Criminal Legal Aid (General) (Amendment) Regulations 2013

Baroness Kennedy of Shaws Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Pannick (CB)]

My Lords, another week, another set of legal aid regulations to regret. These regulations will severely limit the availability of legal aid advice and assistance in prison law. I shall mention four examples of issues for which legal aid advice and assistance will no longer be available by reason of these regulations. The first is Parole Board proceedings for indeterminate sentence prisoners—ISPs—where the Secretary of State refers the case before the expiry of the minimum term for advice on a move for the prisoner to open conditions, and also where an ISP is removed from open conditions and the Minister seeks advice from the Parole Board on a return to an open prison. This will no longer be covered. The Parole Board itself said in its written evidence to an inquiry on this subject by the Joint Committee on Human Rights that because most prisoners require a period in open conditions before the Parole Board can be satisfied that they are safe to release:

“There is in consequence, a great deal at stake for prisoners at these reviews”.

The need for high standards to be applied at such hearings, in the interests of the prisoner and in the public interest, is obvious, and because of the impossibility of prisoners representing themselves effectively at such hearings and problems such as how to manage a prisoner cross-examining a professional witness giving evidence about the prisoner’s conduct in prison, the Parole Board told the Joint Committee in its written evidence that it believed the proposal to remove legal aid,

“is very likely to impede our attempts to deal with cases fairly, promptly and effectively”.

It is very surprising that the Secretary of State should have proceeded with the changes despite the concerns expressed by the Parole Board.

The second example of decisions which will be excluded from legal aid is decisions to place or keep a prisoner in Category A—that is, prisoners assessed to be a high security risk—which of course affects prison conditions. A third excluded category is the allocation of places in mother and baby units. Vulnerable women will be denied access to legal advice on whether they should be separated from their babies. A fourth example is decisions on removal from association—that is, segregation decisions. One could give many more examples.

What are the justifications offered by the Secretary of State for denying legal advice and assistance in such important matters, even if all other eligibility criteria are satisfied? The main answer given by Mr Grayling, the Secretary of State for Justice, in his oral evidence to the House of Commons Justice Select Committee on 3 July 2013 is that the difference between him and his critics was “ideological”—his word. Indeed, he used that word three times in as many minutes in response to questions on this matter. The report of the evidence is published as HC 91. Mr Grayling told the Justice Committee:

“I do not believe that prisoners in jail should have the right to access legal aid to debate which prison they are put in”.

He went on to say that they should not have the right to legal aid to raise other questions about their treatment, with limited exceptions.

This is to reverse 35 years of progress in the approach adopted by the legal system to the treatment of prisoners. The modern era of prison law began in 1978 when the Court of Appeal required fair disciplinary proceedings for those alleged to be involved in the Hull prison riots. Since that decision, our courts have repeatedly made it clear that administrative decisions in prison must comply with basic standards of legality, procedural fairness and rationality.

The application of legal standards to decision-making within prisons has immeasurably improved the quality of those decisions and ensured greater transparency and accountability. No one, with the possible exception of the Secretary of State for Justice, could doubt the public benefits in enabling prisoners to hold prison authorities to basic standards of legality and fairness or the indispensable contribution which has been made in this respect by legal aid. That a Secretary of State, and indeed a Secretary of State for Justice, should now, for so-called ideological reasons, wish to reverse such developments is very much a matter for regret.

Mr Grayling’s second point is that legal aid is not needed because the internal prison complaints system and the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman will provide redress where appropriate. Without legal assistance a prisoner is simply not going to be able to make his or her points effectively and speedily by reference to the applicable legal requirements. Unhappily, many prisoners lack basic skills of literacy or suffer from other problems which impede their ability to present an effective grievance. Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, Mr Nick Hardwick CBE, echoed these concerns in his evidence to the Joint Committee on Human Rights, as recorded in paragraph 174 of the Committee’s seventh report.

As the Law Society has pointed out in its helpful briefing on this Motion, at present many complaints are simply, effectively and speedily resolved by a solicitor’s letter setting out the legal position to the person taking the decision. The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman can only make recommendations and provides a much slower method of seeking redress than a solicitor’s letter. The ombudsman, Mr Nigel Newcomen CBE, told the Joint Committee on Human Rights that he was concerned about the Government’s proposals, in particular because his office was unable to cope with the expected increase in workload.

These regulations will not even save public money. The cost of maintaining legal aid in ISP cases before the Parole Board, for example, is minimal, and the cost of ISPs remaining unjustifiably in closed conditions when they could safely be allowed to move to open conditions is high. The Howard League for Penal Reform has pointed out that the Ministry of Justice has put the cost of dealing with each complaint to the ombudsman at £830, which is more than three times the £220 fixed fee for a solicitor doing this work under the legal aid arrangements.

In the Supreme Court last April, in the case of Osborn v the Parole Board, reported in volume 3 of the 2013 Weekly Law Reports page 1020, paragraph 72, Lord Reed stated for the court that,

“procedures which involve an immediate cost but contribute to better decision-making are in reality less costly than they may appear”.

I suggest that the Minister conveys the suggestion to the Secretary of State for Justice that the words of wisdom of Lord Reed should be displayed on Mr Grayling’s desk in very large letters.

These regulations will do enormous damage to the rule of law in prisons and there is no justification for them. I beg to move.

[Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws (Lab)]

My Lords, I echo everything that has been said by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. I, too, regret that the Government are taking this course and regret profoundly what was said by the Secretary of State for Justice, Mr Grayling, in describing the differences between those who supported the maintenance of legal aid and those who were agin it. It is as though it is not enough to go to prison and lose your liberty, and experience the deprivations that we know imprisonment means, so we are looking for other ways to punish.

I will speak specifically about women. As we in this House all know, women in prison are very largely those who have experienced abuse or domestic violence. They are often in prison because of serious social problems, they have mental health problems, and often have problems of addiction. The panoply of problems that they have do not make them people who will be well able to represent themselves in trying to get their rights in prison.

I will mention the issue of mother and baby units. In the past I have been involved in such cases, where a woman seeks to prepare for an application to have her baby remain with her, and has to secure supportive evidence, expert reports, and so on. It is impossible for a woman to do that without the help of a solicitor. Representations have to be made in relation to any refusal to offer a woman a place in a mother and baby unit, and I can assure noble Lords that that is sometimes done—and not done—for the best of reasons.

Women sometimes make applications for temporary release when something disastrous is happening at home with other children; they seek a temporary licence so that they can spend time at home. Many female prisoners are their children’s primary carer. We know that 55% of women in prison have a child under 16 and wish to make use of that release on temporary licence when they have emergencies at home. I know from experience that the application of the release on temporary licence policy is frequently misapplied by prisons, and women who are eligible are incorrectly refused. Legal help is vital to them for making their application, making representations, drawing on supportive evidence, and so on, but it is no longer available.

Disabled prisoners often have real problems about the suitability of their accommodation or other services they need, and need legal help to acquire them. Mentally ill prisoners do not get legal help to deal with many of the attendant matters that go along with convincing the authorities of the seriousness of their problems, whether that is on the depressive scale or as regards behaviours that clearly show disturbance, but which often bring them into dispute with the authorities in the prison. There are often arguments about the capacity of such women. They present with difficult and challenging behaviour which is often met with a strong disciplinary response from the prison so that they are awarded extra days as punishments, when in fact mental health is the problem. As extended prisoners, women often have the date of release set further and further away because of their behaviour, but that behaviour is due to their mental ill health.

In those sorts of cases you need to have the representation of someone who is legally qualified to help take the appropriate course and find the appropriate expertise to support applications. The Government’s response is that prisoners should use the internal complaints procedures—the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, described the inadequacy of that. The process of appealing to the ombudsman is often slow and does not give the remedy that is sought. Add to all that the poor educational attainment of most women in prison and the situation is hopeless.

Before this debate a Member of this House said to me, “Are you speaking in the legal aid debate?”, to which I replied, “Yes”. He said, “You know it’s hopeless”. My response to that was that it may be hopeless, but I hope that by having this debate some members of the Government will feel shame. I am speaking of the most vulnerable today. I hope that a feeling of shame will enter into discussions among the Government and between the coalition partners about the impact of this on the lives of some of the most fragile people in our society.