Transparency and Consistency of Sentencing

Debate between Anna Soubry and Lord Beith

Thursday 2nd February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson). I agreed with many of the points that he so ably made based on his experience. It is easy to joke about the profusion of lawyers taking part in debates such as this, but in reality many of us stopped practising only within the past two years, before we came to this place. We therefore bring with us an abundance of experience and knowledge, especially those of us who were at the criminal Bar and both prosecuted and defended, which gave us an insight into cases from both perspectives. That is a great feature of the criminal Bar and, I hope Members will concur, adds to our ability to bring real experience and hopefully insight to this important debate.

I shall put my cards on the table. I practised at the criminal Bar for some 16 years until my election, and I am very proud of that. I should perhaps not put this too strongly, but it was one of the most rewarding and enjoyable jobs I have ever done, for all manner of reasons. As a member of the criminal Bar I defended far more than I prosecuted.

I should like to put it on record that I find it most peculiar that the Labour party, certainly in my constituency, seems to think it should criticise me for standing up in the House and talking about the law, particularly the criminal law. Often, I speak in defence of not only my own profession but solicitors, who are suffering in a way they have never suffered before due to the reduction in legal aid. I find it perverse that the Labour party attacks people such as me in those circumstances. It professes to be the party of the poor, the repressed, the deprived and some of the most needy in our society, but it is those very people whom so many at the criminal Bar and solicitors have represented for a long time, often with very little reward.

When I joined the criminal Bar, somebody said to me, “You are going to be a social worker wearing a wig.” Those of us who have been at the Bar or worked as solicitors and who have defended criminals will know from experience how often we go beyond the fee—and it is not a very great fee. We know how often we have given a fiver or £10 to clients who have no money in their pockets so that they can get home when they find themselves in the fortunate position—my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) will despair at this point—of not going into custody when they thought they might receive a prison sentence.

I once gave a client £10 so that he could catch the train back to Worksop. This perhaps shows my naivety. I took him to Nottingham railway station and assumed he would spend the money I had given him on his ticket. In fact, he went off and bought a large amount of heroin and was arrested by the police. Hon. Members can imagine my reaction when I found out what he had done with the money.

I digress from the subject of the debate, but I want to make the point that the criminal justice system could not operate without the Bar and solicitors who often go that extra mile, often at their own expense, to ensure that it works properly. I fully understand and appreciate that the legacy we have inherited means we have no option than to reduce the amount that goes into the legal aid pot, which means that members of the criminal Bar are seeing a reduction in their fees—that is in the context of having had no genuine increase since 1997. I know the Government can do nothing about that at the moment, but when the time comes we must ensure that those who do legal aid work are properly remunerated. It could be said that I have diverged from the subject of the debate, but I wanted to make that point.

Consistency in sentencing can be truly achieved only when the following occurs. It starts at the beginning. To achieve consistency in sentencing, we must ensure from the outset that there is a proper and full investigation of the allegation. That means that witness statements must be properly taken and that all relevant evidence must be properly gathered. A constituent who has come to me has quite properly complained following an assault allegation—she was the victim. She suffered cuts that required stitching to her face and a broken jaw, but the police did not collect her medical records despite the fact that she had signed the right form. She has now been told that the police are going to make the charge “common assault”. On the basis that what she told me is true, it is clear that the charge should be either for wounding or for a section 20 offence, or perhaps for an even greater offence. It was not a common assault, and it is clear that the police did not do a proper job in their investigation and in ensuring that all relevant evidence was available, which is important not just for the progression of the case, but so that the sentencing judge can pass the right sentence. In order to do that, we need to ensure that there is a full and proper investigation from the outset and that the right charge is reached. We also need to ensure that witness statements are properly taken, which includes, if appropriate, a victim impact statement.

My hon. Friend the Member for Dartford said that the previous Administration were overly prescriptive and mandatory—a long-standing complaint of many of us about their conduct of the criminal justice system. I do not want police officers to go out with a checklist of all the things they must do when they take a witness statement. I want them to be properly trained to be able to rely on their own plain common sense. I do not want them to be overly prescriptive and certainly not stereotypical.

In his statement the other day, the Secretary of State talked about the changes we intend to make to the compensation scheme. This might be difficult to understand, but he quite properly mentioned the fact that not all victims of crime look at the crime in the same way. I have been burgled more times than I care to remember; in some instances, that did not have a particularly upsetting effect on me, and I would be the first to say that, but on one occasion it upset me greatly because my grandmother’s engagement ring was stolen. I do not know the value of the ring, and it does not really matter; what mattered to me was my sentimental attachment to that piece of jewellery. On another occasion when my home was broken into, I found it distressing that somebody had been through items of a very personal nature in my study. On another occasion, nothing much was particularly disturbed, so the trauma, or the effect, was not as great. However, we cannot say everybody will be the same, because, as we all know, crimes come in all different shapes and sizes, and they affect each and every one of us differently.

[Sir Alan Beith]

Did the hon. Lady welcome, as we on the Select Committee did, the fact that the Sentencing Council was prepared to treat burglary as an offence against the person, as well as against property?

[Anna Soubry]

Absolutely. If I may say so, there was so much I agreed with in the right hon. Gentleman’s speech. From my short time on the Select Committee, I know he brings a huge weight of experience and plain, good common sense to his chairing of the Committee. I absolutely agree with what he says.

To be frank, I would never stand up and say we definitely want to keep the Sentencing Council. I know some of us disagree about this, but I always thought the Court of Appeal was a good place to determine the issues we are discussing, and I could see no good reason why that should not continue. However, we are where we are.

What we do know—this has already been mentioned—is that the sentencing judge will look at the aggravating and mitigating features in relation to every offence. It is therefore important that when the police go out and take witness statements, they make sure everything that should be in them is in them so the judge can pass the right sentence. If items of great sentimental value are stolen in dwelling-house burglaries, for example, that is an aggravating feature.

The same is true of trashing or ransacking the property, and of inducing fear in a particularly vulnerable person. One of the burglaries I suffered was at night-time, and my children were of an age where they were very frightened. They thought—this is common among children who have the misfortune to have their homes burgled at night—that the person would come back, and they were in fear of that. Such things must be in the witness statements so the judge can pass the right sentence. That will give us the consistency we want.

One of the things that is extremely annoying for somebody who has been the victim of a car crime is the fact that they lose their no claims bonus. There is also the huge inconvenience caused by the fact that their car has a broken window and that they will not be able to use it because it has to go off to the garage. Again, those are important aggravating features.

In offences of violence, there can be an assessment of the physical scarring that might remain, and of the pain and suffering the victim might have been caused, but their mental anguish must also be set out in detail so that the proper sentence can be passed.

I would go further and say that when police officers go out to get statements from witnesses, they should include in them the effect of a particular crime on the witness. The classic example is somebody who witnesses a fight in the street, which might be a particularly violent and unpleasant incident. That will have an effect on the witness, and if it does, it should be in the witness statement.

At the heart of good, consistent and transparent sentencing is an overriding and underlying belief in the fact that we should trust our judges. I say that with absolute certainty in one respect: if I had not come to this place, I would undoubtedly never have been made a judge. I am not, therefore, making these comments to curry favour with any judge. Hon. Members may not find this surprising, but the reason I would not have become a judge is that I fell out with so many judges.