Justice

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Helen Grant

Thursday 12th September 2013 Ministerial Corrections

[Caroline Lucas]

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice what assessment he has made, in calculating the likely costs or savings arising from his Transforming Legal Aid proposals, of the possibility of (a) increased applications for permission for judicial review and (b) increased applications for costs from public authority opponents, if lawyers are not paid unless permission for judicial review is granted; what the evidential basis was for that assessment; and if he will make a statement.

[Official Report, 10 September 2013, Vol. 567, c. 689-92W.]

Letter of correction from Jeremy Wright:

An error has been identified in the written answer given to the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) on 10 September 2013.

The full answer given was as follows:

[Mrs Grant]

At around £2 billion a year we have one of the most expensive legal aid systems of its type in the world. The consultation paper ‘Transforming Legal Aid: delivering a more credible and efficient system’, contained a range of measures aimed at reducing the cost of and promoting public confidence in the legal aid scheme, including a proposal that providers would only be paid for work on an application for permission to proceed with a judicial review if permission is granted by the court.

We are concerned that legal aid is currently being used to fund applications for permission for judicial review in weak cases which are unsuccessful and which have little effect other than to incur unnecessary costs for the public.

As part of our consultation we have published an impact assessment which is available at:

https://consult.justice.gov.uk/digital-communications/transforming-legal-aid

As noted in the impact assessment, under our proposal set out in the consultation paper the provider would need to make an assessment of whether the application is arguable and therefore permission should be applied for. There may therefore be a fall in permission applications made. This may reduce the number of cases the Legal Aid Agency (LAA) need to process and reduce the number of hours required in court for these cases with an associated saving for Her Majesty's Courts and Tribunal Service (HMCTS). We have also noted in our assessment that there is the potential for an increase in requests for reconsideration of the permission application at a hearing, or onward permission appeals to the Court of Appeal where permission has been refused, which may result in an impact on HMCTS from reconsidering the applications.

In both circumstances however this is unquantifiable as the behavioural response of providers and clients is unknown.

Regarding possibility of increased applications for costs from public authority opponents, it is already the case that providers should generally agree costs as part of a settlement or seek a costs order form the court, as they would if acting for a privately paying client. This is set out in paragraph 6.58 of the 2013 Standard Civil Contract General Specification.

The consultation closed on 4 June 2013 and we intend to publish a Government response shortly.

The correct answer should have been:

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Helen Grant

Tuesday 21st May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

1. What recent discussions he has had with his Cabinet colleagues on the costs and benefits of his reforms to judicial review.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mrs Helen Grant)]

The impact assessment of 23 April and the Government response to the consultation clarify the costs and benefits of our reforms, which are intended to tackle delays and reduce the burden, while upholding access to justice.

[Caroline Lucas]

Figures published by the Minister’s Department confirm that the proportion of judicial review applications for planning and environmental cases has remained unchanged since 2005. Does she agree that, rather than facing a culture of so-called meritless judicial review applications, what we actually face is a meritless attack on people’s fundamental constitutional rights to challenge unlawful behaviour by public bodies and protect their environment, without a shred of evidence to substantiate the changes she is rolling out?

[Mrs Grant]

I do not agree with the hon. Lady. Judicial review is a critical check on the power of the state—and it will remain so—but it is also subject to abuse, stifling innovation, frustrating reforms and imposing unnecessary costs on individuals, business and the economy. Our reforms will tackle the burden while maintaining the benefits of the rule of law, access to justice and the right to a fair hearing.

Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Helen Grant

Tuesday 21st May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas]

Will the Minister explain what the situation will be if the Government lose the appeal, which seems entirely likely given the legal case?

[Mrs Grant]

As an optimist, I would prefer to decide what action is appropriate if that happens. I do not want to prejudge the appeal.

I shall now deal with the non-Government amendments on gender reassignment. Amendment 15 would enable a marriage to be held to be continuously valid from the date of the original marriage solemnisation, effectively restoring the original marriage. Amendment 22 would allow couples who have continued to live together following the annulment to apply to have their marriage reinstated from the date on which they notify the registrar of their wish to have their marriage reinstated.

I understand the concerns that prompted hon. Members to propose those amendments, and the Government have great sympathy for couples who felt required to make the difficult choice to end their marriage to enable one party to obtain gender recognition. However, it is not possible to reinstate a marriage that has been lawfully ended by an order of the court. It will be possible to backdate converted marriages to the date of registration of the civil partnership, as the civil partnership will not have been lawfully ended.

Couples who have continued to live together will be able to marry by virtue of the changes in the Bill. I realise that that will not be a reinstatement of the original marriage, but I sincerely hope that couples will feel able to make use of these important provisions. I realise that some transsexual people in this situation may be disappointed, but we need to ensure that a person’s legal relationship status is completely clear at all times in the eyes of the law.

Amendment 18 would enable a one-off payment of £1,000 from public funds to be made as compensation for the distress caused to and costs incurred by couples who had their marriages annulled to enable one or both parties to get gender recognition. I cannot support that amendment because we have to take the law as we find it. It is not fair arbitrarily to compensate couples who decided to end their marriage under the law that applied at the time. There will be other couples who felt unable to end their marriage and who may have suffered distress as a result of not being able to obtain gender recognition. We have taken on board the issues that the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion and my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer) have raised, and we will continue to listen carefully.

The first part of amendment 16 would provide a power for the Registrar General to make regulations about the issuing of new marriage certificates to couples in which one or both parties have obtained gender recognition that reflect the trans party’s acquired gender, but retain the original date of registration. That could include the date of registration of a marriage that had been annulled. I assure the House that that part of the amendment is unnecessary because the power provided in the Bill is wide enough to deal with those matters. We will give serious consideration to the registration date that should be referred to on any new marriage certificate issued to a couple who are to stay married following gender recognition. We will also need to ensure that the certificate does not inadvertently reveal that one party has gender recognition.

The second part of amendment 16 would provide a power for the Registrar General of England and Wales to make regulations providing for amended birth certificates for transsexual people’s children to reflect the transsexual person’s acquired gender. The amendment does not seem to be directly related to equal marriage, and in any event I cannot accept it as section 12 of the Gender Recognition Act 2004 makes it clear that gender recognition does not affect the status of a transsexual person as the father or mother of a child. That section is necessary to ensure the continuity of parental rights and responsibilities and to protect the right of children to know the details of their biological parents.

Amendment 12 is intended to remove the provision in the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 that makes a marriage voidable when a transsexual person marries a non-trans person but does not inform that person of their trans status prior to the marriage or at the time when it takes place. I cannot accept the amendment, because the current provision in the 1973 Act and the corresponding provision in the Civil Partnership Act 2004 provide important protection for the non-trans spouse. If a non-trans person finds themselves in a marriage to which they did not fully consent, it is only right that they should be able to apply to annul the marriage rather than have to wait to bring time-consuming and often costly divorce proceedings.

Amendments 13 and 14 would require the Gender Recognition Panel to issue full gender recognition certificates to all applicants in protected marriages, irrespective of the non-trans spouse’s views. It would then be open to the non-trans spouse to issue divorce proceedings. I understand that the amendments are intended to remove the so-called “spousal veto” in schedule 5. However, let me be clear that non-trans spouses will not be able to veto their spouses obtaining gender recognition. I also understand that the amendments are intended to deal with the problem of hostile or obstructive non-trans spouses who deliberately seek to delay nullity proceedings. I have not seen any evidence that that is a widespread problem. If the grounds for the marriage being voidable are met, the hostility or absence of the non-trans spouse should not delay a court in issuing a decree of nullity. If there is evidence that unnecessary delays are occurring, we believe that it should be a matter for the court.

It must be remembered that a marriage is contracted between two people who should have an equal say in the future of that marriage. We consider that it would be unfair to remove the right of every non-trans spouse to have a say in the future of their marriage before gender recognition takes place. I therefore ask hon. Members not to press their amendments relating to gender reassignment.

Finally, I thank all right hon. and hon. Members who have contributed to this important debate. I am conscious of time and know that I need to leave a little time for the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) to respond, so I will conclude my remarks.

Violence against Women and Girls

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Helen Grant

Wednesday 12th October 2011 Westminster Hall

[Caroline Lucas]

As I was saying, 102 homeless applications were made due to domestic violence. Nearly 11,000 women experience physical and emotional violence; more than 2,700 women experience sexual assault; and more than 6,600 women were the focus of stalking. Those are big figures, but behind each number is a real life that has been hugely damaged by this experience. Moreover, 44% of the 264 young people assessed by the youth offending service in Brighton and Hove in 2009 had been abused—that is nearly half—and 42% had experienced domestic violence at home.

I therefore welcome the fact that, in its call to end violence against women and girls, the Home Office has recognised the need for a targeted approach to tackle the ongoing scandal of violence against and abuse of women and girls. The Government’s strategy purports to put prevention at its heart, yet I fear that that objective risks being undermined by a lack of joined-up thinking and the policies of other Government Departments.

Furthermore, as the domestic violence team at Brighton and Hove city council has told me, in the Government’s strategy, there is no allocated funding for prevention of and early intervention for violence against women. All the money is still being allocated to crisis work, with only limited attention being given to addressing the cause of the problem—in other words, perpetrators’ behaviour. In Brighton and Hove, since 2004, the city has been working specifically with perpetrators to address their abuse and I am proud that it was the first programme to be accredited nationally by Respect. The local authority has committed to maintaining the programme, but due to demand it is not able to accommodate all the referrals. It finds it very difficult to turn away people who want to join the programme, because it is so concerned about the risks that people face if help is not available.

That work needs to be properly funded. It should not be made dependent on sympathetic council administrations, or put at risk because of central Government spending cuts. Brighton and Hove, whose intelligent commissioning on domestic violence is recognised as good practice, has a local commitment to developing a strategy on violence against women and girls, with work already under way to deliver that strategy. However, not many local areas have the same kind of co-ordinated approach and I want the Government to consider making it an obligation that all local authorities must fulfil.

As well as the historical focus on tackling the aftermath of violence, such as bringing perpetrators to court, we must ensure that preventing violence in the first place is much more of a priority across Government. Let us take, for example, work with young people in schools. The importance of that work is underlined by the findings of an NSPCC study, which revealed that almost half—43%—of teenage girls believe that it is acceptable for a boyfriend to be aggressive towards a female partner. One in two boys and one in three girls believe that there are some circumstances in which it is okay to hit a woman or force her to have sex.

Young people in Britain not only have an alarmingly tolerant attitude to violence against women but many of them are exposed daily to the results of our failure to confront such attitudes head-on. For example, a YouGov poll for the End Violence Against Women Coalition found that a third of girls are subjected to unwanted sexual contact at school, with sexual harassment being routine. In addition, the NSPCC found that 33% of girls between 13 and 17 who are in an intimate partner relationship have experienced some sort of sexual partner violence. Although there has been an increased focus on other forms of bullying, many schools fail to recognise that unwanted sexual contact, sexual harassment and sexual name-calling are also specific forms of abuse that girls suffer routinely.

Girls from ethnic minority backgrounds may face additional risks. The Home Affairs Committee recently reported that schools are failing to respond to girls who are at risk of forced marriage and may even be putting female students in greater danger. We will wait and see whether forcing someone into a marriage becomes an offence in its own right, as the Prime Minister has indicated that it should be. I hope very much that he will introduce legislation on that issue.

[Mrs Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald) (Con)]

The hon. Lady made an important point about early intervention and prevention, particularly in relation to girls. Does she agree that we must do a lot more in schools and that we must talk to our girls about self-empowerment, self-esteem, gender equality and empowerment? Does she agree that we need to do much more in those areas?

[Caroline Lucas]

I thank the hon. Member for her intervention, not least because I know that she has a great deal of expertise in this area, and of course I absolutely agree with what she says. It is also interesting that young women themselves tell us that they want things to change. Around 52% of young women who were polled said that ending domestic violence against women and children is the issue that they care most about. That is according to research carried out by Girlguiding UK in conjunction with the Fawcett Society, the British Youth Council and Populus.

All over the UK, women’s organisations are doing innovative work with these young people, often with only minimal resources. For example, Rise, a charity based in Brighton and Hove, delivers a personal, social, health and economic preventive education programme on healthy relationships to schools across the city. It is also currently working to integrate the Women’s Aid “Expect Respect” programme into work that is currently taking place in primary schools. Rise also delivers “Break for Change”, a groundbreaking group for young people who are aggressive in their relationships. That group is for the young people’s carers, too. The Home Office itself is currently running a campaign called, “This is abuse”, which is aimed at tackling teenage relationship abuse.

However, work to prevent violence against women and girls cannot be left to occasional campaigns or women’s organisations working in partnership with good schools where they can. It must be an absolutely integral part of education and policy that is delivered in every single school.

Unfortunately, it appears that the Department for Education is dragging its feet on this issue. The commitment to teaching sexual consent in personal, social and health education is welcome, but it needs to go much further and include all forms of violence against women, including teenage relationship abuse, forced marriage, FGM and sexual exploitation. It should also be linked to work on gender equality and work that challenges gender stereotypes.