New Clause 6
Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Bill [Lords]
9:30 am
Henry Bellingham (Shadow Minister, Constitutional Affairs; North West Norfolk, Conservative)
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
We now move from the slightly racy subject of uniforms to a more arcane and lugubrious matter—judicial review. Nevertheless, it is important. The new clause states:
“The actions and decisions of private companies and their agents”—
it remains to be seen whether they will be wearing uniforms—
“enforcing the orders of the courts shall be reviewable in the High Court.”
The reason for the new clause is simple: when enforcement is undertaken by agents employeddirectly by the courts, Crown agents or Her Majesty’s Government, the actions and decisions of the court and agent in question are reviewable by the High Court. Having researched that matter, I am virtually certain that I am correct in saying that. At all times their actions can be subject to judicial review.
On the other hand, when enforcement is undertaken by a private company and its agents, which happens a lot, their actions might well not be reviewable by the High Court. I am particularly concerned about arecent case: Heather and others v. Leonard Cheshire Foundation heard by the Court of Appeal in 2002. As I understand it, that case is still on appeal to the House of Lords. What happened was that elderly people were placed in the care of the Leonard Cheshire Foundation by the local authority. The Court of Appeal found that if they had been placed in a local authority homethey would have had the protection of the courtfrom unreasonable or perverse actions and decisions. However, the Court of Appeal ruled that they could not make use of those rights of protection from the court because they were in an independent, private home.
There is a substantial concern that if that rulingis upheld and applied across the board to private organisations and operations of all kinds, including sub-contractors for local authorities, there will be no possibility of judicial review in the High Court. We are therefore faced with a contradictory situation. We know that judicial review is available when it comes to the actions of court bailiffs—that is, Crown agents. The Minister has said on a number of occasions that she wants a unified and consolidated service, so that everything is brought back under one piece of legislation and everyone knows exactly where they stand, be they consumers or creditors, or commercial organisations trying to enforce their debts or debtors. Basically, there will be one law for everyone.
We know from what we have discussed so far, however, that there are in fact one or two different powers in different parts of the Bill. I would have thought it necessary to ensure that all bailiffs are treated in the same way when their actions are reviewed. For all creditors, whether their debts are being enforced through Crown agents—that is often the case if a Government body of some kind is involved, but not always—or through private bailiffs, and for all debtors, whichever type of bailiff is dealing with the matter, surely there should the same level playing field when it comes to one of the ultimate recourses to justice available to people in this country: judicial review.
We feel strongly about the new clause, which would put those private bailiffs on exactly the same footing as Crown agents—in other words, those agents directly employed by the court or by Her Majesty. On the basis of wanting to make things simpler, easier and fairer, I commend the new clause to the Committee.