Queen’s Speech

Baroness Rawlings Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Rawlings (Con)]

My Lords, it is a brave Peer who says anything in your Lordships’ House about prisons with the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, present and due to speak. However, I commend the Prime Minister for including the prison and courts reform Bill in the gracious Speech and for searching for ways to reduce the number of prisoners in our overcrowded jails, as was spelled out so well by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf. The Minister of State started his speech with what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, called the centrepiece of the Queen’s Speech. The Minister stressed the importance of being “accessible and proportionate” and “out of the courtroom” where necessary, and spoke about disputes being resolved through mediation rather than jail and the importance of human rights, which I imagine includes self-protection, which was put into historical context so clearly by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans.

I agree wholeheartedly with what the Minister of State said, and I have just two brief questions for the Parliamentary Secretary, my noble friend Lord Bridges. I will hardly detain your Lordships at this late stage in the debate. Following the Minister of State’s very clear opening speech, will the Government look into reforms to magistrates’ court fines and Crown Court convictions concerning listed building enforcement notices requiring two years’ imprisonment for non-compliance? There are so many of these offences yearly. Does the Parliamentary Secretary think that minor offenders, such as those contravening Section 9 of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990, should be clogging up our overcrowded prisons?