Oral Answers to Questions

Damian Green Excerpts

Tuesday 13th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)]

1. What plans he has to increase the uptake of restorative justice.

[The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)]

The Government intend to publish a framework for restorative justice that will improve the victim’s awareness and access to restorative justice. We have also introduced legislation to put restorative justice on to a statutory footing for the first time.

[Dr Huppert]

I am delighted to see a statutory basis for restorative justice. The Minister is, I hope, aware of the experiments in police-organised restorative justice conferences for victims of serious crime—a study carried out by criminologists from the university of Cambridge from 2001 to 2005—which showed that more than £10 of the costs of crime could be saved for every pound spent on this process. Will he ensure that ring-fenced funding is available for restorative justice, as well as the statutory basis?

[Damian Green]

I am happy to assure my hon. Friend that we are already investing more than £1.5 million to help build capacity in dealing with restorative justice throughout the criminal justice system and, in particular, for pre-sentence restorative justice, which is what his question refers to. I am also delighted to report that over 18,000 police officers have received training in restorative justice techniques. This is contributing to the greater success of our restorative justice measures.

[Mr Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend come and visit Swindon, where we are piloting neighbourhood justice panels, involving the community in making decisions about wrongdoers and having a real sense of control for the first time in relation to crimes that affect a large number of people in my community?

[Damian Green]

I would be delighted to visit my hon. Friend. It is always life-enhancing to go to Swindon—I speak as a fan of Reading football club. He is right that pilots have found that restorative justice is associated with an estimated 14% reduction in the frequency of reoffending and, perhaps even more importantly, that 85% of victims who participate in restorative justice are satisfied with the experience. Since we want to put victims at the heart of the criminal justice system, that is an extremely encouraging result.

[Priti Patel (Witham) (Con)]

2. If he will bring forward proposals to ensure that victims of crime receive compensation from those who committed the crime.

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[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

18. What plans he has to reduce the number of young people within the criminal justice system.

[The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)]

Reducing the number of young people in the criminal justice system continues to be a priority for this Government, and a range of work is going on to prevent youth offending. Youth offending teams play a key role, and cross-Government initiatives such as the troubled families programme, the liaison and diversion programme and the ending gang and youth violence programme demonstrate a co-ordinated approach to this issue.

[Steve Brine]

The Minister will know that members of the Justice Committee were told on a recent visit to YOI Hindley that breaches frequently occur when young people are released from custody and return to their community, from which they are often excluded by order of the court. That, of course, negatively hits reoffending figures, and the same circle continues to be drawn. Will the Minister work with colleagues across Government to make sure that young offenders leaving the secure estate have far better resettlement plans, as that is one sure-fire way to reduce reoffending?

[Damian Green]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point, and I look forward to receiving the Select Committee report on this matter, which we are expecting shortly. I am happy to assure my hon. Friend that we are working not only with other Departments, including the Department for Communities and Local Government, but with the Youth Justice Board to ensure that young people have access to suitable accommodation on release from custody. The YJB is also working to improve resettlement on release from custody by encouraging local services to work more collaboratively to ensure that young people have suitable accommodation, which is an essential step in stopping them reoffending.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

Under Labour, the number of first-time offenders fell by a third. Does the Minister believe it is realistic to think that that trend can continue when the cuts to local authorities are as deep as they are? He says he has a co-ordinated approach, but what is happening in practice?

[Damian Green]

I am happy to tell the hon. Lady that I do not need to project that things are carrying on in the right direction—they are carrying on in the right direction. In the past year, the number of first-time entrants to the youth justice system has fallen by 20%, from 45,900 to 36,700. I am grateful to her for giving me the chance to give those figures to the House.

[Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock) (Con)]

19. What progress he has made in tackling corporate offences of fraud, bribery and money laundering.

[The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)]

The coalition has a clear commitment to tackling corporate offending: we implemented the Bribery Act 2010 from July 2011; we published the “Fighting Fraud Together” strategy, which is led by the National Fraud Authority; we established the Economic Crime Command in 2011, as part of the National Crime Agency; and we introduced provisions on deferred prosecution agreements in England and Wales in the Crime and Courts Bill.

[Jackie Doyle-Price]

Clearly the infrastructure is in place for prosecuting these offences. Will my right hon. Friend work closely with the Serious Fraud Office to ensure that prosecutions are brought against corporate bodies when offences have been committed?

[Damian Green]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, but of course the SFO acts independently of Government. As I said, the Government take all forms of economic crime seriously and what we can do is provide the SFO and other prosecutorial bodies with the tools they need to carry out their roles. That is why, for example, we introduced clauses to provide for the deferred prosecution agreements, which we think will be a valuable tool. They have tough requirements, such as a financial penalty, reparation for victims and repayments of profits. That kind of practical tool in the hands of the prosecutors will make us much more effective at fighting economic crime.

[Mr Speaker]

We are ahead of schedule, but the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame M Morris) is in his place and we can safely proceed to topical questions.

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[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

T5. Will the Secretary of State urgently review the proposed changes to the Bail Act 1976 contained in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012? In some cases, magistrates will be forced to free defendants who they know will fail to surrender, will commit further offences while on bail and, in some cases, will go on to intimidate witnesses? To make matters worse, as the 2012 Act stands, if those offenders breach their bail conditions, the magistrates’ hands will be tied and they will have no choice but to rebail them. Is this not a ridiculous state of affairs?

[The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)]

The one point on which I will take issue with my hon. Friend is the fact that he talks about magistrates “knowing” that someone will commit an offence in the future. It is reasonably well established in British law that people are innocent until they are proved guilty—

[Sadiq Khan]

Have you seen the Bail Act?

[Damian Green]

To suggest, as the shadow Justice Secretary is doing from a sedentary position, that he, or a magistrate, knows who will commit a crime in the future seems to me to be an absolute breach of all the traditions of our justice system. Of course, if an offender goes on to commit another offence while on bail, including intimidation of a witness, that offence will be considered in its own right. If it could attract a sentence of imprisonment, the option of remand is still open to magistrates. I think we should stick by the basic tenets of justice.

[Alison Seabeck (Plymouth, Moor View) (Lab)]

In his response to my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods) on the question of payment by results and reoffending, the Secretary of State talked about the importance of evidence. Will he share with the House his assessment of the reasons behind the failure of the Mayor of London’s Project Heron at Feltham?

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[Jack Lopresti (Filton and Bradley Stoke) (Con)]

T7. Does the Secretary of State believe that the election of police and crime commissioners on Thursday will help restore public confidence in the way that offences are dealt with in local communities?

[Damian Green]

I agree with my hon. Friend, not least because although they are police and crime commissioners, people may have focused too much on the policing aspect. The crime reduction aspect is at the heart of what these new elected bodies will do, and crime prevention and some of the things that we have been discussing earlier this morning, such as restorative justice, will play a very important part in each locality in improving the criminal justice system and improving public confidence in the criminal justice system. The PCCs will play a significant part in that.

[Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)]

Harassment, threatening behaviour and bullying on social media are all increasing. What training has the Department put in place to enable probation officers, magistrates, judges and the court services to deal with that?