Jonathan Djanogly
Main Page: Jonathan Djanogly (Conservative - Huntingdon)Department Debates - View all Jonathan Djanogly's debates with the Home Office
(12 years, 6 months ago)
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Alun Michael
Yes, indeed I do, because the provision of legal aid can help to resolve the direct problem. That measure, combined with the cuts in local government services, particularly in England, which have led in some places to the ending of support and early intervention services, mean that serious problems are likely to arise and to escalate, as my hon. Friend says.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Jonathan Djanogly)
I must put the record right on this point. The Government are not taking away legal aid for victims of domestic violence. Indeed, we are keeping it for the victims of domestic violence.
Alun Michael
I note what the hon. Gentleman says and have no reason to argue with him, but I am sure that my hon. Friend will be looking very carefully at the small print of the proposals and the way in which the Government take them forward.
Violence generally is not only the top priority in crime prevention, but is very expensive to society. Without going into detail, I point out again that a project led by John Shepherd of University College hospital, Cardiff, in which a clinical approach—almost an engineering approach—is used to analyse where violence happens, the context in which it happens and its causes, has led to a 20% greater reduction in levels of violence in Cardiff in the past decade than has been achieved in equivalent cities. Given our scarce resources, we must target prevention and early intervention measures and work to understand the causes and nature of criminal activity. In that way, we can reduce the number of violent incidents, which has the benefits of reducing both the number of victims and the level of violence against victims, and of making savings to the public purse in the police and criminal justice system and in the health service.
I am pleased to see the Chairman of the Justice Committee, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), in his place. I remind Ministers of the commitments they made to pick up a copy of that Committee’s report on justice reinvestment. I was a member of the Select Committee at the time that report was prepared. Essentially, it asks: are we spending money in the right ways, or are there are better ways to use our resources? I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will agree that although some lessons may have been learnt from that report, many more lessons can be drawn from it, and that in many ways, when it comes to the criminal justice system, we are not spending money in the most effective way.
The report pointed out that most of the things that really affect levels of offending are outside the criminal justice system. That signals more strongly than anything else the need for strong partnerships and joint working by the police, other organisations in the criminal justice system, and those outside. We need to use the benefits of restorative justice, making offenders face up to the impact of what they have done. There are also lessons to be learned from relational justice. Some of the issues covered by the hon. Member for South Northamptonshire, to do with the way that babies and young people are treated, are often about failures of relationship, as well as moral failures.
We need to refresh the partnerships involving the police, local authorities and other agencies to cut crime. As Sir Robert Peel said when he established the first police service here in London, the purpose of policing is to prevent and reduce offending. He also said:
“The police are the public and the public are the police”,
which is a bit delphic, but I think it means that unless the police and the public are in tune—unless there is a good relationship between the police and the public—policing will not be fair and will not succeed in the basic aim of creating a safer society in which offending is not taken for granted.
The Home Secretary referred to internet-related crime. I applaud the emphasis that she placed on this modern scourge, but great care is needed. We need to be sure that we do not get things out of proportion. Given the vast growth in online retailing, I am not sure that the number of offences is that out of proportion to the numbers for retail crime in our shops. We need to be sure that the big figures do not just reflect the big increase in the size of internet trading. Care is needed because legislation should be the last refuge of any Home Secretary, not the first. We should not repeat the mistakes made over decades in the offline world, as laws rarely prevent what they forbid. I therefore encourage the Home Secretary to work this out with the industry and parliamentarians. It is not good enough to have the Government and industry deal with the issue alone; Parliament has a role.
The Home Secretary has in her team the Under-Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), who, in opposition, took on an important role in this House, working on internet-related issues. I suggest that she listen to him, and to the members of the Parliamentary Internet, Communications and Technology Forum or PICTFOR, which succeeded PICTCOM, the Parliamentary Information Technology Committee. PICTFOR seeks to engage Members of this House in understanding internet-related issues. As the chair of that group, I offer our engagement in response to her welcome for that comment.
I am disappointed not to see something in the Queen’s Speech about sprinklers to prevent preventable fires in houses, especially those in multiple occupation. I encourage the Home Secretary and the Ministers on the Front Bench to get a grip on their colleagues in the Department for Communities and Local Government. I had a meeting with a Minister in that Department who seems completely oblivious to the fact that the Department’s approach, and its refusal to accept such a change, means that it is putting its head in the sand and putting lives at risk. Ann Jones, an Assembly Member from north Wales, introduced a Measure on the subject in the Welsh Assembly, so Wales is benefiting from taking steps forward on this matter. I spent time with the police service in Vancouver and saw how it has been able to reduce not only the risk to life but the amount of damage to property through the installation of sprinklers in new properties. I encourage the Government to stop ignoring a measure that is supported by the insurance industry and the fire service, and to follow the Welsh Government and Assembly in implementing such a measure.
On Lords reform, we ought to look not only at the composition of a new House of Lords, but at better methods of scrutiny and constructive debate. Perhaps we ought to be more imaginative and think more laterally, as my hon. Friend the Member for Manchester Central said—perhaps we should have a single Chamber but with different mechanisms—rather than just allowing the debate to grind on as it has for decades, which seems to take us nowhere.
My final point on home affairs relates to the Home Secretary’s reference to the item in the Queen’s Speech on enhancing border security. Frankly, the Home Affairs Committee has seen little indication of improvement in the work of the UK Border Agency and a great deal to be worried about. One of the problems is that it is not an agency at all. It is not a separate agency with its own directorate and a board to which it is accountable, but an integral part of the Home Office and, therefore, the direct responsibility of the permanent secretary, the Home Secretary and Ministers. They really need to get a grip on it, rather than thinking that a bit of cosmetics, such as dividing the Border Force from the Border Agency, will make the difference that is needed. Introducing responsibilities into the new National Crime Agency might help to make that difference, but it is confusing that that agency will have some responsibilities and that the Border Force is being taken out of the Border Agency.
To sum up, while Labour was in government crime fell by 40%, and that was not by accident. It was possible only through strong partnerships and effective policing by motivated officers. That was supported by sensible reforms, the provision of new powers, such as antisocial behaviour orders, new preventive work, especially partnership working through the youth offending teams and the creation of the Youth Justice Board, which I am glad the Government are now allowing to continue its good work, and halving the time it took to get young offenders before the courts. More could be done on that, because we still take too long to deal with young offenders. A society that fails to nip things in the bud when young offenders start offending, or even before they have been absorbed into the criminal justice system as a result of being caught and prosecuted, is condemned to live with the disastrous impact of a life of crime on victims, the community, the families of offenders and victims and, essentially, the offenders themselves. We cannot afford that and the Government should put more emphasis on the need to prevent crime in the first place.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Jonathan Djanogly)
The coalition Government have had a shared goal since entering office: to modernise the justice system so that it delivers better for the public. I want to respond to the many welcome contributions to what I considered to be a very thoughtful debate in the context of our overall ambitions for reform.
Our primary objective on home affairs and justice is to improve the system so that it keeps the public safe and secure and works to cut crime and reoffending. If we can deliver that, we will ensure that there are fewer victims and will raise public confidence. Not least owing to the vital need to control public expenditure in the face of the economic situation, we are determined to show that that can be done affordably, but we are also certain that any changes should be made without our sacrificing fundamental values in which we believe, such as freedom and liberty.
The shadow Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper), opened her speech with the Opposition’s standard line that the cuts have hurt but have not worked. It is true that the problems here in Europe and elsewhere in the global economy mean that it is taking us longer than anyone hoped to recover from the biggest debt crisis of our lifetime, but the one thing that would make the situation even worse would be for us to abandon our credible plan and deliberately add more borrowing and even more debt. That would jeopardise the recovery, and would jeopardise the low interest rates that are so important to families and businesses in this country.
I believe that we have already made a good start in delivering our home affairs and justice goals. We are making the police more accountable by moving towards the introduction of police and crime commissioners, and are changing the focus of our prisons to ensure that they are places of productive work rather than idleness. In abolishing ID cards and sorting out the DNA database, stopping the fingerprinting of children without parental consent and scrapping 28 days’ detention, we have also turned the page of civil liberties. We have taken real steps forward on efficiency, reorganising whole areas of justice so that they work for the public better and at a lower cost, while simultaneously bringing about a transparency revolution. All that represents good progress, but we cannot rest on our laurels. That is why the measures on home affairs and justice that we have been discussing today are important. They constitute a coherent and ambitious package which represents the next stage of justice reform.
My hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Mary Macleod) made some important points about the value of women to the economy and about how it could be developed, and also about the benefits of micro-financing. I fully support the view of my right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Mr Kennedy)—I believe that the same point was made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake)—that House of Lords reform should not be used as a political football. Whether the Opposition agree is yet to be seen, although what Opposition Members have said today suggests that that is likely to happen.
The right hon. Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Mr Clarke) clearly has strong views on House of Lords reform. He questioned the Government’s position on consensus and the proposed costs of the reform. All those matters will be debated fully as we go up what I think he called the garden path, although I prefer to call it the yellow brick road. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) observed that the issue should be seen in context, given the urgency of economic issues and the need to punish criminals.
On civil justice, we are building on the principles of efficiency and effectiveness that animate all our reforms by taking long overdue steps to sort out the operation of the family courts, to improve the performance of courts and tribunals, and to address the scandal of delays in our adoption system.
On criminal justice, we are legislating to ensure that we are smarter on crime and better at catching criminals. That is why we are making a step change in the country’s capability to tackle organised and serious crime with the creation of the new National Crime Agency. We must also make sure we are smarter at punishing and reforming offenders. Underpinning all our reforms, we are continuing to expose the false choice offered by those who say we have to choose between our security and our freedom. It is this Government who want to open up our courts to the public via television and who want to strengthen freedom of expression by reforming libel law, and it is this Government who are committed to enhancing judicial and parliamentary scrutiny of our security services while modernising the capabilities of the police and the courts so they can keep the public safe.
There have been many interventions on the subject of police numbers, including by the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Tony Lloyd). We must be clear that the effectiveness of a police force depends primarily on effective deployment of police officers. That is what leads to effective policing. Sir Denis O’Connor has supported that view, and that is where we continue to focus our efforts. The link between officer numbers and crime levels is not simple, but we know that effective deployment is what matters most.
I welcome the support of several Members—including both the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), and the shadow Home Secretary—for setting up the NCA. Through its wider, joined-up remit, the agency will build on the work of its predecessors in tackling organised crime, protecting our borders, fighting fraud and cybercrime and protecting children and young people from sexual abuse and exploitation. The protection of the public will be at the heart of all that this agency does.
As the Bill progresses, the House will want to probe and test its detailed provisions, and I note that the Justice Committee will be keen to review the NCA start-up, as its Chairman, my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Sir Alan Beith), said. I am sure such issues will be scrutinised on Second Reading and subsequently, and I look forward to those debates.
I welcome the Justice Committee Chair’s support for many of the measures in the Crime and Courts Bill. The creation of a single family court will make the family justice system more accessible to the public and improve efficiency. Like him, I look forward to the Westminster Hall debate of 24 May, in which we will be able to consider the family justice system in more detail. I can also offer some reassurance on the question of litigants in person. I hope he is encouraged by the financial support made available by the Ministry of Justice to implement many of the recommendations of the Civil Justice Council for supporting litigants in person.
On immigration, the right hon. Member for Leicester East and others expressed concerns about the removal of a full right of appeal in family visa visit cases. As he will know, new evidence is often submitted on appeal that should have been submitted with the original application. The appeal then in effect becomes a second decision based on new evidence. The key point is that no other visit visa attracts a full right of appeal, and therefore this represents a disproportionate use of taxpayers’ money. Its removal was fully supported during consultation.
Keith Vaz
Will the Minister and the Home Secretary, who is also present, receive a delegation of Members of this House with an interest in these issues? I think a deal can be struck that will be fair to our constituents and that will help the appeal process. We want to look at the quality of the decision making as well as the appeal process. If the Minister is prepared to do that, and if the Home Secretary, through the Minister for Immigration, is prepared to meet the Chair of the Justice Committee, myself and others who have an interest in these issues, I think we can come to a compromise that is acceptable to all sides.
Mr Djanogly
Yes—[Interruption.] The Home Secretary has just advised me that the Immigration Minister would be delighted to meet the right hon. Gentleman and discuss this issue in the detail it deserves.
A number of Members raised the issue of broadcasting court proceedings. I would characterise the various contributions as having given a general—but, in some cases at least, a cautious—welcome to the Government’s proposals. The Government are committed to improving transparency and public understanding of the court system, and allowing broadcasting from courts will contribute to that. Of course, the filming and broadcasting of judicial proceedings must be carefully and sensitively undertaken, and I can assure Members that there will be no filming of victims, witnesses, defendants or jurors. There will of course be restrictions on the use of footage to ensure that it is only used sensitively and for informational purposes.
The hon. Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) and my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell) spoke strongly in support of our drug-driving proposals. I can tell my hon. Friend that we are working to ensure that the necessary “type approval tests” for devices to be used in police stations are completed without delay.
The Government’s proposals to reform civil proceedings to enable the courts to take better account of sensitive material and prevent damaging disclosure of intelligence material have been of great interest to the House and the public, and we have had many valuable contributions on that. The Government are committed to ensuring that we can reassure our allies that the confidential basis on which they share intelligence with us can be protected, while ensuring that the courts are able to make real findings on the merits of cases where sensitive information is given. I think the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr David) said that he is opposed to closed courts. Let me say to him—[Interruption.] If he would like to make his position clear, I am happy to give way.
Mr Djanogly
There is a difference there, so we can yet persuade the hon. Gentleman. I am pleased to hear that, and we will do that.
Most people in this country are sickened at the thought of terrorists or suspected terrorists winning, as they have been winning, large sums in civil courts by reason not of their innocence, but because the authorities have not been able to use sensitive intelligence information which, if discussed openly, could endanger public safety in open court. We need a system—with checks and balances, admittedly—that will provide for this issue in the small number of cases where it is relevant.
Our core aim in introducing the Defamation Bill—
Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)
Before the Minister moves on, perhaps he can shed some light on a concern raised by the Royal British Legion and Inquest, about secret inquests. [Interruption.]
Mr Djanogly
I am advised that we are looking carefully at the issue, and we would be pleased to engage with the Royal British Legion and others on it.
Our core aim in introducing the Defamation Bill is to reform the law so that it strikes the right balance between the right to freedom of expression and the protection of reputation. As the points raised illustrate, there is a wide range of views on exactly what that balance should be and how individual issues should be dealt with. We look forward to an extensive and informed debate both here and in the other place as the Bill proceeds.
The draft communications data provisions provide for targeted, practical measures that are essential to enable our law enforcement agencies to keep pace with new technologies, with strong safeguards to protect civil liberties. We can protect the public while continuing to uphold civil liberties in an internet age. As the Home Secretary clearly set out, there will be no single Government database, no real-time monitoring of communications of individuals, and no new powers to intercept e-mails or phone calls of members of the public. That will address the concerns raised by several Members.
My right hon. Friends the Members for Berwick-upon-Tweed and for Carshalton and Wallington raised the issue of collection of data. I can assure them that we will be extending the role of the interception of communications commissioner to oversee the collection of communications data by communications service providers, and it will continue to be the Information Commissioner’s role to keep under review the security of information kept up to the end of the 12-month retention period.
Members clearly share views on the scourge of antisocial behaviour, to which several of them referred. Antisocial behaviour is an issue that really matters to the public, and for too many people it remains a nasty fact of everyday life. Despite the years of top-down initiatives and targets handed out by the previous Government, more than 3 million antisocial behaviour incidents are reported to the police each year and many are not reported at all. That is why this Government want a transformation in the way that antisocial behaviour is dealt with, and I thank hon. Members for their useful contributions and interventions. The Government have stripped away the targets that hampered professionals’ ability to crack down on this kind of crime. We will introduce more effective measures to tackle antisocial behaviour, including replacing the bureaucratic and ineffective antisocial behaviour orders, more than half of which are currently being breached at least once.
Mark Hendrick
The Minister will be aware that antisocial behaviour in Lancashire has been cut in recent years from 155,000 incidents per year to about 100,000 because of Labour’s measures. What does he think a 20% cut to policing will do to that?
Mr Djanogly
As I said, this is as much about how we use police officers as about the number of them.
Alun Michael
Does the Minister recall that I made the strong point that the Government are in danger of being guilty of surrendering the simple concept of an antisocial behaviour order, which has been effective in reducing antisocial behaviour by maintaining the restrictions that it imposes? Will he clear that up, remove the Home Secretary’s threat to get rid of ASBOs and simply make it easier to use that good mechanism?
Mr Djanogly
As I said, ASBOs are proving to have been ineffective and overly bureaucratic, and we are going to replace them with an order that is simpler to use and that works better.
May I congratulate theright hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Alun Michael) on his support for police and crime commissioners? Although I wish him well in his campaign to be one, may I say that this is somewhat of a volte face from his position when Labour was in government?
Gloria De Piero (Ashfield) (Lab)
Will the Minister confirm that a breach of the proposed replacement for the ASBO—the crime prevention injunction—will not result in a criminal record?
Mr Djanogly
ASBOs are civil orders at the moment. [Interruption.] A breach can lead on to a criminal offence, absolutely it can.
The Government want people to have powers that really work, that can be enforced, that provide faster, more visible justice to communities, that rehabilitate offenders, where possible, and that act as a real deterrent to perpetrators.
Alun Michael
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Surely it should be possible to correct what I am sure is an inadvertent misleading of the House by the Minister—he would not have intended to do it. The ASBO is a civil order. A breach of it is a criminal offence, tested by the criminal quality of evidence.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)
Further to that point of order, I call Mr Djanogly.
Mr Djanogly
I think that is exactly what I said. If I did not, I am happy to reaffirm it.
The community trigger will empower victims and communities to demand that agencies take action against persistent antisocial behaviour problems. The Government will shortly set out our formal response to the consultation and our new powers, which will put victims and communities at the heart of agencies’ response to this problem.
The Bill dealing with families seeks to ensure that we tackle the root causes of delay in care cases as part of a wider package of reform that was set out in the family justice review. I am grateful for the interventions of my hon. Friends the Members for Milton Keynes North (Mark Lancaster) and for Harrow East in support of the Government’s intention to tackle the delay in care proceedings. I am also grateful to the right hon. Member for Leicester East for his support of the Government’s intention to legislate on a target of six months in care cases.
Reforms to the use of experts in family courts—on both the number and quality—have been rightly raised by the Chair of the Justice Committee. Proposed amendments to the family procedure rules and practice direction on experts were submitted to the family procedure rules committee in April. These amendments seek to ensure that expert evidence is commissioned only where necessary—this, in turn, will save time in proceedings.
On the quality of experts, Ministry of Justice officials have spoken to health regulators on developing minimum standards, and this will be an important area for my Department to improve.
Mr Djanogly
I think that question is for others in the Ministry of Justice and the Home Department to address.
The adoption clauses on ethnicity will also help to reduce the time children have to wait for an adoptive placement and will see more children placed in stable loving homes with less delay and disruption. My hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes North gave a very well-informed speech on adoption and my hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom) spoke very well on the urgency of the early years of a baby’s mental development and the benefits of early intervention—