Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I had the privilege and pleasure during my Army career to have audiences with Her Majesty the Queen. When I became Chief Inspector of Prisons, those audiences continued. What was very impressive was the Queen’s knowledge about our prisons. May she rest in peace. God save the King.
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Henig. I have three points to make. First, as other noble Lords have said, I deplore the number of times we were asked by the Commons response to our amendments to a number of Bills in the previous Session to break the rule of law. The noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, did the decent thing and resigned from the Government over the...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I strongly support Amendment 1, to which I have added my name. I declare an interest as a vice-chairman of the Chagos Islands (British Indian Ocean Territory) All-Party Parliamentary Group. How do the Government have the neck to condemn others for far less, while at the same time standing condemned by both the International Criminal Court and the General Committee of the United...
Lord Ramsbotham: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they have made with the establishment of the Royal Commission on the Criminal Justice System announced in the 2019 Queen’s Speech.
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply. I make no apologies for asking the Question again, because, as I have said before, I regarded it as extremely discourteous of the Government to ask Her Majesty the Queen to make an announcement which they had no intention of implementing. I had no notice of the intention of the noble Lord, Lord Bach, to bring up this matter on Report on the...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I declare my interest as a founder member and, like the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, a vice-chairman of the Chagos Islands All Party Parliamentary Group. Having once had the pleasure of meeting the Chagos Islanders based in Mauritius, I rise to strongly support this amendment. As the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, and the noble Lord, Lord Horam, have explained, this issue is an...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I rise to strongly support this amendment, which was so ably introduced by my noble friend Lady Meacher, particularly if it is matched by a strong commitment to restorative justice among all sections of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, particularly prison governors. I have witnessed an unfortunate case in which a governor admitted to me that none of the recommendations...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I strongly support this amendment. Noting the success of the Youth Justice Board, as the noble Lord, Lord Marks, did, I venture to suggest that many of the problems of women in the criminal justice system would disappear if there was such a board, and the establishment of women’s offending teams.
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, when you are speaking 51st on the Second Reading of a Bill which has already generated much controversy in the other place, the chances are that some other noble Lords will have already mentioned any point you wished to make. That is very true in this case, so I will make only one point, which I beg the Minister to take away and reflect on, because it is borne out by practical...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I support Amendments 89 and 90. I endorse what the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, said. Thompson and Venables, the murderers of Jamie Bulger, although 10 at the time, had a developmental age of only four, which makes their High Court trial obscene. The noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, is to be praised for persistently trying to raise the age of criminal responsibility through a...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, when you are number 55 in a 74-strong speakers’ list, you have not got much new to say. As other noble Lords have said, there is much to be welcomed in this Bill—certainly including its intention and stated aims of integration and innovation, particularly for those who require rehabilitation. However, as always, the devil is in the detail. I must thank Nicola Newson for an...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I support Amendment 292P, so ably introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, bleakly pointed out, the history of royal commissions under this Government is not particularly promising, which will not give much hope to the mover. In the 2019 Queen’s Speech, as the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, said, it was announced that there was...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I support Amendments 240A and 259C, so comprehensively introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames. Ever since the formation of the Youth Justice Board, I have been keen on the idea of a women’s justice board, with the accompanying offender management teams, particularly if it was matched by a Prison Service appointment of a director of women’s prisons—a...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I rise to support Amendments 210 and 211, and congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, and the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, on their introductions. I am at one with the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, on this issue. When he was Prisons Minister, Rory Stewart once attended a conference on the issue, organised by Nacro, which as the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, said, has led on this for a...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I strongly support all the amendments in this group, not least because the cause of prisoners serving indeterminate sentences has been languishing ever since such sentences were formally abolished by LASPO in 2012. I commend the tireless work of my noble and learned friend Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood on their behalf. For nearly 27 years, since my first inspection as Chief...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I, too, congratulate my noble friend Lady Meacher on bringing forward this Bill. I make no apologies for focusing entirely on my wife, who took her own life recently after a horrendous year. Having broken her hip in a fall, she fell again in the street and was called in by the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital for a scan, which was misdiagnosed as showing that she had an aggressive...
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, does the Minister agree that we have forfeited any right to have our word taken as our bond, through our shameful treatment of those whom we employed as interpreters in Iraq and Afghanistan?
Lord Ramsbotham: To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they have made with the establishment of the Royal Commission on the Criminal Justice System announced in the 2019 Queen’s Speech.
Lord Ramsbotham: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that disappointing reply. The last time I asked his predecessor this Question, I was told that a committee in the Ministry of Justice was looking into the issue. I must admit that I deplore the deliberate discourtesy to Her Majesty the Queen of asking her to announce something which the Government have no intention of implementing.
