Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Bill

Debate between Wera Hobhouse and Jim Shannon

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons & Programme motion: House of Commons
Tuesday 25th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)]

It is very refreshing to see such widespread consensus; I take the fact that the Chamber is relatively empty this afternoon as a sign that we all know that the Bill is a very welcome step forward and that there is widespread consensus. As has been said, the Bill makes our legal practices around divorce fit for the 21st century, and the Liberal Democrats very much welcome the changes.

Divorce can be traumatising and affect whole families for years after the event. Up until now, the legal process by which divorce happens has further exacerbated that trauma, dragging out the process and forcing couples into conflict to assign legal blame. Currently, it is impossible to seek a no-fault divorce unless the couple have been separated for at least two years. To file for divorce more quickly than that, couples must claim unreasonable behaviour or adultery.

The impacts of such a system are devastating, especially for children. Divorce and family breakdown are considered an adverse childhood experience that has lasting impacts on the children. Recently, we have talked about adverse childhood experiences around knife crime, the penal system and policing. I hope and wish, because I am a member of the all-party group for the prevention of adverse childhood experiences, that the whole approach—the trauma and fault approach—to a lot of services will be much better and more widely understood, and that all 650 MPs in this country will understand what trauma and fault mean. I encourage all hon. Members to attend at least some meetings of our all-party group. Family separation is an adverse childhood experience.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

We are all very concerned about the impact on children. The reality of the damage of divorce is manifest, not just in the process, which we are discussing, but primarily in the separation of parents and the subsequent years in which children live torn between them. Does the hon. Lady agree that whenever divorce is granted, there must be greater focus on the children of the break-up?

[Wera Hobhouse]

I thank the hon. Gentleman. Throughout the years, we have understood how important it is that we take children seriously and focus a lot on their mental health and wellbeing. I totally agree.

Living through adverse childhood experiences hugely influences the likelihood that a child will end up serving time in our criminal justice system, have poor mental and physical health and find it very difficult to build stable, loving relationships. Our divorce legislation must take that into account and be trauma-informed.

People often come to the decision to divorce at the most chaotic times of their and their families’ lives. We must have a system that tries to restore order—not fuel further chaos—and we must absolutely support children throughout that process.

The new legislation, which would allow couples to file for no-fault divorce and complete the process in six months, would leave space for families to continue to function in very difficult circumstances. It would encourage couples to be mindful of their marriage and the impact of divorce, while not pushing them towards further conflict.

Each year, over 100,000 couples get divorced in England and Wales. In the years that have passed since the most recent significant family legislation, over 1.7 million people have assigned blame in the divorce process. Needless to say, this Bill is long overdue.

There is much more that can be done to bring our marriage laws into the 21st century, as the hon. Member for Newton Abbot (Anne Marie Morris) said. We must recognise that marriage and civil partnerships are not for everyone and that young people who do get married are doing so later and later. Our legal system needs to catch up with society, in which millions of couples choose to live together without making a formal commitment. The Law Commission suggests granting essential but limited legal rights to couples who have lived together for at least three years. Such legislation would complement the new divorce, dissolution and separation laws, and I urge the Minister to take another look at that proposal.

Family law defines millions of lives, young and old. We have an obligation to ensure that the law is up to date and empowers people, instead of holding them back. Changing the current legislation to focus on reconciliation, as opposed to conflict, is a very positive first step in the process, but there is more to be done.

Offence of Sex for Rent

Debate between Wera Hobhouse and Jim Shannon

Wednesday 28th November 2018 Westminster Hall

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. I thank the hon. Member for Hove (Peter Kyle) for setting the scene, as he often does, on issues of particular importance to the House and to myself. I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) and to have heard her contribution.

I look around and see in the Chamber the familiar five Members who attend debates on all these issues, and I see the Minister, who is always there to respond. I have to say that, on the issues we have recently sought his interest in and his support and help for, he has been very responsive. I put that on the record at the start. I also thank the hon. Member for Hove for the hard work he has put into bringing this issue to light and into searching for answers. Perhaps in my contribution I can make some gentle suggestions from a Northern Ireland perspective, based on what we have done in the past, which might be helpful in bringing this forward.

That any person in our free, modern society should think it is okay to ask for sex as a payment of any type is absolutely disgraceful and unacceptable. That should be the starting point of the debate. This subject reminds me of something the BBC would put together: a gritty historical drama set in the Victorian era, in which an enlightened few try to bring about freedom and safety for people of all classes. The problem is that it is not a gritty historical drama but real life in 2018 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

We have women and men who have nowhere to live and no money to rent and who have escaped the social security system and feel that they have no other option. As the hon. Members for Hove and for Bath said, if we put ourselves in their position and grasp that, we will realise just how far down the level of acceptability they have gone. They are doing something that they do not want to do but that they feel they have no other option but to do. They allow their body to be used so that they have a roof over their head. Sometimes it is as basic and as cold as that.

There are students who cannot afford to do it all and who make the decision to rent a room for free in exchange for sexual favours. I suspect that we all know stories from our constituencies and from further afield—the media is certainly full of them—of the unacceptable price of rental accommodation and of students with vast student loan debts. That puts some students in a position in which they are wondering, “How on earth am I going to afford this?” In desperation, as a last resort, they are driven towards these unacceptable, but for them sometimes very real, situations. The thought of my grandchildren being put into this kind of situation makes me feel physically ill. I find it abhorrent that anyone would put a person, either a young woman or a young man, in this situation. It is unjustifiable and we must address it. That is why I welcome the opportunity today to make a small contribution on this issue.

Technically, it is an offence to do what we are discussing. The previous Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice told the hon. Member for Hove that

“an offence is committed when a person offers accommodation in return for sex, as they are inciting/causing another person to have sex with them in return for ‘payment’.”

That is technical terminology. It appears to be a reference to the offence of causing or inciting prostitution for gain under section 52 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003. However, that has yet to be tested, which is why I welcome the indication by the hon. Member for Hove of what solutions there could be. There certainly needs to be a prosecution—a test case. If the case is not winnable, let us change the legislation to stop this abhorrent practice once and for all.

So-called landlords feel that this is a grey area in which they can get away with exploiting vulnerable and needy people or young people, depending on their circumstances. We must send out a very clear message from this debate—a cross-party message from the hon. Members who are here to support the debate. How do we do that? That question was addressed first by the hon. Member for Hove and then by the hon. Member for Bath. Now I will pose it to the Minister, but in addition to posing it, I will—very gently and positively, I hope—put forward some suggestions.

[Wera Hobhouse]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is useful when media outlets pick up these issues, because that spreads the message and encourages people to come forward? It helps them to understand that this practice is illegal and that if they go to the police, there can be prosecutions, but people need to come forward.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. We need co-operation, and we perhaps need someone to take a lead by making a complaint to the police that can then be taken forward. Sometimes police also need help to bring about prosecutions and set the example that the hon. Member for Hove referred to in his introduction.

As I was saying, how do we send a clear message? I look to the Minister and offer my humble opinion that we should strengthen the law so that no one can feel that this is a grey area any more, as the hon. Member for Bath mentioned in her intervention. Let us in this debate, with a statement from the Minister, and more generally from the House, make this a black-and-white issue and keep men and women from being exploited in this way.

In Northern Ireland, we have sought to address issues such as this through the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Criminal Justice and Support for Victims) Act (Northern Ireland) 2015. The legislation was brought forward in the Northern Ireland Assembly by my colleague in the other place, Lord Morrow. The Minister will be aware of this as part of the background to the issue, and I hope others are also aware of it, but Northern Ireland became the first part of the United Kingdom to make paying for sex a crime, when the legislation came into effect in June 2015. Anyone caught breaking the law can be jailed for up to a year and face a £1,000 fine. That is the sort of legislation that we need here; it is the sort of legislation that the hon. Members for Bath and for Hove, and indeed every one of us in the debate, would wish to see in place.

Let me give an idea of what can be achieved with such a law. I should say first that allegations may be made, but an evidential base has to be there as well. Figures released by the Public Prosecution Service for Northern Ireland in August 2016 showed that seven people were referred to the PPS: no action was taken in three cases, two men received cautions, and the remaining two cases were being considered by a senior prosecutor. We have had events at the House of Commons and in the House of Lords at which we have made information about that legislation available for Members to look at.

The fact that the Police Service of Northern Ireland used the legislation to arrest men at the outset sent a very strong message that this behaviour and abuse of power is not acceptable and never can be. That message must be sent out UK-wide, and I sincerely but gently encourage the Minister to take steps to do that today: he should make it crystal clear not only that it is not okay to do these things and that advertising them publicly as if it were is not acceptable, but that if a person is found to be exploiting someone for sex in return for a room, that person will be arrested, will be fined and will go to jail. The Minister should give the police something to work with and give vulnerable people something to cling to. They are protected by law and, more than that, they are worth more than just a room for hire.

Social Homes for Rent

Debate between Wera Hobhouse and Jim Shannon

Wednesday 6th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Wera Hobhouse]

The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. The Budget also announced that the cap on local authorities’ housing revenue accounts will finally be lifted, but only in high-demand areas. It has not been clarified how authorities will apply, which makes it difficult for local councils.

People on low incomes, people working on zero-hours contracts and people on universal credit increasingly have nowhere to go except into social housing, which exists as a safety net provided by the state for people who are just about managing.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Does the hon. Lady agree that every constituency has a real need for social housing that is available for decent rent and that is fit for purpose? The need for appropriate housing has been magnified by the implementation of the bedroom tax, which sees families being penalised because their local authority has no available housing to fit them. Does she further agree that major steps must be taken either to meet that need or to lift this tax from those who are unable to move to a smaller house due to the lack of appropriate housing in their area?

European Economic Area: UK Membership

Debate between Wera Hobhouse and Jim Shannon

Monday 6th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Jim Shannon]

I thank my hon. Friend and colleague for his comments. We hear that today from Members who have a different opinion in relation to remain and inject fear into the whole debate. I am very positive about leaving the EU and leaving the EEA. When we are out and away, we are going to be better off. Let us have a positive outlook and we will be successful.

Do I believe that the best economic benefits are to be found as a non-EU member of the EEA? The bottom line is that EEA membership involves a range of obligations, including free movement of people, financial contributions to the EU, and accepting EU rules with no direct say over them. In short, we get the immigration issues, the tariffs and the charges, but very few benefits. Some Members have referred to the comprehensive trade deal, which I believe we can negotiate—I hope so. I have great confidence in the ministerial team and in what we are trying to achieve.

[Wera Hobhouse]

May I ask the hon. Gentleman what will happen to his opinions and his positive outlook if we cannot get the positive trade deals that he is hoping for?

[Jim Shannon]

I am a “glass half full” person. I look on the bright side of life, because that is what we should do. Some people have a “glass half empty” outlook, and they look at everything negatively, but I do not look at things in that way. I am positive about what we are doing, the way forward and the ability of our ministerial team to achieve what we want. We have to agree to differ about how some things will come together, and that is part of life.