Just over a 100 years ago, a little-known thinker called Noel Skelton coined the idea of a property-owning democracy. That belief is still a core tenet of conservatism. However, today, we are talking about tenants, not just tenets. For far too many in England, property ownership has a fatal flaw: for far too many their ownership is fundamentally limited, in that they do not truly own the properties that they have saved to buy. They are merely tenants, albeit often on longer leases. In some cases, they are trapped by extortionate ground rents; in others, they risk losing the roof over their heads if they fail to make such payments. Some face exorbitant management charges or have to seek permission and pay a charge simply to change a kitchen cabinet.
Our leasehold system has its origins in the feudal property laws. Feudalism was a core part of my history degree; it has no place in contemporary Britain. This is why I am so delighted to speak in this debate today. Successive Governments have promised reforms to the leasehold system and failed to deliver. As we heard in the other place, Tony Blair’s new Labour promised to sweep it all away—it even produced a pamphlet about all its plans. However, the Labour Government did no such thing during their years in power. They retreated in the face of vocal opposition, and the situation of leaseholders today is little changed from that of the 1970s. That is why this Bill is so profoundly important.
The reforms are deeply conservative, championed by none other than Margaret Thatcher during her opposition and her premiership. I am encouraged that His Majesty’s Opposition plan to engage seriously, as we all have a common interest to ensure the Bill’s success.
The Bill corrects many injustices. Let me list just a few. It will end permanently the sale of new freehold houses; it will give new rights to existing leaseholders, making it cheaper and easier for them to extend their leases, and making such extensions 990 years as a default; it will bring new transparency over service charges and make it easier for leaseholders to enfranchise; it will protect more leaseholders from unfair and unjustified service charges; and it will improve the management of many buildings. These are huge steps forward, and I pay tribute to the work of my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Levelling Up. Housing and Communities, as well as to the Housing Minister, Lee Rowley, and before him, Rachel Maclean. The reforms also build on the work of Sajid Javid as Housing Secretary, and incorporate many recommendations of the Law Commission. I welcome all of these measures. Taken together, this package is by far the biggest and most serious change to the leasehold system in recent decades.
However, I hope my friends in the Government will not object to me pressing them to go further in a few key areas, while recognising all that they have already secured. The first area is enfranchisement—the process by which leaseholders can take over their freehold. This will be improved by the Bill, but I urge the Government to go further and abolish the residential freehold exemption and lower the threshold of consenting flats required. Certainly, it should not be possible for a freeholder who also owns leases in a particular block to cast deciding votes on enfranchisement, and nor should absentee overseas owners be able to block the process.
Secondly, successive Housing Ministers have championed commonhold as a viable alternative to leasehold. I am encouraged that the Government have included a swathe of the Law Commission’s reforms, yet the Bill does not yet include the measures that the Law Commission considers necessary to make that system of tenure the new default. We need to move towards a commonhold system, and I sincerely hope that the necessary further measures can be incorporated as the Bill goes through its further stages. I hope that my noble friend the Minister can confirm that they will be included, so that we can finally get rid of the leasehold system.
Thirdly, my right honourable friend Boris Johnson secured a substantial majority just five years ago on a manifesto which included the promise to implement a
“ban on the sale of new leasehold homes”.
The Government have sought to suggest that banning leasehold houses fulfils this promise. It does not, for the majority of leaseholders are in flats. I recognise that no Government would want to ban immediately the sale of new leasehold flats, and that the commonhold fixes I have referenced above would need to be shown to work. However, I suggest that the Government take a power to allow the Secretary of State to end all leasehold, while committing here that it would be commenced only once the market was ready.
Fourthly and fifthly, we have heard a great deal in the other place about the need to address both forfeiture and the fleecehold estates. My honourable friend Rachel Maclean said quite simply that forfeiture must go, and she is right. It is simply wrong that a freeholder can make a tenant forfeit their flat over a disputed service charge. Likewise, my honourable friend Neil O’Brien was one of many who argued strongly about the need to end the model of fleecehold estates and to help the 3 million or 4 million people who are stuck with them. I will not repeat all the points made, save to say that I completely endorse the thrust of their arguments and call on my noble friend the Minister to commit to act now.
I have outlined five areas where I believe the Government should move further. I hope they will do so, so that the Bill, which already achieves so much, can be one which truly delivers the reforms needed to end leasehold for good.
]]>In short, if an individual makes a malicious complaint about someone to the police, the police can act to remove that record. Malicious reporting to other organisations—whether social services or an employer as part of a campaign of stalking and harassment—does not carry the same safeguard. As a result, data is retained on individuals who have been targeted maliciously, be it through workplace harassment, stalking or something else. Many victims find that, even if the person targeting them has been convicted, their harassment continues because such records remain. Current data protection rules mean that such records cannot always be deleted. The retention of this data has lasting consequences for all individuals involved.
This proposed new clause seeks to enable the deletion of data where a clear threshold is met to show that the report was the result of malice and that retaining it would continue the harassment. As the testimony of victims has shown, it is not necessary to be an MP to be subject to malicious reporting as part of a deliberate campaign of stalking and harassment. Such reporting, designed to have a serious long-term impact on victims and their families, can occur against anyone doing any kind of public work, in the context of domestic abuse or as anonymous, vexatious harassment.
Public bodies can refuse to delete the data on the grounds that they feel it necessary to retain that data for compliance with a separate legal obligation or for performing a task in the public interest. To overturn this, a person has to demonstrate that the public body’s retention of the malicious data is not necessary for either of these purposes, thereby putting the burden of proof on to the data subject and potentially requiring lengthy court action.
For most people, this is not possible or desirable, leaving them with no legal recourse. This amendment would update the UK general data protection regulation and address these inconsistencies, mirroring the concept of exceptional circumstances under which any deletion would take place. The proposed new clause would give all data controllers guidance on how to manage situations where there are competing obligations—for example, in safeguarding or identifying repeated attacks on an individual via third-party reporting. Unlike the current right to object, this would create an absolute right to request deletion and therefore overrule exemptions that currently apply. This would ensure that public bodies such as local authorities are able to comply with these requests for deletion without risking failing to meet their legal duties. At present, these authorities are very clear that due to existing data protection rules they cannot take this step.
For this duty to be robust and not undermine important concerns about retention of records for safeguarding purposes, there needs to be a clear threshold that is met to show that to retain the data would be to continue the harassment. By limiting this explicitly to proven victims of crimes, when the data is linked to that crime, we could ensure it does not become open to abuse—but it should extend to private companies such as employers to ensure that cases such as inappropriate employment references generated as part of discriminatory processes are not retained.
Could Ministers give serious consideration to updating the law in this regard? This Government have a strong track record on taking action against harassment, stalking and other harms against women and girls. I would like to understand why the Government do not see the need to update the law to take account of this very real situation. The retention of data in such circumstances is illiberal, oppressive and contrary to the mores of a democratic society. Therefore, I would like my noble friend the Minister not just to respond but to acknowledge that this is a serious issue that needs redress. I very much hope that, after this stage of the Bill, my noble friend the Minister will meet me, my noble friend Lady Morgan and Stella Creasy to discuss it further.
]]>The late Lord Nolan set out three golden threads for standards: codes of conduct, independent scrutiny and education. The key question for your Lordships’ House is who should exercise that independent scrutiny, especially when ministerial conduct has been called into question. One of the central pillars of our unwritten constitution is that the Prime Minister, appointed by and chief adviser to the sovereign, remains in that position for as long as he or she commands the confidence of the other place. Other Ministers remain in post for as long as they retain the confidence of the Prime Minister. Not one of us in this place would object to raising standards in public life or disagree with the Nolan principles, but the Nolan principles work precisely because they are just that—principles and not rules. My noble friend Lord Forsyth mentioned the recent excellent Policy Exchange report on upholding standards, which deals with this. My fear is that, by the patchwork codification of standards, whether statutory or quasi-statutory, covert or overt, we erode the functions of political accountability that are the proper province of Parliament.
These political mechanisms of accountability are a great success of the British constitution and one that other countries struggle to emulate. We should not abdicate standards enforcements to ethics tsars or unelected regulators who are accountable to no one. If we do, we invite the unedifying prospect of judicial or regulatory pronouncement on ministerial appointments and dismissals. This, I fear, will not improve the standing of parliamentary democracy but diminish it.
]]>In moving the Motion for an humble Address, my noble friend Lord McInnes pointed out that leasehold reform was first announced in 1952 and that too little has happened in the intervening years. My daughter, who is pretty apolitical, announced that she would vote for any party that finally ended the unfairness of leaseholds; I am pleased that we are possibly giving her a reason to vote Conservative.
We say that an Englishman’s home is his castle, but that is sadly not the case for the owners of more than 5 million homes across England and Wales that languish under leasehold covenants. Some examples of exorbitant charges include: a £60 consent fee for replacing a doorbell; a £360 charge for a new doormat; and, unforgivably, a £250 consent fee to have a pet dog. The leasehold system has been described as feudal, but such mercenary practices would give even the Sheriff of Nottingham a run for his money.
This has been a long debate and several noble Lords have already spoken on these points, so I will restrict my comments to three important reforms in this Bill. The first concerns service charges and management fees. The Bill will bring such opaque fees into the light by requiring transparent, standardised service charges. This will end exploitative practices, such as charging a 50% commission on buildings insurance, and will prevent management companies treating service charges as profit-making schemes.
Secondly, I turn to ground rents. In the past decade, developers of new-build homes have sold leaseholds to unsuspecting customers, promising low ground rents while auctioning the freehold to investors. These investors can then exploit the new home owners with unfair and opaque service charges, as well as charging them a fortune to rectify the situation. This Government have already legislated to cap all new ground rents at a peppercorn rent; this Bill takes the next step. In England and Wales, all new houses will be freehold. This will ultimately sound the death knell for leasehold houses and put an end to sharp practices by predatory developers and investors.
Thirdly, on short leases, ending the creation of leasehold houses is welcome but will do nothing for existing leaseholders. Currently, leaseholders have a right to extend their tenure by 90 years, but that is perilously close to the 80-year cut-off where people face exorbitant marriage value costs to secure their home. This has been tolerated by the housing system for too long, so I welcome confirmation that the Bill will abolish marriage value. This Bill will increase the standard lease extension tenfold, from 90 to 990 years, and will remove the requirement for two years’ ownership from eligibility for lease extensions. These are all welcome changes, but they beg the question as to why the Government do not simply finish the business and abolish the leasehold system entirely.
On that note, I turn to the main area of weakness in the Bill. Of the 5 million leasehold properties in the UK, 70% are flats. I am disappointed that this Bill neither stops the creation of new leasehold flats nor sets out a path out of leaseholding for existing flats. There is an alternative system, as many noble Lords have pointed out, which is commonhold. Unlike leasehold, with commonhold there is no limited tenure and no requirement for a third-party overseer, while the home owners have total control over the management and administration costs. In 2021, the then Secretary of State committed that the legislation was the beginning of even more fundamental change to English property law through the widespread introduction of the commonhold tenure.
Despite the commonhold model being widespread in Scotland—they abolished their feudal rent and feu duties in 2004—we have only 20 commonhold developments. The Law Commission’s 2020 report into commonhold states that it is the preferred alternative to leasehold. I would therefore have welcomed a commitment by the Government, by the Minister, to restate that we are moving towards the commonhold tenure system and to implement the Law Commission’s recommendations in full. Is that indeed the Government’s final intention?
The debate today also encompasses public services. Like many people, I have been dismayed by the accounts of the growing debacle of HS2. It is a sorry story of poor planning, mismanagement and overspending. I read that the Cabinet Secretary had received a request from a senior government adviser for an investigation into the Permanent Secretary at the Department for Transport over the mismanagement of this project. Astonishingly, it is alleged that he forwarded the request directly to the Permanent Secretary for a response. I cannot verify whether such an account is correct, but the root cause of this debacle is a lack of accountability, which is felt through our increasing inability to get the basics of public services right or to build large infrastructure products on time or on budget. My noble friend Lord Maude recently—well, actually, a while ago—completed his review into the governance and accountability of the Civil Service. We look forward to the recommendations with keen anticipation, and I hope that the Government will not delay its publication any longer.
]]>The Bill is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to put in place a robust procurement system that encourages procurers to focus on outcomes that deliver productivity improvements and innovation, reduce the cost to the public purse, and drive efficiency. It should do away with unnecessary and excessive procedural requirements that make it much more difficult for smaller businesses to compete and grow.
We should not lose sight of the fact that there is already much flexibility in the Bill, which is good news for delivery on social and environmental principles. This flexibility is evident in the Bill from the very outset, with the objective to maximise the public benefit and to allow economic, social and environmental matters to be considered. When it comes to awarding contracts, Clause 22 allows for a broad range of award criteria to be included in procurements where they are relevant, including those relating to social and environmental aims.
The Bill also includes a facility for a specific expression of government policy in the form of the national procurement policy statement and the Wales procurement policy statement. These can be used to create obligations to consider social and environmental goals of the day, such as net zero, without compromising the importance of maintaining an efficient and workable procurement regime. That is why I agree with my noble friend the Minister that we must avoid at all costs the inclusion of broad and unfocused obligations in relation to social and environmental matters.
Amendments to the Bill that would place requirements on contracting authorities always to have to include social and environmental benefits when awarding their contracts would slow down the procurement regime and increase risk. They would also significantly disincentivise small and medium-sized enterprises, which do not have the back-office capability to maintain huge reams of social and environmental policies and practices.
In summary, I am heartened that the approach the Government are already taking in the Bill will allow contracting authorities the flexibility to deliver procurement outcomes that address these important social and environmental objectives on a case-by-case basis while retaining value for money at the forefront. With this Bill, we are leaving behind a slow and bureaucratic procurement system that is unnecessarily restrictive in nature. Let us not change one set of restrictive procurement practices for another.
]]>I say, first, that not a penny should be spent on perpetrator programmes until we are sure the victim support provision is comprehensive. But where it is, we should also look at perpetrator strategies. We must do all we can to help victims, but our ultimate aim is to come as close as we can to eradicating domestic abuse from our society. Here, we are looking to reform individuals but also to weed out the idea that domestic violence is somehow a normal part of existence. Our targets are as much perpetrators as their children and extended families. It is right, then, that the Government should come forward with a perpetrator strategy, and one year should suffice to ensure it is sufficiently thought through and properly resourced.
In particular, I call attention to proposed new paragraph (a),
“improving the identification and assessment of perpetrators.”
Everything we have heard throughout the passage of this Bill has been about domestic abuse and its victims falling through the cracks—cracks in public health, cracks in early intervention, cracks in enforcement and cracks in sentencing. We need to get ahead of this crime wherever we can, and that means getting better at identifying perpetrators as well as victims to lessen damage and expedite justice and reform.
A large number of organisations, including those that support victims, have come forward to say they support this amendment and call for the Government to create a perpetrator strategy. The only caveat I would offer is that we should make sure that the strategy is thoughtful and comprehensive and that the programmes it offers are quality-assured. I read with interest the debate from the other place, where Members heard stories of providers that were not only opportunistic but unqualified bidding for contracts to provide perpetrator programmes. But if we get this right, the effects could be profound.
Other noble Lords have mentioned the Drive project, which works with high-risk, high-harm abusers—in other words, the worse and most dangerous perpetrators of domestic abuse. A University of Bristol evaluation found the Drive project reduced the number of perpetrators using physical abuse by 82%, and those displaying jealousy and controlling behaviour by 73%, and that it was similarly effective in reducing other types of abuse. In other words, if we have a strategy that supports quality-assured programmes such as these, we can prevent abuse, reform perpetrators and save lives.
My final point is a call for the Government to ensure that funding is available for such programmes consistently and universally. Local authority budgeting cycles or geographical location should never prevent such provision being available. The consequences are simply too profound for postcode lotteries. Domestic abuse is unfortunately ubiquitous and, if we are to attempt to eradicate it, our support programmes must be too.
]]>Perhaps most tragically of all, the current law offers inadequate protection, and this amendment would begin to correct that. Currently, we are in the absurd position that many post-separation offences would be a crime only if they occurred before separation. In the words of one Crown Court judge:
“If you have had the strength to leave—we are suddenly not supporting those people? They have got the legislation wrong.”
There are a few important legislative issues to consider. The first is that the Serious Crime Act definition of coercive control does not cover post-separation abuse. Therefore, once this Bill passes, there will be an anomaly in the law, both within English statute and across the United Kingdom, since it is covered in Scotland. The amendment in the other place was withdrawn because of an ongoing government review into the offence of coercive behaviour. This would seem a compelling reason, but I do not think it reason enough to ignore this amendment. The review in question does not look specifically at economic abuse and, since it is concerned only with the current application of the law, which does not recognise economic abuse, it is unlikely to do the issue any justice. Therefore, the review should not stand as a barrier to the acceptance of this amendment.
Finally, it has been argued that victims of abuse can be protected under existing legislation concerning stalking, since statutory guidance has been updated to include economic abuse. But, practically speaking, this is unlikely to be effective. The guidance given to police officers when drawing up stalking protection orders does not include economic abuse provision. Indeed, it is not clear how it could. I therefore believe there is a clear and compelling case for accepting this amendment. The evidence that economic abuse is a crime has been accepted by all, as evidenced by the debate and continued passage of this Bill. It is now a question of offering every possible legal protection, consistently and universally, for the very brave victims of this awful crime. This amendment does that and has my unqualified support.
]]>“Controlling or coercive behaviour by persons providing psychotherapy or counselling services”.
First, I commend the apposite wording—in particular, “persons providing … services,” since these abusive individuals are rarely actually psychotherapists, counsellors or registered practitioners of any kind, but individuals purporting to offer such services. That these charlatans are able to operate beyond the law and act on vulnerable people should be revisited, even if it is not the specific subject of this Bill.
The Domestic Abuse Bill will update our laws to recognise the breadth, and, unfortunately, the subtlety, of the crime. It will now include, among other things, the offence of coercive control. However, while the Bill recognises that such insidious behaviour is punishable within a household, it clearly exists outside the household too. This amendment seeks to address that omission, but it also speaks to the notion of what constitutes “domestic,” namely, the definition of the “connected” person. If one reads the language of the Bill and hears the heartbreaking stories of this abusive practice, there is surely no doubt that this proposed new clause belongs in the Bill.
We are talking about situations where bogus therapists attempt to alienate their subjects from their families and breed dependence on them, the so-called counsellors. False memories are concocted and sown, with happy childhoods replaced with nightmares of abuse that never happened. The symptoms follow a familiar pattern: the self-styled development coach preys on their vulnerable clients and tears them away from their families, to the extent that they break off all contact and become estranged. There are countless such cases. The goal of such therapy is coercion and control, to debilitate and disable—abuse, if ever there was.
The Bill currently defines “connected” persons using the language of intimate personal relationships, among other things. This captures the nature of what occurs in these bogus sessions. Families, friends and loved ones are wilfully alienated by the abuser, who then offers him or herself as a replacement. A dependence is created, and contact and communication of any kind with family and friends are discouraged. This is intimate, yet clearly abusive—exactly the subject of this Bill and exactly why I hope the Government will accept this amendment.
I began by lamenting the lack of legal protection and redress for those who might be duped by unqualified counsellors and psychotherapists, and I believe that this is definitely worthy of more debate and attention from the Government. But what we are talking about now is including such controlling and coercive behaviour by those who cruelly abuse their professional trust. The consequences for the individuals concerned and their families are profound and long-lasting. What goes on in these cases is intuitively and evidentially abuse. It is clearly coercive and controlling, and it is clearly done in the context of the intimate relationships captured by “connected” persons. For all these reasons, I would argue that the new offence belongs in this Bill. I strongly support the amendment.
]]>I stress that this is the right Bill for this offence: non-fatal strangulation is about fear, control and a toxic mix of physical and psychological abuse, and it is often done with the express intent and insidious subtlety of evading detection. As such, it can be protracted and cause lasting and even permanent harm. Crucially, the current law is letting victims down; this Bill is our chance to put that right and protect them.
Many other noble Lords have already spoken about the horrific nature of non-fatal strangulation, but the current problem of undercharging highlights that the true nature and intent of the crime is not fully understood. As always, context matters: the current narrow approach not only limits the sentencing options but has other serious consequences, as it impacts on future risk assessments and public protection decisions. These include future bail applications, sentencing decisions—including dangerousness determinations—and Parole Board decisions.
As the seriousness of the crime is not currently understood, neither, unfortunately, is the management of its consequences. This is particularly the case when it comes to contact arrangements for children. To protect the welfare of children, these arrangements should reflect the seriousness of the crime; unfortunately, they do not.
I am conscious that, to tackle non-fatal strangulation as effectively as possible, we need all relevant agencies to work together. Early intervention is needed to mitigate damage and even save lives. Unfortunately, current understanding of symptoms and consequences will likely lead to cases being missed and narrow or absent diagnoses offered. If those in the health service seeing patients with the relevant physical and psychological conditions are conscious of the links to non-fatal strangulation, the problem can be picked up earlier and the victims supported.
This would not only save the victims from further and more serious harm; it would also be better for society, as the earlier intervention would be easier and more cost-effective, compared with dealing with the horrific further abuse and deaths of victims. In many of these cases, this will be about protecting children as well as the victims themselves.
It is shocking that, in this country, thousands of victims experience the trauma of non-fatal strangulation every year. Given that the current criminal justice system is clearly not able to protect these victims, we cannot afford to let this Bill pass without addressing this issue. We all know how commitments to introduce something in a future Bill can get derailed through no fault of those making those commitments. There is a suggestion that this new offence could go in the police, crime, sentencing and courts Bill, but that is not the Bill before us now; it has not even started its journey in the other place, and it may well be delayed for months into the future.
We need to get this right, and there is no reason why this offence cannot be included in this Bill to get the victims the protection they need now. If we miss this opportunity to introduce this offence, many women will die, others will suffer unnecessarily and we will be behind most of the English-speaking world on domestic abuse protection.
The UK has been rightly proud of its leading role on the world stage on gender-based violence over many years; this amendment is needed to ensure that we stay ahead and do all we can to protect victims. Rather than have the uncertainties of a future Bill, we can address this issue now in a Bill that will come into law very soon. I urge the Government and Ministers to work with my noble friend Lady Newlove and to include this new offence in this Bill.
]]>In fact, there is very little to object to in the trade deal. Of course, it is more what is not in it that is worthy of debate. A deal that does not go as far as some had hoped on services is necessarily limited, but this need not be limiting: opportunity lies where we can break new ground. Take financial services, for example: it is true that the EU has not yet granted the UK equivalence, which would ease market access—but, equally, this provides an opportunity to set our own rules, such as allowing pension funds to invest in infrastructure, an area where there has been chronic underinvestment.
To successfully go it alone, we will need to usher in a new era of leadership and accountability. This era demands a change in approach, across both Whitehall and Parliament. We can no longer blame the EU for having to implement unpalatable policies, or blame its bureaucracy when things do not go according to plan. Supporting business, rolling out the vaccine and setting our own immigration policy are now entirely in the hands of UK lawmakers, and, for all of them, we will be accountable to the British people.
However, to succeed, we need reform—to change our approach to the way we handle major strategic projects, the way we partner with business and the way we train and enable our domestic skills base. In our end is the beginning of a new relationship with Europe and a responsibility on us to make the most of our many opportunities.
]]>Time is necessarily short, so I want to focus on three areas, all of which have been mentioned before. The first is community services. Some 70% of people experiencing domestic abuse will access support via community-based services. These include independent domestic violence advisers, who provide anything from housing and court advice through to health and emotional support. The Bill provides a statutory-based duty to provide accommodation-based services, and this is to be welcomed. But unless it is extended to community-based services, we are simply leaving another crack for victims to fall down. Some 70% of domestic abuse victims will never set foot in a refuge. Charities have expressed fears of a two-tier system, with patchy and inconsistent community-based support. We must ensure that geography is not a barrier to getting help and getting out.
The second and third areas concern offences that speak to the insidious subtlety of domestic abuse, specifically coercive control and non-fatal strangulation. On the first, I hoped that the Minister would be able to give an update on the Home Office review of the offence. But in the meantime, I would like to lend my support to extending the definition of coercive control to include economic abuse and to urgent calls to make sure the offence applies post-separation. It is not hard to imagine abuse continuing when a relationship has ended and victim and perpetrator no longer live together. When physical access has been mercifully denied, economic abuse is often the sting in the tail. One in four women experience this after the relationship has ended.
Finally, and here I pay particular tribute to the work of my noble friend Lady Newlove, I wholeheartedly support the move to create a separate offence of non- fatal strangulation. Many noble Lords have talked about this. Strangulation is the second most common cause of female homicide, and it is not hard to imagine how the non-fatal version can be used as it is—as a tool to exert fear and control. Most victims experience a real fear that they will die, causing the worst of long-term mental health issues, such as suicide and PTSD.
Yet there is a poor understanding of the crime and its impacts, and chronic undercharging under the current law. Many instances are tried under common assault, meaning that sentences simply do not fit the crime. New Zealand and 37 US states have introduced a new law to recognise non-fatal strangulation as a distinct offence. It is time we did the same.
Domestic abuse needs a multifaceted and nuanced legislative approach to ensure that its victims are protected and supported and its perpetrators prosecuted, punished and deterred. We must cease our collective reliance on other parts of the law to offer adequate protection. This bespoke Bill is a welcome step towards providing that protection, and I am pleased to be able to support it.
]]>This Bill is a critical step in the right direction, yet if we stop here our criminal justice system will continue to let down the victims of crime. I believe passionately in the rehabilitation of offenders and declare my interest as a member of the development committee of the superb charity Clean Break. But victims of serious crime should always be on our list of priorities. I welcome the fact that the Bill puts victims first by placing a statutory duty on the Parole Board to ensure that there is proper consideration of whether there has been a failure to disclose the location of the victim’s remains in the case of murder or the identity of a child when it comes to taking or making indecent images of children. This is a positive and welcome move and it is hard to understand how any convicted criminal can claim to be rehabilitated if they continue to withhold such information. Failure to do so shows a lack of understanding, remorse and compassion. It shows that they are not willing to do what it takes to redress wrongs and accept responsibility for what they have done.
However, we should also consider what else we can do to support victims. Justice is not a single moment in time; it is a process of rehabilitation that victims too have to go through before they can come to terms with what has happened to them and take back control of their lives. My concern is that this Bill will not fundamentally change current practice and that families in such cases will continue to have to rely on the discretion of the Parole Board. There are too many concerns about the lack of transparency and accountability in the Parole Board’s processes, and some serious question marks hang over its duties in relation to responsibilities towards victims.
Never has there been a more courageous, compassionate and passionate advocate for victims’ rights than my noble friend—I am very proud to call her a friend—Lady Newlove. Not only did she and her young family have to come to terms with the most base and horrific of crimes, but she has lent her voice to support others. However, even she has been let down by the system. Unbeknown to her and her family, the perpetrators of the crime that left her a widow and her daughters without their father have variously been recommended for parole, early release and a place in open prisons with home visitation privileges at the weekend. Why was she not told? Does she not have an inalienable right to feel safe and secure?
Noble Lords might be aware of the victim contact scheme. This is supposed to allow for a victim whose offender is sentenced to 12 months or more to be kept informed of the progression of the sentence and any associated parole. However, victims have told of being contacted by the scheme only to be informed of Parole Board decisions that have already been made. One victim even discovered a decision on Twitter before being informed by the scheme.
Let us take the case of John Worboys, the black cab rapist, recommended for early release from his life sentence by the Parole Board. More victims of Worboys’s heinous crimes had to bravely come forward for the Parole Board to reverse its decision. Why were the victims not part of the Parole Board hearing in the first place, or at least fully aware of it? Instead, they were forced to come forward by fear itself to stop what was nothing less than the undermining of the justice that they thought had already been done.
That tells us that, for the victims of crime, sentencing and conviction are just the beginning of justice. If sentences are altered or shortened, or the terms and conditions of release are changed, victims have a right to know and a right to their say. It is not okay that my noble friend Lady Newlove and her family were not told that the subjects of their own personal nightmares could be walking the streets of their home town without their knowledge.
My noble friend has called for a victims’ advocate unit to level the playing field. Her point is that, once a victim’s impact statement has been read, victims cease to exist as the process of justice continues to wind its course. Victims should be given training and legal aid so that they too can continue to hold the courts and the Parole Board to account, continue to advocate for their needs as victims, and get access to any information they need about the terms of parole or release or the location of offenders.
Alongside a victims’ advocate unit, we also need comprehensive reform of the Parole Board. This is the same Parole Board that released John Worboys, even though he remained a danger to society, released Garry Newlove’s killers without telling his family when and where, and released Helen’s killer, even though he had it in his gift to bring peace to the victim’s family but declined to do so. It is time to embed the rights of victims alongside those of offenders, recognising that the Parole Board’s decisions impact both.
Everyone deserves a second chance, and so too do victims of crime—a chance to rebuild their shattered lives, to restore confidence, self-esteem and self-worth, and to try again to live the life that was taken away from them. Justice needs to focus far more on the rights, wishes and needs of the victims. For that reason, and notwithstanding some serious concerns about the Parole Board’s decisions, I support and welcome the Bill and commend it to the House.
]]>On Monday, the Prime Minister rightly told the nation not to frequent bars, theatres or clubs, with a massive effect on those businesses and many more. However, on Tuesday they heard from the Chancellor that the Government would support them with £330 billion in loan guarantees to give firms access to cash. I very much welcome the package outlined by the Chancellor and appreciate that this is a fast-moving and uniquely challenging situation. However, I echo many other noble Lords in urging him to provide much-needed clarity and to consider additional measures to support the self-employed and businesses in the service, hospitality, retail and entertainment sectors.
No Conservative would want to see good money thrown after bad to support a failing industry, but that is not the situation we face. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of perfectly viable and profitable businesses which risk going under because of an act of God. The first duty of a Government is to protect their citizens, but they must also intervene now to reassure businesses that they will stand behind them. This cannot be just through loans; they will need tax holidays, cash injections and relief from PAYE and other pressures. The message must be clear to business owners: keep your staff on your books, the Government will support you. As a country, we will get through this terrible virus. However, if ever there was a role for government, it is here and now. We must ensure that our economy is strong and vibrant on the other side.
This extraordinary backdrop should not overshadow what I hope will be a critical change in measuring return on public investment—a rewriting of HMT Green Book rules. I welcome what my noble friend the Minister said about this. For years, this outdated Treasury methodology, which was intended to guarantee the best return for government investment, has perversely done more to widen economic disparities, depress productivity in poorer parts of Britain and deepen the gulf between north and south. We cannot continue to count every pound spent in terms of narrow cost-benefit. This Budget shows a welcome break from orthodoxy to ensure that funds are now allocated on the basis of how much they will improve well-being and social cohesion in the areas targeted.
The first indicator is the approach to spending on infrastructure. It seems that the Government are minded to go even further than the feted £100 billion. The Chancellor said that, by the end of this Parliament, public sector net investment would be triple the average over the last 40 years in real terms. This money must be spent on projects that have sustainability and productivity at their heart, so I am pleased that, as well as roads and railways, we have significant outlays for improving 4G networks such as the £5 billion for gigabit broadband. As the eyes of the world will be on the UK in Glasgow later this year, it is good to see the Government committing to building electric charging infrastructure. The commitment to carbon capture and storage technology will be vital if we are to meet our commitment to be net-zero on carbon emissions by 2050.
One former casualty of the outdated Treasury methodology is the Swansea tidal lagoon project. I have mentioned this many times; it has the potential to be the prototype for world-leading exportable technology. Could my noble friend the Minister commit to looking at this again? Our uniquely powerful tidal flow is an enormous competitive advantage that it would be a crime to ignore.
When it comes to investment, we cannot do better to boost our productivity than to invest in our people, so I commend the £2.5 billion new national skills fund. In this time of profound economic change, it is vital to support people as they upskill and reskill on their journeys to future-facing careers. Such a fund should give our high-growth, innovative firms access to a stronger pipeline of talent. I was disappointed—as were many others, including my noble friend Lord Leigh —to see a stringent reduction in the lifetime allowance for entrepreneurs’ relief. I declare an interest as the co-founder of a start-up company. We must mitigate the reputational damage this shift could do to our hard-won entrepreneurial culture. Access to talent, domestically and globally, will go some way to offsetting this, as it remains the No. 1 concern for start-up businesses.
This was a Budget about a crisis, but it was also about sowing the seeds of recovery. This pandemic has been a reminder that we are a truly global society, so we must build a workforce, infrastructure and ideas that can compete and succeed globally. On that measure, this Budget holds much promise.
]]>The real question is: what is holding the Civil Service back from delivering important and badly needed reforms on behalf of democratically elected Ministers and Governments? We have some of the finest civil servants in the world, and many of the best of them tell me just how much they want to see change. But individual excellence does not mean the institution itself is able to implement such reforms.
Government failures are, of course, not always the fault of the civil servants and there are myriad examples of failures caused by Ministers ignoring good advice. But, as Sir Christopher Meyer recently observed, accusations of bullying seem to have become commonplace when Ministers are demanding exacting standards, being direct or even disagreeing with the advice provided.
No sane Minister would want to go without at least receiving the best advice, even if they choose not to follow it. Civil servants should give robust advice and be resilient enough to make greater use of written directions, which enable them to air their concerns about a policy. But a Minister also has a right to expect accurate advice. A report into the row over the Windrush scandal, which led to the resignation of Amber Rudd as Home Secretary, found that Home Office officials had provided her with the wrong information and then failed to clear up the problem. The internal report, which demonstrated that civil servants had “not supported” her, was inexplicably delayed in its publication.
Some of those admonished for poor performance take shelter under an accusation of bullying—indeed, such accusations can even constitute a form of bullying themselves. As there is no legal definition of bullying, the whole area risks becoming entirely subjective. Being banned from a meeting or cut out of key copy list for correspondence was standard treatment when I was a special adviser in government. Would the treatment of Mr Weisel in “Yes, Minister” constitute bullying?
I therefore seek assurance from my noble friend the Minister that there is a fair process of fact finding when such accusations are made. The Civil Service should not be sitting as judge and jury over elected Ministers, and any concerns of alleged bullying must be assessed objectively and not subjectively. Robust challenge of officials by Ministers is not just something that the Civil Service should tolerate, it is critical to ensure good decision making and better policy formation —the other side of the coin called “speaking truth unto power”. We cannot have Ministers being afraid to criticise, in even the mildest form, for fear of reprisal.
Tony Blair, when reflecting on his own experience, remarked that:
“If you had a crisis, there is nothing better than that British system … But when it came to how do you do health service reform or education reform, or … the early battles I had on reforming asylum and immigration policy, I found it frankly just unresponsive.”
Civil servants are too often woefully unprepared for the huge operational burdens placed upon them, and there is an incomprehensible resistance to training them for such responsibilities. When my noble friend Lord Maude was Minister for the Cabinet Office, he proposed that senior civil servants headed for these very big responsibilities should be put through top management courses, typically three months, at top business schools. This is the routine practice of high-performing organisations. He proposed, and it was agreed, that 10 Permanent Secretaries should go through these courses before the 2015 election. And yet by the election, instead of 10 doing three months at Harvard, Stanford and INSEAD, one person had had done a week’s course at IMD in Lausanne—not quite what was intended, and it is difficult to understand the resistance to make a serious investment in such key people.
It is little wonder that Ministers get deeply frustrated when their departmental officials prove incapable of implementing their policies. After all, this is what democratically elected Governments are held to account on. If they fail, it should not be because there is too little capability in the Civil Service to implement or deliver.
It is this that should be the subject of today’s debate: a Civil Service that desperately needs to look again at its capabilities in leading important operational departments—rather than worrying about unnecessary changes to the Ministerial Code.
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