Oral Answers to Questions

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

I very much welcome the work that Weston College does in prisons. We are also developing our training offer for employers in areas such as rail tracks and construction, and HMPPS’s Creating future opportunities programme is working to improve the employability of offenders in both prison and the community.

[Danny Kruger (East Wiltshire) (Con)]

I declare an interest as the founder and chairman of a prison rehabilitation charity. The Minister has helpfully set out what the Government are doing about reducing reoffending, which I welcome. Is he aware, though, of the enormous pressure put on prisoners who are approaching the end of their release, given the pressures that the prison service is under? That is partly because of early release itself, which is releasing prisoners before they finish programmes provided by charities or the prisons, but also because of the churn of prisoners being shipped around the prison system because of the pressure on that system. Is there anything he can tell us about what the Government are doing to ensure that prisoners approaching the end of their sentence have some stability in the prison they are serving in so that they can get support as they approach release?

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

Several of the things that I have mentioned already are designed to do exactly that, and we recognise exactly what the hon. Gentleman says. On the SDS40 scheme, prison and probation officers have done an outstanding job in supporting prisoners through that journey.

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Danny Kruger Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 29th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (East Wiltshire) (Con)]

I think you indicated that I could speak for a little longer than eight minutes, Mr Speaker.

[Mr Speaker]

Yes.

[Danny Kruger]

Thank you very much. I do not want to have too much grumbling at the eight-minute moment. I will take my 15 minutes, with time for interventions.

I start by paying tribute to the hon. Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) for her very powerful speech and the way in which she has led this campaign—with great respect, sensitivity and, to use a contested word, dignity. She and I knew each other before we were MPs, when we both worked in the charity sector. I like and admire her greatly, and I know that we have more in common than might appear today.

All of us in this House have this in common: we all share a deep concern about the experience of people dying or fearing death, pain and suffering. I bear heavily on my conscience the people whose lives will be prolonged beyond their wishes if I get my way and this Bill is defeated today. I will not disregard those people or minimise their anxiety. We will hear those voices in today’s debate—we have heard many of them already—speaking through hon. Members in what I know will be very moving speeches.

If I voted for this Bill, I would have on my conscience many more people whose voices we cannot hear—the people who would be vulnerable as a consequence of the huge changes that this Bill would introduce in our society and in the NHS. My view is that if we get our broken palliative care system right and our wonderful hospices properly funded, we can do so much more for all the people who we will hear about today, using modern pain relief and therapies to help everybody die with a minimum of suffering when the time comes. We will not be able to do that if we introduce this new option; instead, we will expose many more people to harm.

I will go through the Bill in a moment, but first I will say a word about process, in response to the points made by the hon. Member for Spen Valley. This Bill is simply too big for the time that it has been given, and I implore hon. Members not to hide behind the fiction that it can be amended substantially in Committee and in its later stages. The remaining stages of a private Member’s Bill are for minor tweaks, not the kind of wholesale restructuring that we would need if we were ever to make this Bill safe. Members who vote for the Bill today must be prepared to see it become law largely unamended. I suggest that if they have any doubts, the only responsible choice is to vote no, and let the advocates of assisted dying bring back a better Bill at another time.

[Alistair Strathern (Hitchin) (Lab)]

I deeply appreciate the respectful way in which the hon. Gentleman is making his point, but I stand before him not sure of how any colleague in this Chamber cannot have doubts whichever way they are voting today. It feels like there are two necessary harms that we are all forced to weigh up. If the hon. Gentleman is so certain that doubt should push people one way, I am deeply intrigued to hear why that is, when it is very clear that many people will continue to suffer unnecessarily if we reject this Bill.

[Danny Kruger]

I recognise that there are very many doubts on each side, and I fully respect the arguments that have been made by the hon. Member for Spen Valley. Of course this is a finely balanced debate, but the point about process is that this Bill is too flawed; there is too much to do to it to address in Committee. By all means, let us have this debate, but let us have that before a Bill of this magnitude is brought forward, The consideration of the Bill should be much more comprehensive.

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

Contrary to what the media are saying, today’s decision is not about bringing this Bill into law; it is about allowing it to go to the next stage. People may have misgivings, but the hon. Gentleman is making the assumption that the Bill cannot be corrected or amended in order to make it palatable to people who have doubts. We all have doubts, but surely today’s vote is simply to let it go to the next stage. The final decision on Third Reading is the critical one in deciding whether the Bill goes into law.

[Danny Kruger]

I think I have made the point that this Bill is too comprehensive and there is too much in it to address through the process of a private Member’s Bill. If the hon. Gentleman has serious concerns about aspects of the Bill that he would not be prepared to see come into law, he should not be supporting it today.

Let me explain the concerns about the Bill that I think are too comprehensive to be dealt with in Committee. I recognise how hard the hon. Member for Spen Valley has worked to try to ensure that it is safe, but I do not believe it is, for the following reasons. Let us start at the beginning. The process starts with a conversation between a patient and a medical practitioner—not necessarily a doctor; just a medic of some sort, unspecified at this stage. If the patient tells their ordinary family doctor that they want an assisted death, the doctor is obliged to either explain how it works or pass them on to someone who will do it—which is probably what will happen, by the way. The likelihood is that we would see a new branch of medicine spring up, like the medics I met in Canada.

[Kevin McKenna]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Danny Kruger]

I will in a moment.

These medics I met in Canada are specialists in assisted death and personally kill hundreds of patients a year in their special clinics. [Interruption.] If hon. Members have difficulty with the language, then I wonder what they are doing here. This is what we are talking about. I met doctors for whom this is their profession and their job, and they are proud to do it.

[Lewis Atkinson (Sunderland Central) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Danny Kruger]

I will give way to the other hon. Gentleman.

[Kevin McKenna]

I want to be very clear that “medical practitioner” is a synonym for doctor—not nurse, pharmacist, dentist or any other practitioner. To be a doctor is to be a practitioner of medicine. We need to be very clear on this. There is lots of law and regulation on this, and I believe that what the hon. Member said is incorrect.

[Danny Kruger]

What the Bill actually says is that a doctor means

“a registered medical practitioner…who has such training, qualifications and experience as the Secretary of State may specify by regulations”.

Obviously they are some sort of regulated medic—I recognise that—but they are not necessarily a doctor. We will find out. I recognise that they will have professional qualifications, but it is not clear what those are going to be because it is not in the Bill.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Gentleman for the way in which he is engaging in this discussion, in the same spirit as the hon. Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater). We often hear that one of the safeguards associated with the Bill is that medical practitioners would be involved and that a diagnosis of a terminal illness, with six months or less to live, would be required. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that medicine is not an exact science? It is the science of uncertainty blended with the art of probability. There is no exactitude in this. No court will second-guess medical opinion; it will simply look at process.

[Danny Kruger]

I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman; he is absolutely right. I am afraid that the definition of terminal illness is in a sense the essential flaw in the Bill, but I will come on to that.

Going back to the conversation that the patient has with the medical practitioner, the crucial point is that the conversation does not need to be started by the patient, according to the Bill. It could be started by the medic—any medic—perhaps in hospital, who could make the suggestion of an assisted death to a patient who has never raised the issue themselves, whose family have never suggested it and whose own doctor does not think it is the right thing to do. And so the idea is planted.

Then, for whatever reason—and, by the way, there is no need ever to give a reason—the patient says that they want to proceed with an assisted death. They sign a declaration, or rather somebody else can sign it for them. It could be any professional, someone they do not know—maybe a new medical practitioner. A total stranger can do all the paperwork on their behalf. That is what the clause about the proxy entails. Then these two medical practitioners make their assessment.

[Paula Barker (Liverpool Wavertree) (Lab)]

I urge the hon. Member to check the wording of the Bill, because if somebody signs as a proxy, they have to have known the individual for two years, and would simply be signing to say that they agree with the patient who wishes to go forward with assisted dying.

[Danny Kruger]

I do not have time to check the Bill now, but from my memory it refers to someone who has known the patient for two years or someone of good standing in the community, which could be some sort of professional who is not known to them at all. Someone can quickly check the Bill, but my understanding is that it could be a total stranger to them.

[Jim Allister (North Antrim) (TUV)]

Is the matter not very clear? Clause 15(5) states:

“In this section “proxy” means—

(a) a person who has known the person making the declaration personally for at least 2 years, or

(b) a person who is of good standing in the community.”

So there is no protection such as that which is pretended by the supporters of the Bill.

[Danny Kruger]

I am grateful for that intervention.

The assessments have to determine whether the patient is terminally ill, whether they have mental capacity to make the decision, and then whether they have been coerced or pressured into the decision. In many ways the whole issue turns on the question of whether someone is terminally ill. I am afraid that it is a term of great elasticity, almost to the point of meaninglessness. It is well known, as the right hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) said earlier, that it is impossible for doctors to predict with any accuracy that somebody will die within six months. It is a purely subjective judgment, made in this case by a doctor whose job will be approving assisted deaths. They simply have to determine not whether it is reasonably certain that death will occur, but that it can be reasonably expected—in other words, that it is possible.

[Simon Hoare]

The thrust of the Bill, as I understand it, is to ease suffering and pain in a patient who has a diagnosis and will die of the condition that has been diagnosed. But that right could only be exercised within a six-month period, and the pain and discomfort could last a lot longer than that. Has my hon. Friend heard—because I have not—what the importance of six months is? Why not eight, 10 or 12? What would stop people challenging it on the grounds that the dam has been breached, the six months is entirely arbitrary and it could, and indeed should, be extended by negative resolution in a statutory instrument?

[Danny Kruger]

My hon. Friend makes the right point, and I am afraid to say that is absolutely the case. The six-month cut-off is completely arbitrary and impossible to determine. It is a line in the sand, and of course it could be challenged, as so much of the Bill could be challenged, on human rights grounds. Every one of the safeguards that has been introduced by the hon. Member for Spen Valley would in fact be a barrier and a discrimination against the new human right that has been awarded to one group but should of course be awarded to all—if the point is conceded in this way.

[Melanie Ward]

Earlier this week, colleagues and I met two eminent doctors who were former presidents of the Association for Palliative Medicine, and they raised serious concerns about the Bill, including that the doctor or medical practitioner who makes the assessment need never have met the person they are assessing, or been involved in their care at all. What does the hon. Gentleman make of that?

[Danny Kruger]

The hon. Lady makes a very important point. I will not get into the question of public opinion and the polling, because it is so contested, but there is clear evidence that the doctors who work with the dying—the palliative care professionals—are opposed to a change in the law by a great majority. They see the damage that it would do to the palliative care profession and services, and they see the danger for vulnerable patients.

[Wera Hobhouse]

I appreciate that the hon. Gentleman talks to us as a medical professional and we need to listen to his views. But is it not true that any medical assessment is an approximation; something that cannot be said for certain? For this decision too, we cannot be 100% certain, but that is life. We cannot make legislation that is 100% good because at some point we have to make a decision, on balance, whether something has merit or not. For that reason, we should vote for the Bill.

[Danny Kruger]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady, especially for promoting me to the status of doctor; I am actually a charity worker and political hack by background. It is good of her to credit me with those skills—perhaps I should set myself up as a medical practitioner. She is right that medics and indeed judges have to make difficult judgments all the time. I think it would be very dangerous and inappropriate to give them the power to do so in this case.

The whole question of the six-month cut-off is very important. I acknowledge all the points that have been made, but there is another problem with the definition of terminal illness. Almost anybody with a serious illness or disability could fit the definition. I recognise that these are not the cases that the hon. Member for Spen Valley has in mind—of course they are not—but that is the problem with the Bill. All that someone needs to do to qualify for an assisted death—for the definition of terminal illness—is refuse treatment, such as insulin if the person is diabetic. In the case of eating disorders, a topic on which I have worked with the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse), a person just needs to refuse food. The evidence from jurisdictions around the world, and our own jurisprudence, shows that that would be enough to qualify someone for an assisted death.

[Lewis Atkinson]

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that every day in the NHS patients refuse treatment, and indeed food, and that there is currently legal oversight in respect of coercion and other such matters? Would the Bill not strengthen protections in those areas?

--- Later in debate ---

[Danny Kruger]

I am perplexed by that argument. The suggestion that there may be coercion—of course there will be—and abuse, and all sorts of injustices that take place in the current system, does not strike me as an argument for regulating and licensing assisted suicide. If we have concerns about practice in the NHS, let us deal with that. Let us not license suicide—and, by the way, evidence from around the world shows that that increases suicide in the general population. Suicide is contagious. For instance, Oregon is often pointed to as an example. The incidence of suicide, outside assisted suicide laws, has risen by a third there since it was legalised. There would be enormous contagious effects were we to regulate and license it in this way.

[Richard Tice (Boston and Skegness) (Reform)]

The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent case for the Bill to be passed today. What he is actually saying is that there are specifics that require debate, analysis and discussion in great detail in Committee—that is the whole point of it. If it is not dealt with properly in Committee, it will not pass Third Reading. He is suggesting that because he does not like those specifics, we cannot discuss the Bill in any detail.

[Danny Kruger]

I am sure that the hon. Member for Spen Valley is delighted to have the support of the hon. Gentleman. I refer him to the point that I was making: this is an inappropriate process.

[Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a superb speech, as I expected him to do. On the issue of process, I say this to the hon. Member for Boston and Skegness (Richard Tice), my constituency neighbour: as he will know, I have introduced some very serious Bills, including the one that became the Investigatory Powers Act 2016. It was preceded by three independent reports and pre-legislative cross-party scrutiny by both Houses, which happened before the Committee stage. The point is that that process should take place before Second Reading, not after.

[Danny Kruger]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend. I will now run through the process before taking any more interventions.

As I have explained, pretty much anybody with a serious illness or disability could work out how to qualify for an assisted death under the Bill. Members may think that far-fetched, but it is what happens everywhere that assisted suicide is legal, including in Oregon.

[Cat Eccles (Stourbridge) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The hon. Gentleman is using incorrect language. It is not suicide. That is offensive. I ask him please to correct his language.

[Mr Speaker]

That is not a point of order.

[Danny Kruger]

I am sorry if offence is given, but the fact is that the value of having a Bill in black and white is seeing what the law really is. What the Bill would do is amend the Suicide Act 1961. It would allow people to assist with a suicide for the first time. I respect the hon. Lady’s concern, but I am afraid we do need to use the proper language here.

The Bill’s scope is very broad. Members who think that assisted suicide for people with anorexia or other conditions that would not be regarded as terminal could not happen here should consider the young people in the UK today who are given a diagnosis of terminal anorexia and put on a palliative care pathway—essentially, assigned to death. Of course these are extreme cases—

[Wera Hobhouse]

rose—

[Danny Kruger]

I am not going to give way again.

There are a great many of these cases, I am afraid, and I mention them to show how wide open the Bill is. [Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. May I ask the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) to keep a little calmer? She has intervened twice already, and plenty of other Members who also need to be heard.

[Danny Kruger]

I think particularly of disabled people, many of whom require constant treatment to stay alive. All, immediately and by definition, will be eligible under the terms of the Bill for a state-sponsored death. I refer Members to the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which has made the point that the line between disability and terminal illness is very blurred. That is why the Bill’s title is, in fact, so dangerous.

[Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)]

rose—

[Danny Kruger]

I will make a little progress.

The second question that medical practitioners have to answer is about mental capacity, and here again is a great vagueness. How do they judge if someone is in their right mind when they are asking for help to kill themselves? The Bill says that the definition of capacity is based on the Mental Capacity Act 2005, but that Act is deliberately expansive. It explicitly assumes capacity in the patient, so having acute depression is no bar to being judged to have capacity under the Act. Being suicidal is no bar under the Act, so the capacity test is no bar at all.

Finally, there is the question of coercion. Is the patient asking for an assisted death because of pressure from someone else? There are two glaring problems here. The first is that the process does not even attempt to answer the question properly. There is no investigation, no requirement for medics to interview friends and family, and no need for a psychiatrist or family doctor to be consulted. The medics just need to satisfy themselves—who knows how?—that, to the best of their knowledge, the person has not been pressured.

The second problem with the coercion test is that it focuses on only one type of coercion—the less likely type. The bigger danger is not other people pressuring someone to do this; it is that they pressure themselves—hon. Members have made this point. The Bill has nothing to say on that. Internal pressure is absolutely fine. If you feel worthless or a burden to others, if the NHS will not offer you the treatment you need, if the local authority will not make the adjustments you need to your home, if you have to wait too long for a hospital appointment, or if you want to die because you think the system has failed you, that is absolutely fine.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Danny Kruger]

I will get to the end of my speech.

That is the medical stage, and I will jump straight to the judicial stage. The medical practitioners sign it off, and then the judge has to confirm all the same tests. Of course, many eminent judges have made the point that it will overwhelm the family courts if the test were applied properly, but it will not be applied properly, because the Bill assumes that judges will fulfil a new inquisitorial role and actually look into cases as investigators, which is entirely unknown in English common law. But the Bill will not require any actual investigation.

There is no requirement for a judge even to meet the applicant. They simply have to have a phone call, or maybe it will be an email, from one of the medics. That is it. That is the inquiry. On that basis, the judge must decide whether it is more likely than not that there has been external pressure. After the judge approves it—they are required to approve it, unless they can find evidence of external coercion—we go to “the final act”, as the Bill says, where a junior colleague, as a medical practitioner, oversees your death by pills or lethal injection.

And here is the last thing that the Bill does or does not do. There is no requirement at any stage of the process—at either the medical or the judicial stage—for anyone to tell the patient’s next of kin, their wider family or even their GP that the NHS and the judicial system are working in secret to bring about the death of their loved one, maybe their father or their daughter. I say again that these are not the cases that the Bill was designed for, but they are directly in scope, and it is going to take more than a tweak in Committee to get them out.

Is this what is meant by having choice at the end of life? Let us talk about choice. I am often accused of wanting to impose my view on others—that point was made earlier. People say, “If you don’t approve of assisted death, don’t have one, but don’t deprive me of the choice.” In fact, the evidence is that, with this new option and the comparative loss of investment and innovation in palliative care, real choice will narrow. There is a broader point to make about choice, which is that no man or woman is an island. Just as every person’s death, even a good death, diminishes us all, so we will all be involved and affected if we make this change.

The Bill will not just create a new option for a few and leave everyone else unaffected; it will impose this new reality on every person towards the end of their life, on everyone who could be thought to be near death, and on their families—the option of assisted suicide, the obligation to have a conversation around the bedside or whispered in the corridor, “Is it time?” It will change life and death for everyone.

I am very aware of the terrible plight of the people who are begging us for this new law. I think we can do better for them than they fear, but we also need to think in real human terms about what the effect will be on the choices of other people, and I do not mean the people who are used to getting their way. I am talking about the people who lack agency, the people who know what it is to be excluded from power and to have decisions made for them by bigwigs in distant offices who speak a language they do not understand—the sort of people who the hon. Member for Spen Valley and I both know from our previous charity work, and who we all know from our constituency work. They are not the people who write to us campaigning for a change in the law, but the people who come to our surgeries with their lives in tatters, or who the police or social workers tell us about—the people with complex needs. What are the safeguards for them?

Let me tell the House: we are the safeguard—this place; this Parliament; you and me. We are the people who protect the most vulnerable in society from harm, yet we stand on the brink of abandoning that role. The Rubicon was a very small stream, but on the other side lies a very different world—a worse world, with a very different idea of human value. The idea that our individual worth lies in our utility, valuable only for so long as we are useful—not a burden, not a cost, not making a mess. Let us not be the Parliament that authorises that idea.

I mentioned at the start of my speech the voices of those we cannot hear: the frail and elderly and the disabled. As we are surrounded by such a cloud of witnesses, let us do better than this Bill. Let today be not a vote for despair, but the start of a proper debate about dying well, in which we have a better idea than a state suicide service. Let us have a debate in which we remember that we have intrinsic value; that real choice and autonomy means having access to the best care possible and the fullest control over what happens to us while we live; and that true dignity consists in being cared for to the end.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Child Trust Funds

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2024 Westminster Hall

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I am pleased to speak in support of my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Sir Jeremy Quin), and it is a privilege and a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Ed Davey), who spoke so well. I entirely agree with what has been said.

I had the pleasure of speaking a few weeks ago at a conference organised by the Share Foundation. Gavin Oldham is in the Gallery for this debate. Andrew Turner spoke at the conference as well and laid out all the practical challenges that we have heard. There was also a very good speech by Ruth Kelly, the former Labour Minister who had oversight of the child trust fund policy when it was introduced. It inspired me to recognise how often good Conservative policies are introduced by non-Conservative Governments, because I have a great respect for the policy.

Another speaker discussed the real genesis of the child trust fund, which was, of course, Tom Paine. In the 1770s and 1780s, he wrote about an approach by which Governments simply gave families a lump of capital as a means of sustaining them and ensuring that they developed the habits of thrift, industry and self-reliance that we all need. We might remember that in the 1990s, the then Labour Opposition were developing ideas around what they called asset-based welfare, which is a very good principle and one that I would not give to Labour entirely. We all share these ideas—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Julie Elliott (in the Chair)]

The debate may now continue until 6.15 pm. I call Danny Kruger to resume his speech.

[Danny Kruger]

Thank you very much, Ms Elliott—I shall resume, rather than start again. I was saying that the child trust fund has its roots in a very good British tradition: the principle of asset-based welfare. In the 1990s, there was a tussle about the approach to public services. On the one hand, there was what we have come to call new public management, which was about centralised and bureaucratic quasi-market systems based on individual entitlements and comprehensive services. On the other, there was asset-based welfare, which was about putting capital into families and supporting communities to develop their own collective responses to social challenges.

In the new Labour years, the new public management model won out, with the great and noble exception of the child trust fund, which is such a brilliant innovation. It is such an important principle that people should be trusted to manage wealth and to sustain their families directly. I regret that, in 2010, when the coalition Government came in, the child trust fund was abandoned —I was going to have a pop at the Liberal Democrats, who I am sure were responsible for scrapping it, but let us just blame George Osborne, because we can all unite on that. Junior ISAs were established instead, and that is also a very good principle.

I want to echo the points that were eloquently made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham and by the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton about the real injustice that families now endure. Back in the days when the child trust fund was created, not enough consideration was given to children without mental capacity to access and manage their own finances upon becoming adults. Something very wrong was done without anybody intending it and without it being properly thought through. I will not repeat the points made by my right hon. Friend, but we have a huge obligation to right that injustice.

It is worth pointing out that we have not just tens of thousands of young people locked out of money that is rightfully theirs and without the money or incentive to pursue a Court of Protection case to unlock it. There is also a significant disincentive to open a junior ISA for parents with a disabled child who are thinking about the long-term future and whether it will be possible to access that money. So we are inhibiting the principle of saving altogether.

The right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton and my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham made very good suggestions about a one-off order solution—I absolutely echo the case made there—and also about the DWP appointee scheme. The fact that we do that for benefits—as we have heard, those often account for much greater sums than the child trust fund—means that we should extend it. I also agree with the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton about relieving the pressure on the Court of Protection.

The principle of child trust funds is such a good and important one in terms of the welfare model that we should have. The injustice that we have at the moment—the complexity of the system and the fact that there are so many dormant accounts—does not apply just to the families who know about the money that belongs to their disabled children and who want to access it; many millions of young people do not know that they have the right to this money—that it is, in fact, rightfully theirs. I understand that about 6 million young people have accounts, worth around £2,000 each, that they are unaware of, and it is estimated that around 1 million of those young people will come from deprived circumstances. What an enormous injustice it is that all that money is sitting there in Government accounts that they are not able to access! This has been described as malign neglect; it will not be deliberate—nobody is actively trying to prevent young people from accessing money that is rightfully theirs—but, nevertheless, for reasons we have heard about, disabled children and young people more widely are not being given access to money that is rightfully theirs.

I echo the point made by campaigners, including Gavin Oldham from the Share Foundation, about having a default withdrawal policy whereby the system knows the bank details of young people who are registered with HMRC. I understand that about 60% of young people with child trust fund accounts that they have not yet accessed could simply be given the money. That should happen; there would need to be communications and an information campaign around that, but it is the right thing to do, not least because it would stop the outrage of companies charging a 25% fee for the benefit of informing young people of the fact that they have this money. That, I think, is the future model.

As a country, we should be proud of the principle of child trust funds. A lot of people are increasingly thinking that we need to develop approaches around asset-based welfare. I noticed that David Willetts, a former colleague of ours, is proposing something similar—a capital sum granted to young people at coming of age—and Gavin Oldham has suggested that inheritance tax receipts should be used to invest in child trust funds for the future. I think that this is an old idea whose time has come, and I hope we can fix the immediate problems we have and then think more broadly about how to extend this model more widely.

Prison Capacity

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Monday 16th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Alex Chalk]

I know that the hon. Gentleman cares passionately about joint enterprise, but I must tell him this: joint enterprise is the legal doctrine that means that the getaway driver is culpable, or that the person who supplies the firearm in a murder is held properly accountable and found guilty. Those are important tools that the Court of Appeal considered carefully in the case of Jogee. Getting rid of joint enterprise would mean that a lot of people who have helped or encouraged the commission of offences get away—in some cases, with murder.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I declare an interest as the founder and chairman of a charity that works in prisons. I very much support today’s announcement of an expansion of prison capacity and tagging, both of which are necessary and right. I understand that the Lord Chancellor was inspired by Texas prisons. I visited some Texan jails and saw that they are doing two things right. The first is sentencing, with tough justice ensuring that people get the sentences that they deserve. The second thing that they are doing in Texas to reduce the jail population is getting rehabilitation right and, crucially, relying on civil society—outside organisations get access to prisoners before they are released and then support them afterwards. I think that the Government are getting it right on sentencing, but does the Lord Chancellor agree that we need to do more on rehabilitation, particularly by involving civil society?

[Alex Chalk]

My hon. Friend is completely correct. We in this Chamber all know that the context for offending—not an excuse, but the context—can be deep-seated problems of addiction, homelessness, relationship breakdown and so on. One thing I am pleased about is that the Department of Health and Social Care is investing over half a billion pounds, with more than 1,600 additional staff, to ensure that drug treatment is available to those who need it. For our part, we in the Ministry of Justice have launched a pilot of three intensive supervision courts in the Teesside and Liverpool Crown courts to ensure that those whose offending behaviour is driven by substance misuse can get the treatment they need to get them off drugs and off the driver of their offences.

Draft Criminal Justice Act 2003 (Home Detention Curfew) Order 2023

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Monday 20th March 2023 General Committees

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I recognise the essential importance of rehabilitation. Does the hon. Lady agree that the opportunity to allow prisoners to spend longer on HDC as they approach the end of their sentence will aid their rehabilitation by enabling them to take part in community support outside prison?

[Ellie Reeves]

If HDC is done properly, it can work well, but my concern is that this measure is being rushed through, without a properly thought-out process. I will talk a bit about the probation service and the challenges that it is already facing. This measure comes on top of that and will increase its workload further, which is why I have real concerns about how this will work in practice.

The probation service now faces severe staff shortages and unmanageable workloads, and morale is at rock bottom. All of that has led to a failure to monitor dangerous criminals, putting the public at risk. Meanwhile, we hear time and again of prisoners who have been released to sleep rough on the streets or drift back into drug abuse, making them more likely to commit further crimes. And what did we hear from the Government last week? They are forcing 5% of headquarters staff to move back to the frontline.

It is another sticking-plaster policy in response to 13 years of failure, and today’s proposals will likely add a further burden to an already overstretched probation service. They mean that officers will need to complete more HDC assessments, testing the suitability of the proposed release address and examining any previous behaviours by the prisoner on licence or bail. However, the chief inspector of probation recently detailed the current poor standard of risk assessments, with two thirds of those inspected being insufficient. If risk assessments are done quickly, there is a real danger that they will not be completed to the required standard and so the public may be at risk from those released.

We need assurances from the Minister today about what will be done to ensure that the probation service has the capacity to take on the sudden spike in cases from implementing this plan. How will the Government ensure that assessments are not rushed but are properly carried out? Can the Minister confirm that all those released early will have the same checks as they otherwise would have had, including home visits, checks on the proposed release address, and domestic abuse call-outs?

In conclusion, real harm is being done by the chaos in our criminal justice system.

Powers of Attorney Bill

Danny Kruger Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 9th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I will be brief: I completely agree with the purpose of this Bill and will be supporting it, but I want to speak briefly in recognition of the great significance of LPAs. I quote from Stephanie Boyce, the President of the Law Society, who has said:

“LPAs are arguably one of the most important legal documents that a person will make because they delegate such wide-reaching powers over their life…the consequence of an attorney making a poor decision could result in the loss of all their assets, being put into a care home against their current or past wishes, or even their premature death”.

It is death that is on my mind, because of my role as chair of the all-party parliamentary group for dying well, which campaigns against a law for assisted dying in this country. The problem of elder abuse is sadly endemic in our society, and I am afraid that ensuring that we get the signature or the verbal assent of an elderly person is not always enough to protect their interests. We must always hold to the essential dignity of a person in old age. The more dependent they are, the more dignity they need.

I spoke yesterday about my concerns about the drift towards a cashless society. We are moving towards a paperless society as well. That may well be a good thing for older people, but it can also become more bewildering and expose us to greater potential for abuse. I think we need a grand review of the effects of digitalisation in our society, on our communities, on vulnerable people and on liberty.

Assisted Dying

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Monday 4th July 2022 Westminster Hall

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

It is an honour to serve under you, Sir Roger, and I welcome the debate. I should declare that I am chair of the all-party parliamentary group for dying well.

Let me start by saying how much I recognise the good faith, integrity and powerful arguments of the hon. Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi), all hon. Members speaking in support of the petition and all the campaigners who support it. I recognise the extreme distress and anxiety felt by families who have been through the agonising death of a loved one who experienced suffering that no human being should go through. I will address the issue of bad deaths in a moment, but first I want to look at the implications of assisted dying as I see them, and what would happen if we did it in this country, based on our experience and that of other countries.

I do not have a suite of powerful personal stories, although I recognise the enormous moral value of them all; I invoke the nameless and numberless people who will be affected if we introduce this law. The main argument for assisted dying is the simple one of autonomy. I think a lot of the support for assisted dying comes from the simple and natural resentment that anybody should try to stop people doing what they want, especially about something as important as this—literally a matter of life and death. But in this case, things are the other way around for many people. In my view, we need to keep assisted dying illegal because, as a matter of practical fact, for many people, it would narrow their autonomy. It would reduce their freedom substantially, because it would put them on a path with only one destination. That is because of the incentives that assisted dying would introduce.

The first incentive would be in our healthcare system. The simple, blunt fact is that it is cheaper for the system to help people end their life early than to care for them for weeks, months or years. That is not an argument we hear for assisted dying, but it is compelling. The cat was let out of the bag rather when the Member of the Scottish Parliament who is trying to legalise assisted dying in Scotland cited research from Canada showing that the health service there has saved hundreds of millions of dollars in care costs. We see, in contraction to a point made by the hon. Member for Gower, that where assisted dying is introduced, investment in palliative care stalls or recedes in comparison with countries where assisted dying is illegal.

Meanwhile, in Oregon, we see people being refused palliative care on cost grounds and then choosing assisted dying because there is no other option. I know we pretend that we do not have rationing in the NHS, but obviously, with finite resources, we do. Do we really imagine that assisted dying will not become an option that doctors and medical managers will not tacitly—even unintentionally—encourage?

[Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making some very interesting points, although I am on the other side of the argument. With such controversial issues, we tend to point to facts on either side of the argument. Would it not be sensible to have an independent inquiry, by the Health and Social Care Committee or otherwise, to look at the points that he raises and the points that others would raise on the other side of the argument?

[Danny Kruger]

I recognise the force of that point, but the fact is that Parliament has debated the topic repeatedly over the last 20 years. We have devoted considerable hours of parliamentary time to it already.

[Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con)]

We had the opportunity to vote on the matter in 2015, but that was a great many years ago and many people who are Members of Parliament today were not present. Does my hon. Friend agree that “repeatedly” was perhaps the wrong word to use in that context?

[Danny Kruger]

As I understand it, we have had 14 hours of parliamentary time devoted to the topic in this Parliament alone. I suggest that there are other topics that we could address. I recognise that assisted dying is worth discussing, but there is something that we should do first, before we consider it. I will come to that point in a moment.

Members who think we can prevent people from being put on the pathway to assisted dying by good drafting, or because doctors are good people—obviously, they are—should think about the “do not resuscitate” scandal we had during the pandemic, and about the Liverpool care pathway, and then suggest there is no risk. I think there is a risk. I know that doctors are good people who want the best, but if we force them to make utilitarian decisions about the best use of resources, will they not push people in this direction?

As well as the pressure on the healthcare system to take this route, I worry even more about the pressure on patients themselves to request assisted dying if it is an option. It will be an option for almost everybody approaching death—that is the proposal. Clinical guidelines for many terminal or chronic illnesses will likely require doctors, at an early stage of planning treatment, to ask patients whether they would wish to have assistance in taking their own life. What a question to ask. Whatever the guidelines, every family will be required to have the conversation, in whispers or openly. In some families, we know how that conversation could all too likely go.

Over half the people in countries where assisted dying is legal choose it because they feel they are a burden to their family. Tragically, a lot also say that they are lonely. Is that not terrible—people getting the state to help kill them because they do not want to be a burden on a family that never visits them? Talk to any hospice manager about relatives and they will quietly confirm it. There are a lot of people who want granny or grandpa to hurry up and die.

[Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)]

The hon. Member is making a number of points. Like the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake), I am on the other side of the debate. Is it not the case that many of the people who are being characterised as wanting granny or grandpa to hurry up and die, are in fact simply wanting their pain to end, and want a compassionate way to bring that to an end? They do not want them to die; wanting them to die is the furthest thing from their mind. However, they are going to have to die, and they want to make it a better death.

[Danny Kruger]

I really do thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. She is absolutely right, and I thank her for allowing me to make it abundantly clear what I hope I made clear earlier: I recognise the enormous power of the campaign, and that the overwhelming majority of people want it for the best of intentions. All of the people campaigning for this, and the overwhelming majority of the people who imagine making use of this law, do so for the absolute best of intentions. Please can we not have a deliberate misunderstanding of the points I make? I represent a lot of people who think this way, and I am making the point in all sincerity.

I challenge Members, many of whom must visit their hospices and know what is acknowledged as the fact of elder abuse. Tragically, we have a rising epidemic of elder abuse in this country. Half of elderly people who are victims of financial crime are victimised by their own adult children. It is not just the elderly we need to be concerned about. It is no surprise that no disabled organisation supports the proposal. It is the most vulnerable people, who by definition rely on the support of other people—their families and professionals—who are most at risk of assisted dying laws being misapplied, which is what I fear would happen. Suddenly, every controlling and coercive relative, every avaricious carer or neighbour, every overstretched or under-resourced doctor or hospital manager would have the means to cut their cost, and I do not believe it is possible to design out the risks.

[Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a compelling case. We have heard a lot about quality of life, but who are we to judge what a quality life really is? Is someone who is profoundly disabled without quality? Is someone with profound learning difficulties without quality? Why do we assume that the only lives worth living are those that are perfect or of high quality in the eyes of others?

--- Later in debate ---

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, I think there is a lot in that. As Health Secretary, I met people on both sides of the argument. I admire so much those who give palliative care. I took the opportunity to put more funding into palliative care, although I also support the mixed model of funding because I think that the funds raised through voluntary efforts and philanthropy are important—I have raised money for my brilliant local hospice, St Nicholas Hospice in Bury St Edmunds. But the truth is that even the best palliative care in the world cannot stop the deep pain and trauma that comes with some diseases, especially but not only cancers, at the end of life. Medicine simply cannot stop the pain in every case.

As Health Secretary, I also heard from supporters of change. I want briefly to mention two examples. The first is Sir Paul Cosford, the former medical director of Public Health England—my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) will have worked with him—who gave enormous and great service during the pandemic. Everybody in this Chamber will have heard him on Radio 4. What most people will not know is that he was living with cancer for the entirety of the pandemic. The work from home provisions allowed him to keep serving right up until very shortly before his death. A month before his death, he asked for some time with me, one on one, and he explained to me that he was nearing the end. As a doctor, he had seen many, many patients go through what he was about to go through, and he did not want to go through that. He said to me, “The end, when it comes for me, will be brief, but others do not have that choice.” He asked me this question: “Would you want the choice of how to die?” I ask everyone in the Chamber that same question.

As a local MP, I was honoured six weeks ago to meet David Minns, who has terminal myeloma. He told me a heart-rending story about how he saw in recent years his daughter die of a very painful cancer without successful pain mitigation, and he does not want to go through that. Nor does he want to go to Switzerland; he is a proud, patriotic man. He could potentially live longer if he knew that he could be assisted in his death, as we have heard from so many others.

Nine countries now allow assisted dying in a highly specific form. There are reasonable arguments on both sides, so there are constraints in place. We can learn from the experience overseas. There are countries with our common law tradition and parts of this United Kingdom that are considering assisted dying.

[Danny Kruger]

Does my right hon. Friend not acknowledge that in every single country where measures such as assisted dying, assisted suicide or euthanasia have been introduced, there is only one direction of change, which is towards more progressive liberalisation of the law? It always goes towards more liberalisation, including in Canada, where euthanasia is now being proposed.

[Matt Hancock]

I heard that argument, so I looked into it. In Oregon, for instance, which is the originator of the proposals that many people support, that is simply not the case. There was one change made many years ago and the law has now rested. There is essentially agreement about it.

I cannot see how the Minister can argue for anything other than an informed, compassionate debate on the Floor of the House. For 50 years we have had a legal choice over who to love. For a decade we have had a legal choice over who we can marry. Let us have an informed debate about, when the end is inevitable and the pain insufferable, how we die.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Stephen Timms]

I have not seen the polls that the right hon. Member refers to, but I think it is the case that all the major organisations representing disabled people in the UK oppose this change in the interests of their members.

There are good and compassionate arguments—we have heard a number of them—in favour of the change that the petition calls for. I do not agree with those arguments, but let us be clear that they are not the only arguments for the change. In some minds, they are clearly not the decisive arguments either. As we have been told, in some countries where the change has been made, it is explicitly about saving the health service money.

My party introduced the national health service, which is our proudest achievement. It needs to be adequately funded. The fact that it is not being adequately funded at the moment must not become an excuse for giving up and accepting that painful deaths are unavoidable. Instead, as all right hon. and hon. Members have agreed so far in the debate, we need to invest in palliative care, where there have been big advances and where there could be many more, and to ensure that adequate care is provided to everybody who needs it.

I agree with the organisation Care Not Killing that we want

“a funded policy for comprehensive hospice, community and hospital specialist palliative care services across the country with a duty placed on NHS trusts to ensure these services are made available to all who need them.”

I visited my local children’s hospice on Saturday—we have heard from a number of Members who have made such visits—and it had a fête to raise funds, because it is struggling for cash. In my view, it should not have to do that.

“In Place of Fear” was how Nye Bevan summed up what had been achieved in founding the NHS. Let us not give up now and decide that we can no longer afford the relief from fear that he rightly promised.

[Danny Kruger]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir Stephen Timms]

I cannot give way again.

We should renew our determination not to impose fear and an awful moral dilemma on frail and conscientious elderly people approaching the end of their lives, and insist on modern palliative care for those who need it and a properly funded health service that supports living.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Slaughter]

I not only do not accept that; I find it the most appalling scaremongering. I have never met a GP who I do not think has a duty to their patients. They may vary in their competence and skills, but in their duty to their patients there is a very honourable tradition among general practitioners, and indeed the whole of the medical profession in this country. To throw such comments into this debate is not helpful to the right hon. Gentleman’s own side, let alone anyone else’s.

It is right that recently, under the former Health Secretary, the right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock), who spoke earlier, the Government undertook research, but they have so far not found the time or resource for a proper investigation and debate, potentially leading to legislation. I am a supporter of good local palliative care, and for several years I have been fighting to retain it for my constituents against attempts to restrict it. We should strive to provide the very best palliative care to all those who are nearing the end of their lives. For many families, palliative care and respite care for family members is essential, but in order to offer the very best palliative care, we need the tools, the people and the money to sustain it.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) has recently spoken about Labour’s plan for a national care service. To offer people real dignity in dying, we need a focused approach to care and end-of-life care, which a national care service could provide. Pembridge Hospice and Palliative Care in North Kensington served my constituents for many years until, several years ago, the in-patient unit was closed because it could not recruit a consultant. That is where we should look for problems. Assisted dying is not an alternative to palliative care; the two complement each other.

[Danny Kruger]

Does the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that the Health and Care Act 2022 included the amendment proposed by my noble Friend Baroness Finlay of Llandaff to ensure that palliative care becomes a commissioned service in the NHS for the first time in its history? Does he welcome that?

[Andy Slaughter]

I heard that from one of the hon. Gentleman’s colleagues earlier and I absolutely welcome it. However, as I said, we need not only a policy commitment but funding—and that includes workforce planning, because palliative care consultants are in short supply.

This should not be a debate only between different attitudes, religious practices or medical treatments; it should be a debate about ensuring that the needs of the terminally ill are met in the most appropriate and compassionate way. I understand the strongly held views of those who oppose assisted dying, but I am a firm believer in freedom of choice and bodily autonomy—issues that have come to the fore in the wake of the reversal of Roe v. Wade, and not just in the US. This is a matter of conscience. It is one of the most sensitive that we have to deal with, but we must not shirk our responsibility on those grounds.

I agree with the petitioners’ request for the Government to grant the means to debate and, if there is the will in Parliament, to reform the law in the interests of those who find themselves at the end of their life and in a perilous position. Whatever our difference of opinion here, we all agree that those nearing the end of their life deserve our compassion. There is more that we can do, not just in the debate on assisted dying, but in how we care for those who are terminally ill.

As the world changes around us, we cannot stand still. We have a duty to bring this matter before Parliament again and allow it to decide. How we begin that process is down to the Government. I hope the Minister agrees that, if the necessary time is made available in Parliament, we should be able to debate, vote and, if there is the will, legislate on this issue. It would be perverse if Scotland, Jersey and the Isle of Man had legislated on this matter before we have even had a chance to discuss it in a meaningful way. This has been a very good and measured debate, but the next stage must be to allow the voices of our constituents, which are very strong on this matter, to be heard—not just this in Chamber, but the main Chamber, and therefore through legislation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Tuesday 14th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I remind the Minister that the courtroom in Chorley is still available—it is back up for sale.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

2. What steps he is taking to implement the recommendations in Richard Oldfield’s report on the dynamic framework of the probation service, published in June 2021.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lucy Frazer)]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for his interest and input in this area. I welcome the findings and recommendations of Richard Oldfield’s report, and in particular his primary conclusion that we should do more to encourage the participation of smaller organisations in the delivery of rehabilitation services. We are looking at how we can use more grants rather than contracts where it is appropriate to do so as well as how to simplify the qualification process and bidding process for the dynamic framework.

[Danny Kruger]

I declare that I am the founder and chairman of a small charity working in prisons and probation. I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend for that answer. I congratulate Richard Oldfield on his report and the Minister on commissioning it. I am pleased to hear about the progress being made. Does the Minister agree that we need a culture change across the justice system, with managers and commissioners being prepared to trust the small community-based organisations that can deliver such good value, and that that entails having a bolder attitude to risk?

[Lucy Frazer]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. It is really important that local community services deliver rehabilitative services in the communities that they serve and we are trying to ensure that culture change. Of the 26 organisations delivering rehabilitative services in the unified model, 23 are voluntary and community sector organisations, but we will do more to ensure that those small community organisations deliver services for us.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Danny Kruger Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading - Day 2
Tuesday 16th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I am delighted to speak in support of this Bill. I particularly welcome the balance it strikes on sentencing, with longer sentences for the most serious offenders but smarter justice, including more community punishments, for young offenders. Having worked for 10 years with prisoners and young offenders, I know that this is the right balance, and that the Bill will be welcomed by my constituents and across the country.

That is why I am so disappointed by the stance taken by the Labour party. It is understandable to object to aspects of the Bill, it is right for the Opposition to challenge the Government on civil liberties and police powers, and it is understandable to see whether this Bill can be amended to include more protections for women and girls, but for the Opposition to say that they will vote against the whole Bill at this early stage—to vote against the aims and principles of the Bill—is to try to make such amendments impossible. It is also blatantly opportunistic. They had no such in-principle objections last week; there was no sense that the clauses on protests or street safety, or the relative number of mentions of women and statues, were so bad that the whole Bill had to be rejected. Last week, the Opposition were just planning to abstain on Second Reading. That in itself was pretty craven and showed Labour’s weak commitment to law and order, but now they have been blown off the fence and blown into voting against the whole Bill. They faced a test this week: would the party, under its new leader, stand for law and order, or would it stand for gestures? It faced that test and failed it, and the public will notice.

Of course it is right that we use this occasion to discuss the abuse and misogyny that women suffer every day in this country. Some of this abuse is already illegal, but all of it must be deprecated in the strongest terms, because all of it has its root in male disrespect of women. This is not a modern phenomenon. I am afraid to say that it is as old as time and it is written on almost every page of human history. But something else is written in our history too: the attempts by society to contain male violence and male disrespect.

Our culture historically taught men that they had a duty to honour and protect women. It is a difficult thing to say, because it may appear that I want to turn back the clock to a time when men chivalrously protected the weaker sex, but of course, as I have said, that is not how it always was in the old days, and even if it had been, we do not accept the idea that women need protection by men; they just need men to behave themselves. So let me say emphatically that I do not want to turn back the clock; however, we do need to face the fact that our modern culture has not delivered all the progress it was supposed to. I wonder whether that is because our modern culture has a problem with telling people how to behave—it has a problem with society having a moral framework at all.

It is right that we are having this debate, and I hope we get to a better place because of it, because the key thing is that all the laws in the world will not stop violence against women and will not stop sexism if our culture is not right. We need boys to grow up secure in themselves, with good role models and an innate sense of respect for other people. That means stronger families and more supportive communities.

Oral Answers to Questions

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jacob Young (Redcar) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to reduce reoffending.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to reduce reoffending.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Lucy Frazer)]

We are committed to cutting crime and reducing reoffending. A total of 80% of people in our prisons have reoffended, so if we want to cut crime we absolutely need to stop reoffending. In the past two weeks, we have announced a transformative cross-governmental package to address the underlying causes of reoffending: £80 million to increase the number of drug treatment places for prison leavers; and £70 million investment to cut reoffending by supporting people from prison into accommodation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Frazer]

The measures to which my hon. Friend refers—those which his prospective candidate is interested in—are exactly the measures that we are rolling out. We are looking at shortly rolling out tags for persistent offenders, and expanding and refreshing our integrated offender management tools to ensure that the police crack down on neighbourhood crime.

[Danny Kruger [V]]

I declare an interest as the founder and chairman of a prisoner rehabilitation charity. I very much welcome the announcement of a new package to support the reduction in reoffending that my hon. and learned Friend just mentioned. Does she agree that the dynamic framework for probation contracts should have an explicit objective of enabling small frontline charities and social enterprises to play a full role, with full cost recovery, in the delivery of rehabilitation services?

[Lucy Frazer]

I do agree, and I commend my hon. Friend for the work that he did before he came to Parliament to support youths at risk of reoffending. He will be interested to know that of the 221 organisations that qualified for the dynamic framework, nearly 80% are voluntary sector or community organisations. So far, we have awarded 17 contracts, four of which have been awarded to the voluntary sector or community organisations, but we hope to build on this. We expect the proportion of awards in those sectors to increase in the next round, because 70% of the personal wellbeing bids and 100% of the women’s services contracts have come from organisations in those sectors. As I have discussed with him, we are also conducting a review of the first stages of the competition to ensure that we maximise those sectors’ participation in future competitions.