teenage years not at school but working in a foundry—has still received not a penny of compensation?
Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)
I am grateful to my noble friend for his comments. Victims and survivors of child sexual abuse and exploitation deserve access to appropriate support and routes to compensation. As he mentioned, the inquiry’s report gives indications of recommendations to that effect. The experience of his former constituent highlights the need for that to be a matter of urgency, and we are working at pace in government to ensure that we identify how best we can deliver against the inquiry’s recommendations.
My noble friend mentioned DBS checks, which are one of the recommendations that we are still working through and looking at. Some of those issues in relation to this House will be for the parliamentary authorities. More generally, the report was commissioned by the noble Baroness, Lady May of Maidenhead, as Home Secretary in 2015. It came through in October 2022 as a major report and it was responded to by the Government in May 2023, but no progress has taken place until July this year, and we are now starting to exercise some energy in response to those recommendations. We will bring forward recommendation responses in due course.
Non-crime Hate Incidents
Lord Mann Excerpts(2 months ago)
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Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)
How about the half a billion pounds that was announced today by the Home Secretary? How about the focus on neighbourhood policing, with 13,000 police officers? How about the record levels of investment in policing, which were cut under the Government in which the noble Lord served? How about getting back to the levels of police officers that existed when I was Police Minister in 2009-10? That might help to deal with some of the issues the noble Lord addresses. He knows the serious issues that this Government have pledged to address.
Lord Mann (Lab)
My Lords, statistics have been essential in assessing and understanding the levels of anti-Semitism in this country, as endorsed by two all-party inquiries and by evidence from every major Jewish community organisation. Can I entice the Minister into a meeting to discuss how we can further improve the system?
Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)
I would never resist a meeting with my noble friend Lord Mann, and he can have one. I always say that it is better to have an open door than to have one kicked down.
King’s Speech
Lord Mann Excerpts(5 months, 4 weeks ago)
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Lord Mann (Lab)
My Lords, I reference my entry in the register of Members’ interests as the Government’s independent adviser on anti-Semitism, a role to which the Prime Minister reappointed me yesterday. I join the welcome to the three new Members of the House. I have known my noble friend Lord Hanson for a very long time and I have known the noble Lord, Lord Goodman, for even longer. I have never been afforded the opportunity to meet my noble friend Lord Timpson in his many prison visits. I think all three will enhance the quality of this House.
I want to say a word on illegal immigration. There has been a bit of an old-fashioned debate going on recently about identity cards. We have identifiers in vast numbers of forms these days. The difference from when my noble friend Lord Blunkett raised the issue of identity cards nearly 20 years ago, when I was one of those who supported him, is the digitisation of the world. We have digital passports. The vast majority of people who wish to work in this country have digital passports and I am at a loss as to why I need digital identification for virtually everything I have to do in my life other than get a job. It seems to me that the pull factor in this country could be removed by requiring a form of digital identification for everyone who gets a job. I think that, rather than the various gimmicks that have been tried or huge expensive things, will in itself be the fundamental difference.
On the Government dealing with small boats, I say that we had a family business. We used to take trucks across the channel and to Holland regularly. They had 7 x 4 x 3 flight cases in which you could fit a body. In fact, we had a false body in them with ventilation. It would have been easy to smuggle people through, because trucks were virtually never stopped. There is some indication that the problem is being shifted back from small boats to lorries, which is where the problem was before. I think that the debate on identification and identifiers will take place and that this House should spend a good amount of time discussing how best that can take place. There is a certain inevitability, in my view.
I also want to talk about extremism. There is a new form of extremism in this country. It is not recognised across government, it is not recognised structurally and we do not put resource into it. We see extremism in relation to criminality and terror—rightly so. We are rather good at dealing with terrorism and that kind of extremism. We are not perfect and we never will be perfect, and the more resource is allocated to that, the better. That is one form of extremism, but there is what I call the soft belly of extremism as well: people who do not intend to break the law and who are not terrorists but whose entire approach and ideology is to destroy democracy, the system and society that we live in, and who have other aims and objectives. In my work, I am seeing the ongoing targeting of people in the Jewish community who dare not speak out because of what has happened to them, particularly in the workplace, purely because they are Jewish. That is organised, and it is done by extremists. The state does not know how they are organising, where they are organising or who they are because we have no system, unit or resources. It is imperative that government takes hold of this and understands who the people in this country are who wish to destroy our democratic system not by violence but by other means, who we will never catch through criminality and therefore who we will have to deal with in other ways. Critically, we need to know who they are and how they operate.
Anti-Semitism in the UK
Lord Mann Excerpts(11 months ago)
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Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I refer to my entry in the Register of Members’ Interests. I would like to confirm with the Minister, and thank him if it is the case, that he announced three-year funding for the Community Security Trust. That is a welcome change of policy that for some years I have pressed the Government for, and it will make the trust’s work much easier.
In my view, there is a sinister change in what is going on with anti-Semitism beyond the noise, which is bad enough: it is the very specific, organised and co-ordinated targeting of individual Jewish people, at work and in their accommodation, in ways that we have never seen before. I do not mean awful random violent acts of anti-Semitism, which of course are dangerous and threatening for all of us and something that we need to deal with, but the co-ordinated targeting of people, isolating them and organising pile-ons to force them out of workplaces—in some cases off student courses and in other cases out of accommodation, but particularly from the workplace. That co-ordination is something that we have not seen in this country.
I urge the Minister to agree with me that, for the Jewish community to be safe, this crisis of anti-Semitism is going to require the maximum detailed co-operation between all parties in this House, because this scourge is already out of control and lives are being ruined that we are not even seeing. We are going to see more of that as they surface, because people are alone and terrified and are being picked off.
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
First, if I make a correct the record, I may have said three-year funding but I should have said two-year funding. If I mis-spoke, I apologise.
On the points that the noble Lord raises, I completely agree. The targeted stuff that he refers to is a particularly pernicious form of anti-Semitism, and I too have seen evidence of it. The police are aware of it, and I hope they will crack down on the perpetrators. The noble Lord is right that it needs a cross-party response, but to some extent he is missing the point: it needs a cross-society response. It is not just us in here; everyone has to get on board with this.
Immigration Rules and Border Security
Lord Mann Excerpts(11 months ago)
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Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
To answer the last question, I say that the date is soon. I am afraid that I cannot improve on that. They all require fact checking and a variety of other things. In terms of the Care Quality Commission, that is precisely what we are doing. It was made very clear the other day that, additionally, care workers in England will be able to sponsor migrant workers only if they are undertaking activities as regulated by the Care Quality Commission going forward.
Ukrainian family members can still come. It is just that we are unifying the schemes currently in existence. The old family scheme allowed settled Ukrainian sponsoring family members to come here. That settlement used to have only a six-month qualification. They can still come under the Homes for Ukraine scheme. The sponsors can now be British, Irish or settled in the UK, and that obviously includes family members. This scheme was greeted favourably and with some very positive comments from the Ukrainian embassy, which I am happy to recount if anybody would like to hear them.
Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
My Lords, my wife and I drove trucks for our family business regularly through Calais to Dover, and we are very aware of the weaknesses in the systems and pressures from people smugglers attempting to come in through commercial vehicles, trucks and lorries. What is the increase in the number of checks done on those vehicles this year compared with last year, and what is the increase in the number of people found to have been smuggled or trafficked through those routes using trucks or lorries this year compared with last year?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
I am afraid that I do not have the statistics on trucks. If I may, I will write to the noble Lord.
UK-Rwanda Partnership
Lord Mann Excerpts(1 year, 1 month ago)
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Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
As I said in answer to an earlier question, Clause 1(6) details international law. It includes the human rights convention; the refugee convention; the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1966; and the United Nations Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment of 1984. I could go on. I suggest that we read Clause 1(6); it is very clear.
Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
My Lords, will the refugees from Rwanda be put up in hotels?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
I really do not know how to answer that.
Policing of Marches and Demonstrations
Lord Mann Excerpts(1 year, 2 months ago)
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Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
My Lords, I do not know what direct orders the Metropolitan Police Commissioner gave. As I said earlier, the response to the Cenotaph, where violence was being deployed, was swift and appropriate—not that it is my call to judge the police’s actions; that is for the courts. I do not know whether he gave those sorts of orders. I was at Victoria station by chance on Saturday afternoon, and I have never felt more uncomfortable in this country because of the tension. It was palpable in the air. It was disgraceful.
Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I have visited Jewish communities across the United Kingdom over the last few weeks. Everywhere the message is the same: Jewish people and Jewish families are scared. Does the Minister agree with me that the increased police presence we have seen in Jewish communities, be it in Leeds, Manchester, London or elsewhere, has been essential in ensuring that people have been kept safe? Can we be certain that this increased presence will continue for as long as it is needed?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
I certainly hope so. Police forces up and down the country have stepped up their neighbourhood patrols to support local Jewish and Muslim communities, including visiting schools, synagogues and mosques. We have seen a rise in the anti-Semitism that the noble Lord describes; that is appalling. I certainly hope that the police’s response will stay in place for as long as it is needed.
Ports and Airports: Queues
Lord Mann Excerpts(1 year, 9 months ago)
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Murray of Blidworth) (Con)
The Government have an ambitious vision for the future UK border, which will put in place the world’s most effective and secure border system. We are already using automation and trialling other technologies to improve fluidity and minimise queues for all arriving passengers, without compromising on our number one priority: the security of the border.
Lord Mann (Non-Afl)
Last year we had the absurdity, particularly at holiday times, of having to queue to get back into our own country. Can the Government guarantee that this year at holiday times we will not have that indignity?
Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)
I am afraid I simply do not agree with the picture that the noble Lord paints. Border Force plans extensively at both local and regional levels to ensure the smoothest possible journey for all passengers, with over 90% of passengers processing through the UK border in 30 minutes or less. I remind the noble Lord that there are, on average, 144 million crossings each year at the UK border. An estimated 86% of those passengers who travel through the UK border are eligible to use the automated e-passport gates, which are currently our automated solution for processing arriving passengers.