Criminal Legal Aid (General) (Amendment) Regulations 2013

Baroness Stern Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to follow the statements that have been made by so many of your Lordships universally condemning these regulations and identifying the specifics of why they are wrong in principle and wrong in fact.

I have not been someone who has objected to any legal aid cut. I have been concerned about some but, as a member of a Government who themselves had to look at legal aid issues, that was not the concern. However, what particularly concerns me about these regulations is the point that the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, made early in his contribution when he referred to the reasons given by the Secretary of State, the Lord Chancellor, for making this change—said to be ideological.

While there may be that ideology so far as the Lord Chancellor is concerned, noble and learned Lords have already made it plain why it is legally wrong: because prisoners have rights. Therefore, if the justification is that, ideologically, they should not have rights, he is saying that they should be in the same position as the people in the black holes of Guantanamo.

I am still shocked by the piece that the Lord Chancellor wrote in the Daily Mail on 11 September 2013, in which he described judicial review, not once but twice, as,

“a promotional tool for countless Left-wing campaigners”.

That is completely untrue, of course. I do not think that the Daily Mail would be regarded as a left-wing campaigner, yet it used judicial review to challenge the Leveson inquiry. Much as I admire it, I do not think that the Countryside Alliance, when it brought a judicial review against hunting, would have regarded itself as a left-wing campaigner.

It is deeply worrying that that is the ideology that underlies these changes. It would be deeply worrying if it came from anybody, but coming from a Lord Chancellor—a Secretary of State for Justice—it is a matter of the gravest regret, which is why I am very happy to support the noble Lord, Lord Pannick. It is wrong for these reasons. It is wrong because legal aid is about justice, not about ideology. It should be about ensuring that people can vindicate their rights where properly those rights deserve to be vindicated. Therefore, the Lord Chancellor—the Secretary of State—is ideologically unsound and also legally wrong.

This measure is, I regret to say, shabby, and a political and populist move which does no credit at all to a Government. Equally, it does no good, as noble and learned Lords and noble Lords have pointed out, in terms of cutting the budget. I very much hope that the noble Lord—and I, for one, welcome him to his place on the ministerial Bench—will do his best to make sure that that point is driven home within the Ministry of Justice and that the Secretary of State recognises eventually that this sort of move, which he regards as ideological, is in fact utterly to be regretted.

[Baroness Stern (CB)]

My Lords, my memory of the gradual application of the rule of law in prisons also goes back a long way—as far back as that of my repentant noble and learned friend, whom I have the great honour to be sitting next to and of whom my opinion has warmed considerably as the years have gone by.

I recollect the days when prisoners were found guilty of disciplinary offences and sentenced to lose many days of remission without being heard or allowed to defend themselves. I remember a riot at Wormwood Scrubs prison in which 54 prisoners and 11 prison officers were injured. It was hushed up. The full facts emerged after two and a half years and no one was ever held to account. I am sure that there would be no support in 2014 for the rule of law not being maintained in prisons. The arrival of lawfulness improved immeasurably the working conditions of staff, the treatment of prisoners and the safety of the environment in which they both lived. My noble and learned friend Lord Woolf was right to say in his report on the Strangeways riot in 1991 that,

“the system of justice which has put a person in prison cannot end at the prison doors”.

Therefore, within this context, since this is a Motion of Regret, I regret very much that the framework of lawfulness in which prisons operate is to be reduced. I understand the argument about cost, but these measures will certainly save no money at all, and they will shrink one of the elements that keep prisons fairly safe and fairly manageable—that is, the provision of access to a remedy when a decision seems arbitrary and unjust.

Perhaps I may mention one specific situation so that it may be on the record. I refer to prisoners who are held in extreme conditions, such as in the case quoted by the Chief Inspector of Prisons when he gave evidence to the Joint Committee on Human Rights. It concerned a woman with severe mental health problems in Bronzefield prison who was held for five years in conditions that amounted, in his view, to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. In future, such a woman seems very unlikely to be able to get legal aid to challenge her conditions and her placement. Women who have their babies taken away have already been mentioned, and I endorse the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy.

I end by endorsing the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, about the excellent work done by the Howard League and the Prisoners’ Advice Service. Neither of those specialist legal aid prison law firms will be able to continue under these arrangements, and that, too, is a matter for profound regret.