argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Education
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I first turn to Amendment 223A from the noble Lord, Lord German, which would allow local authorities to "establish and maintain" secure academies and prevent any for-profit corporation doing this Dealing with those points in turn, first, we are not aware of any specific legislative barrier to the provision of secure 16 to 19 academies by local authorities. However, it is government policy that academy trusts are not local authority influenced bodies. As a result, no academy in England is operated by a local authority and our position here is to mirror academies’ policies and procedures in secure schools to the greatest extent possible. That said—
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Social Welfare
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My understanding is that the £259 million was announced in the spending review to continue the programme to maintain and expand capacity in both secure and open residential children’s homes. I am not able to say any more than that; it might be a question for my Treasury colleagues to clarify. However, I am also able to clarify it to the noble and learned Lord. Perhaps I can drop him a line on that specific point.
Terrorist Incident at Liverpool Women’s Hospital — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the noble Lord for his questions, and I join him in paying tribute to our emergency services, who acted so quickly to try to preserve life at the scene of the attack, and to the taxi driver, who really was a hero in what must have been an extremely frightening situation. We wish him and his family well. With regard to the first question about lone actors, clearly we get information from all sorts of sources. The noble Lord is absolutely right to point out that the nature of terrorism is changing, and we have seen a number of lone-actor attacks in the past few years. I cannot comment on this attack further because clearly it is a live and very new investigation. The facts of the case will come out as the investigation continues, but I know that the police made a statement today. I will get back to him on the report he referred to if I can. I am not sure what more I can say about it today.
Terrorist Incident at Liverpool Women’s Hospital — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Patrick Cormack (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, we all support the enormous bravery of the taxi driver and salute him. There is apparently some crowd funding going on of dubious authenticity. I do not ask my noble friend to comment on that, but should it not be automatic that anybody who foils a terrorist outrage of this sort is rewarded by the Government and that any material loss suffered, such as the loss of the man’s taxicab, is dealt with on an official basis?
Terrorist Incident at Liverpool Women’s Hospital — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): The noble Lord is right. Certain parts of what could be used to make a bomb are now controlled under Home Office licence, as he will know. If I can, I will of course put a copy of the report in the Library.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Daniel Moylan (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I will speak to the amendments to which I put my name in this group, which are in the names also of the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, but before I do so I will make a few remarks about two amendments that I have not put my name to but now see clearly that I should have done, namely Amendments 226A and 226B in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Armstrong of Hill Top. These amendments address a part of the Bill that makes one potentially subject to a serious violence reduction order for what one "ought to have known". The noble Baroness dealt with it from the point of view of its equalities implication when she spoke to her amendments. I will deal with it from the point of view of its absurdity What ought one to know? Your Lordships’ House is full of astonishingly complicated rules about which carpet you can and cannot stand on, what date you have to put amendments down by and things like that. As a relatively recent Peer, I have spent most of the last year wandering around the place wondering what I ought to know. Is that a basis for culpability of some sort? How is it to be established? I am not a lawyer at all and I have no experience of the criminal justice system, but it is surely hard enough to establish in court as a matter of evidential fact what a particular person knew or did not know, let alone what they ought to have known. This is all to be worked out by a judge, without the benefit of the wisdom of a jury, with no particular guidance and no idea what "ought to have known" means. The whole thing is completely absurd. The idea that one should have one’s liberties restricted simply because of what one "ought to have known" should be taken out of the Bill. These amendments would effect that and I lend my support to them On the amendments to which I have put my name, noble Lords have already made the case extremely well. We need to start with a clear understanding that a serious violence reduction order is a criminal sanction. It is nothing less. We cannot make it the same as civil penalties. This all started back in the 1990s when parking offences were decriminalised. In my service as a local councillor, I benefited hugely from that. It was a tremendous idea and worked extremely well, but we cannot then carry on applying the same principle. An SVRO is not a parking ticket; it is a potentially serious restriction on your liberties that travels with you and, if you are a young person, stigmatises you, if are trying to make your way in university or wherever you might move to around the country, by making you go and register and so on. This is not a parking ticket; it is very much more serious.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): If the Sikh was going about his business with his knife in his pocket, he would have reasonable excuse. If he then got into a fight and the knife was not used in the commission of the common assault, the knife would be irrelevant to the case. But I must absolutely caveat my comments: the court would decide the facts of the case.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I have just fallen into a trap that I do not like to fall into, which is to take on specific cases. The court would have to determine the facts of the case to decide whether the knife was relevant and, therefore, whether an SVRO could be made.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): What I can clarify is that I will not take theoretical cases again. But the court would need to consider whether in the circumstances it is proportionate to make an order. That does not go into the specifics of any given case.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): I think I backtracked quite a bit to say that the courts would then make the judgment call on whether the SVRO would be made, based on the facts of the case. I am not saying that, theoretically, it could not happen, but the courts may decide otherwise. It would depend on the facts of the case.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Daniel Moylan (Conservative, Centre-right): Perhaps I may just add that it seems so widely drawn that the first condition, in proposed new subsection (1), is that there has to be an offence. It does not say that there has to be an offence involving violence. So, first there has to be an offence. Then you engage proposed new subsection (3)(b): during the commission of the offence, whatever it might have been, did the person involved carry a knife? If the offence was, say, a driving offence, I am sure that an SVRO would not be applied for or granted, but there is a large area of discretion here. When you take it a little further into proposed new subsection (4), it is simply an offence—the carriage of a knife and the question of "ought to have known". So the whole thing wanders off into this speculative landscape where evidence does not seem to matter and it is all mental constructions. I am sorry for going on.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): I will most certainly do that. So this is offences where the knife is not actually deployed and the person with the individual with a knife in their pocket would not have known that the knife was in their pocket. Without getting myself into further trouble, I would say that the courts would take those facts into consideration—but I will elect to write to noble Lords with as many permutations and combinations as I can possibly think of before Report.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): I think I need to reflect further on what noble Lords have said. I will try to answer the noble Lord’s question in a letter before we start talking about examples. We are, after all, in Committee, and I am learning, like other noble Lords, as we go along Amendments 226, 226A and 226B would remove the provisions that enable a court to issue the SVRO if two or more people commit an offence but not all of them used or were in possession of the weapon—that is slightly going back on what we were discussing. When a knife offence or offensive weapon-related offence is committed, it is not always the case that all the offenders had the weapon in their hands—as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, pointed out—during the commission of the offence. But if the court is satisfied that a person knew or ought to have known that another person committing the offence had a knife or an offensive weapon during the commission of the offence, and this person committed an offence arising out of the same facts, we think it would be appropriate for an SVRO to be available. Again, I will put the various permutations and combinations to noble Lords in a theoretical way. This would allow SVROs to be made in relation to all the individuals who were involved and were convicted of such an offence, should the court consider an SVRO to be necessary in respect of those individuals This provision intends to cover situations such as a robbery or a fight where a weapon was used by one individual, but where other individuals convicted of offences related to the same facts knew, or ought to have known, that a weapon was being used or carried by another person involved in the offence, even if they themselves were not carrying the weapon. This is very similar to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, except that that individual was brandishing the weapon.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): What I am saying, and what I said earlier, is that it will be up to the courts to decide whether it is appropriate, bearing in mind the facts of the case, and whether the court thinks an SVRO in respect of an individual is necessary to protect the public or any particular members of the public in England and Wales.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): We have covered a spectrum of different types of offending and behaviour. We must not forget that at the point at which—no pun intended—someone is issued with an SVRO, they will have been convicted by the court of a knife or offensive weapons offence. The court will also, I am sure, take into consideration previous patterns of behaviour. If the Sikh who got involved in a fight and had his knife with him had no previous convictions for weapons offending, that would be quite different from a repeat offender. It would be for the court to consider whether to impose the SVRO. I hope that I have made that clear and that it will become clearer to noble Lords by the examples I will provide Of course, we will consider, in the light of the Committee, whether we have got all the permutations and combinations right. That is what noble Lords do best—scrutinising legislation, and I have the benefit of some serious legal players around the Chamber I now move on to the concerns of the noble Baroness, Lady Armstrong, about the disproportionate impact that SVROs might have on some vulnerable groups—primarily women who might be coerced into carrying weapons. I completely empathise with the circumstances in which such women might find themselves. We discussed domestic violence only a few months ago and know the effect that coercive control can have on women. At the heart of what we are doing is committing to preventing offenders of all ages, genders and backgrounds becoming involved in serious violence by developing resilience, supporting positive alternatives and delivering timely interventions.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
Susan Williams (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, has explained, this group of amendments deals with further aspects of the new serious violence reduction order. Amendments 231A and 231B would remove the requirement for an offender subject to an SVRO to notify the police of their home address; any changes to their home address; the address of any other premises at which the offender regularly resides or stays; or the address of any place they decide to live in for a period of one month or more We included notification requirements in the legislation in order to help officers to identify those subject to an order in their area. It is a common feature of other offender management regimes, including in relation to sex and terrorism offenders, so we are not breaking any new ground here. We stated in the draft statutory guidance that the police should use the notification stage to engage with the offender and clarify the effects of an SVRO: that is, to explain to the offender in ordinary language the requirements and effects of an SVRO and what offences may be committed if they breach the order. This, along with an up-to-date description, could be used to assist with future identification when conducting a stop and search. It is therefore important that we keep the notification requirement as currently drafted to ensure that officers are able properly to identify those subject to an order Amendment 233 would create a defence so that an offender can tell an officer that they are not subject to an SVRO if they have a reasonable excuse to do so. I do not see any circumstances where it would be reasonable for an offender not to tell an officer that they are subject to an SVRO if they are asked. It may be that the noble Lord wants to cover circumstances where an offender subject to an SVRO has a reasonable excuse for carrying a knife. In such circumstances, it would be for the police, and ultimately the courts, to decide whether the reasonable excuse defence was made out in the event that the offender was arrested and then charged with an offence in relation to the possession of a bladed article or offensive weapon.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, as the amendments’ explanatory statements make clear, and as the noble Lord, Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames, identified, the intention is to provide for the establishment of a women’s justice board for England and Wales which mirrors the rather lengthy provisions setting up the Youth Justice Board. I am grateful to the noble Lord for his kind words. I can assure him that I gave his amendment very careful thought, and my approach to it has not been adversely affected by the support given to it by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. I also heard what my noble friend Lord Attlee said about his role being to help me: with noble friends being so helpful—well, I will leave that one there.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
John Attlee (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, perhaps I may respond to what noble Lords have said. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, mentioned young offender institutions. When I was getting educated by Frances Crook, I asked her, "How often do inmates at a YOI get taken out on camp?" She said to me, "John, you should ask how often they are taken out of their cells." In response to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, I am not proposing conscription or a national service-type solution. However, the points that he makes are absolutely what is informing my thinking. He made a valid point about the need for instructors and I am not proposing the use of the military to provide that function. Prison officers ought to be taking up that role and I envisage, among other things, youngsters who trained as Outward Bound instructors who cannot necessarily get particularly well-paid employment then training as prison officers and being double-hatted. There are a lot of things that we could do if we wanted to do them.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
John Attlee (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I am very grateful for the response of all noble Lords in this short debate. I would tease my noble friend the Minister and invite him at some stage to read a recent report to the Chief Inspector of Prisons that stimulated some of my thinking The noble Lord, Lord Marks, mentioned soft skills, which are extremely important. I know that anger management training is done within the prison system, but one thing I envisage is on exercises: the trainees have to practise anger management scenarios where they are faced with someone being stroppy and have to respond in the right way, and you can really only do that in an exercise outside the ghastly prison environment That takes me on to the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, about isolation. The inside of a prison is absolutely ghastly. If you have youngsters who are already mentally fragile, having had a ghastly upbringing, which everyone in this Committee knows about, and then stick them in a conventional prison, it is the worst possible environment. That is why I am proposing that, to try to rebuild these youngsters, we need to do it in the beautiful countryside, not inside a ghastly prison. But I am extremely grateful for the response of the Committee and I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
John Attlee (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I had a very sheltered upbringing: I do not know where I could get any recreational drugs. If I went to a pub, I would probably find myself trying to buy recreational drugs from an undercover police officer. The one way I could certainly get some drugs is to get myself sent to prison on remand, because I could get drugs in a prison. I would like to hear from my noble friend the Minister what he is doing to stop drugs getting into prisons. It would be very helpful to understand how drugs get into prisons. Who is bringing them in? That is why my previous amendment referred to "remote" and "rural", because it would be virtually impossible to import drugs into that establishment.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
David Wolfson (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, this probing amendment from the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, would require the courts to impose a sentence with the requirement to attend a residential rehabilitation unit where the offender has a drug or alcohol addiction, unless they had been convicted of murder, manslaughter, a terrorism offence, or a sexual offence. So, we are dealing here with the position at sentence. I will come to my noble friend Lord Attlee’s point about drugs in prison, although that is a slightly different, albeit related, point from that raised by the amendment.
Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill — House of Lords, 2021-11-17
Topic: Law and Crime
John Attlee (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I oppose the Question that Clause 165 stand part of the Bill; I seek not to add but to remove something from the Bill. Section 9B of the Juries Act 1974 gives the judge the power to consider whether a disabled person can undertake their duties as a juror when there is doubt on the part of court officials. New Section 9C requires the judge to consider whether a British Sign Language interpreter would enable the juror to be effective. The rest of the clause is concerned with sensible, consequential provisions The Committee should note that the judge is involved only if there is doubt on the part of officials. A potential juror with an effective hearing aid would not go through the Section 9B process since there would be no doubt that they could be effective. I undertook jury duty many years ago, long before arriving at your Lordships’ House. It was indeed interesting to me, but I regarded it as a duty or an obligation. It is not a right or a privilege in addition to being a duty, as, for example, voting in a general election is. Therefore, I see no requirement to make these special provisions so far as a completely deaf juror is concerned I accept that many deaf people can also lip-read, which would no doubt supplement the assistance of a BSL interpreter. My concern is surely that many cases turn on the credibility of the witness and, sometimes, which witness is not telling the truth. Suppose in a case involving an expert witness, counsel is asking searching questions and makes a provocative suggestion. The expert witness might calmly respond, "No, that is not correct", knowing full well that opposing counsel will return to the matter later. However, what the deaf juror inadvertently could pick up is, "No, that’s wrong", which might appear to be the counsel having the witness on the ropes, when that is far from the facts A further difficulty might arise in the jury room when deliberating the verdict. I have been in the jury room. Discussion could be fast and furious, and I cannot see how the interpreter could possibly keep up. It would be possible to slow the proceedings down, which might be beneficial, but since we do not research how juries operate we cannot tell what the effect would be. The other jurors may simply ignore the deaf juror Finally, the clause also, quite properly, makes consequential provisions that put the interpreter under the same obligations of confidentiality as the other jurors. However, he or she is not a decision-maker and will still be in a different position, and we cannot know what, if any, chilling effect on discussions may arise from the interpreter’s presence. I expect noble Lords supporting me will come up with far better arguments than mine, but I oppose the Question that Clause 165 stand part of the Bill.