Criminal Justice and Courts Bill

Yasmin Qureshi Excerpts

Tuesday 17th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Redwood]

I do wonder whether a period of six weeks is required. Presumably the proposal relates to a typical case in which those who are likely to object have followed the earlier processes of the application in great detail. After the original decision there may have been a planning appeal, and they will surely have all their arguments prepared and be ready to move before six weeks have passed. That period seems fairly generous in the circumstances. I wonder how much longer the process is likely to take, and how much High Court capacity there is for dealing with such cases expeditiously.

While I am keen to defend the green fields in my patch from inappropriate development, and am very accustomed to the techniques that we sometimes need to use for the purpose, I am also aware that we need land for building, and that people sometimes object to developments in certain locations that independent-minded people would deem perfectly reasonable. I suspect that in the case of applications of that kind, we might get into difficulties. I am pleased to see that you know exactly what I mean, Mr Deputy Speaker. When we seek to represent our constituencies, we all try to balance such considerations. I am strongly in favour of new growth and new development, but I am equally strongly against its taking place in certain localities where I would find it objectionable, as would many of my constituents.

Let me make two more brief points. I note that new schedule 3 proposes an amendment to the Planning (Hazardous Substances) Act 1990. It states, of course, that leave cannot be granted without the High Court’s approval, but I think that the main issue is whether it poses problems of a different kind, which, given that hazardous substances need to be controlled carefully, might make a more timely result even more crucial.

The new schedule also refers to the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004. Perhaps the Minister will tell us whether any different considerations apply when someone’s property is the subject of compulsory purchase. I would expect a higher standard of proof, and more rights for people to object, to apply when the estate or the council envisages a better use for land that they own than when a piece of land which is near to where they live, but which belongs to someone else, has been subject to various planning processes and the owner wishes to develop it. I think that those are slightly different cases, and that litigants should be given more protection when they are subject, under the Act, to a compulsory purchase to which they object or which they do not welcome.

I hope that the Minister will be able to clarify some of those points.

[Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)]

The Government tell us that they want to make changes to the judicial review process because too much money is being spent in court and people are making frivolous, vexatious or irrelevant claims, but the statistics do not bear that out. It is true that there has recently been an increase in the number of judicial review cases, most of which have involved immigration. However, under the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012, immigration cases now go to the upper tribunal to be resolved. In reality, the number of cases dealt with by judicial review is no greater than it was some years ago. I must therefore tell the Government, with all due respect, that the cost-based argument is complete hogwash. Something else is motivating the Government and, in particular, the Secretary of State, who has made the telling comment that judicial review is generally

“a promotional tool for countless Left-wing campaigners.”

In his speech, the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) listed a number of organisations that were not of the “loony leftie” variety. The Government’s motivation has become clear, and I think that it is very sad for our judicial system that they are curtailing the basic right of judicial review for the sake of their own political agenda.

The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill) seemed to suggest that virtually all judicial review cases were frivolous and a waste of time, and that we did not need the process. He even made what I would describe as the rather irrelevant political point that in the 1970s the Labour Government had not been particularly pro-judicial review. Governments of all complexions make wrong decisions, but that does not mean that 40 years later a political party cannot change its mind about a matter such as judicial review. I know that the hon. Gentleman is a lawyer, although I do not know whether he still practises.

[Robert Neill]

Does the hon. Lady not understand the point that I was making? It is erroneous to suggest, as the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter) did, that placing a restriction or limitation on judicial review undermines fundamental freedoms, Magna Carta and so forth. In fact, it is a fairly recent innovation in our public and administrative law.

--- Later in debate ---

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I happen to believe otherwise, and I do not think that I am alone. For instance, Lord Dyson, the Master of the Rolls, has said that

“there is no principle more basic to our system of law than the maintenance of the rule of law itself and the constitutional protection afforded by judicial review.”

I agree with him. Although the concept is only 30 or 40 years old, it has resulted in one of the most revolutionary developments in our legal system.

It is very easy to say about some of the more political cases, “These are loony leftie agendas”, but the hon. Gentleman may remember from his study of the courts—I remember studying them when I was doing my law degree—the number of cases where judicial review came in and was the only mechanism open to people who had suffered incredibly because of decisions made by a local authority, a public authority or the Government. To say that judicial review only came into being about 40 or 50 years ago and that it is a new concept is irrelevant. It may be newish, but it has had an important effect on our judicial system, and there are a lot of rights and benefits that people now take for granted—whether they are in a care home or one of the many different types of institution in our country, or in respect of public authorities that pass legislation or take actions that affect a whole range of ordinary people. For such people who are not able to get justice, it is judicial review and our courts being proactive that allow them to have their rights asserted. The hon. Gentleman talked about Lord Denning. It is absolutely right that he was one of the most brilliant judges we have had, and he truly helped ordinary people.

[Mr Redwood]

Does the hon. Lady not accept that judicial review can be used by people on the right as well as the left—and, indeed, it is so used—and that the Government probably would not welcome a judicial review from UKIP any more than they would from the Greens? Are certain things not so political that they ought to be hammered out here in Parliament and in general elections, not in court?

[Yasmin Qureshi]

Walter Bagehot talked about the fact that in our system we needed the three separate bodies—the Executive, the judiciary and obviously Parliament—and that all three must be strong to be able to act as a check on each other.

The fact that we in Parliament are elected does not mean that we do not make mistakes. In the history of Parliament, some appalling pieces of legislation have been passed which have turned out to be wrong. It is only because we have a strong judiciary and a proper judicial review system that those pieces of legislation have been found to be wrong. It is because of that that ordinary people have been able to get justice—the people of this country, the people we are supposed to be representing.

[Robert Neill]

Does the hon. Lady not accept that in a democracy the remedy for bad legislation is at an election, through removing the legislators? That is democracy.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

rose—

[Robert Neill]

To have the courts second-guessing the legislature undermines democracy.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

rose—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. Both hon. Members cannot be on their feet at the same time. If the hon. Lady gives way to the hon. Gentleman, she must let him make his point before jumping back up. Bob Neill, have you finished?

[Robert Neill]

Yes.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

Although we talk about democracy, bad laws have been created, and we cannot wait five years until the next election for such laws to be changed. I say with respect to the hon. Gentleman that that would be completely wrong. If an election takes place tomorrow and a bad law gets passed, are you really saying our people should have to wait five years and change the Government?

[Sir Edward Garnier (Harborough) (Con)]

I think I am getting a little confused, and it may be entirely my fault. I was under the impression that judicial review was about challenging in court the method by which the decisions of public authorities and the Executive had been arrived at. The judicial review court does not say that a decision was right or wrong; it criticises the process. So there is no question of a court repealing legislation, as the hon. Lady seems to be implying.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I entirely agree with that. Those of us who have been practitioners of law—a few such Members are present—will know that since coming into existence judicial review has been revolutionary for our country. We do not have a written constitution, and Lord Woolf has said:

“In our system, without its written constitution embedded in our law so it can’t be changed, judicial review is critical”

and the Ministry of Justice is showing a

“remarkable lack of concern for the precision of the facts”.

You might say, “Well, maybe Lord Woolf has an agenda here because he’s a lawyer and perhaps he wants money to be available,” but I am sure that highly respected individuals such as Lord Dyson and Lord Woolf, who understand the issue about the public purse as well legal matters, would not be saying these things if they did not believe that these parts of the Bill are fundamentally wrong.

In the 21st century, when we have now got a society that is fairer and kinder to its people, it is sad to have a go at people who are challenging the might of the state. Local authorities, institutions and Departments are still more powerful than the individual litigant or even pressure groups. You may not agree with a pressure group’s policy, but they are not as strong as the might of the state, and we should always have equality of arms. That is one of the fundamental principles of our law. You cannot have one side—local authorities and Departments—with all the money at its disposal and the best legal brains available against the ordinary person on the other side who has none of those benefits, or even pressure groups, who often do not have enough money to be able to spend hundreds and thousands of pounds on top barristers. They therefore cannot afford to lose.

We have to have parity of arms, instead of the state effectively using this opportunity to strangulate and stop the individual—the little person—or even the pressure group, many of which represent a group of our people who are interested in an issue. Pressure groups do not exist just for themselves: they are there because a whole lot of people in the country object to something or feel that there is a problem with an issue. They do not have the resources and they are being strangulated, yet the hand of the state is being strengthened.

I am surprised that a Conservative Government are trying to do this, as they have always taken pride in protecting liberties. What you are doing through all the various provisions and the changes being made to the judicial review, however, is effectively preventing the ordinary person from challenging the decision.

We say that judicial review will somehow make civil servants or public officials think, and wonder whether they might be challenged. Well, I think that is right. In a proper democratic system, local authority or state civil servants should be thinking about the effects of their actions. They should not be above the rule of law. They should be thinking about whether everything is right or not.

As a lawyer who has done some judicial review cases in my life and as somebody who worked in the Crown Prosecution Service as an in-house lawyer, I think it is right that a decision made by a prosecutor should be subject to challenge. When I am making my decision on whether a case should or should not proceed, it is right that that should be able to be challenged, because that would make sure I did my job properly as well as holding me to account. That is very important in our system. Civil servants and local authority officials absolutely should have to look over their shoulder to see whether they are making the right decision, because at the end of the day they are paid by the state and they are supposed to represent and govern our country in a proper way. If they are acting properly, professionally and honestly, they have nothing to worry about from judicial review. Only people who are not acting properly should be worried about judicial review.

[Robert Neill]

What would the hon. Lady say to the residents of Wickford near the Dale farm estate whose local council was found by the courts to have acted entirely properly, but removal of a Gypsy Traveller site was delayed for years by the abuse of the judicial review process? What defence does she have for those people?

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I am not going to talk about individual constituents in particular constituencies, and I cannot comment on their issues, but your using that example as a reason to constrain judicial review is not very credible. In doing so, you are detracting from the seriousness and importance of judicial review. By introducing this provision, you are effectively reducing the number of cases in which judicial review can take place. It is very easy to say, “The local authority got involved but the Traveller sites could not be removed and there were delays”, but that is just one small aspect of judicial review. You and I know—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I have let “you” go a few times, but in fairness, I am not guilty of any of this and I certainly did not want to intervene in the Dale farm situation.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I am sorry, Mr Deputy Speaker; I got a bit carried away.

In a civilised society and a democratic country, access to law is very important, and that includes judicial review and those who have been charged with criminal offences. It is fundamental to a civilised society. The Government’s proposed restriction of judicial review is wrong and will cause problems. I ask them to reconsider, especially as immigration cases have now been taken out of the judicial review process. The number of judicial review cases is therefore similar to past levels, so the argument that there are too many such cases and money is being wasted is not credible.

It has been said that people can simply go for judicial review without any challenge: that they can walk into the High Court and say, “I want a judicial review” and get one. Everybody knows that the first thing someone has to do is to seek leave to obtain judicial review. High Court judges are some of the best and most experienced legal brains in the country; they do not grant judicial review applications willy-nilly and then set a hearing date. Many people apply for leave—that is the important part—to seek judicial review, but those applications are sifted and a lot are rejected. Weak, frivolous and vexatious cases get thrown out, and only a very few go on to the next stage, at which leave is granted for judicial review to be considered and a date is set. The sifting stage takes out all the rubbish anyway, and only the good cases of substance and merit go forward. Then, a full hearing takes place and in some cases, people are successful and in others not.

So the suggestion that I can somehow walk in off the street and ask for a judicial review and the court will grant it and set a time for it is a load of rubbish. I am surprised that Members who should know better—who know that that is not the situation—are trying to suggest that that is happening in our courts. It is not. Very few cases reach judicial review, which is still only sparingly used, but it is very important and fundamental to our legal system.

I remind Members that although we now accept that we can challenge the decisions taken by the various local authority and Government Departments and institutions such as quangos, there was a time when we could not. It is only because people are able to challenge the decision-making process that, today, we have a much fairer, much more equal society in which ordinary people feel that they get justice. That was not the case 40 or 50 years ago, and if we compare the situation then with now, we see it has improved tremendously, and active judicial review has been the biggest source of that improvement.

--- Later in debate ---

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I was on the Committee when this matter was debated, and the Bill contains a number of provisions that concern me and my hon. Friends. One of those relates to the secure colleges that the Government seem to think are a panacea or solution for young people who get involved in the criminal justice system. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) said, we heard from countless experts and not a single one said that secure colleges as envisaged by the Government were right or would work. There were questions about whether the college would be segregated and how large the units should be. From the Government proposals it seems that the secure colleges will be large institutions, and it is not guaranteed that segregation will occur and that girls will be in one environment and boys in another. There was not even any information about what will actually happen.

The experts accept that there is no harm in having an educational establishment, but it must be a small unit in which children are looked after. It should be almost like a home, but obviously with an element of rehabilitation and education thrown in. At the moment, the way the secure colleges are envisaged makes it seem as if the old-fashioned borstals are being brought back. We all know that they were completely useless and a waste of time, and they did not rehabilitate or help young people. The new secure colleges are going down the same line.

The Government have not said whether they are willing to put in the resources needed to run a proper establishment for young people, and teach them to mend their ways and stop committing criminal offences. There are issues such as restraint and what methods will be used, and how we deal with young people who misbehave a bit but do not commit offences and how we tackle violent or disorderly behaviour in the secure colleges.

A whole lot of things are missing. That is one reason why many people on the Committee—certainly Labour Members—were concerned about the secure colleges because there is not enough information about them. With all the debates that have taken place, I hope the Ministry of Justice and the Lord Chancellor—I know he is here—will listen and that when the secure colleges are introduced, they will be properly checked and resourced, and that they will deal with issues relating to young people. It is well known that a lot of young people who end up in the criminal justice system often come from broken homes or abusive families, and they often have physical and mental health issues. They need to be looked after, so that they can become good citizens and not continue to be a problem for the state.

Punishment is of course an element of dealing with someone who commits a crime, but another should be rehabilitation. When someone commits a crime, everyone says, “Throw the book at them. Give them the longest possible sentence.” The idea is that that will stop them committing crimes. They may not be able to do anything while they are in prison, but we know that many people who come out of prison end up back there. From my experience of representing young people, and indeed defendants generally, the last thing in their mind when they commit a crime is that they will get five, seven or even 20 years for it. They do not think about the possible sentence: they just see the opportunity that has arisen or they commit offences because of their background.

We have been obsessed in the past few years with the idea that longer and longer sentences of imprisonment will stop the problem of crime, but they will not. We spend thousands of pounds incarcerating an individual, but if we spent our resources at an earlier stage in people’s lives to help and support their families, we would get better balanced citizens. The punitive approach of the criminal justice system should in fact be more about rehabilitation. Until a couple of centuries ago, someone who stole a sheep would be hanged, but that did not stop people committing that offence or other minor offences with the same punishment.

[Dr Huppert]

I agree with what the hon. Lady is saying about prevention. How did she vote a few moments ago, when we discussed exactly that issue in relation to knife crime—whether we should lock people up or try to prevent it?

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that helpful intervention. I have never said that people should not be imprisoned. When people commit serious offences, or repeat an offence, they should be given prison sentences. My point is that we incarcerate too many people for far too long. No one here will disagree with that point—[Interruption.] Well, some seem to think that people should be in prison for ever. But we know that if we bang people up for a long time, it just costs hundreds of thousands of pounds, whereas if they are on the outside and we help them by rehabilitating them and perhaps finding them accommodation and a job, their lives can turn around. That is where the money should go, but that does not take away from the fact that some people should be imprisoned for a long time, depending on the seriousness of their offences.

[Julie Hilling]

Does my hon. Friend agree that some people, both young and older, need to be removed from society, but where we put them while we attempt to rehabilitate them is an important factor? Putting a lot of young people together in a secure college does not work. The most effective form of “treatment” for young offenders is small units where they can get individual attention and help to divert them from the path of offending.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. Before the hon. Lady replies to that intervention, I know that she will be careful to stick to discussing secure colleges which is a matter in the Bill, rather than straying back to the subject of sheep stealing, which is one of the few things not in the Bill.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. She and I were on the Bill Committee and I know that the Government members on it could not have helped but be struck by what was said by the experts—different people such as probation officers—who were dealing young people. They were all saying that secure colleges were a bad idea.

[Ann Coffey]

Does my hon. Friend agree that we do not have a category of “victims” and a category of “offenders”? Often when one looks into the offenders’ histories, one finds that they themselves have been very early victims. Putting offenders into secure accommodation because they are offenders does not take account of the fact that they themselves are victims and they can become victimised within that environment.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I entirely agree and can give an example to the House of a case I had when I was a prosecutor. A young man, aged about 14, was in a care home. He set light to a curtain but realised quickly what he had done and tried to put out the flames. He did, and nobody was injured. People might think that he should have been put into prison and have the key thrown away. But let me tell the House the circumstances of that young man’s life. On the day in question, the young boy had been in court to give evidence against his mother’s boyfriend, who had sexually abused his younger sister. When he arrived at court to give evidence against his mother’s boyfriend, immediately upon seeing him she punched him in the stomach. He burst out crying and ran away from the court to the care home where he did this, before realising what he had done. That is the sort of thing we do not see in the headlines. The headlines would say, “14-year-old boy let off by the courts” if he received a conditional discharge or was not dealt with severely. Young people’s circumstances cannot be mentioned in public so people do not realise that a lot more can be happening in their lives than they think.

We know that most young people who have committed crimes have been abused themselves, either sexually or physically, or have been neglected or had cruel treatment. They are often psychologically damaged and the last thing they need is to go to a borstal-type school. What they need is structure in their lives and someone to care for them who will make life better for them.

[Sarah Champion]

My hon. Friend is making good points, particularly about the secure colleges and why young people need to be in a supportive environment. I want to apologise to the Secretary of State. I used the word “restraint” but he was right; “reasonable force” is the correct terminology. However, I still do not think that “reasonable force” is appropriate in a place that is meant to be nurturing young people.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

You will be pleased to know, Madam Deputy Speaker, that I shall now move to other aspects of the Bill, as I have made my point about secure colleges.

I want to refer to judicial review and I stand by the comments that I made earlier. The argument given against judicial review is that it is costly and that too many people are vexatiously seeking judicial review. As I said, one cannot just go to the court and say, “Can I have judicial review?” One has to seek leave to apply for judicial review and that application is assessed by a judge of the High Court, who are meant to be the ablest legal minds in the country. I know that they will not say to an applicant, “Yes, you can have it and we will use the court’s time.” They will not. They will review the case and look at the papers. Then, if they think there is merit in the application, they will take it one step further, look at the case and set it aside for a hearing. The Government seem to think that there are many so-called frivolous or vexatious judicial review applications, but many of them would be sloughed away by the internal judicial process in any event. Very few cases actually get to judicial review and—