North Liverpool Community Justice Centre

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Tuesday 29th October 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Ellman]

Thank you, Mr Streeter. The co-location of key criminal justice agencies in the centre—the police, probation, Crown Prosecution Service and youth offending teams—is an important part of its approach, but there is more. Crucial support services—dealing with, for example, drugs, debt, financial problems generally, victim and witness support and antisocial behaviour—all working together are critical, as is vital family support. It is a uniquely holistic service.

The centre has been privileged to be served by two outstanding judges with their colleagues—his honour Judge Fletcher, and from December 2012, Judge Clancy. The writing has been on the wall for some time, before the Government’s hasty consultation on closure, which took place in six rushed weeks over the summer recess. The answer to my parliamentary question about the issue on 9 September showed that the centre’s fate was sealed, and the Government have now announced that it is to close.

The reasoning on which the closure is based fails in two fundamental respects. The Government’s key argument is that the cost of the centre does not justify its continuation. First, the Government’s claim that it has failed to address crime successfully is deeply flawed. Crime rates in north Liverpool, which is the area covered by the centre, fell by 7.2% between 2005 and 2010—much more than elsewhere in Liverpool, and much more than elsewhere across the country. It must be remembered that the centre hears a high proportion of serious crimes. Some 88.1% of cases involve violence against the person, while the national average for cases of that sort is 47.8%. That makes its success even more notable. Its important work in addressing antisocial behaviour—a demand of the local community to address that—is simply ignored in the assessment. That work is vital to the community, yet it does not feature in the judgment on the centre’s future.

Secondly, and inexplicably, there has been no assessment of the centre’s key aim of conducting preventive work and supporting the community through its inter-agency approach. That failure is incomprehensible, as prevention of crime and supporting the community was a major objective of the centre from the very beginning. Its outstanding work on victim and witness support has resulted in, for example, a 90% to 100% successful conviction rate in cases of domestic violence. However, that outstanding work has been ignored, and I understand that with the centre’s closure, the person who has been doing that work—someone who has received national awards for their success—will cease doing it.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

As we would normally expect, my hon. Friend is making a very powerful argument on her constituents’ behalf. However, the justice centre also serves constituents in my constituency, and the closure proves the point that the Government understand the cost of everything, but the value of nothing. The Merseyside police and crime commissioner, Jane Kennedy, has described the proposals as “unnecessary vandalism”, and she has suggested that such a cut would make the job of our police force

“more difficult as the reforming work with prolific offenders will lose its focus”.

Does my hon. Friend agree that we will see reoffending rates rising because of the decision?

[Mrs Ellman]

I agree with my hon. Friend. He makes very important points, and his comments have also been made by the mayor of Liverpool, Joe Anderson.

The centre conducts excellent work with young people in schools—it has been involved with 18 schools in the local area—and it works with colleges such as Rotunda college, helping to build the confidence of young people, yet that work is disregarded. Innovative links with mental health services make it a specialist centre, yet that work is simply cast aside. Many offenders suffer mental health problems that need to be addressed. The centre has been doing valuable work in that regard, yet even that is not worthy of assessment. Excellent rehabilitation projects such as the Turnaround project, supporting women, are considered to be unimportant. When I visited that project, I realised how important it was and how much those participating in the project valued it.

The crucial work of the citizens advice bureau, giving vital practical support to vulnerable adults and the community as a whole, is not considered worthy of consideration. The CAB is situated in the centre, and I understand that it will close when the work of the centre comes to an end. That will be a grave loss for the whole community; yet again, it has not been considered.

The failure to assess a key part of the centre’s remit is unacceptable. The Government even have the gall to criticise the centre for reducing its community involvement. That is hardly surprising when the Government themselves have cut funding so much that the community engagement team have been disbanded. The manager left last year and has not been replaced; the deputy is on long-term sick leave; and in the past three months the centre manager and district manager have gone.

What is to happen to these vital services? What assurance can the Minister give me? The North Liverpool community justice centre provides an important facility for the people of north Liverpool. It has a dedicated staff, committed to the local community. Its budget was cut dramatically, from £1.8 million a year in 2005 to £1.3 million a year in 2012, and a further £300,000 reduction was planned.

According to the people I represent, the centre has made a real difference to their lives. Yes, the centre is primarily about the court and reducing offending and it has achieved that, but it is also about working with the local community in this very deprived area, building links and developing community strengths, and people in the community value that. However, the assessment on which the decision to close is based ignores that vital preventive community work and dismisses the significant reduction in crime in the area.

[Steve Rotheram]

rose—

[Mr Gary Streeter (in the Chair)]

A short intervention from Steve Rotheram.

[Steve Rotheram]

Once again, my hon. Friend hits the nail on the head, and she is very generous about giving way. Does she agree with me that the decision to make the announcement on the cusp of the parliamentary recess has meant that the ability to scrutinise the decision fully has not been afforded to local agencies and people who want to keep the centre open?

[Mrs Ellman]

I fully agree with my hon. Friend’s comments. The consultation was carried out during the parliamentary recess. It was rushed. Many people did not have the opportunity to make a response, and many people did not realise that it was in fact taking place. It seems a very curious time in which to carry out a consultation on something as serious as this.

I am convinced that the decision is based on financial considerations, taking advantage of the break in the centre’s lease. We are told that the work will transfer to another court. Will that indeed be the case? What will fill the gap in terms of reducing crime, undertaking vital preventive work and supporting this resilient but deprived community? I hope that the Minister today can provide the answers.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Shailesh Vara)]

It is a pleasure that for my first speech in the Palace of Westminster as a newly appointed Justice Minister, I am serving under your chairmanship, Mr Streeter. I congratulate the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman) on securing this very important debate on the North Liverpool community justice centre. In her speech, she made a number of comments, and I hope that by the time I have finished my speech, I will have allayed some of the concerns that she and the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) have expressed.

The decision to close the centre was an important one, based on the hard truth that the local drop in work load and the high cost of running what is a single courtroom centre have made it untenable. Following the public consultation on the centre’s future, I announced in a written ministerial statement last week the decision to close the centre. Currently, it is planned that the last sitting day will be Friday 28 March 2014. To keep the centre running would cost almost £1 million a year, and there is no evidence that that would be money well spent in terms of the results that it achieves compared with other courts.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State did not take the decision to close the centre lightly. He did so after a detailed analysis of the centre’s work and of all the points raised in the consultation responses. The consultation did not identify any single operational or efficiency reason why the centre should not close.

I stress that we are committed to continuing to provide court users in north Liverpool with effective access to justice, while seeking ways to do so at a lower cost and alongside our efforts to improve the efficiency of the justice system as a whole. In transferring the majority of the centre’s work load to Sefton magistrates court, we have been clear that the principles of the centre will be maintained and at a court that has modern facilities and a reputation for innovation.

The North Liverpool community justice centre was established in 2005 as a court and community resource, with criminal justice agencies co-located with other third sector services in a dedicated building. The centre serves an area with a population of about 60,000 people in the north end of the city of Liverpool. The original intention was to provide an intensive approach to the crimes affecting the community at a very local level for both adult and youth cases. When it was launched in 2005, the centre’s objectives included the provision of community justice in a deprived area of Merseyside and, through that, a material reduction in reoffending levels through the adoption of innovative approaches to the handling of offenders and very close cross-agency working with both public and third sector organisations.

There is no doubt that the centre rapidly built a good reputation, both locally and internationally, for developing a new approach to court-based problem solving for offenders. However, following an evaluation published in 2012, it is equally clear that the success of the centre in terms of results was at best mixed. There was no empirical evidence to show that the centre was any more successful at reducing reoffending levels than a mainstream magistrates court.

As a result, and given the financial climate, the then ministerial team questioned the value for taxpayers’ money that the centre provided and concluded that it should continue as a court for up to two years, but with a view to increasing its work load and remit. That was vital when the centre’s own catchment area work load was falling significantly, in line with that of other magistrates courts. The increase in work load has been achieved only to a limited extent, with the transfer of mental health cases from a wider catchment area to the centre. As a result, the number of cases heard at the centre has increased during the past six months. For the 12-month period to March of this year, the centre’s courtroom utilisation rate stood at 55%. Between April and July of this year, that increased to an average of 71% through the hearing of mental health cases. However, despite that increase, the actual work load in volume terms remains relatively low.

[Steve Rotheram]

According to “Doing justice locally: the North Liverpool Community Justice Centre”, a report published by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, on page 97:

“As a result of these innovations”—

of the centre—

“our assessment is that criminal justice is speedier, fairer, more efficient, more community oriented, more holistic than the traditional court model”.

Does the Minister agree?

[Mr Vara]

As I shall come on to say, Sefton magistrates court offers a number of the services that are provided at the centre. The hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside referred to various co-located agencies, and I assure her that Sefton magistrates court has probation services, a citizens advice bureau and victim and witness support services, among others. The services that are being provided are to be relocated 1.8 miles away to another centre, which will provide the same level of service. I will refer later to the extent that any difference is required.

As I was saying, despite the increase in utilisation, the work load in volume terms remains relatively low and would continue to be so as a single courtroom site. For example, since April the centre has dealt with an average of 168 cases a month, which compares unfavourably with Sefton magistrates court, where the majority of cases will go. Over the same period, Sefton dealt with 467 cases a month. Due to the limited cell capacity at the centre, it is not feasible to transfer in any more custody work to increase utilisation.

A key driver in the decision to close the centre was the fact that there are real limitations to the volume of cases it can deal with as a single courtroom site, and it is three times more expensive than other courts. Furthermore, it is not more successful at reducing reoffending than cheaper courts, so it simply cannot be seen to represent good value for money.

[Steve Rotheram]

The Minister claims that the centre is not more successful, but that is not the information that has been provided to us—I will get the report and dig the relevant section out. The Deputy Prime Minister, who talked about prisons being “colleges of crime”, and the Prime Minister, who talked about a “rehabilitation revolution”, should have been looking at the centre as a model to take to other areas. What will it cost the Exchequer to send the prolific reoffenders that the centre deals with properly back to prison, because they will no longer be benefiting from the innovative approaches of the North Liverpool justice centre?

[Mr Vara]

The hon. Gentleman wants hypothetical answers for the future, but I am not delving into the realms of the future. I will, however, look at the facts as they are—as we have them—and if he disagrees with them, I am happy to give him the sources of my information. I repeat that the services provided at the centre will not be affected in any way—they will only be at a different location, some two miles away, nothing more.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Vara]

The hon. Lady asks a good question, but she must be mindful of the fact that even at the north Liverpool centre, some of the other agencies were decreasing the support that they were giving. That is not to say that that may continue at Sefton, but I assure her that as we speak, other co-located agencies are present there, which I hope will continue to deliver services. However, it would be wrong for me to give a promise based on the declining number of people at the original centre.

As set out fully in the consultation response document published last week, it seems clear to me that the case for change is made and the decision taken is the right one. In conclusion—

[Steve Rotheram]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Vara]

No, I have concluded. I am aware that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside has visited Sefton magistrates court, but I understand it was not recently. I suggest that she and her colleagues visit as soon as possible. I like to think that the concerns that they have expressed today will be eased when they see what is actually on offer.

Question put and agreed to.

Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Monday 14th October 2013 Commons Chamber

On the basis of the case I have put before the House, I would like to test its opinion on this matter, because I think that it has widespread support.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

I want to focus my remarks on new clause 4. Part 8 of the Bill deals with firearms, and I broadly welcome the Government’s proposals on sentencing, but I urge them to go further on checks and fees. Following the Dunblane shootings in 1996, in which 16 children and one teacher lost their lives, the Labour Government were right to ban handguns and introduce tough new licensing laws, but it is also right that we, as parliamentarians, periodically review such laws. I therefore commend the Minister for the introduction of these proposals.

Despite the UK having one of the lowest rates of gun deaths in the world, it is no secret that there are pockets of the country in which the criminal use of firearms remains a problem. It is often most notable in large cities, where gangs can plague communities. However, it would be wrong to assume that the sale or transfer of prohibited firearms is the only consideration that Parliament should look to reform.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is not right to pursue legislative change against law-abiding citizens who do not transgress? Would it not be better to focus attention on the lawbreakers instead?

[Steve Rotheram]

I suppose it would depend on the aim of the legislative change. The community that I represent needs a strong message to be sent from this House that the current level of gun crime is unacceptable and that we will give the police every power possible to tackle the blight on our neighbourhoods.

In recent years, we have also seen a rise in the use of firearms, breaching police and public safety, by individuals with track records of domestic violence and mental illness, leading one coroner to call for “root and branch changes” to gun licensing laws. For instance, in the last 12 months, 75% of female gun deaths occurred in domestic incidents, and 53% of female gun deaths in the last five years have involved the use of a legally held weapon, so the improved guidance that the Minister has provided for the police on this issue is to be welcomed.

Such statistics reinforce Labour’s call to ensure that applicants do not have a history of domestic violence or violent conduct as a statutory requirement and not just as a discretionary guideline. While the last Labour Government went a long way to reducing crime and encouraging safer, stronger communities, and introducing tough sentences for gun crimes, too many people still believe the use of guns to be an occupational consequence of their criminal activity. Perhaps the most high-profile incident of gun crime was the appalling murder of 11-year-old schoolboy Rhys Jones in Liverpool in 2007. Sean Mercer was sentenced to life in prison, but what made the incident even more sickening and unpalatable was that Mercer was just 18 years of age. That is why the Government are right to be tough on those who possess prohibited firearms and who sell or transfer them to criminal gangs, which blight neighbourhoods in so many of our major cities.

In my own city, we have tried many innovative approaches to tackling gun crime. Across Merseyside, the police and the local media deserve enormous credit for the campaigns they have undertaken on firearm detection and recovery. This is not just some right-wing tough-on-crime agenda; this is an issue that primarily affects the lives of ordinary people up and down the country, something that Parliament must ensure is reflected in the strength of the laws that govern gun control licensing and in the length of imprisonment. That is why I support clause 100, which seeks to separate the existing offence in the Firearms Act 1968 into two parts, and, in doing so, make it an offence to possess prohibited firearms for sale and transfer, and introduce a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.

It is also right for the clause to increase the maximum penalty for the existing offences of manufacture, sale or transfer, or the purchase or acquisition for sale or transfer, of unauthorised firearms from 10 years to life imprisonment. Speaking with Merseyside police and the governors of local prisons, it is becoming increasingly clear that the tactic deployed by gangs is to use the same firearm for different shootings, but then to redistribute the gun to different members of the gang as and when it is “needed”, so to speak. By making the transfer of a firearm a crime punishable by a life sentence, I am positive that this will act as a stronger deterrent, and that those who ignore this change and are later prosecuted will receive severe custodial sentences.

I support clause 101, which seeks to amend sections 50 and 170 of the Customs and Excise Management Act 1979 to increase the maximum penalty for the unlawful importation of firearms, prohibited under section 5 of the Firearms Act 1968, from 10 years to life imprisonment. This is particularly important for an area such as Liverpool, with our revitalised docks now shipping record tonnage of trade. Inevitably, there will be those who wish to import illegal firearms into the port. The clause sends a strong message to people involved in the smuggling of weapons into Merseyside that if they are caught, this activity will carry a life sentence.

I support clause 102 in its efforts to allow British Transport police officers to carry firearms without requiring an individual certificate, giving them the same powers as officers of other police forces. Many incidences of gun attacks have taken place on public transport in Britain over the years. It is therefore right that we remove this anomaly and give the transport police the powers they require to combat this specific threat.

I am keen for the laws on firearms to be as tough as possible. New clause 4, tabled by the Labour party, will help the Government to achieve this common aim. New clause 4(4) notes the rising cost to police forces of administering the current firearms licensing regime. According to the Minister, more than 170,000 firearms licences and approximately 620,000 shotgun licences have been issued. The current fee for a firearm or a shotgun licence is only £50 for five years, yet the cost to the administrating force is, according to the Gun Control Network, about £200. Considering that the firearms licence averages out at just £10 a year, it is cheaper to own a gun than it is to own a fishing licence. That is absurd. I cannot see why the taxpayer is being asked to subsidise a large number of gun licences that are being issued to and used by a minority of individuals who wish to use guns for recreational sport. I am not aware of any other licensing system that subsidises to that degree.

[Tessa Munt (Wells) (LD)]

In a rural area such as mine, a number of people have to hold firearms licences because they deal with fallen stock. I assume that that would be a legitimate business expense that they could claim to do their job. Putting the firearms costs at the correct level so that the police do not have to ask other taxpayers for some sort of subsidy would be a logical thing to do, and would not cause problems in rural areas where these firearms are needed.

[Steve Rotheram]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right that if the burden can be transferred to another expense and taken from the police force budgets to subsidise this practice, it could only be good for law enforcement in the country. Last year, Devon and Cornwall police estimated that they spent a total of £1.2 million on completing firearms licence applications, but recouped only £514,000 in fees—phenomenally disproportionate.

Unsurprisingly, I am very much of the opinion that we should implement full cost recovery in the UK. In 2012, the police spent almost £20 million on administering firearms licences. I do not believe that the public would deem that to be a good use of declining police resources. I understand that the Government are in the process of implementing a new fees system, to which the Minister just referred. Unfortunately, it represents a missed opportunity because it will not include a full cost recovery proposal, only an increase in the fees.

I shall finish by sharing with the House the remarks of Lord Justice Openshaw who, in April this year, sentenced seven members of the notorious Croxteth Crew gang to a combined total of 113 years in prison. The Crocky Crew and the Strand gang from Norris Green terrorised parts of the border between my constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg). Lord Justice Openshaw’s words paint a picture of how crimes can escalate and how the pattern of crime develops in parallel with continued feelings of social isolation. In all too many cases, criminal activity is a graduated process.

Obviously, only a minority progress to the most serious crimes, but for many it starts as antisocial behaviour and becomes more serious with burglary, violent assault and drug use. Then, before long, it becomes gun crime, punishment shootings and murder. What is more startling is that this pattern is developing quicker than ever before, and the accused are often mere teenagers or predominantly young men in their early 20s when they are caught and prosecuted.

These words should make us all think about how we vote and about the message that this Bill sends to criminals across the country. The judge said of the gang:

“Their days were spent posturing outside…shops dealing drugs. It is as if they belong to some sort of outlaw tribe which has rejected all society’s moral standards and conventions. Their minds are spent towards feuding and prosecuting vendettas against former associates.”

Central to this gang’s dominance was an arsenal of weapons, including several pistols, a double-barrelled shotgun and grenades—in this country! While the fear of crime is much greater than the likelihood of being a victim of crime, firearms are a major problem and we should never be complacent about them. That is why the whole House should support the Government’s reforms and the Opposition amendments. Together, we can redouble our efforts to get guns off our streets.

[Damian Green]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) for his very thoughtful speech. I am also grateful to Opposition Front Benchers for their support for new clause 20.

It is clear from today’s debate that there are three separate issues to be discussed. There is the illegal use of guns that are held illegally, there is the illegal use of guns that are held legally, and there are the costs associated with guns that are entirely legally held and legally used. The first thing that we must do is ensure that those issues do not become confused with each other. Each of them relates to an extremely serious area of public policy, but the response to each of them needs to be different.

I cannot improve on much of what was said by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton about how tough we need to be on the criminal use of illegally held guns. I am grateful to him for his support for clauses 100 and 101 and the amendments to those clauses. They plug loopholes in the existing law, which will hopefully make policing the criminal use of illegally held guns—and illegally distributed guns, to which he rightly referred—less difficult.

As was made clear by the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) and by me in my opening remarks, the illegal use of legal guns can lead to terrible tragedies. The Atherton case, which was raised by the hon. Lady, left a huge scar on a family and, indeed, on a whole area, and gave rise to a number of recommendations. In my view, all that divides the two Front Benches on the issue is how effective we consider each other’s proposed methods of dealing with it would be. I shall not weary the House by repeating a speech that I made at the outset of the debate, but we have thought long and hard, and, moreover, have taken significant action since the Committee stage, when we last debated the issue. We published the new firearms guidance at the end of July.

Let me address directly the points that the hon. Lady reasonably made about individual court decisions. As she rightly said, I cannot comment on such decisions, not least in view of the fact that her comments were slightly opaque because, understandably, she could not mention names. I can only reiterate that the new guidance makes it absolutely clear that evidence of domestic violence and abuse will generally indicate that an individual should not be permitted to possess a firearm. It would be difficult to make it clearer that that is the way in which the court should interpret the guidance in the event of an appeal.

One of the other lessons that the Independent Police Complaints Commission and the coroner drew in the Atherton case was that police enforcement needs to be more effective. We can write laws or guidance, but ultimately it is the human beings who execute those laws that make the difference. We are working with the national policing lead for firearms licensing to ensure that police all over the country, in every police force, have a more detailed awareness and understanding of the Home Office guide. As I have said, the College of Policing will publish authorised professional practice on firearms licensing, which will complement and cross-refer to the Home Office guide. In addition, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary has been conducting a scoping exercise, and will use the evidence from that to decide whether a full firearms licensing inspection should take place.

Points of Order

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Tuesday 18th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that. Secondly, with specific reference to the hon. Gentleman’s question, right hon. and hon. Members must take responsibility for the accuracy of what they say in the House—the Chair cannot take over that responsibility. His point will have been heard by the hon. Member and by others, and I thank the hon. Gentleman for putting it on the record.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

We are not going to have a debate about the matter that the hon. Gentleman could not raise. However, if he wants briefly to raise a point of order, he can.

[Steve Rotheram]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. I understand your concerns about raising matters in this House that are sub judice, and I would never put you, as the Speaker of the House, in that position. My question was going to be that whatever the outcome, every eventuality should be afforded to the families and that the Secretary of State should be considering a possible outcome in which the families would need support from the public purse for any inquest that might follow on from any decision in the High Court tomorrow. That is all I was asking.

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Tuesday 18th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

12. What recent assessment he has made of security arrangements in courtrooms.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mrs Helen Grant)]

The security of our courtrooms and courts is a serious matter. Regular assessments take place at least once a year and they are monitored at cluster, regional and national level to aid in the continual review of security.

[Steve Rotheram]

A suspect who had been released on bail entered Liverpool Crown court with a knife he had smuggled through security checks and threatened to kill himself in the dock. Tragedy was averted on that occasion, but will the Minister outline what steps she is taking to instruct security staff to be extra vigilant during their searches of suspects on bail?

[Mrs Grant]

We are aware of that serious incident and I assure the hon. Gentleman that a full review of security has taken place at Liverpool Crown court. An action plan for improvement has been put together and good progress is being made. Training in search procedures for all G4S staff was provided last summer and its effectiveness is being monitored. Security arrangements are now operating to a required standard, but remain under careful review.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Speaker]

Last but not least, I call Steve Rotheram.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

After a lengthy campaign, tomorrow the High Court will hear the application from the Attorney-General to quash the original verdicts into the deaths of 96 Liverpool fans at Hillsborough in 1989—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Gentleman must resume his seat. My strong sense—I do not have advance briefing on the detail of the matter—is that the issue that he is raising could well be sub judice.

[Steve Rotheram]

indicated dissent.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. It is not a matter to be raised now, so we will leave it there. I am sorry to disappoint the hon. Gentleman.

[Steve Rotheram]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. That is the end of it. We must now move on.

Police (Complaints And Conduct) Bill

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Wednesday 5th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hanson]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his intervention, but I think he has missed my point, which is about where the buck stops. This is about the employment terms and conditions of individuals who work in the police service, and if the sanction for not participating in action with the IPCC was dismissal of a police officer, removal of pension or something else under the disciplinary proceedings the Minister has mentioned to me privately, would the chief constable exercise that or could the police and crime commissioner? Would the police and crime commissioner stand aside from the decision or would the chief constable take it alone? I am not trying to complicate matters; I simply want clarity, and this is the time for clarity on the Bill.

If a police and crime commissioner took a different view from the chief constable, where would the buck stop? Is the matter operational? Is it protected, or is it not? That is an important point in achieving clarity, because the Bill is not only about the important matters we are debating on Hillsborough but will be in place for future IPCC investigations until it is amended or repealed. Such investigations might be serious, like Hillsborough, or they might be relatively trivial. I want clarity from the Minister about where the responsibility will lie.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that one of the ways around the point that he raises would be for the Minister to write to individual forces to provide guidance on what he believes would be an appropriate process for forces to follow, should officers refuse to take part in interviews?

[Mr Hanson]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that suggestion. The Bill is about giving powers to the IPCC to compel officers to give evidence. If officers do not give evidence because they choose not to do so—in discussions with us, the Police Federation gave examples of circumstances where officers may not wish to do so—the IPCC will not be able to take forward the investigations as it wishes in relation to Hillsborough, which is my hon. Friend’s main concern at present. However, the legislation is in place for all time, until it is repealed.

If there are no sanctions, an officer could retreat into their shell. The sanctions that the Minister outlined to me privately are available to the force, but who takes the decision on such sanctions? Would it be appropriate for a police and crime commissioner to learn about the case from constituents or through representations from the MP and to take decisions? Or is it solely a chief constable matter? I pose those questions for debate.

I share the wish for a strong examination of the point made by the hon. Member for City of Chester, supported by my right hon. and hon. Friends who signed the amendment, because the question of what happens when an officer says no is critical to the effectiveness of the Bill. The Minister needs to give a strong assurance that that issue will not cause difficulties with the Hillsborough investigation or for future investigations into matters of concern yet to arise, involving a particular force in a particular area.

Police (Complaints and Conduct) Bill

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Wednesday 5th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

I welcome the Government’s proposals, but I wonder whether the right hon. Gentleman, like me, is surprised that page 10 of the Bill research paper states that the IPCC cannot already compel serving police officers simply to attend an interview in connection with any ongoing investigation. Does he believe that there should be clear sanctions against those who refuse to do that?

[Damian Green]

The hon. Gentleman asked two questions. First, he asked whether I was surprised that the power did not already exist. To some extent, yes I am. Obviously, the IPCC was set up under the Police Reform Act 2002 and given powers then. Perhaps this is the first time that so much focus has been on it—indeed, it has caused the House to agree to emergency legislation to give the IPCC that particular power.

Secondly, I know that sanctions are of particular concern. As has been said, we will debate the matter in detail on an amendment to the relevant clause in Committee later. However, I preview my thoughts on that by pointing out that clear sanctions will be available to chief constables and forces to apply to those who refuse to obey what will be an IPCC instruction, and later a requirement. They will be very powerful.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

The IPCC is still going through that information. The majority of officers may well have retired by now. This is a large undertaking and represents the biggest single investigation that the IPCC has ever done. It estimates that this will involve it investigating more than 2,400 officers. That is the overall quantum—the actual division is not yet clear. Obviously, many officers may have moved to other forces, and so on.

[Steve Rotheram]

If the right hon. Gentleman will not put sanctions in the Bill, as seems likely, what confidence does he have that police forces will take the necessary disciplinary action against serving officers who refuse to help the IPCC?

[Damian Green]

I have very great confidence in that. There are two points to make in response to the hon. Gentleman, the first of which is that similar sanctions under the conduct regulations are not in any other Bill, so it would be anomalous suddenly to pluck out the sanction for this offence and put it in legislation. Secondly, and more importantly in practical terms, given the enormous and understandable public interest in the matter, the relevant chief officers will be extremely keen to ensure that they use their powers to take sanctions—ultimately, officers who break the conduct regulations in that way can be dismissed. The conversations I have had with senior officers in recent days suggest that that is the case.

I said in response to my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Stephen Mosley) that the IPCC has said that the investigation will be the biggest it has ever undertaken. The Government recognise the additional burden that such a large investigation places on it. We have made it clear that we will ensure that the commission has both the powers and the resources it needs to conduct its investigations into Hillsborough. We take that commitment seriously, which is why we have introduced this fast-track Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

Yes, absolutely. I agree unequivocally, and it is a widely held view in the police service as well. I know that the hon. Lady understands that retired police officers are just members of the public, however, and therefore that giving the IPCC powers that the police do not have to compel witnesses to appear would be anomalous and certainly not something we would want to do through emergency fast-track legislation. Nevertheless, she made the moral case very powerfully.

The IPCC has existing powers to interview officers and former officers who are themselves the subject of an investigation for either a conduct or a criminal matter. The IPCC can already compel a suspect to attend an interview, but it needs to hear from officers not just when they themselves are the subject of the investigation. It also needs to obtain evidence through interviews from those who might have seen the events unfold, when they might have seen or heard of fellow officers amending statements and records—in other words, when they had witnessed key events in relation to Hillsborough.

As I have said, the IPCC can compel officers who are themselves under investigation to attend for interview. Clause 1 extends this power so that serving police officers and police staff can be compelled to attend for interview as witnesses as part of any investigation managed or independently undertaken by the IPCC. The power will apply to officers in Home Office forces and other policing bodies, such as the British Transport police. I am clear that any serving officer who fails to comply with a request to attend such an interview should face disciplinary measures. I emphasise that point once again.

That is consistent with the existing regime that applies when a person who is the subject of an investigation fails to attend for interview. For the sake of clarity, I will repeat that such disciplinary matters may have serious consequences, including— ultimately—dismissal. I have set out that the power granted through clause 1 applies to individuals still serving with the police. The IPCC will not be able to compel a retired officer to attend an interview as a witness through the use of this power.

Several hon. members have asked why the provision should not apply to retired officers, but, as I said, they are in the same position as ordinary members of the public and so are no longer bound legally by the same responsibility as serving officers—although the hon. Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) made the point about moral responsibility. To grant the IPCC the power to require a retired officer to give evidence simply as a witness would provide the IPCC with greater powers over the public than those available to the police. I think the House would rightly be uncomfortable about that.

Let me again be clear, however: that does not mean that the IPCC cannot or will not investigate retired officers for misconduct or criminality that they might have committed. The IPCC will do that. We are just not providing the IPCC with the power, at this stage, to compel such retired officers to attend an interview as a witness to events on the day or thereafter. Crucially, the IPCC has not asked for that power in relation to the Hillsborough investigation, so the House does not need to rush its consideration of the matter.

I know that many concerns have been expressed in the House and outside that an officer who wants to avoid the repercussions of their actions can simply retire and avoid all sanction, but that is not the case. The IPCC can and will investigate any individual suspected of criminal behaviour. It has the powers it needs to pursue these individuals and bring them to book. For example, the IPCC already has the power to require an individual, serving or retired, who is suspected of misconduct or criminal behaviour to attend an interview. The IPCC can, in appropriate cases, refer a matter to the Director of Public Prosecutions where there is evidence of criminality in relation to Hillsborough.

If an individual is subsequently convicted of a criminal offence, in connection with their service as a police officer, they could lose the majority of their pension. It will be for the relevant police and crime commissioner to apply for this sanction. That is in addition to any penalty ordered by a court. Let me be clear: charges can be brought regardless of the employment status of the individual concerned.

[Steve Rotheram]

Just for the record, will the Minister clarify something? Criminal behaviour could lead to someone who is serving or who is retired facing a reduction in their pension. What happens if somebody is found guilty not of criminal behaviour, but of wrongdoing? Does the same sanction still apply?

[Damian Green]

The sanctions apply if someone is convicted of a criminal offence—I think that is the point the hon. Gentleman wishes to be clarified. If someone has not been convicted of a criminal offence, matters affecting their pension would, not least, engage human rights legislation as well, so things would be much more difficult in those cases.

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

Again, it will be a matter for the IPCC to decide what to do with the evidence it finds. Inevitably, in this kind of investigation, the evidence it finds will be public. I think I can see where the hon. Gentleman is trying to go. As I say, the IPCC has considerable powers of investigation and it could make things public that might enable someone to make a complaint, at which point it would have to decide whether its powers were sufficient or whether its new powers conferred under this Bill could be triggered. The underlying point is that the IPCC is independent: it is for the IPCC to decide what best to do with the evidence it finds during the course of its investigations.

The Bill is narrow in scope, but crucial to the process of achieving justice for the 96 individuals who died as a result of the Hillsborough disaster, for those who were injured and for the families and friends of all involved.

[Steve Rotheram]

I thank the Minister for his patience again, but I am certain that he must understand the nervousness on Merseyside when this particular issue goes through this House. I know, because I have spoken to him, that the Minister is fully aware of and appreciates the current situation of Anne Williams, whose online e-petition reached over 100,000 signatures some weeks ago. Will he assure us that none of the investigations that will be carried out through the additional powers of the Bill will in any way impact on the time scale of the new inquests? Will he say more about his latest expectations regarding the timing of the application to the High Court to quash the original unsound verdicts?

[Damian Green]

On the first point, I know that the IPCC is extremely aware of the desire for things not to appear to be unduly delayed. Indeed, that is one reason why we are here today—to put a Bill through all its stages in one day, which shows that the House and the Government are trying to speed the process up as much as we can.

On the application to the High Court, I know that my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General is proceeding as fast as he can, and I think a decision will be made public very shortly. I can go no further than that, but the hon. Gentleman’s wider point is well made, and I absolutely take it. I am very conscious that people want to see that this process, having started after the report, is not unduly delayed at any stage. I am very keen, as I know are many other people who have been involved from the start, that that should happen.

That explains why the House should not today consider the wider reform of the IPCC, although we will examine whether there are other gaps in its powers. We have asked it what tools it needs to progress its investigations into Hillsborough, and this short Bill will ensure that it has the two additional powers for which it asked. The Bill thus represents an important step on the road from truth to justice for Hillsborough. All who support that aim will, I hope, support this Bill. I commend it to the House.

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[Mr Hanson]

I hope it can be said that death does not bear a party banner, and that the tragedies faced by many of my constituents and those of other Members throughout the House have led us to take action that will achieve the justice that they seek, the justice that they want, and the justice for which they have fought in the face of the lies that have been perpetuated in the community around them for so many years.

We should recognise that the Bill is one step—albeit a small step—towards our achieving justice for the 96 families, their friends, their relatives, and the many people who were injured on that day; but we should also recognise that that journey towards justice is far from over. As we have heard today, the Attorney-General is considering whether there should be a fresh inquest. We certainly want to see the verdicts of the original inquest crushed, and we want the Director of Public Prosecutions to review as a matter of urgency evidence relating to the important matters that occurred that day. The Independent Police Complaints Commission is, of course, already looking into the conduct of police officers.

The Bill is part of the process of securing justice for the relatives, friends and families, but it is only part of that process. Justice will not be achieved until all the matters to which I have referred have been dealt with to the satisfaction of the families, in line with the Hillsborough panel’s recommendations.

Based on the report, the IPCC wants to look into two potential criminal and misconduct issues. First, it wants to examine the conduct of the police on 15 April 1989, addressing the culpability of the individuals and organisations involved and the safety standards, planning and operational decisions of that day that led to the Hillsborough disaster. Secondly, an equally important, but perhaps even worse, series of incidents is being examined: the evidence suggesting a cover-up in the weeks, months and years after the disaster. Of the 164 statements taken by officers on that day, no fewer than 116 were changed in some way, shape or form. That is deceit on a huge scale and we need to get to the bottom of it for the sake not only of the integrity of the police, but of justice for the 96.

I thank the Home Secretary for having listened to the concerns expressed by the shadow Home Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford about the powers available to the IPCC. It must have the tools it needs to carry out a thorough investigation into both allegations of criminality and misconduct and the events of the day. The families who have campaigned for that—as well as for the inquest, for the quashing of the verdicts and for the Director of Public Prosecutions to review the evidence—demand no less.

My right hon. Friend called in October for the inquiry to have those powers, because she recognises that it must get to the bottom of why so many police statements were altered. Although the IPCC can pursue officers it believes to have committed crimes, it does not at present have powers to compel serving or former officers to be interviewed as witnesses; nor can it compel civilians to give evidence. Those obstacles must be removed, and the Bill achieves that. What consultations did the Minister have with the families prior to the publication of the Bill, and does he intend to have further discussions with representatives of the families in the next few weeks?

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) has said, the Home Affairs Committee welcomes the Bill. It has also made some helpful comments, and I hope the Minister will reflect on them. It is clear that the IPCC does not have the powers it needs to meet the objectives it has set itself. Indeed, it has informed the Home Affairs Committee that

“where police officers refuse to attend for interview, IPCC investigators can only seek the information they need through the submission of written questions to officers via their solicitors or other representatives. Not only can this seriously undermine public confidence in IPCC investigations, it can also impact on the overall effectiveness and timeliness of investigations.”

Clause 1 will remedy that, and I welcome it.

There is a separate issue. My right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary has rightly asked Lord Stevens to address in his independent review for our party whether there should be a new police standards body and to look at the role of the IPCC going forward. That is a debate for another day, but as the Minister has recognised, in the longer term we will need to put in place a strong body to provide the safeguards and standards required to hold the police to account. That will take time, however, and the friends and families of the victims and the communities of Merseyside, Liverpool, my area of north Wales and beyond demand that we have early action. That is why this Bill is before us today.

[Steve Rotheram]

On the need for urgency, does my right hon. Friend agree that the Bill does not inhibit our ability to establish a lead investigator to oversee the myriad current investigations, and that that might help Parliament to understand the need for urgency?

[Mr Hanson]

I am very much on the side of my hon. Friend, and I again want to pay tribute to him and to the impact he has made on these matters since his election in May 2010. He knows the community where he lives and which he represents. He knows that they want to see those matters dealt with urgently, as do all hon. Members; those of us who have bereaved relatives in our constituencies know what that means to them and how they want to see the main important matters that my hon. Friend has brought forward addressed.

Clause 1 will amend the Police Reform Act 2002 to confer witness attendance powers on the Independent Police Complaints Commission. The way in which that will be done is set out in newly published regulations from the Minister, which will adopt a similar approach to that set out in the 2002 Act. Clause 2, on the application of part 2 of the 2002 Act, will deal with questions that the Minister has also mentioned. It will amend the legislation currently preventing the IPCC from investigating any matters previously considered by the Police Complaints Authority. Given that these issues occurred under the PCA’s jurisdiction, it is vital that that bit of the Bill is also put in place.

Later on we will deal with an amendment, but it is important to refer now to the issue at the heart of it. I have pressed the Minister strongly, as have my right hon. Friends the Members for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford and for Leigh, on the issue of the sanctions in place should an officer fail to attend an interview. Such an officer would indeed be subject to misconduct proceedings, and the Minister has explained to me privately, and has explained to the House today, how he believes those will deal with that issue. I simply say to him that we will be maintaining a strong watching brief, because we may need to revisit the sanctions issue either in Committee or at a later date.

The amendment tabled by the all-party group on the Hillsborough disaster, so ably chaired by my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern), raises that issue. We will have the debate when we deal with the amendment, but it is important that those who refuse to address the needs of the IPCC—if there are such people, and there may not be—face some sanction. The Minister has made it clear to me that that will involve police misconduct proceedings, which could involve dismissal, loss of pension or other issues. The key question is this: is the sanction sufficient? We will test that at a later date.

Discussions also have progressed with my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary and myself on the IPCC’s inability to compel retired officers to attend interviews. The Minister has agreed to look at this matter. He has given an explanation again as to why retired officers should not be eligible to be brought for interview; this was because of the difficulties of legislation and other related matters. In a letter that he sent the shadow Home Secretary on 22 November, which was copied to me, he said:

“As I set out on Monday, we understand the calls to grant a power to compel retired officers to attend interviews, and” —

this is important—

“will consider these in slower time, but do not feel it is appropriate to grant such a wide-ranging power through fast track legislation.”

Will the Minister indicate during this debate what exactly he means by “slower time”? I would like to know with whom he is discussing these issues, when he intends to report back to the House on them, and whether he will explore the issues that we have discussed in respect of human rights legislation and pension confiscation. Will he report back to the House after this fast-track legislation on those matters?

A commitment made by the Minister today—even now, dare I say it—from across the Dispatch Box to report back to this House on those matters would be of great interest. It would be very much welcomed by Members of this House, who are concerned that officers involved in incidents at Hillsborough who have retired will not be subject to criminal proceedings because they are not involved in criminal activity but could give information that is beneficial to a range of other matters relating to the Hillsborough inquiry. I want to know from the Minister, now or later, what he means by “slower time”, because it is important. I would welcome reassurance that those powers are available and will be considered. I will not push him further than that today, but we will revisit the question in due course.

I would also like the Minister to confirm my understanding of the situation with the IPCC’s oversight as it extends to private contractors that provide services to or on behalf of the police. The legislation is put in place for Hillsborough, but also for other events, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) mentioned, and for all time until it is changed by future legislation. Will the Minister confirm that police community support officers and those individuals who undertake private contracting for the police force will come under the auspices of the Bill? I know the answer to that question, but I want the Minister to put it on the record in the Chamber before the Bill is passed.

I welcome the fact that the IPCC has suggested that it will be in a position to take witnesses early in the next year. All Members of this House who are involved, both those who represent the city of Sheffield—I am pleased to see my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith) in her place—and those who represent constituencies in the north-west would welcome an early conclusion. The Minister has been keen to say that the investigation will be independent, but I would welcome some indication of the time scale within which, once the Bill has been approved, he would expect the IPCC to conclude its consideration of these matters. If he cannot do that today and wants to give it further consideration outside the Chamber, I would welcome it if he could drop a note to Members who speak on the subject on Second Reading. An indication from the IPCC of its intended time scale would certainly be welcome.

I genuinely support the Minister’s Bill, but I would also welcome his comments on correspondence that I have received in the last 24 to 36 hours from bodies representing the police that have considered the Bill post-publication. It worries me, so I ask the Minister to give some consideration to the points it raises. First, I have a letter from the Police Superintendents Association of England and Wales addressed to my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary and copied to me. It is from Chief Superintendent Derek Barnett, the president of the association, and the very first line states:

“It is disappointing that the only notification…of this legislation was a telephone call from an official the day before the Bill was tabled.”

He goes on to say that he shares

“your commitment to ensuring that the Hillsborough case is fully and properly investigated in a manner that is both expeditious and thorough, and with the eventual outcome that the full circumstances of those terrible events are once and for all indentified and that justice can be seen to have been done.”

The police superintendents support elements of the Bill, but I am slightly surprised that they were not consulted about it as a whole apart from by telephone on the day before it was tabled. Between now and the Bill’s consideration in the other place, will the Minister meet the superintendents or contact them and listen to the points they want to make? I support the Bill as it is, but the superintendents want to make some points about it and the lack of consultation is concerning. They will have a role to play on these matters in future and the Minister might find that they support him.

I also have a similar letter from the Police Federation. It is from the deputy general secretary, Stephen Smith, who states on page 2:

“I have to say that I am personally disappointed by the action taken in issuing the Bill, rather than consulting with the sub-committee in the first instance. I believe this course of action demeans the very important work that has been carried out over the last 7 years.”

The sub-committee to which he refers is the Police Advisory Board for England and Wales sub-committee, which is a negotiating body on these matters.

Whatever our view on a range of incidents, the police have an important say on this matter, and the fact that they have not been formally consulted is an oversight. Between now and Second Reading in another place, if the Bill progresses today, as I expect it to do, will the Minister make contact with the Police Federation to give the police an opportunity to have their say?

My final point relates to the scope of the Bill. The Minister knows that he is the Policing Minister for England and Wales, and that potentially, as we discussed outside the Chamber, police officers who in 1989 worked for a force in England and Wales may now work for a force in Scotland or Northern Ireland, outside the Minister’s jurisdiction. We raised the matter in our informal discussions and I do not believe I have had a response from the Minister, unless I missed it. I would welcome an update on the progress that he has had with the devolved Administrations in Northern Ireland and Scotland on ensuring that the terms of the Bill would not encounter any difficulties from those Administrations. They are different Administrations and have different police forces. If somebody is now employed by the Police Service of Northern Ireland or the Scottish police force, that could present difficulties. I would like to see the matter resolved. The Minister has said outside the Chamber that he has discussed it and is coming to a conclusion on it.

I welcome support for the Bill from Liberty, the human rights group, which believes that this is the right course of action. There is cross-community support for the Bill and I wish it fair passage. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) referred in an intervention to the petition organised by Anne Williams. Perhaps the Minister winding up the debate can give us an update. As we know, Anne Williams has a very difficult and challenging illness and wishes to ensure that her concerns about her family’s loss are resolved before her illness reaches a sad conclusion, as she expects it to do. We should consider an early opportunity to discuss that petition again in the House. May I press the Minister for an early answer from the Department on the earliest possible inquest into the family of Anne Williams?

The Bill has widespread support. There are some issues which I have raised with the Minister today that we want to see explored in detail, but I know as somebody who represents families who lost relatives at Hillsborough, I know from being born and growing up in Liverpool the community that I represent, I know from my support for that football team for my entire life, and I know from the contributions, work and efforts of my right hon. and hon. Friends from across the region and across my area of north Wales that the events of Hillsborough in 1989 caused such challenge, tragedy and concern that we now want justice for the families of those 96 victims and others who were injured.

Through their effort, passion and commitment the families have brought the case to the stage that we are at today, where an inquest is potentially pending, verdicts can be quashed and the Director of Public Prosecutions is going to act on the matter. The Bill gives an opportunity for the Independent Police Complaints Commission to provide answers and take real action on the concerns that have existed for many years. I welcome the Second Reading of the Bill. We will return to issues in due course in Committee, but the Opposition support the Bill here and in another place and look forward to the day when the IPCC’s investigation leads to satisfaction, truth and justice for the families of those who were lost in Sheffield on that day in 1989.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve Rotheram]

The Minister has mentioned our questions about a lead investigator. According to paragraph 9 on page 3 of the Home Affairs Select Committee report that was published today, the Committee is recommending

“that a single, lead investigator should be identified”.

How much consideration will he give to that report?

[Damian Green]

As I have said, I can see where the demand is coming from, and I have read the Home Affairs Select Committee report. There are, however, very good reasons for what I have said about this, which I am sure hon. Members will understand. Given the constitutional independence of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the IPCC, there could not be any attempt to direct them, especially the DPP. It would be improper in all senses for a chief investigator, let alone a Home Office Minister, to direct him and tell him what to do. It would certainly be constitutionally improper as well, so there are genuine difficulties involved in going down that route. I assume that the underlying drive behind the request for such an investigator is the need to ensure that people do not go off in different directions or fail to talk to each other, thereby causing unnecessary delay through a lack of coherence among the various strands that hon. Members have talked about. Everyone involved is aware of that; I know they are doing their best to make sure that they proceed as much as possible in parallel.

The right hon. Member for Delyn asked me about engagement with the Police Superintendents Association and the Police Federation. As I said in response to an earlier intervention, I have already had an exchange of correspondence with both bodies; indeed, my officials spoke to them before the Bill was published. I believe the right hon. Gentleman said at one stage that we should have consulted formally, but that would have taken 10 or 12 weeks, so it would clearly have been impossible. Inevitably, there has not been a lot of time between getting the Bill right and publishing it. Of necessity, then, the consultation with the bodies was done relatively shortly before we proceeded. I sensed the House’s pressure to get on with this, and that is what we are doing.

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Tuesday 18th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

8. What assessment he has made of the adequacy of staffing levels in the probation service.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Jeremy Wright)]

Individual probation trusts determine their staffing requirements. The contracts negotiated and agreed with the trusts take account of the need to ensure that services are delivered effectively, efficiently and economically within the resources available. The performance data we collect indicate that probation trusts are making effective use of their resources to protect the public.

[Steve Rotheram]

Many will recall that the Deputy Prime Minister said before the last election that he wanted to stop prisons turning into “colleges of crime”. Last week, the Minister revealed in a written answer to me that 4,175 offenders in England and Wales had been recalled to prison in the first three months of 2012 and that the rate is actually rising under this coalition, to more than 16,000 a year. Is that happening because the Government are failing on reoffending or because the probation service is totally understaffed?

[Jeremy Wright]

I do not think it is either of those two things. It is right to be concerned about the rate of recall to prison; the hon. Gentleman is perfectly right to say that. It is also right that I put on the record, because this is my first opportunity to do so, that the probation service comes in for a great deal of criticism but does excellent work. It looks very hard at risk when it releases prisoners from custody and it does its very best to minimise that risk. Where we find that reoffending or breaches of licence resulting in returns to custody occur, we will work hard with the probation service to learn the necessary lessons.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Grant]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. The Crown court carries out checks on jurors on their first day. Passports, national identity cards or Home Office documentation confirming their immigration status must be produced.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

T5. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of prisons recently said of HMP Liverpool that“resettlement resources were not adequate to meet the needs of the population held, with backlogs of the reviews necessary to address offending behaviour and little planning for short-term prisoners.”Given that HMIP report, what comfort can the Minister provide to my constituents that he is taking seriously the important issue of an overstretched service?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Jeremy Wright)]

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, but I have not had a chance to look at that report yet. I will look at it and come back to him. Generally, resettlement is hugely important. We are keen to see offenders get back into the community and straight into productive work, which is one reason we want offenders to be admitted quickly on to the Work programme that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State introduced so successfully in his last job.

Mesothelioma (Legal Aid Reform)

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Tuesday 26th June 2012 Westminster Hall

[Bill Esterson]

My hon. Friend has a long and distinguished record of fighting for those suffering from many industrial diseases, especially mesothelioma. He has made the point well: 200 people have died since the last time the issue was debated. That demonstrates the urgent need for the Minister to indicate exactly when the review will be held and how quickly it will conclude.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend will be aware, as I am, of constituents who have unfortunately contracted asbestos-related diseases such as mesothelioma. Why are people who have terrible diseases through no fault of their own being doubly punished by the Government? Is it a case of the law of unintended consequences, or does my hon. Friend believe that they are being targeted by this uncaring Government?

[Bill Esterson]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for his question, and I hope that the Minister will answer it. We could all make our guesses as to the true motives. There are well-established financial links between the Government and the insurance industry, which might be at the heart of why things are being done in the way that they are.

It cannot be right that victims of asbestos-related diseases should be required to surrender a quarter of the damages that they have been awarded to pay for legal costs. Those damages are awarded to recognise and compensate men and women who have suffered terribly, if it is at all possible to compensate them for the pain, suffering and life-shortening that resulted from their work.

Mesothelioma has an extraordinarily long latency period of up to 60 years. As well as those 30,000 who have already died in the United Kingdom from mesothelioma, an estimated 60,000 more are yet to lose their lives due to past exposure, the vast majority of which occurred at work.

Defamation Bill

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Tuesday 12th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clarke]

I made my remark about the case being hypothetical to avoid being drawn into arguments about that case, which is rather familiar to people who know this subject. There are arguments about how far the plaintiff had connections with this country and a reputation here, but as it happens I was producing the example of a Saudi and an American purely hypothetically and I do not think I should get drawn into the merits of a past case. My hon. Friend, who is an expert in this field, rapidly understood why those particular nationalities had leapt to my mind when I gave the example.

Alongside these adjustments in the law to help support freedom of expression, I want to ensure that effective remedies are available for those defamed. Often what most concerns claimants is not financial compensation, but meaningful public clarification that a story was wrong. We have therefore included provisions in clause 12 extending existing powers to enable the court to order publication of a summary of its judgment. Parties will be encouraged to reach agreement, where possible, on the contents of the summary and issues such as where, when and how it is to be published. However, in the absence of agreement, the court will be empowered to settle the wording of the summary and give directions on those other matters.

In addition to protecting freedom of expression and reputation, the Bill seeks to modernise the law. Our biggest difficulty has been in relation to the web, the internet and so on. Currently, website operators are in principle liable as publishers for everything that appears on their site, even though the content is often determined by their users, but most operators are not in a position to know whether the material posted by their users is defamatory or not, and very often, faced with a complaint, they will immediately remove material. The Government want a libel regime for the internet that makes it possible for people to protect their reputations effectively, but which ensures that information online cannot be easily censored by casual threats of litigation against website operators.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Mr Clarke]

Surely; then I will get on to our proposed approach to that rather difficult problem.

[Steve Rotheram]

I broadly support the Bill, especially clause 5, which the right hon. and learned Gentleman is explaining. Can he give any comfort to the parents of Georgia Varley, a Liverpool youngster who was tragically killed and whose family and friends set up an RIP website, which trolls then used to abuse and disparage her death in a sickening and vile way? Can he outline specifically the proposals to tackle such abuse by internet trolls who hide behind the anonymity of a computer to abuse those remembered on RIP websites?

[Mr Clarke]

I cannot possibly comment on an individual case and individual possible action. I anticipate that the difficulty may be that the defaming of a deceased person always gives rise to questions of whether any action is possible. Trolling is an extremely unpleasant, curious activity which some very nasty people appear to be going into. There have already been quite a lot of prosecutions for trolling, but we think the public are entitled to proper protection against it.

Our proposed approach, under clause 5, will provide website operators with a defence against libel, provided they follow a procedure to put complainants in touch with the author of allegedly defamatory material. This will strengthen freedom of expression by ensuring that material is not taken down without the author being given an opportunity to defend it. Conversely, it will strengthen protections by enabling people who have had their reputation seriously harmed online to take action against the real author and bring proceedings against them if the matter cannot be resolved by other means.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sadiq Khan]

As the right hon. Gentleman will know, the Joint Committee looked into that issue and wanted a first hurdle before a corporation could sue. The Government decided not to accept that recommendation. He raised the example of corporations. The use of defamation laws by corporations has a chilling effect, especially given the inequality of arms. I am sure that that issue will be teased out and clarified in Committee, given the expertise that it will have.

As has been said, clauses 2 to 7 set out the defences that will be available to a claim for defamation. Some simply replace and codify common-law defences, while others provide new defences. I wish to touch on some of those defences.

Clause 4 is intended to address responsible publication of matters of public interest, the so-called Reynolds defence. That is a defence of responsible journalism in the public interest. The clause will abolish Reynolds and codify the factors that a court may consider when judging whether a defendant has acted responsibly.

I am aware that some groups, including the Libel Reform Campaign, are unhappy with the clause, believing that the Government have not gone far enough, that the defence is too time-consuming and expensive, and that it is unreliable because defendants are often required to clear a series of complex hurdles to gain legal protection. They also believe that it will simply freeze the Reynolds defence at the current point in time. There is genuine concern that subsequent case law may develop based on what is in the Bill. Would a “son of Reynolds”, as it were, be in the best interests of our defamation laws? We will need further debate and discussion on that important issue, and I look forward to that in Committee.

As has been said, clause 5 is intended to address defamation involving websites. It creates a new defence for operators of a website when a defamation action is brought against them in respect of a statement posted on that website by a third party.

[Steve Rotheram]

Despite what the Secretary of State said earlier, only a handful of people have been convicted of trolling. It is difficult to prosecute, because of the gaps in the relevant legislation, the Telecommunications Act 1984 and the Communications Act 2003. Does my right hon. Friend believe that clause 5 will do what it is intended to do and discourage and deter people who post sickening messages on RIP websites?

[Sadiq Khan]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving the important and outrageous example of people being trolled. It is worth saying for clarity that the clause deals only with defamation cases. I would not want the public to think that it was a panacea for all sorts of outrageous behaviour that takes place on the internet. He is right to remind us that other legislation, including criminal law, needs to be updated to allow authorities to take action against those who troll against innocent victims. We are all aware of the case of our colleague, the hon. Member who had outrageous words said against her, leading to a successful prosecution. If there is a lacuna, it needs to be filled, but we should be clear that clause 5 deals simply with cases in which a defamation claim is made.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)]

I have to attend an all-party parliamentary group annual general meeting, so I apologise if I have to leave before the next speech has finished.

I particularly welcome clause 5 and I shall speak mainly to it, addressing the issues of social media, trolls and the damage that can be caused to individuals, particularly to young people.

Some in public life accept the consequences of engaging with social media. For many of us in this House, our job and our way of life necessitate engagement with such media, but we are, I suppose, big, bad and ugly enough to be able to deal with the consequences.

It was interesting that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) highlighted issues concerning children and deceased individuals, and the fact that an estate cannot have any redress in internet trials of children and young people. I have experienced a couple of cases myself. As the hon. Gentleman also said, there are already laws, but there are two types of internet trolls. There are those who know very well indeed how to negate those laws and how to dodge them so that they do not get prosecuted. They troll and post on the internet in a way that ensures they are protected from prosecution. I know this from people who have contacted me and from two police investigations that I instigated. There are some very clever people out there. There are also people—otherwise sensible, learned and normal people—who, when they sit in front of a computer and veil themselves in a cloak of anonymity, can turn into a troll or almost some kind of monster. These are the people who occasionally get caught and are occasionally prosecuted, but it does not happen very often.

Opening my front door one morning, I was surprised to find three Bedfordshire police officers lying on their backs with their faces under my car. This was because a student from Oxford had posted on the internet that he was going to bomb it. The Bedfordshire police were assiduous, but at the point of prosecution I decided not to go ahead. I considered the fact that a 20-year-old sitting in front of a computer who suddenly made a spontaneous comment possibly did not deserve a lifetime criminal record for a foolish act. I thought that his having been contacted by the police was probably enough of a deterrent to stop him doing such a thing again. Given that this was a student from Oxford, one imagines that he was an intelligent individual.

In another case, a man who I believe worked in the civil service whose wife was pregnant posted on the internet that he would like to lock me in a car, set it on fire and watch my flesh melt from my bones. I thought that was pretty graphic, but again I chose not to prosecute, as this was a family man with a good career whose wife was about to have a baby and I thought that the police’s intervention might be enough to prevent him from doing something similar again. As a Member of Parliament, I accept that when I speak about various campaigns and issues, it may elicit this kind of response from people who do not agree with my point of view.

Other people are not in the public eye and do not expect to receive the condemnation that we receive for the positions we take. Some people spend their life building a reputation—it might not be a major one, just one in their field, perhaps that of a teacher, a health worker or someone working commercially—based on their integrity, expertise and ability. In building that reputation, they also build their own persona and status, and identify themselves through whom they have become.

When a newspaper prints a story about an individual, or there is an altercation between two individuals, all that those people identify themselves with—all that they believe themselves to be—can be destroyed by one posting by an internet troll. For some people that is incredibly serious, and carries psychological consequences. Their identities may be challenged to the extent that they doubt that they are who they thought they were. There is a famous example of, I believe, a European Prime Minister who suffered and committed suicide, because the person he had built his life up to be had been suddenly taken away from him by what people had written on the internet. There are many consequences about which we never hear, so we sometimes do not know what people have to deal with on a daily basis.

Let me give another example, from my own experience. I was on a live television show this morning. The first question that the presenter asked me was, “Is it true that your ex-husband gave you an ultimatum—that if you did not give up politics, he would leave you?” My ex-husband is quite poorly. Anyway, he would not have dared to give me such an ultimatum, and the fact is that he did not. I was asked the question because of the lie that someone had posted on the internet seven years ago. My ex-husband is actually quite ill, but I could not filter the question on live television. That is one of the consequences of indiscriminate postings, comments left on websites that can be regurgitated years later.

[Steve Rotheram]

The hon. Lady has raised a very important point. There are people I, being a scouser, describe as idiots, who get involved in this sort of activity thinking that it is a bit of banter, which it is not. However, there are also people who are professional trollers. There is something called The Trolling Academy, which gives advice, specifically “Target MPs”. I have been targeted, and I think that others have as well. Someone said on Twitter that they wished I had AIDS, for instance. As the hon. Lady says, it is fine for those of us with thick skins, but there are ordinary, innocent people out there whose lives are detrimentally affected by trolls. That is why I suggested that clause 5 might need some additional work.

[Nadine Dorries]

As always, the hon. Gentleman has made an excellent point. I have discovered that Twitter has a block button. All that you need to do is block someone, and I do it all the time. A parody account called Blocked By Nadine has been set up on Twitter because I have blocked so many people. However, I think that most social media networking sites are very responsible. They respond to complaints and work with the police. Although clause 5 is welcome, I think that there is a degree of responsibility among the more well-known and well-used sites, where people are very much aware of the professional trolling that the hon. Gentleman has mentioned, and of the fact that MPs are being targeted. Besides, there is always the block button: we do not have to see what anyone has said if we do not want to.

One of the big issues is how clause 5 will protect young people from the cyber-bullying which I am sure we have all heard about from parents in our constituencies. Young people are bullied on the internet—on Facebook, and on other social networking sites. That was always going to be a consequence of the establishment of social media. As was pointed out by the right hon. Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan), technology of that kind has moved way ahead of UK law. It has left the law wanting, because it is unable to protect some of the most vulnerable people, particularly the young. The right hon. Gentleman also said that we might not have a chance to debate the matter again for another generation. I hope that that is not true, because technology will continue to move apace. In fact, I almost feel that this legislation should be returned to the House annually, because technology will continue to develop and new problems and challenges will regularly arise.

As I know from constituency cases, young people without the ability to deal with insults, defamation and the rubbishing of their young and precious reputations on the internet are far more vulnerable than any adult. When someone posts a message on the internet saying that a certain young girl is fat and ugly and so forth, it can take the victim a lifetime to get over those words. They are often not words that somebody would say to another person without hiding behind the cloak of anonymity, which is why they use an anonymous persona on the internet. In some cases they might be known, however, but what is said on the internet is like sending an e-mail, which is different from saying the words directly to the other person; it is much easier to type something and press “send”, and then it is gone, but what has been written can have huge consequences.

As we know, in some areas of the country there have been suicide pacts and groups of suicides among teenagers, and social networking and social media have played a part in all those cases. It is probably best not to go into the details, however. We must put in place a mechanism by which social networking sites and websites can be contacted so that they respond to such cases quickly.

I rose to speak in order to highlight some of the problems that exist, based on my own experience and the experiences of some of my constituents, and to explain why I believe clause 5 is important. This Bill is now before the House, but we must not wait another 10 years or another generation before we look at this matter again. I ask the Secretary of State to make a commitment that it will be looked at more regularly, as the internet is constantly evolving and developing and young people and the vulnerable must be given protection.

Victim Support

Steve Rotheram Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2011 Westminster Hall

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Scott. I am pleased to have secured this debate on the support for victims in the judicial system. Many Members are interested in the subject, and some might wish to take part in the debate. I made it clear to both the Minister and the shadow Minister that I wish to focus on the tragic case of Claire Oldfield-Hampson, which I raised more than 10 years ago in a parliamentary debate on 8 January 2001.

I have been working on the case with Joanne Bryce and her family, who come from my constituency in St Ives. We have pursued a number of issues that have arisen from the killing of Claire Oldfield-Hampson in 1996. Unfortunately, those issues have never resulted in any kind of closure for the family and many remain unresolved. I am pleased to say that my constituent was able to visit me in Parliament today and will be monitoring this debate.

I wish to bring this issue to a number of general conclusions that may be relevant to other cases in today’s debate. I have given the Minister advance notice of the background to the case and the issues that arise that are relevant to his portfolio. A range of concerns fall under the broad umbrella of victim support. No doubt, Members will find that a number of those concerns differ from the ones that they want to raise, but some will be similar.

We are debating this issue on a day when the consultation on the Government’s sentencing policy has come to a close. Although that is not directly relevant to the issues that I raise, there are some indirect references to the manner in which the cases are dealt with. In this instance, the case was mounted in mitigation. In other words, the convicted was prepared to accept a manslaughter charge rather than a murder charge.

I come to this issue in support of my constituents. I have no legal training or any experience of the court system, particularly the criminal justice system. Looking at the issues that have arisen from this case, I have to say that I was overwhelmingly shocked at what I considered to be an absolute travesty of justice. As I said in the debate more than 10 years ago, this is the case of an innocent victim who was treated by the judicial system as if she were the perpetrator of the crime and her husband the victim: the trial primarily dealt with the case in mitigation and did not address any of the points that would have challenged that.

The people whom we are talking about today are the victims of a series of events, which, if their case gets to court, could be described as life-changing, life-defining or, tragically in the case of Claire Oldfield-Hampson, life-ending. The justice system uses as a metaphor the image of the scales—the scales of justice—which have to be balanced. Yet the debate that takes place is often remote from the events themselves and can be conceptual and intellectual. Those engaged in the system never wish to appear to prejudge any case. None the less, the case that I wish to present today shows that victims are often treated in an imbalanced manner by the system itself.

Let me explain the background to the case. According to the courts, Claire Oldfield-Hampson was unlawfully killed by her husband with a hammer on 25 September 1996. He buried her body in a shallow grave in the garden in the early hours of the following day. Within two days, he was using her bank accounts and leading a life of deception involving their seven-year-old child, Felicity, who provided excuses for her mother’s absence.

The deception was perpetrated for two years. Calls in person and by telephone were received by Hampson and further excuses were given. Regular contact was maintained between Felicity and her grandmother, Mary Oldfield, who became a constituent of mine, but who sadly died a few years ago. At that time, she lived only five miles away. Mary met the child on a fortnightly basis. She baked cakes to send to Claire, knitted for her and exchanged Christmas, birthday and wedding anniversary cards. They had been very close. Mary Oldfield gave a cheque for £3,000 to David Hampson to give to Claire to help them through some difficult times and she offered them a car. The family was supportive to the Hampsons in many ways.

The deception continued until the family—Joanne Bryce and her husband, Alex—became increasingly concerned and encouraged the commencement of police investigations in December 1998. Hampson confessed to killing his wife only when it became absolutely clear that there was no other possible explanation for her absence.

Hampson was tried at Northampton Crown court in October 1999. He pleaded guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility because he alleged that he was depressively ill as a result of his wife’s constant nagging.

Judge Francis Allen concluded by accepting that Hampson’s wife behaved in a way that was calculated to impact on his mind. The judge gave Hampson a six-year prison sentence that was then reduced to four years on appeal in July 2000. He was released in December 2000, only 14 months after the original trial.

During the two-year deception, Hampson plundered Claire’s bank account, shares and insurances to the tune of £11,000 and fraudulently claimed benefits. The intention of seeking a conviction for fraud was dropped on the grounds that Hampson would ultimately be tried for a more serious capital offence. Four days before the original trial, the Crown Prosecution Service accepted a plea for manslaughter. No witnesses were called; there was no jury; and the trial took under an hour. If anyone wishes to read an example of what I consider to be injustice, they should read the transcript of that trial, which was purely a case in mitigation.

Claire Oldfield-Hampson was killed by her husband in 1996 and then she was exhumed by the state from the garden that she had been buried in, dragged along to the court and slaughtered again in public—verbally. It was a travesty, frankly. I urge people to look at this case. If it is an example of what our judicial system does, we should be ashamed of what we do in the name of the victims of capital offences, such as murder and manslaughter.

In fact, there were several travesties in the court, beginning with the opening words of the defence counsel. The defence counsel said that Hampson was

“a man of good character”.

Hampson killed his wife; buried her in the garden; took her money from her; deceived her family and the world; involved a child in that deception; attempted to defraud the benefit system; fraudulently accepted money from his mother-in-law; and he only accepted his guilt at the 11th hour. In addition, he had a less than impressive—in fact, it was rather dubious—employment record. Apart from all that, perhaps he was a man of good character, but the rest of it does not look very good, does it? Nevertheless, we were told that he was

“a man of good character”.

We were also told that Hampson was depressively ill and that there was a causal link between that illness and the killing. Two years after the killing, he was seen by two psychiatrists. Basically, the case for prosecuting him for manslaughter rather than murder was based on what I described at the time and still describe now as the flimsy science of retrospective psychiatry. Somehow, it is thought that a psychiatrist can determine the state of mind of someone two years previously—someone who, as the evidence shows, was known to be very successful at deceiving people—yet Hampson was able, in my view, to deceive everyone involved in the whole system into believing that he had taken those actions and killed his wife as a result of her constant nagging, which we were told had impacted on his mind. In fact, we were told that the nagging was calculated to impact on his mind. So we were told that Claire was constantly nagging Hampson, making him depressively ill. Once again, however, there was little corroborative evidence and no opportunity for proper cross-examination.

Perhaps what was most hurtful of all were the claims made in the case that Felicity, Claire’s seven-year-old daughter, had

“received very little love or affection from her mother”.

The transcript of the case continues, saying that Felicity

“turned very much more to her father, who was a warm, kind and loving parent to her.”

I sent the Hansard report of the 2001 debate in Parliament on this case to the then Director of Public Prosecutions, David Calvert-Smith, and subsequently I met him to take him through what I considered to be some of the inadequacies in the system. We went through some of the issues and indeed he wrote to me again in August 2001 to try to contradict some of the claims that I had made to him. The claim that Claire’s daughter received very little love or affection from her mother might sound like a rather subjective assessment, but I felt that it was very significant and that I should say so. Joanne Bryce and her husband demanded a police investigation, which was undertaken by Bedfordshire police, as a result of the complaints that were made about the way that Claire’s family were treated.

Then David Calvert-Smith wrote to me out of the blue in December 2002 with a letter of apology, which I thought was very noteworthy. In that letter, which is dated 24 December 2002, he said:

“Specifically, in my letter of 7 August 2001 third paragraph I asserted there was no evidence on the prosecution file to support the statement “that Claire loved her daughter very much”. At the time of the prosecution and indeed at the time I wrote to you that was correct. What has now become apparent from the Bedfordshire enquiry is that had other witnesses been seen and interviewed during the original investigation and other sources of information examined and revealed to the CPS, then that assertion (that there was no evidence that Claire loved her daughter) should not, and would not, have been made. Although not directly privy to the Bedfordshire Police enquiry, the Chief Crown Prosecutor for Cambridgeshire and his staff have been assisting that Force’s investigation in every possible way. I do not know and cannot anticipate what the eventual outcome of that enquiry will be”—

etc, etc. He continued:

“My statement will understandably have caused distress to Mr and Mrs Bryce. I am sorry that you and they were given what has now been revealed to be wrong information.”

The fact is that one of the fundamental arguments in mitigation was the charge that Claire was an uncaring and unloving mother and a nagging wife. Of course, just a small amount of additional investigation proved that charge to be untrue.

Quite apart from what, in my view, was the travesty of justice meted out to the memory of Claire Oldfield-Hampson by two courts of law, a number of other issues need to be addressed. Some of them have been addressed by the Government since the trial. The Crown Prosecution Service at Huntingdon had said that the charge would never be downgraded from murder to manslaughter, yet Claire’s family were told only five days before the trial that the charge would be manslaughter rather than murder when the CPS phoned to let them know, giving them no opportunity to have a discussion or to challenge why.

My constituent, Joanne Bryce, points out:

“There was no trial only a hearing with no jury and no witnesses, and no-one to challenge the information that had been taken from Hampson.”

Only Hampson’s argument was heard. Joanne also pointed out:

“There was a complete character vilification of Claire – 9 out of 11 national newspapers ran with the headline “Nagging Wife killed by husband”. It seemed that nagging was the capital crime and the killing just a minor incident. All this went unchallenged…Claire’s personal diaries must have evidence of family relationship”.

There was certainly a lot of material in Claire’s diaries that was never made available at the time or shown to the court. There was also video evidence about Felicity’s relationship with her mother and Joanne notes that

“there were 66 exhibits which had there been a trial would have been in the public domain.”

I have already mentioned the flimsy science of retrospective psychiatry. The police failed to provide a Home Office information pack; they did not provide a family liaison officer and there was a failure to identify the senior investigating officer, so Claire’s family were never told who that officer was. There was a failure to provide information about the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme in respect of the funeral expenses; there was a failure to obtain evidence of Claire’s character; there was a failure to investigate fraud and theft; and the family were denied access to Felicity, who had been placed in the care of the murderer’s family.

There are other issues that have arisen that I want the Minister to address, particularly the fundamental right of a murderer to remain the next of kin of their victim. As a result, the murderer still has the right to access the estate of the person they have murdered, in the case of a domestic killing such as this one, so my constituent, the sister of the woman who had been killed, had no right of access to the house, whereas the murderer’s family could go in and help themselves to what they wished. She had to plead with the murderer for access to the death certificate to proceed with the funeral. The murderer had full access to all the family heirlooms and to Claire Oldfield-Hampson’s records from way before they first met, but all of that was denied to the blood relatives.

I think the Minister knows the question I wish to ask today. Is it not right that someone charged with a capital offence, but not yet convicted, should have such rights at least suspended, if not removed entirely? I cannot understand how this kind of situation can occur in this country, with a murderer having control over the estate and life memory of the person they have murdered. Should we not be addressing ourselves to these issues?

There was a swathe of other failings in the case, many of which were identified by the Bedfordshire police investigation. The report of the investigation was submitted in December 2002, but even now, nearly 10 years on, the family are seeking to gain access to the full version, which contains more than 100 redactions.

Before today’s debate, I sent the Minister my notes, and I urge him to look carefully at the case and address the issues that I have outlined. I had hoped that the Claire Oldfield-Hampson case was a one-off, but since then other people have contacted me about similar ones. Recently, Angela Geddes of Carnoustie in Angus contacted me. She spoke out after her father Roger admitted killing his wife Ann at the couple’s home there. She gave me a newspaper cutting, which states:

“The daughter of a woman killed in a horrific axe attack by her husband has hit out at a decision to allow her father to plead guilty to a reduced charge of culpable homicide. Speaking after her father Roger Geddes admitted killing wife Ann, the couple’s daughter Angela Geddes said: ‘The family are devastated at the lack of justice and the charade we have seen in court’.”

That case is in the different legal context and judicial system of Scotland, but the killing took place only last year and the same argument applies. Angela Geddes says:

“I do believe he has managed to deceive the psychiatrists who do not know his true colours and only hope he shows them before he is released and becomes a danger to my family and the wider public.”

Again, just last year psychiatric evidence was used to mount a case in mitigation.

It is a good thing that this Government and the previous Government have committed resources to Victim Support and other advocates for victims. There is also the code of practice for victims of crime, but even Victim Support has contacted me to complain that although the code covers most of the issues,

“Local Criminal Justice Boards have now been asked to stop reporting on it to the Ministry of Justice, meaning it’s now essentially not being enforced. This bodes very badly for victims”.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman paints a very vivid picture of the trials of his ongoing fight for justice for his constituents. I was interested to read the extract from Hansard that he sent us, of a speech he made in the House in 2001:

“First and foremost, our justice system should consider the victims and their families. After all, it is primarily on their behalf that our society seeks to uphold the law and administer justice. Victims are already grieving and aggrieved parties. The process should not leave them more aggrieved.”—[Official Report, 8 January 2001; Vol. 360, c. 852.]

In my constituency, James McVey, a young man of just 18 years of age, lost his life to what is sometimes termed “a one-punch assault.” Does the hon. Gentleman agree that at times far too much emphasis is placed on the rights of the perpetrators of acts of violence and not on the rights of their victims?

[Andrew George]

Although I say it myself, I could not have put it better myself. The hon. Gentleman’s point is absolutely right. The conclusion that we draw from these kinds of cases is that the perpetrators appear to be treated with a great deal more respect than the victims. I do not think that we have the balance right; the scales of justice have tipped over too far in some cases.

I am aware that many other people wish to take part in the debate and I apologise for having spoken at such length, but I feel very passionately about this deeply concerning matter. I have these questions for the Minister. Does he agree that the issues raised by this case and by the difficulty that we have had in trying to secure justice, clarity and closure, would benefit from a departmental review? What progress has been made in the 10 years that have passed since I first raised the issues, and what progress still needs to be made? Although the introduction of victim statements has helped, they have been rather intermittent and not widely used, so what further proposals are there to ensure that victims and their families receive fair treatment? Does the Minister agree that it is appropriate to suspend the rights of people charged with murder and manslaughter, including their entitlement to be next of kin, hold the death certificate and handle the victim’s estate, and finally, does he agree that claims made in mitigation should be open to challenge in court by victims and their families?

My constituents have been unable to achieve what they seek: closure. In fact, the further they look into the case the further they appear to be from closure. We would certainly welcome an opportunity to meet the Justice Minister to ensure that lessons are learnt from this and the many other cases in which we believe justice has not been served.