Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2023

Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede Excerpts

Tuesday 13th June 2023 Grand Committee

Those are the main points that I would draw to the attention of the Committee.

[Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede (Lab)]

My Lords, the Opposition support this draft order. Supporting ex-offenders into employment is something that we must all endeavour to be better at, especially given the central role employment can play in preventing future offending. It is vital that our criminal records system does not unnecessarily trap people in the past when they are committed to reform and have stayed out of the offending cycle and rebuilt their career. However, the overriding concern when legislating in this area must always be the protection of the public.

The exemptions included in the 1975 order strike that proportionate balance because those areas of work, such as working with vulnerable individuals or potentially sensitive information, require a high degree of trust. We are satisfied that the proposed extensions to the 1975 order can be introduced while maintaining that vital proportionate balance. Given the culture that we have seen across some of our fire and rescue authorities, and the police, we must ensure that people are properly safeguarded. I am glad that representatives of the fire authorities are here today.

Justice system intermediaries have very high levels of responsibility for the vulnerable individuals they assist, including children, and they sometimes have unsupervised access to them. Notaries also frequently deal with vulnerable people and highly sensitive information, and it is right that individuals who undertake such work are subject to additional DBS scrutiny.

The relevant organisations are producing guidance to ensure that a proportionate approach is taken with regard to the disclosure of criminal records in these additional areas, to ensure that equality and individual privacy are upheld alongside public protection. What plans, if any, do the Government have to review this guidance to ensure that it is indeed proportionate, as the Minister emphasised, and drafted in line with the anticipated need of those professions, as recommended by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee?

Can the Minister share whether the draft order represents the extent of his department’s current intentions to change the criminal records system? Will he also inform us whether he has had any recent meetings with the organisation #FairChecks, or whether the Government have any plans further to reform in relation to its campaign about offences committed in childhood?

When preparing for this short debate, I reflected on my experience with the DBS system. As somebody who has worked all their life in private industry, I have never been checked in the DBS system. I have recruited many people and been recruited, I have been a company director and various other things, and I have never been checked. However, I have been checked by the DBS system as a magistrate and as a coach for my son’s sports clubs to make sure that I am a fit and proper person to carry out that coaching role. However, I have never had to jump that particular hurdle in my working life.

As the Minister said, this is a very live issue when one deals with youths, as I do as a magistrate. It is not unusual for me to have a youth in front of me who says that he aspires to being a football coach. Of course, if you are a football coach you will be coaching youths, which requires the highest level of DBS check. It is not necessarily a bar, but it is the highest level. When I sentence youths, I want to encourage them to go on to fulfil their ambition, if it is to be a football coach. While on the one hand we support these enhanced safeguards, I hope they will not be a bar on people fulfilling their ambitions. The fear is that these enhanced checks will act as a disincentive for people to go ahead and apply for certain types of roles, such as the example I gave.

I hope the Minister can expand a little further on what the Ministry of Justice is seeking to do with a wider review of the whole DBS system, and how it could be thorough on the one hand but on the other proportionate to the aspirations of people who seek to get a job as a firefighter, as in his example, or, as in my example, a youth who wants to be a football coach. The system is very cumbersome. The effect of that is that it discourages people checking and putting their names forward. I hope the Minister can expand a little further on the work the Ministry of Justice is doing to look at the whole criminal records review process.

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his contribution and for the support he offers to this statutory instrument. I will respond to his two main questions. First, on the guidance, officials from the Ministry of Justice, with the help of officials from the Disclosure and Barring Service, are working closely with representatives from these professions to develop and update their guidance to ensure that it is proportionate and fair. As far as I know, that is an ongoing process and a matter for ongoing review to make sure this scheme works proportionately.

As far as other plans are concerned, as I understand it—having regard to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and a recent judgment of the Supreme Court—the intention is to remove the disclosure of certain youth cautions, warnings and reprimands from the system altogether so that there is less clutter, if I can use that shorthand, in the system. There is also something called the multiple conviction rule, which I think necessitated disclosure when there was more than a single conviction. This will, I hope, reduce the likelihood of protection of the public unduly interfering with the important objective of rehabilitation; that is the intention, at least.

We have to find a balance. We are doing our best, particularly in the youth area. I am conscious of the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, about those who aspire to be a football manager and so forth. We really do not want, if we can possibly avoid it, to put obstacles in their way from when they got into trouble at 15, 16 or 17 when they are now 27 and settled down. We do not want the earlier criminal record to be a blight on their lives. We have to strike the right balance.

Work on this is ongoing. My good friend in the other place, the right honourable Edward Argar, is meeting criminal justice charities on 13 June—tomorrow, I think. It may even be today; I have slightly lost track of what day it is at the moment. They will discuss further reform of the criminal records system to see whether we can simplify it and tip it a little more in favour of youth, in particular, to ensure that the rehabilitation objective is properly followed.

That is the most I am able to say this afternoon. I am sure that there are further instalments to come in this important story. Unless noble Lords have any other questions, I commend this instrument to the Committee.