King’s Speech

Baroness Ludford Excerpts

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ludford (LD)]

I applaud the speech made by the noble Baroness and I look forward to seeing her Private Member’s Bill. I too warmly welcome the new Ministers.

I was as delighted to hear the Attorney-General yesterday promise that the new Government would respect and uphold the rule of law as I was to hear the new Prime Minister do the same in regard to the European Convention on Human Rights. The display last week at the European Political Community summit of the London treaty—the London treaty, note—which set up the Council of Europe, which hosts the convention and the European Court of Human Rights, sent a massive and very welcome signal of intent.

I also applaud the fact that not only have the Government scrapped the Rwanda scheme, but yesterday they made regulations to amend the ill-named Illegal Migration Act such as to ensure the processing of asylum seekers.

I very much welcome the proposed Hillsborough law to impose a legal duty of candour on public servants and authorities, although can the Minister explain how it will be enforced?

The London Victims’ Commissioner has reported on the inadequacy of action against stalkers—most of whom, although not all, are men—and the National Police Chiefs’ Council has called out an “epidemic” of violence against women and girls, as we have heard often today.

Sky News reports that misogyny, harassment and sexual abuse are even rife in the ambulance service, which is so utterly depressing as it should be all about keeping people safe. A young woman told the “Today” programme this morning that if an objection is made to boys quoting the extreme misogynist Andrew Tate, they are told, “Boys will be boys”, and, “You can’t take a joke”.

What are the Government’s plans to tackle this distinctly unfunny epidemic of violence, not only through the criminal justice system but socially and through an education system aimed at changing the behaviour of some men and boys with a warped perception of masculinity? Can the Government also look at the violence, threats and intimidation from supposedly trans rights activists—often very frightening men in black balaclavas—who have physically attacked women and threatened to rape and kill the TERFs? Has the police response been adequate? I do not need to refer the conversion therapy Bill, as I agree with the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott.

Women in the criminal justice system are described by the Ministry of Justice as among the most vulnerable in society, with complex needs that include trauma, domestic abuse, mental health and substance misuse problems. The fact that this trauma has been increased in some cases by male-bodied prisoners being placed with them shames those in charge of such decisions. I agree with my noble friend Lord McNally in calling on the Government to revisit, and hopefully accept, the recommendation of the 2007 Corston report on trying to avoid custodial sentences for women.

To continue on the subject of women, will this Government amend the Equality Act to clarify that “sex” means “biological sex” in order to resolve some of the problematic interactions between the Equality Act and the Gender Recognition Act?

I will cite in detail the Howard League’s recent valuable paper on options for a lasting solution to the prisons crisis on Friday, when we debate the report on community sentences by our Justice and Home Affairs Committee chaired by my noble friend Lady Hamwee. Wearing my European enthusiast hat I hope that the Minister’s plans will include looking at practice on community-based and diversionary schemes in the Netherlands and in Scandinavian countries. I also hope that the Government will try to get back into at least some of the EU justice and home affairs instruments and bodies, such as SIS II, which the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhope, mentioned.

I share the outrage at the IPP scandal, and I would like to hear more detail on the Government’s plans to expedite the safe release of post-tariff IPP prisoners. Will the Government set up a royal commission on the criminal justice system, as suggested by the Bar Council? Will they invest in a sustainable and resilient justice system recognised as a vital public service that truly serves the public? There is as yet no promise of more money.

My last remark is on the need to dig all those agencies supervised by the Ministry of Justice out of the 19th century and get them into the 21st century. Among them are His Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service, which includes the Probate Service, the Office of the Public Guardian and the Passport Office, which includes the General Register Office. Many of us only encounter some of those agencies on the death of a loved one, and we can have a very unhappy experience of bereavement bureaucracy, as I did, at a time when we need less stress, not more.