The Hague Abduction Convention

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 10th March 2015 Westminster Hall

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Foyle (Mark Durkan) on obtaining this important debate. I thank him for allowing me to make an extremely brief contribution to add to what he has said about the importance of looking at the issues from the point of view of the child. Like him, I have a particularly difficult constituency case at the moment. I know that the Minister is aware of it. I will not refer specifically to it, but I want to raise the issues that concern me, which add to what the hon. Gentleman has already outlined.

There are issues about the content and operation of the convention, which mean that the best interests of the child are clearly not always served. I understand the importance of the issues of jurisdiction and freezing the situation where it is, but, in the constituency case that I have, it cannot by any stretch of the imagination be in the interests of the child for the decision-making process to take so long. A very young child has not had contact with one of their parents for two years. The likelihood of a relationship developing as one would want between a parent and the child—whether they live with them or simply have contact—is almost impossible. It is extremely heartbreaking and very difficult to deal with.

I am grateful to the Minister for the time that he has given to me and my constituent on this issue, but I do think that, in the circumstances—the hon. Member for Foyle is raising fundamental questions—this is a good time for the Government to say, “Could we be doing more? Should we be raising this in international forums? Should we be looking at how we can have the best interests of the child—as our legislation, the Children Act 1989, puts it—clearly at the centre of what happens?” I look forward to what the Minister will perhaps commit a future Government to doing.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Selous]

My hon. Friend is right to mention drugs in prisons as that issue is of great concern to the Ministry of Justice, not least because of new psychoactive substances that are getting into prisons. Our existing prisons have drug treatment programmes, and we are considering how we can continually improve and make that work more effective.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister will know that many young people who become involved in offending have themselves been victims of crime—perhaps crimes that they have not disclosed such as sexual abuse. When did he last meet the children’s Minister, the Under-Secretary of State for Education (Mr Timpson), to discuss that issue and consider how we can ensure that those young people, as victims, get the help that they deserve?

[Andrew Selous]

I reassure the hon. Lady that I am working closely with the children’s Minister and I have met him on a number of occasions, most recently last week. We are working closely together to address the issues that she has quite properly raised.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 16th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

In the previous Session of Parliament, the Justice Committee identified that under this Government the progress made in implementing the recommendations of the Corston report on women prisoners had stalled. What has happened in the past year to address that and to make sure that the different needs of women, particularly in preventing reoffending, are being properly addressed by this Government?

[Simon Hughes]

There is a list of steps that the Government are taking. I cannot give them all now because Mr Speaker would not allow me. We have legislated to make sure that women’s interests are specifically provided for in the rehabilitation process. There have to be specific programmes to meet the needs of women. We have made sure that in each of the women’s prisons there will be the capacity for women to have spaces outside the walls on a gradual programme, so that they can be rehabilitated more quickly. I am clear that the needs of women are entirely different from the needs of men in prison, not least because of their family responsibilities, and that is written through—as through a stick of rock—all that we are seeking to do in relation to women in custody. I will give the hon. Lady the full list later.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 11th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Simon Hughes)]

It is true that the rate of self-harm is far too high in our prisons and is traditionally higher among women than men. I can reassure my hon. Friend a little, however: between 2004 and 2010, the number of incidents was over 10,000 a year, but that has come down significantly in the last three years to fewer than 6,000 last year. However, this issue is clearly linked to mental health, and the Deputy Prime Minister, the Secretary of State and I have made it clear that we want mental health services to be as good in prisons as in the rest of the country and as good as all other NHS services and that we want to identify mental health issues when people first enter the criminal justice system, so that, ideally, they can be diverted from prison, not sent to prison.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

In a recent court case where a child was being considered for adoption, it was reported that the president of the family division described it as “profoundly disturbing” that the parents did not qualify for legal aid and could not afford legal aid representation. Given the lifelong nature of adoption, will the Secretary of State look again at the issue of legal aid funding for these kinds of cases?

[Mr Vara]

We are in regular dialogue with the judiciary—indeed, I have had a meeting with Sir James Munby—but we have had to take some tough decisions on legal aid. At some £2 billion a year, it was the most expensive legal aid budget in the world, and even after the reductions, it will remain one of the most generous in the world.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 1st July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I am very much of the view that mentoring is an important part of the way we support former offenders as they come through and leave the prison system. It is essential that we help them get their lives back together again, particularly given the fact that many of them come from the most difficult of backgrounds. I am encouraged by the number of voluntary sector organisations that have expressed an interest in and put their names forward for the transforming rehabilitation programme. The voluntary sector will play an extremely important part in the way things develop in the future.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

When did the Secretary of State last meet the Secretary of State for Health to discuss mental health services and drug services? They are under pressure in many areas and it is vital to follow that up in order to support people coming out of prison by ensuring that they have access to those services.

[Chris Grayling]

I completely agree with the hon. Lady. The last conversation I had with the Health Secretary about this was a week ago. We intend to do joint work on it and I see it as my Department’s next big priority. It is something we have to tackle and to tackle effectively.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

The right hon. Gentleman is right to say that drugs in prison—whether adult prisons or young offender institutions—are a continuing problem, but as he and I have discussed, that problem is changing. Increasingly we see good reductions in mandatory drug testing rates for adult institutions—down from some 25% positive results to nearer 7%—but an increase in problems with drugs that are not in and of themselves illegal, but which should not be misused in prisons. For that reason we need to change the testing regime and give ourselves more tools to address the problem, which is what we seek to do.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

Under the previous Government, the youth offending teams brought together professionals from different areas to help to tackle youth offending and bring down youth crime. What is the Minister doing to invest in mental health services and drug rehabilitation services in particular? Skills are important, but, if the issues that affect many of our young offenders are not addressed, they are likely to return to crime.

[Jeremy Wright]

The hon. Lady is right that youth offending teams do valuable work. They continue to do that work, of course, supported by the Youth Justice Board. We are looking at the moment at how we can strengthen youth offending teams and have greater support from the Youth Justice Board to ensure that high standards are maintained. She is right, too, that one of the advantages of the youth offending team model is that it brings together a variety of different agencies, including those within the health sphere. She is right that mental health questions, in particular, are often relevant to addressing wider reoffending needs.

Child Protection

Meg Munn Excerpts

Thursday 12th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, and we could have taken up this entire debate with the history of some of these cases. And these are only the high-profile cases that we know about and read about. They are only a small sample of what has actually been going on; many more have not reached the headlines or even the courts.

Away from the high-profile stories that make the media headlines, the wider figures show that our various child protection agencies have never been busier. The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children reports that referrals to ChildLine about sexual abuse were nearly twice as high in June and July of this year as in the same period last year, pre-Savile. There have been 2.4 million visits to the ChildLine website in the last year—an increase of some 28% on the previous year. The NSPCC estimates that more than 50,000 children in the UK are known to be at risk of abuse. It calculates that last year, a total of 2,900 rapes or attempted rapes of children under the age of 13 were recorded; that is eight per day. Indeed, 32%—almost a third—of all sexual crimes in this country are against children under the age of 16.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

I know that the hon. Gentleman feels very deeply about this issue. Do these figures not show that we have to be more aware of the fact that paedophiles will target professions in which they can get access to children, and that the Government therefore need to do more? Instead of relaxing regulations relating to children and Ofsted child protection inspections, the Government need to be much more cognisant of the issue, target areas where such things are likely to happen, and make people aware that paedophiles will be in these professions. Action must be taken to stop them.

[Tim Loughton]

I agree with the hon. Lady, who knows a great deal about this issue, having been a practitioner in the field; indeed, she and I have worked together through the all-party group on child protection. We need to be wiser to the professions in which paedophiles and potential paedophiles will inveigle themselves. At the same time, however, training and awareness in some of these professions—an issue I shall return to—have improved enormously, although not enough, yet, and the inspection regime has improved. In too many cases, we were inspecting the wrong thing. I hope that joint agency inspections, which we were promised but which have been put on hold, will still happen, so that we have that cross-disciplinary eye: police looking at children’s services, children’s services looking at education, education looking at health services.

Too often, there was a silo approach to inspection, which took up a great deal of the time of professionals who would rather spend it looking after the families, and not enough dissemination of information. The best way to bring that about is better multi-agency training, which we have not been good at. That is beginning to happen, however. For example, we have multi-agency safeguarding hubs, through which different agencies are co-located—sitting next to each other in the same room, looking at the same intelligence, discussing cases and coming up with a much better informed and sharper action plan. All those things are improvements, but the point the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Meg Munn) makes is a valid one.

I know that many Members want to contribute to the debate, but there is a bit more I want to say. With the list I have given goes a looming public apprehension about whether we really have cracked child protection, buffeted by almost weekly revelations of the latest scandal involving abuse at the hands of a bishop, a music teacher, a taxi driver or a soap star. To some extent, it matters not whether the perpetrator is dead or alive, or how long ago his alleged misdemeanours took place. The higher profile given by the media to cases linked to celebrities has, however, been deeply unhelpful, as it detracts from the reality that the main perpetrators are common criminals in ordinary jobs.

Of course, the fact that so many cases are now coming to court, however belatedly, is a sign of some success, in that offenders are now being pursued better by police. Victims are being heeded more loudly and sympathetically, prosecutions are sticking and the perpetrators are being made to pay.

However, are our children safer now than they were 50 years ago, when Savile and others started to ply their trade? Have we just replaced celebrity abuse of star-struck teenagers while the establishment turned a blind eye with systematic abuse to order by organised gangs, be they Pakistani-British—high-profile cases of which we have seen—or of whatever culture? Are internet groomers and the recent Oxford and Rochdale abusers just a modern-day version of Savile, armed with mobile phone technology but without shell suits and the lure of the “green room”? In that sense, given the reach of technology as a key tool of the abusers, do they not pose a much more widespread threat now than ever before?

I think that those of us in the know here today can say that children are safer now than back in the 1960s, but that is a tough sell to the public at large. But if that is the case, when did things actually get better? When did child protection come of age and society at large recognise its significance? When did we equip our agencies sufficiently to question the “It’s just Jimmy” mentality and start turning over some rather grubby stones? Was the landmark Children Act 1989 the turning point? Was it the shocking revelations concerning the north Wales care homes, which have of course come full circle, as we now know that the whole story was not properly revealed? It is to answer these questions that I and others have been calling for some time for an overarching inquiry into the whole sordid history of child abuse in this country, going back to the 1960s and traversing the Children Act, into what I call the legitimate legislation tsunami post-Victoria Climbié. Such an inquiry must involve a commission, led by respected figures from the law, lawmakers, social services and children’s charities. It must set out to provide the holistic assurance that has been so sapped by the plethora of at one time weekly inquiries and reviews set up by the Home Office, the BBC, the Department of Health and numerous others, and it must go everywhere.

Such an inquiry must address four main issues. What exactly happened, and why, over all those years? When did things start getting better, and how? Have all practical steps been taken to give victims the confidence to come forward, and for the police to pursue vigorously any remaining offenders? Perhaps most important of all, have all our major institutions that have significant dealings with children and young people instituted child protection policies and practices that are fit for purpose in 2013 to deal with modern-day technology and savvy perpetrators?

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[Ann Coffey (Stockport) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), who as children’s Minister responded positively to the parliamentary inquiry into children who go missing from care, which was conducted by the all-party group for runaway and missing children and adults and supported by the Children’s Society. I am pleased to support his call for an overarching inquiry.

Over the past 20 years, we have had numerous high-profile inquiries and serious case reviews after children have been harmed, abused and killed. Almost without exception, those inquiries and reviews have come to the same conclusions—poor inter-agency working, sharing of information and communication were significant factors in failures to prevent the child’s injury or death. There is a public frustration that time and again recommendations point to the same failings in the system.

It seems that a lot of reviews and inquiries look at the failures of the organisations around the child rather than putting the child’s voice and experience at the centre of the review. I recently looked at a systems review of CSE practice by Stockport’s children’s safeguarding board through the eyes of a victim. I was struck that on a number of occasions her case was closed because she withdrew her co-operation. She would not communicate. Surely a better way would have been to find someone capable of talking to her and winning her trust, which could then have prevented the harm that subsequently happened to her.

Listening to the children who gave evidence to our inquiry, it was clear that children felt that they had not been, and were not being, listened to. One of the key challenges facing agencies charged with safeguarding children is being able to communicate properly with children, so that they feel able to talk about what is happening to them. I agree with the Children’s Commissioner, Maggie Atkinson, that staff who work with children and young people, from whichever discipline or profession, should experience a common set of training that crosses all boundaries. Unless we can communicate with children, we will not know what is going on in their lives and therefore we will not be able to prevent them from coming to harm.

Sadly, all too often, that essential communication with children does not happen and we find out all too late about the horrors of the experience that those children have been subjected to, which they then have to relive as witnesses in our courts. There is widespread concern about the treatment of child witnesses in the court system. The failures to provide sufficient support to child witnesses are based on an inadequate understanding of how to communicate with children.

No one should be in any doubt about how much children worry about going to court. Many children express those fears to the NSPCC’s ChildLine. I will read out just one example. One girl said:

“I have to go to court this week to give evidence and I really don’t want to. I didn’t want to report the abuse but I was told I had to. It just feels like everything’s my fault and I wish I had never told anyone.”

I welcome the new guidelines issued by Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions, on cases involving child sexual abuse, which he said would ensure that the focus was on allegations made by victims, rather than their weaknesses and vulnerabilities. However, I fear that we are a long way from that in the way witnesses are cross-examined in our courts now.

The Government are making progress in piloting section 28 of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999, which will allow pre-recorded cross-examination of young and vulnerable witnesses. That is very welcome.

I recently tabled a series of parliamentary questions which revealed that in the first three months of 2013 registered intermediaries were requested for children in only 16% of cases. This indicates to me that the police, the prosecution, the defence and the courts do not really understand how difficult it is for children to communicate in the current adversarial system and do not understand the need for registered intermediaries to facilitate communication between them and the court.

Interestingly enough, in spite of all the publicity surrounding witnesses who have been called liars and fantasists and subjected to aggressive cross-questioning by multiple lawyers, I understand that there have been barely any complaints to the Bar Council, which indicates the acceptance and normalisation of aggressive, adversarial cross-examinations.

I have been reading with interest the work done by academic experts such as Professor John Spencer of Cambridge university and Joyce Plotnikoff about the need to reform the rules and conventional practice in the cross-examination of children. I would like the Minister to consider establishing a commission of inquiry made up of expert judges and leading academics into reforming the rules on cross-examination of children after the spate of recent high-profile sex trials in which lawyers branded vulnerable victims liars again and again.

Of course the right of the defendant to a fair trail and to examine fairly the witnesses against him or her must be sacrosanct, but the process has to be about obtaining the best quality of evidence in a way that is robust, reliable and safe for the witness. As Lord Justice Auld said in his review of the criminal courts:

“A criminal trial is not a game under which a guilty defendant should be provided with a sporting chance.”

Currently, the court appears to be set up as a theatre, in which lawyers perform for the benefit of the jury. Sometimes it does not seem like a real cross-examination of evidence, but to be about smearing and breaking down the witness to get defendants off the hook. One senior English barrister told Dr Emily Henderson, a visiting fellow at Clare Hall, Cambridge and a criminal barrister herself who is doing a six-month study of the impact of changes to cross-examination, that:

“You are always really playing to the audience. Of course, it is one-on-one in that there is only one person answering questions, but you are constantly aiming everything at the people who are ultimately going to be making the decision. So you are playing to the gallery.”

Another barrister told Dr Henderson:

“I have three speeches: my opening, my closing and my cross-examination.”

Barristers in sex abuse cases must be stopped from manipulating child witnesses like puppets.

As many leading academics, including Spencer and Plotnikoff, have said, 30-plus years of empirical research in this and similar adversarial jurisdictions has shown again and again that conventional cross-examination is more likely to confuse and mislead children than to draw out accurate and reliable evidence. Indeed, research by the NSPCC showed that more than 90% of children under 10 do not understand the questions they are asked in court. The commission that I am proposing could also consider what further measures might be undertaken to improve the safety and reliability of processes for the taking and investigation of children’s evidence by the criminal courts. In addition, it could examine extending the role of registered intermediaries to allow them to cross-examine vulnerable witnesses under the direction of counsel. This idea was first raised more than 20 years ago in the 1989 Pigot committee report, which recommended that advocates’ questions should be relayed through a specialist child examiner, such as a paediatrician, child psychiatrist, social worker or other person who enjoys the child’s confidence.

In most other continental jurisdictions, including France, Germany, Austria, Norway and Italy, young child witnesses are questioned by a neutral specialist. The interviewer investigates issues that the defence wants raised and consults the defence in the process.

I was heartened that in 2010 and 2011 the Court of Appeal released several judgments designed to clean up poor cross-examination techniques. The court was very clear that cross-examiners must use language appropriate to the developmental stage of the witness. However, despite these encouraging comments from the Court of Appeal, how we treat children in court is still a massive problem. In the last couple of weeks, we had the judge who described a 13-year-old victim of abuse as predatory. This was in addition to one of the barristers in the Oxford case accusing one of the girls of being a serial liar and fantasist who had fabricated the allegations, and a witness in the Stafford trial had to endure being called a liar day after day.

[Meg Munn]

There was a lot of condemnation of that at the time, with the Prime Minister and others saying that those remarks should not have been made, but does my hon. Friend agree that we should be worried not that such remarks are being made but that people in these positions believe these things in the first place about children?

[Ann Coffey]

I agree. Attitudes to children in our society are quite awful sometimes. That manifests itself in various ways.

Children’s charities and victim support groups said that the Staffordshire trial shamed British justice. These cases demonstrate the urgent need for reform. I hope that the Minister will agree with me that a commission to look into further reforms of the practice of cross-examination is the only way to ensure that in the future we get the best possible evidence, without which the courts cannot do justice to the victim or the defendant.

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[Mr Andrew Smith (Oxford East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart). I agree with the points that he and, indeed, previous speakers made—this is a vital debate.

I want to focus on the lessons and the aftermath of the awful crimes uncovered in Oxford in the Bullfinch investigation. We were all shocked and horrified by those crimes, and it is right that those who are guilty are punished and feel the full force of the law. It has to be said, though, that the convictions were just the beginning of the action that needs to be taken.

I welcome the steps that are being taken by the National Group on Sexual Violence against Children and Vulnerable People. No one should underestimate the challenge of pulling together all the Government Departments, agencies, local authorities and outside organisations, including in the private sector, whose commitment, resources and action are needed to provide real focus and drive to this vital work. I hope that this debate can support the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice in having the clout and reach that he will need to force the pace of progress and deliver real change on the ground. I also support the further steps called for in the “Childhood Lost” petition to the Prime Minister by the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood), which calls for more sensitive court procedures, the publication of serious case reviews, and consistent support across the country for victims of child sexual exploitation.

The Oxford victims, who, as children, should have been protected and cared for, suffered so much and were very brave in giving their evidence. We owe it to them and to all who are at risk to make a mighty effort to prevent such abuse in future.

I have three key points to make. First, the victims and their families are owed a clear explanation of what went wrong; why they were failed; and, where there was fault, who was responsible and what action will be taken about that. It is terrible to think that this went on so long, for years and years, before the hideous reality was uncovered, thanks eventually to police and social services action. It is right that the Thames Valley chief constable and the county council chief executive have apologised for the time it took and are committed to uncover any shortcomings within their organisations.

We have to look to the serious case review as the first step, but, as the independent chair of the Oxfordshire safeguarding board has made clear to me, the prime purpose of serious case reviews is to learn lessons to improve work to safeguard and promote children’s welfare. She wrote to me:

“SCRs are not inquiries into how a child died or was seriously harmed, or into who is culpable…Nor are SCRs part of any disciplinary inquiry or process relating to individual practitioners”.

Such action is the responsibility of the relevant organisation, be it the county council, the police, the health service, or whoever. The abuse in these cases went on for a very long time, and some of the staff involved, and those responsible for them, will have retired or otherwise moved on. In its briefing for this debate, Oxfordshire county council says:

“Staff previously employed by the County Council will be interviewed by the Serious Case Review author and will be a matter for the Serious Case Review.”

It seems to me that there may well be a gap in accountability between the ambit of the serious case review and the internal enquiries undertaken by the county council and the police.

I will of course look very carefully at the serious case review and the outcome of the internal reviews. It is crucial that this is all fully transparent and covers every angle. I am sure that the public will want to know what independent involvement and oversight there is of these reviews. We might well, though, need a public inquiry to get to the bottom of how children in care were left so vulnerable and what can be done to take good care of those at risk in future. The police and crime commissioner for Thames valley has already called for a more general public inquiry into how we safeguard children nationally, reflecting remarks, which I support, that have already been made in this debate. I would like to hear the Minister’s response to that.

My second key point is that it is vital that we put in place effective measures to protect children. Children and parents must be educated in the risks and tell-tale signs and have someone to go to for support and advice. We all have a responsibility to report suspicious activity to the police. I welcome the “Say Something If You See Something” toolkit produced by the NWG Network and the Children’s Society to help businesses, as well as the wider community, to play their part.

One good thing to come out of Operation Bullfinch in Oxfordshire is the joint team, the Kingfisher unit, bringing together police, social services, drug and alcohol specialists and the health service in combating child sexual abuse. Another is the work being undertaken with schools to alert children to the dangers of grooming. Steps are also being taken to develop a multi-agency safeguarding hub. I urge colleagues from other areas to find out what is being done in their constituencies. Such initiatives are urgently needed everywhere because, sadly, as is becoming more evident as more cases come to light, grooming and abuse are a significant risk everywhere. Do not let the councils, police, schools and other agencies wait until they have a horror on the scale of Operation Bullfinch to deal with.

My third key point is the question of whether, in social care practice and law, the balance is right between the rights of the child and the duties of parents or those with responsibility for care to safeguard that child. I asked the Library for a briefing on this, because one of the issues of public concern material to the Operation Bullfinch cases is how on earth children can go missing time after time from what supposedly is a place of care, even when staff suspect those children are victims of grooming. The Library dug out for me the statutory guidance under the Children Act 1989. Volume 5, which is on care homes, states:

“Staff in children’s homes that are not approved as secure children’s homes should not try to restrain the child or young person simply to stop them from leaving the home.”

Similarly, “Is it legal? A parents’ guide to the law” by the Family and Parenting Institute states:

“A parent cannot stop a child leaving home by locking them in or physically restraining them.”

I told one of our colleagues this and he was shocked that he could not legally ground his teenage daughter.

We have to be careful because, sadly, as other awful cases have shown, abuse sometimes takes place in the family home itself, and no one wants to be in the position of locking the fire escape. Equally, however, it is no good our criticising care workers for their inability to prevent the victims of grooming from going out if we do not give them the power to do so. This needs to be looked at very carefully, to see whether the balance can be shifted more strongly towards allowing those charged with safeguarding to fulfil their responsibilities.

[Meg Munn]

I am listening carefully to what my right hon. Friend is saying, because this situation is familiar to me from my time working in social services. At that time, secure places were available, which meant that once a child was identified as being at risk, they could be put in secure premises where they were offered support. I am concerned that that provision is not as widely available any more and that that is one of the reasons we find ourselves with the dilemma being described by my right hon. Friend.

[Mr Smith]

That is precisely the sort of thing I had in mind when I said that we need to look carefully at whether the balance can be shifted towards enabling those with caring responsibilities to fulfil them.

We also need urgently to spread the best practice of those care homes—there are some—that have achieved a lower rate of absconding. The sad reality in many of these grooming cases is that the victims initially want to go out because of the treats and affection, and then later, when they are drugged, abused and threatened, they are too scared not to go out and need protection.

The sad lesson of Operation Bullfinch and similar cases is that while most children can enjoy a childhood free from such horrors, there is a bigger risk of grooming and abuse out there than was previously realised. We know about it now, though, and there is a massive responsibility on us all, both to uncover what has gone wrong and to do our utmost to make sure that every child is safe.

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[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for granting a debate on this important issue. In my speech, I shall concentrate on the issue of sexual abuse of children in religious institutions. I have met survivors of abuse and their advocates on a number of occasions. They endured terrible suffering, and they seek justice. They have called for an independent commission of inquiry into the sexual abuse of children by clergy in religious institutions, not just in schools.

A public inquiry or similar process would undoubtedly bring the systematic abuse of children into the open, and would outline the lessons of their experiences. An inquiry would highlight the betrayal and abuse of trust by religious institutions—institutions that are meant to look after the spiritual and moral welfare of children. Time and again, children and vulnerable adults were betrayed by those whom they trusted. Even today, victims struggle to be heard. Known abusers are defended by senior clergy. Some parents prefer to believe the priest rather than their own child. There are cover-ups, witnesses are fearful of coming forward, and members of some faiths are reluctant to go to the authorities because they do not belong to the same faith.

I have looked into the issue in my capacity as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on child protection, and have concluded that, while it is essential for us to find some way of ensuring that victims are heard and believed, a public inquiry may not be the best way of ensuring that we do what we need to do to protect children today. I support other Members’ call for an overall inquiry, and indeed I have written to Ministers about the issue, but now we can do better. The Government can show that they are listening and understanding by addressing current failings.

Reasons for sexual abuse are found not in the teachings of any faith or religion, but in individuals who take advantage of the power, position, trust and authority vested in them by an institution. There is evidence that faith leaders are taking some steps to ensure that cases are not covered up, and that they are establishing robust safeguarding policies that includes support for victims. There have been changes in the way in which the Catholic Church and the Church of England deal with sex abuse cases, especially following the Nolan report and the more recent Butler-Sloss review. The Bradford Council for Mosques and the Bradford safeguarding children board have worked together to produce a paper entitled “Children do matter”. The Methodist Church has a safeguarding policy, and has issued a joint statement with the Church of England on guiding principles. The Methodists are undertaking a systematic review of sexual abuse cases dating back to 1950, in order to establish exactly what happened and what the response was. That is an excellent move, which I would like other faiths to emulate. Lessons can be learnt, and our children can be better protected.

However, there is also evidence of continuing denial. Recent reports have suggested that a year ago, Cardinal Keith O’Brien blocked a similar review of abuse in the Catholic Church in Scotland. We need to look at the behaviour of faith institutions, and to ask whether the proposals for change are sufficient and the pace of change fast and widespread enough. We need to understand that part of the abuse by people who represent faiths stems from the fact that we expect more of them when they are looking after our children. This is not just the abuse of trust that we see elsewhere; it is a fundamental betrayal of the beliefs held by members of those faiths.

Organisations, including religious organisations, can and must do all that they can to protect children, deter paedophiles, and ensure that perpetrators are stopped and face justice. They must change a culture that minimises both the prevalence of abuse of children and its effects. I was disturbed to discover from the internet that an organisation called Catholic Voices, which seeks to portray the Catholic Church positively in the media, is minimising the issue of abuse by Catholic priests. Its argument is that it is much more prevalent in society in general than it is in the Church. Does it not understand that organisations which are in regular contact with children must ensure that those who work with children in their name are their responsibility? Those are astonishing statements from a religious organisation that should be doing all it can to prevent abuse. Contrition and action are what is needed, not denial and deflection.

It is not just the Catholic Church that needs to do more. The Church of England has only just apologised for the scandal of the abuse that took place in Chichester, and there are worrying reports from other faiths. A new book by a Muslim woman describes abuse that she suffered at the hands of her imam, and there has been a Channel 4 documentary about alleged cover-ups by rabbis in some Jewish communities. However, this is not just the responsibility of religious organisations. We must ask whether the law and the guidance are sufficient to protect children in religious institutions today. Are we being complacent, and therefore complicit, when we say, as the children’s Minister said in a letter to me,

“we encourage organisations to continue to improve their practices to ensure that today’s children are kept as safe as possible”?

The duties of all schools to safeguard and promote the welfare of children are made clear in the Education Act 2002, which—along with additional guidance—places a statutory duty on all schools to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, and states that all schools should have a child protection policy and child protection procedures in place. The re-launched guidance entitled “Working together to safeguard children” states that safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility, which is welcome. Safeguarding is clearly the responsibility of everyone, particularly those who work with children. However, the list in paragraph 8 of the introduction makes no specific mention of anyone who holds religious office. The only mention of faith organisations appears at the end of chapter 2, which deals with organisational responsibilities. Faith institutions must be in the mainstream throughout documents on safeguarding.

Two other documents, “Safeguarding children and safer recruitment in education” and “Dealing with Allegations of Abuse against Teachers and other Staff”, specify a duty to report abuse that is proven, but the institution concerned can make a judgment on whether there is not a case. Clearly judgments must be made, but we also need to have better oversight of the systems in schools and a mechanism to check that cases are being reported appropriately.

[Mr William Cash (Stone) (Con)]

Given the tragedies that have occurred in the Catholic environment, I hope the hon. Lady has not overlooked the fact that the hierarchy of England and Wales, through the Archbishop of Westminster in particular, has set up a safeguard arrangement, which is being followed through effectively.

[Meg Munn]

What I am saying is that it is the role of organisations to do precisely that, but I am coming on to question whether faith organisations are taking that seriously. When an organisation within the Catholic Church puts on a website the other side of the coin on abuse and talks about minimising it, surely we can expect our faith organisations to say, “Not in my Church, not by my priests,” and to do everything they can to ensure that, rather than saying, “Well, it’s not as bad as it is elsewhere.” That is not an acceptable attitude and speaks of denial and deflection. That is what I am saying.

I know that the Department says that it does not specify in relation to faith schools because they can be of different types, but I worry that this is not clearly understood by those who run faith organisations. The make-up of local safeguarding children boards as set out in section 13 of the Children Act makes no mention of religious organisations and “Working Together” is silent on the issue. The Tackling Child Sexual Exploitation action plan contains no specific action to work with religious institutions to address the issue. We treat religious institutions differently when we do not name them.

I believe there is more we need to do. The children’s Minister in correspondence with me has said he believes that mandatory reporting—the issue raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Mr Robinson) —is already in place. He states that any organisation must refer cases to the Disclosure and Barring Service and failure to do so is a criminal offence, but this relates only to issues about staff. Is it really clear, particularly for religious organisations and voluntary organisations, that they must report suspected instances of abuse to the relevant agencies?

Some countries have mandatory reporting, and I know that that is not the answer to all the problems, but I understand that those campaigning for mandatory reporting are outraged, as we all should be, that a perceived gap in legislation means that a more senior member of a religious organisation believes that it is all right to move the person on, or ignores concerns, or makes up their mind to deal with the matter in house. This is not acceptable.

Child abuse is the scandal that we must tackle. I fear that the Department for Education is complacent and must urgently review law and guidance to ensure that it is an explicit requirement on religious organisations. Specific reference to all religious and faith institutions and their duty to safeguard children and vulnerable adults must be made in all appropriate legislation and guidance to leave no room for ambiguity. We cannot be reluctant to deal with the problem for fear of accusations of discrimination and prejudice. We owe it to children to take action.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Wright]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that this is a hugely important issue. Given his knowledge of the subject, he will recognise that a consistent approach is also important. As I said a moment ago, the work should start while prisoners are in custody and continue as they go through the prison gates and out into the community, so that supervision and support for those with drug or alcohol problems can be maintained throughout the process to ensure that they do not relapse and go back to their old ways. We will certainly think about how we can engage with not just health service providers but rehabilitation providers, and do so over a longer period.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

Offenders with drug addictions often lead very chaotic lives, and often relapse several times before they secure the help that will enable them to embark on the path towards a more normal lifestyle. They need a great deal of work over a long period, and they are often not directly ready even to start looking for a job. How will the Minister’s system of payment by results, and his efforts to get more offenders into work, take account of the work that will need to be done over, perhaps, a number of years?

[Jeremy Wright]

As the hon. Lady says, this is a difficult and faltering path for many people with serious drug addiction problems. The system that we are designing, however, is based on the central tenet that people should do what works to reduce reoffending, and that those who do so will be rewarded for it. If someone has a major drug problem, it will be necessary for providers to address that in order to ensure that that person does not reoffend. I am confident that they will focus on those issues, and will do what is necessary to turn people’s lives around. If what is necessary in the case of a particular individual is getting him off drugs and keeping him off them, I am sure that that is what they will do, but we will need to bring in a number of agencies to work with them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I have a lot of sympathy with my hon. Friend and I will ask the Minister responsible for prisons and probation whether he will work with him to look at the situation described. Clearly, it is not sensible to locate such facilities in highly sensitive locations, although my hon. Friend will agree that their provision in the community is vital.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Government have proposed to move personal injury cases below a certain level into the small claims court, which will mean more people representing themselves in person. That is likely to mean that a lot more time will be needed for those cases, as well as a lot of negotiation, which will lead to more costs. How does the Minister think that such a move will save the public money?

[Chris Grayling]

I am not sure whether the hon. Lady has experience of the small claims court, but this plays to the point raised by her hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel). The small claims court is more of a mediation environment than a combative legal environment, and that is a better way of dealing with many of the smaller claims that people need to bring.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Tuesday 18th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

Our consultation includes proposals to introduce a series of limitations in the judicial review process, particularly to stop people coming back again and again looking for new legal nuances to launch a new case. I believe, as does the judiciary—this has been highlighted in a number of recent cases—that judicial review is simply being used as a vehicle to delay being deported from the country, which is wrong.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

The all-party parliamentary group on child protection is conducting an inquiry into the review of family justice and the Government’s proposed reforms. We have today heard that in most situations the judge did not meet children in the looked-after system before making decisions about their lives. Is it not time that judges who work on family justice cases are dedicated to family justice rather than dealing with other cases, so that we can ensure that they are properly trained and can communicate properly with children?

[Chris Grayling]

It is not for me specifically to instruct the judiciary on how they handle cases—the independence of the judiciary is a feature of our system. However, I am sure the hon. Lady’s comments will have been heard by those who lead the family division. It is very much a matter for judges to decide how best to ensure that they have the right mix of experience.