Oral Answers to Questions

Lilian Greenwood Excerpts

Tuesday 14th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Alex Chalk]

Absolutely nothing could be further from the truth. The Government are committed to this. I was a practitioner in 2010 and I well remember when Labour was in government and Labour Members derided the “gravy train” of legal aid. We will never do that, because we recognise its importance. This Government have eased the rules on hardship and interim payments to enable the early drawdown of payment for work done, and for solicitors we have doubled the number of opportunities to seek payment on account. This is really important: we are accelerating work on CLAR—the criminal legal aid review—because we want to put between £31 million and £51 million into the profession as soon as possible. That funding will be released before too long.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

What progress he has made on implementing the recommendations of the Lammy review, “An independent review into the treatment of, and outcomes for, Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic individuals in the Criminal Justice System”, published in September 2017.

[Imran Hussain (Bradford East) (Lab)]

What progress he has made on implementing the recommendations of the Lammy Review, “An independent review into the treatment of, and outcomes for, Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic individuals in the Criminal Justice System”, published in September 2017.

[The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Robert Buckland)]

We remain absolutely committed to taking forward every recommendation that falls to Government and to completing the action on all those within our responsibility over the next 12 months. Recently, in February, we provided a further progress report in which we describe the undertakings to which we have committed the Department in relation to the recommendations.

[Lilian Greenwood]

Black and minority ethnic young people already face discrimination in the jobs market, and those with a criminal record are doubly disadvantaged. By putting barriers in the way of young people who have changed and present no significant risk to others, the criminal records system traps them in their past. The Taylor review recommended reform to ensure that young people are not unnecessarily held back by childhood offences, but my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) called for a new approach, learning from the system for sealing criminal records adopted in many US states. When will the Government implement Lammy review recommendation 34 and allow young people to demonstrate that they are more than their past?

[Robert Buckland]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for that question. She will be glad to know that only last Thursday the relevant statutory instrument was laid before the House to remove both the requirement for automatic disclosure of youth cautions and the multiple conviction rule, which cause problems for people who have old convictions, regardless of their nature or the sentence. I want to go further. I have considered carefully the recommendation of the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy), and the sentencing White Paper later this year will have further proposals for reform of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.