Victims and Prisoners Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 31st January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD)]

From these Benches, I will be extremely brief, because I agree with everything that has been said. I signed Amendments 27 and 29 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I absolutely support the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, which my noble friend Lady Hamwee has also signed. We cannot have commissioners who are commissioners in name only. They need clear roles, responsibilities and powers, and clear limits to those powers. The problem at the moment is that they do not, so we support the amendments.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, said it right when she said that it is time to give the Victims’ Commissioner the statutory place and rights that are appropriate. That is exactly the point of this suite of amendments. They aim to do two things. One is to give the Victims’ Commissioner the right status to be able to get the right information and have the right relationships to make them most effective, but it is also placing duties on other organisations to co-operate with the Victims’ Commissioner. That is what this suite of amendments is about. That means that they are very important. They also reflect the powers that other commissioners have in this space.

We have a group of amendments which give the Victims’ Commissioner a statutory duty to review the operation of the victims’ code, placing a statutory duty on the Secretary of State to consult the commissioner when making any changes to the victims’ code or issuing any statutory guidance relating to it. The amendment refers to the duty of the Secretary of State to consider any representations in relation to the drafting of the victims’ code in consultation with the Attorney-General. Again, I thought, “Why do you have to say that?” But, actually, I think we have to.

Amendments 27 and 29 alter the procedure for amending the victims’ code to require formal consultation with the Commissioner for Victims and Witnesses—I did not think that was necessary either, but if we need to say that, then we do—and affirmative parliamentary procedures.

Amendment 28 refers to

“the duty on the Secretary of State to consult the Attorney General on any revisions”.

Amendment 35 refers to

“the Secretary of State’s duty to issue regulations on the information to be collected by PCCs at a local level”.

Amendment 43 also places a duty on the Secretary of State to

“issue regulations on the timing and format of the information”.

This is about relationships that the Victims’ Commissioner needs to have to do their job effectively—with the Attorney-General, with PCCs, with the agencies with which the commissioner has to work.

My amendment—again, you would not think it would be necessary, but it clearly is—states that there is a specific public authority duty

“to co-operate with the Commissioner in any way that the Commissioner considers necessary for the purposes of monitoring compliance with the victims’ code”.

If we do not give the Victims’ Commissioner the power to ensure that the code is being complied with, we are not taking victims seriously. If we do not do that, we do not place the right kind of duties on the Secretary of State. We also need to make sure that the way the Victims’ Commissioner works is joined up with all the different agencies that she—it has always been “she” so far—needs to have.

We are very keen on this group of amendments because it does those two things: it gives the Victims’ Commissioner power, and it places a duty on different parts of the state to provide, as the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, said, formal parts of criminal justice infrastructure. This a powerful suite of amendments that I hope the Minister will agree to, and certainly will discuss with us as we move forward.

[Lord Bellamy (Con)]

I am very grateful, once again, to all noble Lords who have spoken to this group of amendments, which is related to the previous group. I am very sorry if the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, and I have managed to fall out over what is actually a legal discussion. Maybe we can pursue some of the points that were made in the previous group further, so that we understand each other and where those who support those amendments are coming from.

As far as this group of amendments is concerned, I will take first the amendment that would place a specific duty on specified public authorities to co-operate with the Victims’ Commissioner. I do not think anyone is in any doubt—and certainly the Government are not—that the Victims’ Commissioner plays a most important role that requires collaboration across the criminal justice system and the support sector. We recognise that there is other legislation affecting the domestic abuse commissioner which gives them the kind of powers that I think are partly, at least, being sought under this amendment.

I cannot at this moment accept the amendment, as I am sure noble Lords completely understand. But I am very much open to working with the Victims’ Commissioner and the House on whether there is any common ground on this approach, which would help us build up the bricks we are looking to build up to create the building that will enable this whole system to be more effective.

As regards the amendments to require the Secretary of State to consult the Victims’ Commissioner, I first make an extremely nerdy point, just for clarification. Clause 3(3) states:

“In preparing the draft the Secretary of State must consult the Attorney General”.


That is probably a bit confusing at the outset, but what is essentially being said is that the Secretary of State must consult relevant Ministers responsible for the bodies to which the draft is to apply: the Lord Chancellor, the Home Secretary—both of whom are englobed in the phrase “Secretary of State”—and the Attorney-General, who is responsible for the Crown Prosecution Service and similar justice bodies. It is a sort of ministerial consultation.

As to the question of consulting the Victims’ Commissioner on the code, further amendments to the code and so forth, I cannot imagine any circumstances in which the commissioner would not be consulted on all these matters. We have not set out in the Bill all the stakeholders that should be consulted but I would very much like to continue to work with the Victims’ Commissioner on this issue and how we continue to recognise that vital role. Again, may we take this amendment under advisement and see how far we can go?