Family Justice (Transparency, Accountability and Cost of Living) Bill

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Friday 26th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[John Hemming]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

It is indeed a privilege to propose legislation in a private Member’s Bill. When I found out, through the usual process of an immediate torrent of lobbying phone calls and e-mails, that I had the opportunity to promote the sixth private Member’s Bill this Session, I was certain about what I would like to propose. I spent some time considering it, however, and was pleased to receive an offer of assistance from Ron Bailey, who has considerable experience of private Members ’ Bills and assisted me greatly in a number of ways, particularly in meetings with groups outside Parliament. I also declare an interest as chair of the Justice for Families campaign, which campaigns for improvements in this policy area.

My conclusion was to propose legislation that would improve life for children and families. I was aware that there is a serious problem with the quality of expert evidence in family court proceedings, so that had to be part of the Bill. I was also aware that there are problems with the treatment of children in care, so that issue had to be included in the Bill. Additionally, I have for years been concerned about the impact of increasing energy prices on families, and that is also part of the Bill. I am concerned about how certain procedural aspects and judicial proceedings assist public authorities in covering up malfeasance by public officials, so in one sense this Bill could be called the “No more cover-ups Bill”.

When I tabled the name and short title of the Bill, I was unaware of events and issues that have arisen over the summer and make the urgency of this Bill much greater, and I will come to those points later.

[Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that in putting together three elements in the Bill, he seeks to use this opportunity to get three bites of the cherry?

[John Hemming]

This is about justice for families in the wider sense. Our society should be based on making life better for families in this country, and making people’s lives easier through better judicial proceedings, fewer cover-ups and cheaper energy bills is all about justice for families.

Over the summer, I worked mainly outside Parliament to consult bodies interested in these matters. As a result of those consultations, I aimed to compromise and ensure that, in a very contentious area, my Bill had support from a broad swathe of opinion. I managed to do that; the only collective group set in opposition is the Association of Directors of Children’s Services.

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[John Hemming]

I accept that the Government are progressing issues. To be fair, I have been working on these proposals with bodies outside Parliament, so I have not gone into the minute details of the Government’s proposals. My concern comes back to the issue of academic scrutiny, although other aspects come into it as well. I wish to see progress in this area, but I am not too bothered about how we achieve that. I would prefer it if the Bill were considered in Committee. If a lot of the clauses are dropped in Committee because that seems appropriate, so be it. What is important is that we achieve the outcome of a reliable judicial system with decisions taken on the basis of the best academic knowledge available at the time. That is not what we have at the moment. It is the outcome I am focused on—getting a better system—and I am not particularly bothered about how we do that.

If the Government are to oppose the Bill, they need to explain how they can ignore the serious concerns of other countries. In June, we were aware of the maltreatment of girls in care and the prosecutions that had resulted. However, the true enormity of the magnitude of abuse of children in care over many decades, not all by Savile, had not been revealed at that point. I was personally aware of the cover-up at Haut de la Garenne, and I highlighted that in September when I referred to the banning of the US journalist, Leah McGrath Goodman, who had been excluded from the UK in an attempt to stop her reporting on the saga at Haut de la Garenne. I did not, however, know exactly what had been covered up. The Government may try to argue that the existence of the independent reviewing officer means that there is no urgency about making any changes. However, the cases in Rochdale and Rotherham, as well as the case of the children in A and S v. Lancashire county council, demonstrates clearly that the existence of an employee of a local authority who is called “an independent reviewing officer” is not sufficient to protect children from abuse while under state control. Can we really accept that there is no urgent need to ensure that children in care are listened to? The recent report from the children’s rights commissioner revealed that children in care had been running away—and one was living in a cave—because they had not been listened to.

A further issue, which has arisen since June, is the revelation of the cover-up at Hillsborough. I would not claim that the Bill would definitely have prevented that: however, the provisions on judicial review will make it easier for more ordinary people to ensure that public authorities do what Parliament has said they should do and facilitate the revelation of cover-ups at an earlier stage. Making it an offence to threaten and prevent people from talking to regulators or elected representatives would help to prevent cover-ups, many of which succeed because people are intimidated into not reporting things to the appropriate authorities.

[Lorely Burt]

We understand that more public figures are to be questioned in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal. Does my hon. Friend agree that his Bill might have been a great help in this instance? Had it been around, the children might have been listened to, not punished for reporting the abuse?

[John Hemming]

Indeed, some of the children were punished for complaining; that is the scandal. If one aspect of the Bill would prevent cover-ups, it is the part that would make it an offence to punish or threaten somebody to prevent them from talking to their MP or going to the police. In America, that is an offence, but in England it is not, and that allows bullies to use all sorts of techniques to prevent people from complaining.

We should protect people’s right to complain. Interestingly, a key clause in the first amendment to the US constitution is the right to petition all aspects of the state. It means that the courts cannot prevent people from talking to elected representatives. That sort of provision is perhaps in article 5 of the Bill of Rights, but we do not really enforce it in law. We have many situations in which people are intimidated in an attempt to prevent them from complaining. Yes, some complaints are wrong, but it should be for the police to decide if a report is wrong, not for somebody else to decide to punish children for complaining about their maltreatment.

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[John Hemming]

The idea is to move in that direction over time. In Committee, I might accept that we could stick with the Government’s limited objectives—[Interruption.] Yes, without subsidy. The key objective is to do this without a subsidy. The Bill does not require additional public funding; its aim is to improve the lives of families and family justice in the widest sense.

[Lorely Burt]

The Bill requires the aim to be achieved by 2020. Does my hon. Friend agree that it would be a sad thing, with all the innovations that are being worked on at the moment, if we were unable to move as far as code level 6 by then?

[John Hemming]

I thank my hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. This issue will clearly need detailed discussion in Committee.

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[Jim Dobbin]

That is certainly an important question that people are asking. The difficulty is that many of the staff involved have retired, as these cases arose a number of years ago. Recently, the head of the department concerned resigned, so things are happening there, but at present the local authority is reviewing the whole process. It still has another report to come out; after that, it will be fair to accept that members of staff may well lose their jobs because of the affair. That is a possibility, but I do not want to pre-empt the decision of the local authority.

I have referred to better staff training. Partner agencies, such as the police, community groups and schools, must be better co-ordinated. Criminal justice organisations should be encouraged to support young people who have been exploited, throughout the entire process—when reporting the crime and making statements; in pre-trial preparation; when they go to court; and after the trial. The recommendations refer to holding

“Regular multi agency information sharing meetings”

to ensure that possible victims and abusers are identified, and proper responses are developed; at present, none of that is happening anywhere, as I understand it. The Rochdale case is not the only one; this is a problem across the country—and indeed the globe, as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley, said.

I illustrate the need for this Bill by referring to a constituency case. A constituent, Mr X, came to one of my surgeries to complain that the local social services children’s unit was threatening to remove the youngest of his five children. The child had cerebral palsy. The other four children were well looked after and were doing very well at school. The department refused to accept that the child’s cerebral palsy was the reason for his unhappiness at school. Even though a consultant paediatrician, with whom I was acquainted, diagnosed cerebral palsy, the diagnosis was questioned by the department and the professionals. They had to bring in an independent paediatrician to verify that the child had cerebral palsy. That was verified, but even then there were question marks. I knew that the parents were a caring, loving couple.

The social worker complained to the family court judge that Mr X was seeking my intervention. The judge ruled that Mr X could no longer seek any help from his Member of Parliament. I raised that issue in the Chamber with the then Solicitor-General, who appeared to support what I said, and thought that the ruling was wrong. When she checked, she found that the judge was within his rights to rule as he did. That is why I am pleased that that issue is tackled, as I understand it, in the Bill. Eventually, the department backed off, but not before Mr X had a massive heart attack and died. It is my view that the worry about the threat of his son being removed, and the possibility of his other four children being removed, caused his death.

Members may remember the perceived satanic abuse cases that suddenly appeared on a council estate in my former council area. That followed similar episodes in the Orkney islands a number of years ago. Professionals were encouraging a theory that some families were involved in satanic abuse. A number of children were removed from their families. The courts tackled the issue, and eventually ruled that there was no evidence to prove the claims, and the children were allowed back to their families.

I use those local experiences as examples of why I support the Bill. I am convinced that there is a need for changes in departments that are responsible for the protection of children, and that family courts need to respond to these challenges in parallel; that is most important. I am absolutely amazed that the Association of Directors of Children's Services opposes the Bill. I hope that it will eventually see the error of its ways and bring itself into the 21st century.

[Lorely Burt]

My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) was a little coy when he was invited to speculate on why that august body did not support his Bill. I wonder whether the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Jim Dobbin) has any idea why it does not.

[Jim Dobbin]

I can only guess. I feel that the ADCS is absolutely acting as a protective body, and it is protecting its membership; I think that is the only reason it has made that statement. We will not know otherwise until it clarifies why it has taken that stance.

I have been appointed the United Kingdom’s delegate to the “One in Five” campaign, which is a sub-group of the Council of Europe’s Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development. It is to hold a major conference on trafficking and child abuse.

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[Lorely Burt (Solihull) (LD)]

I support the Bill. I will speak mainly about clause 1, but first let me say that clause 2’s provisions are based on the personal experience of my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming), who campaigns tirelessly and fearlessly on behalf of his constituents and others. I know how angry he was when a constituent was threatened over even speaking to him. To say he feels passionately about injustice—especially when perpetrated against those least able to fight for themselves, such as children—is an understatement.

Madam Deputy Speaker, you missed a wonderful explanation of thermodynamics, which I am sure will be to your eternal loss. We do not need an explanation of thermodynamics, however, to understand that making energy-cost savings of £1.1 billion by 2020 is an extremely laudable aim.

We are living in strange times. The Savile scandal is not only still rumbling on, but there are now suggestions that more public figures will be exposed. The press is reporting that we are now trying to substitute transparency for trust, because people no longer trust our public institutions. It seems that trust is becoming an old-fashioned word. The foundations of trust are shaken to the core when the actions of well-loved figures are uncovered—unfortunately, discovered too late for many people—and that is why this Bill is so important. We cannot have trust without transparency, and that is very pertinent to elements of the Bill.

A particularly helpful aspect proposes family group conferences which would give the extended family a say in resolving problems in a consensual manner instead of decisions being made in what can appear to be a rather high-handed manner by people who are not specifically involved with the family. Section 1 of the Children Act 1989 enshrined the rule that the court must treat the welfare of the child as the paramount consideration. Under the care and supervision proceedings in the Act, the child concerned can be taken into care only if they are

“suffering, or…likely to suffer, significant harm; and…the harm, or likelihood of harm, is attributable to…the care given to the child, or likely to be given to him if the order were not made, not being what it would be reasonable to expect a parent to give to him; or…the child’s being beyond parental control.

The Act goes on to state:

“Before proceeding with an application, the local authority should always obtain and consider legal advice on whether, in the circumstances of the case and in the light of the available evidence, the court is likely to be satisfied”

that the conditions I quoted are met

“and that an order is in the best interests of the child and that making a care order would be better for the child than making no order at all.”

However, that is not always the case, because sometimes, as we have discussed, the expert evidence is based on opinion, which cannot be challenged. The purpose of my hon. Friend’s Bill is to ensure transparency so that the reasoning behind the opinion can be tested. He cited the example of an expert opinion in a case where a child was taken away from their mother because she took the view that the child—a baby—should be fed on demand. It is scandalous that someone could give that opinion without any kind of challenge.

The provisions on proceedings in the family court and the Court of Protection would clarify the role of the friend and/or the McKenzie friend. They would also ensure that grandparents and other members of the wider family may have a say and offer their own perspective. Grandparents have knowledge of the situation and an interest in a positive outcome. They feel strongly about family break-up, but as things stand, although they do not have any say in the family court, they are often literally left holding the baby. The McKenzie friend system assists parents in the family court, who are often in need of a legally trained friend of the family or someone who has a little more expertise and advice to give. Not every parent can afford to have a lawyer in the family court, and that is against the spirit of what it is supposed to provide. Such psychological support, whether it is practical or results merely from the person being there, can be extremely valuable.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

The hon. Lady is making a very good case, and I totally agree with her. In many cases, the authorities can pay for their legal advice but the appellant cannot. She is therefore right to advocate the increasing use of McKenzie friends, if possible.

[Lorely Burt]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. We see examples of this in many walks for life. I have been involved with a group called the Association for Shared Parenting, which provides the McKenzie friend system for parents who have been separated from their children and are trying to regain access to them. In the spirit of the big society, we should allow that sort of thing to be permitted much more widely.

On clause 2(5), it is very important that children in whose best interests it is to be in care should be placed locally where there is good reason to do so. We saw tragic examples in Rochdale of what can go wrong. In that context, the contribution by the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Jim Dobbin) was most welcome. If children are placed locally, they still have their local connections and are not so isolated and prey to the apparently flattering but ill-conceived intentions of people seeking to groom them for all kinds of nefarious activities which can ruin the rest of their lives. Under the current system of independent scrutiny of children in care, children can complain to the perpetrators. For example, if the body they complain to is the local authority, and the body responsible for the care that they are given is the local authority, I see no logical reason for opposing the possibility of separating out the two in the interests of fairness and transparency. Earlier I told my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley about the schoolchildren who complained about the molesting activities of Jimmy Savile and were actually punished for doing so. These children must be able to go to somebody independent to whom they can complain.

As we have heard, there can be prejudice against children in care and after they have been in care. It is absolutely scandalous that a child can be branded and disadvantaged for life through, usually, absolutely no fault of their own. They need the protection that my hon. Friend offers in clause 3, subsection (4) of which addresses the prejudice that he described. The protected characteristics to which he refers, which are defined in the Equality Act 2010, are age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, and sex and sexual orientation. It is sad that someone’s having been in care in their younger life should be added to that list, but unfortunately I can see why he thinks so. It is important that any child can make its way in the world without additional discrimination of that kind.

Part 3 contains measures on the cost of living to achieve lower fuel bills. It would require a strategy to be produced by the Secretary of State that would help to end the misery of cold homes for millions of people. I suggested earlier that my hon. Friend was seeking three bites of the cherry, but given the rarity of one’s name coming up in the ballot, we want to address all the burning issues—if you will pardon the pun, Madam Deputy Speaker—that we have been thinking about for a long time. We want it all, basically.

The Bill would provide that the Secretary of State must

“by 2020…require any replacement heating system”—

that is, boilers. Apparently, 1.3 million boilers give up the ghost every year, and they are the ones we most need to replace with the best quality boilers that can be envisaged. I say “envisaged” because we are talking about 2020. We are making improvements in the quality and efficiency of boilers all the time, so I do not think—contrary to what the hon. Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood) said earlier—that a band 6 boiler is necessarily too big an aspiration.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

The hon. Lady makes an important point, particularly now, as we are hitting the winter, with the change in climate, the bad weather and so forth. She is quite right, because whichever way we put the argument—and without wanting to get too political—one of the issues is that the price of fuel and heating continually goes up, but it never goes down. She is therefore making a valuable point. Most of the families concerned cannot always afford to get their boiler put right, so she has hit on a sensitive issue.

[Lorely Burt]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I am sure he will welcome the fact that by that time we will be in a position to use green deal funding, so as not to be a burden on the taxpayer. Although some of the technologies are not quite ready yet, the fact that we can aspire to that is an important aspect of this Bill.

In conclusion, I do not understand the laws of thermodynamics, but I do see that the energy innovations of combined heat and power, and flue gas will make a major difference to household bills in the UK, and I commend all of this Bill to the House.