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It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. In my short time in Parliament, perhaps the most terrifying thing I have heard so far is the evidence we took on the Business and Trade Committee that state actors are joining forces with criminal gangs to attack this country in the cyber-theatre. From his vast experience, has the right hon. Gentleman ever delivered a report quite so urgent and time-sensitive?
My hon. Friend is delivering a searing indictment of this Budget. Does he agree that the intention of the farm tax may have been to take in multimillionaire so-called “slipper farmers”, but in rural constituencies like his and mine, it is hitting tenant farmers?
The Isle of Wight Youth Trust is set to lose £200,000-worth of funding by the end of the financial year. Early support hubs will lose funding across the country, and up to half the 24 surveyed said that they may close services. Will the Secretary of State speak to cross-departmental colleagues to ensure that bridge funding is put in place, so that no young person loses out?
I am sure colleagues across the House will want to join me in wishing a very happy Lancashire Day to Lancastrians everywhere, and perhaps most especially to the only Lancastrian Speaker of the 158 people to have held that office—there will have to be three more before it reaches the number of Herefordians who have held it. I also wish a very happy Thanksgiving to all our American friends, hosts and families. No one needs reminding that the Leader of the House is a thoroughly good and sensible man. [Interruption.] “Careful”, he says. We like to keep things orderly at business questions, but I cannot imagine what he can possibly have made of the past few weeks. We have had an entirely unnecessary period of prolonged economic uncertainty; endless media pitch-rolling and U-turns; a relentlessly dismissive attitude to this House from Ministers; repeated breaches of the ministerial code; and even the fiasco of a convenient Office for Budget Responsibility leak on the morning of the Budget. The House should be in no doubt that yesterday we saw the Government increase taxes to the highest levels since at least 1970, according to the OBR. Between last year and this, the Government have raised something like £100 billion in additional tax revenue, much of which will fall on working people. They have done so not through any coherent tax policy or vision for the UK economy, but through an array of “back of a fag packet” tricks and wheezes, whose inevitable effect will be to make it even harder for businesses to expand and for people to get jobs. As Paul Johnson, lately of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said, it is “big tax rises but no effort at reform”. The tax rises are mainly to finance extra spending, and are not because of worse forecasts. This Government claim to speak for working people, skills, employment and growth, but those are all things they chose to undermine at yesterday’s Budget. Those were their choices. Even now, the Government have failed to please their union paymasters. In the words of Sharon Graham, general secretary of Unite, the decision to freeze income tax thresholds will result in 10 million workers paying the higher rate of income tax. A stealth tax on workers means that everyday people pay the price again. What is the point of this Government? What are they for? No one can say, however they vote and whatever their politics. This Chancellor and this Prime Minister came to power last year with no idea and no plan. Even by that standard, they have been a colossal disappointment, but that is not all. As we just noted in the urgent question, this week has also seen a leak of the Justice Secretary’s intention to abolish jury trial for all but the most serious cases. We had the embarrassing sight of the junior Justice Minister, the hon. and learned Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Sarah Sackman)—a woman who transparently believes in the importance of jury trial—defending this preposterous proposal. The Justice Secretary is the same man who said in 2020: “Jury trials are fundamental to our democracy.” Blackstone, no less, called them “the glory of the English law”, and yet they are to be abolished by a Justice Secretary and a junior Justice Minister who both went to Harvard law school and a Prime Minister who spent nearly four decades at the Bar. The Bar Council has made clear that jury trials are not the cause of any case backlog, destroying the Government’s attempted justification for the policy. The Criminal Bar Association has strongly criticised the proposal, as has the legendary Baroness Kennedy of The Shaws. Many others will doubtless do the same in the coming days. Again, it is inconceivable to me that the Leader of this House supports this decision. I hope that at the very least he will allow time for a Backbench debate soon on this topic. Both the Budget and the Government’s proposal to abolish jury trial have something fundamental in common. The Chancellor seemed unaware yesterday that in asking people to, as she put it, “make a contribution” to the Budget, she is not inviting them to engage in some voluntary process. She is in fact using the full force of the coercive power of the state to take away their freely owned property in taxes. The removal of jury trial would do the same thing to the involvement of citizens in this country in the exercise of the criminal law—that other supreme coercive power of the state. Whatever the rhetoric, and whatever the smoke and mirrors, both these actions demonstrate that this Government hold the ordinary men and women of this country in profound contempt. No one should be surprised if those actions and this Government are now treated by those people with similar contempt.
To govern is to choose, and the Chancellor has chosen. She has chosen spending over saving, higher taxes over welfare reform, and benefits Britain over working Britain. She would rather raise taxes by £26 billion than shave a single penny off the welfare bill. She will make people who work and save pay more for the benefits of millions who do not. I say that the Chancellor chose, but are these her choices or those of Labour Back Benchers? Just a few months ago, when debating the Government’s personal independence payment reform Bill, those Back Benchers were the ones who stood up and said things like, “I didn’t come here to cut benefits.” They were the ones in and out of meetings with No. 10 while the debate was going on in this Chamber, and they were the ones who forced the Disability Minister to stand up during that debate and announce that there would, in fact, be no savings. The Government’s welfare Bill then became a spending Bill, which Labour Back Benchers all voted for, of course. The Chancellor could have used the Budget to right that wrong—or could she? The wolves have been circling ever since. This was not a Budget for Britain; it was a Budget for Labour Back Benchers. It was a “save our skin” Budget, but in saving her own skin, the Chancellor is selling the country down the river at a cost of £26 billion to taxpayers and 200,000 jobs, on top of the 150,000 that have already been lost since Labour has been in power and the thousands more that the unemployment rights Bill will destroy.
This Budget is simple: taxes are going up on working people to pay for more benefits. That is the story of this Budget. The Chancellor told the country that she was spending to bring down the cost of living. Really? For whom? Inflation is up, tax is up and wage growth is down. The only group of people who are going to be better off are those on benefits—the 10 million people of working age whose benefits will be uplifted by inflation, the thousands more who will go on to sickness benefits in the year ahead, and the half a million households who will get money from the lifting of the two-child cap. Those households will receive £5,000 more on average by the end of this decade, at a cost of £3 billion to the taxpayer, and some will get much more. A family with five children could get an extra £10,500, while a family with eight children will be able to get an extra £21,000, nearly as much as the annual pay before tax of a full-time worker on the minimum wage. Labour Members have told us again and again today how Labour is fixing child poverty by giving out that extra money. We all care about children—we all want children to get the best start in life. [Interruption.] Come on. Labour Members are chuntering at me, but they cannot doubt the fact that everyone in this place wants children to get the best start in life. Handing out money might improve the poverty statistics that they like so much to crow about, but it will not solve the problem. Work is the best way out of poverty, and the Government’s handout will make parents less likely to work. There are couples across the country—couples in work—who are wondering whether they can afford another child. Thanks to this Budget, their taxes are going up, and their incomes may well go down. Thanks to this Budget, some of them will decide to have no more children, or no children at all. That is sad, and it is unfair. Labour Members have been crowing about the Budget, but as my hon. Friend the Member for West Worcestershire (Dame Harriett Baldwin) said earlier, the threshold rises it contains could even drag some working families below the relative poverty line that they like to talk about so much.
The sad fact is that the country went through a pandemic and we had to get the country’s finances under control. This Chancellor promised that she would not increase taxes on working people, but that is exactly what she has done. Who can trust her? I know that people out there do not. If all we heard about this Budget was the speeches of Government Members, we would think something wonderful was going on. I hate to shatter their delusions, but the fact is that people out there are despairing. People have been saying to me, “If all the Government are going to do is take your money in taxes, why work? Why bother?” We are seeing those who can, from successful business people to talented future entrepreneurs, leaving the country. The Government are killing aspiration and growth, and, in fact, savings. The OBR says that household savings will fall as a result of the Budget, from 6% to 2% by 2030. The Budget is an attack on people who are simply doing the right thing: working, saving, trying to pay their way in life and trying to build a better future. The Government could make different choices. If they were willing to get a grip of the welfare bill and bring it down, they could cut taxes on working people. We have heard from several Ministers, and from the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions himself, that the system needs reform, but their actions say otherwise. Working-age welfare spending is up £40 billion in this Budget. The Timms review’s terms of reference tell us that there are no savings to see here. The Secretary of State will not even say the word “savings”. They say one thing, but do another. It sums them up. After all those promises not to put taxes up on working people, here we are with two Budgets in a row hiking taxes on working people. It does not have to be this way. We have identified £47 billion of savings from public spending. Of that, £23 billion is welfare savings from doing the right thing, such as stopping giving sickness benefits to people with anxiety and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and stopping handing out benefits to foreign nationals. It is not kind or compassionate to trap people on benefits. It is not fair on people who are working to pay the bills, and it is simply not affordable for our country to go on like this. The Minister likes to chat a lot during debates, and he has said that he stood for office “to stop drawing charts”—[Interruption.] He might like to listen to what he actually said, although he does not like to listen to other people. He said that he stood for office “to stop drawing charts and start changing them.” He has certainly achieved that. Inflation is up, unemployment is up, borrowing is up and public spending is up. Perhaps he can tell us which of those he is most proud of. The Minister, the Chancellor, the Prime Minister and the entire Government will all leave their mark on our country with this Budget. At their last Budget, they dug a hole. With this Budget, they have dug it deeper. Instead of cutting the welfare bill, they are adding to it. Instead of getting people into work, they are putting them on benefits. Instead of backing workers, they are funding stay-at-homers using the hard-earned money of Britain’s taxpayers. That is the choice they have made, and we reject it.
5. What steps she is taking to help support small and medium-sized music recording studios.
Thank you, Mr Speaker, and apologies for making it just in time. Chiltern Railways are entirely to blame. I thank the Minister for that answer, however a couple of weeks ago I met my constituent Dom, who runs a small music studio. The cost pressures on the music industry coming from this Government are unsustainable at the moment, not least from business rates—even after yesterday’s announcement—employer national insurance and the minimum wage. With so many small music studios having closed in recent years in this country, how will the Government ensure that our music industry has a solid future?
T2. Much of Buckinghamshire’s tourist economy is under- pinned by walkers coming to enjoy our countryside and the beautiful Chilterns, but on top of the tourism tax, the industry is threatened by the Secretary of State’s Government threatening to plaster Buckinghamshire with solar panels, which will drive the walkers away. What representations is she making to her colleague the Energy Secretary to protect tourism in Buckinghamshire?
I entirely endorse the argument that my hon. Friend is making. The big punishment in yesterday’s Budget was the increase in taxation on dividends. That says to our wealth creators and entrepreneurs—the people who create jobs—“Don’t bother.”
In reflecting on the title that the Government have offered up for today’s Budget resolutions debate, “Economic Sustainability and Fair Choices”, I have found myself wondering on what planet anyone could possibly call yesterday’s Budget sustainable or fair. The forecasts show that GDP growth will be down in every year from 2026 to 2029, consumer prices index inflation will be up 3.5% this year, taxes will increase by £26 billion, the unemployment rate will hit 4.9% in 2026, the size of the state itself will increase to 44.8% of GDP, borrowing will go up £11 billion, and debt interest will be higher in every year of the forecast. That is not the makings of a sustainable economy or growth, and it is certainly not fair on the taxpayers who will have to shoulder the burden to pay for it all. As I visit businesses in my constituency—the retailers and hospitality businesses on the high streets of Wendover, Princes Risborough, Great Missenden; the village pubs; the furniture manufacturers in Princes Risborough and the surrounds; and the rocket scientists and big businesses at Westcott venture park—they all paint a picture of preparing for things to get worse. They say that they are not planning to take on new employees or apprentices.
Labour Members are like a broken record. The last Conservative Government certainly made a number of mistakes—we have put our hands up to that—but we left employment high and unemployment at a record low, and jobs were being created every single day. Now, businesses are not taking on—or are planning not to take on—more new starters, or, like Rumsey’s Chocolaterie on Wendover High Street, have already had to lay people off or cut their hours because of employer NI, business rates and the looming Employment Rights Bill. Those are the real-world consequences of the Labour Government’s policies. The dividends tax in the Budget struck right at the heart of the entrepreneurs—the small business owners—who risk everything to create growth, employ people and create the jobs that we want in our economy. It has sent them the message: “There will be less in it for you, if anything at all.” Many of those businesses operate on narrow margins, working their socks off almost for nothing, and this Government are making it even harder for them. That is no way to run an economy. I am lucky enough to have many farmers in my constituency of Mid Buckinghamshire, where around 90% of the land is agricultural, and I talk to them as often as I can. My party held an emergency food and farming summit at Fleet Marston farm in my constituency a couple of weeks ago, where my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, the shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins), and the shadow Farming Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore), joined me to again hear directly from farmers about the impact the family farm tax will have. They will have to either sell up to a third of their farm to meet that tax bill or take on a level of debt that it will take over 40 years to pay back. The National Farmers Union, many other organisations and farmers directly have tried to reach out, including yesterday on Whitehall, to get Labour MPs and Ministers to listen and understand the real-world consequences of their decisions. And yet the Budget yesterday was entirely lacking anything other than the transferable allowance to take away the stress, anxiety and existential threat to British agriculture that the family farm tax and changes to business property relief represent to family businesses and family farms up and down the country. I can assure anyone who challenges the point I am making that it will not be other farmers who buy the land when farms have to sell to meet the inheritance tax bill—it will be property developers and those with all sorts of other concerns, who will not keep that land in food production. The nation’s food security will suffer as a direct result of the failure to scrap the family farm tax yesterday. I want to talk briefly about another issue I have been focused on for a number of years, during the last Parliament and this one. I draw the House’s attention to my co-chairmanship of the loan charge and taxpayer fairness all-party parliamentary group. I am grateful to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and the new Exchequer Secretary for the time they have taken to reach out on this issue. Some of the announcements yesterday were welcome, off the back of the McCann review. However, I am sorry to say to the House that they have not been met with total joy from the victims of the loan charge, because many people caught up in the loan charge are still being asked to pay amounts of money that they simply cannot afford. The Chancellor, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and other Ministers are on the record saying, when in opposition, that the victims of the loan charge were “victims of mis-selling” and that the perpetrators—those who promoted these schemes—should have been brought to justice. What we got yesterday was nothing of the sort. We did not get the fully independent review that the APPG and the Loan Charge Action Group have been calling for. Despite the concessions yesterday, many people simply will not be able to pay. Two thirds of the victims are now over 55, 40% are over 60 and a quarter are already retired. They just do not have the ability to find the amounts of money being asked for, and the offer on the table is nothing like the settlement made with the big banks some years ago, which was in the region of 10% to 15%. I urge the Exchequer Secretary to look at this again and to deliver a genuinely fair settlement to everyone caught up by the loan charge and pursue those who sold the schemes.
While the spousal transfer is a very narrow measure that might give a couple of years or maybe a decade’s relief, at the end of the day farmers will still have to sell massive chunks of their farm to meet the inheritance tax bill. What will the hon. Lady say to her farmers when that point comes?
The crisis in our criminal justice system is not caused by jury trials but by inefficiencies in the system and a lack of advocates able to prosecute and defend trials, according to the Bar Council and the Criminal Bar Association. When will the Government engage with them, rather than relying solely on Sir Brian’s report, in order to maintain the cornerstone of our justice system—the jury trial—while improving inefficiencies in the criminal justice system?
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell. I congratulate the hon. Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi) on securing this critical debate. As chair of the all-party parliamentary beer group, the hon. Lady has heard first hand from many stakeholders, including the British Beer and Pub Association, about how the extended producer responsibility regime is directly affecting businesses. We have heard contributions from Members from across the House today, and indeed from across the United Kingdom, proudly standing up for the businesses in their constituencies and highlighting some of the challenges that the scheme is creating, as well as the challenges facing the hospitality, pub and brewery sector in the United Kingdom in the last year under this Labour Government. As well as the hon. Lady, we have heard powerful representations from the hon. Members for Woking (Mr Forster), for North West Leicestershire (Amanda Hack), for Strangford (Jim Shannon)—I had to hold myself back from intervening on the hon. Gentleman—for Llanelli (Dame Nia Griffith), who talked powerfully about steel packaging, for Runcorn and Helsby (Sarah Pochin) and for Caerfyrddin (Ann Davies). I am extremely proud of the positive action taken by the previous Conservative Government on packaging and waste. Between 2010 and 2022, the amount of waste going to landfill was successfully reduced by 47%, and the amount of biodegradable waste going to landfill by 46%. In 2015, we introduced a charge on single-use plastic bags, resulting in a 95% cut in sales of plastic bags in major supermarkets. Building on that, we went further and banned the use of single-use plastics such as plastic straws, cutlery and cotton buds, which also restricted businesses’ use of other single-use plastics such as plastic plates. The last Conservative Government also introduced a tax on plastic packaging containing less than 30% recycled plastic, which encouraged businesses to reduce the use of single-use plastics in their supply chains. Finally, we introduced a simpler recycling collection system, which I am pleased the current Government have taken forward from us, thereby continuing to make recycling more user-friendly, cutting down on confusion and the time spent recycling, and ultimately improving recycling rates, which is good for our environment. These actions were achievable and proportionate. Importantly, the last Government also laid the correct economic foundations to make those changes and supported businesses—which, I have to say, stands in contrast to what we heard yesterday when the Chancellor delivered her autumn Budget. Many Members here joined me to speak in this Chamber in May, when we had a Westminster Hall debate on glass packaging and the EPR scheme. Back then, I raised my concerns with the Minister about the economic situation and spoke about how, when introducing measures that place costs on businesses, the Government have a responsibility to consider whether this is the appropriate time to impose new burdens on businesses. The British Retail Consortium has said that retailers support the “polluter pays” principle, but it is concerned that the levy will not deliver value for consumers in these challenging economic times—times made far worse by this Labour Government and their mishandling of the economy, as we saw in the run-up to, and the delivery of, yesterday’s retrograde Budget. The hospitality industry is a key growth sector. A June 2023 report by Ignite Economics, which was commissioned by UKHospitality, found that, for every pound that the UK hospitality industry directly contributes to GDP, it creates a further 58p indirectly and a further £1.30 when including the induced impact. That report also outlined that between 2016 and 2023, hospitality increased its annual economic contribution by £20 billion, to £93 billion. Furthermore, since 2016 employment in the sector has risen to 3.5 million, making hospitality the third largest employer in the country. Finally, hospitality contributed £54 billion in tax receipts to the Treasury last year. Unfortunately, it appears that this Government do not understand that higher costs and taxes burden businesses and can cause them to close, leading to job losses and destroyed livelihoods. Since the autumn Budget last year, figures published in August of this year show that two hospitality venues are closing every day—including over 100 pubs and restaurants. Turning again to glass, which is a key reason behind this debate, glass packaging is 100% recyclable—and infinitely recyclable, meaning it can be recycled again and again without losing quality. The previous Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the right hon. Member for Streatham and Croydon North (Steve Reed), received a joint letter from the British Beer and Pub Association, British Glass Manufacturers’ Confederation, Scotch Whisky Association, WineGB, Wine and Spirit Trade Association and UKHospitality. The letter warned the Government about the “numerous economic headwinds” that businesses are facing, and highlighted that, while glass represents only 5% of the volume of containers placed on the market, the glass charges cover approximately 30% of the scheme’s cost. The fees are much higher for glass than any other materials, at 10p per average bottle of wine and 17p for every average bottle of spirits, eight times as high as equivalent EU schemes. Indeed, those organisations said in a joint statement: “There is a risk that without action from the UK government to reduce these fees and move to meaningfully support businesses rather than restrict them, the scheme will result in producers switching to less sustainable materials and that many producers will be charged twice—further restricting investment into the economy.” Does the Minister agree that that is clearly not how a circular economy should run? The Minister may be familiar with Mermaid gin and its iconic bottles, which are so beautiful that some companies have upcycled empty bottles into drinking glassware. The Isle of Wight Distillery, which produces Mermaid gin, has said that bottles were designed to be reused and returned to the circular economy. As their compliance and sustainability manager noted, “it would actually be cheaper to put our liquid into plastic bottles.” Does the Minister agree that no environmental or recycling policy, however well-intentioned, should end up incentivising companies to think about switching to packaging that is actually less environmentally friendly? Furthermore, in an article published 31 October by Food Manufacture, Josh Pitman, managing director at sustainable packaging firm Priory Direct, is quoted as saying that he is still receiving hundreds of queries from its over 21,000 customers who do not understand EPR and what they need to do. Mr Pitman outlines how his firm has effectively acted as “EPR customer service” and is quoted as saying that “there appears to be a lack of clear, helpful guidance and limited proactive engagement with affected businesses from government, aside from some overly exclusive and expensive events featuring official spokespeople.” What action will the Minister take to provide clearer and more accessible guidance to affected businesses? The Minister may also be aware that One Water, a water brand that seeks to provide clean water and sanitation to communities around the world, has warned that EPR is placing a disproportionate burden on compliant companies, with the scheme estimated to cost the firm £140,000 in 2025. It is estimated that the scheme has already contributed to a £400,000 loss in glass product sales, mostly through lost hotel, bar and restaurant sales. How will the Minister work with stakeholders to ensure that compliant companies are not disproportionately affected? Climbing food prices, record levels of farm closures, two pubs or restaurants closing a day and business confidence at a 15-year low, as well as the awful costs of the family farm tax—even before it has fully come into force—outline why we are currently in a food and farming emergency. As the Minister may know, last week the Leader of the Opposition and the shadow Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins), hosted a food and farming emergency summit to ask farmers, fishermen and food producers what urgent measures they need to survive the next 12 months. The EPR was raised as a key issue that is causing the sector significant concern because food, drink and hospitality businesses, including local pubs, are currently being unfairly charged twice. Following that summit, and having listened to the measures the industry said are needed, my right hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State wrote to the Secretary of State to ask the Government to work with her on the industry’s call for a rapid review of the impact of the Government’s EPR scheme on the food, drink and hospitality sectors, including through the double charging of pubs, about which we have heard many times today. I hope that the Minister will consider the merit of that request, which came directly from those attending the emergency summit. I noted in yesterday’s Budget that the Government will: consult in 2026 on the extended producer responsibility and proposals to measure how often and how well local authorities use fees; appoint a producer responsibility organisation by March 2026 to give industry a role in the scheme’s operation; and consult on reforms to the packaging waste recycling note system. Perhaps the Minister will repeat that in due course. That is all well and good, but the sector needs urgent action now to ensure that the EPR system is fit for purpose and that our fantastic food, drink, retail and hospitality sectors are protected and encouraged to thrive.
The Minister is talking about economic viability. I mentioned that the Government said in the Budget yesterday that they will consult on the EPR scheme, and she has repeated that. The Conservatives are calling for an urgent review. A consultation is not good enough; proverbially, that just kicks the steel can down the track. Will the Government commit to an urgent review so that businesses do not suffer in the coming months?
Under this Labour Ministry of Justice we have had leaked prisoners and now leaked documents. When we had leaked prisoners, the Justice Secretary came here, demanded a review, put in new checks and made it clear that he would personally look into it. Given that we have had leaked documents, what steps will be taken? Can the Minister rule out the leak having come from special advisers or Ministers, and will there be a leak inquiry to find out how the information got out from the Ministry?
Electric and plug-in car drivers in Hinckley and Bosworth in north-west Leicestershire have woken up angry and anxious this morning. They were told to do the right thing by getting electric cars, yet the Chancellor is going around this morning saying that they will be charged per mile and that the money will go into improving roads. The Leader of the House, a learned man, will know that that link was broken in 1937. There is some consternation about how the charges will affect the second-hand car market, whether vehicles will need trackers, and what happens when charges are passed over. Those are serious considerations for my constituents, who are trying to understand how the scheme will work. May we have a debate in Government time on how the electric vehicle charges will work?
Q I am the shadow Justice Minister. Thank you for the written briefings, particularly the one done with INQUEST and Justice North, which is very detailed. As has been alluded to, we cannot go through it all, but could you pick out perhaps the two or three points where it is most important to make further amendments, based on what you just said? Pete Weatherby: Primarily, our concerns are around command responsibility and the extent to which the Bill covers, or does not cover, the intelligence services, and we have concerns about the clause 11 offence going too far in its requirements.
Q We have time for you to expand slightly on what you want to see change in those three elements. Pete Weatherby: On command responsibility, the Bill, and the original Bill, created both individual and corporate duties, and quite rightly so. The problem with the corporate duties is that the offences require a very high threshold. They require either intent or subjective recklessness, which means that the person has to foresee the risk but nevertheless decide to take it. It is not impossible, but it is extraordinarily difficult, to apply that to an inanimate object like a corporate body. In the original Bill, we imposed some corporate duties but put the responsibility for enforcing them on the heads of the public body involved; this has not quite been followed through in this Bill. We would like to see a simple amendment to clauses 5 and 11, as we set out in the briefing, to put that legal responsibility on the chief officer or the chief executive of the public body. Without that, a lot of the duties in the Bill are reduced to something that looks good but is rather ineffective. We have said all the way through that our watchwords are “practical” and “effective”. If law is not practical and effective, don’t bother. That is the first thing. On the intelligence services, some of the many campaigns behind a Hillsborough law include the Manchester Arena families. There was a major failure of the intelligence services and the way they dealt with the aftermath of the bombing. This is all in the public domain: they had intelligence that related to the bomber and the bomber’s activities, and they did not act on it. The chair of the public inquiry, having heard closed evidence, came to the conclusion that they should have acted on it. Although he could not say whether it would have made a difference, it might have made a difference. Obviously, that is very important. The problem beyond that was that MI5 then put an incorrect narrative—a false narrative—to the inquiry itself. The judge, the chair of the inquiry, found that the corporate case that it had put was incorrect. There are other examples. Obviously, we have very limited time. I know you are going to hear from Daniel De Simone, the BBC reporter, this afternoon. His case is another one where the security services have fallen short in terms of candour. These are not the only examples. We are very keen to apply the duty of candour and all of the duties here as much as possible to the security services. The objections to that are that it might interfere with national security. I represented seven of the Manchester Arena families, and I can say very clearly that there is no intention to interfere with national security whatsoever—quite the opposite. The Bill drafted by us, and this Bill, does not affect national security, positively or negatively. It just does not affect it. What it does affect is that when the intelligence services have to report to an inquiry or the Intelligence and Security Committee or whatever, they have to tell the truth, whether in open or closed session. That is the key element of it. We think that has been missed. The Government invited me to have a meeting with the intelligence services last night, and I did. I know that this Committee has been briefed as well. I think it was quite clear that the intelligence services have missed that point. We have put forward a very simple amendment that we think takes complete account of those concerns about national security. We ask you to look at that and to adopt that amendment.
Q Hello; I am the shadow Justice Minister. Professor Lewis, are there any significant differences, or even minor differences, between the work that the Law Commission did and its recommendations, and the Bill as drafted? Professor Lewis: Yes, there are some differences, but the Bill substantially implements the Law Commission’s recommendations on misconduct in public office. All of the core structural reforms have been adopted, in clauses 12 and 13. There are a few material differences in detail; I will perhaps run through them as a list, without expanding on them, and then if there are any you wish to pick up, you can. There are some objective fault elements in both offences where the commission had recommended subjective awareness: in the seriously improper acts offence, the commission recommended that the defendant had to realise that a reasonable person would regard the act as seriously improper, whereas the Bill requires that the defendant knows or ought to know that. There is a similar shift in the breach of duty offence. There is some divergence in relation to the defence to what we recommended as the corruption offence—the seriously improper acts offence. We recommended a public interest defence; the Bill has a reasonable excuse defence. We recommended that the persuasive or legal burden be on the defendant, whereas in the Bill it is only an evidential burden to raise the defence that is on the defendant. There is an extra seriousness threshold in the breach of duty offence, which we explicitly rejected; we did not think it was needed. That is the requirement that “the act…falls far below what could reasonably be expected”. It is a sort of gross negligence threshold. I think the other points are fairly minor. One is about the repeal of section 26 of the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015, and the other is some differences in relation to what counts as holding public office. Having said that, our recommendations on that were that the Government consider certain kinds of public office for inclusion in the list, and the Government have considered all of those kinds of public office. We had anticipated that further work would be needed to refine the list, and that work has been done.
Q It is obviously difficult to talk about hypotheticals, but I think it is potentially helpful, because we are talking about legal terms that not even members of the Committee will necessarily be familiar with. Taking first subjective versus objective awareness, in what sort of scenarios might that create a difference in how the Bill operates? Professor Lewis: What it does is expand the scope of the offence. In circumstances where the defendant was not aware—did not realise—that a reasonable person would regard the act as seriously improper in relation to the seriously improper acts offence, or was not aware of the duty in the context of the breach of duty offence, under our recommendations, the defendant would not be liable. Under the provisions in the Bill, however, if the jury were of the view that the defendant ought to have realised the relevant fact, that would suffice. It is an expansion of liability.
Q I ask the same question, but on reasonable excuse versus public interest. Professor Lewis: That is less clear. The one thing I could say quite confidently is that there is a significantly lower burden of proof on the defendant. The defendant just has to introduce some evidence to raise the possibility of a reasonable excuse, and the burden will then be on the prosecution to disprove the reasonable excuse beyond reasonable doubt—so to the criminal standard. That difference in relation to the burden of proof is favourable to the defence. On whether there is a material difference in relation to a public interest defence versus a reasonable excuse defence, I think reasonable excuse would probably encompass things that would fall within a public interest defence and might be broader, but without anything on the face of the Bill constraining what a reasonable excuse is, it is difficult to say. I suppose, eventually, there will be case law that will deal with the question of what does and does not constitute a reasonable excuse in these circumstances.
Q Mr Guest, can you see any prosecutorial disadvantages to the new offences compared with the existing law? Tom Guest: No. In general, we were supportive of this project from the outset—not because we were having difficulties with the common law offence, but because it sets it out much more clearly to have it contained in an Act. It clears up certain areas such as, “Who is a public official?” and, “How should a jury assess seriousness?” We have not identified disadvantages with the misconduct provisions.
Q The common law offence is unlimited in its penalties, essentially. Do you, as prosecutors, sometimes advocate for sentences above what will be the statutory limit to the sentences for the new offences? Tom Guest: The statutory limits introduced by the Bill seem to fit the culpability in the two offences. The breach of duty offence is clearly far more serious because it engages a duty to prevent death or serious injury. We see the statutory penalty as high and suitable, so far as it is for the CPS to say that. Similarly, the seriously improper acts offence perhaps does not have the same level of culpability but it still has a significant penalty. It is within the remit of the unduly lenient sentence scheme, so we have not identified any concerns about the proposed penalties.
Q But are you aware of examples that have gone above those limits? Tom Guest: I am not aware of them. There is always a question of overlap. If you have another offence, such as an offence of rape, then we would be charging rape, and we have the maximum sentence of life there.
Q I will pick up on the earlier questions on contractors and subcontractors. If I put in everybody’s mind the Post Office Horizon scandal, where you had contractors and potentially subcontractors, do you think that there would be any obstacles to prosecuting a scenario similar to the Post Office Horizon scandal because of contractor and subcontractor limits? Professor Lewis: All I can say in relation to the misconduct in public office offences, the ones that the Law Commission recommended, is that we recommended the Government consider the inclusion of contractors. They have not been included separately in schedule 4 but, as Mr Guest said, I do not think I am in a position to comment on whether in particular cases, particular offences may have been committed, because one would need to see the evidence and one would need to be a prosecutor in order to take a view on that.
Q But potentially? Professor Lewis: If someone were in public office, which I think is not necessarily the case based on the clauses before us, it is possible that the seriously improper act offence could be considered. I think that is as far as I can possibly help. Tom Guest: Turning to the duty of candour extension, which directly addresses this, I think our straight answer is that “direct contractual relationship” is in the Bill for a reason; of course we would look at the evidence and the precise contract, but it does appear limited to that. I agree with what Professor Lewis said: when you come to the misconduct in public office offences, schedule 4 is intended to reflect existing public offices, but every attention should be paid to it to decide whether it has become any wider or more narrow, and whether there is good reason for that. We are not expressing a view but, if we are going to replicate the existing common law, we need to make sure that schedule 4 does so effectively.
Q I am Kieran, the shadow Justice Minister. I want to give my sincere condolences to all of you and all of the families for what you have been through. I want to commend your persistence, courage and bravery in carrying on and campaigning over such an extended period, as you have all done. It really is remarkable, and we are all very grateful. I will not ask many questions, as there are MPs on the panel who have worked with you and know you very well, and I am sure that they will be keen to ask questions. I will just ask whether any of you want to talk about how things might have been different, and how the experience might have been different for you, had you known what had happened from the start and had truth from the outset. Charlotte Hennessy: My experience is very different from Margaret’s, Sue’s and Steve’s, because I was so young. I did not know the magnitude of what had happened until the Hillsborough independent panel released its report. That was the only opportunity I had to access evidence statements and be able to piece a timeline together of what actually happened to my dad. That was when I really realised the magnitude of what had happened. I want to acknowledge the Hillsborough family members who are not here today—if it were not for them, and for the survivors who stood by their truth even when they were shut down by those who were supposed to protect them, and if they had not fought the fight, children like me would never have known the truth of what happened. For me, it only got worse from there. It was like Hillsborough had just happened at that time, because that was when I realised that my dad’s original cause of death was completely untrue—even down to his pathology report being untrue. It was not how my dad died. I will not speak about the details here, but I will send them privately to the Committee. It has had a profound impact. Had all that information been available, I do not think I would have had to spend my whole teenage and adult life fighting for the truth of what happened to my dad. It now impacts my own children, like Margaret said earlier. My husband is here in the room today. We have had to educate our children on the seriousness of those lies, on the impact of the cover-up, and on the fact that their granddad would have been buried in a lie if it were not for those good people.
Q Part of the Bill is about creating parity of esteem in legal advice and support, and one of the biggest reasons for that is that it costs money. Have any of you experienced financial loss as a result of everything you have had to do? Margaret Aspinall: Yes. The family has had great financial loss. As I said earlier, I had four other young children. The youngest was only six—the same age as Charlotte—at the time, the next was seven, one was nine, and then a son who was fifteen going on sixteen. They had an absolutely terrible time. I had to change their schools because of things young children were saying. Innocent children were saying terrible things about how their brother died and how it was caused. Obviously, it was what they were listening to, so I had to change their schools. It was a very difficult thing. My husband was at the game as well, and he has never been to a game since. He just cannot face going to another football match. My children went through a terrible time, like Charlotte did. At the same time, I realised something when Sue and I were working in the Hillsborough office a few years ago. A phone call came through, and Sue said to me, “Margaret, there’s somebody on the phone for you.” I picked the phone up, and it was my granddaughter, who was 10 at the time; she said, “I would like an appointment to see my nan, please.” I thought, “I’m doing to my grandchildren exactly what I’ve done to my own children.” I was working so hard, and not just myself, but others—though I can only speak for myself—to get to the truth of Hillsborough. The lies and the cover-up, as Charlotte said, were an absolute disgrace. When it came to the funding, we had to pay for every court case we went to. I am even talking about even judicial reviews, scrutiny, inquests, all different things. We paid every step of the way, and they had lawyers paid for by the state—from our taxpayers’ money—while we had to go cap in hand, trying to fight for the truth that was there all along, and for justice. What families went through—I cannot forgive that. My children grew up with Hillsborough and my grandchildren are growing up with Hillsborough now, 36 years on. They are still not seeing their nan because I am busy doing other things to try to get a Hillsborough law, alongside others—good people, unsung heroes, who are supporting this campaign. They have done so much to change a system that must be changed—not for us, because it is too late for us—but for the good of this nation. The law has got to be changed, in all its entirety. Steve Kelly: On the point of finances, when Hillsborough happened, obviously your finances just did not come into it. I will speak personally—I was a taxi driver at the time, and taxi drivers never earn good money, do they? You are always struggling, but you get by. I remember that I had to go to Sheffield to find my brother, I came home, and the last burden that I wanted to give to my mother and my sister Joan was issues of finance. When the disaster was coming to the fore and all the information was coming out, we were obviously making plans to bury our brother. There was only one thing you could do at that time: you would go and borrow the money. I went to the bank and borrowed the money. I never, ever went to my mam and told her how much it was. Again, she had just lost her son, and she did not know how. You just bore those problems and lived through them for years, on the financial side alone, with paying loans back and so on. That is why we want this law in—we beg you to bring this law in—because the trauma alone of losing someone, and then the trauma again of all these years fighting back, is so difficult to bear. The financial burden was not even a second thought—I appreciate the question, but it was nothing to do with us really. We got through it. People should not have to get through things. People should be helped and supported. This law, hopefully, will do that.
Q42 I am the shadow Minister. Thank you for coming along to assist us with our proceedings. I have a question for you, Deborah, on the work of INQUEST. Will you illustrate the practical effect at inquests of public bodies usually being heavily legally represented, while affected families do not necessarily have any legal representation? Deborah Coles: Thank you for the question. It has been a long-standing campaign of ours to try and sort out what we perceive is a real inequality of arms. The best way to describe it is that it is a traumatic and distressing process to go through an inquest into the death of your loved one in any event, but to try and navigate those processes without your own individual legal representation, and even be expected to ask questions yourself or rely on the coroner to do so on your behalf, is not only extremely unfair but I think perpetuates the sense that the system is not working to get to the truth and to deliver the answers that you want as a bereaved person about how your loved one died. I can think of so many examples since INQUEST was set up where families still today talk about the retraumatising nature of the inquest process. What legal representation can do as well is enhance the really important preventive function that an inquest can play in safeguarding lives in the future, but that is only where you have a family with the benefit of a lawyer to explore the areas of concern. In our experience, too often the default of state and corporate lawyers is to try and defend their reputations, to try and narrow the scope of the inquest process, and try and prevent consideration of the very serious issues that need exploring, particularly when we are talking here about how our work is predominantly around state-related deaths, where the state had a duty of care towards somebody. In our experience, it is only through legal representation and where families feel that they can play a meaningful and effective part in the process that the truth can come out.
Q You mentioned what the coroner might choose to ask or not ask. What is your experience of the variability in the way in which coroners approach these issues? Deborah Coles: There is a lot to be said about the inconsistency of the coronial system. Different coroners approach their roles in very different ways. It is quite hard for an individual coroner when they are confronted with teams of state lawyers representing different interests to then try and properly represent the interests of an individual family. Some coroners can try and do that, but that does not take away from the fact that it is the relationship that the bereaved family have with their lawyer that can often ensure that the questions of the utmost importance to a bereaved family are actually asked.
Q Professor Waters, first I want to acknowledge the circumstances that bring you here today, which is not something that any of us would want to experience. Condolences on your loss. What was your experience of applying for legal aid, and what difference did it make to you that you did not get representation? Professor Waters: It was two years ago exactly on this day that the inquest into my sister’s death started. We found out four days before the commencement of the inquest that our application for legal aid had been refused—four days. In preparation for that and the possibility that we might have to go into the inquest not represented or foot the bill ourselves, or the lawyers have to do it pro bono—why should they?—I read over 2,000 pages of disclosure evidence. It was very traumatic, as you can imagine, to read some of the details of what my sister went through and some of the medical reports and so on. That alone was traumatising. A freedom of information request recently found out that Ofsted, which is one of three public bodies—interested parties—that our family were up against, spent £68,000 on external counsel alone and could not provide us with the figures for how much it had spent in its internal legal department. Ofsted has its own legal department—but it still spent £68,000 of taxpayers’ money on external counsel. Presumably, the other interested parties, Reading borough council and Berkshire NHS trust, will have spent similar amounts of money and also have their own internal legal departments. My family, as taxpayers, were indirectly paying the legal fees of the three bodies that had done harm to my sister. That just speaks volumes on the imbalance of power in this system. It is really retraumatising that at your absolute lowest—and I really hope that no one in this room has been where I was—it is at that point that you suddenly have to navigate this entirely alien system. You do not have lessons at school on what an inquest is, where you find an inquest lawyer, what a prevention of future deaths report is, what kind of coroner you want or what kind of inquest you are going to get. But suddenly, when you are absolutely traumatised by a terrible and preventable death of a loved one, you have to find this stuff out. I am here speaking to you. I have been speaking publicly about what our family has been through and continues to go through—but for every person like me and the other witness, how many hundreds of people are there who are crushed by that system and are unable, for whatever quite legitimate reason, to stick up for themselves and inform themselves? Parity of arms is absolutely crucial and it cannot come soon enough.
Q I am the shadow Minister. Some members of the Committee had the opportunity to meet deputy heads of the security services last week. One thing they talked about was that individuals within an organisation might have one version of events that they understand, but the wider organisation has other information pertaining to that that they do not understand, so they have a perception of what might be in the public interest and what it might be reasonable to disclose as an individual, but that is not there in its entirety. Given your previous role, can you comment on what the challenges might be for the security services in managing the additional duties that this Bill will place on them? Lord Evans of Weardale: First, I should make it clear that I am a strong supporter of this Bill. I think it is very timely. It is clear that victims, members of the public, have been badly let down by public authorities over a number of years. I gave evidence to the infected blood inquiry. It is very clear that something needs to be done and I support the Bill. I support the inclusion of the intelligence services in the Bill and strongly support chapter 2, which I hope we will be able to get on to. There is as much need for the intelligence services to be accountable as there is for any other public authority. It seems to me right that they should be included in the scope of this Bill. I also recognise that there are particular circumstances that mean that the mechanism for achieving accountability and candour might need to be different. Certainly from my previous role heading the service, there are two areas that I think are of potential concern. The first and most important area is that members of the service are under existing legal constraints on what they can say. It needs to be clear how they would be able to cope with this duty of candour, which will be set against their other existing legal duty of protecting information and handling sensitive information appropriately. That needs to be resolved, and I believe that the mechanism laid out in the Bill resolves it acceptably. This is not about institutional defence of the agency or its reputation. The sort of information we are talking about is such that, for instance, its disclosure could identify a human source, which could lead to their exposure and potentially their death in the worst circumstances. It could also be information we have about an enemy or threat to the UK, whether that be a terrorist or foreign state, and if that state or terrorist group knew that we had the information, they could probably work out where we got it from. They would then be able to take steps to stop us from obtaining it in future, which would mean that we were less able to protect the country against foreign intelligence activity or terrorist planning, and therefore the ability of the agency to safeguard the country would be reduced. That is what you are trying to protect. You have already cited my second point, which I acknowledge but do not see as the key point, and it is that any individual desk officer in MI5—I think this would probably be the same in MI6 or GCHQ—may see a very small part of a picture, but, particularly for very sensitive information, the need-to-know procedures are in place. They will not necessarily understand why a particular piece of information is very sensitive, or actually what the bigger picture is. Bilaterally providing that information between an individual and an external scrutiny body brings two problems. First, the external scrutinising body may not be equipped to handle highly sensitive information, and therefore it might go astray, even with good will. Secondly, it is important that the overall understanding of the agency is disclosed to the investigating body, not just one picture or one part of it. That is why I think it makes sense for the responsibility to rest on the head of the agency. I also looked with great interest to see what pressure there was on the head of the agency to respond to this. The fact that in certain circumstances there is a criminal liability on the head of the agency struck me as being quite a strong measure, and a measure that is appropriate in the circumstances.
Q In your experience of organisations that have delivered what you might call a duty of candour without this legal sanction, either successfully or unsuccessfully, what are the key culture changes we need to ensure that organisations deliver? Lord Evans of Weardale: Your use of the word culture strikes me as being very important. We all know that you can have loads and loads of rules, but if you have a culture that says, “Actually, we don’t really mind about that,” they will not necessarily work. Therefore, ensuring that an organisation is actually educated in its ethical responsibilities seems to me to be critical. I know from the time that I was in the Security Service that quite a lot of work was done on this, and I believe that the same now applies in the other intelligence agencies. Any intelligence service has the potential to abuse the powers entrusted to it by Parliament or Government, and it is very important that there are constraints on that; part of that is people understanding their ethical responsibilities and the fact that there are really effective speak-up channels, so that, if somebody has a concern, it can be voiced safely and people feel they have permission to raise concerns.
Q I am the shadow Minister. I want to begin by thanking you both so much for coming. What you and the other families have been through is horrendous. I want to pay tribute to the courage and perseverance that you have shown, along with the other families, in persisting in raising these issues on behalf of your lost loved ones. It would be helpful for the Committee to hear from you both directly what the impact has been on you and your families of having to go through what you did and what you hope might be different for other families in future. Jenni Hicks: What we did go through was that we did not get our truth for 24 years, which is cruel and unacceptable. That has to change. We had many, many challenges in that journey. The main challenge of all—on a personal level—was becoming childless, and all the grief and things that go with that. On top of that we then had a fight just to get the truth about how our daughters, Trevor’s and my daughters, died. Obviously there was a huge state cover-up. There were lies and corruption going on, with horrendous and untrue things in the media. The Liverpool fans were wrongly blamed—and we are Liverpool fans, so not only were we bereaved, but we felt we were somehow at fault for our daughters’ deaths, too. The whole thing was horrendous. It actually prevents you from moving forward with your grief because it becomes about the event, and not so much about your loss. You have to deal with your loss at a later stage. The whole thing was absolutely cruel—I really have no words to describe how awful it was, and it must not happen to other people in the future. We had, as I say, various challenges on our journey for the truth. The Peter Taylor inquiry was the first one. Peter Taylor did get to the truth, but the Crown Prosecution Service did not act upon that. If the CPS had acted on the Taylor inquiry, we could have got to our truth more quickly. Various things happened—is this the kind of thing you want to know? We had a judicial review. You probably know the whole of the things that we went through. To be quite truthful, we tried everything, including a private prosecution, but we seemed to be snookered every inch of the way. The one thing that did get us our truth was the Hillsborough independent panel, the independent panel and the attorneys following up on its results—they were absolutely marvellous, actually. That was down to Lord Michael Wills and Gordon Brown, and to Theresa May, who carried on with that when the Conservative Government came in. If it had not been for those people, we would still have been looking for our truth. The Hillsborough independent panel findings led to Dominic Grieve quashing the original inquest verdict of accidental death and announcing a new inquest, which of course, finally—after 26 years, would you believe it—meant we got the correct inquest verdict of unlawful killing. I am trying to précis this down, because I know we do not have a lot of time, but that is basically a very quick version of what went on, but to me, it was the Hillsborough independent panel. I have read through the Bill and things, but I would like to see the public advocate team that we have now used in a similar way, to be able to retrieve the documentation that you need. If we had been able to do that at a far earlier stage, we would not have had to wait 26 years for the correct inquest verdict. I really do think that the public advocate team should have powers similar to those of the HIP—or the same as the panel had. In the first instance, they should not just be about tea and sympathy and pointing you in the right direction; they should be about more than that. It should be about being able to retrieve the documentation needed, particularly if there are lies being told and it is a state cover-up. We need that documentation far sooner. For me, with my personal experiences, without that we will still have long delays. Yes, it will be good to have a better duty of candour, a duty of candour with consequences, and obviously I think we should have more a duty of conduct, rather than just a code of conduct. That would make a huge difference as well. They should be statutory duties, not just codes of conduct, which is just people making up their own rules as they go along, I think. Those are my feelings on it and that is what I would really like to see. I also think it is important to implement Pete Weatherby’s important amendments to the Bill. They should be implemented straight away, to be quite honest with you. The other question I would like to ask—I have written it down, so that I do not forget—is this: are we going to have funding for inquests and for whatever families there are? I would like a little more detail on how that is going to work for families, please, if someone could help me with that. It has not been made clear. It was just said that we will now be able to have legal aid, but I am not quite sure how that is going to work, because what about in split families? By the time my ex-husband and I got to our first inquest, we were already on the road to divorce—we had split up. Would we both be able to have equal representation?
We get to question the Minister at the end of the process, so that is a helpful thing for you to have given to us to think about.
Q I am the shadow Minister. Could you begin by telling us, given your experience of what happened at Grenfell and the investigations that followed, the key things that you think the Bill needs to address? Edward Daffarn: Ordinarily, I find it much easier to respond to questions, but in this instance I made some notes that I would like to try to communicate to you. It could go wrong and I might have to ask you to ask me questions. The thing with Grenfell is that it is so complicated. There are so many tributaries and so many issues. I have spent a little bit of time trying to relate what happened to us at Grenfell to the Bill. I have broken it down into three parts. The first part is an introduction explaining why the Bill is so important and why it is relevant to Grenfell. A lot of the relevance to Grenfell is also relevant to all the other public inquiries and investigations that have taken place over the last 30 years—on Hillsborough, infected blood, the Manchester Arena. There are so many similarities, but I would like to spend three or four moments on each. The second part is about the need for culture change within organisations, and how the Bill can assist that. The third part that I wanted to address is how the Bill can assist in getting to the truth in public inquiries. Please bear with me; if things go wrong I will let you know and ask you to ask me questions. At the heart of what I believe is that we need this Act to be implemented without delay and not to be watered down. There is a statement by Bishop James Jones: “The patronising disposition of unaccountable power”. That was the title of his Hillsborough report. Those words are so powerful. They sum up exactly what our position was as bereaved people and as survivors after the Grenfell Tower fire—not only after the fire but in the way we had been treated beforehand. It was this total powerlessness against forces that we had no control over. I truly believe that this Bill can act almost as a silver bullet that could change all that. I will go into some of the reasons in a minute. I want to talk a little bit about our public inquiry. At the beginning of the inquiry, Richard Millett, who at the time was a QC, asked all of the corporate core participants to take responsibility, tell the truth and help us to get to what we needed to know. At the end of the public inquiry, he said that the “merry-go-round of buck-passing” still played and that the melody was still being heard. That was after nearly five years of a public inquiry—the truth was not being heard. In their closing statements to the public inquiry, the core participants gave evidence for two-and-a-half days. Again, Richard Millet stated that if everything the core participants said was true, not a single person was to blame for the Grenfell Tower fire. Imagine sitting in and listening to that evidence over all those years and then, at the end of it, not a single person had taken responsibility for what had happened to us. The inquiry concluded that the core participants were guilty of “systematic dishonesty”, which led to the totally avoidable deaths of 72 people. We need to use this Bill to make sure that nothing like that can ever happen again. Grenfell United attended an inquest family day and left understanding that the families wanted three things. They want to stop public officers from lying and covering up when things go wrong. They want a duty to proactively assist and disclose information to public inquiries. They also want parity of arms—true proportionality in representation in terms of legal aid in front of public inquiries. How would the Bill address those changes? Obviously, there is the duty of candour, transparency and frankness, a duty to go further than not telling lies, but to proactively assist in getting to the truth in public inquiries, and to change the culture of public authorities and the public officers within those authorities to instil a code of conduct, ethics and values. That is my first part—that is how I would like us to understand why the Bill is so important. I want to talk a little about changing the culture inside these organisations. Again, I go back to what Bishop James Jones said: we need to dismantle the patronising disposition of unaccountable power that these organisations feel entitled to exhibit. The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea’s tenant management organisation, which was our landlord, behaved like a mini mafia. It was a non-functioning organisation that bullied and intimidated residents. Anyone who put their head above the parapet was targeted. The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, whose duty it was to monitor and ensure that the TMO behaved in a proper way, failed completely in its duty to do that. As a result, as residents, as leaseholders, we were not treated with respect, and we were not treated with dignity. It is interesting to think about those words—respect and dignity—alongside the duty of candour. People need to be treated in that way. Along with the duty of public authorities, and public officers, to tell the truth, and on candour, transparency and frankness, we also need to look very carefully at their duty to instil a code of conduct and ethics, which must be signed up to by the organisations. I am a social worker. Every year, I have to renew my commitment to our code of conduct and ethics. When I was engaging with the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and its officers and councillors, I was amazed at their complete lack of understanding of their role as public servants. As a social worker, if someone does not want to work with me, I have to find it inside myself to provide exactly the same service to them as to someone who does want to work with me. There can be no discrimination. At the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, if we challenged them in any way, they would come after us, as individuals. I used to feel that as a lowly social worker I understood my role as a public servant; the leader of the council at the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea had no idea about those responsibilities. It is really important that, as part of this Bill, we instil a code of conduct and ethics that is meaningful, published and promoted, that is part of training, yearly appraisals and interview processes, and that is, possibly, monitored by the public advocate as well, to make sure that we try, somehow, to change the culture inside these organisations. It is not a silver bullet, because social workers have values and ethics, and things go wrong in social work. Ofsted has values and ethics and, as we heard previously, things go very wrong in Ofsted. It is not a silver bullet, but it is really important. In terms of criminal sanctions, there must be some bite behind these duties. The other thing with criminal sanctions is that cover-ups normally happen from the top down and not from the bottom up. If junior members of staff are being bullied by senior staff members to tell lies and take part in a cover-up, a criminal sanction would allow them to refer to their legal obligations not to commit a criminal offence. It would give them a way out of that. In the Grenfell Tower disaster, there were eight public bodies and 27 commercial organisations. We need to make sure that those commercial organisations, which were carrying out a public function, are also responsible for duty, candour and transparency, and that they also have to sign up to the code of ethics and values. We must ensure that they behave in the same way that the public authorities have to behave. Finally, I want to turn to how the Bill can assist in public inquiries. I briefly mentioned the “merry-go-round of buck-passing”— which was still turning: after all the evidence was given by the core participants, there was no one to blame for the fire. As bereaved and survivors, many of us attended the public inquiry and sat through months and months of this evidence. Very naively, I think we always believed that the public inquiry was the one thing that would give us the truth and allow us to leave with an understanding of why 72 people died. I always thought, “Well, these people will come and the truth will give us what we want, and it will set them free.” There were probably 200 witnesses who appeared at the public inquiry, and I can count on the fingers of one hand how many turned up and gave evidence from their heart. I sent some evidence to you—a seven-minute tape from the public inquiry, put together by Forensic Architecture, of public officials basically just saying, “I can’t remember. I can’t recall.” We had Robert Black, who was the chief executive of the TMO, responding to a question from Richard Millett, the QC of the public inquiry, by saying, “Pass”—like he was on “Mastermind”, like this was some sort of quiz that he could take part in or not take part in. I am sure you have seen Eric Pickles. Towards the end of the public inquiry, he advised Richard Millett that he should use his time very wisely, because Lord Pickles had other, more important, things to do with his time that day. That is the kind of contempt and disrespect that we were treated with during the public inquiry, and I truly believe that the Bill forces public authorities to go beyond just telling the truth in public inquiries and that it forces them to provide more in-depth information. I think it would be really helpful if public inquiries and public officials were invited at an early stage to provide position statements about their organisation. That would do one of three things. It would help to speed up the public inquiry process, it would reduce the pain and suffering of families, because the process would not take as long, and it would reduce the cost on the public purse. I thought quite hard about those things, and I hope that I have managed to communicate them in a way that was not too quick and that was understandable.
Q Hello, Chief Constable Guildford, I am the shadow Justice Minister. Obviously police officers are already under considerable obligations in terms of their conduct. What gaps do you think this Bill might help to close to ensure that police officers conduct themselves appropriately in their roles? Chief Constable Guildford: In terms of the broad structure around misconduct, we have the standards of professional behaviour, but when it comes to addressing the gaps, I think the criminal allegation side of things—particularly the misconduct in public office aspect—has had a number of reviews by the Law Commission over a long period, I think starting around 2015 or something like that, and various reports. In the three main offences before the Committee this afternoon, I think we have some clear directions from lawmakers that send a very clear message to all public servants, but particularly police officers, about the consequences of their decision making. I think this complements a lot of the cultural change that has obviously occurred since the formulation of this Bill, which has been on the back of the Hillsborough disaster. If you think about how long ago that was and how far the police service has come since then, some of these elements before us really do help to embed and underline the fact that lawmakers have been very definite in their expectations of police officers. We have an internal code of conduct, which we hold officers to account for, but in terms of the more strategic gaps and the will of Parliament, this is very declaratory, in my opinion.