Victims and Prisoners Bill (Eighth sitting)

Sarah Champion Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 29th June 2023 Public Bill Committees

[Jess Phillips (Birmingham, Yardley) (Lab)]

rose—

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

rose—

[Edward Argar]

I will give way first to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley.

[Edward Argar]

I am grateful to the shadow Minister. I will come on to how this will work in practice, but I suspect hon. Members may wish to return to it in their contributions to their amendments. I give way to the hon. Member for Rotherham.

[Sarah Champion]

What she said.

[Edward Argar]

I suspected that might be the case.

The requirement to share compliance information and to report to the Secretary of State on the joint review of this information will enable a clear national picture to be formed of how the criminal justice system is delivering for victims. It is important to remember that police and crime commissioners are directly elected and directly accountable to their local communities.

The requirement provides a means to escalate issues that cannot be solved locally and will enable Government to establish a new national governance system to pinpoint and intervene to address any systemic problems. The Victims’ Commissioner and inspectorates will be asked to participate in the new national governance system to ensure that victims’ needs and their perspectives are reflected. This will, of course, be covered in the relevant statutory guidance that will set out the operational detail across these clauses and the wider oversight framework.

Clauses 8 and 9 put two duties on the British Transport police and Ministry of Defence police respectively that mirror those placed on criminal justice bodies in clause 6. The duties are to promote awareness of the victims’ code and keep their compliance with the code under review. This ensures parity between local, national and non-territorial police forces. British Transport police meet victims of crime every day, including those mentioned by the hon. Member for Rotherham who are involved in child criminal exploitation, such as through county lines.

Instead of jointly reviewing information with police and crime commissioners, the British Transport police will be required to jointly review information with the British Transport police authority, which is the appropriate oversight body for them. Similarly, the Ministry of Defence police will do so with the Secretary of State, which in practice will mean that the Secretary of State for Defence is the appropriate oversight body for them. It is important that all police forces that have contact with victims, and therefore have responsibilities under the code, are responsible for promoting awareness of and complying with the code to help support victims. If I may, Ms Elliott, I will address amendments 47 and 13 and new clause 2 in my wind-up remarks. I commend clauses 6 to 9 to the Committee.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sarah Champion]

I have tabled what I hope is a straightforward amendment that would place a stronger duty on criminal justice bodies to promote awareness of the victims code, rather than just asking them to take reasonable steps. Clause 6(1) states that,

“Each criminal justice body which provides services in a police area must…take reasonable steps to promote awareness of the victims’ code among users of those services and other members of the public”.

The amendment would remove the words “take reasonable steps” and make the clause stronger. For example, a reasonable step could be a poster in a police office reception, so that when asked about this during the compliance process, they could say, “Yes, we have taken a reasonable step. Everyone that comes into the police office can see that. It is a reasonable step.”

As other Members and I have already pointed out, compliance and awareness of the existing victims code is worryingly low. I look to the Minister to do something more robust to get that awareness into the public domain. Victim Support’s “Victim of the system” report found that as many as six in 10 victims do not receive their rights under the victims code; 20% of victims are not referred to support services, 46% do not receive a written acknowledgement of the crime, and 60% do not receive a needs assessment. The status quo is not working. For victims to access their rights, they must first be aware of them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Argar]

I am grateful to hon. Members for their contributions. I will respond on amendments 47 and 13 in turn, and will then touch on new clause 2.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Rotherham for amendment 47. I understand that she seeks to require relevant bodies to raise awareness of the code, rather than taking “reasonable steps” to do so. I reassure her that our intention is, of course, that victims will be made aware of the victims code. The “reasonable steps” term is commonly used and well understood in legislation. The use of it here seeks to replicate section 24 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, which states that a senior police officer must “take reasonable steps” to discover the victim’s opinion before giving a domestic abuse protection notice. It appears similarly in the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017.

[Sarah Champion]

I am feeling the way the Minister is going with this. Might I make an on-the-hoof addition of the phrase “all reasonable steps”?

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Does Sarah Champion wish to move amendment 47 formally?

[Sarah Champion]

The Minister is a reasonable man and I am a reasonable woman, so I will not press amendment 47.

[The Chair]

We now come to amendment 13, which has just been debated. Does Anna McMorrin wish to move the amendment formally?

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Argar]

I will speak to clause 11 stand part, and in my concluding remarks address the speech that the hon. Member for Rotherham will make when she speaks to her new clauses.

Our approach through the Bill is to provide a framework to drive improvement and to use statutory guidance to set out how to operationalise that framework. That is why clause 11 requires the Secretary of State to issue guidance that will support the bodies subject to the code awareness and code compliance duties in clauses 6 to 10 to discharge those duties. It also requires those bodies to have regard to the guidance, which I hope provides reassurance to the hon. Member for Rotherham that there are sufficient provisions in place to ensure agencies take the statutory guidance on board.

We intend for the guidance to cover topics raised by hon. Members: how relevant bodies can promote awareness of the code, including how to make the code accessible and how to provide training to staff so they can confidently engage with victims; how police and crime commissioners will be required to report to the Secretary of State on their local reviews of code compliance information; and what good or poor performance looks like. It will also cover information on how local and national oversight structures will work, including routes for escalating on issues between them and on how data sharing and publication will work. The frequency of information collection will be set out in regulations and reflected in the guidance as appropriate.

Getting the guidance right is crucial to ensure that the policy works on the ground, so that it is clear what those subject to the duties are expected to do, and to encourage good practice and consistency across England and Wales. We intend to publish details of the guidance during the passage of the Bill to enable parliamentarians to have it to hand as they debate the Bill in its subsequent stages, and we are currently working with bodies subject to those duties and those who represent victims to develop it so that we can be sure it will work operationally. Underlining the importance of considering the views of those affected by the guidance, the clause also requires the Secretary of State to consult relevant stakeholders before issuing the guidance, which will ensure that it is useful and reflects the operational context.

Our approach to setting out the framework for code awareness and code compliance in the Bill, and the detail in statutory guidance and regulations, is the right way to drive improvement in the victim experience. I hope that clause 11 will stand part of the Bill.

[Sarah Champion]

Clause 11 is a welcome part of the Bill that requires the Secretary of State to issue guidance regarding the code awareness and reviewing code compliance. We know that the guidance may include provision about ways of promoting awareness of the code; how information is collected, shared and reviewed; and the steps that an elected local police body must take to make the public aware of how to access compliance information. That is all vital for ensuring accountability and awareness of these issues, but alone it does not go far enough. It must be on the face of the Bill that the code is accessible to all victims, particularly those who have disabilities or whose first language is not English. The Secretary of State must ensure that code awareness is raised among those groups too.

It is also not enough to publish code compliance and draw public attention to how to access that information. If we want to ensure that victims’ rights are met, we need to actively monitor their enforcement. New clause 5 seeks to ensure that the victims code is accessible to all victims and associated services. The new clause is supported by Women’s Aid and addresses issues raised by charities such as Victim Support, which I thank for helping to draft it.

As we know, the victims code sets out the minimum standards that organisations must provide to victims of crime. However, specialist violence against women and girls organisations have an abundance of evidence that indicates the needs of deaf, disabled and blind victims, as well as victims whose first language is not English, are being overlooked, neglected or at best addressed inadequately. It is truly concerning to hear from Women’s Aid that public bodies, including the police, often fail to comply with their obligations under the Equality Act 2010 to eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation when interacting with victims facing communication barriers. Their right under the victims code—

“To be able to understand and to be understood”—

is also not being upheld. We know from specialist “by and for” led organisations that this is having a direct impact on marginalised victims not coming forward. This failure to respond to their communication needs is preventing victims from coming forward. As a result, victims are left with no choice but to stay longer with an abusive perpetrator and are at risk of increased harm while being denied justice.

Rising Sun, a specialist service, highlighted a case whereby a victim’s disability was not factored into the support plan and she was not provided information in Braille. Not only did this impact on her ability to make an application for a non-molestation order; she could not even read the resources provided on domestic abuse. She was left feeling humiliated and embarrassed, and stayed with her abusive partner for a further four weeks before fleeing to emergency accommodation with her children.

As discussed on earlier amendments, by failing to address and respond to communication barriers, there is a risk of the police having incomplete information and evidence from victims due to the lack of support to ensure they were understood. A survivor working with Women’s Aid urged for there to be more training to support those with accessibility needs, such as deaf people. She highlighted that we have a BSL Act but this it is not having any impact on survivors of domestic abuse.

The Government state that one of the first objectives of the Victims and Prisoners Bill is to introduce measures

“to help victims have confidence that the right support is available and that, if they report crime, the criminal justice system will treat them in the way they should rightly expect.”

It is clear, therefore, that new clause 5 is vital to ensure that all practical steps are taken to ensure that the code is fully accessible to all victims, particularly deaf, disabled and blind victims, as well as victims whose first language is not English.

Victim Support has also raised concerns about the need to implement the right to be understood. One woman, Angela—both her name and the languages have been changed—was wrongly arrested when she attempted to seek help from the police after experiencing domestic abuse. Despite taking regular English classes, Angela struggles with language skills in pressured or stressful situations. When she contacted the police to report the abuse, her partner at the time, who was fluent in English, managed to convince the police officers that he was the victim. Angela said:

“They cuffed me, put me in a police car, so I said, why? I was being treated like a criminal, so I was in great shock.”

At no point did the police ask Angela if she understood what was happening or if she needed a translator, even when she started speaking in Romanian. She said:

“They were just saying, ‘speak English, speak English!’”

Angela was arrested and held in police custody. She only got an interpreter at 8 pm, despite asking for one at 2 pm. After explaining what had happened through the interpreter, Angela was, thankfully, released and her partner was later charged. Eventually, the case went to court and the perpetrator was found guilty and issued with a restraining order. However, a copy of the court ruling was only sent in English, and Angela had to pay to have it translated.

It must be on the face of the Bill that the Secretary of State must take all practical steps to ensure that victims who are deaf, disabled or visually impaired, or who do not speak English as their first language are able to understand their entitlements under the code. We cannot allow anyone, in particular vulnerable women such as Angela, to be wrongfully treated and unaware of their rights do to these language barriers.

New clause 5 would also require the Justice Secretary to ensure that criminal justice bodies signpost victims to appropriate support services, and to ensure that appropriate training is delivered to staff in criminal justice bodies, including by specialist domestic abuse services. This is desperately needed, as we know from the examples we have heard over the past few days. I urge the Minister to consider adopting the new clause, or to please give assurances that he will include guidance on not only accessibility and awareness of the code, but on providing training to criminal justice agencies.

I now turn to new clauses 11 and 12. New clause 11 would place a duty on the Secretary of State to make an annual statement on compliance with the victims code, and new clause 12 would require the Secretary of State to set minimum threshold levels of compliance with each right of the victims code. The new clauses aim to strengthen the accountability of the victims code of practice by placing a duty on the Secretary of State to oversee them. They also aim to remove the core responsibility of overseeing enforcement of the code from the police and crime commissioners, who currently do not have sufficient powers and, in many cases, resources to either ensure compliance or hold contributors to the local criminal justice board to account.

New clause 12 would also ensure that the information on regulations covers every right in the victims code so that genuine improvements for victims will be achieved. In 2019, the independent Victims’ Commissioner carried out a review of delivery of the victims code. Sadly, the review found that the code is failing to deliver the improvements and sense of change required, because of fundamental problems that require systemic changes to be fixed. The needs of victims are not being met, and agencies are still struggling to deliver the code. The review called for an urgent reform—and that was in 2019. Wider victims code compliance data is not readily available, but aspects of it, such as being informed of the option to write a victim’s statement, are tested by the Office for National Statistics. That is reflected in the Ministry of Justice’s “Delivering justice for victims” consultation document, which sadly offers no detailed look at code compliance from other data sources.

The new clauses seek to tackle the lack of compliance by addressing the accountability issues denying victims and witnesses their rights and entitlements. The current set-up relies on the local criminal justice boards, the majority of which are chaired by the PCCs. LCJBs were introduced to bring together criminal justice partners to identify priorities, improve the experiences of victims and witnesses and deliver agreed objectives to improve the effectiveness of the local criminal justice system. They are aligned to the police force areas and operate as voluntary partnerships. However, when looking at right 4, for example, regarding support services for victims, the third sector, integrated care boards and sometimes local authorities are missing from this core conversation on the victims code.

In 2016, the Local Government Association undertook a high-level review of the council’s role in providing community safety services. Part of that review scrutinised PCCs and their role in chairing LCJBs. The review found that relationships between local councils and the PCCs were, not surprisingly, varied. It was clear that in some areas relationships are well established, with close work taking place; in others, relationships have proved more difficult to establish and there is very little contact, particularly where local priorities differ between the leading PCCs and the community safety partnerships. The review also found that similar variations were reported regarding the strength of local authority relationships with other statutory partners. In some areas excellent relationships are in place; however, it is clear that that is not universal. In other places, there continue to be concerns about siloed working and core issues such as data sharing. Stronger mechanisms must be in place to ensure that code compliance is on a national scale. We cannot have another postcode lottery being exacerbated due to the lack of accountability.

By placing a duty on the Secretary of State to both gather the data and publicly analyse it, there will be an emphasis for the relevant bodies to both return the data and work to improve it. Additionally, requiring criminal justice agencies to report annually on compliance provides the Secretary of State with a level of necessary oversight to ensure compliance and that victims’ rights and entitlements are upheld. The Secretary of State can then make an annual statement on the current state of code compliance and provide additional support and scrutiny wherever necessary to ensure that the code is working effectively for victims and witnesses. That also allows for more parliamentary scrutiny where necessary.

New clause 12 requires the Secretary of State to set a minimum threshold level of compliance for each right under the victims code. If the threshold for compliance is not met, the Secretary of State must commission an inspection and lay it before Parliament. Core accountabilities of the measures in the Bill must go back to the Secretary of State to ensure that we as parliamentarians can hold him or her to account, reporting the steps taken to correct any issues. That is a vital safeguard for Parliament. It should lead to urgent and tangible change where failures have taken place, and ultimately to a better experience for all victims.

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Argar]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Rotherham for tabling the new clauses, and I hope that she will allow me to address them all together. Although they each address different aspects of victims code awareness and compliance, they are interrelated. I wholeheartedly agree with the aims of each new clause, but we believe that the issues are already addressed in the Bill and associated measures. What differs is how the new clauses would achieve what is essentially a shared aim.

Broadly, the new clauses would either place duties in legislation where we instead propose including provision in statutory guidance, or introduce duties that we feel are already provided for in the Bill; I will go through the specifics in a second. As I said, the approach that we have taken to drive up code awareness and compliance is to set up the key structures of the framework in the Bill but to allow for the regulations and statutory guidance that operationalise it to be where the detail is found. Where we have introduced new duties, we have carefully considered how to do so in the way that we believe will be most effective in delivering the improvements in victim experience that I think is a shared objective for everyone in the room.

New clause 5 is intended to improve accessibility and awareness of the victims code and associated services. I share the hon. Lady’s aim of ensuring that all victims have access to the information that they need to support them in engaging with the criminal justice process. The new clause would require the Secretary of State to

“take all practicable steps to ensure that the code is fully accessible…and to promote awareness of the code”.

As right hon. and hon. Members will have seen in clauses 6, 8 and 9, we are placing explicit duties on criminal justice agencies to promote awareness of the code among victims and the public. We have placed that duty on agencies rather than the Secretary of State. Because those agencies are the ones in contact with victims day in, day out, they are best placed to raise awareness directly with victims themselves and to shoulder that responsibility.

Outside the Bill, I agree that there is a role for the Government in promoting code awareness. This is why we have committed to raising awareness of the code among practitioners, victims and the general public. For example, we are looking at a Government communications campaign and similar measures to boost that broader reach.

[Sarah Champion]

What language is that campaign in? I am holding up my phone to make a point about access to smartphones and smart technology. Translating all the core documents, which could easily be downloaded on a phone or printed out by an officer or support service, does not seem a particularly complex thing to do, if there is the Government will to make it happen.

[Edward Argar]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady. As I say, I am looking at how we might do this, so I am not in a position to make firm commitments to her, other than that I will bear what she says in mind when we get to the point of being able to do something like this. She made a sensible point and, typically, in doing so she also suggested a possible solution.

Accessibility is hugely important. The code, however brilliant it may end up being, is of limited value if people cannot access it to understand it and know how it relates to them. We know that victims not only need to know about the code, but need to understand it. We recognise the importance of that. We are considering carefully how we can ensure that everyone who needs to understand it can do so. I am happy to work with the hon. Member for Rotherham. My meeting agenda over the summer and in September is getting longer and longer, but I am always happy to spend time with her to discuss such matters.

The hon. Lady’s new clause 5 would also give the Secretary of State the power to make regulations prescribing that criminal justice bodies must signpost victims to appropriate support services and must receive appropriate training, including from specialist domestic abuse services. It is absolutely right that victims should be signposted to appropriate support services. Right 4 under the code contains an entitlement for victims to be referred to support services and to have such services tailored to their needs. Through the new duty on criminal justice agencies to take reasonable steps to make victims aware of the code, more victims should be aware of their entitlements.

I turn to training. Agencies already deliver training on the code to their staff to ensure that they are confident and comfortable sharing it. For example, the national policing curriculum uses interactive and group training methods to deliver training in as impactful a way as possible. That is regularly reviewed and updated as necessary.

[Edward Argar]

The hon. Lady slightly pre-empts my answer. If that information is centrally held, I will endeavour to get it and write to her with it.

I am also pleased that the College of Policing has developed the Domestic Abuse Matters programme, which has already been delivered to the majority of forces. It was developed in conjunction with SafeLives and with input from Women’s Aid.

In addition, the CPS will work with specialist support organisations to develop bespoke trauma-informed training on domestic abuse to help prosecutors to understand the complexities that victims experience in those crimes. Information on domestic abuse and how to recognise the signs and provide support is also available to HMCTS staff. To increase the impact that the training agencies already deliver, we are using statutory guidance to set out advice regarding appropriate training so that staff working with victims are confident in how to share the code sensitively and effectively at the right time for the victim.

We are confident that for both training and accessibility, statutory guidance under the existing code awareness duty is the most flexible and effective approach. It can set standards while allowing agencies to tailor it for the different needs of agencies, staff and victims, and it can be kept up to date more easily, which enables us to take a continuous improvement approach. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley is right to make the point that we can have fantastic guidance and training, but the key thing is to ensure that it is engaged with and that practitioners take the training on board and—I have used this dreadful word a few times—“operationalise” it in their day-to-day work. It is right that independent agencies have the expertise to decide how best to design and deliver training, rather than the requirement sitting with the Secretary of State. We already have provisions in the Bill and additional measures to address the aims of new clause 5, so I encourage the hon. Member for Rotherham not to press it to a Division.

New clause 11 would place a duty on all agencies with victims code responsibilities to monitor and report on compliance, and a duty on the Secretary of State to report annually to Parliament. I am grateful for the debate we have had, and I absolutely agree that we must monitor and report code compliance information. That is vital to understanding whether victims are getting the service they should. As I mentioned in our debate on a previous group of amendments, in 2019-20 only 23% of victims and 22% of the public were aware of the code, and only 45% of victims felt that the police and other criminal justice agencies kept them informed. That is why the Bill already legislates for new duties on code awareness and compliance in clauses 6 to 11. We therefore consider that new clause 11 is already covered by the existing provisions.

[Sarah Champion]

I wonder whether the Minister plans to speak about what enforcement there is if things do not go as he anticipates in the Bill.

[Edward Argar]

Without testing the patience of the Committee, I have a few more points I intend to make before concluding. I hope that some of what I say may well reassure the hon. Lady. If it does not, I am sure she will return to it at some point.

Together, these clauses set out the new code compliance monitoring framework by requiring key criminal justice agencies to keep their compliance with the code under review through collecting, sharing and reviewing compliance information and by reporting to the Secretary of State—either through police and crime commissioners, for local area reporting across agencies, or via separate routes for the national police forces. As has been outlined, those reports will be fed into a national forum where the data is reviewed, and the Secretary of State will publish relevant information to create as much transparency as possible. We are actively considering how often compliance information and data will be shared, and we will include that in the statutory guidance.

Where the amendment differs is in covering all agencies that deliver services under the code. This is a long list and includes bodies for which direct working with victims of crime is not central to their work. We carefully considered which agencies should come under these important but potentially not un-onerous monitoring and reporting responsibilities. We sought to choose key agencies that work day in, day out with victims of crime and have most responsibilities under the code, for example the police, the CPS, the courts, prisons and probation, and youth offending teams. That is where we want to prioritise resourcing to deliver robust local and national oversight. I agree that the Secretary of State reporting annually to the House is a vital part of accountability. We will continue to test and develop proposals for the new national governance forum, and I am open to considering how the findings and outcomes of that forum can best be reported to Parliament to allow parliamentary scrutiny and debate of such measures.

New clause 12 would require the Secretary of State to set victims’ code compliance thresholds by regulations, trigger inspections if thresholds were breached and require inspection reports to be laid before Parliament. I agree that there should be clear standards for the service that victims should receive, and consequences if service falls below that threshold. Our approach to achieving that is related to, but slightly different from, the proposal of the hon. Member for Rotherham. Although we will use regulations to set out what information must be collected to monitor code compliance, we think statutory guidance should cover the important issues that the hon. Lady has raised, such as thresholds that may trigger escalation to address poor performance. That is particularly appropriate for considering performance thresholds, given how the victims’ code sets out entitlements: they are a mix of what victims should receive, or have the opportunity to receive, and how they should be treated. In this context, the quality of communication and delivery really matters.

We will better understand code compliance, including the quality of delivery, by gathering consistent information from a range of different sources, including victim feedback, quantitative data and process narratives to understand how agencies deliver less measurable entitlements. That basket of evidence will hopefully give us a broader picture of how well local areas are delivering the code. The information on code compliance will allow police and crime commissioners to assess where improvements are needed, what agencies’ plans are to drive these improvements and whether those plans are working. Measuring whether standards are improving in this way will be more effective than setting a potentially arbitrary threshold, against each code right, as to what triggers escalation.

Where local solutions fail or greater oversight is required, police and crime commissioners will be able to escalate systemic issues to the national governance forum. I agree that inspections will help to drive change, which is why the inspectorates will be invited to attend the national governance forum. When systemic issues and poor performance are identified at a national level, that will be an opportunity to use the powers that we have introduced in the Bill for Ministers to direct a joint victim-focused inspection in areas that are consistently not delivering or to examine a range of issues that are clearly challenging in a number of areas, rather than requiring an inspection for each individual breach. In cases where there are individual breaches, there are, of course, complaints processes, and the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman can take appropriate actions to identify the most appropriate route for redress.

Finally, with regard to laying a report in Parliament, inspection reports are already published. As I have said, I am open to considering how the national governance forum reports and work can be fed into Parliament, and I will work with the hon. Member for Rotherham and others across the House to ensure that we get this right. I hope that that gives the hon. Lady some reassurance.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 11 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Fay Jones.)