Serious Crime Bill [Lords]

Gareth Johnson Excerpts

Monday 5th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

rose—

[Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)]

rose—

[Mrs May]

I will give way to the shadow Home Secretary and then to my hon. Friend.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

The number has been dropping year on year but it is understood—the prosecution agencies believe that this is the most likely explanation—that that is due in part to the Court of Appeal judgment in the 2011 case of Windsor v. the Crown Prosecution Service. The Court ruled that suspicion that the defendant had benefited from criminal conduct was not sufficient grounds under existing legislation to grant a restraint order. That is a legal interpretation of the previous legislation—the 2002 Act—and how it was being operated by the courts. We are reducing the test from a “reasonable cause to believe” that the defendant has benefited from criminal conduct to a “reasonable suspicion”. We believe that will enable restraint orders to be applied at an earlier stage of the investigation. We have identified that a piece of legislation, as it has been operated by the courts, has had an impact that has led to a drop in the number of restraint orders, so we are addressing that in the legislation we are putting forward. I said that I would give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson), so I will now do so.

[Gareth Johnson]

I am grateful to the Home Secretary for giving way, and I welcome these measures to seize assets resulting from ill-gotten gains. As she has pointed out, the whole principle behind the measures is to ensure that crime does not pay. Will she assure the House that offenders are not able to avoid having their assets seized simply by absconding from the judicial process, by skipping bail for example? Will she assure us that that issue will be tackled?

[Mrs May]

Perhaps it would be helpful to the House if I went through the other measures in the Bill that will strengthen our ability to deal with how, under existing legislation, offenders can sometimes make efforts to hide their assets or to ensure that their assets are not available. There are a number of areas in which we need to ensure that those assets can be accessed so that somebody cannot do what my hon. Friend has said and avoid having their assets seized.