Thames Valley, Berkshire
Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Baroness Primarolo
Fiona Mactaggart
I did write to the hon. Gentleman, yes. I omitted to write to the Chair, for which I am very apologetic.
Madam Deputy Speaker
If the Minister and the hon. Gentleman indicate their assent, the hon. Lady can have a couple of minutes.
Sentencing
Debate between Fiona Mactaggart and Baroness Primarolo(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Fiona Mactaggart
I was one of those Home Office Ministers who introduced the concept of victim impact statements, so I am well aware of that, but the problem is that with early guilty pleas, that has not usually been the case in practice. From my reading of the Green Paper it is not clear to me what will happen: will Ministers automatically ensure that the victim impact statement can fully outline what has happened to the victim?
I do not believe therefore that what is proposed is being done to make the victim’s experience better. There is no evidence of that, because there is no evidence of careful listening to victims’ organisations, which is what I would have expected had that been the case. I would have expected real engagement with women’s organisations that deal regularly with the victims of rape and other sexual violence. According to the British crime survey, one in 250 women were victims of sexual assault in the last year. This is a widespread offence, and we are not taking it sufficiently seriously when the Secretary of State for Justice can say, “Well, there’s rape and then there’s rape.” We need to change the way we deal with this issue. We need to be really serious about these issues. Although there is a case for discounts for early guilty pleas, they should not be universally applied to people who have been responsible for some of the most violent and degrading crimes, and his Green Paper does not stop that—