Modern Slavery Bill

Debate between Lord Warner and Baroness Hamwee

Monday 8th December 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Warner]

My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendments 72D, 73B, 74AA, 74CA and 74DA in my name. These amendments are all designed to give the anti-slavery commissioner greater freedom of manoeuvre in dealing with the Home Office and to prevent endless procrastination over the release of reports submitted to the Home Secretary and the Home Office, particularly if they contain what I would call “unacceptable messages”. We have been over this ground in both sets of amendments at some length. This is all of a piece with some of our earlier discussions. We have certainly seen in real life how reports of other independent sources of inspection or advice can—how can I put it?—languish in government department in-trays. Some of these amendments attempt to address real issues.

I accept that my amendments are pale imitations of the more radical amendments moved and discussed by the noble Lord, Lord Patel, in the previous group. I would certainly withdraw some of mine if the Government were moved to accept many of his. That is not bargaining across the Table but a statement of fact; the noble Lord has some very powerful amendments which deliver more effectively than my amendments. I do not always travel hopefully about whether Home Office Ministers in this place are able to deliver changes, so I shall press on with my more limited amendments.

Amendment 72ZZA requires the commissioner to produce a three-year plan, not just a one-year plan. That enables him—sensibly, I think—to plan ahead for a reasonable period of time. Amendment 72B removes the detailed control of the Home Office over the plan, as prescribed in Clause 42(4), (5) and (6). These seem totally superfluous, given that Clause 42(1) already gives the Home Secretary the power of approval over the strategic plan. Why do we need these extra, more detailed control methods, other than to demonstrate what we have said for some time about the Bill: that it too often finds ways of controlling the room for manoeuvre of the anti-slavery commissioner?

Amendment 73B removes the detailed Home Office control over the nature of the commissioner’s annual report by removing Clause 42(9). It is another attempt to loosen the shackles, in the phrase I used earlier. Amendments 74AA, 74CA and 74DA are designed to ensure that Ministers do not delay in laying the commissioner’s annual report before Parliament, the Scottish Parliament and the Northern Ireland Assembly. They all require the annual report to be laid within a month of receipt by the particular Ministers.

These amendments are in the best interest of the commissioner’s independence and safeguard the position of Parliament and the Northern Ireland Assembly. We have to remove some of these controls in order to give the commissioner more freedom of manoeuvre and to ensure that important reports are not delayed in reaching Parliament and public scrutiny. I beg to move.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, I have Amendments 73ZA and 74ZA in this group and it would be very odd if I did not agree with the noble Lord, Lord Warner, given the debate we have just had. I do not think that I need to lay it on with a trowel. However, I will use this opportunity to refer to the duties of the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, because Section 36 of the Terrorism Act 2006, to which my noble friend referred, has a mere six subsections, and that is it—and he gets on with it. I have still not been able to find the constraints on his report, which would take the form of redactions, to which my noble friend referred. However, as I said, I can understand the need for them for the commissioner as well as for the reviewer.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Lord Warner and Baroness Hamwee

Monday 9th December 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Warner (Lab)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend’s Amendment 9, which puts contact between siblings in the Bill. I apologise to the House that I was unable to take part in this Bill’s proceedings in Committee because I was engaged on the Care Bill. However, I was on the Select Committee on Adoption Legislation and I echo the points made by the chairman of that committee, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss.

On the basis of my six years as a director of social services, I have a general point about why the Minister should concede on Amendment 9. While I was director, the Children Act 1989 was passed. That was a classic example of Parliament saying in a Bill that decisions about children should be taken on the basis of the best interests of the child. In the overwhelming majority of cases where siblings are separated, the best interests of the child are to maintain that contact. Sibling contact is often a private child’s world, which is not always well observed by adults, whether they are social workers or other adults involved in that child’s life. Maintaining that contact is overwhelmingly important to children. My noble friend has shown that the option of putting it in guidance and relying on best practice has had a good run for its money and it has not worked. We should return to some of the ideas in the Children Act 1989 and put in the Bill the obligation to help maintain contacts between siblings when they are separated. These contacts are in the best interests of the children and very important to them. It costs very little to put that in the Bill.

[Baroness Hamwee]

I support Amendments 9 and 10. When the noble and learned Baroness was talking, I remembered that when she was meeting children—she shared with the House some of their moving comments—I was in the next room meeting the carers, mostly social workers. When we talked about contact generally, not just with siblings, several of them said that the problem lay in adopters not wanting to know, preferring to see their children as part of the new family and wanting to leave the past behind. Therefore I take very seriously the point that she and other noble Lords have made about the importance of having this in the legislation. Guidance has not been enough and I do not see that it will be enough.

In support of Amendment 10, in Committee the noble Baroness, Lady Young, gave such an important explanation of the need to know one’s identity that, without wanting to embarrass her, I feel it should be framed. It said a lot about the specific issue about which I was concerned, about descendants of adopted people and, as she has just mentioned, the need of older adults to know about their heritage and background. What she has said seems in line with adoption practice and with Amendment 1, which we have agreed. It is an important way to move practice forward though statute.