Victims and Prisoners Bill (Thirteenth sitting)

Janet Daby Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 11th July 2023 Public Bill Committees

[Edward Argar]

The hon. Lady alluded to the fact that people with law enforcement experience already sit as Parole Board members, so, on her last point, there is already a pool, which can be augmented and built up over time. That will allow those who are already experienced in Parole Board decision making to sit on some of the most serious cases. That therefore mitigates her concerns.

We are seeking to ensure that the views of those experienced in law enforcement are considered, and we will strengthen that further. That is not a factor that will determine the outcome, but we want to ensure that those voices are heard more consistently and that the process is more formalised than at present. We believe the clause strikes the appropriate balance in ensuring that the board has that perspective at its disposal in any particular case, as well as other relevant perspectives, to aid it in reaching the decision it chooses to reach.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 46 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 47

Parole Board membership

[Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

I beg to move amendment 120, in clause 47, page 43, line 6, leave out from “office” to end of line 9 and insert

“only on grounds of proven misconduct or incapacity”.

This amendment would allow the Secretary of State to remove the Chair of the Parole Board only on the grounds of misconduct or incapacity.

I want to begin by providing some context about the justification for removing the Parole Board chair from office. The Parole Board is rightly independent from the Executive. That independence is well established in several court rulings and is crucial to how the board functions. There are elements of the Bill that would undermine that independence. The Minister will know that I am not alone in voicing those concerns, given that Members of his own party also did so on Second Reading.

The Minister has been open to hearing and taking on board the concerns of Members throughout our time in Committee, and I know that that has been much appreciated. Therefore, I hope that he will reflect on the concerns raised on protecting the independence of the Parole Board. A balance needs to be struck. Although Members on both sides of the Committee will recognise the need for the Secretary of State to have the power to remove the chair, what matters is how that is done. I do not wish to recount too much the circumstances of the removal of Nick Hardwick as chair of the Parole Board—Members will likely already be familiar with those—but it is important to recognise the challenge that placed on the independence of the Parole Board. The powers of the Executive must be appropriate. I consider the termination protocol devised after Nick Hardwick’s time as chair to have the better level of that appropriateness.

The current grounds on which the chair may be removed are set out in a clear way, and the criteria that must be satisfied are reasonable and measurable. There is a procedural fairness in how a recommendation for removal can be made. That is not to say that it is a perfect mechanism. It does not, for example, consider misconduct as a criterion for the chair’s removal, nor does it fully address the concerns raised by the High Court regarding recourse and appeal in the removal of the chair. Furthermore, it does not recognise the potential impact of removing the chair on the independence of the Parole Board. All these merit further consideration in determining how a removal mechanism should operate.

As it stands, I do not believe that the power being given to the Secretary of State to remove the chair addresses those points adequately. Its current wording is narrowly focused and too broadly interpreted. Maintaining the public’s confidence in the parole process is a perfectly reasonable aim, but it should not be the sole consideration in whether the chair is fit to perform the functions of the role.

If the clause ends up on the statute book, how will the Secretary of State measure public confidence? Will it be on the basis of a decision made on an individual case? Clause 47 goes on to say that the chair must not “play any part” or “influence the recommendations” in relation to an individual case. That would clearly make it unfair to dismiss the chair because of a decision taken on a single case.

The Parole Board’s job is to take decisions on complex and occasionally controversial cases. In a small number of examples, that may result in a certain level of unease, but unfettered ministerial power to remove the chair on fairly broadly interpreted grounds is not the proper way to resolve that unease.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

I am very supportive of the argument that my hon. Friend is making, because there needs to be absolute confidence that the Parole Board is acting for the right reasons. Any indication of political influence would undermine public confidence in the system. That is why I support her amendment.

[Janet Daby]

I thank my hon. Friend for everything she just said, and I absolutely agree. Those are absolutely the points that I am making as well. I fear that the power is too subjective and, with respect to the Secretary of State, may be misapplied if not handled carefully. In evidence to this Committee, the chief executive officer of the Parole Board himself said that this risked the Parole Board’s independence, and the measure fails to note that the chair may need to be removed on grounds of proven misconduct or incapacity.

Although I do not intend to take amendment 120 to a vote, I hope that it will encourage the Minister to rethink how this clause is drafted, tighten up the removal mechanism, give greater consideration to protecting the Parole Board’s independence and privilege misconduct or incapacity as reasons for removing the chair.

[Ellie Reeves]

I welcome the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East. First, it is right that if someone is not up to the job as chair of the Parole Board, there should be a way of removing them—the public would not expect any less—but clause 47 goes a great deal further than that. Amendment 120 seeks to address that. In his evidence to the Committee, Martin Jones, the Parole Board chief executive, stated:

“There is already a protocol in place that would allow a Secretary of State to follow a process in a fair way to remove the chair of the Parole Board if they believe they are not fulfilling their functions.”––[Official Report, Victims and Prisoners Public Bill Committee, 20 June 2023; c. 55, Q107.]

Caroline Corby, the chair of the Parole Board, stated at the Justice Committee’s evidence session:

“My concern is that if it is used simply because the Parole Board has made a controversial decision, that potentially impacts on the independence of the Parole Board.”

That is because parole decisions, by their very nature, are sensitive and controversial. Removing the chair because a decision in an individual case is unpopular would likely influence the panel’s decision making, thereby undermining the independence of the board in its judicial decisions. Given that, Ms Corby argued that

“the chair of the Parole Board needs more protection than pretty much any other chair of any arm’s length body.”

For those reasons, the Justice Committee concluded in its letter to the Justice Secretary that there should not be a statutory power to enable the Secretary of State to dismiss the chair of the board in the manner and terms proposed. I would be interested to hear what the Minister has to say about these points and what reassurances he can give me and my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East.

[Edward Argar]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Lewisham East for her kind words, for the approach she has adopted throughout the passage of the Bill and for her amendment, which gives us an opportunity to debate this issue alongside clause 47. The Bill creates a new power for the Secretary of State to dismiss the Parole Board chair on the grounds of public confidence, and the amendment would change the grounds of that dismissal power to misconduct or incapacity.

There is already a process for terminating the appointment to the chair due to misconduct or incapacity. The agreed protocol allows an independent panel to make a recommendation to the Secretary of State on whether the chair should be dismissed on the grounds of absence, if they have been convicted of an offence or are an undischarged bankrupt, or if they are unfit or unsuitable to continue in their role. The protocol extends to all board members, not just the chair, and is an essential recourse, where necessary, for maintaining the high standards required of board members. The amendment would effectively replace an existing process, albeit only for the chair and without requiring the involvement of the panel.

The purpose of clause 47 is not to replace that important process but to create a new route for dismissal on grounds that are not already incorporated in the agreed protocol—namely, public confidence. The Parole Board is a high-profile public body that makes important decisions on public protection every day. I do not underestimate in any way the difficulty of its job, and in general—as we have alluded to in debates on previous groups—the board do it very well. However, it is right that the Secretary of State for Justice should have the levers to change the leadership of the board if a situation arose whereby public confidence in the overall work of the board had been irreversibly damaged, because public confidence goes beyond individual decisions.

The chair is responsible for ensuring that the board takes proper account of guidance provided by the responsible Minister or the Department, for ensuring that the board is well run and is delivering high standards of regularity and propriety, and for promoting public awareness of the work of the board. As there already exists a process for the chair of the Parole Board to be dismissed on the grounds of misconduct or incapacity, I am grateful to the hon. Member for Lewisham East for saying that she does not intend to press the amendment to a Division, but I understand the context in which she tabled it. Notwithstanding what I may say in a moment on clause 47, I am happy to have a further conversation with her outwith the Committee, if she thinks that would be helpful.

[Janet Daby]

Again, I thank the Minister for his very mature approach. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[Edward Argar]

Clause 47 amends schedule 19 to the Criminal Justice Act 2003, which governs the membership and operation of the Parole Board. The clause makes important changes to the Parole Board’s membership and leadership. Let me begin by confirming that subsection (10) means that any changes in respect of the chair of the Parole Board do not impact on the appointment or functions of the current chair, Caroline Corby. She has led the board well since her initial appointment in 2018, and the Ministry is grateful to her for her effective leadership in this high-profile and, at many times, challenging role. She will step down as chair in October next year, and it is at that point that the functions of the chair as set out in the clause will come into force.

I now turn to the specific provisions of the clause. Subsection (3) increases the statutory minimum number of Parole Board members from five to seven. In practice, the board, of course, has many more members than that, and its current membership stands at about 300. I take this opportunity to thank the board’s members more broadly for the difficult, but crucial work they do in keeping the public safe from harm.

The Government are increasing the minimum membership of the board for two reasons. First, to make the position of vice chair a statutory role, which is necessary because of the changes the clause makes to the chair’s functions. Secondly, as we touched on when considering clause 46, to require the board to include a law-enforcement member in its core membership. The requirement for a law-enforcement member is in clause 47(4), with a definition of the role in the proposed new section (2A) to be inserted into the Criminal Justice Act 2003 by clause 47(5).

The overall effect will be for the Parole Board to be made up of a minimum of seven members: a chair, a vice chair, a law-enforcement member and four other statutory members, one of whom must have judicial experience, one must have knowledge of probation, one must be an expert in prisoner rehabilitation and one must be a psychiatrist. Requiring the board to have access to that range of expertise as a minimum will ensure that risk is assessed as effectively as possible and that offenders are released only when it is safe to do so. The board will remain free to recruit members from other fields and to appoint independent members, as it deems appropriate.