Change of Name by Registered Sex Offenders

Debate between Joanna Cherry and Tim Loughton

Thursday 2nd March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry]

I could not agree more.

The hon. Lady reminds me that, at the outset of my speech, I should have congratulated the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) who, as always, is completely across the subject. She often raises important issues, both in this House and in the public domain, that others have not dared to raise. I pay tribute to her for that.

I am talking about the Huntley case because it is disgraceful that, 18 years later, safeguarding loopholes remain whereby applicants can submit identity documents for DBS checks that display a new identity, despite the efforts of various hon. Members. At least the Government have acknowledged the safeguarding loophole whereby registered sex offenders are able to change their name by deed poll, but I am afraid that the ability to change identity in a more fundamental way, about which the hon. Member for Telford spoke so powerfully, by simultaneously changing one’s name and one’s gender, remains unaddressed.

In our public life, across the United Kingdom, self-identification has become a de facto right without legislation. Any individual can easily, and for any reason, change their name and gender on documents commonly used to establish identity via a process of self-declaration. That includes documents such as passports and driving licences, which can be presented for the purposes of a DBS check and show the individual’s new name and acquired gender instead of, and as opposed to, their sex.

The DBS grants enhanced privacy rights to individuals who change their gender when changing their identity. Those are exceptional rights that are granted only to individuals in that group. The result is that identity verification is compromised, meaning that there is no guarantee that the information returned during the check and displayed on the certificate will be accurate or complete. Those exceptional privacy rights also allow an applicant who has changed gender to request that all their previous names are withheld from the DBS certificate that is issued. That right to conceal previous identities is not given to anyone else; disclosing previous identities is a key component of safeguarding, and DBS certificates issued to all other individuals display all other names the applicant has used.

No doubt there were good reasons for the privacy requirements set out in section 22 of the Gender Recognition Act. I hasten to add that I am completely in favour of equal rights for trans people, but I am not in favour of a system that allows sex offenders to exploit the principle of self-declaration to evade the safeguarding process. Applicants who change their gender are also permitted to conceal their sex, and the DBS certificate issued will display their acquired gender instead. That right is not granted to any other individual; the importance of sex to safeguarding means that for all other applicants, their sex is always displayed on the DBS certificate. These are all serious risks to safeguarding that compromise the validity and reliability of the DBS regime.

This is a particular problem as we roll out digital identities, including for DBS checks, because there is a risk that the existing loopholes will be perpetuated in the digital realm. In the drive for convenience and ease of use, digital identities risk creating a new safeguarding loophole. In-person identity verification acts as a safe- guarding protection in and of itself, yet digital identities can be shared remotely, meaning that that important step is removed. The current operation of the DBS regime means that identity verification is compromised and organisations requesting DBS checks cannot have confidence in the information that is disclosed.

There are steps we could take to close the loopholes: the mandatory use of national insurance numbers for DBS checks and identity changes; having DBS certificates that display the sex registered at birth; and having DBS certificates that display other names used for all applicants, including those who have changed gender as part of changing identity. We are talking about rules of safeguarding that apply to people who have been convicted of sex offences, so all of this should be a no-brainer. In order to be effective, the rules of safeguarding must apply equally to everyone.

[Tim Loughton]

I am pleased that the hon. and learned Lady has raised this issue. It is extraordinary that more than 20 years on from what happened at Soham, we are still addressing here today the issues that came up then. It seems absolutely a no-brainer, as she puts it, that for people who have committed heinous crimes and whose sex offending history shows that they still pose a potential to harm children, the full identity should be available to those who need to see the DBS checks as they are taking them into employment. I think there is a degree of agreement on that. The change of gender qualifications, which I fully understand and which are necessary, should not apply to sex offenders. A full change of name history must be automatically linked at the DBS, and a change of name must be automatically linked to a DBS check, to make sure that all that information is available in respect of those people who pose a risk to vulnerable children.

[Joanna Cherry]

I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He correctly encapsulates what it is that I am asking for: in order to be effective, the rules of safeguarding must apply equally to everyone and there must not be loopholes or get-outs. Whenever the members of one group are excused from the normal requirements of safeguarding, a loophole is created that is ripe for exploitation.

I wish to make one final point. I am sure that we will hear that abusing the process and failing to disclose previous names is an offence, but that is just not good enough. A minor matter of administrative fraud such as making a false declaration is nothing in comparison to the significant risk posed by sex offenders abusing this system, which is really ripped open by the loopholes that I have described. It is high time that the safeguarding loopholes, which result in a situation where people—sex offenders—can change their identity, are addressed.

European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill

Debate between Joanna Cherry and Tim Loughton

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting: House of Commons & Committee: 2nd sitting
Wednesday 8th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry]

There is not much on which the right hon. Gentleman and I will agree, but we can agree on this point. There needs to be a recognition, along with the triumphalism of members of the Conservative and Unionist party about their win in England—which I understand, because we feel pretty triumphal about our win in Scotland—that, if theirs really is a Unionist party, they must engage properly with the representatives of the other parts of the United Kingdom.

Before I deal with the amendments in this group, let me raise again with Ministers the points that I made yesterday about the sweeping powers that the Government are taking to themselves in clauses 3, 12, 13, 14, 18, 21 and 27 to table delegated legislation making provision for areas of devolved policy. The Secretary of State tried to rubbish my interventions yesterday, but if he had time to read the independent report of the Scottish Parliament Information Centre overnight he will know that this is not some SNP party political diatribe, and that careful analysis of the Bill makes clear that it is a matter of fact that the Government are taking to themselves the right of British Ministers, acting alone, to produce delegated legislation in relation to devolved areas. That shows that the paragraph about which the SNP has complained on a number of occasions will actually be included.

The Secretary of State tried to deflect me yesterday, first by saying that the power related to reserved matters. That was simply not correct, as it clearly relates to devolved matters. He then suggested that the power that the Government were taking was merely technical. He will, of course, know that the Sewel convention does not apply to delegated legislation, although it probably would not matter if it did, because the Government are now prepared to drive a coach and horses through it. Interestingly, the Government’s delegated powers memorandum to the Bill states that UK Ministers “will not normally” make regulations in relation to devolved areas

“without the agreement of the relevant devolved administration.”

That is what the Sewel convention says, but we know that it has lately been more honoured in the breach than the observance.

Let me ask the Secretary of State again to revisit the remarks that he made yesterday. Will he acknowledge, for the record—and these are matters on which there may be litigation in the future, so the record might be quite important—that the clauses to which I have referred give UK Ministers the power to make delegated legislation in relation to devolved matters? Will he acknowledge, for the record, that that constitutes an incursion into devolved policy that rightly causes concern not just to the Scottish National party but to all who believe in the devolved settlement?

I know that it is history, but 22 years ago 75% of the people of Scotland voted for that devolved settlement. It is worth remembering that the background against which they did so was years and years of Scotland voting Labour but getting a Conservative Government. Now they are seeing years and years of Scotland voting SNP but getting a Conservative Government. I think it reasonable to draw a lesson from that history: there probably will be another constitutional referendum in Scotland soon, because the tension that now exists is similar to the tension that existed in the 1990s. I look forward to hearing from the Secretary of State later today an acknowledgement of the power that is being taken by the British Government.

Overall, I would say that this Bill is about the Executive taking as much power to themselves as possible, not just from the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly but from this Parliament, with their swingeing use of delegated legislation and, in relation to clause 26, which I will come to in a moment, from the judiciary.

The Conservative and Unionist party’s manifesto revealed that the Government’s aim was to change the balance between Government, Parliament and the courts and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford) said yesterday, we see in this Bill the beginning of the changing of that balance. We also see a continued attack on rights, not just the undermining of EU citizens’ rights, as we heard yesterday, and not just the undermining of workers’ rights, which we will come to later today, but the rights of child refugees.

It is fair to say that it is the proposal in the part of the Bill that we are discussing that has excited the most public comment. I have certainly received many communications from constituents who are worried about this, and in that connection I wish to speak to the amendments tabled in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East—new clause 43, amendment 28 and amendment 29—and at least to address them at this stage, whether or not they are made, which is perhaps a matter for later.

Across Europe, thousands of unaccompanied children are living in the most desperate circumstances, many of whom are separated from their families. Legal family reunion is a lifeline to those children, who would otherwise risk their lives in dinghies or in the back of lorries to reach a place of safety with their families. We have seen some pretty awful evidence recently of what can happen when refugees resort to dinghies or the backs of lorries.

In 2018, in recognition of that fact, a cross-party coalition in this House, including prominent Members of all parties, including the Conservative and Unionist party, recognised the humanitarian need for family reunion to continue and secured a legal commitment from the then Government to negotiate a replacement for the current rules when we leave the European Union. For the Government now to seek to remove those protections risks causing panic among refugee families currently separated in Europe, with potentially tragic consequences. It is also deeply unacceptable to the constituents of many MPs in this House.

The Government say that they are going to continue with refugee family reunion, so it is not clear to me why they are going to the trouble of taking that commitment out of this Bill, unless they want to hedge their bets a bit. Based on experience, that is what I suspect they are up to. Without this obligation in the Bill, there will be no obligation on the Government to ensure that family reunion continues beyond the very restrictive rules in United Kingdom law.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I was one of the supporters of the original family reunification amendments. I trust the Government and that this commitment will be stuck to in the appropriate place—an immigration Bill. Does the hon. and learned Lady acknowledge, however, that post-Dublin III there is a potential problem with the full extent of those family members who qualify for family reunification, and that that needs to be sorted out? There is also a problem with the rate at which potential applicants are processed in places such as Greece and Italy, which is not working well, and with the cost of applications. The whole scheme needs to be properly overhauled, and just bunging it into this Bill is not necessarily the best way of getting the best result that we all want.

[Joanna Cherry]

The answer to that is that the whole scheme is not being bunged into this Bill. The obligation to maintain certain minimum-level requirements is being taken out by the Bill, although it was agreed by cross-party Members, including the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), in the last Parliament.

The UK’s immigration rules as they stand—apart from some very limited circumstances—allow children to reunite only with parents, not with other relatives, in the UK. Under the EU Dublin III regulation, children have a legal route to reunite with other family members such as siblings, grandparents, aunts and uncles, and 95% of children that the charity Safe Passage supports to reunite with family safely and legally would be ineligible under the current UK rules. The consequence of this is that they would be forced to remain alone, separated from their families. There is a legitimate concern that taking out this previous commitment, through the Bill, is the beginning of a move towards an absolutely minimalist approach by the Government to their rights and duties.