Oral Answers to Questions

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Tuesday 9th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

T2. I draw the attention of the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests in that my wife is an education lawyer. Parents appealing decisions in relation to education, health and care plans and health needs are forced to wait between nine months and 13 months from appeal registration to hearing. That is far too long in terms of a child’s development. Does my hon. Friend agree with that? Does he also share my concern that some schools are delaying providing education, health and care plans in the knowledge that it will take a year or more to have an appeal?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mike Freer)]

My right hon. Friend is right. Despite special educational needs and disabilities appeals and disposals being up by 24% and 29% respectively, I do share his concerns, and systematic reform is required. That is why through the SEND and alternative provision improvement plan, the Department for Education and ourselves will be working hard to ensure that it is improved. I am more than happy to meet my right hon. Friend to go through the details.

Devolution of Justice: Wales

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2022 Westminster Hall

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

I congratulate the right hon. Lady on securing the debate. She makes important points about the detention of women, and I know that the Ministry of Justice has sought to discuss the issue, negotiate and open facilities in various local authorities. My constituency was a consideration at one time, but no suitable accommodation could be found. Is that not an example of the Ministry of Justice seeking to answer the issues that have been raised? Local authorities themselves are rejecting it.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I will return to that later, but because the right hon. Gentleman has raised the point, I will engage with it now as well. There is a residential unit in planning for one area of Wales, but we really need to know exactly which services will be there. Will it effectively be a small-scale prison, or will it actually offer the services that women need? We also need to know what the interface will be between the devolved service and the reserved provision. That is a very timely point, because it has just become apparent at the private prison near Bridgend, HMP Parc, that the local authority has had to step in to take over social services there. Again, this ad hoc arrangement, the lack of clarity and the lack of scrutiny over who is providing what is resulting in bad outcomes, which is why the debate is so timely.

It is evident that there are not many of us in this room. That is actually part of the issue, because Westminster will concentrate on where the loudest majority issues are. However, there is a phenomenon in Wales: the disconnect. Frankly, if this is the best we can do in relation to the disconnect with the highest imprisonment rates in western Europe, we must consider looking at the issue in an alternative way.

--- Later in debate ---

[Liz Saville Roberts]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, and I am honoured that Members from across parties are pointing out the inconsistency that we are experiencing in Wales.

The UK Government’s prison population projections from 2021 to 2026 anticipate that prisoner numbers in the England and Wales conglomeration will rise to 98,500 by March 2026. Those are extraordinary figures. As part of that increase, the Ministry of Justice anticipates that the number of adult female prisoners in England and Wales will increase by over a third—36%. Disaggregated data from Wales shows that the number of Welsh women in prison will likely increase from 227 to 308. Therefore, the provision that is being planned now for south-west Wales, although welcome—even to those of us who disagree that that number should be arriving in the system—is highly unlikely to deal with the numbers we are anticipating to arrive in the system.

Under the plans that took effect in May, the maximum prison sentence that can be handed out by magistrates has increased from six months to a year, which is also expected to contribute to a rise in prisoner numbers. Disaggregated sentencing data shows that the average custodial sentence length for women sentenced in Wales already increased from seven months in 2017 to 13.6 months in 2021. Although 23% of the Welsh female prison population was serving sentences of four years or more in 2019, that has increased to 29% in 2021. How does that align with the Welsh Government’s stated aim to reduce the number of Welsh women in prison? The answer, of course, is that it simply does not because there is no direct link between the very worthy policy, which most of us support, and the means to bring it about.

I am pleased that the UK Government are working with the Welsh Government to establish a pilot women’s residential centre in Wales as an alternative to custody, and my probation service in north Wales is doing very good work to the best of its ability on the ground, but the policy and structure that we have in place hinder it. In truth, the number of women supported will be small and focused in very specific areas of Wales. Therefore, my second question to the Minister is: given that overall incarceration of women from Wales will increase, does he honestly believe that to be coherent policy making for women in the criminal justice system in Wales? Particularly since the autumn statement, it looks likely that Departments such as the Ministry of Justice will have less capital money to spend in the long term. I wonder where that leaves the development of multiple women’s residential centres across Wales.

Another issue that shines the cold light of reality on the jagged edge is housing. Housing and the responsibility for preventing homelessness lie, as we all know, with the Welsh Government, and have done so for 22 years, but the policy aim is not properly aligned with the Westminster-controlled criminal justice system at present. The removal of priority need for prison leavers in the Housing (Wales) Act 2014 was driven by several factors, including low levels of housing stock and pressures on hard-working local authority staff in finding accommodation for prison leavers. It was, however, in part due to the inability of the Welsh Government to control or even influence the upstream factors that affect the rate and timing of demand for housing prison leavers. Even though prison leavers still get let out of prison on Fridays, they get no support at the weekend. The outcomes of that need proper scrutiny.

Those factors include the rapid rise in prison leavers from an ever-expanding prison population, the long distances from home addresses, which reduce the likelihood of prison leavers being able to receive support services, and the fact that Welsh prisoners are widely dispersed across England, making it hard to know when and where the demand will arise when they return to Wales. The same facts apply equally to English-address prisoners held in Welsh prisons. This is not looking at the justice experience just from a Welsh perspective but as a totality.

[Alun Cairns]

The right hon. Lady is looking at this from a purely nationalistic point of view, and I understand the motive behind that. Does she not accept that a prison in England could be closer to a prisoner in my constituency, and more appropriate than what she envisions in her purist approach, which is that the prison must be in Wales? If it were in north Wales, it would be four and half hours away.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

With respect, there are a number of prisons close to the right hon. Gentleman’s constituency. I was emphasising that women are at present going to prisons in Gloucestershire or Cheshire. If we sent prisoners from south-east England to Parc or Berwyn, they too would be very distant from their homes. That is not an effective way to ensure rehabilitation.

[Alun Cairns]

That is a challenge that we need to address sensibly, but simply saying that a Welsh prisoner needs to stay in Wales is not sensible. If a Welsh prisoner needs to stay in Wales, must they travel four and half hours from north Wales to a prison in south Wales? We need to recognise the interconnectivity between Wales and England; 50% of the Welsh population live within 25 miles of the border.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

With respect, the right hon. Gentleman is looking at the convenient location of prisons, rather than at justice outcomes, which is what I hope we look for in our scrutiny. It is not a matter of where people go; it is a matter of their coming back to the communities where they have committed crimes. I am looking at this not just from the point of view of those individuals and their families, although I hope the children of prisoners would certainly be our consideration, but from the point of view of the communities to which they return.

I hope we all aspire to effective rehabilitation. Yes, we penalise people by taking away their liberty, but when they return to the community, we hope that they are healthier than when they went to prison, have the opportunity for more education, are housed, can find work and have a stable family environment. That is all down to services, and there is a jagged edge where there is no interconnectivity between reserved and devolved powers.

To return to housing, since the removal in 2014 of priority need in Wales, there has been an increase in the number of prison leavers presenting as homeless. As we have mentioned, housing is a factor in the success or otherwise of rehabilitation. In the year 2019-20, fewer than half of those released from prison custody who were managed by probation services in Wales went into settled accommodation. However, simply reintroducing priority need for prison leavers is meaningless unless we have proper joined-up working between criminal justice and social services providers, as the local authority in Bridgend does.

I have emphasised the two issues of housing and women in the criminal justice system to highlight the illogical nature of the misaligned mishmash of powers and responsibilities, which leads to problems in the operation of justice in Wales. There are countless other examples I could have chosen from across the justice system: policing, probation, courts, education, health services, access to justice and the experience of victims in Wales.

The portrait of justice in Wales is so ill drawn that it can only be presumed that the Ministry of Justice assumes that no one is looking. We are at least looking today, but there is the important question: what is to be done? The Thomas commission proposed the devolution of justice responsibilities to

“enable the proper alignment of justice policy and spending with social, health, education and economic development policies in Wales, to underpin practical, long-term solutions; place justice at the heart of Government; enable clearer and improved accountability.”

Devolution of justice is not simply a nice thing to have, a policy toy to play with. It is essential if we want to build a better and fairer society. It is the only way truly to end the jagged edge and create a system that genuinely serves the people of Wales. It would also offer some protection against the attack on human rights and civil liberties that the UK Government have been undertaking, such as their curbing of protest rights through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022.

It is hard to see how the Welsh Government can develop any plans for a Welsh Bill of Rights without having full control over justice in Wales. I have tried to think from the opposing point of view, and there are three points that critics of what we propose might throw back at us. The first is the cost of devolution. When I spoke in the debate on the Thomas commission report three years ago, the Minister at the time claimed that the additional running costs would amount to £100 million per annum, but that is not even consistent with the evidence provided by the UK Government to the Thomas commission. Rather, the UK Government’s 2018 estimate was that the initial set-up costs associated with devolving justice—all right, at the time; fair enough—would amount to £101.5 million, with subsequent additional costs of some £37.5 million per annum.

Focusing on the additional financial costs involved for devolved Government, the Welsh Government estimated set-up costs of £13 million, with £10 million per annum of additional costs to follow. In other words, excluding set-up costs, the extra incremental cost of devolving justice would come to less than half the amount claimed by the justice Minister three years ago. That is in the context of an annual spend on justice functions in Wales of some £1.2 billion.

Moreover, while there would clearly be some additional costs involved in devolving justice, there are estimates that Wales would benefit financially if justice were devolved. Per capita spend on justice is lower in Wales than in England, but if justice were devolved, the operation of the Barnett formula would, over time, ensure that the amount in the Welsh budget derived from UK spending on justice in England equalised at the English per capita level—that is, it would be more.

While it would ultimately be up to the Senedd to decide how to allocate the extra resource, those funds would be available for spending on justice-related functions, such as crime prevention, tackling substance misuse and reducing homelessness. As it is, the Welsh Government are already putting money into funding extra police community support officers. There is an argument that people in Wales pay more for policing than people in England. This change would ensure better scrutiny, and that the money spent for Wales would be accounted for in Wales.

The potential to reduce homelessness gives an example of the real savings that could be made as a result of our reducing the negative outcomes of the justice system. The charity Crisis has estimated that

“people who experience homelessness for three months or longer cost on average £4,298 per person to NHS services, £2,099 per person for mental health services and £11,991 per person in contact with the criminal justice system.”

It is a matter of whose budget we look at to see the savings. They are not all siloed in one place.

As Lord Thomas himself noted in evidence to the Senedd last year, devolution presents a great opportunity for Wales; we could

“take advantage of Wales’s relatively small size and its lack of a vast metropolis to see if you can mould the workings of the bodies together to produce a coherent policy that is designed for the needs of Wales, rather than the needs of a much bigger country with very different potential problems.”

When it comes to the operation of justice in Wales, small really is beautiful, flexible and community focused.

Let me move to the second point I anticipate being used to counter what we propose. Advocates for the status quo might say, “We need better funding for the system.” That does not account for the structural issues at play here. Yes, fair and proper funding for Wales is vital for the operation of justice, but as I have highlighted, different policy decisions in Wales and Westminster are creating unavoidable tensions and failures, which money alone cannot solve.

There are two structures in play, and they are pulling in different directions. For example, even in the years of austerity in the 2010s, under a devolved system, the Welsh Government might well have chosen not to close so many courts or pursue the absurd privatisation of probation. We could have made different policy choices, even in the context of reduced funding.

The last Labour general election manifesto sadly rolled back from implementing the Thomas report, citing that it was a case for only reversing austerity rather than pursuing devolution to Wales. Therefore, cautiously, I ask the shadow Front Bench to recommit fully to implementing the Thomas commission report, just as they committed to doing so in their previous manifesto in 2017. If they will not, the question is whether the Labour party is intent on undermining its Labour colleagues in the Senedd.

Thirdly, other advocates of the status quo point out that it is not further devolution that we need, but better joined-up working between the Ministry of Justice and Welsh Government officials. However, even experienced MOJ officials in Wales are often overridden by their superiors in London, through policy decisions that often have no thought about Wales. There are agreements in place between the MOJ and Welsh Government, such as the concordat published in 2018 to establish a framework for co-operation between the MOJ and Welsh Government. However, in practice, such agreements do not work properly. As my hon. Friend the Member for Arfon (Hywel Williams) showed when he questioned Ministers about the memorandum in the context of the development of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, it was unclear whether the UK Government followed the concordat and consulted properly with the Welsh Government on the Act, in spite of the impact that so many of the changes to policing and justice would have on devolved policies and competences.

Where UK and Welsh Government are aligned on justice matters, progress is slow. For instance, the Thomas commission recommended that problem-solving courts be established across Wales to promote alternatives to custody and tackle root causes of offending. The UK Government are piloting problem-solving courts, but not one is in Wales. It is in the Welsh Government’s justice work plan to pursue the establishment of a court. Can the Minister tell us what recent engagement he has had with the Welsh Government on establishing problem-solving courts in Wales?

The Welsh element of justice will always be an afterthought. My hon. Friends the Members for Arfon, and for Ceredigion (Ben Lake), run after Ministers saying, “Have you thought of this? Have you consulted on that?” The answer almost invariably is a bland no. Then, we find that we have to catch up.

On accountability, the mechanisms and institutions of the English and Wales system do not properly engage with the Welsh part. Let us take the Lammy report—a landmark report on racial disparities in justice. There is no real engagement on how devolved services interact with the justice system in Wales, or exploration of the Welsh content. The specific needs of Wales are drowned out on the Justice Committee. The Welsh Affairs Committee has sought to scrutinise the effect of the interface between reserved and devolved matters.

[Alun Cairns]

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for making some points about racial injustice. Does she share my frustration that the Welsh Government chose not to be part of the race equality audit established by the former Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), to provide a baseline of evidence? There were active invitations and efforts made to encourage the Welsh Government to participate, so that we could establish whether the same problems existed in Wales, and they chose not to. That runs contrary to the right hon. Lady’s statement that Wales is an afterthought.

[Martin Vickers (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind hon. Members that interventions limit the time available for other Members to speak.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

Thank you for calling me to contribute, Mr Vickers. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts) on securing the debate. It is unfortunate that we have such limited time, but I will try to canter through some of the key points that I want to make.

I approach this debate as an advocate for devolution and as the former Secretary of State who took the Wales Act 2017 through Parliament. It is hard to believe that in 2010 our inheritance from the last Labour Government was the legislative competence order system, whereby the Welsh Assembly had to ask permission to pass legislation in any particular area. It is worth remembering how far we have moved from the system between 2010 and today, when we have a full law-making Parliament in Cardiff Bay. I hope that sets out the context for my remarks.

During the development of the Wales Act 2017, it was clear that some were determined to devolve justice, irrespective of the evidence from within the profession that did not support that devolution. We agreed to disagree with the Welsh Government in the end, with the First Minister specifically saying that he would revisit the matter. The only conclusion I could draw was that the political elite wish to see the devolution of justice, rather than the issue being raised on the doorstep, or forming part of a campaign from those in the profession or our constituents, who really wish for genuine improvement in this area. That is not to say that improvements do not need to be made—they do—but there have not been calls for devolution of the issue, other than from the political elite.

I also note that the Commission on Justice in Wales was established by a devolved institution on a reserved policy matter. Imagine if the UK Government decided to have a commission on health or education in Wales—devolved policy areas—without there being equal and active engagement with the other party. That demonstrates that the political elite are driving this agenda, rather than this being something that is demanded.

The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd based her claim around genuine problems that need addressing. I am not denying that there are challenges in the system. We all remember the challenges in Wales—it could be said that they are even greater partly as a result of the intervention by the Welsh Government, who closed down the courts during covid when they were still functioning in England. That is an example where the Welsh Government have sought to influence justice in a negative way.

The right hon. Lady said that devolution of justice is a chance for Wales to have better outcomes. If I wanted to be flippant, I would point to the outcomes in health and education; sadly, our waiting times are longer, and our education outcomes certainly have not improved, as they have across England and Scotland in the past decade or more.

The key point I want to make in the limited time I have is about the importance of the industry that is the legal system operating between Wales and England. Extremely profitable large law firms based in Cardiff form part of an ecosystem that develops businesses, often from the City of London or other parts of the United Kingdom. Functions and professional legal expertise are provided in Cardiff, creating some of the most highly paid jobs in a desired legal profession, creating career opportunities and allowing people to move inside and outside Wales to develop their business model. Some of those firms have office spaces in the City of London and attract the business of the City, and the functions are then conducted in Cardiff. Devolving justice to the Welsh Government and to Wales would really undermine those business models. Those are the businesses that the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd should talk to.

[Hywel Williams]

The right hon. Gentleman made the claim earlier that this is a matter of the elite calling for change, and then he makes an argument for elite lawyers in Cardiff.

[Alun Cairns]

I would like to see more elite lawyers in Cardiff, because raises gross value added and creates career opportunities for Welsh people, wherever they come from.

During the negotiations on the Bill that became the Wales Act 2017, I received representations from some of the most senior lawyers in England and Wales, who were very concerned about the agenda of devolving justice and the damage that would cause to the sector.

[Liz Saville Roberts]

Where does the right hon. Gentleman think our priorities should lie—the business models of law firms or justice for people living in the communities of Wales?

[Alun Cairns]

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for the question, but I do not think they are mutually exclusive. We can address the injustices that the right hon. Lady has raised—those genuine challenges need to be addressed, and I look forward to the Minister’s response—but that should not undermine the large employment numbers, the well-paid positions and the career progression that is provided for people, certainly from my constituency, who work in law firms in Cardiff and south Wales. Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd called for the development of that cluster, but the right hon. Lady’s proposals would do nothing but undermine it.

[Martin Vickers (in the Chair)]

I call Hywel Williams. Four minutes if you could, Mr Williams.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anna McMorrin (Cardiff North) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Vickers, for the chance to respond to this debate. I pay tribute to all who have contributed. It is not lost on me that the debate is happening today of all days, as we face England in the football. Yma o hyd. Pob lwc, Cymru. I am sure we are all behind the Wales football team this evening.

A fair and effective system is fundamental to any country, and 12 long years of this Tory Government have completely broken the justice system across England and Wales. When the Commission on Justice in Wales undertook that unprecedented examination of justice, its conclusion was unequivocal:

“the people of Wales are being let down”

by the justice system. Crime is high, charges are low, criminals are getting off and victims are being let down. With record court closures, a decade or more of cuts and crippling court backlogs, the UK Government’s inability to adapt to current pressures and to lead through a victim’s focus is letting every one of us down.

A survey by the Victims’ Commissioner for England and Wales revealed that less than half of victims would report to the police again due to their traumatic experiences. The former Victims’ Commissioner, Dame Vera Baird, said in her resignation letter that the

“downgrading of victims’ interests in the government’s priorities”

is appalling, and she criticised the UK Government.

That is not just our view; it is the view of victims too. My constituent Sarah, who reported being sexually abused by her doctor, had her truth misbelieved and mistrusted in court. She was stripped of her dignity in the witness box, and was subjected to vicious public humiliation and personal attacks in the so-called pursuit of justice. She told me:

“I felt like I was being publicly beaten and humiliated. I wouldn’t advise anyone to go through it”.

In Wales, many of the services are the responsibility of the Welsh Labour Government, yet the overarching justice system is at the mercy of this Tory Government. We must recognise the scale of the challenge we face. It is clear that the UK Government’s current approach is not working. They must work with the Welsh Labour Government to see how things can be managed in the future, and above all ensure that victims come first. We must focus not on where but on how justice is delivered.

The probation system in Wales was brought to its knees by a failed privatisation, based on the untested and untried payment by results system. The Tories were repeatedly warned that it would not work, but they persisted anyway. The Welsh Labour Government have done their best to mitigate the worst of the impact across the justice system, but the only solution is to have a UK Labour Government in Westminster working with a Welsh Labour Government in Wales.

[Alun Cairns]

The hon. Lady is making important points that obviously would need to be debated if there were time, but do the Labour Opposition in Westminster support the Welsh Government’s call for the devolution of justice? At the time of the development of the Wales Act 2017, they were opposed to it.

[Anna McMorrin]

The right hon. Gentleman is getting ahead of himself, although I absolutely hope that there will be a UK Labour Government shortly. We in UK Labour are working closely in partnership, as we would in government, to ensure that the best justice system is focused not on where justice is delivered, but on how it is delivered. That is done in partnership, and the details must be worked out.

[Alun Cairns]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Anna McMorrin]

That is absolutely not being delivered by this UK Government, who have systematically broken the criminal justice system. It is appalling. Day in, day out, I speak to victims who are suffering and traumatised, and who have been retraumatised by the justice system that this UK Tory Government are presiding over. Only one in 100 rapes recorded by the Welsh police resulted in a charge last year, let alone a conviction.

[Alun Cairns]

What is Labour’s position?

[Anna McMorrin]

The right hon. Gentleman should listen, rather than chuntering away on the sidelines.

One victim, Rachel, told me:

“They didn’t treat me as a human being”,

as she relived her traumatic experiences in the justice system. She felt that the system was worse than the rape itself.

On International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, the crime survey for England and Wales released its latest figures, showing that 1.7 women experienced domestic abuse in the past year alone, but everyone knows that the true number is much, much higher. According to figures reported by the BBC, about 60% of women in custody across the UK have experienced domestic abuse.

In May, the then Justice Minister, the hon. Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins)—I have lost count of how many Justice Ministers we have had since—finally announced the pilot for the women’s residential centre in Swansea. That came four years after the Government originally announced it in their female offender strategy, even though they labelled it a priority, and the centre will not actually open until 2024. Across Wales, there are a total of zero female estates, and recent Cardiff University research shows that last year 218 Welsh women were sent to prisons in England.

This Conservative Government’s priorities have never been on the side of victims, and they continue to treat vulnerable women as an afterthought. Labour has long argued for facilities for vulnerable women with complex needs who would otherwise be sentenced to custody. They need a safe and secure facility that is fit for purpose, and that allows them to maintain contact with their families, especially their children. Shockingly, as the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts) pointed out, Wales has more people in prison than almost anywhere in western Europe. All the evidence shows that a sentencing policy that is based heavily on punishment, deterrence and imprisonment is counterproductive.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mike Freer)]

It has been a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Mr Vickers; I think this is your first outing in the Chair. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts) on securing the debate, and am grateful for her significant contribution on justice in Wales over the past several years. I thank all hon. and right hon. Members for their contributions.

The right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd secured a previous Westminster Hall debate, which took place on 22 January 2020, on the report by the Commission on Justice in Wales, otherwise known as the Thomas commission, which was published in October 2019. It is inevitable that we have touched on many of the same issues today. In the intervening period, work on considering and, where appropriate, implementing the Thomas commission recommendations was delayed by the coronavirus pandemic, but the right hon. Member has ensured that it remains a live issue for this House.

It will not come as a surprise that the Government’s position on the devolution settlement has not changed. We disagree with Lord Thomas and with the Welsh Government, and do not think that justice should be devolved. Indeed, the many challenges brought by the coronavirus pandemic demonstrated in a number of areas that the settlement is working well.

[Alun Cairns]

The Minister has provided a clear response, and we understand that the Government’s view is that we should not devolve justice. Does he understand Labour’s point of view on the issue? It seems to me that two different messages are coming from Cardiff Bay and from the Opposition in Westminster.

[Mike Freer]

My right hon. Friend asked a very pertinent question and did not get a clear answer from the hon. Member for Cardiff North (Anna McMorrin). My understanding is that the official Opposition do not support the devolution of justice—that is what I took from her speech.

Let me go back to what happened during the coronavirus pandemic. The pandemic served to demonstrate that in a number of areas the settlement is working well. In fact, the justice system performed better in Wales than it did in England in several respects, and I will say more on that later. Among the key arguments made by those who support devolving justice to Wales is what they see as the principle that a holistic approach is required to ensure that policy objectives can be delivered effectively. Of course, we agree that policies on substance misuse, education, mental health and social welfare need to be aligned with measures to reduce reoffending and protect the public, which is the responsibility of Westminster, but the notion that justice must be devolved to achieve that is misplaced. The Ministry of Justice works closely with the Welsh Government to ensure that justice policies are aligned and that we take account of distinct Welsh needs.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Thursday 5th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Maria Miller]

The hon. Lady needs to be very careful with what she is talking about. We are absolutely taking action on cyber-bullying. There is already guidance in place to help schools and to help children understand cyber-bullying more effectively. It is clear not just from what I am saying but from what the Prime Minister has said that it is absolutely unacceptable to have such abuse online. I am pleased to say that ask.fm has taken the problem very seriously and put in place more robust reporting mechanisms, increased moderation on the site, and given people the opportunity to turn off anonymous postings. Those are the sort of practical changes that can make websites safer for young people to use, but ultimately we must ensure that parents work with their children, too.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

The Secretary of State has taken significant steps to protect children online, and the introduction of ISP-level filtering is a significant move. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the debate is far more complicated, however, than simply switching the filter on or off? Software developers have a significant responsibility and parents must ultimately be responsible, but does the Secretary of State agree that schools have a part to play by updating their sex education lessons and curriculum to ensure that people understand the greatest risks?

[Maria Miller]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and he is right: we are at the forefront of online safety. It is not just me saying that; the Family Online Safety Institute says it, too. It is really important that we acknowledge that not only ISPs and people who have websites should take these matters seriously. As he said, parents and schools should take their role seriously, too.

Protecting Children Online

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Wednesday 12th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Helen Goodman]

My hon. Friend is obviously doing great work in her constituency and what she says is truly shocking. It is confirmed by the statistics which the NSPCC has been collecting.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

Reference has been made to Google. I do not defend that or any other search engine other than to say that this debate is highly technical and we need to be accurate. Google does not host anything; nor does any other search engine. Google merely provides the means of finding a site, and the hosting, which is an international problem, needs to be addressed appropriately.

[Helen Goodman]

This is not an occasion for nit-picking—[Interruption.] It is important to take an international approach and I am disappointed in the Government for, among other things, not taking any international initiatives.

The police say their resources are inadequate to the task. Peter Davies, the head of CEOP, said that the police are aware of 60,000 people swapping or downloading images over peer-to-peer networks but they lack the resources to arrest them all. In any case, the IWF currently deals only with images on the web, not peer-to-peer images.

In answer to my parliamentary question last week, the Minister of State, Home Department, the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Mr Browne) revealed that in 2012, despite the fact that the police are aware of those 60,000 people, only 1,570 were convicted of such offences. What do Ministers intend to do about the problem? I hope that in his winding-up remarks the Home Office Minister will tell us. There is no point huffing and puffing about the problem if Ministers do not take the necessary action. It is obvious to the whole country that the current situation is totally unacceptable. It is obvious that Ministers have not got a grip. It is obvious that we need a change.

That is why our motion proposes a complete shift in approach from a reactive stance to a proactive strategy. We are calling for three things—first, safe search as the default option. The industry has already made the filters that are needed to screen out not just child abuse but pornography and adult content generally. We are saying that the filters should be the default, either on all computers and devices connected to the internet or by requiring internet service providers to install them by default. Then we can institute the second part of an effective system: robust age verification. A person seeking to cross the filter would be asked to confirm their name, age and address, all of which can be independently checked. Again, we know that this works. It is what Labour did for gambling sites in 2005. It is what mobile phone companies do when someone opens an account and gets a SIM card. It is what people do when they get a driving licence.

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[Fiona O'Donnell]

I would have welcomed more of an indication of regret from the hon. Lady at the words that she used. If she had experience of working in child protection, she would know that those words should be used very carefully.

I welcome the Minister’s comment that this issue is about much more than just child protection and includes child abuse. Sadly, in this day and age, it is also a matter of life and death. Fortunately, children can and do use the internet safely, and we must not lose sight of that.

Although I might not have been active on this issue in the House, I have been in my constituency. Last Friday, I went to Burgh primary school in Musselburgh, where the children recently took part in a competition to talk about and devise ways of keeping themselves safe when using the internet. That is a great example of how we can empower children. I do not want children to be frightened of using the internet. It is an incredible resource that allows them to socialise, learn, have fun and access entertainment. We must be clear that we do not want to put children off. At Burgh primary school, I saw children being empowered to keep themselves safe. They even taught me a few lessons about how I could be safer. The head teacher and Mrs Gilbert, who leads the IT group, have the children running the school website. That is a great way to show children that the internet is a tool that could be useful to them at any point in their life and, at the same time, to ensure that they are aware of the risks.

Ofcom recently released figures showing that 91% of five to 15-year-olds have access to the internet at home. On average, they access the internet for about 90 minutes a day. A survey of 851 young children in 2012 by the ChildLine website also provided some interesting information. It was clear that what children really enjoyed was the fun, games, information and opportunities for social networking that they could access. What really concerned me, however—I hope the Minister or a Front-Bench Member will respond to this point—was that the survey showed that 69% of children are now accessing the internet through mobile phones, making it far more difficult for parents to supervise what they are saying and how they are interacting. I would be interested to hear whether the Government have any proposals for how we can deal with mobile phone companies and keep children safe, given that that is the way they are increasingly accessing the internet.

We all know horrific stories of bullying and of children accessing inappropriate material, and I have seen first hand through my work the impact that can have on children’s lives, development and their ability to become parents. I remember one child saying to me, “Fiona, I don’t think I should be a parent.” He had suffered such horrific abuse and seen such awful images that at the age of 10, this boy did not think he should be trusted to be a parent. We are discussing the most serious issues of children’s right to a childhood and a healthy adulthood.

We must do more to protect children, and this debate has caused me to reflect on an experience that I had around the age of 16—this was before the age of computers, certainly in the highlands of Scotland. I was getting ready for bed one night and I suddenly caught sight out of my bedroom window of a flashing light. I realised there was a man in the kitchen that overlooked my bedroom who had been watching me undress, and he was flicking the light to let me know that he was doing that. This is the first time I have ever shared that experience, because at the age of 16 I was too scared to tell anyone. I thought I had done something wrong; I was scared to tell my parents. My father had warned me that I should shut my bedroom curtains when getting ready for bed, and I was scared that he might go down and confront the man, or that my father—a very peace-loving man—might be hurt. I just did not feel I could do that, and I lived in fear for many months that the man was going to approach me or tell people what he had seen. We must remember just how difficult it is for young people to tell their stories—it has taken me until the age of 53 to tell that story.

The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children supports many of the recommendations in the motion, in particular having an opt-in option so that adults must choose if they wish to access adult material. That is the stage we have reached. I am no Mary Whitehouse, but I think we have reached a stage where so many children are at risk that we must do more.

[Alun Cairns]

I accept the hon. Lady’s thrust of where we need to get to. However, with such a relatively simplistic approach to an opt-in, how would we overcome encryption methods that would simply get around that?

[Fiona O'Donnell]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, but I confess that that is well beyond my level of knowledge. In this day and age we must at least challenge the issue, and I am grateful that the Government have called a summit next week, which will be a great opportunity. I hope we give a clear steer and that there will be time scales for internet service providers as well. I confess freely to the hon. Gentleman that I do not have the answer to his question, but we must set that challenge and tell the sector that it must get its house in order. It is clear that we must do more.

Not so long ago, we in this House took the decision to make it illegal to carry a child in a car without them being safely secured in an appropriate way. At this time I think there is a greater risk to children’s safety from accessing the internet than from getting into a car, and if we can intervene in such circumstances that will be absolutely in order. It is early in the debate but I am glad that so far we have not heard talk of the nanny state. We must act on this matter to keep children safe.

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[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

This is an extremely important debate, which deserves wide and thorough consideration in this House. It is right that in recent years much attention has been given to this subject. I pay tribute to the Minister for the way he has responded to the debate, to the Prime Minister for the interest he has shown, and to his adviser, my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Claire Perry), who has driven the agenda from quite an early stage and to whom credit should be given.

It is also important to give credit to the press, which has fed back persistently and consistently on this subject. I have no doubt that the Daily Mail’s campaign and active interest have contributed to encouraging politicians’ attention on to something that is obviously very important to the public in general, and, dare I say it, to its readers.

I must say, however, that the motion, as it is phrased, is not very helpful. It conflates child sexual abuse content, which is illegal, and adult content which is legal but from which we need to protect children. The actions needed to tackle these different types of content are different and it is very unhelpful to confuse and conflate the two.

This is one of the most dynamic problems we face as a society. As soon as one issue seems to have been dealt with, another problem emerges. That is the nature of today’s fast moving society, but this area of policy is certainly at the leading edge of the speed of change. Technology is developing faster than any Government can legislate, and avoidance measures lead to anti-avoidance measures, which in turn go on in a cycle. This throws up the risk of Members and individuals believing that there are straightforward solutions. That is not the case, and I pay tribute to the Government for stating on the record that their policies will develop. That is the pragmatic approach we need to take. We need to develop clear principles: focusing on helping parents to introduce safety features; offering a choice of filters available from internet service providers; prompting parents towards security features; making it easier for parents to take charge; challenging the industry, which is exceptionally important; and working with law enforcement organisations to combat illegal content.

[Jim Shannon]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for making such a balanced contribution. He will be aware that many companies have a zero-tolerance policy on child sexual abuse. One of those companies is Google, which helps fund and is a member of the IWF. Does he think it is now time that companies that are not members of the IWF joined and helped to fund it and adhered to its policies and principles?

[Alun Cairns]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for highlighting the IWF—I should declare an interest as one of its champions—and would encourage all the industry to join and support its greater funding in the way that Google announced earlier today.

Before the Government’s welcome statement in response to their consultation on the debate over opting in and opting out of adult content, we ran the risk of presenting the situation as one that was relatively simple and where responsibility to protect ourselves could be conveniently passed over to others—for example, to ISPs. In reality, it is not that straightforward; it is far more complicated, and that is my issue with the motion, which, rather than helping, confuses the subject. Thankfully, however, the evidence to the consultation was clear.

I pay tribute to Reg Bailey, the chief executive officer of the Mothers’ Union, who recognised that complexity, against the general direction of the debate at the time and against those calling for a simple opt in/opt out approach—or an appropriate variant of it. A filter not only passes responsibility from parents to large organisations, whose judgments might be completely different from those of individual families, but makes false promises, because of the avoidance measures I mentioned earlier. Encryption, for example, is a typical problem that an ISP filter would not overcome, but a parent would not necessarily understand that.

At the moment, about 30% of customers choose to have an ISP opt-out. If the policy was reversed—so that people had to opt into adult content—the proportion would likely be much higher, which would run the risk of legal adult content providers using common avoidance techniques, such as encryption or proxy servers, which create further problems. Web proxies, which are a more recent development, and peer-to-peer networks are also not covered by ISP-level filters, but, believing their household computer to be safe, parents would be led into a false sense of security.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Would the hon. Gentleman not admit that some of these measures would make it safer for the average parent than the present situation?

[Alun Cairns]

I am coming to that very point. Challenges remain, but the last thing we want to do is create the impression that this is a simple issue and that children and families can be protected at the flick of a switch; it is much more complicated than that and deserves an intelligent debate. We need to recognise the differences in these areas, rather than giving the impression, as some Members have, that the flick of a switch will make the difference. An ISP filter would be oblivious to the very risks from which we need to protect children. Furthermore, such filters would not protect against bullying, grooming or other serious risks, but at the same time they would give parents a false sense of security.

One of the most effective answers—there will be several answers, and filters have a part to play, but they are not the only solution—is for a parent to show a genuine interest in what is being viewed online. I am pleased that the debate over the past year or so has focused the minds of technology providers on making device-level and even profile-level security features and filters easier to use and understand. Google has its SafeSearch, for example, while Windows 8 has made significant steps: it can e-mail parents a list of all the sites viewed by a householder so that they can check themselves what the child has been looking at. Furthermore, now when someone signs up to an ISP or sets up a new router, they are asked what settings they want, not only for the household, but for each computer. It needs to go even further, however, down to profile level, because the same computer can be used by different people. It is important, therefore, that we have the right profile filter settings to protect the children using the computer. Clearly, technology companies need to do more to communicate that message and help parents further.

My comments so far have related to legal adult content, but we would all agree that the far more serious issues surround illegal content, particularly that involving the abuse of children—the area on which most of the recent public debate has focused. It is extremely important that we distinguish between legal and illegal content. This should not be a party political issue and there are no easy solutions. Some content might be distasteful, but might well be available on shelves of newsagents or shops in Soho.

[Ms Abbott]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Alun Cairns]

I am running short of time, but if the hon. Lady will allow me to make my point, I might answer her question.

We need to recognise, however, that the policing of such shops is relatively straightforward and that in general children cannot access or stumble across such material. Appropriate filters should stop the “stumbling across” element, but that leaves us with the policing. We need to publicise the work of the IWF and reassure people who might report issues to it that they will not necessarily be compromised. Much attention is focused on search engine companies, and it is important that they play their part—they have a responsibility here—but having researched their activities, I am aware of some of the technology they use to identify illegal content. They can claim to be playing a part, therefore, but search engines need to be at the cutting edge of image analysis and coding—they need to be one step ahead of the perpetrators of these terrible offences.

By focusing the debate on search engines, as some Members did earlier, we are forgetting that hosting is where the offence effectively lies. If a website has been scratched from the search engine, the URL still exists and those seeking to view illegal content can go straight to that address. The IWF, which has been mentioned several times—I welcome the extra money made available to it today—has made a huge difference. Some 1% of the content it removes from the internet is hosted in the UK; 54% is hosted in north America; 37% is hosted across the rest of Europe and Russia; the figure for Asia is only 1%; and for South America it is even smaller. Those are the issues. It is an international problem.

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[Mr Gary Streeter (South West Devon) (Con)]

I am pleased to take part in this debate. I congratulate the Labour party on calling it and using up one of their Supply days to raise a serious and important matter to us all.

It seems that every great invention that we make as human beings brings both benefits and disbenefits. I think of the internal combustion engine, which led to the car, which gives us all great mobility but creates pollution and kills 3,500 of our citizens on the roads every year. Now we have the internet, which gives us amazing access to information and the ability to interact socially, but can allow access to all kinds of unsavoury and potentially harmful material. It is vital that we do a better job of protecting our children, and I congratulate the Government on the steps they have taken so far.

I have just two points to make in this debate. I do not pretend to be an expert and I certainly do not follow my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Alun Cairns) in his technological knowledge. These points have been drawn to my attention by the British Board of Film Classification, which I would describe as a trusted and familiar friend to most of us, as we see its image before films. I think back to the first film I went to see, the James Bond film “Thunderball”, in 1965—obviously I was a baby.

[Alun Cairns]

What was the certificate?

[Mr Streeter]

I do not know what the certificate was, but may I just get on with my speech?

My point is that we trust the BBFC’s classifications. When the Video Recordings Act 1984 was passed, more than 25 years ago, certain video works—I will come to online content in a second—were made exempt from classification because they were considered unlikely to be harmful. However, the content of exempt works has changed beyond recognition since 1984, which means that inappropriate and potentially harmful content can be legally supplied to children. On 24 May 2013, the Government announced that it planned to lower the exemptions threshold in order to prevent children from accessing potentially harmful material, so well done to the Government. This is a most welcome decision, for which the BBFC—along with the home entertainment industry, the recorded music industry, retailers and law enforcement bodies—had argued for some time.

Once implemented, the decision will improve the protection that children enjoy from potentially harmful media content by ensuring that video content such as drug misuse, strong violence, racist language and certain sexual content can no longer legally be freely supplied to children. Instead, the BBFC will classify such content to keep it away from vulnerable and impressionable children. The Government have said that they hope to have the new regime in place by April 2014, and I very much hope—I know that the Minister is listening carefully—that the Government will keep to that timetable, which requires secondary legislation. However, the legislation has never covered online content, and there is now particular concern about the content of online music videos.

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[Fiona Mactaggart]

I do not think that that is what is happening in this debate. I will come to that point in a moment, as it has also been raised by other hon. Members.

The conclusion of our cross-party report was that parents need help, a topic that has been dealt with to some extent already in the debate. We need to think of better ways of helping parents, because what we have is not enough. I genuinely think that home-level security controls can make a huge difference. The technocrats on the Conservative Benches might suggest that such controls are much less powerful than we think, but they are much more powerful than what is often used currently. We must not make the best the enemy of the good.

Companies need to step up to the mark, and we have been able to put pressure on some of them to do so. During our inquiry, TalkTalk showed how it would be possible to have home-level security arrangements, even though other companies said that it would not be possible to do it in that way. Now, those other companies are beginning to face up to the fact that it is possible.

[Alun Cairns]

I still want to underline the point that there are relatively easy ways of getting around some of those filters. We must not give the impression that having such filters will protect families and individuals.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

The hon. Gentleman might well be right. Most filters are too complicated for someone like me to implement—a point that I kept making during the inquiry. I simply cannot do that thing where you have to type in about 25 digits and letters in order to make a filter work; and that is chronically true of mums.

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[Sheila Gilmore]

In many ways, I would hope that that was not the case. I do not know where the ISPs make their money, but many of us are critical of their reluctance in this matter. One or two Members have suggested today that, because some of the proposals would not be perfect and would not screen out everything and because some organisations and people might be clever enough to get around them in various technical ways that we do not necessarily fully understand, we should not take those steps. As in so much of our political and social lives, we should not make the best the enemy of the good. If we can do something to improve things, we should do it.

[Alun Cairns]

I want to highlight that I am a strong advocate and fan of filters, but I think it is very dangerous to give the impression that they are the whole answer. The solution is far more complicated than that and we must be clear about it.

[Sheila Gilmore]

We must not approach this at cross purposes. I do not think that anyone is saying that any of the proposals are perfect; we are merely seeking to improve the situation and to give greater protection. I have no doubt that there will be some very clever people who can find ways around all sorts of things—we know that that happens—but to say that we should not put such measures in place for that reason would be wholly wrong.

Let me address some of what the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) said. He seemed, perhaps surprisingly, to be setting the state against the parent in a way that is not helpful. Of course parents should be making decisions for their children, but there are many circumstances in which we have to rely on others in schools and in the wider world to protect our children. That is not an abdication of parental responsibility, because parents cannot be with their child all the time. They will not be able to supervise every social contact they have. As a parent, I would certainly prefer to be confident that I could let my children out into a world that I could regard as reasonably safe—whether that was the physical or virtual world—than to be unable to do so. Perhaps that is not what the hon. Gentleman was suggesting, but that was how it came across to me. Suggesting that such an approach somehow does not leave things to the parents and that it wants the state to step in is a wholly wrong way of considering the matter.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Thursday 18th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Vaizey]

We have responded to the “In Battalions” report. I note that, of the 20 or so theatres that took part in the survey, about half had actually received an increase in their funding. We continue to support new writing, and theatre cuts amount to less than about 3% overall, so theatre has been well protected. The report concentrated on a few theatres whose funding had been impacted and did not concentrate on those that had had their funding increased or had received new funding. It ill behoves the hon. Gentleman, who supported Newcastle’s arts cuts, to complain about arts cuts.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

2. What progress her Department has made in improving broadband availability throughout the UK.

[Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)]

8. What progress she has made on broadband delivery.

[The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Maria Miller)]

Two thirds of premises in the UK now have superfast broadband available. Some 100,000 more homes and businesses are getting coverage every week and average speeds have increased from 5.2 megabits in May 2010 to 12 megabits by November 2012.

[Alun Cairns]

The Government have made excellent progress in rolling out broadband across the UK, and the Secretary of State should be congratulated on that. However, there are some rural communities where the last mile remains a problem. What consideration has she given to reviewing the regulations to empower rural communities to take more control in assisting in the rolling out of broadband to their areas?

[Maria Miller]

As my hon. Friend will know, the Government have committed to 2 megabits on a universal basis throughout the country. We also have a £20 million rural community broadband fund to do the sorts of things he mentions, including working with the Welsh Assembly to make sure broadband reaches rural areas. Importantly, we are also always looking at ways to remove barriers that are stopping that last mile, and I will continue to work with my hon. Friend and other colleagues on that.

Leveson Inquiry

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Monday 3rd December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Ms Harman]

The inquiry was set up—I congratulate the Prime Minister on setting it up, and my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition on demanding it—not only because the criminal and civil law were broken, but because the press demonstrably had not abided by their own standards that they set out in their code of conduct. To stop that happening again, we must decide who overseas the regulator, because currently no one does.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

I am sure the right hon. and learned Lady remembers that the inquiry was established because of a number of smears from Opposition Members against the former Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport. In view of the fact that the Leveson inquiry cleared my right hon. Friend of any such allegation, should she not apologise?

[Ms Harman]

Lord Leveson actually said he was not going to look into whether there had been a breach of the ministerial code. He said that was not a matter for him, and he was right; it is a matter for the independent adviser on ministerial interests, who did not get the chance to investigate because the Prime Minister did not refer the matter to him.

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[George Eustice]

I do not think Lord Leveson does make that clear. The new body that he recommends would have powers of investigation, and that would deal with the culture which led to this criminality.

The central recommendation of Lord Leveson’s report, which we must not lose sight of, is this:

“In order to give effect to the incentives that I have outlined, it is essential”—

not preferable or helpful but essential—

“that there should be legislation to underpin the independent self-regulatory system”.

I agree with Lord Leveson on that, because throughout his inquiry one question simply would not go away: how do we make a reality of independent self-regulation without some kind of underpinning in statute? In other words, “How do you create the incentives to be part of a body that can fine you and deliver stiff penalties against you?” There was no question but that Lord Hunt and Lord Black failed to answer that test. At one point, Lord Black was suggesting that we could perhaps restrict membership of the Press Association and that people who did not sign up to this new body could be denied access to Government briefings or to accreditation for events. That would be very much a closed shop system, which Lord Leveson completely rejects.

The truth is that to make this work we will need some kind of statute, because the contract system outlined by Lord Hunt would be inherently unstable. It was suggested that the contracts should last for no more than five years, but such contracts, which require what the legal profession calls a constant supervision, are very difficult to enforce in a court. After five years, newspapers would walk away from that system and we would be in the same boat as we are in now.

If the industry has failed to come up with an answer that does not require statute after 18 months of thinking about it, what does the Secretary of State think that it will come up with in the next six weeks? I am deeply sceptical that it will come up with an answer.

[Alun Cairns]

My hon. Friend and other colleagues have made much about the need for a change of culture, but does he not accept that we cannot legislate for that? Culture must be dealt with by agreement from all parties.

[George Eustice]

I agree and I am coming on to that point. We will deal with the culture by having a credible regulator, not by saying that the police should be kicking down the doors of newsrooms as a matter of routine.

Let me tackle some of the myths. The Prime Minister said that by introducing such legislation, we would be crossing a Rubicon. As many other Members have pointed out, that argument is incorrect. We already have a Defamation Bill going through this Parliament that has cross-party support and even the support of the press. If the principle of legislation is in itself inimical to liberty and freedom, where were the freedom fighters when that Bill was going through? It was passed on Second Reading without even a Division.

Section 12 of the Human Rights Act 1998 refers to freedom of speech so, as the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) pointed out, such a provision has already been accepted. Some say that mentioning the idea of freedom of speech in a Bill compromises it because a future statute could take it away, but we already have it in the Human Rights Act. The US has the first amendment, which is a statute that protects freedom of speech. The Government rejected the same argument when they introduced the Bill that became the European Union Act 2011, when many Government Members said that a sovereignty clause meant losing one’s sovereignty. The argument was not accepted at that time and we should not accept it now.

Some say introducing legislation would be too difficult and far too complicated. I had a look back at the original private Member’s Bill introduced by C. J. Simmons, the Labour MP and journalist, and it is just six pages long. It is very simple and merely sets up a body, which is broadly what we are suggesting now. A couple of weeks ago, we had the Second Reading of the Groceries Code Adjudicator Bill, which is just 16 pages long and performs a similar function—in fact, it is a more statutory Bill than we would need in this case. I shall be on the Public Bill Committee and I am told that it will be very short. The Defamation Bill, which is very complicated, was no more than 32 pages long. I do not accept that introducing legislation is too difficult.

Some say that such questions are for the birds in the age of the internet and things are difficult because blogs can do whatever they like. I fundamentally disagree with that argument. The changes coming from the internet mean that it is vital for this House to revisit the legislation. Just as some internet news sites, such as The Huffington Post, have already opted to be part of the PCC, if we could get the incentives right under a new body, we could get online credible news organisations wanting to be part of the kitemark system because it would give them protection. By enacting legislation, we would create the incentives that would enable internet-only news sites to take part.

As Lord Leveson points out, we should not encourage a system in which the newspapers engage in a race to the bottom with blogs that have no credibility. If newspapers are to survive, they must carve out a new role for themselves—they need a niche and some additional credibility. Just as people expect of broadcasters a different standard and character of journalism from that which they expect of newspapers, we should reach a situation in which people expect a different character and standard of journalism in newspapers from that which they might get on some blog sites. I do not accept the argument about that, either.

Some say that all we really need is for the police to do their job. It is curious that those who say that the statutory underpinning about which I am talking would lead to a chilling effect on journalism go on effectively to advocate a system that requires the police to kick down the doors of newsrooms, launch dawn raids and arrest journalists almost as a matter of routine. We should not be comfortable with the fact that dozens of journalists will face trial next year. We as a House must recognise that there was a culture in the press that enabled those crimes to take place. We should not collude in the argument that it was just a few journalists and that we should just lock up a few people from The Sun; we must recognise that there was a failure in the culture that we must tackle.

Let me finish by recommending a way forward to those on the Government Front Bench. Lord Leveson says that the ball is now in the politicians’ court. My view is that since any Bill would fundamentally be about freedom of speech, we should have a free vote. To use some of the terminology that I have read so often over the past few weeks, I think that it would be wrong for Parliament to be muzzled or gagged. We should have a free vote. I am conscious that many Members of this House have a strong ideological objection to the idea of any form of statute and they should have the right to have their say in a free vote, but Parliament should also be allowed to reach a rational and measured conclusion on the recommendations of Lord Leveson’s report.

I recommend that we accommodate the Prime Minister’s wish to give the industry six weeks to come up with a proposal. After that six weeks, we should have a free vote in Parliament to decide whether to introduce a Bill in the next Session. That motion should be binding and if Parliament as a whole believes we need some kind of new Bill, we should enact one in the next Session. I must stress that that would not necessarily mean taking forward everything in the Leveson report. I know that there are concerns about Ofcom, so let us see whether we can find a way around that. There are concerns about data protection, so we could exclude some of those elements. My hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) mentioned concerns about the scope for third party complaints, so perhaps we could limit that scope to systemic problems in newspapers rather than individual stories or concepts. There are ways around all the problems, but I am certain that we need statutory underpinning to make self-regulation work.

[Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)]

It gives me great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice) and I commend him for his wise and courageous speech. I suspect that his views, like mine, have been influenced by the evidence he heard as a member of the Joint Committee on Privacy and Injunctions.

I shall confine my remarks to politics—it might sound like a novel idea, but we are politicians and there is a political context to this question—not least because the merits of Lord Leveson’s report have been well expressed by other hon. Members on both sides of the House. In that context, I was pleased to hear the Secretary of State say in response to a question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) that the Government would legislate if she and the Government felt that the press were dragging their feet and not implementing Leveson. That poses the question of whether that would include the underpinning—that is, whether she would be satisfied if the press were implementing Leveson even without the underpinning—and it might be helpful if the Minister who responds could clarify that as well as the time frame the Government are imagining. The hon. Member for Camborne and Redruth mentioned six weeks and that sounds to me like a very sensible time frame, but it would be helpful for all Members if the Government could provide some clarification about the speed with which they expect the press to move and, failing that, when they would expect to introduce legislation.

I think it is assumed that as a politician I carry with me a fair degree of cynicism, but I admit to having felt surprised and disappointed by the Prime Minister’s response last Thursday to Lord Justice Leveson’s report when the ink was hardly dry on it. I was one of many Members who applauded the Prime Minister when he established the Leveson inquiry. I felt reassured by him when he looked into the eyes of the victims and promised to implement it if it was not bonkers. Four days on from publication of the report, I have not heard any explanation from the Prime Minister or the Secretary of State of what it is about the report that they think is bonkers. That can only lead me to question why the Prime Minister set up the inquiry in the first place, only to reject its central recommendation.

[Alun Cairns]

That criticism surely also applies to the Leader of the Opposition, who after just three or four hours accepted the almost 2,000-page document in its entirety. Does the right hon. Gentleman not think that that was somewhat political?

[Mr Bradshaw]

No, what my right hon. Friend accepted was the central tenet of Lord Leveson’s recommendations, which was that it was essential that whatever happened had statutory underpinning.

There are only two possible explanations for the Prime Minister’s cursory dismissal of Lord Leveson’s recommendations, having set up that inquiry. One is that he never thought that some sort of statutory underpinning would form part of the learned judge’s recommendations. If that was the case, may I suggest that the Prime Minister was naive, ill-informed or both? It was perfectly clear to anybody following the evidence of the inquiry, particularly that of the victims and expert witnesses, and from the questions that Lord Leveson posed to the industry, that some sort of statutory underwriting, underpinning or oversight—whatever one wants to call it—of a new independent regulatory body was the very likely outcome.

The only other explanation and, I am afraid, in my view the more probable one is that the Prime Minister has been persuaded by representatives of the press—in another example of the very problem that the Leveson report also addresses—that there should be no statutory underpinning, and that the Prime Minister has taken the view that he would rather put up with a few short-lived howls of dismay from the victims and others than with the daily and unforgiving hostility of the newspapers from now until polling day. If that is the case, it is very depressing and exactly what happened after all the previous inquiries into press standards and regulation.

The press have appealed time and again for one more chance, for more time to put their own house in order. They have strung out the process. Most of the politicians and most of the public have lost interest. If this is the calculation made by the Prime Minister and Lord Leveson’s opponents in the press, I believe they are profoundly wrong. First, this time the victims are not going to go away. They are not toe-sucking Ministers, but completely ordinary members of the public—yes, and some celebrities too—whose lives have been trashed. They are numerous, organised and angry, and they enjoy widespread public support.

Secondly, whatever the press do now—we all know that for the next year or so they will behave reasonably well, exactly as they have done after previous inquiries, only to revert sooner or later to their bad old ways—the issue of press standards and regulation is not going to fade from the public eye, because from next year and probably right up until the general election, some of those allegedly responsible for the most egregious abuse will be on criminal trial. Day in and day out we will be reminded by the courts of the behaviour that caused the Prime Minister to establish the inquiry in the first place, and we will be reminded of the repeated failure of the political class to do anything about it. Do the Prime Minister and the Government really want to find themselves in a position where they stand accused by the victims and others of having failed to implement the recommendations of the very inquiry they set up to address these problems?

The Prime Minister may feel that he has had a few supportive headlines and columns in the newspapers since Thursday, but the context may be very different in a year or so. He may think he has been clever now, but he may not look so clever in a year or so. I hope the Secretary of State can persuade the Prime Minister and her sceptical colleagues in the Government to rejoin the consensus. She said that she wanted political consensus, but does she not realise that it was the Prime Minister’s response to Leveson on Thursday that broke the political consensus in the House in support of Leveson’s recommendation of statutory underpinning? I hope she will use her powers of persuasion to bring the Prime Minister back into that political consensus so that we can implement Leveson, and soon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Coffey]

My next point is that Sir Brian insists that there will be no involvement of political parties. My concern is that that reinforces the prejudice that to have ever been involved in politics is somehow to be not interested in public service. I know I am taking a different view from a lot of other people. I am not suggesting that a serving MP or a serving Lord should be on any regulatory body, but I am concerned that politics is again being traduced in an unsatisfactory way. Thatis just an example of some of the minor things to which my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Damian Collins) referred—about trying to change the name of briefings and what they could be called. Frankly, that section of the report did not deserve the ink that was wasted on it.

On the problems the report will solve and the problems it will create, we have recently debated, and debated several times, the terrible incident of Hillsborough. There were two other incidents in the late ’80s that forced a change so that we moved away from the Press Council to the creation of the Press Complaints Commission. Not many people will recall that on 9 May 1989, a report from the ombudsman was printed on page 2 of The Sun. Of course, that was not enough. Today, the PCC rules would enable something of equal prominence to be printed, and the ombudsman adjudication at the time indicated that the headline should not have appeared. One concern is that we may start to give false hope to people who have been maligned by the press.

[Alun Cairns]

How does my hon. Friend reconcile the want of victims for solutions with the inconsistencies of the report, which does not extend to digital media?

[Dr Coffey]

My hon. Friend makes a useful point about digital media. I think somebody suggested that we should begin to look at how we regulate the internet. That is a challenge, even if we think only of closing down access to sites.

Returning to the Hillsborough incident, I do not want people to get false hope that all of a sudden journalists will not produce stories that they do not like. The same could be true of the situation in Bridgend. The PCC did good work on that, and the Government at the time said, “Yes, there was some good stuff.” We should have learned a bit more.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hanson]

I respect the way in which the right hon. Gentleman put his case today, but I believe that the debate is about the need for statutory underpinning of a regulatory system. Lord Leveson said clearly in his report that this was the seventh time in 70 years that we had examined the issue. I feel very strongly that we need to have cross-party talks and share what has emerged during today’s necessary debate, but also that we should reach the conclusion which—as the Secretary of State will see when she reads the report of the debate—was reached by the majority of Members on both sides of the House, who have spoken in support of the Leveson recommendations.

[Alun Cairns]

I respect the right hon. Gentleman’s view, although I disagree with the element relating to statutory underpinning. Is he saying that if legislation to that effect is not passed in the present Parliament, it will be a Labour manifesto commitment for the next general election?

[Mr Hanson]

I think that the hon. Gentleman, who has dipped in and out of today’s debate, will know that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition has said that he wants action urgently. He wants action by Christmas; he wants action in the next few weeks. I too want to see statutory underpinning of Leveson’s recommendations as a matter of urgency, and I hope that we can achieve consensus. When the hon. Gentleman—who has not been present for the whole debate—reads Hansard, he will see that his hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon, his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough and others have supported some of Leveson’s recommendations.

I accept that there are concerns about state regulation. In a letter to me, the editor of my own regional newspaper, the Daily Post, said:

“I am strongly opposed to statutory regulation of the press.”

However, I say to that newspaper editor, and to others who share her view, that we need to consider what that means. In his summary of recommendations, Lord Leveson says:

“An independent self regulatory body should be governed by an independent Board”.

Is that state regulation of the press? He continues:

“The appointment panel… should be appointed”

in a “fair and open way” with “an independent process”. Is that state regulation? No. He continues:

“Funding for the system should be settled in agreement between the industry and the Board, taking into account the cost”.

Is that state regulation? No. The code and the board should

“subscribe to an adequate and speedy complaint handling mechanism”.

Is that state regulation? No.

“The Board should not have the power to prevent publication of any material, by anyone”.

Is that state regulation or censorship? No, it is not. It is, by statute, the underpinning of a voluntary agreement between the press and the state in relation to regulation of those areas. It is no different, dare I say it, from the legal services body that was set up by statute to look at solicitors, or the Judicial Appointments Commission, which was set up by statute to appoint judges, or the General Medical Council, which was set up by statute to be the independent regulator of doctors, or Ofcom itself, or the Advertising Standards Authority. All those were established by Parliament, and they are all independent of Government and Parliament, but they all fulfil a regulatory role across the board. Those matters are important. We need to have that independence, and we need to underpin it with statutory regulation.

As the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice will be winding up for the Government and I am the shadow Police Minister, it is important to place it on record that Leveson’s recommendations are important in respect of policing. I believe we can do more, but it is right that the term “off the record briefing” should be discontinued. It is right that all senior police officers should record their contacts with the media for the sake of transparency and for audit purposes. It is right that there should be guidance to police officers on who can speak to the press and when. It is right that we should have an audit of who uses the police national computer and when. It is also right in respect of the police that we should examine guidance and spell out the dangers of hospitality, gifts and entertainment.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Djanogly]

The legal aid scope changes will not come in until April 2013, but that is indeed something that is on the horizon. I have visited the right hon. Gentleman’s local law centre, and it is a very good organisation. As I said to him the last time he asked about this issue, changes are going to have to take place, and that is why we are looking to put in place transitional arrangements.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

The legal aid budget amounts to a spend of £39 per person in the UK, while it is nearer to £5 in Spain, France and Germany. Does the Minister agree that the present position in the UK is wholly unsustainable, and that savings have to be made in the light of the financial circumstances that we inherited from Labour?

[Mr Djanogly]

Savings do have to be made. A similar comparison can be made with a Commonwealth country such as New Zealand, where the figure is about £18 per head. We must ensure that the scarce resources are spent as well as possible, and that people do not go to court when they do not need to do so.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Djanogly]

This is relevant to a number of Departments. We are working with them to ensure that the procedures are such that better determinations are made at the outset so that we get fewer appeals. This is taking up a significant amount of my time. The hon. Lady makes an important point.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

When a magistrates court is forced to close, does my hon. Friend agree that every effort and flexibility needs to be shown to accommodate those magistrates in alternative courts?

[Mr Djanogly]

Yes, and they are. So far as I know, no magistrates have been forced to resign because of any court closure. They are normally encouraged to join the successor court, although some take the opportunity to resign at that point for their own reasons.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Tuesday 13th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Blunt]

As the hon. Lady very well knows, we are having to manage a 23% reduction in our budget over the next four years in order to make the Ministry of Justice’s contribution to rescuing the nation’s finances. Sadly, probation services, like other elements, are not exempt from this. However, for the reasons she has given, they have been relatively protected under the spending review. We will of course continue to look for all available efficiency savings wherever we can, but the output of probation is very important.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

An appeal to the special educational needs and disability tribunal listed today will not be heard until late February 2012. Does the Minister agree that that is wholly unacceptable and that a much quicker process is needed in order to resolve some of the cases relating to special needs?

[Mr Djanogly]

If my hon. Friend would like to write to me, I will look into that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alun Cairns Excerpts

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

9. What consideration he has given to those responses to his Department’s consultation on legal aid that raised concerns about his Department’s definition of domestic violence.

[Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan) (Con)]

13. What his policy is on the provision of legal aid support for victims of domestic violence.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Jonathan Djanogly)]

We published the Government’s response to the consultation on 21 June. Legal aid will remain available for applications for protective injunctions, as at present. However, for disputes about children or finance following the breakdown of a relationship, legal aid will be available for victims of domestic violence where there is objective evidence of the need for protection.

[Mr Djanogly]

For family matters, including disputes about finance or children arising from the breakdown of a relationship, legal aid will be available for victims of domestic violence where there is evidence of a need for protection. Of course, we will also provide civil legal aid for victims of domestic violence to apply for protective injunctions, such as non-molestation orders.

[Alun Cairns]

It is reassuring that victims of domestic violence will remain eligible for legal aid under the changes, but the evidence is not always clear, because many victims will not report domestic violence to the police. What sort of evidence is the Minister expecting to see in order for people to qualify for legal aid?

[Mr Djanogly]

We listened to the concerns expressed in the consultation that our criteria for evidence of domestic violence were too narrow and we have expanded them. The key issue is that the triggers must be objective.