Prisons and Probation

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Tuesday 14th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

Let me develop my points, and I will give way in a moment.

My right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice has proposed a radical, evidence-based approach to put rehabilitation truly at the heart of our prison and probation services. I am delighted to be joining his team, and it is right to pay tribute to and congratulate my hon. and learned Friend the Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Lucy Frazer) who has taken her place—it was my place for many years—as the Solicitor General.

This has been a wide-ranging and informed debate. It included speeches from distinguished members of the Justice Committee, on which I served for four years with some Members present, and I am grateful to them for their considered, eloquent contributions. The debate moved away in a welcome manner from the rather false dichotomy of public good, private bad, or vice versa, because the truth is that neither is true. We are seeking a genuinely mixed approach that works whether in the south-west or north-east of England. We want an approach that keeps rehabilitation and reducing reoffending at the heart of our deliberations.

I want to take this opportunity—my first such opportunity—to pay tribute to the biggest single asset in our prison and probation services: the people who work in them. I have been in professional contact with these people since the early 1990s. Probation officers work hard to prepare important pre-sentence reports. Prison officers work tirelessly, often on the frontline of potential harm, to make our prisons civilised and safe places. I am thinking, too, of the volunteers who work alongside them—the prison chaplaincy has been mentioned—and the healthcare staff and charity workers. Of course, we should not forget the offenders and former offenders who work hard to help their peers, and the listeners trained by the Samaritans to help prisoners who are struggling to cope. The system just would not work without all their dedication, skills and bravery, and it is my task to champion their work and to give them the resources, tools and conditions in which to excel.

A lot has been said about the need for a clear evidence base. As a lawyer, of course, I naturally support that, and it is right to support it because I think we can agree that blind ideology, whether in favour of an overweening state or in favour of a mythological free-market paradise, is not the right answer for our prison and probation services.

[Sir Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

I welcome my hon. and learned Friend to his job, to which I hope he brings the same tremendous skills as he brought to his previous job as Solicitor General. He was kind to listen to my representations last night about my local probation area in the south of England, which has managed to make the system, as it currently exists, work extremely well. My local service has an outstanding reputation, and in listening to what it says, I am struck by the fact that for it to tear up all the progress it has made under the present system for another system would not help those it looks after. I urge him to consider some form of flexibility in his plans so that the very best that has been learned in the current system can be incorporated into the new system.

[Robert Buckland]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, and of course I am familiar with the CRC to which he refers. It is an example of how best practice has been achieved, and it shows excellent delivery of unpaid work placements right across the region. It offers a comprehensive range of programmes and, frankly, outstanding leadership, too. He is right to talk about flexibility within a national framework.

The right hon. Member for Delyn (David Hanson), as he always does, made some pertinent points about recall rates. It is right to say that the increases are a direct consequence of the fact that 40,000 more offenders are being supervised as a result of the positive transforming rehabilitation changes. It is inevitable that there will be an increase in breaches with an increase in numbers, but I take his point. It is very much part of my consideration and thinking to ensure that, as we go forward, the monitoring and enforcement of orders is as important as the imposition of those orders—in fact, more important in many respects.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill), the Chairman of the Justice Committee, who in his inimitable way made the important point that, from the evidence he has heard at length, a mixed-economy approach to prisons and probation is the right one. He spoke about through-the-gate support, and it is good to note that there is £6 million of funding from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to support people to move away from rough sleeping and into accommodation, which is clearly one of the key gateways away from reoffending.

The hon. Member for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) raised a horrifying case, and I reassure her that a serious further offence review is under way. The Government remain in favour of raising the maximum sentence for causing death by dangerous driving, and we will look to do so as far as parliamentary time allows.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Tuesday 9th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

No, the reality is that there are issues with violence in both public and private sector prisons. Certainly, the numbers that I have suggest that there is a significant issue in public sector prisons such as Liverpool, Exeter and Bedford, where there have been urgent notifications. We should not take an ideological approach. There are very good private sector prisons, and there are some very good public sector prisons, and it is right that there is a diversity of prisons in our system.

[Sir Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend pay tribute to the prison officers in both public and private prisons who, by and large, do an exceptional job in very, very difficult circumstances? Does he agree that we should on every occasion do what we can to encourage them and raise their status as an important part of the whole process of judicial sentencing?

[Mr Gauke]

My right hon. Friend is right to make that point, and I happily pay tribute to the work that prison officers do in this country—a point that I made in my party conference speech in Birmingham last week. The work that they do in protecting the public and rehabilitating prisoners should be valued by us all. It is not often very public, because it is, by definition, behind locked doors, but they do excellent work and we should recognise that.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Committee: 7th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 13th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bryant]

That is where we disagree. I believe that we will get the best possible deal only if we have the best possible process; the two go hand in hand. Indeed, if the Government introduced a Bill to implement an agreement and they started to lose votes on individual elements, they would probably then go back to Brussels and say, “You know what? I cannot get this through Parliament, so you’re going to have to give me a better deal.” At that point, I think that our colleagues and friends in other countries in Europe would improve the deal. I believe we would end up with a better deal.

[Sir Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

Oh yeah right!

[Chris Bryant]

I am glad that the right hon. aristocrat agrees with me.

Women and the Economy

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Wednesday 9th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mims Davies (Eastleigh) (Con)]

I am pleased to have an opportunity to speak in this important debate. The representation of women and women’s issues in this House has not been very good historically. It is appalling that I am only the 380th woman ever to be elected to this House. I am very proud to have been elected, of course, but there is clearly a lot of work to do to improve women’s representation and bring these issues to the House. I am delighted to be a member of the brand-new Women and Equalities Committee, which will strain every sinew to ensure that we have fair representation in this House and across the work we do here.

It is seven months since the general election, and I believe that this Government recognise the importance of women in the economy and that they are focused on the issues we all share, as families and members of the community, such as childcare, flexible working, better schools, opportunities for apprenticeships and a focus on science, technology, engineering and maths.

Progress on women’s issues has too often been seen as niche, or the concern of local or representative bodies. If we want real and clear change and equality of opportunity for all, women’s campaigns must not continue to be seen as niche. Progress is needed urgently on many fronts. Full equality is needed in the areas of taxation, better action on domestic violence, fairness for all carers, whether they are looking after young people or older people, and a firm understanding that the gender pay gap is wrong and must be ended, and in a much shorter timescale than the one we are seeing.

[Sir Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the things that limit pay in the care sector, particularly for women, is that in old people’s care, in homes and other places, there is no structure to allow people to move up? More thought needs to be given to having a proper career in caring, which would allow people to be paid more as they gain more qualifications.

[Mims Davies]

I absolutely agree with my right hon. Friend, and I am standing beside a nurse—my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield)—who is nodding her head. We absolutely need to value carers, from mothers to people who look after older members of our society. We need to make that a proper career structure and to value the people who look after vulnerable people day in, day out.

Over the past few months I have been contacted several times about the perverse taxation arrangements for sanitary items. Let me make something extremely clear: anyone who believes that tampons are a luxury is ignorant and wrong. I am delighted that the Government will give this revenue to women’s charities while they negotiate with the European Union to sort out these outdated rules. Women’s charities tell me that they see this Government as a great reforming force standing alongside women. They are delighted to see Conservative women taking every opportunity to tackle, get involved in and highlight matters that have long been ignored by Labour.

An example of inequality that I have found and that we, as a Government, have seen being corrected, is domestic violence. Too often, our family courts system is outdated and does not take into account the unique requirements in domestic violence cases. For instance, it is far too rare for judges to impose protection orders to stop perpetrators following victims out of court. This Government are putting £40 million into services for victims of domestic abuse. I welcome that. I hope that the Government will continue to take on the challenge of supporting women through the courts system so that perpetrators cannot continue to pursue their victims. Negatively affecting their confidence because that takes place can mean that those women continue to be trapped in a system where they cannot play their part in the community or the economy.

Business of the House (Police (Detention and Bail) Bill)

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Thursday 7th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

I rise wholly to endorse the words of the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith) and to say to my right hon. Friend the Policing Minister that I applaud the way in which he has handled this matter and the speed with which he has responded to what was clearly a completely untenable situation. Does he agree—as I am sure he does—that the history of emergency legislation is not always a happy one, so that the right hon. Gentleman’s points carry even greater weight?