Crime and Courts Bill [Lords]

Robert Buckland Excerpts

Wednesday 13th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jenny Chapman]

It was not me who made that suggestion; it came from the legal services ombudsman. So clearly there is a way around this matter and the Minister may wish to explore that a bit further. His intervention shows that the Government are not going to do this, but we would like them to commit to a robust complaints procedure to sort out the problems that our constituents face. They deserve access to a robust complaints procedure when things go wrong, as they too often do, so we hope that hon. Members on both sides of the House will support our proposal.

[Mr Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)]

I shall speak briefly in support of a probing proposal, my new clause 17. I listened carefully to the speech made by the hon. Member for Darlington (Jenny Chapman), and I entirely share and sympathise with the thrust of her argument: we do need to make sure that the regulation of the behaviour of bailiffs is not just about certification; and the continuing behaviour of individual bailiffs does need to be monitored, tracked and adequately assessed, so that regulations are adjusted to keep pace with changing practices in debt collection.

We all know that debt collection is a sad fact of life that affects a large number of our constituents. We have all, in our case loads, doubtless come across worrying stories about abuses of power. It is right to acknowledge that the Government are moving, with their transformative agenda, to address large parts of the concerns that Members rightly have. Using the existing legislation to create new regulations is a good step forward. Importantly, the strengthening of the certification process, in the form of training and the like, is a valuable way forward, as is the creation of the new fixed-fee system. As I have already said, that deals only with the point of certification and not with practice. We must be realistic and we must acknowledge that taking a snapshot of the behaviour of individual bailiffs will not deal with many of the problems that beset people who are in debt but still deserve to be treated with respect.