Community Payback

Rob Butler Excerpts

Tuesday 28th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)]

At the outset, I declare my interests, having served as a magistrate for 12 years, as a member of the Sentencing Council and as a non-executive director of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, all prior to my election.

In my role on the bench, I sentenced many people to community payback. It is a superb way to achieve the purposes of sentencing. It acts as a punishment by depriving offenders of their free time; it makes reparation to the public by improving local community facilities; and it often also helps to rehabilitate offenders by providing them with new skills or, at times, giving them their first ever experience of work. I have heard many accounts of people who have gone on to use those skills and experiences in later employment—employment that reduces their likelihood of committing further offences and so reduces the number of victims of crime.

Over the past two years, however, we have had the covid pandemic. When I first saw this motion on the Order Paper, I thought that the Labour party had perhaps forgotten about that. I realised then, of course, that it had not because its leader constantly wanted to keep us in lockdown. The pandemic had a massive impact on work across the entire country, so it is hardly surprising that community payback fell considerably during that time or, indeed, that the type of work that offenders were asked to do was adapted to the circumstances of the covid restrictions that were in place. It seems to make sense to me that when it was necessary, offenders were given tasks that they could complete at home, which included making personal protective equipment and face coverings, which became such a vital part of everybody’s life during those grim covid days.

I do not claim for a second that that was perfect, but it was surely better to have people carrying out their sentence in some form, producing something useful and contributing to their local community. What would Labour have preferred? Would it have preferred that they all sat watching “Bargain Hunt” while waiting for life to return to normal? What about offenders whose health meant they needed to shield for longer than others? Does Labour think that they should have been let off? We certainly do not. Does it not make sense, in fact, that community payback can adapt to circumstances, so if a person is unable to work in a certain location, perhaps because of a physical disability, other provision can be made for them to repay their debt to society? In my time at HMPPS, I constantly called for greater innovation. It strikes me that that is exactly what was demonstrated during the pandemic. Indeed, we can learn from that for the future.

This is an appropriate time to pay tribute to all the staff of HMPPS for everything that they did during the pandemic—I absolutely share the view of Opposition Members on that. I have often described those staff as the unsung heroes of our public services and they certainly proved that over the past two years. I particularly congratulate the winners of the Prison Officer Of The Year and Probation Champion Of The Year awards, which were held last week, recognising the outstanding contributions made across both services. As the chief executive of HMPPS said:

“The incredible work on show reflects the resilience & professionalism I see across the service every day from our fantastic staff”.

I am therefore absolutely delighted with the investment that the Government are making to recruit 500 additional community payback staff over the next three years, meaning that a record-breaking, staggering 8 million community payback hours will be completed each year.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (Andy Carter), who is still a serving magistrate, pointed out, community payback is just one of a wide range of non-custodial sentencing options open to magistrates and judges. I very much hope that the recent unification of community rehabilitation companies and the National Probation Service will lead to a wider use of community orders where doing so protects the public and has the confidence of the judiciary.

I am very pleased that we have already seen the introduction of tougher community sentences under this Government. One aspect of that is doubling from 12 to 24 months the time for which an offender can be subject to curfew restrictions. Personally, I hope that over time the Ministry of Justice will look at creating new forms of community sentences. A couple of years ago, I worked with the Centre for Social Justice on just such a proposal: the intensive control and rehabilitation order, under which offenders would wear GPS tags tracking their movements. They would be confined to their homes under a highly restrictive curfew that allowed them out only for specified reasons such as a job, a meeting with their probation officer, specific reparation work for victims or a course to address their offending behaviour. To some extent, it would be a midpoint between the current community orders and a spell in prison. I would very much welcome the chance to discuss that proposal further with Ministers.

For now, however, I return to my puzzlement at today’s Labour motion. The Government are committed to community payback, and they can prove it with the work done so far, the work still to come, the money being spent and the staff being recruited. Indeed, they are committed to tackling crime and reducing the number of victims in a plethora of ways, including by increasing the number of police officers, giving the police more powers and toughening sentences for the most serious crimes—measures that the Opposition have opposed time after time. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge (Ellie Reeves), who is shaking her head at me from the Opposition Front Bench, was right about one thing: this debate will show which party is serious about tackling crime. It is the Conservative party. It always has been, and it always will be. I am proud to be on our side of the House, in the party that takes action and makes investments to put victims first.