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Coroners and Justice Bill

Yes, I agree entirely, and that is characteristic of the Government. It is just like identity cards, on which we were all told that it would be convenient for everyone to be able to prove their identity. None of these things is likely to take me in, and I do not think that they will take in the public either. Before I move on to consider the clauses, I cannot entirely ignore the Bill's background, particularly as the Secretary of State has provoked a response in view of his opening panegyric about the Government's record on reducing crime and making everyone safer. We are entering a recession that is made far worse by Government debt, and it looks quite clear from the Government's information that that is likely to be detrimental to individuals' safety from crime as well. In view of the Secretary of State's comments, I would be interested to hear whether he agrees with the Home Secretary, who wrote to the Prime Minister in September warning of the increase in crime in general, and violent crime in particular, brought on by current economic conditions. Given that matter, the Bill does not even scratch the surface of what the Government could or should be considering. Violent crime has almost doubled under this Government—a fact now openly acknowledged by the head of the Home Office in his memorandum to Ministers, but not, apparently, by Ministers themselves. There has been failure to plan for, let alone fund, adequate prison capacity, and that is one of the reasons why the proposals relating to the sentencing council take the form that they do in the Bill. At a time when people are concerned about the increase in violence, the full impact of the Government's reckless early release scheme is becoming plainly apparent, for example in the ClearSprings fiasco; the issue was on the airwaves only this morning. The long-term failure to build the prisons that we need for our criminal justice system has led the Government to rely on weak non-custodial arrangements, and to fail to rehabilitate offenders or protect the public. I just point out to the Secretary of State that since 1999, nearly 400 people have been killed by criminals on probation. A quarter of magistrates courts have closed under Labour; they were replaced by administrative measures that do not punish criminals properly and risk penalising the innocent. The mass expansion of penalty notices—again, this is something with which we are having to grapple—conditional cautions and warnings means that half of all criminal offenders avoid altogether court and proper assessment of what is required for them. On the expanded use of spot fines, we now put shoplifters and those caught in possession of drugs on a par with someone accused of dropping an apple. Half the fines are not paid on time, in any event. One has the impression that Ministers are more interested in the taxation and revenue aspects of fining than in tackling the underlying causes, in relation to those who steal. Of course, the same approach is taken to cannabis, as the Government send out more mixed messages about that dangerous drug; they are reclassifying it on the one hand, but continue to make it the subject of fixed penalty notices on the other. I notice that someone was recently ASBO'ed for singing in the bath, but on the face of it, real thugs do not seem to be particularly deterred by antisocial behaviour orders. The Government have repeatedly attacked the role of juries during their time in office. Each time, the Government have had to be fought off, but in the Bill there is yet another attempt to undermine the jury system, in relation to inquests. As I said, there is also the growth of the database state and creeping surveillance, despite all the evidence that the Government are more likely to lose or abuse our private information than to protect it. I am afraid that we see all the hallmarks of those serial failings in the details of the Bill. Just to cheer up the Secretary of State, let me say that there are some measures that we welcome, as I have already hinted and pointed out. We agree that reform of the coroners' system is long overdue. The bulk of the proposals are clearly of great importance, and we will do our best to make sure that those aspects of the reform can work properly. We certainly support measures to prevent criminals from profiting from their crimes, and we will work with the Government to ensure proper protection for victims and witnesses, while safeguarding fair trials. There is much that is good in that part of the Bill. There may well be some challenging issues to do with investigation anonymity orders, but the intention behind them is clearly laudable. We will also look carefully at the Government's proposals to reform the law on homicide. On that issue, we accept that the Government's intentions are good, but the provisions classically illustrate the problem of trying to cherry-pick important, carefully reasoned and crafted, but admittedly controversial, proposals from the Law Commission's report. There is clearly a need to provide a better definition of partial defences to murder, whether on the grounds of provocation or diminished responsibility. Those will be much harder to rationalise if the Law Commission's idea for two categories of murder is not followed, although, as I say, I have some sympathy with the Government on why they may have decided not to go down that road. It is a little strange—I repeat what I said in my intervention—that the Government should propose a wide-ranging partial defence where things done or said could cause a defendant to have a justifiable sense of being seriously wronged, intended to be wholly subjective, yet we are asked specifically to exclude sexual infidelity as a ground for feeling wronged. The whole history of human society, whether one is reading ““Othello”” or considering the case of Ruth Ellis, suggests that that is a matter on which people who might otherwise be behaving reasonably appear to lose all sense of proportion and reason. Without in any way saying that I have a fixed view on the matter, I very much hope that these are issues that we can properly consider, because it will be important that we get them right. None of the proposals goes to the heart of the matter. They paper over the cracks. The sentencing council papers over cracks. Let us be absolutely clear. The fundamental point about this reform is to ensure that sentencing is driven by Government expediency, rather than by the requirements of justice. If it were not, there would be no reason why the existing system could not be tweaked. Something far more radical is proposed, and it amounts to a substantial fetter on judicial discretion. The Magistrates Association put it this way, and I could not put it better:"““to engineer a reduction in the prison population rather than to deliver just sentences that fit individual crimes””." I make the point rightly made by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier): the measure applies not just to whether people are being sent to prison; it applies also to non-custodial sentences and whether community punishments are available. It is right across the board.