Prison Capacities
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers Excerpts(3 months, 1 week ago)
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Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, the crisis in prison capacity results from the fact that the prison population of England and Wales has more than doubled over the last 30 years, and this trend is expected to continue. Why? A large part of the answer is that the length of prison sentences has been steadily growing over the same period. Indeed, the sentences imposed today are about twice as long as they were when I started out at the Bar; they are far longer than those imposed in the rest of Europe and, indeed, in Northern Ireland.
Sentencing laws have long provided that a prison sentence should be for the shortest term commensurate with the seriousness of the offence, but successive Governments have not been content to leave it to the judges to apply this test. They have introduced legislation requiring judges to impose higher sentences for offences considered to be of particular concern to the public. These have not been necessary for the purposes of deterrence, rehabilitation or protection of the public. They have usually been imposed to cater for a perceived public demand for greater punishment, but this has come with a cost: over £50,000 a year for each man in custody.
It makes no sense to spend such sums on increasing punishment when they would be better spent on rehabilitation and other measures to prevent reoffending. Doubling sentences has brought no benefit to the criminal justice system; it has led to the crisis that confronts the Prison Service today. Will the Minister seek to persuade the Government to consider the merits of reversing the trend rather than building more prisons?
Courts: Resourcing and Staffing
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers Excerpts(8 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, I apologise for missing the first minute or two of this debate, due to bad timetabling. I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, for securing this important debate and want to start by endorsing the comments that he made about the great appreciation of all the lawyers in this House, and indeed of the whole House, for the contribution made by the Minister to proceedings involving the rule of law and to wish him well. I also look forward keenly to the long-awaited maiden speech of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Saville of Newdigate.
When the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, was Lord Chief Justice, the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair, announced his intention to transfer responsibility for prisons from the Home Office to what was to become the Ministry of Justice. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, led a delegation of the senior judges, of which I was one, to Downing Street to protest against this. One of the arguments that we advanced was that, if the prisons and the courts were funded from a single budget, the courts would be impoverished because of the demands of the prisons. Confronted with the powerful advocacy of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, Mr Blair reluctantly agreed to drop the idea. However, in 2007, when I had stepped into the shoes of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, the change was made without further consultation. Whether that change is responsible for the present under-resourcing of the justice system is debatable.
A few days ago, I was listening to Peter Clarke, the prison inspector, talking of the underfunding of the Prison Service. The picture he painted was horrifying. We have 30% fewer prison officers than five years ago, yet the prison population has grown to over 85,000. Last year, there were 20,000 assaults in prison, 3,000 of them serious, and there were about 100 suicides. Part of the problem is the inability on the part of the staff to prevent psychedelic drugs being smuggled into prisons. Prisoners are often locked up all day in barbaric conditions, two to a cell designed for one, with an unscreened toilet, and that is where they have to eat because it is too dangerous to allow them to leave their cells to go to a dining hall, let alone to take part in rehabilitation.
The reality is that the public sector is starved of resources across the board. The Government have to make hard and difficult choices when deciding on priorities—a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Bird, in his thoughtful address in this morning’s debate. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, has demonstrated, one priority ought to have been, but does not appear to have been, ensuring that the terms and conditions of service of the senior judiciary remain sufficiently generous to persuade the most able candidates to renounce the rewards of private practice in favour of the Bench. The contribution made by the comparatively small cadre of senior judges to the maintenance of the rule of law is of the highest importance, as was so clearly exemplified in the discussion yesterday in Committee on the Investigatory Powers Bill. It is these judges who have to review the legality of executive acts, including acts of Ministers. It is these judges who are responsible for the worldwide reputation of our commercial court that contributes to so much of our foreign earnings.
Looking at the picture more broadly, the public sector is in, or at least approaching, a state of crisis. Does anyone believe that, if we go on as we are, we are ever going to be able to fund a decent prison service, or a fair and universal access to justice, or a health service capable of meeting the demands that are made of it? Radical measures are called for—measures that will not win votes but are called for by good government.
As to the prisons, is it not clear that we will not be able to provide decent prison conditions unless we substantially reduce the numbers of those in prison? Only then will we be able to provide the rehabilitation that is a primary object of imprisonment. At present, 50% of prisoners reoffend—or, more accurately, are caught reoffending—within 12 months of leaving prison. For young people, the proportion is higher.
How can the Government reduce prison numbers? For a start, they could release the IPP prisoners whose incarceration has long exceeded their tariffs. More radically, they could reduce the length of sentences overall. To this the Minister may make the usual response that sentence lengths are a matter for judges. That is true to an extent, but the overall scale of sentencing is determined by legislative action that ratchets up minimum sentences—and sentences have been greatly ratcheted up over my lifetime. They are much longer than is necessary to achieve the objects of deterrence, punishment and rehabilitation.
At present, the prosecution of historic sex offences is overburdening both the criminal justice system and the prisons. Imprisonment of historic offenders does not in general serve any need of rehabilitation, nor is it much of a deterrent. Its justification is punishment. Ideally, the public would wish to try and punish those who committed offences long ago, but where resources are limited, is this something we can afford? Or should we, as do other countries, have statutory limitation of prosecution for all except the most serious offences?
Should not alcohol be more heavily taxed to prevent, or at least reduce, the abuse that fills A&E departments on Saturday nights, causes long-term damage that the National Health Service has to deal with and results in crimes of violence that kill or injure and help to fill our young offender institutes? What of the modern problems of obesity, that all can see threatens to overwhelm our health? Should manufacturers be permitted to sell the sugar-laden food—and, more particularly, addictive drinks—that are causing not only our schoolchildren so much harm?
I have wandered a little from court resources, but the point I am seeking to make is that, the greater the demands on the public pocket, the less there will be to pay for the things that really matter—and access to justice is one of those. We have a new Government and it would be nice to think that the challenges posed by Brexit will cause them to focus on the need to take urgent steps to reduce demands on the public sector, where this is possible, in order to address what really matters. Unfortunately, I am addressing a far-from-crowded House late on a Thursday afternoon and not taking up residence at No. 10 Downing Street.
I have saved, I think, two minutes, which will be welcome.
Prison Reform
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers Excerpts(8 years, 9 months ago)
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Lord Faulks
My noble friend is quite right to focus on the importance of family. According to research by my department, families are the single most important factor in helping prisoners to resettle on release. A number of prisons have developed visitor centres and are doing their best to make the contact between families and prisoners as pleasant as possible. This is important because, first, the families are, after all, not doing a prison sentence and, secondly, it encourages prisoners to remember that their roots in the community and in their family are the key to not reoffending.
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, the Minister has recognised that we cannot hope to tackle prison overcrowding without improving rehabilitation and thereby reducing reoffending. But is it not the fact that we cannot hope to improve rehabilitation without reducing prison numbers? Can the Minister tell us how the Government will break this vicious circle?
Lord Faulks
The noble and learned Lord, with all his experience of the system, will appreciate that we have a duty, and therefore have to have the ability, to house all who are sent to prison by judges. What we are endeavouring to do is to identify the causes of reoffending. Once we have done that, we hope that that will reduce the numbers. If judges feel it is appropriate to sentence offenders to particular sentences, it is not for the Government to reduce those sentences simply to make the figures balance.
Prisons: Young People
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers Excerpts(9 years, 1 month ago)
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Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, and his panel on their most impressive and wide-ranging review. It makes harrowing reading, particularly the individual case studies. These are young people whom our society failed. There is evidence in the individual cases of failure to take steps that might have prevented their deaths and the review makes practical recommendations aimed at preventing those failures. But, much more significantly, it concludes that the deaths are extreme symptoms of an attitude to the purpose of imprisonment that needs to be fundamentally changed.
One section of the report looks at steps that should be taken to keep young people out of the criminal justice system altogether. I must declare an interest: I have in my time sent quite a lot of people to prison, some of them to serve lengthy sentences, but I have an interest in keeping people out of prison. That is evidenced by my involvement, in one way or another, in a number of charitable organisations that help to do this: the St Giles Trust, Endeavour Training and Youth at Risk.
The review emphasises that, if there is to be change, it must come from the top down. The top is, of course, the Secretary of State for Justice. When responsibility for prisons was passed from the Home Secretary to the Justice Secretary the judges had reservations. We were concerned that the funding demands of the Prison Service might be met at the expense of the court system and the administration of justice, but it seems to me that there is something to be said for the same Minister considering the actions that will give best value for money in both areas. Value for money is critical. We are in a period of financial stringency and it is not realistic to expect Ministers to take actions that will increase overall demand for resources. Some of the review’s recommendations call for an increase in the resources devoted to looking after those in prison, but I suggest that these resources can and should be funded by a reduction in the overall size of the prison population.
As the review points out, the prison system costs in excess of £3 billion a year. The cost of a single place in a male young offender institution is approximately £40,000 a year. The substantial savings that can be made by a reduction of the prison population is obvious. How can this be achieved? There are three ways. The first is by diverting young people away from the criminal justice system. The second is by rehabilitating those in prison, so that they do not reoffend. The third is by reducing the length of sentences served by those who are sent to prison.
Most young people who end up in custody have a history, going back in many cases to early childhood, of disability or disadvantage. Many have mental health problems. Almost all have one thing in common: a lack of self-respect. They do not believe in their own worth because no adult has ever suggested that they were worth anything. Rather, they become used to denigration and abuse. If you do not respect yourself, you do not respect others. The Harris review emphasises young people’s need for peer example and approval. It is this that the charities with which I am involved, and many other charities, provide. They show young people that they are capable of achievement and that their worth is appreciated. I have seen in practice young lives literally transformed in this way.
Such organisations are having a hard time. Many of them rely on funding from local authorities but cash-strapped local authorities are withdrawing that funding. This is perhaps not the best day to emphasise the value of government support for charities that work with young people, but I do so none the less. Of course, those providing funding must be satisfied that it is being put to a use that is cost-effective.
Young people who offended under the influence of mental illness should not be given custodial sentences when what they really need is psychiatric help. It is critical that the sentencing judge is fully informed in such cases. The review draws attention to the fact that many defendants are being given custodial sentences on the basis of presentence reports completed on the day of conviction. This surprised me, for it was not my experience. I endorse the recommendation that a custodial sentence for a young adult is serious enough for a full and comprehensive written report to be prepared for the court.
I turn to rehabilitation of those in prison. It is a depressing fact that a large proportion of those who come out of prison soon go back in again, having reoffended. Anyone who has read the Harris review and some of the reports that it considered will not be surprised by this. The review paints a depressing picture of prison life today. Shortage of staff means that prisoners are spending a disproportionate amount of time locked in their cells. Opportunities for constructive activity are very limited. The review rightly comments that this is “impoverishing to the spirit”. It is a vicious circle because employment in such an environment is not attractive, so that some staffing vacancies are not being filled.
A fundamental recommendation of the Harris review is that there should be a change in attitude as to what prisons are there to do. They are there to impose the punishment of deprivation of liberty by holding prisoners securely and safely. That said, the prison regime should not itself be designed to be punitive. It should be primarily designed to rehabilitate. Restrictions should be the minimum necessary. Life should approximate as closely as possible to the positive aspects of life in the community. I hope that the Justice Secretary will endorse that recommendation.
I turn to my third and most controversial source of savings—reduction in the length of sentences served. The objects of sending people to prison are punishment, rehabilitation and protection of the public. I believe that we are sending people to prison for longer than is necessary to impose the appropriate punishment. The review provides the figures. On 31 December 2014, there were 84,691 people in prison—almost double the figure in the early 1990s. Why is that? Courts have been sending more people to prison and for longer terms. The average sentence length has increased by about 15%. Why is this? Are people more wicked than they were 25 years ago? I do not believe so. I think that the increase in imprisonment is in part attributable to statutory imposition of minimum terms for murder, which have had a knock-on effect on other crimes, and in part to media pressure for longer sentences. How does one reverse this trend? Keeping old men in prison for years and years when they no longer pose a danger to society is, I believe, disproportionately expensive when the money could be better spent preventing young people becoming criminals in the first place. Government should try to get this message across to the public and look for ways of reducing, rather than increasing, sentence length. For all these reasons, I support this Motion.
Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 (Criminal Courts Charge) Regulations 2015
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers Excerpts(9 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, in the days when one was allowed to use Latin in court, counsel and judges sometimes delighted in the phrase res ipsa loquitur: the facts speak for themselves, or, the answer is obvious. For the reasons given by every single person who has spoken thus far in this debate, that phrase applies to the Motion. I shall not repeat the reasons, but I shall support the Motion if I have the opportunity.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lord Faulks) (Con)
My Lords, I thank all noble, and noble and learned, Lords who have spoken in this debate, in which, although it was short, strong feelings have been expressed and cogent arguments advanced about the criminal courts charge. The Secretary of State for Justice has developed a reputation—referred to by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf—for listening to the arguments and approaching with boldness and imagination the often difficult challenges that justice and paying for the cost of justice present. Although I cannot promise the House an immediate review of this matter, I can promise that all the speeches made today will be carefully heeded by the Secretary of State for Justice. He will be considering them extremely carefully.
Let me deal with some of the points that have been made, succinctly but powerfully. First, on judicial discretion, this was one of the arguments that came before both Houses when the Bill was going through Parliament. Indeed, I was the Minister who took the relevant clauses through. The argument—except from the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby—was not that there are no circumstances in which it is appropriate for a defendant to pay the costs of their appearance in court, but that there should be some discretion. The Government believe that convicted adult offenders should take responsibility and contribute towards the costs they impose. If they do not, of course, the cost is paid by the taxpayer. The criminal courts charge is intended to ensure that offenders take a greater share of the burden, currently borne by taxpayers, of funding the criminal courts.
Imposition of the charge is purely about recovering costs. It is not a punishment and therefore should not be treated as part of the offender’s punishment in any way. Therefore, it would not be appropriate for a discretion to be exercised. The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby—parting company from a number of other noble Lords—said that he did not accept that any cost should be imposed on a defendant for appearing in court. One of the reasons he gave was that in some way, it would be rather invidious, because a judge or magistrate might be perceived as having some form of financial interest in the outcome of a case. Although I think the noble Lord accepted that that would not be much of a factor in reality, he was in a sense making an important point: that judges and magistrates should not be able to choose whether to charge for the use of a court, as it were, and that it would therefore not be appropriate for there to be a discretion.
I understand entirely that it is most important that the courts charge framework means that offenders are given a fair and realistic opportunity to pay the charge. Although a court does not have discretion in terms of the charge itself, it does have discretion to consider an offender’s means and set payment terms at affordable rates. Offenders will be able to contact a fines officer at any point to request variations in payment rates if their circumstances change. At such points the courts and fines officer will have an opportunity to take existing debts into account, making sure that repayment is reasonable and affordable, given the offender’s individual circumstances.
The criminal courts charge legislation also gives the offender the opportunity to have the charge remitted after two years where the offender takes all reasonable steps to pay it and does not reoffend. It will be for the courts to decide whether all reasonable steps have been taken, having regard to the offender’s personal circumstances. Here matters such as unemployment, interruptions to benefits payments or poor health can be taken into account.
Noble Lords were concerned about the possibility of there being an inducement to plead guilty. Of course, that is a highly relevant consideration. Defendants facing trial are not required to pay the criminal courts charge; they will be subject to the charge only if they are convicted following a hearing, or of course if they plead guilty. It is always a delicate matter whether defendants plead guilty to an offence of whatever seriousness. The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, and others have acknowledged the fact that it is well known that a discount—often of a third—will be given to a defendant who pleads guilty, and it will depend on the precise juncture at which that defendant pleads guilty. Pleading guilty at the first possible opportunity will obtain the maximum discount. An experienced legal adviser, such as the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, will approach the question of an appropriate plea with delicacy and will not of course encourage a defendant to plead guilty if there is a defence. Indeed, they will go further than that and tell the defendant that they should not plead guilty to an offence they have not committed. We believe that the delicate matter should not and will not be distorted by the question of a criminal courts charge.
Let me deal with the point that perhaps can be summed up by the principle of totality, which those of us, like me, who have had to sentence defendants have borne very much in mind. It is true that, very often, where there are a number of different sentencing options on the menu and more than one has to be prescribed, a judge will try to make sure that, in the round, the penalty or combination of penalties is meted out that is appropriate to the offence. I understand why certain magistrates have been rather more lenient than they might have been, obviously had there not been the criminal courts charge, but that is not what the legislation provides and is not something that should be done.
The criticism is also advanced that there was a lack of parliamentary oversight in relation to these provisions, and the suggestion is that the statutory instrument severely limited that oversight. There is nothing improper about the time in which the regulations were laid. I can assure noble Lords that the criminal courts charge provisions underwent considerable scrutiny. I can personally testify to the level of scrutiny they underwent in this House. I have looked back at Hansard for the House of Commons, and the principle and the appropriateness of a criminal charge were considered in debates. The question of the actual level of the charge is a different matter—I see the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, grimacing. I wholly understand that there is a distinction.
However, the concerns raised in this Motion regarding discretion and the effects on plea decisions are points that were carefully considered and debated at considerable length at the various stages during the consideration of the Bill in both Houses. As to charge levels, draft charge levels were also published to inform parliamentary and public debate, the charge levels set out in the regulations being a slightly adjusted version reflecting up-to-date costing information. I do not consider that the Government at the time behaved improperly by laying the regulations when they did, especially in light of the significant amount of scrutiny that took place generally on the principle. It may be that magistrates expected there to be a greater amount. This was a difficult attempt to try to cost the use of the courts. The victim surcharge is another mandatory charge—there is no discretion—which was introduced in 2007 by the then Labour Government.
On the question of benefits assessment, regarding the suggestion that claims on savings cannot be substantiated, an impact assessment was published when the Act was introduced early last year that was based on indicative charge levels. Significant work was then carried out to assess the costs of running the criminal courts, which resulted in the publication of the draft charge levels I have previously mentioned. This was published as an addendum to the original impact assessment and included an updated analysis of the benefits and costs of the policy. An updated impact assessment was produced to accompany the regulations and has now been published. It includes a considered analysis of the benefits and costs of the provisions, estimating total cash inflows arising from the charge at £95 million from 2019 to 2020.
A number of noble Lords remarked on the unfortunate response of a large number of magistrates. I agree with all noble Lords who have emphasised the importance of magistrates and what a vital task they perform for society in general, and we are of course concerned that any magistrates should not feel confident in the provisions of sentencing and indeed other provisions that they have to administer. Of course I have read about and the Government are well aware of those magistrates—reported in the media to number something like 50—who say that the courts charge was certainly one of the reasons for their resignation. Just for context, I should say that I understand that 350 magistrates have resigned in the relevant period, and of course others will have retired. They may have myriad reasons for doing so. However, I do not want to underestimate the significance of the general discontent referred to by the noble Lords, Lord Rooker and Lord Ponsonby, and others. The Secretary of State and the Ministry of Justice take that matter very seriously.
I also bear very much in mind what a number of noble Lords have said about the importance of rehabilitation. We do not believe that this will be an additional barrier to rehabilitation. The Government are extremely concerned that rehabilitation should be at the heart of reforms to our sentencing provisions and indeed in the way in which the prison service will, we hope, be changed in the following years. I should say that failure to pay the court charge will not extend the time it takes for a conviction to become spent for the purposes of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974. I take the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, that it is important that defendants feel that they have been dealt with fairly, and that itself can be relevant to their rehabilitation. However, we consider that setting the repayment rate fairly and proportionally according to each offender’s individual circumstances, as long as they provide the court with the details, should mitigate any sense they have of unfairness which may follow the criminal courts charge.
Office of Lord Chancellor (Constitution Committee Report)
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Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, I gave evidence to the Constitution Committee when it was considering the role of the Lord Chancellor, and I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lang of Monkton, for the opportunity to comment on his committee’s report and on the response of the Government, as set out in the letter of Chris Grayling.
The Government broadly welcomed the report but did not accept that any of its specific recommendations required action or a change of attitude on the part of the Government. I am going to suggest that this response showed an unwarranted complacency, and I propose to do so by reference to the evidence given by the then Lord Chancellor to the Joint Committee on the Draft Voting Eligibility (Prisoners) Bill on which I served.
Section 1 of the Constitutional Reform Act provides that:
“This Act does not adversely affect … the existing constitutional principle of the rule of law, or … the Lord Chancellor’s existing … role in relation to that principle”.
That role is underlined by Section 17, which requires the Lord Chancellor, on taking office, to swear an oath, which begins with this undertaking:
“I will respect the rule of law”.
As we have heard, the Constitution Committee concluded that,
“The Lord Chancellor’s duty to respect of the rule of law extends beyond the policy remit of his or her department; it requires him or her to seek to ensure that the rule of law is upheld within Cabinet and across Government”,
that this oversight role,
“is not adequately reflected in the current oath which requires him or her simply to ‘respect the rule of law’”,
and that the oath should be amended,
“to a promise to ‘respect and uphold the rule of law’”.
The committee also recommended that the Ministerial Code and the Cabinet Manual should be revised to reflect this oversight role. The Government disagreed with the desirability of effecting these changes.
Section 2 of the Constitutional Reform Act sets out the matters that the Prime Minister may take into account when appointing a Lord Chancellor. These include experience as a practising lawyer or as a teacher of law in a university. It is not, however, mandatory that the Lord Chancellor should have any previous legal experience. Some expressed concern about this. Witnesses emphasised the importance of the Lord Chancellor understanding the rule of law. The committee itself commented that,
“the rule of law remains a complex and in some respects uncertain concept”.
The committee stated:
“We recognise the advantages to appointing a Lord Chancellor with a legal or constitutional background. We do not consider that it is essential but, given the importance of the Lord Chancellor’s duties to the rule of law, these benefits should be given due consideration”.
In the Government’s response, Chris Grayling commented dismissively:
“The Government welcomes the Committee’s acknowledgement that it is not essential for the Lord Chancellor to have a legal background”.
In the same vein, the committee drew attention to the fact that,
“neither the Lord Chancellor nor the Permanent Secretary are required to be legally qualified. In a department responsible for the legal system and … the maintenance of the rule of law, this is undesirable. We recommend that the Government either ensure that the Permanent Secretary supporting the Lord Chancellor at the Ministry of Justice is legally qualified, or appoint the top legal adviser in that department at permanent secretary level”.
The Government did not agree, contending that access to legal services provided by the Treasury Solicitor’s Department was sufficient. Happily, that recommendation has now been implemented in practice.
I suggested that these responses show complacency. For a lawyer, respect for the rule of law goes beyond an intellectual appreciation of its importance. It is, or should be, a passionate belief in and understanding of the concept, for it is the critical foundation of a democratic society. If the Lord Chancellor is not a lawyer, it is surely desirable that he should have at his right hand a lawyer steeped in a belief in and understanding of the rule of law.
I now turn to explain why I believe that the Government’s complacency is unjustified. In 2004, in the case of Hirst v United Kingdom, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights held that the blanket ban on any convicted prisoner being allowed to vote, imposed by the Representation of the People Act 1983, was incompatible with Article 3 of the first Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights. In the subsequent appeals to the Supreme Court in the cases of Chester and McGeoch, Lord Sumption gave a lucid judgment that was critical of the reasoning of the Strasbourg court, but he observed:
“It is an international obligation of the United Kingdom under article 46.1 of the Convention to abide by the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights in any case to which it is a party. This obligation is in terms absolute”.
In his wonderful book The Rule of Law, the late Lord Bingham stated that,
“The rule of law requires compliance by the state with its obligations in international law as in national law”.
I suggest that it is beyond doubt that the rule of law requires this country to alter our law so as to afford the vote to at least some category of convicted prisoners so as to comply with the judgment in Hirst.
The response of the Government to this situation was to publish the Voting Eligibility (Prisoners) Draft Bill, which offered Parliament three options. The first was to give prisoners serving less than four years the vote. The second was to give prisoners serving less than six months the vote, and the third was to restate the blanket ban on prisoners voting. The first two options were designed to make our law Strasbourg- compliant. The third option would have involved Parliament deliberately flouting the decision of the Strasbourg court. There have been cases of countries failing to amend their laws to comply with Strasbourg judgments but none, of which I am aware, where a country has legislated expressly to defy a judgment of the Strasbourg court.
When the draft Bill was published, the Government announced that a Joint Committee of both Houses would be set up to give it pre-legislative scrutiny. Our remit was to advise which of the three options should be adopted or to propose an alternative option of our own. Had our remit been simply to advise whether or not any prisoners should be permitted to vote, untrammelled by the decision of the Strasbourg court, a majority might well have said no. But we concluded that it would not be right for Parliament to place the United Kingdom in breach of its international obligations. Agreeing with evidence given by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, we stated that,
“the principle of parliamentary sovereignty is not an argument against giving effect to the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights. … A refusal to implement the Court’s judgment would not only undermine the international standing of the UK; it would also give succour to those states in the Council of Europe who have a poor record of protecting human rights”.
We recommended that the right to vote should be conferred on all prisoners serving less than 12 months.
I suggest that respect for the rule of law should have led the Executive, and in particular the Lord Chancellor, to do their best to promote legislation that would bring this country into compliance with the convention. They should have promoted legislation that achieved this and done their best to get it through Parliament. Parliament might well have proved unwilling to follow the Government’s lead, but that is a consequence of the separation of powers. At least the Executive would have done their best to comply with the rule of law. I suggest that a Bill that put before Parliament an option to defy Strasbourg would not be appropriate.
When Chris Grayling came to give evidence to our committee, it became plain that he did not agree. He said that,
“my job is to offer Parliament the option. As you know, the job of the Lord Chancellor is to uphold the law. I have sought, in delivering a multiple-choice Bill, to fulfil my obligations to the law and, I believe, to Parliament as well. As to my own position, I intend to take advice at the time of the voting as to what my own particular situation is. I do not think there is any secret about what my opinion is in terms of this … I have an obligation as Lord Chancellor to uphold a decision of the courts. I take that responsibility very seriously. Equally, I have a responsibility to Parliament, which has already expressed a strong view on this matter. Therefore I have to exercise my judgment in thinking how best to address the issue, particularly given the legal advice from the Attorney-General, and indeed the legal view expressed by Lord Hoffmann … about these matters from, I think, 13 years ago … which said clearly that Parliament is sovereign in these matters … I formed the view that it was better to offer Parliament the option … but as to my own position, that is something I will take advice on at the time as to whether my oath of office or my obligations under the Ministerial Code constrain my actions”.
Could the Lord Chancellor have taken this laissez-faire approach had his oath included a promise to uphold as well as to respect the rule of law? I suggest not. Was it not for him to take advice as to how he should react to the Strasbourg court’s judgment in Hirst from the very outset rather than deferring the step until the time came for him to vote? He referred to the advice from the Attorney-General that Parliament was sovereign but, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, stated, that is not the point.
I have explained why I do not find the Government’s response to the Select Committee’s report satisfactory. We now have a new Government and a new Lord Chancellor, and I hope that the Minister will convey to him a request that he give renewed consideration to the views and recommendations of the committee.
Criminal Justice and Courts Bill
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Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Lab)
My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Deben, and the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, I speak as a member of what was last week dubbed the sisterhood and brotherhood of non-lawyers. It is very important that non-lawyers speak in support of lawyers on these issues because, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, said at Second Reading of the Bill, “These are citizens’ issues”. We are talking about the most marginalised, powerless and voiceless citizens whose concerns are at stake.
I speak also as a member of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. We opposed the original clause on grounds of both principle and practice, including the argument put so powerfully by the noble Lord, Lord Deben, that we should not condone unlawful decision-making. This is of particular importance to the enforcement of the public sector equality duty, a point which has been made to us by the Equality and Human Rights Commission. I declare an interest as the honorary president and a former employee of the Child Poverty Action Group, which, as Sir Stephen Sedley has pointed out, was a pioneer in the use of judicial review to further the interests of children in poverty and their parents and played an important role in elucidating the law on social security to the benefit of everyone involved.
I will recount briefly a recent case that is relevant also to Motion D, in which the CPAG acted as an intervener. It was a judicial review against a decision to cut the funding for local welfare assistance schemes—which replaced the discretionary social fund—which we know, from a growing body of evidence, is causing real hardship. The decision has taken place without consultation and without first carrying out the review that had been promised to Parliament during the passage of the Welfare Reform Act 2012. As it happened, the Government settled the case—they clearly did not think that they would win it—and have now consulted. The CPAG’s solicitor said to me that if the Government’s version of the Bill becomes law, this intervention probably would not have been possible,
“because of the uncertainty around whether our charity would end up liable to pay costs. As a result, the Courts would have been ignorant of the broader issues at stake”.
Indeed, the case may not even have got permission because the Government might have argued that, even if they had consulted, their decision would have been highly likely to be the same. I hope that that does not prove to be the case. We do not yet know what the decision will be. However, in answer to a Written Question just the other day, I was told that they have had over 5,000 responses to that consultation. That is not a mere technicality; that is about listening to what local authorities and other citizens of this country think about this issue.
To echo the very powerful speech of the noble Lord, Lord Deben, at issue here are the accountability of the Government, the rule of law and access to justice—the very kind of principles that your Lordships’ House has traditionally upheld. I hope very much that your Lordships will uphold them again today.
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
The amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, will do no more than bring the law into accord with the position as described, with apparent approval, by the Secretary of State for Justice in the other place. I hope the Minister will do what he has not yet done, which is to explain to this House why it is open to objection.
Criminal Justice and Courts Bill
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Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, not for the first time, the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, has delivered a brilliant speech—a wonderful defence of Conservative values. I congratulate her on that. She made an extremely telling point when she talked about the politicisation of the judiciary in the United States.
I am very proud to be an honorary citizen of Texas, but when I was in Texas in 1984, at the time of the presidential election, I was invited to go to a $1,500-a-plate barbecue in aid of the man who was running for chief justice of Texas. I said to my congressman colleague, “We don’t do it like that in the UK, and I am bound to say that I am extremely glad of that”. I am very glad that that is still the case.
We have heard some outstanding speeches this afternoon. My noble friend Lord Deben was at his very best. We heard a very powerful speech from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, and a short, telling, moving speech from the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, who was, in effect, speaking for the least of the little ones—to use a biblical phrase.
It is a pity that we are here again, because we have been around this course before in debates on the Bill. I had very much hoped that my noble friend who will be responding to the debate, for whom I have a genuinely high regard, would have been able to persuade the Lord Chancellor and others to have taken note of the telling points made in your Lordships’ House. I cannot help but wonder if the fact that we no longer have a distinguished lawyer as Lord Chancellor has something to do with it.
In his speech, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, talked about the significant and powerful difference between the words “must” and “may”. It is a disservice to our democracy to fetter the judiciary. Of course, they can sometimes be exceptionally tiresome. There is not a single Member of your Lordships’ House—other than, perhaps, those who are learned in the law—who has not been exasperated and annoyed from time to time by what judges have said, but the rule of law is what guarantees our liberties in this country. I am so glad that the noble Lord, Lord Lester, quoted from that brilliant book by Tom Bingham. We must not allow any Government to fetter the freedom of the judiciary.
I have mentioned Magna Carta before and I make no apology for mentioning it again. It was alluded to by the noble Lord, Lord Lester. Next year we shall commemorate Magna Carta and celebrate its 800th anniversary. Already, two of the barons who look down on us in this place have gone: one is gracing an exhibition of Victorian sculpture in the United States and the other is to guard the entrance to the British Library’s great exhibition devoted to Magna Carta next year. Much of Magna Carta is not relevant today, but its centrality is:
“To no one will we sell, to no one deny … justice”.
We are moving in that direction if we do not amend the Bill in this way. That is not a good way to commemorate and celebrate.
The Prime Minister has made a number of extremely powerful comments about Magna Carta, after the first unfortunate one on American television. He has said how crucial it is that we recognise the values encapsulated in that most seminal document in our constitutional history. For all the pettifogging, interference and annoyance that might be caused, one of the things that we have to defend is the right of people like the noble Baroness to take on the big powers and the establishment.
How much I agreed with my noble friend Lord Carlile of Berriew when he was talking about those infrastructure projects. I do not agree with him on the infrastructure projects—on some I do, on some I do not—but that is another matter entirely. I agree that there must be the opportunity to challenge. No Government should have the power to prevent such a challenge simply because it is inconvenient.
I hope that, in winding up, the Minister will be able to indicate that he has listened to the almost unanimous voice in this debate. I hope that, even at this late stage, he will do something—perhaps introducing an amendment at Third Reading—to recognise that the case made by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, in his opening speech and the case made so very powerfully with such quiet effectiveness by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, has been listened to in government circles and will be heeded.
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, if those in this Chamber who were opposed to these amendments at the start of this debate have not been converted by what they have heard, nothing that I can add is going to convert them. I simply say to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, that Parliament did not create judicial review; the judges did. It was, I hasten to say, before I became a judge and was one of the best things that our common-law judges have ever done. These amendments are designed to ensure that Parliament does not damage that which the judges created, and they deserve the support of this House.
Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws (Lab)
My Lords, I know that there is always a sigh in this House when a debate is dominated by lawyers. However, I remind the House that sometimes it is lawyers who know the pain that citizens in our country experience, because we represent them, and that this is about the actual lives on which judicial review has an impact. It is always about the person whose business is to be closed down from trading, based on a department’s or a local authority’s decision that they want to challenge, or the person whose mother is in a care home and suddenly finds that it is being moved or closed down, with no consultation as to the impact on her and her family. It may be about the effect on a disabled child of a decision about their schooling. Those things are about real people’s lives and that is why this is not just a constitutional debate of high flown words or complicated legality—it is about the real impact on the lives of ordinary people.
When your Lordships come to vote in our Lobbies, as I am sure you will be asked to do, I say to those of you who are not lawyers that this is really about people’s lives and about the law coming into play to protect citizens. That is why lawyers and organisations such as the Bar Council, the Law Society and Justice—cross-party and no-party organisations—know why the rule of law matters in our nation and our democracy. This is not, I say to the Minister’s noble friend Lord Tebbit, about judges somehow usurping the power of Parliament. This is about justice, fairness and the things that we hold dear, so I say to my colleagues in this House who are not lawyers that this is not a festival of lawyering. It is about ordinary people.
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Lord Carlile of Berriew (LD)
My Lords, we have heard three very powerful speeches from noble Lords—and noble and learned Lords in two cases—on the Cross Benches, and I anticipate that we are about to hear another one in a moment. We also heard a powerful intervention from a former Home Secretary, who is one of the most admired figures in British politics in the last 40 years. I cannot improve on what they have said, and will not try to do so. All I want to say, speaking as I do from one of the political Benches in this House, is that this is an issue upon which those of us who sit on political Benches are entitled to, and should, exercise our consciences. If we engage our consciences, the extraordinary speech from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick, completely wins the day. I therefore hope that noble friends, as well as those elsewhere in the House, will see that if this matter divides the House, the only course they can take is to support this amendment.
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, the unhappy cohort of prisoners to which this amendment relates linger in prison years after they have completed terms of imprisonment that reflect their culpability. They linger because of a statutory presumption that they are dangerous, which is discredited, has been repealed, and is surely, in the cases of many of them, unjustified. I find it impossible to envisage any credible reason why the Secretary of State has not exercised the power that he has been given to procure their release. His inertia belies the title of Secretary of State for Justice. This amendment cries out for the support of the House.
Lord Wigley (PC)
My Lords, I apologise for having missed the first two minutes of the speech of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, in moving this amendment. As he and the Minister may well be aware, this subject has been exercised me considerably over many months now, having seen cases arising in Wales, and we had a debate on this matter earlier this year. I pay tribute to the way in which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, has persevered with this important battle, by now over many months and years. The facts that he has put before the House this afternoon should most certainly be of concern to anyone who takes an interest in matters of law and who is concerned about the good name of the UK’s judicial system. The case is valid for the whole cohort, but I very much hope that, at least in the limited number of instances he has quoted, where very little risk is at stake, there can be no possible argument, even from the Government’s own standpoint, for not making progress on this matter. I follow the plea made by the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, that noble Lords of all parties across this House take this issue to heart. I very much hope that colleagues on the Labour Benches will stand up and be counted on this matter.
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Lord Davies of Stamford (Lab)
My Lords, I hope that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, was right when he said that he did not believe that any member of the Government had ever wished that the right of review for whole life prisoners should disappear. He may well be right, and I would be the last person to wish to challenge his generosity, but I have seen at very close quarters in the course of my political career how really fundamental legal principles can be eroded under the pressure of electoral and demagogic—I can use no other word—considerations. It is enormously important for us in the House of Lords, who are less prone and less open to those pressures than Members of the other place, to be very clear in our minds about the legal principles on which we really do wish to take our stand and which we think are foundational for our legal system.
I support this splendid amendment on the three grounds that have already been touched on in one way or another by those noble Lords who have spoken to it. One is that it undoubtedly increases the humanity, and therefore the justice, of our legal system, which, after all, has been inspired over the centuries by the Christian idea of forgiveness, as well as by other Christian concepts
It also contributes to the efficiency and efficacy of our penal system, because no penal system can really work properly unless it is committed to the concept of rehabilitation. If rehabilitation is excluded or irrelevant for certain classes of prisoner, because nothing they do and no transformation of their character or behaviour can earn them any kind of release, then there is no rehabilitation for some prisoners and rehabilitation therefore ceases to be a general principle that is observed by the penal system in relation to all its prisoners as a matter of course. That leads to a degradation of the spirit and the culture of the penal system concerned, which would be extremely undesirable.
Thirdly, I very much share the view that has already been expressed that it is very important that other penal, legal decisions about the review of prisoners should be taken by independent judicial or quasi-judicial bodies—for this purpose, I accept that the Parole Board falls into that category—and under no circumstances, for the reasons that I mentioned at the outset of my intervention, by a member of the executive branch of government, open to pressures from Back-Benchers, the Daily Mail and God knows who else.
This amendment is extremely timely and I wholeheartedly agree with the view that has already been expressed that the responsibility now lies with Parliament to clarify the law, to make it absolutely clear what we believe the law should be in this particular matter, not to leave matters to the vagaries of jurisprudence, given the considerable uncertainty that has already been created, certainly in my mind, by the Minister’s statement that it is possible to interpret “compassionate” as including all sorts of issues relating to the conduct of the prisoner as well as the prisoner’s health. We are going down a route that would lead to greater uncertainty for the law and therefore greater injustice, which would be extremely undesirable. We have the opportunity to legislate clearly in this House this afternoon and we should take it.
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers (CB)
My Lords, I support this amendment. In Vinter, the Grand Chamber of the Strasbourg court made it plain that a whole life sentence that had no possibility of review, however long the defendant might be detained in prison, constituted inhuman treatment contrary to Article 3 of the convention. In explaining its decision, the Grand Chamber said at paragraph 112 that,
“if such a prisoner is incarcerated without any prospect of release and without the possibility of having his life sentence reviewed, there is the risk that he can never atone for his offence: whatever the prisoner does in prison, however exceptional his progress towards rehabilitation, his punishment remains fixed and unreviewable. If anything, the punishment becomes greater with time: the longer the prisoner lives, the longer his sentence”.
That passage echoes the observations of the noble Lord, Lord Marks, which I endorse.
The Strasbourg court held that the discretionary power of the Secretary of State to release a whole life prisoner under Section 30 of the Crime (Sentences) Act 1997 did not satisfy the requirement of Article 3 because of uncertainty as to when the Minister would be required to exercise that power. In so holding, it differed from a decision of the Court of Appeal in Bieber, over which I had presided, but as the House has heard, the Criminal Division of the Court of Appeal presided over by the Lord Chief Justice has recently disagreed with the Strasbourg court on this point in the case of McLoughlin.
The Court of Appeal said this about the duty of the Secretary of State:
“First, the power of review under the section”—
that is, Section 30 of the 1997 Act—
“arises if there are exceptional circumstances. The offender subject to the whole life order is therefore required to demonstrate to the Secretary of State that although the whole life order was just punishment at the time the order was made, exceptional circumstances have since arisen. It is not necessary to specify what such circumstances are or specify criteria; the term ‘exceptional circumstances’ is of itself sufficiently certain”.
The court went on:
“Second, the Secretary of State must then consider whether such exceptional circumstances justify the release on compassionate grounds … Third, the term ‘compassionate grounds’ must be read, as the court made clear in R v Bieber, in a manner compatible with Article 3. They are not restricted to what is set out in the Lifer Manual. It is a term with a wide meaning that can be elucidated, as is the way the common law develops, on a case by case basis … Fourth, the decision of the Secretary of State must be reasoned by reference to the circumstances of each case and is subject to scrutiny by way of judicial review”.
One suspects that the Secretary of State may not relish being required to exercise this discretion; nor is it appropriate that the discretion should be exercised by a member of the Executive, as the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, has explained. This amendment would transfer the relevant decision to the Parole Board and define the circumstances in which it would fall to be exercised, with a precision that should satisfy the Strasbourg court.
Lord Ramsbotham
My Lords, I support the amendment and in particular the intervention made by the noble Lord, Lord Marks. In doing so, I remind the Committee of one group of people whom I mentioned during the debate to which my noble and learned friend Lord Lloyd referred. I refer to prison staff. I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Marks, mentioned the word “hope”, because when I inspected prisons in which full life tariff prisoners were held, their governors made the point to me that the fact that those cases could be reviewed, which was not necessarily the same as that they might be released, gave the prisoners hope and therefore enabled them to conform with the prison regime. That was vital for the purposes of the prison staff who had to maintain the regime. It is important in considering this that the role of the staff should not be forgotten.
Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers
My Lords, I had the good fortune a week ago to enjoy a superb production of “Fidelio” at Garsington. “Fidelio” is an unusual opera, as it has a happy ending, when miserable prisoners, unjustly detained, are released on the orders of the minister of state. Many have been waiting for the Secretary of State for Justice to procure the release of a relatively small category of prisoners whose continued detention is a flagrant violation of the demands of justice. They are the IPP prisoners who, despite having received relatively modest tariff sentences, were deemed to be dangerous under a statutory presumption that has since been discredited and abolished. Years ago, they completed the terms of imprisonment that were appropriate for their offences. Their continued detention today is shameful. The amendment should not be necessary, and one hopes that the Lord Chancellor will take the necessary action to demonstrate that it is not.
Lord Ramsbotham
My Lords, in supporting my noble and learned friend Lord Brown and saluting my noble and learned friend Lord Lloyd on his determined and tenacious momentum on this issue, I want to say just one thing. I am amazed that the Government are not tabling this amendment. As the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, mentioned, £40,000 a year for 773 prisoners is £35 million per year. If you have an overstretched and underresourced Prison Service, surely it makes sense to examine where you could make savings to put the money to better effect, rather than spend it on prisoners who should not be there. I fail to understand why, in the face of all the arguments, all the legal statements and all the evidence, plus the legislation passed in 2012, the Government have not taken the common-sense step of approaching this forcefully themselves.