Mary Bell Case (Hansard, 22 July 1998)

§ Mr. Straw

I have now received the Permanent Secretary's report into the circumstances in which Home Office officials had for some time known of the possibility of a book from which Mary Bell would profit financially, but had not informed Ministers. This was, at my request, an investigation to identify lessons for the future, not a disciplinary inquiry.

Since her release in 1980, Mary Bell has remained under life licence under the supervision of the probation service. Throughout this period, officials in my Department's Lifer Review Unit have received regular reports from the probation officers responsible for her supervision. These have frequently included accounts of attempts by literary agents and the media to induce her for substantial sums to tell her story. Indeed, there are records of such approaches to her even before she left prison.

The probation service is responsible for supervising those subject to life licence and for reporting, on a regular basis, on each individual to the Lifer Unit on their progress. The service has a particular responsibility to ensure that the public is protected from people who have previously committed very serious offences. Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Probation has received a copy of the report of the investigation carried out by the Chief Probation Officer of the Durham Probation Service into their handling of Mary Bell's case, and offered me his own independent assessment of it. In the light of this, 547W I am satisfied that the probation service kept my officials properly informed of the plans to publish a book. Given the exceptional difficulties of the case, it is also clear that the service has played a major and positive role in helping Mary Bell keep to the conditions of her licence in the 18 years since her release.

Between 1984 and 1987, my officials were informed that Mary Bell had become interested in producing her own account and had spent some time preparing a manuscript. The supervising probation officer notified them of discussions with a literary agent in 1985 about a possible autobiography. Officials advised the probation officer that the Home Office did not favour publication but had no power to prevent it and would not attempt to put pressure on Mary Bell. Ministers were not informed of these developments and, in the event, the project foundered. Officials heard no more about the possibility of a book until August 1995, when they were informed of her renewed interest in producing her own account.

The probation service notified officials in January 1996 that serious negotiations were under way between Mary Bell, Gitta Sereny and a literary agent. In July, there were informed that a contract had been signed and an advance payment made. Officials responded to these developments along the same lines as their predecessors more than a decade previously, namely by questioning the wisdom of the venture but confirming, correctly, that they had no power to prevent it. Great care was taken throughout to try to protect, through maintenance of an injunction long in force, the anonymity of Mary Bell and her family, in the interests of her young daughter.

Following a probation service letter of 6 March this year, advising that the book would appear shortly and was likely to arouse controversy, officials recognised the need to forewarn Ministers. Because their information was that serialisation of the book would not begin until 2 May they did not, in the event, do so until 23 April, by which time (unbeknown to them) news of the book was already emerging. The initial briefing to Ministers concentrated on the contents of the book, and did not make it clear that officials and the probation service had known about the contract from the outset. Ministers were given a full brief on the history of the case only on 30 April, the day after newspaper serialisation had started and some days after widespread controversy had arisen over the financial benefit to Mary Bell.

The Lifer Unit of the Prison Service Headquarters is responsible for casework on nearly 4,000 life sentence prisoners and around a further 800 lifers now on supervision under licence in the community. Their primary task is to ensure that the lifer system operates in a way which minimises risk to the public. They bear a heavy load and I am satisfied that I have been very well served—as, I believe, have my predecessors—by the conscientious advice they provide on the exercise of my statutory powers in individual cases. The possibility of financial benefit to Mary Bell for a book about her crimes did not involve questions of public risk or any breach of the law or the terms of her life licence. Officials accordingly concluded, as early as 1985, that there was nothing they could do to prevent it and did not therefore believe it necessary to submit to Ministers.

548W

Ministers are entitled to expect that officials will try to spot events involving their cases which are likely to arouse controversy and provoke concern over the adequacy of the law. I believe that officials acted in this case throughout in good faith and in accordance with a correct interpretation of the law. With hindsight, it is clear that there were a number of occasions on which Ministers might reasonably have been informed of developments in the Mary Bell case. The Permanent Secretary has accordingly recommended to me procedural and other improvements which will help guide Home Office staff in assessing future cases where Ministers may need to be kept informed of developments, even where there is no question of the exercise by them of statutory powers. He and the Director General of the Prison Service are specifically preparing revised internal operating procedures for the handling of lifer cases and arranging for supplementary guidance to be provided to lifer caseworkers and supervising probation officers.

I have asked officials separately to consider whether the law relating to criminal memoirs might sensibly be strengthened.