My Lords, there has been widespread condemnation outside the House, and unanimous condemnation inside it, of the activities of parasitic claims farmers and claims management companies that engage in the process of securing referral fees simply to generate profit. A major objection to the activities of those concerns is that they foster the myth of the compensation culture. People who see advertisements on the streets or in newspapers which invite claims may get the impression that hordes of people are succumbing to the temptation to make wholly bogus claims. In the field of whiplash claims, it is acknowledged that there is some truth in that perception. However, in general terms, as the noble Lord, Lord Young of Graffham, pointed out in his report, there is no substance to the suggestion that there is a widespread compensation culture.

The amendment deals with the position of not-for-profit organisations. We are entirely at one with the Government in seeking to ban referral fees made to commercial organisations simply for the purpose of making profits. However, some organisations—be they charities or membership organisations—receive referral fees from firms of solicitors and perhaps from others whom they appoint to panels on the basis of their expertise and record of service, and whose contributions help those organisations carry out their main purpose. That might be service to members or, in the case of charities, the furtherance of the charitable objectives of the organisation. For example, among the charitable organisations are the Spinal Injuries Association, Headway and Action against Medical Accidents. There are others, too, which receive referral fees and use the proceeds to benefit those whom their organisation was set up to help. Other membership organisations and trade unions do likewise.

When we debated amendments of a similar nature last week, the Minister referred to the main—and understandable—objective of the Government, which is to restrict the cost of litigation. We share that objective. In the case of referral fees, it is perfectly achievable. It does not constitute a cost to the system. If a referral fee is effectively charged to the client, of course that is a cost to the client, and that ought to be avoided. On general costs, costs payable by a losing party to another are either agreed or assessed by the court. Obviously, the court can base its assessment of costs on what the normal tariff would be. I have appeared before the courts many times in 35 years of practice as a solicitor—endeavouring to justify the very modest costs that my firm sought—to explain and justify those fees. In fact, a kind of tariff is applied locally by the courts. In any event, if this were thought to be a danger in the system, it would be possible to allow the courts to deal with any such referral fee, to require it to be disclosed and to make it an irrecoverable disbursement from the paying party. So the question of additional costs can be satisfactorily dealt with.

In last week’s debate, the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, made some interesting points, one of which was incorrect. She said that the referral fees received by some trade unions find their way into the coffers of the political party with which I and others in this House are associated. That is not the case. Payments by trade unions to political parties of any colour come out of the political fund, not the general fund. The noble Lord, Lord McNally, who was once more closely involved with these matters than he is now, confirmed that.

However, the noble Baroness also referred, understandably, to the situation that arose in respect of compensation claims by miners regarding pneumoconiosis —a whole raft of cases over many years. Many law firms and others spent considerable time and money researching these cases and it was a very long time before they were settled and a scheme developed. The abuse in that case was actually rather different from what we are now debating. It was not so much the question of referral fees; it was the fact that some firms of solicitors—happily, not many—not only were paid by the Government under the compensation scheme but had the effrontery to deduct some payments from their clients. That was absolutely outrageous and many of the firms involved were severely disciplined, and rightly so, by the Law Society. But that is a separate issue from that which this amendment and the whole topic of referral fees address.

There is a world of difference between the use of referral fees by claims management companies and the like—simply to generate profit and at the same time perhaps to promote invalid claims on the off-chance that some of them may succeed—and that by other organisations genuinely endeavouring to assist their members and receiving funds which in turn are used for the benefit of the members or the non-commercial purposes, charitable or otherwise, of the organisation. I beg to move.

My Lords, I will try not to repeat myself, because I spoke about referral fees last week.

Briefly, in response to the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, the evil of referral fees is threefold. First, if the law firm can afford to pay a couple of hundred pounds for each case, then it stands to reason that the case could have been handled more cheaply. Secondly, when work goes to a particular firm of solicitors, it encourages that firm not to compete and not to do its job properly because, no matter what, the work will come to it. The case of the miners to which the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, referred and which I described last week did not arise directly from referral fees, but one can see the risk. If a firm knows that 23,000 cases will come its way willy-nilly, why should it try very hard? Why should it not take short cuts?

Thirdly, referral fees arrangements deprive the consumer of choice. The argument for referring consumers to a particular firm is that they would not otherwise know where to go. These charitable organisations, to which the noble Lord referred, could do the job just as well by listing a few firms and helping their clients to go to those firms without expecting money to come their way. As far as I can make out from research on the web—I stand to be corrected—on its web page on legal services the Labour Party says that clients who are members of the Labour Party will be referred to a particular firm of solicitors if they have a problem. If one continues to click through the pages, the firm says in very small print, buried deep in the internet, that for every case that comes to it from the Labour Party website several hundred pounds will be paid to the political party.

To make things even worse, referral fees, some of which may well come from legal aid, could be channelled inter alia to a political party. There is no case for referral fees. I encourage the House not to be wooed into any set of exemptions, even where worthwhile charities are concerned, because the bad nature of referral fees spreads throughout the system, regardless of who uses them. I hope that your Lordships will reject this amendment and any similar ones. Now is the time to end the practice of referral fees.

My Lords, I agree entirely with what the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, has just said. Referral fees have for some years been a serious problem in almost all circumstances and have caused a great deal of trouble and unnecessary expense. It is not a case where, as the Labour Party has just proposed, it should be treated just as a matter where two firms are in business. This is a matter that requires to be removed.

My Lords, in my youth I appeared for insurers and unions, and I did not pay anybody to get those cases. We competed on quality. The competition was there so that unions and insurers would send their work where they thought that they would get the best service, not where they thought that they would get the largest fee. It is insidious for fees to be paid to purchase cases from any organisation, whether it is a union or even the finest charity. It is not right that unions and charities should fund themselves in this way. The noble Lord has made the case from the point of view of unions and charities being funded. One has to look at it the other way round. Why should firms of solicitors or even barristers’ chambers—I have heard rumours about this—get work on the basis of how much they pay a person referring cases to them? It is a practice which has to stop.

My Lords, I support my noble friend in this amendment. Referral fees are one aspect of the Bill that will affect union legal services adversely, along with changes to “after the event” insurance and conditional fee agreements. These three issues will make union legal services much more difficult and expensive to operate. Inevitably, fewer cases will be taken. Last year, unions assisted something like 50,000 individuals with cases. There was no charge on the public purse for that assistance. It was done through people’s membership of the union. Many people who were very ill or injured in some way were helped considerably. When this Bill becomes law, essentially, that will become more difficult.

I have checked which unions use referral fees and which do not. Two of the major unions use them and the rest do not. The two which use them do not use them to fund the Labour Party, which is the allegation that is around. As my noble friend explained, the political fund of the unions is completely separate. A separate contribution is made to that. It is registered under the Trade Union Act 1984, which was put through by the noble Lord, Lord King. You make a voluntary donation which is separate from your union membership fee and it is separately accounted for.

The suggestion that referral fees are used by unions to fund the Labour Party is totally wrong. The whole purpose of referral fees where they are applied has been to support the expansion of union legal services to make good some of the defects elsewhere in the justice system. I hope that the House will bear that in mind when it considers this amendment.

I declare an interest as a member of Unite. The noble Baroness, Lady Deech, was good enough to say that she had mentioned the problems of referral fees in a previous debate. That debate took place on my amendment. My case was that trade union officers go to places where there has been an accident. Therefore, there is a certain expenditure when those visits are made. There is obvious expenditure and there should be some compensation. The noble Baroness was good enough to mention referral fees and I was deeply impressed by what she said. Therefore, I will not move Amendment 146.

My Lords, I should have declared an interest as chairman of the Bar Standards Board, which prohibits barristers from receiving or dealing in referral fees. If I gave the impression last week that referral fees that go to unions go direct to the political party and that is wrong, I apologise. My point is that it is happening in another way. I have not yet been corrected but my research on the internet showed that direct referrals from a party to a firm resulted in the firm paying a referral fee to the political party. Therefore, if it is not happening in one way, it may be happening in another.

My Lords, I support the line taken by our Front Bench. Without any question, there are risks with referral fees but they are fairly minimal. The questions that the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, and others should ask themselves are whether they believe that there will be more of the kind of litigants who at present benefit from the union offering these services, admittedly through using referral fees, especially given what we are doing to legal aid in this Bill; or whether there will be fewer people taking action. My view is that if these changes are put through, the likelihood is that unions will not be able to offer services on the same kind of basis that they have in the past. As a consequence, fewer people will pursue cases and the people who will not be pursuing those cases will be the ones at the bottom of the pile, and not those who are higher up with a fund of money to pursue the law without any trouble whatever. I put those very serious questions to those who are pursuing this line.

My Lords, I shall intervene briefly. I declare an interest in that a firm in which I was a partner had major arrangements with a number of trade unions.

I say to the noble Lord who has just spoken that the unions and the firms who do their work will be able to adjust their arrangements. For a start, by not paying the referral fee, the solicitors doing the work will be able to drop their charges to take account of that fact, and the trade unions will be able to adjust their arrangements with their members, although it will not be a major adjustment. The point that the noble Lord reasonably made is capable of adjustment in a way that will enable the abolition of referral fees—which, in general, are extremely deleterious to justice—to be effected.

My Lords, this proposal is not in any way union bashing and I am sorry that it has been caught up like that. I was pleased that when the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, opened the debate he joined with the Government in our general desire to ban referral fees. It is of course right that injured people should be able to pursue claims and under our reforms they will be able to do so. Costs will be more proportionate and the damages they receive will be increased.

However, it is wrong for third parties to be able to profit from referral fees for personal injury cases in this way. I found the intervention of the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, last Wednesday extremely powerful and I recommend noble Lords to reread it. The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, is right: it is not four-square with referral fees but it illustrates the danger of sweetheart relationships in this area. The Law Society was quite right—but rather belatedly so—to deal with a great injustice to miners who had already suffered much in their industry.

On the question of political funding, yes, I understand the difference between union general funds and the political fund and that it is the political fund that goes to the Labour Party. However, again, the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, explained that she was referring to the party itself acting as a referee. Even as I speak, I wonder whether this merry thought has occurred to any other political party. I know political parties look for ways to earn funds and, if this has been thought up by the Labour Party, it is, at the moment, within the law. However, we do not think it is right.

I also welcome the intervention of my noble friend Lord Phillips. I do not always welcome his interventions but this time he has put his finger on it: we are not preventing solicitors taking on a case at reduced rates or for free; nor are we preventing solicitors from making donations to charities or other not-for-profit organisations. Charities representing injured people will still be able to offer advice and recommend the best law firms. However, they should do that in the claimant’s best interest, not on the basis of what fee they can get for that claim. The amendment would not only allow an exception for charities and unions but for all not-for-profit organisations. I fully appreciate that trade-union, charity and political-party referral fees can be nice little earners, but that kind of relationship is not in the best interests of the consumer.

I say to the noble Lords, Lord Monks, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe and Lord Martin, that I am well aware of the record of trade unions in legal advice and the help that they give to their members. I have no doubt of the accuracy of the figure of 50,000 a year given by the noble Lord, Lord Monks. However, I also take the point—which I did not know—that only two trade unions use referral fees. This suggests to me that this is not the universal attack on trade unions that anybody has suggested. We simply say that whether it be political parties, trade unions or charities, it is not healthy or in the consumer’s interest to have sweetheart deals between unions, charities or political parties and individual law firms.

The amendment goes further than earlier proposals. Some claims management companies are currently not-for-profit organisations and others could become not-for-profit bodies in order to get around the ban. In Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Bach, tabled an amendment that would have made an exception for charities only. This amendment now makes a wider exception which would exempt unions, political parties and not-for-profit claims management companies as well.

We believe that referral fee arrangements are wrong in principle. Under the cloak of support for charities, the amendment would allow payments for the referral of personal injury cases by a wide range of organisations. This amendment would make a mockery of the ban on referral fees, which the Opposition have claimed to support in principle—and I believe they do support it in principle. I really think—and the more I listen to this debate the more I think it—that for the Opposition to press this amendment is simply wrong-headed. I hope that the noble Lord will withdraw the amendment.

My Lords, let me make it clear that I do not for a moment charge the Minister—or indeed the Government—with conceiving of this as in any sense aimed at trade unions. It is a by-product of policy. Let me also remind your Lordships that referral fees are only banned—certainly at the moment, under the terms of this Bill—in respect of personal injury claims. For any other kind of arrangement, referral fees are apparently acceptable—not, however, in the context of personal injury claims.

That really illustrates whence this proposal comes from. It comes from the unacceptable activities of those who have perhaps been promoting spurious claims—and we will come at the next amendment to the kind of techniques that some of these firms and outfits adopt to encourage claims in a way that fosters this myth of the compensation culture. That is the genuine motivation of the Government; what they are doing to deal with it goes too far.

I do not recall having jousted in legal terms with the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, 50 years or so ago when we shared adjoining desks at the Honour School of Jurisprudence, but I will joust a little with her, if I may, this afternoon. She first of all asserts that it would be an incentive for firms not to do the job properly. I do not know what possible basis she can have for saying that. A solicitor’s job is to do his best for his client. In a sense, there are two clients when one is acting for somebody referred by an organisation. Far from it being the case that there is no incentive to do the job properly, there is a greater incentive to do the job properly when one has a connection with a potential source of work—whether there is a referral fee or not —because, of course, one does not just lose and upset one client: one potentially loses a whole stream of work. In fact, therefore, the converse of her proposition is actually true.

The second of the noble Baroness’s points which I seek to rebut is that this deprives people of choice. A union member or a member of a charitable or other organisation does not have to use the organisation that is recommended or go to one that pays a referral fee. They have the same choice as anyone else. But they may choose to rely on their own organisation, trade union or otherwise, having established from its experience that a particular firm or firms are capable of carrying out the work. The choice, however, remains with them. The noble Baroness has been on the website and discovered the Labour Party’s scheme. Let me tell her and the House how much that scheme has raised: nil, nothing, not a penny. It is about as vibrant as Monty Python’s parrot. It is redundant. It is a dead scheme. It has never been activated, so that issue need not distract your Lordships’ House.

Before I conclude, I should make one other point in relation to charitable organisations. The ones I have mentioned operate on a referral-fee basis. There are three of them and I think there may be others, although perhaps that is a little beside the point. I liken the process to another aspect which is certainly something that political parties and many charities operate, and that is an affinity card with a bank, where a percentage of one’s expenditure when using the card goes to the organisation. In precisely the same way that it could be alleged—I think wrongly—that as referral fees increase costs in the legal system, so by definition an affinity card must push up the costs in relation to financial services. It is an analogous situation.

I feel strongly about this—

My Lords, drawing on his long experience, can the noble Lord tell us when referral fees first reared their head? I do not recollect them 20 or 30 years ago. Does he know when they began?

To the best of my recollection, they have appeared in the past 10 to 12 years. I have not myself been heavily involved in the practice in which I was a senior partner for the past nine years, much to its relief and mine. Having had our debate and despite the pleas of the Minister, I wish to test the opinion of the House.

My Lords, first, I declare my membership of the Law Society. As we have discussed both in Committee and on Report, referral fees are one of the major causes of the public’s perception that a compensation culture exists in this country. We have heard some powerful speeches across the Benches on the subject of referral fees. My noble friend Lord Thomas called them insidious and I agree. For that reason I strongly support Clauses 54 and 55.

Although there has been some difference of views on the provisions for referral fees set out in Clauses 54 and 55 as they impact on charities and trade unions, generally there seems to be a common view that although these clauses are useful, if they are to catch all the abuses they need to go further—perhaps not as far as the right honourable Jack Straw would want to go in terms of making it a criminal offence, but covering the full range of malpractices. For instance, there is nuisance marketing in personal injury—specifically, advertising in hospitals, cold calling and spam texts; financial incentives to claim; selling contact and case details of personal injury victims without their consents; and auctioning claims to the highest bidder. Mr Simon Burns the Health Minister recently told English NHS hospitals that it was not acceptable to display advertisements for law firms encouraging no-win no-fee compensation claims. That was a firm and wise action, and I commend it.

In our debate in Committee, my noble friend Lord Carlile of Berriew, on the subject of text messaging immediately after an accident without injury even taking place, made a powerful speech in support of extending Clause 54. My noble friend Lord McNally expressed sympathy with the intention behind the amendment and said that the Government would consider it further. I hope that he will tell us today where the Government have got to. Can we expect white smoke on Report or Third Reading or, indeed, a text message? I beg to move.

My Lords, I entirely support the amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, is right that this practice is a nuisance. I was half expecting a text message after I told the House about my fall the other day. I thought that eager readers of Hansard in these companies would have solicited my attention or that of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, but so far nothing has happened. However, like many of your Lordships, I receive periodic texts and e-mails from organisations saying that I may not have made a claim in respect of my recent accident or, latterly, about payment protection insurance problems, and the like. As the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, said, it is an insidious practice and certainly ought to be banned.

I hope that the Minister accepts the amendment and that, if he does not, the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, tests the opinion of the House.

My Lords, this amendment looks to deal with the serious problem of unsolicited marketing, including text messages or telephone calls about personal injury claims. I congratulate my noble friend on raising an issue which, as the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, indicated, annoys and irritates millions of our fellow citizens. I assure the House that the Government have given careful consideration to this issue since my noble friend raised it in Committee. Legislation, which is primarily enforced by the Information Commissioner’s Office, already exists to protect individuals in this area. Recent action by that office has resulted in the confiscation of more than 20,000 mobile phone SIM cards that were being used to send unsolicited text messages.

Following this issue being raised in Committee, my honourable friend Jonathan Djanogly, the Justice Minister, will meet the Information Commissioner to discuss further how the problem can be addressed. Additionally, the ICO, the Ministry of Justice Claims Management Regulation Unit and other regulators continue to work closely with the telecommunications industry on this problem. Across government, an industry working group has been set up and is due to publish a joint guidance note for consumers explaining the functions of the relevant regulators along with advice on how to make a complaint.

On the particular point about advertising in hospitals, the Government do not support the marketing of such services on NHS premises. There is already an absolute ban on unauthorised marketing by claims management companies. We believe that it is more appropriate that authorised marketing should be dealt with through guidance rather than through regulation. In support of this approach, the National Health Service chief executive has recently written to NHS managers to make clear the position on marketing in hospitals and primary health centres.

I am grateful to my noble friend for raising this issue. The Government take it very seriously and are taking positive action. We believe that the answer lies in greater enforcement and robust action, along the lines of regulations and guidance that already exist. We will continue to monitor the situation and take it seriously, and I hope that in the light of that response my noble friend will agree to withdraw this amendment.

My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply. It very much falls into two parts, as far as I can see, in terms of action by and with the Information Commissioner and action by the Secretary of State and Ministers relating to unauthorised and authorised marketing in NHS hospitals. The bit I find difficult is not that relating to the Information Commissioner; indeed, it is very welcome that those powers are being mobilised and that the Minister, Mr Djanogly, is having the necessary meetings with the Information Commissioner. The surprising part concerns the National Health Service. I think that the view around this House is that there should be no authorised marketing of this kind within NHS hospitals. What baffles me is why that kind of marketing is allowed to persist within NHS hospitals. I am not going to press the amendment today but I very much hope that we can progress further, certainly in pressing the Department of Health to be much more robust than appears to be the case about this kind of marketing.

Whatever the form of marketing which is an arrangement between a hospital and a firm of solicitors —perhaps advertising law firms within hospitals or allowing texting—it certainly falls morally within the terms of the kind of action that we are trying to prevent within this clause. It therefore really should be covered, and if there is that power within the department —or indeed by any future regulator under the health Bill that has now passed—I very much hope that it will be exercised and that my noble friend the Minister’s department will keep pressing the Department of Health. Perhaps we might even bring this back for an assurance on Third Reading, to understand exactly what is being authorised if there is such a thing as authorised marketing of this kind. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

My Lords, this amendment is less controversial than some that your Lordships have been debating on Report. I am very grateful to the Minister for adding his name to it, and I will briefly explain its purpose and effect. Lawyers are often criticised, sometimes in your Lordships’ House and sometimes with justification, but noble Lords will wish to acknowledge that a large number of them spend at least part of their time working unremunerated for clients simply because they wish to contribute to the promotion of justice. In some of these cases, the lawyer succeeds for the client. The other side in the litigation, the unsuccessful party, cannot then be ordered to pay the costs of the proceedings because, having been represented by the pro bono lawyer, the successful litigant has no costs.

Section 194 of the Legal Services Act 2007 addresses such cases. It confers power on the court to order a person, normally the unsuccessful party, to pay a sum in respect of the notional costs to a charity prescribed by the Lord Chancellor. The charity prescribed is the Access to Justice Foundation. It then distributes the sums paid to it to voluntary organisations that provide free legal support for individuals and communities. As currently drafted, Section 194 has one defect; it applies to civil cases in the county court, in the High Court and the Court of Appeal, but it does not currently apply to civil cases in the Supreme Court. This is despite the fact that many of the cases in which lawyers act pro bono are in the Supreme Court. This amendment quite simply will remove that defect.

The amendment is also in the name of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith. Unfortunately he cannot be in his place today as he is working elsewhere, although I do not think that on this occasion it is on a pro bono basis. He is, however, the chairman of the Access to Justice Foundation. As Her Majesty’s Attorney-General, he was the promoter of Section 194. I pay tribute, as I am sure all noble Lords will want to do, to his tireless work in encouraging lawyers to give of their time to work pro bono. I know that he is as pleased as I am that the Minister has indicated that the Government will support the amendment.

I thank the Minister for considering this issue and for supporting this much needed reform, which I know will also be welcomed by the justices and practitioners of the Supreme Court and by all those clients, and potential clients, who will benefit from the receipt of further funds from the foundation. I beg to move.

My Lords, briefly, I support every word of the introduction by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, of this amendment. On behalf of the Solicitors Pro Bono Group, which is sometimes called LawWorks, of which I am founder and president, I wholeheartedly applaud this amendment to Section 194, which can only be beneficial to pro bono.

My Lords, we congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, from these Benches. I thank him very much for his well deserved tribute to my noble and learned friend Lord Goldsmith. I have to say that I felt a slight tremor of envy when I saw this amendment on the Marshalled List. I have tried throughout the Bill to put forward an amendment that might have the name of the noble Lord, Lord McNally, attached to it, but have failed miserably. The noble Lord, Lord Pannick, makes one attempt and it succeeds.

My Lords, I will explain. The original amendment by the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, did not cut the muster as legal statute. As the noble Lord knows, I have qualifications in this area, so I tweaked it a little, on the basis of my knowledge of part 1 of the relevant material on English legal institutions, to make it fit for purpose. I was glad to do so.

I am also glad to associate myself with the intervention of my noble friend Lord Phillips, who is on a roll today. I commend LawWorks and its encouragement of pro bono work on the part of solicitors, the Access to Justice Foundation and the work of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Goldsmith, in this area. We hope that it will increase the stream of funding available for pro bono work. I have great pleasure in saying that the Government accept this amendment.

I renew my thanks to the Minister. He is absolutely right; those advising him did indeed improve the drafting of the amendment and I am very grateful to them as well.

My Lords, it is a privilege to move this amendment. I acknowledge and am grateful for the support of my noble friend Lady Gould of Potternewton and the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham.

Last week was the fifth anniversary of the publication of the Corston report, and I have got to the stage now where I feel that the name on the report is not mine, as I gather that in the Ministry of Justice I have become both an adjective and a noun. However, I acknowledge that reference was made to that anniversary by the noble Lord, Lord McNally, in this place, and by the Secretary of State for Justice in the House of Commons. I also acknowledge that last week, on the fifth anniversary, the noble Lord, Lord McNally, held a roundtable discussion on progress and the way forward on the women’s criminal justice agenda.

In a debate in Committee on 15 February, the noble Lord, Lord McNally, said that,

“we are doing many things in the direction of travel of the Corston report”.—[Official Report, 15/2/12; col. 876.]

However, central to my report was the call for strategic and structural changes to drive progress on the women’s criminal justice agenda. I called for a joined-up response across government to address the multiple and complex issues in the lives of women offenders and—I emphasise “and”—women at risk of offending. Therefore, as far as I am concerned, the loss of a cross-departmental women’s unit poses a real risk of returning to policy silos within government departments that will inevitably be reflected locally.

The Ministry of Justice now has two officials left working on women’s policy, and they will inevitably focus on women offenders. In future, it is proposed that the funding should be devolved to NOMS—the National Offender Management Service—at regional level, and it will inevitably be probation focused. So NOMS will deal with women offenders. However, women who are at risk of offending do not come, and cannot come, on to its radar. These women will again be lost, as will a real opportunity to tackle their vulnerabilities before they end up experiencing custody and the consequent damage which that entails to themselves, their families and, particularly, their children.

The costs incurred to the public purse by not pursuing prevention are all too well documented. A women’s criminal justice policy unit does not need to be resource-intensive. In fact, I am not sure that it needs any resource at all. It does not need to mean cross-departmental officials working together in one place in a team. There are opportunities for creative working, with designated leads from each department working together on the common issues facing women offenders and women at risk in terms of mental health, drugs, housing, family, skills and employment. A policy unit would be cost-effective and represents a way to save money. Without such an approach, money could be wasted as individual departmental pots of money are all spent on the same group of women.

The Inter-Ministerial Group on Equalities is already in place, and I have called for ministerial oversight. I cannot see why that group cannot be used for good effect in helping the Ministry of Justice to drive forward progress on this agenda. The responsibility cannot and should not lie solely with the Ministry of Justice. Delivering the various required responses to women's needs is cost-cutting and it should be equalities-driven as well.

I am sure that many noble Lords will recall the speech of Nick Hardwick, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons, on 29 February. I gather that the speech was entitled “Women in Prison: Corston Five Years On”. It was a timely reminder that while progress has been made, there is much more to be done. He said:

“We cannot go on like this … without senior, visible leadership, with real authority and resources to push things through”.

I could not agree more. That is what is missing. I do not mind people using my name, but I want them to make sure that they reflect what I called for, rather than what it might be convenient to suppose I called for.

I emphasise the need for a written strategy for these women. We currently have a virtual strategy in that government Ministers say that they have a strategy but that they will not publish it. That is no strategy at all. Surely that is meaningless if the Government are serious in their attempt to be accountable and to monitor progress. How can they evidence progress in a transparent way without publishing, at the very least, a framework of intent, supported by a statement of what they are trying to achieve for women with vulnerabilities who are caught up in the criminal justice system?

I fully understand that the Government wish to pursue localism and avoid being seen to dictate from the centre. However, without a strategy as an overarching framework, no one knows what it is about locally or can use it to persuade others of the merits of joined-up delivery. How can women's community projects or probation trusts persuade local delivery partners of the need for joined-up delivery at a local level if there is nothing to indicate that the strategy is in place? The Government’s planned programme of work on troubled families rightly intends to provide a clear national steer for local delivery. Why cannot the same be applied to the Government’s strategy for women offenders and women at risk of offending? After all, a lot of these troubled families are headed by such women.

What I am seeking is not a costly option; it is a basic minimum requirement to support the Government’s stated intent to progress the Corston agenda. It would be neither costly nor time-intensive to pull together a brief strategy that builds on earlier progress, because progress there has been. Without a strategy, how will the Government meet their requirements under the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women and the Bangkok Rules for women. Here, there are ramifications for the Government’s standing internationally. I have absolutely no doubt of the Minister's intent to influence policy across government, as the noble Lord, Lord McNally, has said. I also have no doubt that he will rely heavily on his officials to work closely to ensure that that influence results in tangible delivery. However, how much easier it would be for them to achieve that by having to hand a written statement of that strategy and its goals. I beg to move.

My Lords, I am very glad to have this opportunity to support my noble friend. I had the privilege of serving on the Joint Committee on Human Rights when she was its distinguished chair. I then had the opportunity to see at first hand that this is not a passing interest of hers; it is something deeply rooted in her culture and in her sense of justice and the availability of justice for everyone. If justice, in its fullest sense, is to be delivered, what matters is the appropriateness of what is being done when someone is sentenced. It is not only my noble friend who in her very challenging report has spelt out the issues, but I am repeatedly impressed by the research which seems to come to the same conclusion that the overwhelming majority of women in prison should not be in prison at all.

I vividly recall visiting Holloway prison with the Joint Committee on Human Rights—I am not certain that my noble friend was the chair at the time—in connection with some work that we were doing. While we were there we got into very good conversation with some of the staff. It is easy to be prejudiced, but for me it is always interesting that in a place like Holloway you find a mix of people in the profession, including some very good, caring people who—for any of us who would want to be seen as humanitarians—are living a very challenging life in the front line of their professional services. I remember—and this was dealing specifically with short sentences—one woman turning on us in exasperation and saying: “I don’t think you people know what you are doing. We don’t understand what you are doing. These women’s lives are a story of chaos, and all we do by having the women in here for a short term is to increase the chaos in their life in terms of their relationship with their children, their relationship with the community of which they are a part, their relationship with life as they have got to live it”. Then she looked back a little poignantly and said: “Unless, of course, by having them in here for a few days we relieve them of some of the nightmare of pressures outside”.

It is an indictment of us all that we have such an inappropriate, wrong-headed approach towards how we deal with women who may have been caught up in some offence. From that standpoint, it is clear that there has to be an interdisciplinary approach. The problem—the challenge—goes across all sorts of different aspects of life. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, repeatedly reminds us in debates on such occasions, if you are trying to get a change of culture and drive through a new approach, you have to pin down who is really responsible. You have got to have specific arrangements in place to make sure it happens and that it is pursued. This is what my noble friend’s amendment is about: making sure that we stop talking about what is wrong, stop talking about what we should all be doing, and start to do it. If that is to happen, it needs a cross-section of people with a specific responsibility for which they are accountable to make sure it is happening. From that standpoint, I warmly commend the amendment and am glad to support it.

In Committee, we had two separate amendments on this issue which was, in a way, a commentary on the fact that the vital issue of women in the criminal justice system was not even discussed in Committee in the other place. I am very glad to have been able to combine the two amendments in one, in the hope that this time we really may get something in the Bill.

I am glad that the noble Lord, Lord Judd, has drawn attention to the need to get something done. Over the years there have been directors of women’s policy, women’s policy units, women’s policy groups, Ministers for Women, Ministers of prisons looking after it, but nothing has happened. Why? Because there has never been anyone who has been the agent for those people, responsible and accountable for overseeing that what is laid down actually happens. I have lost count of the number of times I have said that, but I say it again. The key word “implementation” appears in paragraph (4)(a) of the amendment and the word “delivery” in sub-paragraph (5)(a). With all the wisdom that has gone into this subject from many sources over many years, it is all there. Everyone knows what is to happen. What is lacking now is the drive to get it done. I therefore hope that the Minister will go away from this particular stage and reassure us that this time something will be done to action what is so well known.

My Lords, may I first put on record my thanks to the Minister, my noble friend Lord McNally, for a number of changes that he introduced to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act? I will do so because it has some relevance to the amendment that we are debating, which will assist many women to break the revolving-door syndrome of reoffending. There has been a near-100 per cent increase in the women's prison population in the past 20 years. The Government will find that the single initiative on the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act will help reduce the women's prison population.

I am attracted to at least one element of the proposal contained in the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Corston: namely, the importance of the Government publishing a strategy to improve the treatment of women in the criminal justice system. When we debated this in Committee, my noble friend Lord McNally said that the Government’s strategy had been set out by our honourable friend Crispin Blunt in a speech on 20 January. That was a good start, and I certainly welcomed that speech.

My noble friend the Minister then set out a series of measures that the Government were taking to improve the position of women in the criminal justice system. The measures included the provision of resources for diversion schemes for mentally disordered offenders; piloting drug recovery wings in women's prisons; giving women prisoners access to the work programme on release; developing intensive alternatives to custody for women; improving access to the private rented sector for women offenders; and developing support for female offenders who have suffered domestic abuse. No one in their right mind could object to these important and welcome developments.

The occasional speech needs to be crystallised. The published strategy document would start by setting out the Government’s overall objectives: for example, to reduce women’s offending—here I mention the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act; to reduce the unnecessary imprisonment of women; to ensure that every probation area and youth offending team has programmes geared to the special needs of women offenders; to place mentally ill women in appropriate treatment settings; and to increase opportunities for contact between women prisoners and their children.

Since we are all interested in outcomes, the strategy document would then set out the measures that the Government are taking to achieve each objective. Annual reviews would be published, assessing progress against each objective of the strategy. This would enable all concerned with the treatment of women to see that the Government had a thought-out, comprehensive strategy to improve the treatment of women in the criminal justice system. It would also enable the Government to be held to account for progress on each objective of the strategy. Very importantly, it would enable this to be done on the basis of accurate information about the measures that the Government were taking to improve the position.

Far from making life more difficult for the Government, this would help increase appreciation for the range of excellent work that is under way to tackle the injustices suffered by women in the criminal justice system. I therefore hope that the Minister will respond positively to the amendment, and in particular that he will agree to the publication of a strategy on women's offending, followed by annual updates on the progress being made towards meeting each objective of the strategy.

My Lords, perhaps I may crave the indulgence of the House; I was not here for the start of the debate on the amendment. Unfortunately, noble Lords moved a bit fast and by the time I got back the debate had already started. I hope that I will be allowed to say a few words as my name is on the amendment.

I start by saying that in no way do I question the Minister’s commitment to reducing the number of women in prison, or to extending support in the community for women who need help rather than punishment. However, I question the Government’s ability to make that happen within the present structure. In Committee, the Minister said that,

“we are working across government as well as with the voluntary and community sector”.—[Official Report, 15/2/12; col. 875].

That is fine, but the rest of his response made it clear that there was little co-ordination across the various elements that were working with government.

This simple and no-cost amendment would provide a model to overcome what is clearly a deficit. It would provide the Government with a strategy for women offenders and women at risk of offending, as well as reviewing the impact of government policies on this vulnerable group. It would also be a driver for local policy to provide co-ordinated and effective work to ensure that women offenders receive the right support to stop their offending behaviour. It is a tried and tested model and it works.

The backgrounds of many women offenders are certainly multifaceted. I will not go into the details as I am sure noble Lords have already heard them. If the Government are genuinely serious about trying to reduce reoffending, we need a holistic solution from all the agencies responsible. Most women offenders have children or are the primary carers for disabled and elderly relatives, so there is an enormous effect on the lives of their families. Many women offenders become homeless: imprisonment will cause one-third to lose their homes and other possessions. They are inadequately prepared for release, with little support and advice on how to cope with the future. Is it any wonder that there is such a high level of self-harming among women who have little hope for the future?

There is no question that progress has been made in recent years, and many extremely committed individuals within and outside the Prison Service have been working tirelessly, but it is essential that the momentum is maintained. The responsibility for that is firmly at the feet of the Government. However, it cannot be achieved by tinkering around the edges, but only by having a well co-ordinated strategy and integrated alternatives to custody via an expansion of the network of community centres. Essentially for the Government, this would save money, which could be used elsewhere.

This year the Government will be reporting to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women—CEDAW—on progress that has been made since the last CEDAW report five years ago, when the committee welcomed the measures that had been taken but expressed concern about there still being too many women in prison. In their report to CEDAW this year, the Government state:

“The UK Government is committed to diverting women away from crime and to tackling women’s offending effectively. It broadly accepted the conclusions in Baroness Corston’s March 2007 report … and is supportive of reducing the number of vulnerable women in prison”.

However, they are going to have to prove that, by the policies and structures that are in place, because at the moment that sentence lacks viability. Contributions from organisations that work in this field will show that that is the case.

If the Government are, as they say, serious about reducing the number of vulnerable women in the criminal justice system, the structures must be put in place to ensure that the needs of these women are prioritised, not marginalised. Only by addressing the issues strategically and monitoring the outcomes of the work effectively will we see a real reduction in the number of women in prison and the level of reoffending.

I do not for one moment question that the Government accept the seriousness of the situation, but I hope that they accept it in the context of this amendment, which will make a great difference by changing the position we have now. I hope that the Government will feel that they can accept this amendment. If they feel they cannot —although I would have great difficulty understanding why not—perhaps they could agree with the principle behind the amendment, of the need for a co-ordinated structure, and come back to us with a new amendment on Report.

My Lords, I support the amendment moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, which will see the establishment of a women’s justice policy unit to review the treatment women received when they enter the criminal justice system. The unit would develop a government strategy for dealing with women offenders and the problems surrounding reoffending. Both these functions would be welcome.

In Committee, I supported an amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Gould, which called for courts to have regard for the effect of sentencing on dependants when sentencing women. I referred to the admirable work that the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, and her influential 2007 report have done to raise awareness of the particular problems facing women in the penal system. Women tend to fall into crime for specific reasons and, it is often claimed, are penalised more harshly than men.

The effect that prison has on women is more taxing. As the report by the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, points out, prisons were designed for men and thus the conditions are particularly unforgiving for women. For example, recent figures suggest that 37 per cent of women prisoners have attempted suicide, 51 per cent have severe mental illness, 47 per cent have a major depressive disorder, and 50 per cent have been subject to domestic violence and 33 per cent to sexual abuse. Developing a specific strategy to ensure that women in the penal system receive more appropriate services is fundamental if these appalling statistics are to be improved.

That the unit would tackle the problems which often give rise to women offending is welcome. It is a venture which would limit the number of women who end up in contact with the justice system in the first place. This is particularly important when we consider that, according to the Government’s figures, 54 per cent of women who are imprisoned are reconvicted within 12 months, rising to 64 per cent if the sentence was shorter than a year. To tackle offending and to limit reoffending, it is vital to eliminate the problems which cause women to fall victim to this vicious cycle of crime.

I am pleased to see that the unit would review the delivery of services relating to children and families. In Committee, we discussed the effect that sentencing can have on dependants. Some 66 per cent of female prisoners have children compared with 59 per cent of men. The Howard League for Penal Reform estimates that only 5 per cent of female prisoners’ children remain with the family when their mother is incarcerated compared with 90 per cent of male prisoners’ children. Clearly sentencing has an undeniable and often disastrous impact on women’s families. For that reason, more than most, the implementation of a unit to oversee and review strategies for women in the justice system would be a positive improvement, not just for these women, but for society at large.

My Lords, I want to make a very brief point in support of my noble friend Lady Corston. She talked about how we cannot leave the issue of women in the criminal justice system to the Ministry of Justice alone. My noble friend Lord Judd made the case for an interdisciplinary approach. Many women get caught up in the criminal justice system because their crimes are crimes of poverty. Women are more vulnerable to poverty than men, and many women in this country are experiencing poverty. They have to manage poverty while looking after their children. As well as a criminal justice system better attuned to the needs of women, we need an anti-poverty policy better attuned to the needs of women. A unit such as this could link the two.

My Lords, this amendment does not ask for much. It is indeed modesty itself. It asks for a focus, a group of people in the Ministry of Justice whose job should be to carry forward the excellent policies that the Minister told the House about in Committee. It makes it clear that the Ministry of Justice cannot do this on its own and calls for the Ministry of Health, the Department for Communities and Local Government, the Department for Work and Pensions and the Home Office to be involved—a point that has just been ably made by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister. It makes it clear that they should report to a ministerial group and that there should be an annual report.

This amendment is not a criticism of the Government’s work so far, nor of that of the previous Government. It is recognition that this is a particularly intractable problem. Efforts are made by many people, and the situation gets a little better, but then it reverts. The Minister will know, because he has just kindly answered a Written Question that I asked, that the Chief Inspector of Prisons said of the Keller unit at Styal prison that it constitutes,

“a wholly unsuitable place to safely hold and manage very seriously damaged and mentally ill women”.

The conditions in which such women are held in Styal prison have been criticised on and off for many years. On 15 February, in Committee, the Minister said that,

“one does not need to visit many women’s prisons to see that far too many prisoners should not be there”.—[Official Report, 15/2/12; col. 876.]

Ministers have said that before. This is not politically contentious. There is wide agreement about what should happen but sadly it does not change or it changes at the margins—one aspect improves while another deteriorates.

That is why there is wide support among those who are concerned with this issue for a statutory framework, a strategy, a focal point and an annual report that will allow Parliament to see if at last we are moving forwards and seeing improvements that last. I very much hope that the Minister will support this modest proposal.

My Lords, I, too, welcome this proposal. All of us have been talking about this area for so long, it is not true. The point about action now, which was made by various speakers, is entirely right. My noble friend Lord Wigley has quoted a number of horrendous figures, which I will not quote again, but the fact that 5 per cent of women’s children stay in the family home should be enough to indicate just how disastrous the effect of imprisoning women is on family life and on the futures of those children.

I very much hope that the actions already begun by this Government, and those started under the previous Government, to do much more to keep women out of prison will continue, which is entirely the right way to work. There needs to be intensive work and support at differing levels, both at professional and volunteer levels, to see the women out of these crises. Women prisoners outnumber men who self-harm, have mental health problems and so on. The situation is horrendous.

Without overemphasising absolutely everything about this issue, I hope that all departments will come together. I want to see good examples of what can happen in a women’s prison, but I also want to see it as an example of what would be effective for a number of men as well, particularly young offenders. I hope that the Minister and all those involved in this issue will treat it with urgency.

My Lords, I add my wholehearted support to what the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, and everyone else around the House, has said. There has been no dissent. How could there be? It struck me that the proportion of women in the prison system is roughly similar to the proportion of children. Those are our two most vulnerable groups and the groups for whom we do least well by and least well for. They are the most vulnerable and the most needy.

It is very nice to see the noble Lord, Lord Warner, in his place, because the previous time we worked together—I imagine that we are together on this—we were fighting to save the YJB. I remember saying then that we must not allow ourselves to think for one minute that children are small versions of adults. Their needs are so different. Women are not other versions of men. Their needs are also extremely different. When the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, was quoted as saying that these prisons were all designed for men, she was quite right; women were in no one’s mind. They suited, and that was where they were coming from. To imagine for one minute that we could stick women into similar institutions and do them any good was absolutely insane.

If we ever get to what the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, suggested and have someone who is in charge of and leads the way in policy, organisation, delivery and practice for women, I hope that that person will be a woman.

I rise even more briefly to support the amendment. I do not know of a single lawyer, prosecutor, judge or prison officer who does not believe that women’s prisons are full of people who should not be there and, worse, who are being further damaged by being held there. The scandal is that we have all known this for years. Ministers know it, but nothing is done about it. The amendment is a modest proposal in the right direction, and it has my wholehearted support.

My Lords, I apologise for missing the beginning of this debate, but I was caught on the hop by the speed of progress.

Prompted by the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, perhaps I may, with some trepidation, remind the Minister of the Youth Justice Board—not to score any points off him but to make the point that that body was set up to produce focus over a continuing period of time and to bring a range of agencies together to focus on the need of that particular group of offenders. I think the Minister accepts that some progress was made in youth justice by that kind of approach, and I hope that he will apply that approach and the same logic to women. I thoroughly support my noble friend’s amendment.

My Lords, I join noble Lords all round the House in supporting the amendment. There has been not one word of disagreement, and I am sure the Minister has listened carefully to what noble Lords have had to say on this issue.

I believe, as does my Front Bench, that the amendment can help to focus a national debate on the needs of women in the criminal justice system more effectively over the coming years, whatever Government are in office. My noble friend Lady Corston referred to what the Chief Inspector of Prisons, Nick Hardwick, said a few months ago. Two of the words he used to describe the state of the women’s secure estate were “aghast” and “ashamed”. I am sure that everyone who has spoken and has any knowledge of the subject would agree with those words.

In my view and that of many of my noble friends, the secure estate is too often no place for women. The majority of women in detention have not committed violent crimes. They are mothers, and each year more than 17,000 children are separated from their mothers because of imprisonment. Many of these women are victims themselves: one in four women in prison was in local authority care as a child; nearly 40 per cent left school before they were 16; over half have suffered domestic violence; and one in three has suffered sexual abuse.

I do not believe that anyone who has read the 2007 report of my noble friend Lady Corston has not been impressed by her recommendations—as my noble friend said earlier, it is now five years since the report was presented—by the examples she gave, by the intellectual force of her arguments and by the way in which these could be translated into effective solutions. We did not do enough to put those solutions into practice but we did make some progress. We continue to listen carefully to what my noble friend Lady Corston says on these matters because of her great experience in this field.

The Women’s Criminal Justice Policy Unit in the MoJ will help to bring her recommendations to life. It will provide a safe and collaborative environment within government and across departments for real joined-up thinking on these matters.

To deal with women’s needs in a holistic way—their health and social welfare needs and how local authorities, the Home Office and other bodies could work to keep them out of crime and out of jail—there is a need for all government departments to work in this collaborative way because the needs are so great and the challenges so important. The results would certainly be more beneficial, not just for the woman involved but for her family and the society that she comes from.

With this great agreement that women should not be in prison—every report that one has read over the years has said the same thing, and all Governments agree—I would hope that this amendment could be put into action. I pay tribute to my noble friends Lady Corston, Lady Gould and Lord Judd and the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, who put their names to this amendment, and to all those who have taken part in this debate this afternoon. They spoke with such passion in the belief that something should be done on these matters. I know the Minister is concerned about this and I am sure that he will look at this very favourably in the cause of justice for women. I look forward to his response.

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, said that she had discovered over the years that she had become not only an adjective but a noun as well. I told her last week when we met that she was well on her way to becoming a national treasure—something I would not wish on anybody. Her report was certainly a landmark report. It is required reading for me and I listen carefully whenever she speaks and when other experts in the House speak on this subject. I also listen carefully to criticisms such as those recently made by Nick Hardwick and repeated today by the noble Baroness, Lady Stern.

I should like briefly to mention our response to those criticisms, and particularly to his criticism of the Keller unit. This is being reviewed and a number of recommendations have been suggested. The potential for the provision of updated facilities to supplement or replace the Keller unit is being reviewed by the National Offender Management Service. However, the majority of recommendations have been actioned, including the development of healthcare and support, including mental health, first aid, training in positive behaviour, support methods, the presence of a registered mental health nurse seven days a week, structured therapeutic programmes provided by mental health occupational therapists and a co-ordinated approach to the clinical review of patients. There is also the introduction of a programme of structured intervention on a daycare basis that is accessible to the residents of the Keller unit. Steps have been taken to ensure the timely sharing of records between mental health and primary care teams. The new governor of HM Prison Styal is currently reviewing the role of the Keller unit, alongside the development of other specialist accommodation in the prison to meet the needs of women with a range of complex problems. The review will continue, and the prison is currently bidding for funding to establish a therapeutic unit.

I emphasise from this Dispatch Box the importance I attach to a strategic and coherent policy addressing the problems of women at risk and the problems of women in prison and on release. The noble Baroness, Lady Gould, and the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, gave us the statistics that underline the importance and urgency of this matter. As the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, mentioned, I had an interesting and informative meeting with Peers and stakeholders last week on the occasion of the fifth anniversary of the Corston report. The noble Lord, Lord Judd, paid tribute to the long-term interest of the noble Baroness in these issues. My interest has grown with every month that I have been in office, every visit I make and every meeting I hold. As has been said, we have too many women in prison and we intervene too late.

However, I do not believe that a women’s justice policy unit bringing together officials from several government departments, as proposed in this amendment, is necessary. That approach was tried a few years ago, but I understand was discontinued after a year or so. I can reassure the House that there continues to be a dedicated resource to women offenders within the Ministry of Justice. However, rather than co-locating staff from other government departments into the Ministry of Justice, officials now work closely with a wide range of rehabilitation reform policy leads in those other departments who are best placed to address the needs of women offenders in their policy areas, including health, employment and homelessness. These close working relationships across departments help to ensure that the needs of women offenders are embedded in cross-government policy-making.

As I explained in Committee, this cross-government approach receives strong leadership from the Minister for Prisons and Probation, my honourable friend Crispin Blunt, who works closely with his ministerial colleagues, in particular the Minister for Women and Equalities and the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Equalities. The amendment suggests that the policy unit would report and be answerable to an interministerial committee. I do not believe that we need any additional interministerial governance for the women’s agenda. The Inter-Ministerial Group on Equalities, on which Ministry of Justice Ministers sit, has responsibility for driving forward the Government’s equality strategy, including strategic oversight of issues affecting women. Departments also work together through the Cabinet Committee on Social Justice and the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Women in the Penal System.

Finally, let me assure noble Lords that officials are already delivering effectively the functions envisaged for the new policy unit. As I explained in Committee, we already have and are delivering a strategy for women offenders. This ensures that women will benefit in key areas such as mental health, drug recovery, tackling violence against women, troubled families and employment. It recognises the important role of women’s community services, as well as the good work by NOMS to implement many of the recommendations in the noble Baroness’s report. We also actively consider gender equality as required under the Equality Act 2010. We are committed to monitoring progress on achieving key outcomes for women offenders in all areas of our approach to rehabilitating offenders. For example, in setting out our plans radically to reform criminal justice through improved punishment, payback and progression of offenders, we have looked very carefully at how these reforms will impact on women, and have given a clear commitment that we will take into account the different profile of women offenders in achieving this, including the reasons underpinning their offending. I believe that there is effective provision to ensure that the Government are held to account for progress against this agenda.

The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, gave us a long list of titles and initiatives, but he also pointed out that nothing has happened. What we need is what the noble Lord referred to: a drive to get it done. I believe that this is what the Government are doing—a drive to do practical things. In Committee, I undertook to consider what more we could do to communicate our priorities for women because, as I have emphasised, I believe that the priorities and policies are already in place. While I do not believe that we need a statutory requirement to report annually to Parliament on our work, I have agreed with my honourable friend Crispin Blunt that we will publish a short document setting out our strategic priorities for women. We will place this on the Ministry of Justice website for easy reference. It will be a live document that can be updated as necessary and will be available to promote questions and debate both in this House and the other place on the progress being made. We will continue to listen to noble Lords on this important issue. Noble Lords sometimes overemphasise the importance of writing things in the Bill. I believe the greater importance is, in the words of the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, in achieving outcomes.

I have listened carefully to this debate. It has been an excellent debate, and I think it will read well outside. I honestly do not believe it is a matter on which the House should divide. I am not in a position to accept the amendment and, therefore, if the noble Baroness does press it, I shall ask my noble friends to vote against it. I would rather urge her to withdraw it in the spirit in which this debate has taken place.

I have said that we will publish a strategic document. It will be a short document setting out our strategic priorities for women. It will be a live document and will be updated. I believe that goes some way towards what the House has been asking for. I believe also that what we are doing in practice meets the demands that have been before the House today. In that spirit, I urge the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords on all sides of the House who have spoken in support of this amendment. I am grateful to them for highlighting the profile of the women about whom we talk. They are poor, they are mothers, they are mentally ill, they are alcoholics, they have very little education, and they have no life skills. They are in prison for an average of 28 days, at the end of which they have lost their homes and children and generally do not get either back. It is a huge social issue, and this is the place where it can be resolved.

I have to say that the Minister is badly advised. One of the reasons progress was made from 2007 was because a women’s criminal justice policy unit was established, and because there was an interministerial group run by Maria Eagle, who harried officials, organisations and NOMS to make sure that this happened. On her watch, more than 30 so-called Corston women’s centres were set up across the country to reduce women’s offending, with spectacularly wonderful results.

To say that there was not an interministerial group is not right. Nor is it right to say that there was not a unit, in that I know that the people working in that unit from different departments made things happen. Indeed, collocation of staff from different agencies in youth offending teams and the Youth Justice Board was the key to getting agencies to work together. If you do not have that nationally, it will not be reproduced regionally and locally.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Stern, who I think of as a friend, said, you can make progress but you can quickly revert. All I say to the Government is that quick reversion is what will happen. I am sorry to sound so passionate, but it is because I feel passionate. I wish to test the opinion of the House.

My Lords, in moving Amendment 151A I shall speak also to Amendment 151B, with which it is grouped.

I am bringing back these amendments following the discussions on them in Committee, both because I believe them to be very important and because the amendment expresses a view shared by noble Lords from all around the Chamber without a single voice of dissent. They were views expressed by people of such knowledge and distinction that there was an obligation to try once more to persuade the Government of the importance of this case.

First, I thank those noble Lords who have added their names to the amendments, in particular my hero the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, who was also poised to add his name to the list but was not allowed to do so. The Public Bill Office informed me that my list was already full—four names were all that were allowed—so my list has lost a little of its potential lustre. I regard the noble and learned Lord as being on my list in spirit if not in fact, and for that I am extremely grateful to him.

Although technically these are amendments they are in fact proposed new clauses, which do not amend but rather underpin the central objectives of this part of the Bill: to reduce the prison population and develop the use of alternatives to custody, and so reduce reoffending. I am a wholehearted and paid-up supporter of the Bill in these key respects, and I have worked all my life to promote the same objectives. They were also, of course, the core objectives of the Government’s policy as set out in the Green Paper. I regard these clauses as enabling ones, which ensure that the Government will achieve their objectives—and without which their success is far from being assured. Indeed, I believe that the Government need these clauses if they are to succeed.

In addition, the magistracy and the probation trusts, the organisations about which I speak, need these clauses as well. They are unequivocally in support of them because they know that if they are to be enabled to achieve their objectives, which are in line with the Government’s own, they too need them. I pay tribute to all the work that they do in their different ways. The magistracy is the bedrock of community-based justice—the representatives of our communities across the land, delivering justice locally. They are hard-working and dedicated, sustaining the peace of the realm within the law and all selfless, voluntary and unpaid. I was a magistrate once and I know how much it takes, in terms of not just time but care and effort, to try to get things right for the victims and the offenders, and for justice to be done. Their task becomes ever harder over time, as our society becomes more complex and difficult to navigate for so many.

By the same token, the work of the probation service has become ever harder but ever more necessary and valuable. As patterns of offending change and prison numbers rise, it has to provide the courts with pre-sentence reports, carry the challenging responsibilities of MAPPA and support offenders in the community, while facing more uncertainties about its own future as yet another review of its work and role is under way, causing anxiety all around. I have also been a fellow social worker—a childcare officer in my far-off youth—and my admiration for the work of probation is boundless. I also declare an interest as a patron of the old Probation Association. I know how much we all need those people, as they work at the interface of the courts and the community, protecting us as they work to reduce reoffending and meet the challenges of offenders.

These are the people who actually deliver the programmes that magistrates need, and they too are solid in support of these proposed new clauses. They know that statutory liaison is necessary to bring about the understanding by magistrates of the intricacy of what is provided in the community for the courts. From the distance of politics or non-penal worlds, it can perhaps be difficult to understand the subtleties of the relationship between these two organisations. The world of the courts is and must be at a certain remove from the day-to-day reality of the world of those who transgress and break the law, but that is where probation also operates. Good and valuable relationships can of course be, and often are, developed between individuals in both worlds. Yet you cannot conduct a system of professional interaction based on the arbitrariness of personal relationships. We discussed at Second Reading examples where we know that good liaison between probation and the magistracy frequently occur. However, we cannot deliver the sort of high-quality, highly professional service we need on that basis alone without communication and co-operation becoming uneven and patchy to the extent that we have seen happen since 2000, when the statutory basis for the relationship was abandoned. All high-quality, professional service must have a high-quality, professional structure within which to work. This is what these professionals want and it is what our communities need.

The magistracy has roughly 29,000 members and probation trusts nearly 12,000 probation officers and probation service workers, though these are slightly old figures—about 18 months old. These are dynamic institutions doing difficult, highly skilled, professional work, where change is an essential part of the progress. They must have a basic statutory basis on which to conduct their business and keep up to speed with each other. To leave it to a voluntary local effort is simply not in the nature of these national bodies. It is important that all magistrates—not just some eager ones—know what their local probation service is doing. Such is the pace of change that contact must be regular in order for everyone to be up to speed. Both parties in this area agree with that. For sentencers, this is important to be able to make properly informed disposals. Custody should never be used because a sentencer is not aware of a programme or a service which could have been a better alternative. This is sometimes tragically still the case today. While the pre-sentence report and information leaflets give a flavour, there is absolutely nothing to match or beat seeing and talking to the providers and the offenders. Quite simply, seeing is believing. This is not rocket science.

In Committee, the Minister said,

“unless we have public confidence in non-custodial sentences we will have criticism of them. We have to win that public confidence”.—[Official Report, 7/2/12; col. 170.]

How right he is. Where do we start? We start with the sentencers themselves, whose use of them will justify and develop confidence. As their own confidence grows, the more they learn. My noble friend also said that he was not aware of any obstacles to magistrates making regular visits. He is quite right; there are no obstacles. However, we need more than a mere desirable aspiration; we need a requirement, if all concerned are to understand the importance of visits and keeping abreast of current provision. I referred to the senior presiding judge’s recently revised protocol in Committee, which sets out voluntary arrangements for probation trusts, courts and magistrates. However, I am told by the Magistrates’ Association itself that, even where relations are very good, the involvement of all magistrates is “rarely achieved” and “aspirational”.

Lastly, magistrates’ expenses have in the past been a thorny issue. Expenses stopped in 2000 when liaison ceased to be statutory. I have already referred to the extraordinary and voluntary commitment of time, effort, skill and responsibility—on every level—of magistrates to their role on behalf of us all. These visits represent training over and above their duties and commitment. It seems petty and short sighted in the extreme to begrudge a bus or train fare, or petrol, to go and learn about a programme, which, if understood and then used, will save the community that proportion of the annual £40,000 cost of each prison sentence and will significantly increase the chances of reducing reoffending at a fraction of the cost while making our communities safer. That is an achievement which I think goes beyond price. My noble friend the Minister told us in Committee that Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service was “looking at” this issue, which suggests at least a recognition of the right way to proceed and where its duty lies. I hope I am right about that.

I believe that this proposed new clause is what the Bill needs really to succeed in its admirable core adjective. I know that my noble friend is expected to make no concessions beyond those already agreed but I also know that it is possible to keep her heart and mind open to argument—otherwise, what are we all doing here? My case is that this simple new clause is not an amendment to anything already in the Bill but would add something which endorses it and ensures that what it stands for is achieved: namely, a safer, more civilised society with less reoffending as a result of less imprisonment and more community disposals. I commend the new clause to the House.

My Lords, I am very glad to support this amendment. The noble Baroness speaks with real experience because she has done a lot of front-line work in precisely this sphere in trying to bring the probation service and others together with magistrates and, indeed, judges. She is to be commended for that. She speaks in this House having done that.

I am glad that she took the opportunity to say a few words about the probation service. In my younger life, the probation service was one of the hallmarks of a decent society. It was a service in which people either had real, relevant experience of life and brought that to the service or had a good, sound, broad education to a high level and were able to bring that perspective to the work which they did. Ideally, it was a combination of both those things.

I am afraid that the probation service has been subjected to pressures and has been propelled towards becoming a sort of alternative to a custodial sentence. The old probation service concentrated on rehabilitation; it was not solely about punishing people. The sentence is the punishment. The people concerned have been told that they are being punished by society and are reported as such in the press. The task the probation service used to take on was that of helping the people concerned to become positive, constructive citizens. However, the service is now so harassed and pressed that it is very difficult to see how that work can properly be done at all, or whether indeed there is cultural leadership on what the task really is—let us be frank about that.

I cannot think of a more practical, sensible arrangement than to ensure that magistrates are not only encouraged but propelled, as it were, into meeting probation service staff, having discussions with them, obtaining information and seeing for themselves the reality of what the probation service does as part of their preparation for the work they will be doing in magistrates’ courts. Two things about magistrates are relevant in this context. I speak as someone whose mother was a magistrate and loved her work. One is that magistrates live in society—that is a strength—and are therefore bombarded by the popular press and everyone else with all kinds of prejudice and superficial judgments. To withstand that kind of psychological pressure, they need to have real exposure to and a real understanding of what is being done.

I was very glad to put my name to this amendment. As always, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, and the noble Lord, Lord Judd. On this occasion, I do so because it provides an opportunity, which is not present in much of the rest of the Bill, to mention the problems faced by the probation service.

It was a great pity when the probation service was made subordinate to the Prison Service under the arrangements of the National Offender Management Service because for years they had worked closely together with the courts and the police in the local area. The amendment draws attention to that relationship. It also makes the point that magistrates must know what is capable of being done in prisons so that there is relevance between what is ordered to be done for the rehabilitation of someone and what is able to be delivered. That will be different all over the country, and rightly so because conditions will be different. Also, as I mentioned in Committee, if prisons and the probation service had to do the same thing everywhere, it would help sentencers enormously to know what was there and what was not there, and the Ministry of Justice would also know what there was and could make good any shortfalls.

The other day, I was very alarmed to hear that the governor of Lindholme, Moorland and Hatfield prisons in Yorkshire had ordered the probation service out of those prisons because the local probation service in that part of Yorkshire was having to work with G4S over the provision of probation services. Presumably, that must have been under the direction of the National Offender Management Service and under all the marketing strategies that it is following. I mention that because I am very disturbed about probation services being marketed when the service is concerned with the face-to-face probation officer and offender relationship, which is absolutely crucial to rehabilitation.

I do not know on what authority the governor ordered the probation service out, but it is alarming because, if he is able to do that, he is interrupting the whole rehabilitation process and drawing attention to the fragility of probation, which must work closely in the community, with police and probation being subordinate to prisons. Therefore, apart from supporting this amendment, which I think improves the Bill and draws attention to the rehabilitative element of all that is going on, I am also glad that it allows us to draw attention to the problems faced by the probation service without which we are not going to be able to reduce the vast numbers in prison who are choking that system.

I support the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater. I agree with everything she said. I remind the House that I currently serve on one of these committees in central London. It is not a statutory committee, but it is a very important committee from which I certainly benefit in my work as a magistrate, as I know all my colleagues do. Nevertheless, I want to make the point that there are other statutory committees. I am thinking of the bench training and development committees which are required to sit under statute. With the best will in the world, the officials administer those committees more thoroughly than they do the probation liaison committees, precisely because they are not statutory committees. For that reason alone, I recommend to the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, that the statutory provision would add weight to what is, after all, one of the Government’s primary objectives, which is to make sure that the magistracy has confidence in community sentences.

My Lords, I support the amendment. The noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, knows so much about the probation service and the magistracy. She draws attention to very little of which we should not take a great deal of notice. What my noble friend Lord Ramsbotham has just said about what is happening in the probation service is alarming. I hope that someone will be able to explain what has happened in a way that makes sense. I go back a long way within the areas of the magistracy and probation and the tremendous work that they do with offenders over very many years. I was a juvenile court chairman. I was horrified when I read the report by the noble Lord, Lord Carter of Coles. At that moment, I said to myself that if I were a probation officer, I would leave the service because I knew it had no future. It is, therefore, even more worrying to me that the whole of the very effective work that it still carries out is under this kind of threat. I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure us that this is not the way forward.

My Lords, as a signatory to the amendment, I am pleased to say that the Opposition is more than happy to support it and should the noble Baroness not receive a satisfactory answer from the Minister—we live in hope—and wish to press the amendment, we will certainly endorse it. I was particularly impressed by the remarks of my noble friend Lord Ponsonby, who speaks from direct and daily experience of these matters in a busy court in the capital. We are already 25 minutes into this debate and there is much more to come, so I am content to rest the Opposition’s case at this point.

My Lords, this amendment returns to issues raised by my noble friend Lady Linklater in Committee. I very much welcome the contribution that she has made on this issue during the passage of the Bill. My noble friend has considerable experience, to which other noble Lords have referred, in bringing magistrates and probation together and building trust in alternatives to custodial sentences. She is very much to be applauded for that. Like her, I pay tribute to the work that magistrates and probation trusts do.

We agree with the noble Baroness that it is important that probation trusts provide information to sentencers about the services they provide in delivering community sentences. We encourage that sharing of information. We agree that such liaison is beneficial both to magistrates and probation. We also agree that it is important that magistrates see for themselves the work of probation trusts. We agree with the intention behind the amendment, but we would point out that the current provisions in legislation already allow for this kind of liaison between probation and magistrates to take place. The noble Baroness is seeking to get two sets of people to talk to each other and that can already happen. There is no statutory barrier to it, but I hear what she says about trying to ensure that this happens, and we are certainly in favour of promoting best practice. We will look to see if there is more that we can do to ensure that best practice is brought to the attention of probation trusts. We are also ready to work with the Magistrates’ Association and others to ensure that we have practical arrangements in hand to encourage magistrates to take part in meetings so that information can be exchanged. We can, however, do this without changing primary legislation. I also note that the amendment does not ensure that magistrates attend these meetings—which would, of course, not be appropriate—it instead places the duty on probation trusts to provide information. As my noble friend Lord McNally said in Committee, we are not aware of a problem in the provision of information but would welcome further information on it if one exists.

I understand what the amendment is trying to achieve. It provides two illustrative examples of what regulations might cover. They include guidelines for liaison and a scheme for magistrates’ expenses. I would like to point out to my noble friend that both of these are, in fact, already covered by existing arrangements. Guidelines for liaison meetings are set out in a protocol issued not by the Government, but by the senior presiding judge. We think it is right that the protocol should set out the process so that there is no suggestion that magistrates should be unduly influenced in sentencing by consideration of a local probation trust’s priorities, rather than what they see as the appropriate sentence in an individual case. That is why the senior presiding judge issues guidance, not the Government. We agree that there should be guidance on these meetings, but we think that the current system is more appropriate and that the guidance—especially since it applies to the judiciary—should come from the senior judiciary, not the Government.

The second example which the noble Baroness gives relates to the payment of expenses. It is true that Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service does not routinely pay expenses for meetings between magistrates and probation. That does not, however, mean that magistrates can not claim expenses. They can, in fact, claim expenses from the probation trusts in attending these meetings. This is an area where the Government might assist by doing more to publicise the process if magistrates are unaware of it. We will certainly consider, as a practical approach, encouraging better liaison by publicising this.

The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, referred to a statutory committee. The amendment would not create a statutory committee; it would merely provide a regulation-making power to promote such arrangements if that was what was decided. On the questions of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, about ordering the probation service out, we are not aware of the detail of that situation. We would welcome further details, and I will then write to the noble Lord with our reaction to what sounds like a very concerning incident.

I hope that the noble Baroness is reassured that we are committed to best practice regarding liaison and that we will look at practical solutions. We welcome her input on guidance and expenses under the current legislation. I hope that, on that basis, she will feel able to withdraw the amendment.

My Lords, I cannot thank everybody who has contributed to this debate warmly enough. It debate has raised many interesting, detailed elements; in particular, what the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, was saying about the serious knock-on effect for the old relationship that the probation service had with its community after it came under the umbrella of NOMS. The example of Lindholme indeed merits some careful examination.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, for making reference to other statutory arrangements. As I understood it, my amendment was to recreate the very effective statutory liaison which existed previously. There was a reality to the liaison until 2000. This needs looking at again. I understand the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, about the worrying nature of the Carter report. I hope that it has, as it were, melted away. I must, as always, thank the noble Lord, Lord Judd, for his incredibly enthusiastic and good comments on this subject which are very heart-warming.

The Minister made some promises. I do not know to what extent they will make a difference, but just as I have encouraged her to have ears to hear, I had better have some ears to hear myself. I was minded to divide the House at this point but I do not think it would be proper until I have learnt a little bit more about what her promises mean. I will indeed return and look at this again, but for the time being I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 151A withdrawn.

Amendment 151B

I am sorry, my Lords—you must be getting very bored with the sound of my voice. I move on briefly to the second, connected clause, which is about the presumption against short sentences.

The presumption against short sentences carries with it the expectation that low-level offending will receive an effective community sentence which is designed to address the causes of offending behaviour and to emphasise that it is in this category that reoffending is the highest of all. This is the greatest area of sentencing failure in this country today, contrary to the central goal of government policy which is to reduce reoffending. There may, of course, be times when a short prison sentence has a place. An example might be when an offender is constantly breaching a non-custodial order and the magistrates feel that they are left with no option. Or it may give the victim of an offender a brief break from the hell of a violent partner and the chance to make changes to her life in the breathing space. These are legitimate but there should be a presumption against these short sentences which is not the case at the moment, as witnessed by the 38,000 sentences of three months or less in the year up to March 2011. That is an astonishing figure; these cases should be the exception and not the rule.

I suggest that we should follow the example of Scotland, where Section 17 in Part 1 of the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010 is entitled, “Presumption against short periods of imprisonment”. Subsection (3A) states that a court,

“must not pass a sentence of imprisonment for a term of 3 months or less on a person unless the court considers that no other method of dealing with the person is appropriate”.

This is a proper model to follow.

Many of these sentences are for women, as noble Lords mentioned in our debate on the previous amendment. They are just enough to do disproportionate damage to children, families, jobs and housing, and to the ability of chaotic, vulnerable people who commit minor offences to keep their lives together at all.

Imprisonment results in even greater chaos to the community, which then has to manage that chaos and to deal with the inevitable reoffending, whereas preventive, effective work through community disposals is far more likely to effect change and make people face up to the causes and effects on others of their law-breaking behaviour. Short prison sentences do absolutely nothing to address offending behaviour. No provision exists during or after imprisonment—hence the reoffending results, at great and disproportionate cost to the community.

It is also worth re-emphasising that where communities want and need to demonstrate toughness in punishment, community sentences are the tough option—and are seen as such by offenders. It is much tougher to be made to face up to what you have done, and why, than to sleep away your sentence in a prison cell; and to learn about the consequences of your behaviour and be made to put something back into the community, for example by doing unpaid work.

An inquiry chaired by Peter Oborne and commissioned by an organisation called Make Justice Work, which is doing a lot of effective work in this field, highlighted how effective community sentences were seen to be by offenders, as well as how much more successful they were at tackling reoffending. This ties in with my earlier remarks about magistrates knowing what community sentences are like. If properly informed, they will be at the front line of awareness of the quality of the programmes, and of what works and is being well done, which will ensure that standards are high. I greatly welcome the Government’s plans to start a consultation on the effectiveness of community sentences, and I look for reassurance from the Minister that a presumption against short sentences will form part of the framework of their thinking.

The second reason that I return to this subject is the need for sentences to come with an explanation in court of the exact reasons for a disposal—and in particular, where the threshold for custody comes in a case, and precisely why and how the threshold has been passed so that a community penalty has become inappropriate. Perhaps the Minister will confirm, following a letter of 15 March from the noble Lord, Lord McNally, whether under new Section 174, to be imported under Clause 61 of the Bill, the sentencing judge or magistrate must explain to a person sentenced to less than six months in prison that,

“no other method of dealing with him is appropriate, and give reasons, including how the custody threshold has been reached, for that conclusion, whether to him if he is present or under rules made in accordance with government amendment 152ZA”.

I am quoting from the letter. If this is the case, that amendment will be welcome, since previous legislation did not require the degree of clarity and explanation that I sought. I look forward to the Minister’s reply and beg to move.

My Lords, Amendment 151B, moved by my noble friend Lady Linklater, relates to the imposition of short custodial sentences. It would place a duty on a court to consider all alternatives before imposing a short custodial term. The amendment would also require the court, when imposing a short custodial sentence, to explain why alternative sentences were not considered appropriate.

As my noble friend Lord McNally said when the amendment was debated in Committee, we completely understand the argument of the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater. We agree that short custodial sentences can be less effective than community sentences in tackling reoffending. The Government looked closely at community sentences and intend to consult very soon on ways to build greater confidence in their use. Our payment by results pilots are also looking to support offenders who are released from short custodial sentences.

As the Minister also said, a duty already exists in current law. I urge my noble friend to look at Section 152 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, which was passed by the previous Government and places restrictions on courts imposing discretionary custodial sentences. It states:

“The court must not pass a custodial sentence unless it is of the opinion that the offence, or the combination of the offence and one or more offences associated with it, was so serious that neither a fine alone nor a community sentence can be justified for the offence”.

That provision applies to all courts that are considering a custodial sentence of any length—not just a sentence of less than six months, to which the amendment is limited. The issue of short custodial sentences has been discussed in Scotland. My noble friend made reference to Scottish legislation. The new Scottish provisions are less onerous on judges than the existing law in England and Wales that I have just explained.

The current requirement on courts considering a custodial sentence is more wide-ranging and onerous than that contained in the amendment. I understand the intention behind it, but I hope that I can reassure my noble friend on this point. I hope that she will feed into the consultation on how to make sure that what is already in law is used as widely as possible. The law is as she wishes it; we need to ensure that it is fully understood and delivered. On this basis, I hope that she will withdraw her amendment.

My Lords, what alternatives to imprisonment are being considered to punish the persistent non-payment of fines, which is a very common reason why people are sent to prison for short periods? Is there no other way of recovering the amount of the fine that could be considered by the courts, and is the matter being looked at by the Government?

I thank my noble friend for those points, and will write to him with details on them. He may wish to feed in to the consultation on the matter.

I thank my noble friend for answering my short remarks. I will go away to think a little more. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

My Lords, I turn to a group of government amendments that concern three areas. I will deal first with the substantive amendments. The first concerns the duties on courts to explain a sentence. The second deals with powers to withdraw distress warrants. I will then deal with the grouped technical amendments that relate to the powers of magistrates to impose fines.

First, government amendment 152ZA relates to the revised provisions in Clause 61, which deal with the duties on courts to give reasons for, and explain the effect of, a sentence. These duties already exist under Section 174 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 but Clause 61 provides for a revised and simplified version of the requirements.

We had an excellent debate on this in Committee. My noble friend Lord McNally was very grateful for the opportunity to discuss the concerns that several Peers had in relation to this duty and the needs of offenders who have learning difficulties or other problems understanding the sentence imposed on them. I pay particular tribute to the noble Lords, Lord Rix, Lord Ramsbotham and Lord Wigley, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Quin and Lady Gould, who have provided enormous insight into the problems that these offenders may face.

As my noble friend said in Committee, the Government were concerned to ensure that we got the balance right between removing unduly prescriptive provisions on sentencers while retaining the important duties to explain a sentence in court. The Government also wanted to ensure that the law remained practical, taking account of the million-plus sentencing decisions made by the courts each year.

The Government have looked again at these provisions, in light of the helpful discussions that we had in Committee. We believe that the basic statutory duties to give reasons for a sentence and explain the effect of a sentence, in open court and in ordinary language, remain appropriate for the vast majority of cases, but we also accept the point made by noble Lords that further guidance on this may be required.

With that in mind, we have looked at subsection (4) of the revised Section 174, which gives a power to the Lord Chancellor to prescribe cases where the duty to explain can be less onerous or not required at all. This power has existed since the 2003 Act came into force but has never been exercised by the Lord Chancellor. On reflection, we think that such a power would be better exercised by the Criminal Procedure Rule Committee, an independent body that provides rules that govern the way the criminal courts operate. The Criminal Procedure Rules already touch on the sentencing process so it seems more appropriate that the committee should have a specific power in this regard.

The first part of this amendment transfers the Lord Chancellor’s order-making power to a rules-making power for the Criminal Procedure Rule Committee. Secondly, the amendment clarifies the scope of the power in relation to the duties on sentencers. The amendment retains the power for the rules to prescribe when the duties to give reasons for the sentence or explain the sentence to the offender do not apply; for example, where the sentence is obvious because there is a fixed penalty or where the case is entirely dealt with on the papers without the offender being present, as happens with many low-level road traffic offences.

I draw particular attention to the fact that the amendment also allows the rules to make provision about how an explanation of the effect of a sentence is to be given to the offender. This allows the rules to cover, if required, any particular circumstances the courts should consider when meeting the statutory duty to explain the effect of a sentence to an offender.

I have no doubt that the committee, in considering this new power, will take account of the debate that your Lordships had in Committee and the helpful representations that have been made from organisations such as Mencap and the Prison Reform Trust. I will ensure that these are flagged to the committee. We believe that the consideration of the detail of requirements is better dealt with via rules than primary legislation. One of the Criminal Procedure Rules already requires the court to,

“explain the sentence, the reasons for it, and its effect, in terms the defendant can understand (with help, if necessary)”.

I thank noble Lords for sharing the benefit of their wisdom and hope that this amendment achieves our goal of allowing for practical measures to be taken to ensure that the duties to explain a sentence are met in every case.

Government Amendment 152BYH relates to a very specific area of the law that deals with distress warrants. Distress warrants are issued following the non-payment of a fine, to recover the value of the fine imposed by the courts. They can be issued by a court or by a fines officer. In Committee, the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, tabled an amendment that sought, among other things, to clarify the law on distress warrants, and in particular whether it was possible to withdraw a distress warrant once it had been issued. My noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford also highlighted the problem of the inability to withdraw distress warrants.

I indicated in response to noble Lords that the Government were willing to look at the issue and, if a change in the law was necessary, to return to it on Report. That is what we have done. I very much welcomed the opportunity we had to discuss this issue with the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and my noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford, as well as drawing on the expertise of the Z2K Trust and the CAB.

We accept that the current law is flawed. This amendment makes a number of changes, mainly to Schedule 5 to the Courts Act 2003. The new clause introduced by the amendment does four things. First, it provides magistrates’ court fines officers with the power to withdraw distress warrants they have issued, in the circumstances specified in new paragraph (40A), which is introduced by subsection (8) of the new clause. This means that a fines officer can withdraw the warrant if there is any part of the sum left to pay and if the fines officer is satisfied that the warrant was issued by mistake. This can include a mistake made as a result of non-disclosure or a misrepresentation of a material fact in the case.

Secondly, the amendment makes it clear in new paragraph (40B) that a magistrates’ court has a similar power to discharge a distress warrant issued by a fines officer as it does to discharge such a warrant issued by the court itself. Thirdly, the amendment enables fines officers to take further steps to enforce a penalty where a distress warrant has been withdrawn, but this time taking into account information that was not available when the distress warrant was issued; this includes the power to issue a further distress warrant. Finally, the amendment enables magistrates’ courts to exercise any of their powers in respect of a fines defaulter where a distress warrant has been withdrawn, including issuing a further distress warrant.

Noble Lords will have noticed that while I have explained the amendment in terms of “distress warrants”, the amendment itself refers to “warrants of control”. That reflects the new terminology that will apply when the relevant provisions of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007, which are presently the subject of consultation, are commenced. However, transitional provision will be made under the powers in Part 4 of this Bill to the effect that, until those 2007 Act provisions come into force, these provisions are to have effect as if the references to warrants of control were to warrants of distress.

These changes put the question of whether a distress warrant can be withdrawn beyond doubt and provide clear but practical powers for the courts and fines officers to deal with mistakes in the issuing of warrants. I am extremely grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and my noble friend Lord Thomas of Gresford, and to the tireless work of Reverend Paul Nicolson of the Z2K Trust, for identifying these problems and encouraging us to address them.

Finally, government Amendments 152BA to 152BYG deal with the changes to magistrates’ fines powers in Clauses 80 to 82. These amendments are largely technical and ensure that Clauses 80 to 82 operate as intended. The policy intention here is unchanged: the clauses remove the upper limit on the level of fines available in the magistrates’ courts on summary conviction. They also allow for the uprating of other fines, in particular by providing a power to increase the maximum fine amounts for levels 1 to 4 on the standard scale of fines for summary offences.

I draw your Lordships’ attention to the set of amendments that applies the provisions to fines imposed for common law offences which can be dealt with by magistrates. These offences—“causing a public nuisance” and “outraging public decency”—were not caught by the previous version of the clauses. It is important that magistrates should have the freedom to impose larger fines for these offences in the same way as they will be able to do when sentencing offenders committing statutory offences.

Overall, these amendments now deliver more effectively the Government’s objectives. I beg to move.

My Lords, as the Minister has explained, Amendment 152BYH is in response to an amendment I tabled in Committee with the support of the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford. The purpose was to remove legal confusion about the power of bailiffs to return a fine to magistrates for consideration. That confusion has resulted in hardship for many vulnerable people.

I am grateful to the Minister and to the noble Lord, Lord McNally, for meeting me and the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, as well as representatives of Zacchaeus 2000 and Citizens Advice to discuss this and related matters. I am even more grateful that the Government agree that the current law is flawed and that this Bill provides the ideal vehicle for removing the confusion. I assume therefore that they do not expect that there will be a further suitable Bill coming along in the foreseeable future and thus they brought forward their own amendment.

I had hoped that I would be able to sit down at this point and that all would be sweetness and light, but as the noble Baroness knows I am worried that the amendment refers simply to the power to withdraw the warrant where there has been a mistake, albeit one made in consequence of the non-disclosure or misrepresentation of a material fact. Rectifying mistakes will not prevent all of the kinds of problems that Zacchaeus 2000 and Citizens Advice have identified. I am particularly concerned about cases where there has been a change of circumstances since the fine was set. For instance, if the debtor’s or defaulter’s material circumstances have changed because of illness, unemployment or relationship breakdown, that could have just the same effect on the ability to pay the fine as if there had been a mistake at the time of the original determination.

I have been in touch by e-mail with the Ministry of Justice about this. Its response was that while the amendment does not cover a simple change of circumstances, it is clear that a debtor can argue that the change of circumstances, if it had been known to the court, would have affected the decision to issue the warrant, so the decision was based on a mistake as to the debtor’s circumstances and that, in other words, the provision in the amendment goes further than the simple slip rule would do.

Will the Minister clarify this statement for your Lordships’ House? I do not really understand what it means. Does it mean that if a debtor’s circumstances change for the worse after the fine has been set and the bailiff is made aware of it, the bailiff can withdraw the warrant and return the fine to the magistrates’ courts on the grounds that the fine would not have been set on that basis had those circumstances pertained when it was set? If it means that, I urge the Minister to withdraw the amendment and make that clear at Third Reading. Otherwise I fear that we face a new source of legal confusion. If it does not mean that, I fear that the amendment will not go nearly far enough to resolve the kind of problems that Z2K and Citizens Advice have brought to our attention. Will the Minister withdraw the amendment and think again before Third Reading? Can the Minister confirm that a mistake will cover cases where the defaulter was not in court when the fine was imposed so that the mistake was made because the full circumstances were not known?

In Committee, the Minister prayed in aid the revision of the National Standards for Enforcement Agents, and in particular the standards they set for dealing with vulnerable and socially excluded people. The revised standards for such situations, now published on the MoJ website, are virtually identical to those previously in operation. It is clear from the experience of Z2K and Citizens Advice that they have not provided an adequate safeguard. That is why we had hoped that the amendment would ensure that bailiffs have discretion within the application of the Wednesbury principles—in other words, a test of reasonableness—to return a fine to the magistrates’ court when they discover that the debtor is in a vulnerable situation as set out in the National Standards for Enforcement Agents.

I am disappointed but realise that the Minister signalled this in Committee. Can I ask that the MoJ monitors this? If it is clear that the National Standards for Enforcement Agents are not on their own providing an adequate safeguard, will the Government consider returning to this issue at the next legislative opportunity?

In conclusion, I thank the Government for having moved on this issue. However, I am seeking assurances about the situation with regard to a change of circumstances, to be made clear in an amendment at Third Reading, if necessary, and about monitoring the effectiveness of the National Standards for Enforcement Agents, which state that,

“the agent has a duty to contact the creditor and report the circumstances in situations where there is evidence of a potential cause for concern”,

to ensure that that happens. Otherwise I fear that vulnerable people will continue to suffer and that legal confusion will continue to reign.

Having read the amendment as drafted, I was confused as to whether the mistake was a technical mistake, a mistake of law or a mistake of fact of the basis upon which the order was made. It is not clear from the wording here that the latter is the proper meaning. I am heartened to hear from the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, that she has received a communication from the Ministry of Justice saying that mistake does not mean the slip rule, which is a very familiar concept to lawyers. It may not be familiar to the bailiff who is knocking on the door. It is important that my noble friend should make it quite clear that a mistake of fact is needed; in other words, that if the magistrates’ court had been aware of the particular circumstances of the individual at the time that the warrant was to be enforced, it would not have made that order. If that is what it means and the Minister says so from the Dispatch Box, I would be satisfied with that. If that is not what it means, we need to discuss the issue further.

My Lords, I speak in support of government Amendment 152ZA and also speak on behalf of my noble friend Lord Rix who unfortunately is unable to be present because of his wife’s ill health. I thank the Minister for the extremely productive meeting that we had, which has been mentioned. The points that my noble friend has asked me to raise arise out of the amendment which came after that discussion in support of what was said.

The context of this is the duty of the court to explain sentences in ordinary language, which we raised in Committee. The Minister admitted that the phrase would ensure only that most people could understand an explanation. While we welcome the amendment and believe that it has the ability to extend comprehension of the effect of a sentence on all parties concerned, which is an important development, we are still not certain that it covers the point about ordinary language. On that, we would like some clarification. We believe that the Criminal Procedure Rule Committee could offer a similar safeguard, but we are not sure about where that safeguard extends and how wide it is. Will the Minister clarify how confident she is that the committee will make rules regarding the need to go beyond ordinary language in certain circumstances? Will it actually make these rules? To what extent are the rules made by that committee binding on the court? The concern is that if the rules are merely guidance, they might not be put into practice, despite the best intentions of the Government and the committee.

Will the Minister tell us about the time scales? When will the committee be empowered to make such rules and when might they be enforced? Are we looking at something imminent? Will it depend on when the Bill is passed? Finally, what opportunities will there be for Members of both Houses to scrutinise the implementation of these measures in the future? If they are rules of the committee rather than something in the Bill, it is more difficult for us to monitor them. They have an enormous effect on the people whom we mentioned in Committee and their ability to understand the process of law.

My Lords, this has been another useful debate. I welcome the support of the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, for the Government’s changes to the duty to explain. I encourage him to feed in his concerns to the committee. I have no doubt whatever that noble Lords will scrutinise how the duty is being implemented. The fact that this may not be part of legislation will not stop people reporting, debating and asking whether this is working as it should. The Government clearly cannot dictate to the committee what it should make its rules on and what it should say, but I have no doubt that when and if noble Lords find that this is not being implemented as they feel it should be, that will have its effect.

On distress warrants, I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, for her guarded welcome of the Government’s amendment. She questioned whether the amendment goes far enough and was kind enough to send an e-mail with a number of questions. She has referred to our response, which gives me an opportunity to expand on or clarify a number of those points. She was concerned, among other things, about whether it allowed for the withdrawal of a distress warrant where there had been a change in the offender’s circumstances or where the offender was deemed to be vulnerable. I will do my best to reassure her on a few points.

It is clear that the government amendment allows for the withdrawal of a warrant where there is a mistake in the decision to issue the warrant in the first place. The amendment covers the case where an offender is not in court when the warrant is issued, which results in the court not having the full information before it. This, in effect, amounts to a mistake. I hope that that also helps to reassure my noble friend Lord Thomas. If there has been a change of circumstances that, had it been known to the court, would have had an impact on the decision to issue a warrant, it is open to the debtor to argue that the warrant had been issued by mistake.

The noble Baroness also raised the question of bailiffs dealing with debtors who find themselves in hardship or appear to be vulnerable. It is important that we strike the right balance between protecting the vulnerable—she is right about that—and ensuring that fines, where appropriate, are paid. Noble Lords will have seen recent criticisms of fine payment rates. The fine is by far the most used sentence of the criminal courts.

In practice, however, when bailiffs come across hardship as defined in the guidance they should not execute the warrant and return it to the court. In response to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, I must say that we would welcome any further information on this matter and on the effectiveness, which she has queried, of the guidance. It is very important that that is monitored. The Government do not think that it would be appropriate for a bailiff simply to withdraw a warrant in regard to a fine issued by a court. This could undermine the decision made by the court, which is why such a power is not included in the amendment, although I realise that that will disappoint the noble Baroness. If, however, the fine was imposed because the full facts were not made clear to the court, or they had changed, the provision in the Bill could apply.

In the case of changed circumstances since the fine was imposed, the debtor can contact the court at any time to speak to a fines officer to have the matter reviewed. The Government would encourage any debtor to contact the fines officer or court about a change of circumstance, which is clearly a better approach than waiting until a bailiff seeks to execute a warrant, but it is important that we separate the two parts in that respect.

As I said in Committee, the Government think it is important that bailiffs are dealt with via effective guidance, national standards and contractual obligations. As the noble Baroness knows, the Government are consulting on the operation of bailiffs, and we will carefully consider responses to that consultation. I hope that the noble Baroness and the organisations with which she is associated will feed into that consultation.

I hope that the noble Baroness can be reassured that the government amendment addresses the key legal issue with distress warrants and places the decision on them properly with the courts. How bailiffs operate is a matter for consultation in order to make sure that they operate properly and as we would wish. I hope therefore that the noble Baroness is reassured and content with what the Government have brought forward.

My Lords, I got the impression that the Minister was saying that outside organisations should do the monitoring. I would argue that the Government have a responsibility to monitor this. I realise that some of this will be covered by the current consultation, but if there is to be a reliance on the national standards and the requirements and standards are not written in the Bill, it is incumbent on the Government to monitor and to make sure, as she said, that these national standards are effective.

I understand the noble Baroness’s point. I was trying to indicate that a number of organisations are closely involved in such cases. Their information is extremely useful to the Government because they are often closer. However, the Government have picked up on the concerns, which has led them to decide that they need a consultation on the operation of the bailiffs system. I hope that she will be reassured by that government involvement in trying to take that matter forward.

My Lords, this group of government amendments contains a number of minor and technical amendments to suspended sentence orders, detention and training orders, youth remand, and the release and recall provision. This group also contains a few substantive amendments to youth remand. Last week, I wrote to all Peers about these amendments, and a copy of the letter has been placed in the House Library. The youth remand-related substantive amendments in this group mean that any imprisonable offences committed while a young person was remanded in prison will be taken into account in order to determine whether a young person has a history of relevant offending.

Amendments 152ZB and 152BZA remove two provisions that are no longer necessary. Clause 75(10) and paragraph 20 of Schedule 9 contain amendments to the Armed Forces Act 2011. The effect is to modify amendments that Schedule 3 to that Act makes to the Armed Forces Act 2006. This was to ensure that those amendments would work if this Bill came into force before the 2011 Act. In fact, the amendments in the 2011 Act will come into force on 2 April 2012, which makes Clause 75(10) and paragraph 20 of Schedule 9 redundant.

Amendments 152YH to 152YQ are technical amendments that will ensure that Armed Forces legislation properly reflects the changes that the Bill makes to the release provisions in the Criminal Justice Act 2003. The Bill makes changes to Section 240 of the 2003 Act on how relevant periods of remand time are credited towards a prisoner’s sentence, and in Schedule 15 makes certain transitional arrangements. These amendments ensure that these changes are also reflected in the equivalent Armed Forces legislation.

Substantive Amendments 152H, 152K, 152P, 152T, 152U, 152W, 152X, 152YD and 152YF in combination provide that where a young person who is being dealt with under the remand provisions of the Bill has previously committed imprisonable offences while remanded in prison under the current law, such offences can be taken into account when determining whether they reveal a relevant history of offending such that the court may impose electronic monitoring or remand to youth detention accommodation.

Currently, 17 year-olds are treated as adults for remand purposes and can be remanded only to prison. In addition, 15 and 16 year-old boys not deemed vulnerable and made subject to secure remand must also be remanded to prison. Offences committed in prison are not taken into account for the purpose of establishing a history under the equivalent tests in the current legislation, but the restructuring of the remand framework is based on the principle that all under-18s should be remanded according to the same test. Under the new remand framework, remands to prison for under-18s will cease.

These amendments are necessary to ensure that courts remanding offenders under the new framework will take into account any offences committed while an under-18 was previously remanded to prison under the old remand framework. They will ensure that all under-18s subject to the new remand framework or who may be considered for an electronic monitoring requirement on bail are treated equally.

I said before that these are mainly technical amendments, that I wrote to all Peers about them last week, and that a copy of the letter has been placed in the House Library. I beg to move.

My Lords, this is a very important social issue. I do not think that anyone in the House disputes the fact that alcohol-related crime is a scourge blighting too many of our city and town centres and one we must address. I pay tribute to many noble Lords, especially the noble Baronesses, Lady Finlay and Lady Jenkin, and the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, for ensuring that we have reached this point. Through their amendments in Committee for an alcohol-monitoring requirement, this issue was flagged up in the way that it was last year in the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill.

In that regard, I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Browning, who brought her knowledge, experience and wisdom to this area, including when dealing with the previous incarnation of this issue during the debates on the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, has given an insight into the terrible harm that alcohol-fuelled violence can cause to victims and their families. I applaud the work that she has undertaken to help the Government establish a more effective approach to building active and safer communities, and in particular the work that she is leading to develop community-led, partnership-based approaches to tackling alcohol-fuelled crime and anti-social behaviour.

As noble Lords have demonstrated through their persuasive and informed words, it is vital that we look at new innovative ways of tackling the causes of alcohol-fuelled crime. That is why the Government have committed, as I set out in Committee, to undertake pilots to trial sobriety requirements as part of conditional cautions and community orders. Since then, we have considered the noble Baroness’s amendments. I was also fortunate to listen to the presentation from the United States based around experience in both South Dakota and Hawaii.

We have attempted to capture the essential elements of the amendments of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, in order to provide a practical power for the court to impose sober behaviour on offenders who commit alcohol-related crime. Through these means we will send a clear message that if you abuse your right to drink and damage those around you, that right can be taken away from you. That is why the Government are bringing forward their own amendment which provides courts with a new power to impose an alcohol abstinence and monitoring requirement as part of a community order or suspended sentence order on an offender who has committed an alcohol-related offence.

The amendment forms an important part of our wider response to these problems, introducing a new and innovative way of tackling the causes of alcohol-fuelled crime through enforced sobriety schemes. I pay tribute at this stage to the work of the London mayor, Boris Johnson, and the deputy mayor, Kit Malthouse, and to their commitment in this area. Their work on the alcohol abstinence and monitoring requirements is a testament to their determination to make a stand against alcohol-fuelled crime in the capital and we will continue to work with them in the development of this initiative.

The requirement as part of community orders and suspended sentence orders will therefore focus on serious offences, in particular violent offences, where alcohol is often a contributing factor, such as common assault, actual bodily harm, affray and violent disorder. Under the Government’s proposed alcohol abstinence and monitoring requirements, offenders will be required by the court to abstain from drinking for a period specified by the court up to 120 days. They will be required either to attend a police station or test centre to be monitored by breathalyser equipment or to wear an alcohol tag around their ankle. This innovative new electronic monitoring technology will test sobriety at half-hourly intervals during the day.

Before imposing a requirement, the court will have to establish a link between alcohol consumption and the offending behaviour. In a case where the offender does not comply with the conditions of the requirement, existing breach proceedings will ensue and the courts will have robust powers to penalise the non-compliance.

I wish to make clear that this requirement does not amount to treatment. That is not to say that supporting programmes such as alcohol awareness and education courses do not have a use here, alongside the abstinence requirement, to help ensure that offenders seek to change their alcohol-fuelled offending behaviour. However, it is distinct from the alcohol treatment requirement and the alcohol specified activity requirement, which seek to treat dependent drinkers and provide advice and support to offenders with other alcohol-related needs. For alcohol-dependent offenders and others needing treatment these options will continue to be the best avenue for addressing these issues.

These new provisions enable the Government to carry out initial trials which will test the processes and practicalities of enforced sobriety schemes and help build the confidence of the probation officials and sentencers who will operate them. We will make use of the lessons learnt to inform further work in this area. We are carrying out an additional pilot to test sobriety schemes as part of conditional cautions. The conditional caution is an out-of-court disposal which aims to tackle low-level crime. The pilot scheme will therefore be targeted at offences such as drunk and disorderly, criminal damage and public disorder, which account for a considerable volume of alcohol-related offences overall. The condition requires an offender to abstain from drinking on the days they are most likely to offend as a result of alcohol and to attend a police station to be tested, using a breathalyser, on those days—for example, Friday, Saturday or Sunday.

We have already had interest from a number of police areas in piloting the conditional caution scheme, particularly from cities where alcohol-fuelled crime is a severe problem. We heard quite a lot about that in Committee. We will announce the pilot areas in the forthcoming government alcohol strategy. The first conditional cautions enforcing sobriety should be administered from April/May. We believe that this is a considered and effective amendment to test out the important concept of reducing alcohol-fuelled crime.

Amendments 152ZC and 152ZD seek to remove provisions under Section 223 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 to amend the minimum period of time specified for a drug rehabilitation requirement or alcohol treatment requirement under Sections 209 and 212 of the same Act. The Government are taking forward provisions in the Bill to remove the statutory minimum period for drug rehabilitation requirements and alcohol treatment requirements in order to increase the use and effectiveness of these requirements, allowing for greater flexibility in tailoring and delivering treatment and recovery options to individual needs. Provisions under Section 223 for these requirements are therefore no longer necessary.

The alcohol abstinence and monitoring requirement, introduced by our amendments, is to be available to the courts in England and Wales but not, of course, to the courts of Scotland or Northern Ireland. It is our intention that the requirement should not be capable of being imposed by a court in England and Wales on a person who is resident in Scotland or Northern Ireland. We undertake to bring forward and table amendments at Third Reading to make that clear. I beg to move.

My Lords, I have some amendments in this group, but of course I am absolutely delighted that the Government have decided to bring forward their own amendments. If the House approves those amendments, I will withdraw the amendments in my name. I would like to add my thanks to all Peers from all sides of the House who have worked tirelessly to try to ensure that this localism response for local communities to deal with alcohol-fuelled offences can actually proceed and that this new sentencing ability will be available to the courts. I would also like to single out the noble Baronesses, Lady Browning and Lady Northover, both of whom have gone to great lengths to listen to all sides of the argument and to take those representations away. I know that they really have worked very hard behind the scenes to get to the point that we have reached today.

The government amendments do not include the “offender pay” content set out in my amendments. I understand that this is a complex issue and, depending on the outcome of the pilots, could be revisited at a later stage, but it has wider implications. The advantage of now being able to proceed with breathalyser pilots as well as tags is that, for those who have to present daily or twice daily for breathalysing, they will encounter staff who will be able to see how they are coping and offer them support to cope with all the other aspects of their lives that they have not been managing well and that have been contributing to their alcohol abuse. There is that support element and I know from the United States that the failure rate with tags is about nine times that with breathalysers. That is partly because the offenders tend to think that the electronics will fail and do not believe in the efficacy of the tags. They sometimes try to tamper with them and so on. It will be very important to see how it works here and compare the different systems.

This week there was a motion to seek international endorsement for these types of programmes from the 180-signatory nations to the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs. These kinds of schemes are being debated there as well. I have had meetings with police officers from different parts of the UK and a consistent story that comes through is that after 10 pm at night alcohol-related problems are between 80 and 100 per cent of their workload, depending in part on the night of the week. Evidence of decreased reoffending has come from the USA and in the pilots we will be able to see whether that is replicated here. There, they are reporting a more than 50 per cent drop in reoffending at three years; a more than 50 per cent drop in drink-driving offences; and a more than 10 per cent drop in domestic violence. There has also been a fall in incarceration rates. Alcohol use appears to be interrupted before the person who has been abusing the alcohol can actually kill somebody, so they have decreased the very serious end of crime as well. We know that in London the Metropolitan Police recorded 18,500 offences flagged for alcohol. Offences involving violence against the person accounted for 64 per cent of those.

My Lords, I, too, warmly welcome the alcohol abstinence and monitoring requirement that the Government have introduced, and I thank my noble friend Lady Northover for the hard work that she has put into bringing together all the parties in order to get an agreement. That is why we have this measure before us tonight. Perhaps I may also say that my friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, and my noble friend Lady Jenkin have worked over the past few weeks not only to bring this to the attention of the Government but to find a solution that will enable us to see this provision on the statute book before, we hope, too long.

These will be trials, of course, and I hope that they prove a valuable tool in addressing the issue of binge drinkers. During the working week many of these people, of whom there are increasing numbers, hold down responsible jobs; but at the weekend they decide that they have not had a good night out unless they get paralytically drunk, to the point where not only do they have to be helped home but—as the noble Baroness knows, having taken me to visit St Mary’s Hospital Paddington to see the work being done there—they take up huge National Health Service resources. I am sure that if we are going to tackle what in this Chamber we euphemistically refer to as binge drinking, these provisions will be valuable across a range of criminal activity and act as a deterrent for the particular group of binge drinkers who will find it difficult to comply with some of these measures during the working week. They may well start to take some responsibility for their behaviour.

The question of when alcohol dependency becomes a medical condition has already been mentioned. I would stress to my noble friend on the Front Bench that the Government should continue as they have started by ensuring that alcohol abuse does not remain the Cinderella of the drugs and alcohol scenario. It is important to ensure that people get appropriate treatment and that it is sustained so that they can recover. As we know, that takes a long time and it takes resources. It is not something that is easy to achieve, but it can be done. I hope that the Government will not take their foot off the pedal in terms of ensuring that proper treatment is available to those who become alcohol dependent.

Finally, these are trials, and as is the case with all trials, it may well be that some defects are identified by the end of the trial period. Some things may not work properly and could be different. If that is the case, I urge the Government not to abandon the trials and say, “Oh well, they didn’t work”—I am sure they will not do that—but to look for ways to modify the proposals, even if it means coming back to the House to make further changes to the legislation. I feel that this is one step on what will be a long journey to identify and address the systemic problems of alcohol abuse that we have in this country.

I, too, welcome the Government’s statement. I am one of those who have been on this journey since we commenced it in the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Browning, I want to express my support for and gratitude to the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay. Her single-mindedness and determination have been extraordinary. She has been willing to accommodate the objections that come along, and on the route she has brought together a wide range of supporters for this change, not the least of which is the mayor’s office. Over the period people have quite significantly adjusted their responses.

The noble Baroness, Lady Browning, was also an important part of this process. I agree with what she has just said about how we should move forward with the Government. I also thank the Government for having shifted their position over the past few months. I believe that they have now presented to the House a workable set of propositions. They will be implemented on a trial basis, but they embark on an entirely new approach and are unlike anything we have tried before. It is probably the first time that the word “sobriety” has been used in legislation in this way. I may be wrong on that, but I certainly have not seen it while I have been here over the past decade. It gives us a platform on which we can try to build in the future.

I also congratulate the Government on bringing forward these proposals in advance of publishing their strategy on alcohol. How many times are we given papers and strategies, but not the teeth to accompany them? Yet in this instance the Government are taking action in advance of the words that no doubt will follow when the paper is produced. I think that people across the whole Chamber are very pleased indeed with the progress that has been made over the past months. We look forward to seeing how the trials pan out. They may need to be adjusted, but they will provide the Government and magistrates around the country with a new tool to help us tackle the pernicious problem of the abuse of alcohol.

My Lords, I will not go on for too long because others have covered the issue. I welcome the Government’s take on this, and obviously I want to congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, on her hard work. Her foot has been flat down on the pedal. As someone who has suffered and who is passionate about making a change in our society, I am really grateful for these pilots. As we have just heard from the noble Baroness, after 10 o’clock at night 80 per cent of all crime is alcohol-related. My husband was attacked at 10 o’clock, so I reiterate that this is very important.

I welcome these pilots, but as we have just heard, they are only pilots. However, we have to think outside the box. They are risky, but risks can be turned around. It is important that we do not wait for more victims and families to lose loved ones. We must do what we say on the tin and make communities feel safe and be happier places to live in. I receive many letters from people who hide behind their doors because they are scared of what they are going to face outside. I live with that every day and I want to make sure that we tackle this problem. I am very interested in these pilots and I wait with bated breath to see what they do.

Even the magistrates welcome this development; I have spoken to magistrates in two areas. Also, offenders will be helped to turn their lives around. Even so, their lifestyles are no justification. Drugs and alcohol are no defence for murder, but when it comes to sentencing they are seen as mitigating circumstances along the lines of, “Oh but for the alcohol”. We have to stop justifying alcohol abuse and make changes for the better. I really welcome these amendments from the Government.

My Lords, I also want to echo the warm congratulations which have been expressed to the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, on achieving some nine-tenths of what she set out to do in her original amendment. She is quite right to suggest to your Lordships that we should accept the Government’s solution, which omits the “offender pays” part of her original scheme. However, ultimately we will need to consider whether offenders should be made to pay some of the costs that they impose on the community—not specifically in the context of alcohol-related offences, but perhaps over a broader area. I see no reason why “offender pays” schemes should not be considered in a more general way, if not in the context of these particular amendments.

It is excellent news that London is to be one of the pilot areas, considering the huge burden that alcohol-related crime imposes on the capital’s health and criminal justice systems. According to the London health improvement board, the capital suffers a higher rate of alcohol-related violence—particularly sexual violence—than the rest of England, and the total annual cost of the health and social impacts of alcohol misuse to the capital is a staggering £2.46 billion. The more robust the measures for tackling this appalling waste of financial and human resources, the better it will be.

My Lords, I shall be exceptionally brief. Like my namesake, the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, I congratulate everybody who has made possible what has happened in the course of the last three or four months. I was a roughrider in the column of the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay of Llandaff, when she originally raised the South Dakota project. I have no intention of repeating anything that I said on the police Bill, except that I am extremely grateful to her for letting me know, after I remarked in the police Bill proceedings that the South Dakota legislation had been transferred into California, that although the Californian legislation is permissive, the Sacramento experiment is going forward. I am wholly delighted by this turn of events. Having had a very minor part at an earlier stage, I find it very satisfying to see the momentum that has gathered.

My Lords, I am not sure what the correct collective noun is for a group of persuasive Baronesses, but whatever it is, we—the House, and indeed society—are greatly indebted to this particular group of persuasive Baronesses, supported as they have been by the occasional male Member of this House.

I would like to join other noble Lords in congratulating the Government on responding so positively and readily to the proposals to carry forward the pilot scheme and to come forward with a legislative framework to adopt the proposals. These have been pushed very hard by the Mayor of London and, indeed, by London Councils as an organisation. There has been complete unanimity politically in London, and in this House too, about the merits of this scheme.

Coming as I do from a city where, unfortunately, alcohol consumption is particularly high—leading generally to low-level crime and a low level of violence which is nevertheless a disturbing social phenomenon—I am very glad that we are beginning to see an approach here that we hope will make a difference. As has been pointed out, however, an alcohol strategy is still awaited. This is perhaps only a first instalment in what may need to be a major review of how we deal with these problems.

The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay—who has been so much the moving spirit, if I can be forgiven the use of that term, in these matters—mentioned one particular matter: domestic violence. There has been consultation about this, as the noble Baroness rightly said. At a meeting held in May 2011, all the violence-against-women agencies present expressed,

“high levels of concern about this scheme operating in relation to domestic violence”.

They gave as reasons that tackling alcohol in itself,

“does not tackle domestic violence … implies that domestic violence behaviour is driven by alcohol, which is not the case … domestic violence can occur when men are sober”—

or when women are sober, as it is not always one-sided—and,

“implies that physical assault (which is linked with alcohol) is the main/only form of domestic violence”,

as that is not correct either. There was,

“general consensus that the additional elements which would need to be considered for DV”—

domestic violence—

“cases, including risk assessment and support”,

would make the matter very complex.

That is not in any way to derogate from the proposals being made, but it does emphasise the need to look carefully, in the context of the pilot, at what will be run as part of the experiment, and to look very sensitively at the concerns of the organisations that work most closely with women as the principal victims of domestic violence, to see whether this is necessarily the most appropriate way of dealing with those problems.

I certainly have an open mind about that, and I assume that the Government would as well. I am therefore just uttering a word of caution. It should not necessarily be assumed that domestic violence is an appropriate topic for inclusion in a scheme of this kind. It is a matter that needs to be tested. The American experience might be helpful in that respect, of course, but the culture is not necessarily the same here as it is in South Dakota or other parts of the United States. I think that we have to be a little careful about jumping to conclusions.

With that single reservation—it is only a note of caution—I very much endorse the principle and the Government’s amendments. I would also like to endorse what the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, has said about costs. I assume that the Government would cover the cost of pilots as they take place in localities. In local government parlance, this would be a new burden, and the convention is that such new burdens are funded by government. As it is a pilot, it should not be too expensive to run—and ultimately, we hope, the public purse will benefit significantly from any savings that accrue, not least in the health service, where such savings would be extremely desirable. I mean savings not only in financial resources but in the time and skills of staff.

The Opposition strongly support this principle. With that note of caution, we congratulate the Government and look forward to taking matters further. Perhaps I may also ask whether the Minister or her colleagues would be prepared to meet before the pilots are instituted with representatives of the organisations concerned with violence against women to explore their concerns and to see whether, perhaps together, a joint approach might be worked out to test the scheme in practice or to see how it might be modified to reflect the real concerns they have expressed. We certainly support the Government and these amendments.

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and my noble friend Lady Browning for their incredibly kind words to me. However, it is they who have been the doughty fighters who have brought us to this position. I should also like to thank my right honourable friend the Secretary of State, Ken Clarke, for his help in taking forward this innovative idea.

The noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, and the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, mentioned domestic violence, and as both noble Lords emphasised, these are complex issues which require multifaceted approaches. We will need to see how, in tackling the abuse of alcohol, there might be a beneficial effect in this area as well. The provision is not targeted at domestic violence, as noble Lords will appreciate, but we will need to see what we can learn from its possible effects. I would be extremely happy on behalf of the Government to meet the organisations to which the noble Lord referred. I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, expressed an interest as well. I really appreciate that and look forward to taking that further forward. It is extremely important that we discuss what is suggested here with such groups.

We agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Browning, that alcohol treatment is extremely important; as a spokesperson for health, I hope that I can reassure noble Lords that we fully recognise that. I want to reassure the noble Baroness that we believe that the pilots are there so that we can learn from them. We need to learn what works elsewhere and see how it might need to be adapted within our own legal, social and economic situation. However, we are optimistic that these are interesting proposals to take forward.

My noble friend Lord Avebury asked about the funding for the pilots and the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, also flagged that up. Existing resources will be drawn on for some of the work with breathalysers, but the Government are indeed providing funding for the pilots and this will be announced shortly. My noble friend Lord Avebury asked about the areas for conditional caution pilots. I hope he will be pleased to hear that this will be announced in the alcohol strategy next week.

Above all, I thank noble Lords for their support for the government amendments, and especially for the work of the noble Baronesses, Lady Finlay and Lady Browning, and others in bringing us to this point. I look forward to our learning from these pilots.

My Lords, Amendments 152BZZA, 152BZZB and 152BZZC all deal with restorative justice. Restorative justice is one of the areas of good news in the criminal justice system. I should have said—I do so with apologies now—that I have the considerable advantage that the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, supports what I propose in these amendments. Indeed, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Liverpool would also have supported the amendment had he been able to be present today.

The fact is that the benefits of restorative justice are now widely accepted, but its role in the criminal justice system is sadly lacking in statutory recognition. It is essential that it now receives this recognition, and the Bill would be an appropriate vehicle for that recognition to be provided.

In Committee, an amendment before the House sought to give statutory recognition, but the statutory recognition then proposed is very different from what is now being sought. I have to concede that the amendment that was put before the House then was not, even with the skills of the noble Lord, Lord McNally, capable of being tweaked to achieve the purpose needed. Following in the footsteps of the Government in relation to the amendment that we just dealt with, for which the Government should be congratulated on taking such a positive role, the present amendments were drafted at a very late stage at the end of last week. Those amendments followed a similar pattern, although there is a significant difference between restorative justice and the alcohol and monitoring requirements.

The present amendments are to the Criminal Justice Act 2003, which provides the framework for sentencing that is of great importance to courts up and down the land when they come to sentence. In relation to three separate aspects of the statutory provisions they ask no more than that one of the options—one of the menus—that those statutory provisions should include is restorative justice. That is needed, and it is surprisingly lacking.

The amendments would require the Government to take no action and would require them to spend no money, but they would take into account the fact that it has been established as a result of experience that restorative justice has an important part to play in the administration of justice, not only in ensuring that offenders receive the right sentences from the court, but in protecting victims. I would like to stress that aspect of the matter, because the Ministry of Justice, in its admirable consultative paper, Getting it Right for Victims and Witnesses, sets out what a significant role restorative justice can play. Paragraph 114 on page 39 of that document states:

“In partnership with the Home Office we will develop a framework for restorative justice. This will provide guidance to local practitioners and help support them to develop and deliver effective, best practice restorative justice approaches suited to local need”.

That is clearly something that is required. It follows on from the statements in the same publication that in 85 per cent of cases where there has been restorative justice,

“victims who participated in the schemes were satisfied with the experience”.

The document also states that it is estimated that there was a,

“14% reduction in the frequency of re-offending”,

as a consequence of the use of restorative justice.

If the full impact of the amendments now proposed had been delivered in a rather more timely way, there could have been consultation between myself and Ministers so that it could have been explained from the point of view of those who have the task of sentencing in courts just why these amendments are needed and appropriate at this stage. Although the matter was only put down in its current form a late stage, for which I owe the House and the Government an apology, we now have a proposal that fits in with what the Bill is trying to do. I personally can claim very little of the credit for these amendments. They are the product of excellent work by the Prison Reform Trust, of which I declare my position as chairman, the Restorative Justice Council and many others—in particular, Paul Cavadino, whose knowledge in this area is quite outstanding. If the Government cannot accept these amendments today, I urge them to give me and those who support me an opportunity to explain in detail why these amendments are very constructive and have no conceivable downside as far as I can ascertain. I hope the Government will listen and respond to what I have just said.

My Lords, it is clear from our debates in Committee that there is agreement in all parts of the House on the merits of restorative justice and the case for ensuring that it is seen as a central and fundamental part of our criminal justice system. I will make five key points. First, it has a salutary impact on many offenders by bringing home to them the impact of their offence on victims. All too often offenders minimise or simply do not think about the effect of their actions on other people. In a restorative justice process the offender has no alternative but to face up to the impact of his or her offences on those at the receiving end. Secondly, restorative justice gives victims much more satisfaction than other ways of dealing with offenders. A lot of research has been carried out on this point. It is clear that victims who have been through restorative justice express satisfaction with that process. It enables victims to tell their story, express their hurt and receive recognition in a way that no other procedure does. It helps to give victims closure, reduce trauma and reduce their fear about the future. Many victims also feel very positive about being involved in a process which can contribute more effectively to the rehabilitation of the offenders. Thirdly, restorative justice reduces reoffending. I have the Home Office research. It found that it did so by around 14 per cent. The process thereby helps to reduce the number of people in the future who would otherwise have suffered loss, distress, injury or damage as a result of crime. Fourthly, restorative justice saves money. The Restorative Justice Consortium has estimated a cost saving of £185 million over two years based on 70,000 cases and a return of £9 for every £1 spent. Finally, a wider use of restorative justice will help to increase public confidence in sentencing. An ICM poll that was carried out last year found that 88 per cent of people wanted victims to have the opportunity to inform offenders of the harm and distress they have caused.

There were a number of speeches in Committee on this matter so I will not repeat all the arguments in favour but I want to put two or three suggestions to the Minister. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, has tabled these new clauses and I think they require some discussion, even between now and Third Reading. One way is to include restorative justice in the statutory purposes of sentencing. Another is to enable courts to include restorative justice requirements in community orders. Another option that is open is to spell out that courts can use activities to require offenders to take part in restorative justice processes. Any or all of these proposals and approaches would help to keep restorative justice in the minds of sentencers and to achieve the Government’s aim of ensuring that it becomes a central part of the criminal justice system. This is not the time to look at a final outcome but I hope very much that this will open up a discussion with the Government with a view to seeing if they will move on any of these fronts. I support the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, in what he has said.

My Lords, I rise briefly to support the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf. There was an extremely useful conference last week by the Thames Valley Partnership which has been pioneering restorative justice for many years. It was interesting to hear exactly how far the National Offender Management Service has gone in preparing for restorative justice to be administered in every prison and every probation area around the country. Indeed, staff are being trained to do it. In addition, the police have trained the all-important committee supervisors and people who run the committees which make it work. Therefore, it would seem logical if this effort is to be overseen and able to come to fruition that it should be backed up by the statutory recognition in the Bill if at all possible.

My Lords, I strongly support the amendment moved by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf. We are entirely in agreement that restorative justice represents a significant way forward. It is calculated, as the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, said, to save public funds, reduce reoffending rates and prove acceptable to the wider community, which is not as hard-line in these matters of penal policy as sometimes people imagine. Restorative justice has been shown to be welcomed by 80 per cent of the victims who participate in it. That in itself is a testimony to its effectiveness. I hope, therefore, that the Minister will feel able to accept the amendment but, if she is not, I hope that she will undertake to meet the noble and learned Lord and other colleagues before Third Reading to allow a further and final opportunity to discuss the way forward to improving this part of the Bill, recognising that it will contribute to the intentions of the Government.

My Lords, these amendments from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, and my noble friend Lord Dholakia return to the question of restorative justice. The noble Lords have been outstanding exponents of the importance of restorative justice and we appreciate the contribution that they have made in the House, nationally and internationally in this matter. The Government support the principle of restorative justice as part of an effective response to crime. It offers a crucial opportunity, not only to assist in the rehabilitation of offenders by making them face the consequences of their actions and seek to make amends for the damaged inflicted on others, but to give victims a greater stake in the resolution of offences and in the criminal justice system as a whole. Indeed, victim satisfaction rates have been extremely positive. Additional work in this area will enable us to realise the benefits of restorative justice further. We already have encouraging evidence around its impact on reoffending rates and anecdotal evidence that it encourages offenders to seek further necessary interventions, such as drug and alcohol treatment.

As I mentioned in Committee, we are committed to delivering greater use of restorative practices across the criminal justice system and we are putting a great deal of time and effort into building up the capacity of youth offending teams, probation trusts and prisons to provide restorative justice services, investing over £1 million in order to do so. We just heard reference from the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, to the Thames Valley restorative justice partnership. It is developing training materials and guidance for using restorative justice in the adult system as part of our response to more serious offences. Its experience is invaluable.

These amendments take a three-pronged approach to adding restorative justice to the current legislation. The first would make restorative justice a statutory purpose of sentencing alongside the existing purposes of punishment, reduction of crime, rehabilitation, protection of the public and making reparation to offenders, as set out in the Criminal Justice Act 2003. The second would create a new restorative justice requirement for a community order or suspended sentence order, while the third would add the words “restorative justice” to the existing activity requirement.

I thank the noble Baroness for that response and express my gratitude to others who have expressed support for the amendments. I firmly believe that they are an indication of matters that should be undertaken to take restorative justice forward as the noble Baroness just described. After the generous offer that was made for meeting with my noble friend Lord McNally, I am happy to withdraw the amendment.

My Lords, in an earlier debate today the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, said that the two most vulnerable groups in prison are children and women. There is another group that is in many ways the most neglected as well as the most vulnerable, and that is young adults, who are in the halfway house between being children and adults. There is nobody in charge of them—they are lost souls. In the prison system, those in young offender establishments, or the split sites, are poor relations. Most facilities are given to children aged between 15 and 18, under the requirements of the contract let by the Youth Justice Board, and young offenders get what is left, which is frequently not enough to occupy them entirely. Whereas we have a Youth Justice Board concentrating on the needs of children and have had many reports, including that of the noble Baroness, Lady Corston, which we discussed earlier, dealing with women, there is nothing dealing with this group other than the Criminal Justice Alliance and the Transition to Adulthood Alliance, which consists of 13 organisations from the criminal justice, health and youth organisations that have been calling for a long time for something to be done about this.

In Committee, my noble friend Lord Adebowale and I mentioned the problems of this group, but largely in connection with the community. I want to mention that community trials have been going on but also to focus on imprisonment, because in our prison system at the moment young men of this age group are disproportionately represented. At the end of September 2011, there were 8,317 18 to 20 year-olds in prison in England and Wales. The sentenced numbers in this age group have gone up by 30 per cent since 1997. If we extend the age group to 18 to 24, which is frequently done, we find that although that group represents only one in 10 of the population, it represents one in three of those sentenced to imprisonment and of those in the hands of the probation service. They account for one-third of the total social and economic costs of crime to the nation. In other words, this group represents a particular problem within the criminal justice system, which to my mind does not appear to be properly settled, and indeed has not been for some time.

There are very promising signs. In Committee, we mentioned the success of the intensive alternative to custody schemes, which are being piloted and pioneered by the Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire probation trusts. They were tailored to the specific needs of this age group. The probation officers commenting on the schemes said, interestingly, that this was the first time they could remember having any hope of achieving anything on reoffending with this age group because at last there were programmes that were tailored to their needs. That was in stark contrast to comments made by the Chief Inspector of Prisons on young adults in one prison; he said that the young men were “sleeping through their sentences”. Commenting on young offenders in this group as a whole, he said that there was a lack of engagement in work, education and training opportunities across the whole YOI estate.

That cannot be sensible—certainly in terms of tomorrow—because if this group, who are so volatile in criminal activities, are being left to do nothing while they are in the hands of the criminal justice system, it must be a contributor to crime rather than a preventer of it. Commenting on the amendment that I put forward in Committee, the Minister warned that the Government did not have the resources to deliver intensive interventions with or supervision of this age group. I acknowledge that it is expensive. It is not a cheap option to do something with them, but on the other hand I put it to the Government that it is more expensive to do nothing and that we cannot afford that. What should we therefore best do?

Since Committee, I have had extremely productive meetings with the Minister, the Prisons Minister and Simon Boddis, who is the official in NOMS responsible for devising and introducing offender programmes—and who had the good fortune to be my principal psychologist when I was Chief Inspector of Prisons. I must admit that I have been encouraged by much of what I heard about what is going on, in areas such as the introduction of work and drug and alcohol treatment programmes. I have to admit, however, that I am concerned by the apparent overfocusing on payment by results, because I am uncertain whether payment by results really works when measuring reconviction. Who is responsible or not responsible for preventing reconviction? You really do not know which factor, which programme or which event it is, therefore how can you know exactly who qualifies for payment?

Yet in order even to have a payment-by-results regime, you have to have a structure in which it is conducted. What I do not see in the whole NOMS structure, as I have said on many other aspects of the system, is anyone in charge or being responsible for overseeing the programmes. Here you have a perfect example of the intensive alternatives to custody scheme in one part of the system. Why should that not be adopted in the other, and if it is all happening in NOMS, why should somebody not be driving it? If that happened, and if somebody was really focusing on the whole problem, the identification of what is needed and what can be done would be much sharper, and the expenses would become much clearer. Sensible planning would therefore be easier.

My Lords, in supporting this amendment, briefly, I very much agree with what the noble Lord has just said: that it is a halfway step. Yet better a halfway step than no step at all. I shall make two observations. I had the privilege for nine years of being the president of YMCA in England. I was particularly impressed by the work that it was doing with young people in prisons and detention centres. During that period, I became very concerned about exactly what preoccupies the noble Lord. It is almost as though we were deliberately building the foundations for a wasted and inadequate life, with future social costs and disruption, reoffending and the rest.

We know that society is becoming increasingly competitive and that it has huge pressures for the young. I say not simply on moral grounds, which I feel strongly about, but on the economic grounds that make absolute sense for the future of the country’s economy. To avoid the future expense of things going wrong repeatedly, and if we have any sense at all about rehabilitation and any commitment to it, these years are crucial. It is the very time that people are on the threshold of life, and they need to be equipped to face it. I make a personal plea to your Lordships: just think of our own families and of our own children and grandchildren in this age group. Think of the turmoil that they are faced with and the support that they need to sort out their lives for the future. Why are we ready to abandon these inadequate, neglected people to a system in which they are not getting any kind of support of that sort? I thank the noble Lord for having introduced the amendment, and I am glad to support it.

My Lords, what the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, has outlined as a beginning is a very important thought for the Minister. I hope that he will be able to adopt it. We all know what goes on in prisons with young people. We all know, and now all pretty well agree, that, early intervention, even in a prison situation, but preferably even earlier so that that does not happen, will in the long run save money. The flexible way in which what is proposed has been outlined allows the Minister to organise it in such a way that it can take account of the actual age of the individual. That will be a very good step in the right direction, whether or not it can be written into law. We have plenty of things to try to add to the law in addition to the ones on the agenda. I hope that it will be taken very seriously and that practical steps will be taken.

My Lords, I rise very briefly to endorse every word that the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, has said. How much it resonated with me. The older end of YOIs are famously inadequate and have been so for some time, no doubt partly because they are also a famously difficult group. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, highlighted the fact that these are very often young people in transition. Transitions are difficult and absolutely awful to go through. I have always said that I am never off my knees in gratitude that I will never have to be a teenager again. There is merit in the idea that they could be, as it were, somehow incorporated—that, if the arms of the YJB became wide enough, they could encompass them in some way. I am not entirely sure how much the YJB is in favour of such a proposition, but maybe there are ways of choreographing that. However, I have simply risen to say that the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, has put his finger on a very real and challenging problem.

The other day, I was visiting Merseyside Probation Trust, which is doing an incredible range of first-class work. Its IACs—intensive alternatives to custody—are particularly impressive. I spent some time with one girl who had been through it. She had form like you had never seen and she came singing the praises of the person from the probation service who had been working with her through this process. It was truly worth while in that case. Maybe it is very expensive—it is certainly very time intensive—but it is something that I, along with what the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, want to endorse.

My Lords, as I sit as a magistrate in both the youth and adult courts, I make one simple point. In the youth courts, we routinely say to youths, “You must behave. If you do not behave, you may come back to the adult court and of course that is a much more serious matter.” What we do not tell them is that the reason that it is a much more serious matter is because there is much less support for them in the adult court system. Everything that the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, said is absolutely right. We see a huge, disproportionate, number of young men from 18 to 24 years old. There are attendance centres, which do good work. I have been to a number. However, it is very minimal compared with the support that this group needs.

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, has identified very clearly the nature of the problem and has come forward with proposals to help deal with it. He made a number of points that are very telling. Perhaps a couple of other matters could be added to the issues he referred to. The first is perhaps implicit in what he was saying: the very high reoffending rates among this particular group. The second, and slightly different, point is that there is a disproportionate number of young offenders from black and minority ethnic backgrounds, which is an aspect that we have not much discussed in the course of the Bill. It is not a function of any greater criminality among that group. All the evidences suggest that, for whatever reason, the likelihood of a custodial sentence—or, for that matter, a refusal of bail at an earlier stage—is much greater for people from that group, compared to offenders with comparable offences. There seems to be an in-built bias against BME offenders, which is a matter that needs to be addressed. The other issue is what happens after certain custodial sentences are completed because, after short sentences there is, effectively, no follow-up. That is a significant contributor to the high reoffending rates.

I hope that this proposal—that there should be a requirement to produce a strategy for offenders in this group—commends itself to the Minister. The phrasing of the amendment is perhaps a little difficult in terms of what might be appropriate for statute. However, the principles that the noble Lord has advanced are surely ones that would commend themselves to the Minister. Again, I hope that he can either indicate policy acceptance of the thrust of the amendment or agree that he will consult further with the noble Lord, maybe with a view to bringing back at Third Reading something to meet the common objectives of the Government and Members of your Lordships’ House. Certainly, I would support the noble Lord’s aspirations in this respect.

My Lords, we keep coming round to these amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. As he said, we have had debates in this House and bilateral meetings about them. There is a certain disagreement. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, seems to think—and I am sure that this will provoke him to get to his feet to say that I have got it wrong—that we have to have a strategy and a command structure and, after that, all will be well. I am old fashioned enough to believe that the buck stops with the Minister. The constant desire to have strategies is not a real substitute for doing things.

Having said that, I said earlier today that you do not have to be in this job long before you realise that we have too many women in our prisons. Neither do you have to be in this job very long to see that the 18 to 24 year-old age group among males is a key area for criminal behaviour. Therefore, we have to think very hard about how we break this cycle of criminality. The noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, acknowledges that this is a difficult group. I cannot quite agree with her about regretting that she is no longer a teenager. I would like to be a teenager again, but knowing what I know now. It is a pity that life does not give you that particular deal.

Does the noble Lord want to revert to membership of the young socialists a little bit?

I said that if I knew then—let me get back to the speech. The noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham and the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, acknowledged that the group we are discussing is a difficult one but that many of the ideas for dealing with it are extremely expensive. We are trying to deal with it but the Government’s view is that it is not appropriate to prescribe in detail from the centre processes which purport to improve outcomes. Such a way of working would lead to inflexibility and take up resources which are better deployed elsewhere. We are looking wherever possible to empower local decision-making and delivery by prison and probation trusts so that they use resources in a way that responds to local priorities. That also fits with our policy for the management of young adult offenders as individuals based on an assessment of risks and needs rather than their age.

My Lords, I expected that response. However, I remind the Minister that I have worked in Whitehall for many years. I do not disagree with him about Ministers being responsible; of course they are, but the question is how do they exercise that responsibility? They cannot do it on a 24 hour, seven days a week basis because they have many other things to do. Therefore, they need a structure to help them do it. The noble Lord referred to a command structure. You can call it what you like but it is a matter of people being responsible and accountable to a Minister for making certain that what the Minister wants to happen does happen. That happens everywhere—in schools, hospitals, businesses and the Armed Forces, but it does not seem to happen in the Prison Service.

I am very concerned about disseminating all responsibility down to the local level. I have said many times in this House that two things are involved in this. One is the question of what should be done, which is the central responsibility, but how it is done is the local responsibility. If you get that the wrong way round and nothing but “how?” comes out from the centre at the top and all the “what” is left down below in the local areas, you get confusion. People in the local areas need to know what they have to do. They should be allowed to disburse their resources locally as there will be different needs in different areas. That again seems to me common sense because unless you have a “what?” coming down, nobody knows where they are going. I have spoken to the chairman of the Youth Justice Board, and I understand that that body would be more than happy to tackle this measure. However, the chairman made the point that she did not want the youth offending teams involved in working with this age group. I accept that entirely. However, the success of the intensive schemes pioneered by the probation service shows that it is taking a keen interest in this group, and I see no reason to interrupt that. Therefore, it seems to me that the framework is there.

The Minister mentioned that a lot of things are going on but was not very specific. In the same spirit in which we have met to talk about many issues after Committee, can we meet to discuss this matter as it is far too important just to be left in the air at half past eight at night without, frankly, it being completely clear? I understand what he says about payment by results.

I am very willing to meet. The noble Lord knows how much I value his experience, expertise and commitment in this area. I am happy to meet him to discuss this matter as often as he likes. However, later this week I will be sitting down with ministerial colleagues to discuss a detailed report on the various areas of MoJ business with the civil servants with direct line responsibility for them. We will have gone through policy areas and will be looking at various policy outcomes. The idea that somehow the National Offender Management Service is drifting somewhere outside ministerial control or accountability or that it is not being set various tasks and responsibilities is just not true.

On the other side, as has been acknowledged, we are dealing with very difficult and straitened times. The resources available to target this area are extremely limited. We shall see whether we can involve payment by results as one way of getting good results and resources into this area. We do not doubt the problem. I am very willing to continue to have discussions with the noble Lord, but I do not want to give him any false hope that we can go down this way in this Bill.

I thank the Minister for that reply. In no way am I seeking to interfere; I am merely seeking to ensure that our commitment to this very important problem is properly recognised because we wish to share everything that he has shared with us that has come up from below to ensure that due account is given when we get an opportunity to do so.

I am not going to talk about payment by results because, as the Minister says, this is early days and the Government have set their sights on it; they have pilot schemes in place and we shall know more. It is premature to take more than that, other than to reflect concerns that are being reflected to me by people who have to operate it on the ground, particularly the small voluntary organisations which operate in this area and which are finding it enormously difficult to survive. In view of the fact that there is so much to play for in this area, it would be sensible to continue the dialogue. Therefore, I wish to withdraw the amendment.

My Lords, this group of amendments would remove the Government’s proposed amendments to the Bail Act 1976. The Government’s amendments remove certain exceptions to the presumption that bail should be granted to a defendant. Currently, bail can be withheld if judges or magistrates believe that the defendant will commit offences on bail, not turn up for subsequent court hearings, or interfere with witnesses. The Government seek to replace that with a no real prospect of custody test to make it far more likely that low-level offenders will get bail. Of course, currently the vast majority of low-level offenders already get bail.

The Government’s proposed changes are poorly thought through and could, in some cases, have the reverse effect to the one they intend. I understand that they are motivated by looking at the statistics of those who have received community sentences after they had been remanded in custody and then convicted at trial. They believe, in my view wrongly, that they will reduce costs by reducing the number of people who were originally remanded in custody.

I have come up with three practical examples which I believe will undermine the object of the Government’s proposed changes and the premise on which they are based. My first example is that of a sentencing bench. A sentencing bench sits and decides to give a community sentence where a defendant has previously been remanded in custody before trial. The sentencing court will know that, if it gives a prison sentence for a low-level but imprisonable offence, it is very likely that the defendant will walk free on the day of the trial or very shortly afterwards.

However, if the sentencing bench gives a community sentence, there is an opportunity for ongoing intervention by the probation service either through a tailored programme for drug rehabilitation, unpaid work or any of a number of courses that they can make. Of course, it is true that a court will be much better informed when it is giving a sentence than when it is making a decision about bail. I believe that it is misleading—and the Government are misleading themselves when they do so—to look at the bald figures of those who have been remanded in custody and those given community sentences.

My second example is of interfering with witnesses. I acknowledge that in another place an exception has been made in the context of domestic violence. I also accept the point made by the noble Lord in Committee when he said that interfering with witnesses is an offence. However, what about this following scenario: a neighbourhood dispute in which a bailed defendant is accused of interfering with witnesses and pleads not guilty? Of course, there will need to be a trial on the matter, but in the mean time the question of bail arises again. Surely the Government cannot be saying that the court cannot take into account a previous conviction of interfering with witnesses. That absolutely undermines everything that they are saying about putting victims at the heart of the criminal justice system. I find it impossible to imagine that they really intend that very real scenario.

My Lords, I will comment briefly. My noble friend Lord Ponsonby made a good point. The question is whether the Bail Act 1976, which as he said has worked pretty well in a practical way at various levels—although no one would claim that it is perfect—needs to be changed by what appears at first blush to be a rather superficial alteration.

I am concerned about the matters raised by my noble friend, to which I hope the Minister will respond tonight, and about the prospect of a custody test and the expectation that a defendant will be given if he is granted bail on the basis that he will not receive a custodial sentence, because it may become absolutely apparent at the time of sentence, for whatever reason—and anyone who has been in a court knows that the facts sometimes do not emerge until very late on—that although the defendant’s expectation is that he will not get a custodial sentence, the court would not be doing its duty unless it gave him one.

The expectation that someone will have once they have been given bail is that they will not—to use common parlance—go down. In my view that is the wrong way around. Magistrates’ courts or Crown Courts should have the discretion that they enjoyed under the Bail Act 1976 to do what they consider to be right in the circumstances, subject to the terms of the Act. Therefore, my view is that the case for change has not been made, and that what is proposed is very superficial.

I wonder whether one reason why the Magistrates’ Association found itself alone on this is that most other penal reform organisations welcomed a proposal that will prevent people being sent to jail. One of the big arguments that we have had about the inexorable rise in our prison population over recent decades is over whether as a society we are too quick to send people to jail. The no real prospect of custody test simply asks, “If you are not going to imprison a defendant if he is convicted, why should you be able to do so before he has been tried?”.

The noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby, tabled amendments that would remove the no real prospect of custody test from some, although not all, of the places in Schedule 11 where it appears. Amendment 152JA would remove the amendment to Section 7 of the Bail Act, which applies to the test to bailed defendants who have been arrested for absconding or breaking their bail conditions. Amendment 152JD would remove the amendment that applies the test to defendants who have committed offences that merit summary imprisonment. However, for some reason the paragraph in Schedule 11 that introduces the no real prospect test for indictable offences is left undisturbed. Amendment 152DA removes the definition of custodial sentences that is relevant to the no real prospect test, but Amendment 152JB appears to remove a consequential amendment that is not directly related to the test.

The noble Lord spoke of the risks to the safety of the public, but how much of a risk is a defendant for whom it can be said that there is no real prospect of custody? We also heard about intimidation. However, as we mentioned, intimidating witnesses is an offence in its own right that is not only imprisonable but likely to result in a custodial sentence. A defendant who is not facing custody for their original offence would be foolish to put themselves at risk of receiving a far more serious sentence by trying to interfere with a witness.

We recognise that special considerations may apply where the circumstances of the offence suggest that there may be a risk of domestic violence. That is why we have included an exception designed to protect those who might be vulnerable in this way. This exception in new paragraph 15 of Schedule 11 would in fact be removed by Amendment 152JC. I do not understand why.

The noble Lord asked me a number of specific questions about the August riots, curfews and the need for sufficient information to be given. It would be fun for me to try to reel off answers from the Dispatch Box, but it would be better, and certainly safer for me, if I wrote to the noble Lord and made that reply available in the Library of the House. He can then contemplate what he will do at Third Reading.

I am not sure that the Magistrates’ Association is on the right path here. We think this is a sensible proposal for keeping people out of prison when it is not strictly necessary for them to be there. I will try to give the noble Lord answers to his questions, but in the mean time I ask him to withdraw his amendments.

I thank the Minister for that response. I make the point that the Magistrates’ Association and every magistrate I have ever sat with do not want to put people in custody, and the whole purpose of my speech was to point out inconsistencies and a lack of clarity in these proposed changes. Nevertheless, I thank the Minister for offering to respond to my specific questions, and I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

My Lords, I start by seeking to degroup Amendment 153 from the other two amendments in the group.

Amendment 153 concerns the 41 prisoners who are currently serving whole life sentences in England and Wales. Before the Criminal Justice Act 2003, these prisoners would have had their sentences reviewed by the Home Secretary after 25 years. If they had made exceptional progress and there was no other reason for keeping them in prison, the Home Secretary would consider them for release on licence. There was never any question of automatic release. Each case was considered on its own merits. Some were released on licence; some were not.

What I have just described was the settled practice of successive Home Secretaries for many years. It was a humane practice since it gave whole life prisoners the same hope of a review as other life prisoners. When the 2003 Act was going through Parliament this settled practice was somehow overlooked. There is no evidence that it was overlooked on purpose. It was not a deliberate omission. The purpose of this amendment is to restore the position to what it was before 2003, except that the review would be carried out not by the Home Secretary but by the Parole Board. The reason for that is that the Home Secretary no longer has any function in relation to sentencing except the power to release a prisoner on compassionate grounds, a power which has never been exercised.

My Lords, I support the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd. All he wants to do in the amendment, as I understand it, is to go back to the pre-2003 position. Because of judgments of the European Court, the Home Secretary is not able to take such a decision, but successive Home Secretaries have not been willing to give this kind of decision to the Parole Board, as envisaged in the noble and learned Lord’s amendment.

I believe that the present position is untenable. The noble and learned Lord referred to the case of Vinter, in which it was decided—by a majority of four to three, a tiny majority—that this was not an inhumane process. I do not always have the greatest confidence in this court, which is not a very happy court to be in. When I appeared before it as an attorney, you had half an hour. Your opponent had half an hour in which to reply. You might have had a few minutes to say a few more words but the court would file out having heard the argument and not have any exchange whatever with counsel or carry the matter any further. A few months later you would have a decision.

As I understand it, this matter will undoubtedly go to an appeal. It will be considered by a court of five and the Government may lose. In all probability, it may then go, if leave is given, to the Grand Chamber and the Government may lose. With these tiny votes and these tiny majorities, one cannot be sure what will happen in this court. The Government will be in a very difficult position and will undoubtedly have to take action.

Without any further words, I believe that the present position is not compassionate, is not human and is not in the interests of justice, whatever that may mean. Surely to leave an individual in this kind of limbo, which he was not left in previous to 2003, is not a practice that would commend itself to the civilised world. I therefore support the amendment.

My Lords, I have added my name to this amendment so persuasively moved by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick. We are here concerned with the most awful cases of murder but, as your Lordships have heard, prior to 2003 such cases were reviewed after 25 years. There is no suggestion that that gave rise to any difficulty or any problems at all. The argument for the amendment is very simple. It is simply wrong in principle for anyone, however wicked, to be told that they must spend the whole of their life in prison with no possibility of review, however long is going to elapse and whatever progress they may make.

It is unlikely that a murderer who has committed such grave crimes that he has received a whole-life tariff will ever make the progress that would make release appropriate, but the point surely is that basic humanity demands that the offender has a chance, however remote, to prove to others and to himself that he can live a worthwhile life. It is surely also very unfortunate from the point of view of prison administration that a group of highly dangerous persons —that is, dangerous when they are sentenced—should be told that however well they behave they will never be released. Surely that makes our prisons much more dangerous places.

I have no confidence that the Minister will tell the House this evening that he will accept this amendment. I very much hope that he will but I have no confidence that he will in the light of what he said in Committee. However, I urge him to ask himself whether our penal regime should really be based on a principle of locking the prison door and throwing away the key.

My Lords, it takes a good deal of cheek for me, as a lay man, to come in after three speeches like that. All I can say is that in the society in which I want to live, no matter how heinous or terrible the crime that has been committed—clearly, these crimes are about terrible things that have happened—that society should be based on the principle of hope of redemption and hope that even the worst offender can become a better and decent person, otherwise it has a very negative culture that undermines a lot more than simply the issue of the prisoner himself. It is about the values and self-confidence of society as a whole. It is high time that this situation was put right. I am very privileged as a lay man to support these well qualified views that we have just heard. I hope that the Minister will take them seriously.

My Lords, I can be very brief because the speeches that have been made set out the case very well indeed. Proper caution has been taken in the way in which the amendment has been worded. We all know that the people whom we are talking about have committed the most terrible offences and in many cases—in practically every case, I suggest—it may well be, given the caution included in the wording of the proposed new clause, that these people will stay in prison for the rest of their lives. All that the noble and learned Lord is asking, as a matter of principle, is that for anyone after they have served—this is the caution— 30 years of a sentence,

“it shall be the duty of the Secretary of State, after consulting the Lord Chief Justice”—

of the day, presumably—

“and the trial judge if available, to refer the case to the Parole Board”.

Surely we have trust and faith in the Parole Board. The Parole Board has to be satisfied that,

“it is no longer necessary for the protection of the public that the prisoner should be confined, and … that in all the circumstances the release of the prisoner on licence would be in the interests of justice”.

My argument is that the Parole Board has to make hard findings in any case, particularly in cases of this kind. Even if the Parole Board is satisfied on these matters, the amendment says only that it “may direct his release under this section”.

The amendment is extremely cautious, but it is humane, in the way that has been described, for people who sometimes may seem not to deserve the protection of a humane state. However, we live in one, and surely the point of the penal policy is for it to be humane when it can be.

I listened carefully to what the Minister said in response to this matter in Committee and it seemed to me then that the Government’s real case is—I put it crudely—that the Daily Mail would not like it. If that is really the level of the argument that the Minister is going to put again today, it is quite unsatisfactory for a matter of principle of this kind. I hope that, if the Minister opposes the amendment, he will find a better argument than that.

My Lords, the better argument is that if I accepted the amendment, the Labour Party would, as it has done on most law and order issues over the past 20 years, try to outbid the hard right to the right. If the noble Lord is announcing a new Labour Party policy on this issue, I shall give way. No, he is not, so let us not go too far down that road.

I acknowledge that this is a cautious amendment. We have heard from some very distinguished and learned Members of the House and I shall not try to match them in legal skills. However, I have been around politics for quite a few years and, in many ways, one has to make political judgments. If we had been debating this in the 1960s along with Sydney Silverman or in the 1970s with Roy Jenkins, we might have found a political atmosphere in which to discuss these issues. Sadly, things have moved on since then and if you are a legal reformer like me you try to make progress where you can.

Part 3 of the Bill carries us forward significantly in two areas of legal reform: reform of IPPs, which we will be discussing later, and the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act. I believe that those are worthwhile measures. I do not think that we are in a position at the moment to move as far as this amendment suggests, cautious though that may be in rational terms. Just as there are passionate arguments about the possibility of ultimate rehabilitation for even the most dangerous offenders, there are equally passionate arguments that there are some prisoners who should never be released under any circumstances. Both views were reflected in the debate in Committee. I do not think that we are in a position—never mind the opinion of the other place—to carry public opinion with us on this matter.

My Lords, I do not find that response in any way satisfactory. What single reason has the noble Lord for supposing that the public would not accept this amendment, just as they accepted the position before 2003? There was no problem then, so why should there be a problem now, unless it is a problem that has been specifically created by two political parties, each of which is trying to be tougher on crime than the other? That is the political judgment that the noble Lord has made and it has nothing to do with the justice of this amendment or restoring to these people the expectation that they had before 2003. I have no hope of persuading the noble Lord or his party, but I intend to test the opinion of the House, because this is something that should have been accepted by both political parties.

As the House will remember, Clause 117 provides that if a person has been convicted of a listed offence for which he has been sentenced to 10 years or more and then commits a further offence for which he might expect at least a 10-year sentence in prison, then he “must” be sentenced to life imprisonment unless it would be unjust to do so.

I described this clause in Committee as being pointless and indeed it is, but I now suggest that it is worse than pointless. In Committee, the Minister described the clause as introducing a new mandatory life sentence, and he placed particular emphasis on “mandatory” to show, no doubt, that the Government in this respect are being tough on crime. But a mandatory sentence is one that the court is obliged to pass, like the mandatory sentence of life imprisonment for murder. This clause is quite different from that.

Despite the use of “must”, the clause recognises that the judge will in fact pass the sentence which, in the particular circumstances, he believes to be the just sentence. That is exactly what judges always do when sentencing. Why then do the Government persist in calling it a mandatory sentence? It cannot surely be in order to create some sort of presumption that a life sentence should be passed. How would the judge begin to know what weight to give to such a presumption? Calling it a mandatory life sentence and the use of “must” in the light of the judge’s ability to pass the sentence he believes to be just is simply a contradiction in terms. To create contradictions in terms in all legislation is a mistake, particularly in legislation of a criminal kind which has to be interpreted by the courts. What the clause could have said was that the court “may” pass a life sentence in these circumstances. That would at least serve some purpose because it would cover those rare cases where the second offence does not carry with it a life sentence as its maximum. As it is, the clause is not only pointless for the reasons I have gone into but it is also ambiguous.

I have one other point. Do we want to create more life sentences? I look round to see if the noble Baroness, Lady Stern, is here and I do not thinks she is, so I will make the points which I know she would have made. She quoted what are on any view some very surprising figures that we have in England and Wales 7,663 persons serving life sentences. The figures, which have been provided by the Council of Europe, show that, whereas we have 12 lifers for 100,000 members of the population, for France the proportion is 0.85 per cent, for Germany it is 2.4 per cent, for the Netherlands it is 0.14 per cent, and for Sweden it is just over 1 per cent. The conclusion from these figures is inevitable. We have far too many prisoners serving life sentences when a long determinate sentence would do just as well. As for deterrence, it is very fanciful to suppose that a prisoner having served 10 years already would be deterred by the prospect of a life sentence rather than a long deterrent sentence and decide thereafter to go straight.

As for Amendment 157, we have a new Clause 134 which creates an offence of threatening with a knife. It too carries a mandatory sentence and, as such, suffers from all the defects which I have already mentioned in the earlier debate. It is even more pointless for the reason that we already have an offence of carrying a knife in a public place under the Criminal Justice Act 1988. It carries a maximum sentence of four years. In 2003 the Court of Appeal issued guidelines in which it said that if the knife was used to threaten, then the sentence should be towards the upper end of the scale. What, then, can be the purpose of now creating a new offence of threatening with a knife, carrying the same maximum sentence of four years? Clause 134 is exactly covered by the existing legislation. Its only purpose I can see is, as I have said before, to give the impression that the Government are doing something about knife crime. If they think that, then they deceive themselves. The only way to do anything about knife crime, as I mentioned in Committee, is to do what has been done in Glasgow and that is to get in among the gangs who use these knives. There, knife crime has been reduced by an astonishing 82 per cent. That is the way to reduce knife crime, not cluttering up the statute book with unnecessary provisions such as this. I beg to move.

My Lords, a concern expressed by some noble Lords in Committee seemed to be that the new mandatory life sentence would be pointless—a word that the noble and learned Lord used several times—because courts will not have to apply it if it would be unjust to do so. It is right to say that the court will retain a discretion not to impose the new mandatory life sentence when the particular circumstances of the offence or the offender would make it unjust to do so. But that is very far indeed from meaning that the sentence is pointless. Save for murder, all mandatory sentence requirements on the statute book contain an exception of this kind. It is done so that mandatory sentence requirements will be compatible with human rights, and to prevent arbitrary sentencing, which cannot take any account of specific and individual circumstances. It is clearly not a permission or excuse for the court to do away with the mandatory sentence requirement. We expect that in the majority of cases the exception will not be engaged at all.

Last summer we made a commitment to introduce a tougher determinate sentencing regime to replace IPPs. A key element of that regime is mandatory life sentences for the most serious repeat offenders. The mandatory sentence requirement in Clause 117 will ensure that the worst repeat sexual and violent offenders receive a life sentence.

Amendment 157 would remove Clause 134, a new knife offence, from the Bill. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, argued in Committee that the two new offences in Clause 134 are adequately covered by existing legislation and that, therefore, there is no reason for creating them. It is true that unlawful possession of a knife or offensive weapon is already a serious criminal offence which carries a maximum custodial sentence of four years. The intention of Clause 134 is to strengthen this existing legislative framework by targeting behaviour that amounts to more than simple possession but does not go so far as resulting in injury to the victim. The new offence will complement the existing offences of possession, which deal with those who carry offensive weapons or bladed or pointed articles in public places or schools without lawful authority, or reasonable excuse or good reason. It will do so by targeting behaviour that goes beyond possession, specifically targeting instances where an individual brandishes a knife or weapon, threatening another and placing them at immediate risk of serious physical harm. We want to send a strong message that this type of behaviour will not be tolerated. The minimum sentence attached to the new offence drives home the point that this kind of behaviour is extremely serious, even if it does not carry through into causing actual physical harm. Indeed, threatening people and placing them in fear of serious physical harm is serious enough that people should expect to face custody if they act in this way.

I know that the noble and learned Lord is particularly concerned about the minimum sentence for 16 and 17 year-olds contained in the new offences. I understand his concern, but in the other place my right honourable friend the Lord Chancellor made it clear at Third Reading that the Government had listened carefully to the arguments made in support of extending a minimum custodial sentence to all those under 18. The Government had then decided, on balance, that it would be appropriate to extend the minimum sentence to the narrower group of 16 and 17 year-olds who commit these offences. The Government have not made the decision to create these offences lightly, but consider it appropriate to have minimum sentences set out in legislation when a particular offence demands a firm and unequivocal response.

The Government cannot accept this amendment. To do so would undermine the strong message sent by this clause. We need this to complement the much wider range of initiatives we have in place to address problems posed by people who unlawfully carry or use knives in our communities. We believe that, in respect of 16 and 17 year-olds, Clause 134 strikes the right balance. I urge the noble and learned Lord to withdraw his amendment, and that this clause and Clause 134 should remain in the Bill.

My Lords, the noble Lord has not explained how a life sentence in the first amendment could in reality act as any greater deterrent than a second long determinate sentence. Nor has he dealt or attempted to deal with the astonishing figures that I mentioned, which show that we seem to have a thirst for creating life sentences that is entirely unique to the United Kingdom. It is not seen anywhere else in Europe. Nor, coming to the second amendment, has he explained why it is necessary to have another offence covering exactly the same ground as the existing offence. Of course it may be limited to handling a knife, but it is not confined to handling and clearly covers threatening, which is now given a new offence with exactly the same maximum sentence. However, I see that the Government cannot be persuaded, and therefore I must beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

My Lords, Clauses 118 and 119 deal with the new extended sentence and release on licence matters. I do not question the Government’s intention in what they are trying to achieve, but I do question the discrepancy that these clauses would create. My amendments would give the courts discretion over the release date of offenders given extended sentences. In appropriate cases, courts would be able to retain the current position whereby prisoners serving extended sentences are released after half the sentence. In other cases, where the court considered it necessary, it could specify that the offender will not be released until he or she has served two-thirds of the sentence.

At present, prisoners serving determinate sentences are released on licence after serving half the sentence in custody. This also currently applies to offenders serving extended sentences. Up to now, the point of an extended sentence has not been to increase the period which offenders spend in custody. Extended sentences are currently intended to make sure that when offenders who pose a risk to the public are released, they are subject to a longer period than usual of post-release supervision on licence. This means that they are subject to restrictive conditions and controls at the same time as receiving constructive rehabilitative help from the probation service. If offenders breach the conditions of their licence, they can be recalled to prison. This is a very useful provision which means that society maintains control over these offenders’ behaviour for a long period. However, the Bill would increase the time which an offender given an extended sentence spends in prison by stipulating that all extended sentence prisoners will not be released until the two-thirds point of their sentence.

When we debated this matter in Committee on 9 February, my noble friend Lord McNally explained the Government’s view that this would be appropriate for some prisoners who would now be given IPP sentences. However, the change in the Bill will not apply only to offenders who would now receive an IPP sentence. It will also apply to people who would currently receive an extended sentence. In future, these offenders will also have to serve longer in custody if this provision in the Bill remains unchanged. The Government have produced no explanation to demonstrate why it is necessary to change the rules for prisoners of the type who would now receive an extended sentence.

As the Bill stands, a court wishing to impose an extended period of post-release supervision will be able to do so in future only if it passes a sentence which also increases the length of time spent in custody before release to two-thirds of the sentence. If a judge does not want to increase the time that the offender spends in prison but simply wants to make sure that he or she has an extended period of supervision on release, why should he not be able to order this as he can under the current provisions for extended sentences?

When I moved a similar amendment in Committee on 9 February, my noble friend Lord McNally said:

“I listened to my noble friend’s idea about discretion … I will ponder this one between now and Report”.— [Official Report, 9/2/12; col. 467.]

That is the stage we have reached. These amendments give my noble friend the opportunity to let us know the result of his thinking on my suggestion. I beg to move.

My Lords, I was teased earlier in the day about my Labour and trade union past. One quote that sticks in my mind is from the great TUC general secretary George Woodcock, who once said that good trade unionism is a serious of squalid compromises. Sometimes law reform or criminal justice reform is a series of compromises. The noble Lord, Lord Bach, shakes his head. Of course it is. We have to carry Parliament with us, we have to carry the various parts of the coalition Government with us, and we have to carry public opinion with us. Reflecting on my noble friend’s amendment, when we announced our decision to reform the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act, one of the campaigning groups rang up and said, “But you have not gone as far as Labour promised in their 2002 White Paper”. That is true, but we were reforming the Act for the first time in 37 years. Labour had talked big and done nothing.

A key element of our IPP replacement regime is the new extended determinate sentence for dangerous offenders. On this sentence, the offender will always serve at least two-thirds of the custodial term in prison. In the most serious cases early release will be at Parole Board discretion. This means that offenders stay inside until the end of that term. My noble friend has proposed that the court should have a discretion as to whether the minimum time in prison offenders on the new extended sentence should serve is one-half or two-thirds of the custodial term. He has explained that one of his key concerns is that there should be an appropriately long licence for the offender without the need to increase the period spent in prison. I have written to my noble friend to address the point regarding the licence.

The new extended licence consists of a custodial term set by the court, during which—or at the end of which—release will occur. This must then be followed by an extended period of licence, which is also set by the court, and may be up to five years in length for a violent offence and eight years in length for a sexual offence. The courts will base the custodial term on seriousness and factors relevant to that. The extended licence period will address risk. As the proposals stand, the court should be able to impose a sentence that will require a suitably long period of licence regardless of when during the custodial term the offender is released. Therefore, I do not think there is a problem with licence, but if there were I am not sure that this amendment would be the solution. It would be entirely possible for a serious offender to remain in prison until the end of the custodial term regardless of the point at which he becomes eligible for parole.

I also note that this would be a new decision for judges, and it is not clear on what basis they would make it. Seriousness and risk management are already addressed by the decisions the court will already make in relation to the sentence. Asking them to decide additionally between different sentence formats would seem to make this a very complex sentencing decision.

Finally, as I have said before, in June last year the Government committed to introducing a tougher determinate sentencing regime to replace IPPs. A key part of that tougher regime is that those on public protection sentences, now that they are no longer liable to receive IPP sentences, will spend more of their determinate sentence in prison. We think this is needed to enhance public protection and deliver public confidence. It will provide more time for offenders and the National Offender Management Service to work towards rehabilitation. I know that my noble friend and his friends in NACRO will continue to campaign on these issues and it is right that they should do so. However, I hope that my noble friend will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his explanation. I am delighted with the information he has given. It is always nice to niggle him from time to time so that we can hear some lovely anecdotes. As long as he keeps bashing the Labour Party, I have no reason not to withdraw the amendment.