Victoria Atkins
Main Page: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)Department Debates - View all Victoria Atkins's debates with the Ministry of Justice
(2 years, 4 months ago)
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Mary Kelly Foy (City of Durham) (Lab)
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Victoria Atkins)
The Government are committed to recognising the extraordinary public service carried out by our hard-working prison staff and officers, and to ensuring that we have a modern employment offer that attracts and retains the very best. I am listening to and working with officers, staff and trade unions on all employment matters.
Mary Kelly Foy
The Minister agreed more than six months ago in this place and on a number of other occasions to meet with the professional trades union for prison, correctional and secure psychiatric workers—the Prison Officers Association—to discuss prison officer pension age as a standalone issue. Yet I am informed that that meeting is yet to happen or even to be scheduled. Does the Minister understand that making promises to prison officers and then breaking them is an insult to hundreds of my constituents in Durham, but entirely consistent with the way this Government treat those brave and loyal workers?
Victoria Atkins
I thank the hon. Lady for raising this matter. I have in fact met the Prison Officers Association; indeed, I was delighted to attend its conference in Eastbourne a couple of months ago. I note in passing that sadly the Opposition were not able to accept the union’s kind invitation to attend that same conference. In terms of pensions, I am determined to have a good employment offer for all our officers. I will continue to meet the POA union and the other unions that work in our prison estate. I emphasise both to officers and to staff that we want to ensure that the hard work they put in to our prison service is reflected in the coming months in the offer we put to our staff.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Victoria Atkins)
The Government are committed to supporting victims of rape and sexual violence. We have seen rape convictions increase by two thirds since 2020, but we are committed to doing much more and going further. Last year the Government announced our ambitious end-to-end rape review action plan, which includes quadrupling the funding for victim support from £41 million in 2009-10 to £192 million by 2024-25. More than half of all Crown courts are equipped to use pre-recorded cross-examination and re-examination for vulnerable witnesses, to make the experience of giving evidence to the courts less daunting. There is much more happening, and I know the hon. Gentleman takes a close interest in these matters.
Jim Shannon
I thank the Minister, who clearly has a very clear strategy to move forward. However, recent statistics from the charity Rape Crisis state that in 2021 only one in 100 victims of rape felt they could report it to the police, with some feeling completely unable to do so due to intense fear and angst about reprisals from the perpetrator. What steps will she take to ensure that victims feel that they can come forward and place their trust in the authorities, to find the closure they so very much want?
Victoria Atkins
The hon. Gentleman is right to identify the concerns that victims have from the very first moment of reaching out for support from the police in reporting these offences. As I say, we have conducted a forensic end-to-end review of the criminal justice system. Part of that includes ensuring that the police conduct so-called suspect-focused investigations whereby, rather than looking at the witness’s credibility, they focus on the suspect’s behaviour. We will be rolling this out nationally over the coming year, and I very much hope and expect that we will begin to see some real results from that.
Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)
Three years on from the Government’s end-to-end rape review, little has changed, with victims waiting three years for their case to get to court, section 28 rolled out in 37 out of 77 Crown courts, and specialist rape courts to be piloted in just three. When I raised the Conservatives’ appalling record in Parliament last week, the Minister accused me of
“false, damaging and intemperate language”,
but I make no apology for standing up for victims. Does she accept that it is her Government’s actions and not my words that are letting rape survivors down?
Victoria Atkins
I am extremely grateful to the shadow Minister for raising that matter. You know, Mr Speaker, that I wrote to you privately concerning conduct in this Chamber, because how we conduct ourselves in this Chamber matters: it has implications far beyond these walls for victims of crime. I raised this privately in a letter to you, Mr Speaker. I copied in the hon. Lady, as a professional courtesy, and it has mysteriously found its way into The Guardian newspaper; I know not how that could have happened. Just on a matter of House business, it is a very great shame that when colleagues express discreetly concerns about conduct in this Chamber, it becomes a matter for the national newspapers.
Turning to the hon. Lady’s allegations, we have more victims reporting their crimes to the police and the Crown Prosecution Service charging more perpetrators. We have timeliness in the Crown court improving by five weeks on last year. What is more, we have seen the conviction rate increase since last year, by two thirds. These are steps towards the targets that we want to meet. I do not for a moment claim that our work is done, but we must, for the sake of victims, ensure that we give them the reassurance and the support they need to bring these allegations to light.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Victoria Atkins)
I know that accessing timely support on release can be particularly challenging on a Friday and that that can increase the risk of reoffending. That is why the Government have committed to pursuing legislation when parliamentary time allows to enable the release of prisoners up to two days earlier when a release date falls on a Friday or before a bank holiday. I welcome the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mark Jenkinson) has introduced a private Member’s Bill on the issue. I look forward to that.
Bob Blackman
What is key is that if we release ex-criminals and ex-offenders on a Friday, they are likely to return to their former habitat, reconnect with individuals whom they committed crimes with and reoffend. Equally, if they are homeless, they will not get any service from the local authority. I therefore commend the moves to change the position so that we can encourage people to rebuild their lives after being in prison.
Victoria Atkins
I thank my hon. Friend, who has a long record of tackling homelessness. We are particularly conscious of the impact that homelessness can have on ex-offenders released from prison, so, in addition to our commitment to legislate on Friday releases, by 2024-25 we will invest an additional £200 million a year to transform our approach to rehabilitation, including expanding our transitional accommodation service across England and Wales. Ex-offenders need a home, a job and a support network, and we are determined to help them to gain all three.
Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab)
Liz Twist (Blaydon) (Lab)
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Victoria Atkins)
A huge body of work is going on across every part of the criminal justice system, from the police to the Crown Prosecution Service and through to the courts. It involves the recruitment of more independent sexual violence advisers, who can make such a difference not only to victims’ recovery, but to their willingness and ability to continue with a prosecution. In particular, we are introducing enhanced measures for specialist support within three pilot courts to support victims who are taking forward these very difficult cases. We are working with the judiciary, the police and the CPS to ensure that we measure and identify what is working so that we can replicate it across the country.
Dame Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)
When it comes to female offenders, trauma-informed and gender-responsive programmes are the only way to break a cycle of crime and incarceration. Tomorrow, the brilliant charity One Small Thing will be here in Parliament to discuss the latest research on the intergenerational traumatic impact of maternal imprisonment. I would really love all Justice Ministers, but particularly my hon. Friend the Minister of State, to come along and hear how the justice system could better be formatted to support women and children.
Victoria Atkins
I thank my hon. Friend for that kind invitation; I would be delighted to attend. On the impact of intergenerational trauma, one of the many reasons we are piloting the first residential women’s centre in Wales is that we want to see how women who should not be receiving the very short sentences that can be imposed can benefit from an intensive residential course rather than prison. I will be watching the results with interest.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
Rob Butler (Aylesbury) (Con)
An inspection report on Oakhill Secure Training Centre has been published today. The centre has a very poor recent record. I am pleased to see that there are signs of improvement, but much remains to be done to achieve a sustained high standard. Will the Minister commit herself to ensuring that both the Ministry of Justice and Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service continue to focus strongly on ensuring that Oakhill can enable children to truly turn their lives around?
Victoria Atkins
Very much so. As my hon. Friend knows from occasions when I have given evidence to the Justice Committee, we are keeping this under close review. We want the children who are held at Oakhill to be held in a way that is safe but also decent, and we want to rehabilitate those young people so that when they are released they can lead productive lives that are free from crime. I welcome my hon. Friend’s focus on this issue, and believe you me, it is absolutely mirrored in the Ministry.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
The Justice Secretary said this morning on television and on the radio, on the basis of conversations that he had had with the Prime Minister in the last 24 hours, that Lord McDonald’s claim that the Prime Minister had been directly and personally informed and briefed, in person, on the allegations that were substantiated at the Foreign Office, while he was Foreign Secretary, against the right hon. Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher) was untrue. Has the Justice Secretary had further conversations with the Prime Minister, and is that still his position?