Sentencing Guidelines (Pre-sentence Reports) Bill

Diane Abbott Excerpts

Committee of the whole House & Report stage
Wednesday 30th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Jeremy Wright]

My hon. Friend makes a fair point in relation to offenders who hover on the border between community sentences and custodial sentences, but he will know that, in the Crown court at least, the majority of such offenders already have a pre-sentence report. Of course, there are also offenders who come before the courts for sentencing and it is blindingly obvious either that a custodial sentence will follow, or that neither a community sentence nor a custodial sentence is realistically in prospect, so I do not think it right to say that we should have a pre-sentence report in every case, but there is already in law a presumption that pre-sentence reports should be ordered unless it is unnecessary to do so. What we are seeking to do here is respond to a very specific set of circumstances that have arisen as a result of a Sentencing Council decision. As he may have heard me say on Second Reading, I do not think that the Sentencing Council handled this well, and as a result we are having to do something that we would otherwise not have to do.

Sentencing offenders is, in all circumstances, a difficult business. The fact that different offenders receive different sentences, even for the same offence, is not necessarily evidence of a defect in sentencing practice as a result of guidelines or otherwise, but is more likely a reflection of the reality that every case and every offender is different. We should not, I suggest, try to stop judges reaching the appropriate conclusion, assisted by Sentencing Council guidelines, in each case before them.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

Nobody is trying to stop judges sentencing in individual cases. All the Sentencing Council was seeking to do was ensure that judges and magistrates had the maximum amount of information before coming to a decision on the sentence.

[Sir Jeremy Wright]

Yes, I think the right hon. Lady is right that that is what the sentencing guidelines were aiming at, but I am afraid that the way in which they were phrased rather missed the mark, in my view. It is perfectly true to say that it is a good thing in most sentencing cases to get as much information as possible, but the sentencing guidelines have, as she will appreciate, particular influence on sentencers, who are obliged to follow them unless doing so is not in the interests of justice. The tone that is set by the Sentencing Council in the guidelines that it drafts gives a good indication to sentencers about the sorts of things that they ought to take into account in sentencing. As she heard me say—I think this is an important point to make—we are talking about the ordering of pre-sentence reports and not about sentencing itself.

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[Sir Ashley Fox]

I have already recorded my support for the principle of this Bill, which is unfortunately necessary to uphold the principle of equal justice. I speak in support of amendments 3 and 4, which would further strengthen this legislation.

Amendment 3 would give the Justice Secretary the power to prevent future errors of judgment by the Sentencing Council. It would require the council to secure ministerial consent before issuing any sentencing guidelines concerning pre-sentence reports. We should be clear that that is not a measure aimed at politicising justice. However, we must ensure democratic oversight of a body that has shown itself to be capable of committing a serious error of judgment, which led to the situation today. The reason why we are legislating is that the Sentencing Council’s guidance proposed treating offenders differently based on their ethnic, cultural or religious identities. That is wrong.

[Ms Diane Abbott]

The Sentencing Council has at no point suggested treating defendants differently according to their ethnicity or religion. All it has tried to do is ensure that judges and magistrates have the maximum information.

[Sir Ashley Fox]

The Sentencing Council says that if, for example, someone is a white, Christian male, they are less likely to benefit from a pre-sentence report than if they were a member of a religious or ethnic minority. I believe that that is wrong.

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[Sir Ashley Fox]

Indeed. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point; the point I wish to make to the Committee is that all defendants should be treated equally. It should not be a matter of whether or not they are a member of an ethnic or religious minority.

The Sentencing Council did not withdraw the guidance on principle, and it did not acknowledge its error. It was forced to backtrack only after public and political pressure, largely from the shadow Justice Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick). Even then, the council continued to defend the policy’s rationale in private communications to the judiciary. That is not accountability—it is evasion. That is precisely why amendment 3 is so vital. We cannot allow this to happen again, and Parliament must have a say when guidance threatens the impartiality of our legal system.

Amendment 4, which addresses the content of sentencing guidance itself, is equally important. The amendment would make it illegal for sentencing decisions to consider a defendant’s group identity, particularly in reference to historical discrimination that has no bearing on their individual case. Current bail guidance from the Ministry of Justice already advises courts to consider the trauma suffered by individuals whose relatives experienced racism or cultural discrimination. It even refers to “important historical events” and their supposed differential impact on specific ethnic or cultural groups. That approach undermines the principle that people should be judged as individuals, not as members of a group. Amendment 4 would draw a clear legal line: mitigating factors in sentencing must relate directly to an individual’s actions and circumstances. Inherited identity or injustices not experienced by a particular convicted criminal should not be relevant to the sentence passed by the court.

Race, religion or cultural background should not determine whether someone is sent to prison, and it should not determine whether or not someone should benefit from a pre-sentence report. The Lord Chancellor has argued that the current Bill allows her to “move at pace” to reverse the worst aspects of the Sentencing Council’s proposals, but this is not just about moving fast; it is also about ensuring that we never face this situation again. Amendments 3 and 4 are essential if we are serious about protecting the most basic principle of a free society, which is equality before the law. Without them, the Bill addresses the symptoms, but not the cause. As such, I urge the Committee to support those amendments and reaffirm our commitment to equality before the law.

[Ms Abbott]

I entirely agree with Members who are making the case that we should all be equal before the law. The problem is that the figures show that that is not the case, and it has not been the case for decades. If we look at the statistics for the numbers of people in prison, black people make up 12% of the prison population, yet we only make up 4% of the general population. That tends to raise the concern that we are not equal before the law across the whole custodial and criminal justice system. I remember that years ago, before some Members were in the House, you could not say anything about institutional racism in the police force and how black people were treated by the police. It took Stephen Lawrence and the Macpherson inquiry to get politicians and people who speak for the state to even acknowledge that there was such an issue as institutional racism in the police force.

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[Siân Berry]

This is—

[Ms Abbott]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Siân Berry]

Yes, of course.

[Ms Abbott]

Just to respond to the point that the hon. Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans) has just raised, the guidelines did not pick out race and ethnicity. In fact, they listed a number of circumstances in which a pre-sentence report might be considered appropriate, such as someone facing their first custodial sentence, someone who is under 25, someone who is a woman, pregnant, a primary carer or a dependent relative, someone who has said they are transgender or someone who may have addiction issues. Far from the Sentencing Council picking out race and ethnicity, that was only one in a long list of circumstances in which it suggested a pre-sentence report might be appropriate.

[Siân Berry]

To return to the intervention from the hon. Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans), it is difficult for some to realise that with these guidelines, the definition of “normal” has flipped away from the male, the white, the Christian and the majority to shine more of a light on people who are parts of minorities and might have experienced systemic problems leading up to the sentencing decision. That is the point of the guidelines. That is how we act in an anti-racist way. It is how we put together policy that mitigates the great problems that the Mother of the House, the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott), has outlined and we know well.

In contrast to this rushed Bill, the process that led to the now suspended new Sentencing Council guidelines was excellent: the document was consulted on widely; the Justice Committee looked at it; and it was given the green light by a Conservative Government, of which the shadow Justice Secretary was a member. Before I am intervened on, I am aware that a small change was made, but in essence the same document has come forward and the same principles were enshrined in the document that was proposed and approved. There was basically consensus that more use of pre-sentence reports should be made for people suffering from systemic injustices, that particular groups might be in greater need of them, and that judges should be permitted and encouraged to ask for such reports for those groups in more circumstances.

I want to talk about another group who will suffer from the delay caused by the Bill suspending the guidelines. I do not know when we will get new guidelines, but there will be more harm to women, families and children, who were all given more specific focus in the new—now suspended—guidelines. I have worked for some years on the problems and injustices facing women in the criminal justice system. I am concerned about the serious consequences that will come from any delay to these long overdue changes to further widen the use of pre-sentence reports and to make those reports easier for these groups. There will be serious consequences not only for too many people with these characteristics or circumstances—however we define it—but for wider society too. Will Ministers tell us about the impact of this delay on women, families, pregnant people and other groups named? When will we get new guidelines that include them? How many people will be harmed in the meantime? This delay has already taken some weeks.

Some Members will be familiar with the seminal 2007 Corston report about women with particular vulnerabilities in the criminal justice system. Incidentally, that document reminds us in its introduction:

“Equality does not mean treating everyone the same.”

The Sentencing Council guidelines were about to help plug a gap that still remained in terms of addressing the recommendations and themes of the Corston report. Indeed, in its commentary, the Sentencing Council rightly points to deeply concerning evidence of this problem. I am aware of difficulties judges have had in justifying delays and adjournments to go and get pre-sentence reports. The old guidance pushed for often impossible same-day reporting back from the Probation Service and cautioned against adjournments. With this delay to the new guidelines, will it be 2027—20 years after Corston—before the old guidelines are fully removed? How many women might be harmed in the meantime?

As far as I can see, the shadow Justice Secretary has scored a major win today, seizing this issue to stage another culture war ambush against another minority. Instead of standing by judges and by important principles we have all known for a long time—instead of simply allowing these guidelines to be trialled while the concerns being raised were addressed calmly—this Government have essentially put an executive order-style Bill before us now for its remaining stages. There was not even time on Second Reading for opponents like me to point that out.

I am sorry, but I believe that this Bill represents nothing less than a rushed and extraordinary capitulation by this Government to hard-right propaganda. People will suffer injustice as a result. It is profoundly worrying to see the Government legislating in this manner, micromanaging justice in ways that are led by—let’s face it—dog whistles, rhyming slogans and disingenuous propaganda. I will support new clause 1, but I sincerely hope that other Members will join me in voting against this Trumpian Bill and showing our respect for the independence of judges and magistrates on these matters. It is vital that we do something today to stand up for evidence-led policy, judicial independence and genuine equality before the law.

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[Dan Tomlinson (Chipping Barnet) (Lab)]

First, I acknowledge that disparities in outcomes in our judicial system are a real issue and merit serious attention. I recognise the work of the Lammy review in 2017, as well as the conclusions of the Ministry of Justice’s 2020 report, “Tackling Racial Disparity in the Criminal Justice System”, which found disparities in how people from minority ethnic groups are treated in the judicial system. It is important that these issues continue to have the focus that they merit.

However, I am glad that the Bill has passed its Second Reading and that we are progressing through its remaining stages today. I am firmly of the view that it is not for the Sentencing Council to make policy decisions on this matter, for those are the domain of politicians and must remain so. The Government should be able to make political decisions and implement them, and the ballot box is the right place for us to be held to account.

What I find refreshing about the continued passage of this Bill is that we are showing that politicians do not have to be jelly-like in the face of blockages to their desire to make political decisions. At the same time, I support the unamended passage of the Bill, because it finds a way to thread the needle with a targeted intervention. Amendment 3, tabled by the shadow Secretary of State for Justice, goes too far and would undermine the independence of the Sentencing Council.

[Ms Diane Abbott]

My hon. Friend refers to blockages. How can he describe Members of this House, and people in the community who are trying to stand up for a fair and just criminal justice system, as blockages?

[Dan Tomlinson]

I do not think that anyone in this House is a blockage—far from it. The point I am making is that I believe that this House should be the place where political decisions are made, and that politicians should make decisions about important things that matter to people in this country.

It is my view that the Sentencing Council is an important body. Crucially, however, it is not political, and I think that if the guidelines had gone through, it would have undermined the important principle of equality before the law. That is a political decision, and Members of this House hold different opinions, but it is for us to contest them in this place. I am glad the Government are making sure that we can make progress on the things that we believe need to be pushed forward for the British people, and I hope that the Bill will pass unamended today, because the precise changes that it proposes would prevent sentencing guidelines from being changed in ways that undermine equality before the law. I do not think that the amendments tabled by the Opposition are necessary, because they take things too far.

With this Bill and much else besides, it is time for us to show that moderate politics, which is the politics of this Government, does not have to be like soup—weak and watery, and impossible to hold on to—but can instead be the politics of action and delivery. I welcome the continued passage of this Bill and urge Members to vote for it today.