Hillsborough: Collapse of Trials

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Thursday 10th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

Without repeating the points I made in earlier answers, I reiterate my commitment to carefully considering the 2018 consultation and the responses that have been given, which were quite varied and included varied views about the merits of the proposal. I will always look to achieve that essential element of independence and to ensure that a voice is provided to those who, prior to this, have been voiceless.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab) [V]]

Ninety-six people died at Hillsborough, including 18 people from the borough of Sefton. That included Kevin Williams, one of the youngest victims, whose mum, Anne, campaigned so hard to achieve the new inquest. Despite the coroner’s verdict, no one was held accountable of unlawful killing at that new inquest. Instead, the loved ones of the bereaved families continue to be smeared to this day. The Justice Secretary said that he was committed to changing the law, so I ask him: how quickly will he introduce the Hillsborough law? Will it deliver parity of legal funding for bereaved families? Will it include a duty of candour on public officials? In short, will it ensure that no one is ever denied justice in such a cruel way ever again?

[Robert Buckland]

I join the hon. Gentleman in paying tribute to all those from the borough of Sefton who lost their lives and to their families, to whom he quite rightly refers. Those campaigners, in particular in his constituency, worked so hard for the inquest. I remember the people he talks about very well, as I think do most of us who followed events closely; I remember them with gratitude and honour.

I will not reiterate the points I have made, but I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answers that I gave a moment ago. I simply say this: I want to get it right and to ensure that things are done as quickly as possible, but I do not want to rush this and get it wrong in a way that, frankly, the families would, once again, be let down by.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Tuesday 9th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to praise the work of our brave police officers, and indeed all emergency workers who put themselves on the line, particularly in the context of this crisis. We are in the process of looking carefully at the sentencing maximums for assaults on emergency workers. I will update the House on our progress.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

The privatisation of probation has been a complete failure. The Secretary of State might want to remind his colleagues of Serco’s role in that failure, given the way it has just been awarded the contract for covid test and trace, but for today will he tell us when the family of probation services will be brought back together in their rightful place in the public sector and end this scandal of privatisation?

[Robert Buckland]

The hon. Gentleman knows that last year an important announcement was made on the reform of the Probation Service, which is progressing. I am considering the matter very carefully, particularly in the light of covid-19 and the effects on the process, and I will make a statement to the House as soon as possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Tuesday 12th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

The hon. Gentleman raises a very important matter. I would like to express my sympathies to his constituent’s family for what they have undergone. I know that the hon. Gentleman has met my hon. Friend the prisons Minister to discuss this, and they may meet again. These tragic cases are rare, but that does not in any way undermine how tragic they are. Because there is a greater workload, with a greater number of people dealt with by CRCs than before, we have seen some increase in the numbers, but the rate falls below 0.5%.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

Last week, the prisons Minister offered to meet the family of Sam Cook, who was murdered by a convicted offender who was released on licence, in a similar case to the one we have just heard about from my hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Ian C. Lucas). They would very much like to meet the Minister. Can the Secretary of State ask his officials to arrange that meeting as soon as possible? They want to speak to the Minister to make sure that no one has to experience what Sam Cook experienced and that the probation service is doing its job to protect the public from offenders who are released on licence and is supervising them properly.

[Mr Gauke]

I know that the prisons Minister would be very willing to have that meeting, but I make the point to both hon. Gentlemen that we want to get this right, we do recognise that we need to reform the probation system and that that is exactly what we intend to do.

Privatised Probation System

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Monday 4th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Rory Stewart]

I am glad that the hon. Lady welcomes the decision in Wales, where it was right to bring things under a single, state-run probation system. I know that she has had the opportunity to meet Amy Rees, who is now the executive director of both prisons and probation in Wales. We will be putting in extra resources; but above all, we are relying on the fact that bringing the two things together will deliver significant efficiencies, and if we can get the through-the-gate investment right, I think the hon. Lady will be pleasantly surprised.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

My constituent Sam Cook was stabbed to death last year. His killer was on licence having been released after being convicted of a similar knife offence, but the probation officer did not know how to use the IT system, so the monitoring of the killer was not appropriate to the concerns of the probation service. I have no idea how that could possibly happen, and I am sure that the Minister is the same. Will he therefore tell us what processes are in place to ensure that processes are properly carried out, that every member of staff is trained to use the system and that we never again see another young man like Sam Cook killed due to inadequate supervision?

[Rory Stewart]

I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for raising that tragic case, and I am happy to sit down with him and, indeed, the family to talk through the details. The way that we learn the lessons of every serious further offence—this happens in about 0.1% of the cases that we supervise under probation—is to conduct a comprehensive SFO review, and those lessons may be about IT, training, support or how a probation manager raises a matter with a senior probation officer. We are happy to sit down with the hon. Gentleman and the family to learn the lessons from that case and ensure that it does not happen again.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Rory Stewart]

The specific issue raised by my hon. Friend relates to women in the criminal justice system, many of whom are the primary care givers. So putting those women in prison has a very serious impact on their children, many of whom, unfortunately, then go on to commit crime themselves. We have therefore commissioned Lord Farmer to do a review looking specifically at the family ties of women.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

13. What steps he has taken to reduce the number of children in the criminal justice system.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Edward Argar)]

As far as possible, we believe that children should be diverted from the criminal justice system through liaison and diversion services. A custodial sentence should be used only as a last resort. As we have seen over the past 10 years, the number of children entering the criminal justice system has fallen by 86%, with the number getting custodial sentences falling equally dramatically.

[Bill Esterson]

According to the latest research, between 40,000 and 120,000 children are born every year with foetal alcohol spectrum disorders. Those with FASD often do not understand consequences, so will the Minister look at the special courts that have been set up in Canada, designed to reduce reoffending by helping those with FASD to understand the consequences of their actions?

[Edward Argar]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. If he writes to me with more details, I will be happy to look at the matter.

Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors: Property Act Receiverships

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Tuesday 18th April 2017 Westminster Hall

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. My hon. Friends have set out examples of how their constituents have been badly treated over a number of years, first by the banks that distressed their thriving and successful businesses and then by the failure to secure justice after a long struggle, often with the support of my hon. Friends and their predecessors.

This is not just about one bank. It has been about Lloyds, HBOS and Royal Bank of Scotland. A constituent of mine came to see me just last week about NatWest, his business having been run down in a similar way to those of my hon. Friends’ constituents’. Businesses that were successful, that paid their interest on time and that were in a position to continue making their payments were run into the ground, in order to realise the maximum possible amounts for the banks and not in the interests of the customer. That is the reality of what has happened over many years and I am afraid that it could still be happening today, given the system that still exists.

The Tomlinson inquiry found at RBS a lack of competition and conflicts of interest, as well as the need for a proper retail banking sector, and yet we are in a situation today where those issues are still to be addressed. RBS may well have its own compensation scheme being set up, but no money has been paid out and at this stage it is being handled by RBS itself. It is still not independent of RBS. At the heart of this debate is that lack of independence and whether there are conflicts of interest in the LPA system.

[Mr Bailey]

Often, banks will say that the poor levels of business lending are because businesses will not come to banks for that lending. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is cases such as those mentioned today that have deterred many small businesses from going to their local banks and that, by default, inhibit our ability to invest in our economy for the future?

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Esterson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I will address that point now—I was going to make it later. Our economy continues to struggle. We see sluggish productivity and low growth, particularly with smaller businesses, and one of the reasons is the lack of access to finance for those small firms, which undoubtedly causes them problems. I am in no doubt that the reputational damage done by these scandals and the lack of trust among smaller firms in the banks are factors that contribute massively to the problem.

We have seen businesses distressed and put out, people’s livelihoods destroyed and people’s lives damaged as a result of the behaviour of some of the banks, and of the people working in them and the people working for them as supposedly outside professional consultants. In the debate last December about alternative dispute resolution we heard about the activities of lawyers who are seconded into some of the banks and about the way they carried out similar activities. The convictions for fraud involved management consultants, and today we are talking about surveyors. There are conflicts of interests, whereby professionals are seconded into banks and then take decisions in the interests of those banks—why would they not do so, when their future lucrative work depends on those relationships?—and referring their own firms for the ongoing work, no doubt for fear of losing such work in the future.

With the LPA, the contracts have now been written in such a way that they favour the lender over the borrower. The borrower cannot then challenge the valuation of surveyors, because the valuer’s duty is to the client, not to the borrower. The original intention of LPA receiverships, which was to create a balance between borrower and lender, has been completely overwritten by the way that the banks prepare their standard terms and conditions in their contracts. Of course, most smaller businesses cannot afford the cost of legal action to challenge what is happening, especially when they are up against the financial clout of the financial institutions causing these problems.

So what is to be done? How can such scandals be avoided in the future? What are the remedies for what has happened before? There needs to be a sea change to ensure that the chances of repetition are reduced. There needs to be compensation, not just a scheme that is administered very slowly and internally without proper independent scrutiny and operation. I am talking about RBS, but in fact it is ahead of the other banks, given that it has any scheme at all. Perhaps the Minister can look at how we can ensure proper scrutiny, independent regulation and a proper complaints process within RICS and other professional bodies, so that RICS members do not get scrutinised by other RICS members. My hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff Central (Jo Stevens) explained the situation extremely well: there is a judge, jury and executioner system within RICS and elsewhere. That has to change if there is to be proper scrutiny to prevent such injustices and an opportunity for remedy when they happen.

We have to prevent such things from happening again, and there has to be compensation. Whatever Government are elected on 8 June have got to take these things seriously. It is long beyond time for that. Justice delayed is justice denied. It is 10 years on, and many former small business owners have lost everything and are completely unable to get compensation for what has happened to them.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Mr Campbell) talked about the Serious Fraud Office’s potential interest, and he is absolutely right. I would like to hear what the Minister says about the potential for an SFO investigation into each and every one of these scandals. What prospects are there in the future for further fraud investigation?

We have got to prevent such things from happening again, and we have got to have proper regulation. The FCA’s remit does not include the regulation of business lending; it is there to regulate consumers. It does have a role in regulating sole traders and smaller partnerships. Is it time that small and medium-sized enterprises are given the same protection as consumers?

There is also the issue of the LPA receivership system. The Labour Government introduced the Enterprise Act 2002, which reformed aspects of insolvency law, but LPA receiverships were not included at that stage. Given what we have heard, is it time that LPA receiverships were given the same status as administration? Should we go down the route of having the chapter 11-type system that exists in the United States? In some way, we need to return to the original intention of LPA receiverships of achieving a balance between the interests of borrowers and lenders and some kind of limit on the level of fees that agents can charge.

My final point is about the process that can be used to deal with complaints. It seems to me that having self-regulation, whether through RICS or elsewhere, is not working, given the examples we have heard about. Is it time to look at meaningful arbitration and proper dispute resolution? I have raised a number of times the issue of the small business commissioner, which the Government are creating. They have acknowledged that there is an issue with the unfairness of contracts for the SBC. We will have a chance to look at that. When that post is created, will the Minister consider the need for proper, meaningful dispute resolution—perhaps binding arbitration—and giving that responsibility to the small business commissioner in relation to these matters, as well as in relation to late payments, which are its primary purpose?

There are a number of issues that need to be picked up. The Minister can respond to them now. The next Government really will have to act, otherwise—my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich West (Mr Bailey) was right to intervene on this point—we will continue to have a system where the relationship between small businesses and the banks is very poor. Unless that is resolved, we will not improve the performance of our small businesses, which are a crucial part of our economy. In the meantime, those who have suffered very seriously by losing their livelihoods will not see the remedy that they should, and there will continue to be a danger of a repeat performance by financial institutions, if that is not already happening.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

If the Minister would be kind enough to finish his remarks no later than 7.27 pm, that would allow Jo Stevens three minutes to sum up the debate.

Safety of Prison Staff

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Monday 11th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I hope the hon. Lady will excuse me as I turn to my notes in order to give her the exact figure. The last year for which we have figures was 2014-15 and the National Tactical Response Group was called out 400 times during that year, so that was just over once every day.[Official Report, 14 July 2016, Vol. 613, c. 4MC.]

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

In my constituency there is no extra money for HMP Kennet because it is closing. It has been open for only 10 years. In answers to letters that I have written to the right hon. Gentleman’s ministerial colleagues, I have been told that the staff will be expected to relocate to the new super-prison in Wrexham. The problem is that that is more than 70 miles away and there is no prospect of many of those staff being able to relocate. Is that not an example of one of the problems in the planning that the right hon. Gentleman is carrying out? He is closing a prison and the staff will not be able to get to the new one that he is opening. How will that help with problems of both overcrowding and prison staff safety?

Oral Answers to Questions

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Tuesday 8th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Absolutely not. It is our responsibility to ensure that children in secure training centres are kept in decent and supportive circumstances that enable them to reintegrate into society. As a result of Youth Justice Board monitoring, the work of the improvement board I set up and the wider work by Charlie Taylor, we are monitoring very carefully the health and welfare of children in all our secure training centres. My Department will have the ability to scrutinise any other organisation that takes over the running of these STCs to ensure that children are kept safe.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

3. What assessment he has made of the potential effect of the UK leaving the EU on legal services.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Shailesh Vara)]

The hon. Gentleman will be aware that on 19 February, the Prime Minister set out the Government position on remaining in the European Union.

[Bill Esterson]

The former head of the Association of Chief Police Officers, Sir Hugh Orde, says that leaving the European Union would increase the risk of terrorism and would mean that Britain would become a safe haven for criminals. I am sure that the Minister agrees with Sir Hugh, but will he explain why the Justice Secretary is so keen to ignore this advice from such a well-respected authority and to take such a risk with public safety?

[Mr Vara]

May I make it absolutely clear to the hon. Gentleman that the Government’s position is that we would be better off in the European Union and that we would be safer and more secure in it? It is also the case that the deal struck by the Prime Minister in Brussels very much achieves those objectives.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Selous]

I will certainly look into that. I had heard that insurance was a problem in employing ex-offenders in certain categories, but, prompted by the hon. Gentleman’s question, I will look into it further and write to him.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

Businesses can employ ex-offenders only if those ex-offenders have the skills that businesses need. Will the Minister therefore ensure that the shortage of staff in prisons—the shortage appears to be making it more difficult for prisoners to take part in education—is addressed as quickly as possible, which must happen if the scheme is to be successful?

[Andrew Selous]

There was a net increase of 420 prison officers last year, and we continue to recruit hard, but the hon. Gentleman makes the valid point that we need good quality qualifications. We will carry on with that work. Dame Sally Coates’s review will help us in that regard.

Oral Answers to Questions

Bill Esterson Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State’s apparent commitment to access to justice for everybody in this country mean that he will reverse the cuts made by the previous Government to that very same access to justice?

[Michael Gove]

We are committed to reviewing the reforms to legal aid, but I have to stress that it was the Labour party’s former justice spokesman, the right hon. Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan), who made it clear during the last Parliament that levels of spending on legal aid were unsustainable under the last Government and we needed to reform. After all, as the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne) told us, there was no money left.