§ Not amended (in the Standing Committee), considered. Order for Third Reading read.
1.24 pm§ Mr. Hartley Booth (Finchley)I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
It gives me great pleasure to return this short, but important, Bill to the House. This is the first time that we have considered it orally in the Chamber. The proceedings in Committee established beyond all doubt that this will be a practical and useful measure. I thank all hon. Members who served on the Committee for their thoughtful and constructive contributions and for maintaining the all-party consensus that the Bill has attracted.
I am grateful to the members of the Howard League for Penal Reform and of the Penal Affairs Consortium, to Home Office officials, who have just entered their Box, and to the many others who have supported or issued guidance on the Bill. For many years, I have felt that the practice of prisoners being unemployed and idle in prison should be reversed. They should pay their debt to society while they are in prison, and that would be an opportunity for them to prepare themselves to re-enter society as law-abiding, useful citizens. I raised this matter with lain Macleod, a former right hon. Member of the House, when I was a mere stripling of a student. Unfortunately, he was unable to agree with me at that time, so I am glad to bring the matter to the House now.
In a publication that was kindly published by the CPC in 1992, I wrote about the importance of prisoners paying something directly to the victims of crime. That is part of the Bill.
The Bill follows a series of important reports from Woolf, Tumim and Learmont, who all called for more work to be provided in prisons and for more financial responsibility to be accepted by prisoners. In recent years, there has been a growing recognition of the need to give the interests of victims greater prominence in the way in which the criminal justice system operates. One of the Bill's key objectives is to give prisoners the opportunity and the encouragement to do something for victims and potential victims of crime. To achieve that, prisons must provide the capacity for prisoners to work hard and productively, and we need a robust system for deducting part of their earnings to help victims and for other appropriate purposes.
The Bill has three purposes. They are: crime prevention, national housework and help for victims. Victims can be divided into three categories—actual victims, families of victims and taxpayers.
The Bill is not about increasing prisoners' wages, but it allows for a modest pay increase which is necessary to motivate them. Since 1991, the Prison Service has made commendable progress in developing so-called enhanced wages schemes. In 18 prisons, 1,300 prisoners out of 9,000 are employed by prison industries and farms on this scheme. Instead of earning the ordinary wage of £7 a week, prisoners on the scheme are paid £15 or perhaps, occasionally, a little more. However, the average amount is £15. The effects on motivation and output have been quite dramatic. In one workshop output has tripled from 725 the same number of workers. The beauty of the scheme is that all the extra pay is funded from the value of the extra output produced, so there is no net cost to the taxpayer.
The introduction of a comprehensive system of deductions has been held back by the lack of a proper legal framework, so the Bill provides a clear statutory framework for four deductions: board and lodgings, upkeep of dependants, savings and contributions to victim support and crime prevention schemes. Participation in the enhanced wages scheme to which deductions will apply is a privilege. Prisoners will earn that privilege. Only then will they be allowed to take part. If they are not allowed that privilege, the alternatives will be ordinary prison work on ordinary prison pay.
I have little doubt that the scheme will prove popular among prisoners, leading to increased levels of activity in prison workshops and to busy prisons. It will mean that prison authorities will have to find more work for prisoners. I understand people's concerns about where the work will come from. It is crucial that it should not be obtained at the expense of law-abiding jobseekers in the wider community. That is why the Prison Service is increasingly seeking to work in partnership with private sector firms seeking opportunities for import substitution, and making every effort to ensure that local jobs are not lost. The prison population is about 54,000. If we can get a high proportion of those people working productively, that will help in a small way to stimulate the economy and to contribute to growth and a reduction in unemployment.
May I share with hon. Members a few examples that illustrate those points? For a Manchester firm, bulk container bag production is in progress in certain prisons. That involves import substitutions that would otherwise come from Turkey. For a midlands firm, safe workwear is being produced by machinists in prisons after advertisements locally for machinists produced no replies. Again, no local jobs have been lost.
For Minit shoe repair shops, refurbishing of machines takes place at Wymott prison. For the Prison Service, mugs and toothbrushes are produced at Ranby prison—there is even a night shift to produce those. For another company, mozzarella and ricotta cheese are produced at East Sutton Park. If that prompts hon. Members to ask, next time they eat a pizza, where the cheese comes from, so be it.
In the course of producing the Bill and during its passage through the House, I have been asked some questions. I should like to respond quickly on a few of them. What of prisoners' dependants? Will they lose social benefits? If there is a payment from the prisoner to the family, there may be some replacement of social security benefit, but, given that one of the main causes of spiralling crime is the break-up of family life, I believe that if the Bill can retain the link between the prisoner and the dependant family so that marriages are saved, that will reduce the likelihood of an offender reoffending.
How will the Bill affect the enhanced wages scheme? It will not affect the scheme badly. Prisoners will still be better off than under the old mailbag and pocket money scheme. The enhanced wages scheme will still succeed.
Will prisons directly benefit from the Bill? That is especially relevant to contracted-out prison services. There is a yes and a no. Money from the payment for board and lodging will go directly to the Consolidated 726 Fund and to the Treasury, so no contracted-out prison—indeed, no prison—will have any conflict of interest, but prisons will benefit because morale in them will be better and they can apply to the Treasury or the Consolidated Fund for project money, possibly from that source.
How will the money be apportioned? I have already mentioned the four destinations. Initially, it will be split simply among four objects, but over the years it may be varied accordingly to what seems relevant in a particular case.
What safeguards will there be against excessive deductions? There will be the prison rules and there will be common sense. This is a voluntary scheme that will succeed only with the will and motivation of the prisoners. In any event, we are signatories to conventions that prevent the use of forced labour which we must observe.
How will the funds be administered? The prisons will set up savings accounts and systems to send money directly to dependants and to voluntary victim support and crime prevention organisations.
Will the scheme be unfair to the unemployed? Indeed, it was put to me by a forceful journalist yesterday that prisoners should stick to breaking rocks in prison. It does not help anyone for prisoners to remain idle. It just adds to our economic burden. It is in the interests of even the unemployed that when prisoners leave prison they have a greater likelihood of going straight, not least because many of the victims of crime are themselves unemployed.
The Government have a proud record on victim support, the funds for which have been increased by 8 per cent. this year. Some £11.7 million has been paid out this year. Under the present arrangements, this Bill will add money to that. That is what the Government intend and there are no plans to change that. Compensation orders will be paid first by offenders in prison, before they become part of the scheme.
There are no losers under the Bill, only winners. Prisoners are motivated, because they will have a little more cash in hand to save for their release. They will gain self-respect from contributing to the upkeep of their dependants. Victim support and crime prevention organisations will benefit from the additional financial assistance they will receive. Society as a whole will gain in two major ways. First, prisoners will come out of prison with some work experience that will help them to resettle in society and avoid reoffending. Indeed, some evidence shows that there is a 50 per cent. greater likelihood that prisoners who have been earning properly, given responsibility and earning respect for themselves in prison will go straight and choose honesty when they come out of prison. Secondly, prisoners will be working more productively. They will be putting something back into the economy rather than just being a burden on the taxpayer.
For the sake of victims of crime, for the sake of prisoners' families, for the sake of the economy and for the sake of all of us, I commend the Bill to the House.
§ Mr. Alun Michael (Cardiff, South and Penarth)I welcome the Bill. The hon. Member for Finchley (Mr. Booth) has taken a constructive approach to the way in which we deal with imprisonment. It is a pity that there is such a short time to discuss the Bill. I understand that the Government are desperate to reach the Constitutional Change Bill of the hon. Member for North Tayside (Mr. Walker), which deals with referendums.
727 The Prisoners' Earnings Bill merits a longer debate as it raises a variety of important issues. However, I do not intend to delay the House. I am afraid that, again, I shall rouse the Minister's zeal to defend the indefensible by pointing out the background against which we are debating the Bill. The Home Secretary is complacent not only about violent crime but about the chaotic state of the Prison Service. That fact has been confirmed by Her Majesty's inspectorate of prisons, as well as by his predecessor.
During this Parliament, the prison population has soared from about 46,500 to about 54,000. That reflects the Government's dramatic failure to address the causes of crime. To make matters even worse, the Prison Service is having to cope with a budget cut of 14.5 per cent. in real terms over the next three years. Not only is that a difficulty facing the Prison Service but it is worrying for the public generally, because if the Prison Service is not effective, a series of offenders who have not been reformed and are likely to reoffend will come back into the community.
Prison certainly has a number of purposes. Punishment and deterrent are crucial, but rehabilitation and making recompense to victims, whether financial or in some other form, are also ways in which the offender should pay his debt to society. It is in the interests of the public for restitution to be paid. It is certainly in the interests of the public and potential future victims to give prisoners a sense of discipline, self-worth and experience of work that is likely to result in their being less likely to reoffend when they are released at the end of their sentence. There are many other issues, such as drugs in prison and the ineffectiveness of much of the psychiatric work that should be going on there, but they go well beyond the Bill's scope.
Reoffending is certainly an issue on which the House should be united. It is not best achieved by sending offenders to so-called "universities of crime". It would be far more prudent to ensure that, once convicted, all activities in which prisoners engage are geared towards effective rehabilitation. That is why we welcome the Bill and have long argued for the principle of productive remunerated work in prisons.
Before the Bill was introduced, my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley, North (Mr. Howarth) said on the issue to which it refers:
Partnerships between prisons and industry could provide invaluable training with genuine qualifications, so that prisoners will have something to offer back to society on their release rather than improved criminal skills.Community service schemes have rightly been applauded where they force offenders to make some recompense to their victims, but there is no reason why prisoners should not work to compensate their victims as well. We are looking at ways in which industry can be brought into partnership so that the lot of prisoners' victims can be improved, while ensuring that prisoners are less likely to offend after release.A balance must of course be struck, because it would be wrong if offenders who ended up in prison were treated better than those in society who are also without proper employment and have not offended in the serious way that has led to imprisonment. I am sure that the hon. Member for Finchley (Mr. Booth) would agree that the Government must maintain a careful balance so that prisoners are not favoured at the expense of other sections of society. Once that is accepted, the principle will be welcome.
728 We recognise the value of productive work in rehabilitating prisoners, and it is a shocking indictment of policy that, at the end of the 20th century, we do not have effective rehabilitative programmes in all our prisons. One ex-prisoner commented in The Guardian:
The boredom in prison is mindless. Facilities like education, sport or the library are very limited in terms of time and quality and more often take the role of baby-sitting rather than adult stimulation".A disproportionately large proportion of prisoners have few or no qualifications. A facility to award genuine qualifications based on work could greatly help them to find gainful work following release. Conversely, many other prisoners are highly qualified, and we should try to make them work in prison-based employment that utilises their skills. Just as in the outside world, neither prisoners nor the community at large benefit from wasted ability.Offenders should never be allowed to earn more money than law-abiding citizens in the community or be advantaged in comparison. I understand and have some sympathy for the proposal that a proportion of the moneys earned should be directed towards victim support schemes and crime prevention measures. We support those very strongly. Community service schemes have rightly made recompense to the victims of crime. It is high time that prisoners should be able to do the same.
However, some concerns have been raised by the Victim Support national office and I hope that the Minister will address two points in his response. First, at the moment, compensation orders are not usually made against offenders who are sent to prison because it is assumed that they cannot pay. A far greater number of prisoners should be able to pay compensation to their victims than is provided for in the Bill. In other words, is it not right that the first call on compensation if a prisoner is able to earn money should be the victim of the crimes for which he has been convicted? I would be interested to know whether the Minister feels that that principle is covered adequately and, if not, whether he will introduce measures to ensure that that principle underlies the way in which we approach a prisoner's responsibility towards the victim or victims of his crime. I am sure that the hon. Member for Finchley, the Bill's promoter, does not disagree with that principle.
The second aspect on which the Victim Support national office has expressed concern, which may go rather more to the content of the Bill, is the compulsory charitable donation. Although the Bill states that donations will be used for voluntary organisations concerned with victim support and crime prevention, there seems to be a suggestion that the main beneficiary will be victim support. If prisoners were allowed to choose the charity to which they gave money, there would be an opportunity for proper thought and discussion about the effects of crime on victims and for reparation.
As the Bill stands, the donation looks a bit like a tax on prisoners. Victim Support is worried about the implication for its Home Office funding. It has always believed that the organisation should be funded by the main criminal justice budget and that the funding should not be dependent on a levy on prisoners. That point ties well with the principle, which I put forward a moment ago, that the first call on the money should be direct compensation for the victims of the crimes that the prisoners have committed. I hope that the Minister will accept that point and the principle behind it.
729 The notion that some money should be diverted to the cost of keeping inmates in prison is welcome as long as, again, it is not seen as purely a cost-cutting exercise. Reductions in the Prison Service budget have already placed great strain on vital services such as education provision and basic security. As with productive work and training, education is important if we are to produce people who not only have been punished by being in prison and by the discipline of prison but come out more likely to avoid reoffending and to be reasonable members of the wider community. I hope that the Minister can respond positively on that point.
The creation of an investment fund for use by prisoners on release should greatly assist in the first few weeks following release. There are far too many cases of prisoners coming out of prison, being totally adrift and almost drifting into reoffending because their circumstances are not very positive. Obviously, they are still to blame for any offences which they commit. However, it is a foolish society that does not anticipate that danger and does not try to build in protections. For that reason, the proposal to give a prisoner something with which to plan a future on release is positive and sensible, and does not conflict with the concept of punishment for which prison is intended.
I hope that the Minister will respond to my specific questions about the way in which the legislation will be pursued. As I said, the Bill has our support. I welcome this initiative, and congratulate the hon. Member for Finchley on promoting the Bill and on bringing it successfully and simply to its Third Reading.
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Timothy Kirkhope)I do not intend to allow my remarks to range as far and wide as those of the hon. Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth (Mr. Michael). Before I speak on Third Reading in general, I must say to him that, although it is of course possible not only that the numbers of inmates in our prisons have been increasing but that they will continue to increase when my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary's tough new sentencing laws are in place, our discussions on the Bill have to do with how productive prisoners' lives may be when they are in prison.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mr. Booth) on having brought the Bill through to the point where we are on the verge of giving it a Third Reading. The fact that the Bill has made such relatively trouble-free progress through its Commons stages, and arrives back in the Chamber without amendment, is the result, I think, of two main factors.
First, the proposals themselves are eminently sensible. They open the way for some exciting developments in the way in which work is provided for prisoners in the future, and, as my hon. Friend said, they do so in a way that means that there are no losers as a result of the Bill, only winners.
Apart from the proposals themselves, the second key factor has been the way in which my hon. Friend has guided the Bill through its various stages, building and maintaining a consensus that has embraced hon. Members on both sides of the House. I know that he has also been assiduous in ensuring that outside organisations concerned with crime and the treatment of offenders were consulted, and were content with the direction set by the Bill.
730 As the House will know, the Prison Service, along with other parts of the public sector, is currently having to examine its operations very critically to meet demanding cost reduction targets; but Ministers and the prisons board have made it clear that we expect cost reductions to come mainly from increased efficiency, not from cuts in regime activities, especially those that can be shown to be beneficial from the point of view of reducing the risk of reoffending after release.
Constructive work clearly falls into that category, and because it actually brings income into the system to offset operating costs, it is in a unique position to maintain or increase the amount of activity provided, while at the same time reducing the net cost of the activity. The key is to get more prisoners to work, and to get prisoners working harder when they are at work. Although work is compulsory for convicted prisoners, those objectives cannot be achieved simply by coercion. As the existing wages schemes show, prisoners will work harder if there is a reasonable incentive.
The arrangements cannot simply be left at that. Prisoners do not have the same living expenses as other people, and it would be wrong for them to accumulate spending money without contributing to the cost of their upkeep, to the upkeep of their dependants or to victim support schemes. The Bill therefore establishes a sensible framework, with appropriate safeguards, for such deductions, as well as for using part of prisoners' earnings for compulsory savings to be repaid on release.
In many ways, the Bill had its origin in the Woolf report on the Strangeways disturbances, but it is also totally in line with the Learmont report, with its call for much more active industrial prisons.
There are two outstanding points. First, I confirm for the hon. Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth that a compensation order to an individual victim of course takes precedence over any other deduction, and that will continue to happen.
Secondly, I agree that Victim Support should derive its main funding from public funds. The Bill does not pre-empt the decision on the voluntary organisations to which deductions should go. Those will be prescribed by prison rules. However, I am interested in the possibility that, when the matter is decided on a local committee basis for prisons, there may be more consultation with prisoners on how the money should be allocated.
I do not want to detain the House. The measure—
§ Mr. MichaelWill the Minister give way?
§ Mr. KirkhopeVery briefly, because I do not want to detain the House.
§ Mr. MichaelI am grateful for the positive way in which the Minister responded on those two points. That is most helpful, and enables us to be even more enthusiastic about the Bill. As victims of the actual crimes will have priority in the allocation of compensation, will there be a change in the guidance to the courts, to take account of the change arising from the Bill?
§ Mr. KirkhopeObviously, notification of the legislation's provisions would be given to courts where appropriate. I remind the House that the question of compensation paid to a victim is always a matter for the 731 courts. They take into account all relevant circumstances when deciding whether a compensation order is appropriate. The Bill's provisions will be made known to the relevant parties.
I congratulate my hon. Friend on introducing an excellent measure that will make a positive contribution to prison life and will be acceptable to the wider community. I commend it to the House.
§ Question put and agreed to.
§ Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed.