Autism and Neurodiversity Research Funding

Debate between Robert Buckland and Steve Brine

Tuesday 16th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who rightly outlines some of the pressures on the system—the increase in diagnosis, which in many ways is a good thing, and the personnel and capacity issues that cause many of the delays in diagnosis, which are all too familiar a pattern for many families, including those in England, Wales and Scotland.

It is interesting to note that research by, I think, the Northern Ireland Assembly calculated the estimated cost to the country of the failure to deal with autism at a staggering £32 billion. Let us just think about that. What a cost to our country: resources wasted, lives wasted and lives lost as a result of these omissions. It does not have to be like this.

[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

It is such a shame to see my right hon. and learned Friend not in Government, but such a pleasure to have him on the Back Benches and to be here for his first speech from the Back Benches in what I suspect is a number of years. Seeing that we have a lot of time in tonight’s Adjournment debate, does he, as a former Lord Chancellor, agree that the way we look at people on the autistic spectrum within the secure estate, and the way he is proposing we might look afresh at that, might affect the way we look at the secure estate as a whole—to understand a lot more, and condemn a lot less? We have such a high prison population, many of whom, especially women, should not be in the secure estate. Could this be the issue that causes us to look afresh at our prison system?

[Robert Buckland]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. In 2020, he and I visited his local prison in Winchester, a prison with many challenges and, there is no doubt about it, a share of the population with a brain condition, sometimes undiagnosed and often an acquired brain injury. Many people who are in for offences of violence have themselves been the subject of violence. Those issues are frankly endemic within the criminal justice system.

That is why, when I was Lord Chancellor, in last year’s sentencing White Paper, I announced a call for evidence on neurodiversity in the system. I was hugely grateful to Charlie Taylor, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, and Justin Russell, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Probation, for leading that independent call for evidence. Charlie Taylor was a public servant who came from the education sector, specifically the special needs sector, had real frontline knowledge and experience of autism and brain conditions and previously ran the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales.

The good news is that, thanks to the published results of the call for evidence, the Government committed—I am pleased to say I committed—to training for frontline staff and the upskilling of those staff right across the criminal and youth justice system, as part of a new custody and detention apprenticeship that is being offered and that will be completed by all prison officers. Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service is developing a revised policy framework and guidance all about those issues, but in particular about children in custody with those conditions. This work is carrying on. I will develop those points a little further. I know people are anxious to come in.

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[Robert Buckland]

I am very grateful to the hon. Lady. I think we formed a pact on Sunday night that we would work together cross-party on these issues. There are plenty of others on the Labour Benches—the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) has a similar experience and knowledge of autism—who I know will put their shoulder to the wheel, and that will be incredibly powerful. She has done work on the issue of knife crime. All too often, there is a sad correlation between the isolation of people who might be suffering from anxiety driven by an undiagnosed condition and what I call a cycle of isolation that can often lead to the decision to arm themselves for their own protection. That is an aspect of knife crime—we always think and talk about gangs—that we misunderstand at our peril, so I am grateful to her for taking part in the debate.

I was talking about the golden opportunity we have. We are between the autism strategy as published and the White Paper, which I am waiting for with relish. The Prime Minister knows that that is another issue I will be pressing him and the Government on in the next few months. Many of us identify social care as an issue not just for older people, important though that this, but for adults with disabilities who need lifelong support. They must be part of the mix. More than half of local government expenditure is on adults with disabilities. If we do not pay regard to that in the plan, we are failing. Although I supported and am happy to support difficult decisions on national insurance and on funding issues, we have to make sure that the system that we are funding is well evidenced, produces the outcomes that we all want to see and has an element of accountability that, at the moment, is lacking. People talk about the black hole of health and social care funding. With respect to everybody concerned with that, that is what it feels like to us on the outside, and we have to change. That is why research on care will be so important.

[Steve Brine]

I am so pleased that my right hon. and learned Friend made the point that social care is not just about older people. That is so important. What he is actually talking about—who knew that the Back Benchers and Front Benchers were so joined up?—is levelling up. He is talking about realising the potential of everybody in our country. It is not that autism is therefore a condition to be managed and kept in its box, as we seek to minimise the damage, but that we want people to achieve their potential, and if everybody can achieve their potential, that is just levelling up really, is it not?

[Robert Buckland]

I could not have put it better myself. Levelling up is about people and communities, not things. Things are important and they deliver us levelling up, but levelling up is about people. That is why the Government have to show seriousness of purpose. I am with the Government on these things—I helped to author a lot of the documents on which they will be held to account. This matters, but if we do not focus on people, we are not going to level up. That is the point that my hon. Friend made so well.

I commend the Autistica report to hon. Members, but if I may crave the indulgence of the House for a little longer, I want to outline what Autistica suggests the key stages of support should be that will make a real difference. First, the report made the important point that support for autistic families around and shortly after the time that they receive a diagnosis has to be improved, because it is big news for families. It is a big moment when they get that diagnosis. I remember now the mixture between relief that the system is listening and deep sadness, grief and anger, and all the emotions that someone goes through as a result. These are big moments for families. It sounds axiomatic, but this does not happen, because we do not empower all families of people with autism to understand the diagnosis and to come to terms with what it means for them. This is a moment when services have an opportunity to get to know these families better and to ensure that their personal profile, which should be done, is really understood.

Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Bill [Lords]

Debate between Robert Buckland and Steve Brine

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion & Programme motion: House of Commons
Monday 8th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to remember the wider family concerns, and the difficult position that grandparents—often on both sides of the divide—face when it comes to issues of contact and the welfare of much-loved grandchildren. He is right to remind us that that is a real dimension of the situation.

[Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Perkins]

rose—

[Robert Buckland]

I will give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) first, but I will come back to the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins).

[Steve Brine]

I have to be honest with the Lord Chancellor: I am troubled by his Bill, but I am not yet entirely sure why and I am listening for him to give me a reason. It almost feels as if we are trying to prevent something from pulling apart by seeking to bind it together even tighter—almost “What the law has bound together let no one put asunder.” Does he agrees that, as a society, we should invest more heavily in relationships, in preparation for marriage and in conflict resolution? I remember myself and Mrs Brine doing that, which is why we are so happily married—17 years next week. If that were the case, maybe fewer relationships would fail.

[Robert Buckland]

My hon. Friend makes the point extremely eloquently that all of us are concerned about the institution of marriage. Those of us who value it and who are part of it can see its benefits, but we are concerned to see a decline in its use—a decline in committed relationships. This Bill will not solve those problems. It will not stop those problems. This is a Bill about the legal process. I do not pretend that, through this legislation, we can solve some of the sociological issues that he raises, but he is right to look through the telescope the right way. My worry is that, however well-intentioned those who are properly concerned about the details of the Bill might be, we are in danger of looking through the telescope the wrong way if we focus our attention on this process, as opposed to what might happen at the beginning.

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[Robert Buckland]

I will just make some progress. I will of course allow for interventions in a proportionate way, remembering the time pressures that we are all under.

The Bill purposefully does not seek to change the other aspects of divorce law for financial provision—I dealt with that issue in my response to an intervention from my hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr Djanogly). It is more than half a century since the Divorce Reform Act 1969 gave rise to the current law. There is only one legal ground for divorce or dissolution—namely that the marriage has broken down irretrievably—but existing law requires that the petitioner must satisfy the court of at least one of five facts before the court will hold that the marriage has broken down irretrievably. Three of those facts—unreasonable behaviour; adultery, which does not apply in respect of civil partnerships; and desertion—rely on the conduct of the respondent. Two of those facts rely on the parties’ separation—namely two years, if both parties consent, and otherwise on the basis of five years’ separation.

Around two out of five divorces in England and Wales currently rely on the two years’ separation fact. The parties must have been separated for at least two years before the presentation of the divorce petition. However, that route to divorce can be used only if the respondent consents; if the respondent does not agree, it is a five-year wait before the divorce can be granted.

Around three out of five petitioners for divorce rely on the conduct facts—that is, unreasonable behaviour, adultery or, in rare cases, desertion. In only around 2% of cases does a respondent indicate an initial wish to contest a petition. Such initial opposition can often be driven by strong disagreement with what has been said about them by the other spouse in the petition. Of those contested petitions, each year a mere handful proceed to a trial at which the respondent’s case is heard. It is abundantly clear that marriages are not saved by the ability of a respondent to contest a divorce, because marriage is—has to be—above all things a consensual union.

I set out at the beginning that the current law incentivises many divorcing couples to engage in proceedings that quickly become acrimonious, even if it had been the intention to divorce amicably. Research shows that spouses are often surprised when told by a solicitor that they must either choose to wait a minimum of two years to divorce or be prepared to make allegations about the other spouse’s conduct. Although this is no longer the world of the staged scene of adultery in a hotel so criticised by the great A. P. Herbert, former Member of Parliament in this House and the author of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1937, it is right that we pause for thought about a situation wherein the law and circumstances are stretched in a way that does not help anybody, least of all the lawmakers themselves. It is a great poetic irony that A. P. Herbert went on to write the smash-hit musical “Bless the Bride” some years after he helped to author that major reform to the law of divorce, but perhaps that story itself makes an eloquent point: those of us who seek to make changes in this sensitive area of the law can, in the same breath, absolutely celebrate the institution of marriage and the values that surround it.

[Steve Brine]

I have found the reason I referred to. I think the unease that many feel about this legislation is the timing of it—the so-called lockdown break-ups. I can understand why that is a sensitive issue at a sensitive time on what the Lord Chancellor rightly says is a sensitive matter. What would he say to those who oppose this legislation on the grounds that it is a difficult time to be introducing so-called quickie divorces?

[Robert Buckland]

First of all, no time is an easy time. This is a sensitive matter at all times. Secondly, these are not quickie divorces. We are regularising the position to end the so-called quickie and to equalise the position with regard to minimum terms. We must, I believe, accept that divorce is a sad and unhappy consequence of relationship breakdown, not a driver for it.