Oral Answers to Questions

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 30th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Jake Richards]

The policy that we are implementing in England and Wales is lawful; it complies with the Prison Rules 1999 and the Equality Act 2010. The guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission has come out. We have 40 days to consider and ratify it, and we will do so.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West and Islwyn) (Lab)]

Given that we are thinking about the women’s prison estate more generally, and given that the Swansea residential women’s centre was due to open in 2024 but now does not look like it will open at all, what steps is the Minister taking to ensure that Welsh women can access alternatives to custody?

[Jake Richards]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that we are determined to drive down the population of women who are in prison where it is safe to do so. That is why Lord Timpson set up the women’s justice board, which has taken huge steps not just in improving resources for women in custody, but in ensuring that we have plans to reduce the population wherever possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 17th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Welsh Affairs Committee.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West and Islwyn) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for her responses. I want to raise the issue of young people not in education, employment or training. We know that the Conservatives failed our Welsh young people for 14 years, so I am really pleased that this Labour Government are investing £2.5 billion in the youth guarantee. How many Welsh young people will benefit from this scheme?

[Anna McMorrin]

Far too many young people are not in education, employment or training, which is why we have committed to a youth guarantee to grant young people right across the UK, including Wales, the choice to learn or to earn, backed by £820 million of funding. This week, we announced seven more youth hubs for Wales, helping young people build critical skills and find jobs. Those measures will be life-changing opportunities for young people, significantly reversing the increase we inherited from the Conservative party in the number of those not in education, employment or training.

Victims and Courts Bill (Third sitting)

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 19th June 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Dr Mullan]

The hon. Member raises an important point. That is why amendment 23 specifically includes a duty to consult victims and their family members on the use of the power. We heard evidence, which I had anticipated, that some victims and their families will not want to see the offender. That is why the judge should consult them and, if that is their clear and settled view, take that into account when making the decision. The point is well made, and that is why our amendment takes that issue into account.

I have spoken directly to several people involved in these types of cases. I mentioned Ayse Hussein from Justice for Victims. She was absolutely clear that even if exercising the power in the amendment meant someone disrupting proceedings and creating a spectacle, as the hon. Member for South Devon described, she would want to see it happen, and there will be many other people who feel the same way. For those who do not, there is no pressure for it to happen. That is why we have said that the judge should speak to people about the power before using it, for the important reasons that the hon. Member gave.

I return to the point that I fear that we will end up worse off because we will have told the public, “We can get these people into court,” but actually the worst offenders will just not come or resist. That is why we need to increase the level of force and ensure that they cannot just make a noise to get out of the whole process. The people on whole-life orders, for example, are some of the worst offenders, who we most want to see in court. They are the ones who would be least bothered by the sanctions, and they would just make a noise in order to not have to be in court.

If we overcome that first hurdle, as a result of our amendments on the use of force, and get offenders into the dock, we also need the power to ensure that they cannot just scream or shout their way out of it. I have to say that I was genuinely shocked by Labour Members’ questioning on this measure during the evidence sessions. Restraint of people through force is practised in a wide variety of settings by a wide variety of people on a regular basis. I have no doubt whatsoever that the practice can be extended to our courts.

As much as I respect the training and expertise of aeroplane crews, I do not consider them to be uniquely qualified in the ability to restrain people in a chair. I urge Members to reflect on any initial resistance that they may have to this measure. Do they sincerely think that what aeroplane crews can achieve up in the air is not achievable in a courtroom? Common sense tells us that this measure is eminently achievable. I was pleased to hear evidence from a senior police officer and a senior staff member of His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service—and, indeed, to hear the Minister herself accept—that it is possible in principle. I am confident that the majority of the British public will agree with us, and I wonder how Members who choose to vote against the measure will explain that action to their constituents.

I will deal briefly with how someone might be gagged —that is to say, silenced—by giving a simple example. I only need to do so briefly, because it really is a very simple matter. In August 2018, a US judge, John Russo, asked for a robber, Frank Williams, to be silenced after he refused to be silent and continued to disrupt the court’s proceedings despite being issued with 12 warnings. Based on their questioning during our evidence sessions, I know that Members struggle to conceive of how that might be done, so I will alleviate their concerns and tell them how it was done: they just placed some tape over his mouth. The US legal system is quite clear about the legal right for an offender to be restrained and gagged. Members can, should they wish, look up the relevant rulings in the US judicial system.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West and Islwyn) (Lab)]

I am struggling to see how a piece of tape can silence somebody. Somebody with respiratory conditions, or whatever, might even suffocate as a result. Has the hon. Gentleman considered the medical reasons for not gagging somebody?

[Dr Mullan]

Absolutely, and it would be for the judge to decide in all circumstances whether it is appropriate. I will be happy after this sitting to send the footage from that case, and the evidence of someone successfully being gagged by having tape placed over their mouth. This is really simple stuff that is being done in other parts of the world and I do not understand why Members find it so difficult to understand.

Victims and Courts Bill (Second sitting)

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 17th June 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Sally Jameson (Doncaster Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q I have already declared my interests but, for the purpose of the panel, I am a member of the Prison Officers’ Association and a former officer at rank of SO, and I am trained in all the relevant uses of force.

I want to come back to the point about compelling attendance at sentencing hearings. The Government’s Bill states that a relevant officer may,

“for the purpose of delivering the offender to the courtroom, use reasonable force, if necessary and proportionate.”

That is in relation to the existing use of force policy framework and the relevant Prison Service orders that apply to it. Do you agree that, when you look at the use of force framework, the words “necessary”, “proportionate” and “reasonable” relate to the whole spectrum of use of force, from the very lowest level, such as a guiding hold, right to the top level, and therefore the word “restraint” in the amendment tabled by the official Opposition does not detail what existing restraint would be used that is not already covered in the current policy framework?

My second question is this. I have never heard or seen gagging in any Prison Service policy, so from your operational experience, what implement would you suggest would be used for gagging and how would it be applied?

Chris Jennings: In reverse order, that is well beyond my area of expertise, because, as you rightly identify, that is not something that is in use in the service at the moment. Perhaps, in some unfortunate hostage situations, other prisoners may deploy such techniques, but not our staff, so I am not qualified to offer a perspective on what sort of equipment may or may not be appropriate.

On your first question, again, I am not an expert on use of force—I have not done the jobs you have done to get to the role I am in now—but I think that the description you gave of the policy is accurate. That way that you described it is what it means at every level; that would be my interpretation.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West and Islwyn) (Lab)]

Q Thank you both for coming before the Committee. You were both quite upbeat about the ability of the Probation Service to deal with the changes, which is great, but when I have talked to probation officers in Wales, they have said that they find their caseload extremely challenging and there are issues with covering the workload they have already. You have talked about geography and how different areas have different abilities. How are you going to manage the measures in the Bill in order that you can deliver the victim contact scheme and victims helpline, but also ensure that victims feel that they are at the centre of the Bill?

Chris Jennings: I was the director in Wales for four and a half years, until 18 months ago, so I know working in Wales quite well. It is one of the better staffed areas, despite colleagues’ perspectives to you being right; there will be some carrying heavy workloads, I am sure. The distinction is between the probation officer caseload and what we ask VLOs to do. They are not the same thing. As Kim described, they are ringfenced activities. There is obviously communication between the two sets of staff, but they are not the same thing.

The overall probation caseload in some areas is definitely something that we are more worried about, but not as it pertains particularly to the VLOs. That is why we are perhaps reasonably upbeat about it. It is not one of the areas that we are under most pressure on, so I think we will be able to absorb it. There will be some national things, such as the helpline and ensuring that we resource that on a national basis. My national team have a key role to play in providing the training, support and guidance to VLOs out there.

Switching my hat back to my other day job, operationally, between me and my regional probation directors, we will have to ensure that we are paying full attention to implementing the Bill well, given how crucial it is to confidence in the justice system and making sure that we are providing the support that victims deserve. I do feel confident about our ability to do that.

Kim Thornden-Edwards: I certainly endorse that. Again, it is about the discrete element of the victim liaison officers. In terms of general staffing, I absolutely acknowledge what you are saying. The Lord Chancellor has acknowledged that there are capacity issues in the Probation Service, and workloads are currently too high. We have a comprehensive plan to mitigate that. Part of that is around growth. The Lord Chancellor announced £700 million of additional funds for probation by the end of the spending review period, so we will be able to look at growth with that funding.

We are also looking at ways to improve our processes and use of technology. Those are things that our probation staff on the frontline are saying to us are real hindrances to their ability to do the best job every day, which they absolutely want to do. They are time hoovers, too. The time that staff want to spend with people on probation and on licence, to protect the public and effect the changes that we need to see in their behaviour, is being eaten up by bad tech and poor processes. Alongside growth, there is absolutely a commitment to make those changes as we go forward.

[The Chair]

Thank you very much indeed. What you have said will be very useful in the Committee’s deliberations.

Examination of Witness

Alex Davies-Jones gave evidence.

Drones: High-security Prisons

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 14th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

That important action taken by the previous Government was, quite correctly, supported by Labour in opposition. When anybody is found guilty of flying a detected drone, the appropriate prosecution will follow.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West and Islwyn) (Lab)]

The Welsh Affairs Committee recently visited Parc Prison in Wales, where we saw the types of contraband being smuggled into prisons by drones. One of the biggest problems reported to us was multiple drones coming in at the same time; it is difficult for the security team to then bring them down, even though they are using CCTV. What is the Minister doing to outlaw the use of those drones, to keep our prisoners safe and secure?

[Sir Nicholas Dakin]

The security and safety of prisoners and prison officers is very important. The Prisons Minister and the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), sitting to my right, recently visited Parc Prison, and are well aware of the issues. They are working with the prison authorities to address them.

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Ruth Jones Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 29th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ruth Jones (Newport West and Islwyn) (Lab)]

It is an honour and a privilege to speak in the debate and to follow so many hon. Members who have made such powerful contributions. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater)—no longer in her place—for all her work on the Bill; colleagues from across the House who have worked together so collegiately; my constituents who have written to me in their hundreds; and the experts who shared their views with us.

Everybody in the Chamber wants a good death, but at the moment palliative care across the UK is chronically underfunded, mostly paid for with money raised by charities and a postcode lottery. I pay tribute to all the hospices that are working around the clock and doing an amazing job on very stringent budgets, especially St David’s Hospice and the Hospice of the Valleys, which do amazing work. However, we have to remember that although we are talking about people with very powerful stories—some of whom are here today—we legislate for all, and that means ensuring that our legislation is safe and future-proofed.

I have concerns about the Bill on issues such as presuming consent. My worry is that if the door is opened with this Bill, it will then be widened, as it has been in places such as the Netherlands, Belgium and Canada. These things will happen.

More than 65 private Member’s Bills were passed in the last Parliament. Not one of them had more than one sitting in Committee, where the average length of debate was 35 minutes; and just over a quarter had any amendments made to them at all. My hon. Friend the hon. Member for Spen Valley has said that she is willing to extend it, which I welcome; I will be pressing her on that to ensure it is safe. If the House votes to carry the Bill forward—I will be voting against it—scrutiny will be crucial at all points of its passage.

We have talked about terminal illness today, but intractable pain is something that people live with every day. That is another issue. In my 30 years as a physiotherapist, I have seen good deaths and bad deaths. We all want to ensure that we get the best for our constituents, so we need to ensure that end of life care is sorted. This has been a good debate, because we have talked—I have certainly talked to my family. My lovely mum of 89, who is disabled, housebound and widowed, said, “It’s all very well talking about assisted dying, but we need to talk about assisted living as well, because that is most important.” Quality of life is crucial here.

We need to ensure that we are here to legislate for all, which is why I will vote against the Bill today. I am grateful for the opportunity to explain.

Prison Capacity

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Thursday 18th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood]

I thank the right hon. Member—that is a very compelling bit of lobbying from her. May I offer to meet with her, so that we can discuss this issue in person?

[Ruth Jones (Newport West and Islwyn) (Lab)]

I welcome the Secretary of State and her team to their places. Can the Secretary of State comment on what was reported in The Guardian earlier this week? Apparently, the former director general for propriety and ethics wrote to the previous Prime Minister telling him that a failure to act on the prison crisis would bring the criminal justice system to a point of “critical failure”. Does she agree that, if this is true, that is an enormous dereliction of duty by the Conservatives?

[Shabana Mahmood]

I thank my hon. Friend. I did read those reports in The Guardian. Of course, none of us has had sight of any of those papers. If those reports are true, it is very worrying indeed. As I said in my opening remarks, I did not use the phrase “the guilty men” lightly when I spoke about the crisis we have inherited and the change we are being forced to make. I believe it was a serious dereliction of duty by the previous Government. I could hardly believe the state of the prison system that I inherited, and I think we have been forced to make the changes that we have because of that failure.

Community and Suspended Sentences (Notification of Details) Bill

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 15th May 2024 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to consider clause 2 stand part.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to move my very first private Member’s Bill through the House—although it may well be my last! It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell, as we debate this important Bill. It is good to see the Minister in his place—and the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green. I thank the Minister for the proactive approach that he took to ensure that we could be here today.

I am grateful to my hon. Friends the Members for Hornsey and Wood Green, for Luton South (Rachel Hopkins), for Neath (Christina Rees), for Rotherham, for Gower, and for Cynon Valley for their support. I also acknowledge the hon. Members for Westmorland and Lonsdale and for Ceredigion for their support. I thank my colleagues on the Government Benches, too: the hon. Members for Eastbourne, for Bassetlaw (Brendan Clarke-Smith), for Dudley North, for Congleton, for South Derbyshire—who I am delighted to see in her place—as well as my very good friend the hon. Member for South West Devon, and other fellow Welsh Members, the hon. Members for Aberconwy and the right hon. Member for Vale of Glamorgan.

This is an important Bill with cross-party support, and I am very pleased to be able to bring it back to the House today. Indeed, there is no greater responsibility on us, as Members of Parliament, than to keep our people and communities safe. That goes for Newport West and for our colleagues right across the country. This Bill will do a great deal to make that objective of keeping our people safe more likely and more durable.

The Bill will amend the Sentencing Act 2020 to create a duty on offenders to notify the responsible officer of any change of name or contact details if they are sentenced to a community order, suspended sentence order, youth rehabilitation order or referral order. It will place a new duty on offenders serving a sentence in the community who are being supervised by probation or a youth offending team. The change of name or contact details could be for any reason, and the Bill captures not just formal legal changes of name, but, for example, the use of an online alias. Offenders will need to notify their responsible officer of any change as soon as practicable.

With that in mind, I now turn to the clauses themselves. Clause 1 sets out that the Sentencing Act 2020 sentencing code will be amended to create a new duty on offenders serving a sentence in the community and who are supervised by probation or a youth offending team, requiring them to inform the responsible officer if they change their name, use a different name—for example, an alias—or change their contact information. That will improve the ability of probation and youth offending teams to monitor offenders in the community.

At the end of December 2023, there were 64,800 offenders under probation supervision on a community order and 44,300 on a suspended sentence order. In the year to June 2023, 2,100 children were sentenced to youth rehabilitation orders and 6,200 were sentenced to referral orders. The Bill will ensure that the public are protected so that, while this significant number of offenders are serving sentences in the community, the responsible officers have the information they need to keep tabs on those individuals, including if they change their name or contact information.

The provisions in the Bill are robust. While the name or contact details change could be for any reason, any difference from what is kept on file must be reported by the offender. It captures not just formal legal changes of name by deed poll but also, for instance, the use of an online alias. Although we have a separate youth justice system, it is of equal importance that services can keep tabs on children and have the right information about them in order to do their job. This policy therefore applies equally to offenders of all ages and will create consistency across offenders on licence and offenders serving sentences in the community overseen by probation services or youth offending teams.

Clause 1 establishes that the requirement will apply to offenders under the age of 18 where a referral order has been made by inserting proposed new section 97A, which provides that the section applies to offenders who have been sentenced to a referral order and where a youth offender contract has not been revoked or discharged. It establishes the requirement for youth offenders sentenced to a referral order to notify, as soon as is practically possible, the relevant member of the youth offender panel if they begin using a name or contact detail that is not specified in the referral order while the terms of the contract are active. It also establishes that the duty of an offender to notify details is to be treated as a term of the youth offender contract in order to ensure that enforcement of the measure is effective.

Proposed new section 97A also establishes the relevant member of the youth offender panel that the offender should notify of any change of name and contact details, and it states that this should be done in writing. The requirement to notify the responsible officer of any change of name will also apply to offenders under the age of 18 who are sentenced to youth rehabilitation orders. As regards those sentenced to a referral order, clause 1(3) creates the duty for the offender to comply with the duty as soon as reasonably practicable and states that any offender who breaches the obligation will be dealt with by the court, in the same way as someone who breaches a youth rehabilitation order.

The Bill applies to both adult offenders and offenders under the age of 18 equally. Subsections (4) and (5) of clause 1 provide that the duty on adult offenders to notify their responsible officer if they change their name or contact details as soon as practicable applies to those sentenced to suspended sentence orders or community orders. Probation and youth offending teams will have discretion as to whether an offender is returned to court if they fail to comply with the requirements set out in the Bill. It is right that the Bill’s enforcement provisions are robust and reflect the seriousness of non-compliance, and it is right that probation officers and youth offending teams have the same powers to deal with non-compliance with this duty as they do in any other case of non-compliance with a sentence requirement.

Clause 2 addresses the territorial extent of the Bill, commencement and short title. Subsection (1) states that the territorial extent of the Bill is England and Wales only, as colleagues will have read in the explanatory notes. Subsection (2) sets out that the Bill will come into force at the end of the period of two months following Royal Assent. Subsection (3) provides that short title may be the Community and Suspended Sentences (Notification of Details) Act 2024. It is important for all of us, irrespective of party or background, that the Bill comes to fruition. I urge colleagues to give it their full support.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

It is always a pleasure to serve under your guidance, Mr Rosindell. Huge congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Newport West on bringing forward this much-needed piece of legislation. I am not rising to block its passage in any way, but I am hoping to get the Minister and those in the other place to consider some of the flaws of the Bill as it stands.

This Committee, especially the Minister, is aware that I am obsessed—that is the only word I can use—with sex offenders changing their name to avoid detection. The reason I went for sex offenders was because they are a very defined cohort of people that I could prove were using the loophole of changing their names and breaching the conditions of their existing orders to do so. However, the same principle applies to all offenders, so I rather assumed that the same conditions applied to offenders in this category and was quite shocked to realise that they did not.

I am really grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Newport West for trying to close that loophole. The problem is this: at the moment, both this legislation and the current legislation for sex offenders rely on the offender notifying. That is my problem with this Bill as it stands. By their very nature, the people who come under the Bill will be people who have committed violence, fraud, deception, coercive control, cuckooing—all the things that involve someone presenting a false representation to vulnerable people. And presenting themselves with a different name is a very good way to do that, because now most people, when they meet someone new, will go on Google and put the name in, see who it is and make a decision based on that. That is just where we are in the world at the moment; if a different name—one that is clean—comes up, we would not have any worries. We would invite that person into our home. We would go on a date with that person. Therefore I am concerned that, under the Bill, it is still the offender who is required to report a name change. It is still reliant on an offender doing the right thing when it would actually benefit them, if they wanted to continue their criminal activity, not to do the right thing.

One of the problems if offenders change their name —other than the ones that I have outlined—is that they can disappear. I discovered that when I spoke to my local police chief about it many years ago, when I first became aware of the problem. He said, “To be quite honest, Sarah, if they change their name, they literally drop off the radar. How am I meant to find someone if I don’t know who they are?” That is my concern with this Bill as well.

The next issue is that the offender has to report to their responsible officer or their youth offending team. That is great, but they are incredibly hard-pressed, and the explanatory notes say that they will be meeting the offender perhaps once a month, so I am very concerned about the other 29-ish days when the offender is not reporting and when that eye is not on them, and about what they are getting up to at that point. I am also concerned about this issue: if they are referring just to the probationary team, who do an incredibly good job but in very stressed circumstances, how does that information get to the police? How does it actually feed into systems? That becomes very important. If there is a breach, how do we enforce against that?

Under this legislation, an offender “could” be taken back to court. When an order is returned to court, the court “could” make a requirement of the order more onerous, impose a fine or even sentence the offender to custody. “Could” is not good enough; it needs to be stronger than that. If an offender is breaching their terms, there needs to be a sanction; otherwise, where is the deterrent? I urge the Minister, during the passage of the Bill—to which I hope he gives safe passage—to look at actually enforcing against that.

Let me give an example, because this isn’t just Sarah being obsessed. Well, it is, but I can actually back it up with data. Between 2015 and 2020—this data is from my written parliamentary questions to the Government —16,000 offenders were charged for failing to tell the authorities details such as a name change and address change. They are only the ones who got caught—the ones we found out about. There were 16,000 in five years. The Safeguarding Alliance, which I am very proud to have worked with for many years, found that more than 11,500 registered sex offenders were then prosecuted for failing to notify changes of information between 2019 and 2022. That is only the registered sex offenders who were found out and then prosecuted, so this is a big problem and something that the Minister needs to take seriously.

Let me end on the example that is Clare’s law. Probably many of us have encouraged our friends to use Clare’s law, whereby someone who has a new partner and wants to check that they do not have a background of domestic violence can call up the police and they will check the name against the register. Of course, if the person has changed their name, it will not show up on that register. It is also required that the police know that they have changed their name, and at the moment, there is no statutory requirement for the responsible officer or the youth offending team to refer that to the police, so there is a big gaping hole within this system.

The Bill is a fantastic first step. It has highlighted to me another area of concern, and I am grateful that the Government are recognising that. But let us get it right, because at the moment it is not right. There will be time to make amendments in the other place, or for the Minister to tighten the Bill up. With those caveats, I will be pleased to give the Bill safe passage, but I do hope that it is worked on as it progresses.

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Argar]

I think there are two points there. There is an opportunity to work with probation to give clarity, but I would hesitate to stray into the territory of “should” for a sentencer, be that a judge or a magistrate, because ultimately the courts have discretion to apply the most appropriate penalty on the facts before them. There is a slight distinction there.

As announced in the spring Budget, we are also improving our digital capability so that information on individuals’ risks will be better shared across prisons and probation, to inform key decisions and better protect the public. The effectiveness of community sentences relies on probation and youth offending teams having the ability to manage offenders in the community successfully, and that means having the right information about an offender. The Bill will help to ensure that responsible officers are given the necessary tools to keep tabs on offenders in the community so they are better able to manage them effectively.

The Criminal Justice (Sentencing) (Licence Conditions) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2022 requires offenders on licence to inform their responsible officer if they change their name and/or contact details. The Government welcome the Bill, which will build on the 2022 order by ensuring that the same duty applies to offenders serving sentences in the community. The hon. Member for Rotherham will recall that we debated a number of these issues in the Victims and Prisoners Bill Committee, possibly even in this room, recognising the challenges in the nature of individuals who commit various crimes and the question of whether they will be compliant and notify, versus the practical challenges of creating another mechanism by which they could be monitored. I am very conscious of the points that she made then—she made them forcefully and eloquently, and I suspect she will return to the issue until it is resolved to her satisfaction. I reassure her that I am conscious of those discussions and I will continue to look at that.

It is also right that swift and clear action can be taken when an offender does not comply. The enforcement provisions for the Bill are tough and reflect the seriousness of non-compliance by giving responsible officers the same powers they have in respect of any failure to comply with the requirement of a court order. If an offender fails to comply with the duty, that will constitute a breach of the order and, as we have discussed, this could result in the order being returned to court. The court could impose additional penalties, but, as I have set out, a degree of discretion is needed.

It is likely that probation would be notified about non-compliance by an external agency, such as the police, in the event the offender was arrested again. To answer the point made by the hon. Member for Rotherham, if that were the case, the default approach would be to treat the failure to notify as a breach. Practitioners will then use their professional judgment and the Probation Service enforcement policy framework to decide how best to approach that, including whether they are going to hand it to the court. As I have set out, the court would then have discretion over what penalty to impose for the breach.

In closing, I thank the hon. Member for Newport West for introducing this important Bill and I confirm the Government’s full and continuing support for it.

[Ruth Jones]

I am grateful to my colleagues across the House who have supported the Bill and joined us for this important stage of its journey. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham, who has been a doughty and tenacious campaigner on behalf of victims and survivors. Her wisdom and experience is very much appreciated, and she has raised some important practical points that I am sure we will seek to take forward as the Bill moves to the other place. I will seek to speak to her and others who want to make the Bill as robust as possible, because at the end of the day we do not want loopholes in legislation.

I am grateful to the Government for their support and would like to pay tribute to the Minister for putting his money where his mouth is. He helped to secure support for the Bill from some of his Back-Bench colleagues. To share what that support looked like, I will tell the Committee that the Minister spent some time walking around Portcullis House with Adam Jogee from my team, seeking gently to persuade people. The fearsome twosome made for a few raised eyebrows from people from all parties, considering that Adam Jogee is the Labour candidate in Newcastle-under-Lyme at the next general election. Luckily, there was no talk of defection either way, so that is good.

[Mrs Heather Wheeler (South Derbyshire) (Con)]

Coming or going?

[Ruth Jones]

I am saying nothing.

To be serious for a moment, I am grateful to the officials in the Ministry of Justice for their work in supporting us to this stage. They were enormously helpful to me and my team. I know that they will be watching proceedings this morning and I want them all to know that I am very grateful indeed.

Thanks go to my team, too. This is my first private Member’s Bill, as I have already said. Taking it through the House since my election has been a brilliant learning experience, although I am not sure that I would want to repeat it. By supporting the Bill today, the Committee has an opportunity to improve the ability of probation and youth offending teams to monitor offenders in the community effectively and to better protect the public. This is a good policy. It should have been done long ago and I urge colleagues to give the Bill their full support today.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 1 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 2 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Question proposed, That the Chair do report the Bill to the House.

[Edward Argar]

I thank the hon. Member for Newport West and hon. and right hon. Members on both sides of the Committee. I thank you, Mr Rosindell, for chairing proceedings today, the officials in my Department who have worked on the Bill, Adam from the hon. Lady’s office, and the Clerks and other officials of the House who have assisted in the passage of the Bill to this point.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly to be reported, without amendment.

Oral Answers to Questions

Ruth Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Alex Chalk]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. I was asked about my priorities when I was appointed to this role, and I said that the guilty should be convicted, that the innocent should walk free and that the public should be protected. It is very important that people who are accused of an offence have confidence that the process will be prompt and humane. Ultimately, the British people are fair minded. They want people to be rightfully convicted, but they also want the innocent to walk free.

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

T6. Since 27 February, there have been six sudden deaths at HMP Parc in Bridgend, and it appears that at least four of those tragic deaths were drug-related. What are the Government doing to ensure that inmates at Parc are kept safe and walk out of prison safe and well at the end of their sentence?

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Edward Argar)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for highlighting a serious and important issue. I am happy to meet her to discuss it further, if she wishes.

In line with established protocols for deaths in custody, we are not able to comment on individual cases until the relevant investigation by the prisons and probation ombudsman has concluded, but HMP and YOI Parc has mobilised a range of actions to gather intelligence on drug entry points and on what has happened. I am happy to meet the hon. Lady to discuss this matter privately.

Community and Suspended Sentences (Notification of Details) Bill

Ruth Jones Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 23rd February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

I am delighted to rise to bring this Bill to the House today. It is an important but focused Bill that will amend the 2020 sentencing code to create a duty on offenders to notify the responsible officer of any change of name or contact details if they are sentenced to a community order, a suspended sentence order, a youth rehabilitation order or a referral order.

The Bill will place a new duty on offenders who are serving a sentence in the community and who are being supervised by the probation service or a youth offending team to ensure that any change of name or contact details is notified to the relevant responsible officer. That captures not just any formal legal changes of a name, but the use of an online alias. Offenders will need to notify their responsible officer of any change as soon as is practicable. My Bill will apply to adults and child offenders alike, so that we can create some form of consistency across all offenders who are on licence. Importantly, it will extend to offenders serving community sentences.

In 2022, secondary legislation was passed requiring offenders on licence to inform their probation officer if they changed their name or contact details. The Bill will help to ensure consistency across the sentencing framework and that offenders serving community sentences have their risks managed effectively. For those offenders who are serving community orders, youth rehabilitation orders and referral orders, the requirements contained in the Bill will last for the whole duration of the order while the offender remains supervised by probation or their youth offending team, until it reaches the end date set by the court, or is otherwise terminated. For suspended sentence orders, this requirement will last for the period when the offender must keep in touch with probation. Once the offender is no longer required to keep in touch with probation or the youth offending team, this requirement will also end.

Failure to comply with the duty will be treated the same as failure to comply with the requirement of the order. An offender could be taken back to court. When an order is returned to court, the court can make the requirements of the order more onerous, impose a fine or even sentence the individual to custody. The management of offenders in the community is of the utmost importance to protect people in Newport West and across the United Kingdom and to reduce reoffending.

It is vital that probation and youth offending teams have the information required to be able to effectively manage offenders in the community, and the ability to take swift enforcement action where needed. The Bill will improve the ability of probation and youth offending teams to monitor offenders. It will help to protect the public by ensuring that while an offender is serving a sentence in the community, the responsible officer has the information they need to keep an eye on that individual. As I have noted, that requirement already applies to offenders released from custody, so I believe it is important to ensure that the same requirement applies to offenders serving sentences in our community.

As co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on safeguarding in faith communities, I have heard harrowing accounts of offenders who have changed their name—legitimately, at present—by deed poll and then gone on to commit harrowing offences again and again. That is not acceptable.

The people of Newport West elected me to this place in April 2019, and since then, I have sat through many a Friday sitting, listening to detailed and, on occasion, lengthy opening remarks on Second Reading. In the hope of getting this Bill speedily through to the next stage of its journey in this House with support from colleagues on all sides, I will bring my remarks to a close shortly.

In supporting the Bill, this House has an opportunity to improve the ability of probation and youth offending teams to monitor and support offenders in the community as effectively as possible. Most importantly for me, it allows us all to better protect the people who sent us here—the British people. Keeping our people safe, from Newport West to North Down and from Newcastle upon Tyne Central to North Devon, is our most important responsibility as Members of Parliament. With that in mind, I urge colleagues from all parts of the House to give the Bill their full support today.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ruth Jones]

With the leave of the House, I rise to close the debate. I thank everybody who has taken part today for the atmosphere of co-operation and consensual politics—it is very different from what happened earlier this week. I start by thanking the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Chris Clarkson); I agree with him that the “lock them up” philosophy is not always the way forward, and community sentences are a vital part of our punishment options. I was recently fortunate enough to go to Cardiff Prison with the Welsh Affairs Committee, where we saw for ourselves prisoners who might be in for just seven days. Seven days is not long enough to do anything useful in terms of rehab or breaking the cycle of offending, so the points that the hon. Member made were very important.

I thank the hon. Member for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory) for her very important points about female offenders and the distances involved. We do not have a single prison for women in Wales—I am not saying that we should have one but, like her constituents, those women in Wales have a long way to travel. That means women being apart from their families. That is disruptive, and it is very costly to visit. If anyone is in any doubt about female prisoners, they should watch “Time” with Jodie Whittaker; it is a very powerful series.

The hon. Member for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) made an important point about aliases and social media. I am sure we have all had issues with people who have had different names on emails; it is a concern that I share. He also highlighted the importance of staff working in the criminal justice system. I, too, pay tribute to those staff and thank them for all their efforts.

I thank the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan)—I hope he can put his feet up on the plane to Dublin after this, because he has been very busy today. I also thank the Minister and the team in the Department. The Minister rightly highlighted that the responsibility for reporting a change of details is on the offender; it is very important that we know that. Finally, I thank the Whips, the Public Bill Office and Adam Jogee in my office. This week has seen our Parliament—the mother of Parliaments—at a low point, but I wish the media could be here to see and feel the atmosphere today. I am not a fan of adversarial politics; I believe consensual politics is the way forward. That has been the case today, and I thank the House for it.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I thank the hon. Lady for her remarks.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time; to stand committed to a Public Bill Committee (Standing Order No. 63).