Victims and Prisoners Bill

Lord Wills Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 18th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wills (Lab)]

My Lords, this is an important Bill. The Government deserve credit for seeking to address many of the ways that victims of crimes and public disasters have been let down by the state over the years. I pay tribute to the Victims’ Commissioner, as many others have tonight. The noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, deserves credit for the way in which she has campaigned tirelessly on behalf of victims for over a decade.

However, it is disappointing that, in many areas, the Government have not gone as far as they could have done, and should have done, to provide better protection for victims. In his opening remarks, the Minister said that his door was always open, and he has certainly proved that to me personally. I hope that he has taken careful note of the number of speakers who tonight have said that this Bill just does not go far enough.

Why, for example, have the Government not introduced a statutory definition of child criminal exploitation, to ensure that children who have been forced into committing crimes are recognised as victims, not as perpetrators? Why, for example, are victims and survivors of rape who have had the courage to report appalling acts of sexual violence still being denied adequate legislation and guidance to prevent intrusive and inappropriate requests for survivors’ personal records? That forces them often to choose between vitally needed therapy and the pursuit of justice. Furthermore, there is no adequate means of enforcement of the victims’ code.

I want to focus my remarks on Part 2 of the Bill, relating to victims of major incidents. This derives from my two Private Member’s Bills, which endeavoured to set up an independent public advocate to act on behalf of the victims of large-scale public disasters and those bereaved by them. It has been a long journey to get to this stage. I introduced my first Private Member’s Bill nearly a decade ago. Since then, I have campaigned to get it adopted by the Government, as has my colleague and friend in the other place, the right honourable Maria Eagle MP, who has campaigned to get a similar Bill adopted there. The proposal went into the Conservative manifesto in 2017, and into the subsequent Queen’s Speech. And so finally here we are.

Throughout this process, successive Ministers and their officials have been generous with their time in consulting me. I place on record my thanks to all of them, including most recently the noble and learned Lord, Lord Bellamy. I am particularly grateful to the former Prime Minister, the right honourable Theresa May MP, who immediately saw the merits of this proposal when she was Prime Minister and has campaigned for it ever since. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Sanderson, for her kind remarks about this; she was a very important member of that team that first brought the independent public advocate into seeing a serious possibility of legislation. She also deserves tribute for her part in this long journey to where we are tonight.

The Government have shown themselves willing to listen, and the version of Part 2 that is now before your Lordships’ House is a significant improvement on the original, profoundly flawed draft. However, it still will not deliver what victims of public disasters and those bereaved by such disasters want and need. The extraordinary persistence, dignity and solidarity of the Hillsborough families’ campaign that generated the momentum that led to the development of the concept of the independent public advocate really deserve better.

The challenge—and it is a challenge—is to strike a balance between the impartial discharge of justice and good government on the one hand and protecting the interests and feelings of the bereaved and injured survivors on the other. My Bill sought to establish two fundamental pillars of a new system, based around the institution of an independent public advocate, both of which this Bill fails to deliver.

The first pillar was transparency. Without it, the bereaved will never achieve anything approaching closure, and, without it, it is difficult and often impossible for the public policy lessons to be learned and necessary reforms made. The second pillar—and this is important in everything that we have heard tonight about what the state should be doing better for victims—was ensuring that victims and the bereaved have some agency in the process. No longer must they be left on the sidelines, dealing with unimaginable grief and loss while the state proceeds, apparently on their behalf, but without giving them any agency in the process. The Government’s proposals do not provide any guaranteed mechanism for securing full transparency, such as the Hillsborough independent panel achieved, and they deny victims and the bereaved any effective agency.

The Government’s view appears to be that, as His Majesty’s Government are democratically accountable, they must be able to wield the executive power for which they will be held to account by Parliament and the electorate. This is not an unreasonable approach, but it does not mean that they should deny bereaved families any effective agency at all in these matters, which is the current position, and nor can it justify any failure to maximise transparency. Again, that appears to be the current position of the Government.

As I have suggested before in your Lordship’s House, one way forward might be to specify that the Secretary of State, in proceeding with an independent public advocate, must act with regard to the dues of bereaved families, the benefits of an independent public advocate and/or an inquiry and/or a Hillsborough-type panel, including in relation to cost, timeliness and transparency, and any wider public interest. Crucially, I have suggested that the Secretary of State must—not may—produce a debatable report to Parliament justifying why they have proceeded as they have done and why, if they have not exercised this power, they have not done so, and that this debatable report should be produced as soon as possible after the public disaster. James Jones, the Bishop of Liverpool, in his masterful report, to which the Government have only just responded, points out that any delay allows these public organisations to protect themselves, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sanderson, has just said, and produce a false narrative. We saw that demonstrated graphically in the case of the Hillsborough disaster.

As the Bill progresses though your Lordships’ House, I will bring forward amendments to try to achieve greater transparency and greater agency for the families. I hope the Government are really listening and will find it in themselves to adopt them—I cannot see any reason why they should not.

Finally, I take this opportunity to urge the Government to reconsider their long-delayed and half-hearted response to Bishop James Jones’s report on the Hillsborough disaster, aptly titled The Patronising Disposition of Unaccountable Power, and to use the legislative opportunity of the Criminal Justice Bill, or indeed this Bill, to introduce a statutory duty of candour for those operating across public services, such as policing, health, social care and housing. By requiring openness and transparency, a statutory duty of candour would assist in creating much-needed cultural change in how state bodies approach inquests and inquiries. It would give confidence to individual members of those organisations who want to assist such inquiries and investigations but may be experiencing quite intolerable pressure, in many circumstances, not to do so. We must see an end to these sorts of evasive and obstructive practices by state bodies following deaths in these circumstances. We have seen, all too often, the damage that this causes, not least following the Hillsborough disaster. A statutory duty of candour would help end this.

The families bereaved at Hillsborough fought a dignified, indomitable campaign for decades to secure truth and justice for those they lost. By ensuring that those similarly bereaved in future never have to endure what they endured, the institution of the independent public advocate will be a legacy for their struggle and for their loved ones. I ask the Government to make it a meaningful legacy and give all the Hillsborough families hope that the Government will be prepared to amend the Bill in the ways I have described.