To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to reduce deaths and injuries of vulnerable road users from public bus collisions in England.

My Lords, the Government are determined to make our roads safer for all users. The National Bus Strategy made it clear that local authorities and bus operators should work together to ensure that bus services are safe and perceived to be safe by all. We also introduced changes to the Highway Code in 2022 and have delivered high-quality walking and cycling schemes, which will be vital to ensuring the safety of vulnerable road users.

I thank the Minister for his Answer. Every six weeks, according to Transport for London’s own statistics, on average one person is killed and 100 people hospitalised by preventable bus incidents. This is getting no better, despite the fact that the number of bus journeys has actually reduced. Given that the London business model is being rolled out to the rest of the country, do the Government still think that having bus companies investigating their own incidents is a good idea?

My Lords, as I have said, road safety is a priority for the Government. The department is determined to make roads safer for everyone, and the delivery of high-quality walking and cycling schemes, coupled with the changes to the Highway Code in 2022, will play an important part in addressing the safety concerns of people wanting to walk, wheel and cycle. Active Travel England is working with local authorities to ensure that walking and cycling infrastructure is of the right quality and in the right places to maximise its value and impact. On the issue of bus companies investigating themselves, as the noble Lord knows from debates on the Automated Vehicles Bill, we have no intention of introducing separate investigation for buses.

My Lords, is my noble friend aware that many injuries caused by buses in fact occur inside the bus, especially to the elderly and vulnerable? Care needs to be taken in examining any statistics that suggest how many bus-related injuries arise in a particular period, to ensure that a distinction is made between those occurring inside the bus, often because of excessive braking, and those involving pedestrians in the street.

My noble friend makes a very good point. It is a matter for individual bus companies, and of training. This issue is clearly of great importance to bus users but, as I say, it is for the bus companies themselves to ensure that their drivers are properly trained and take great care.

My Lords, there is a particular problem for disabled and vulnerable passengers using the new bus stops that are in lanes between cycle paths and the main pavement—not least a very narrow pavement for wheelchair users trying to leave a bus, and a ramp, as a result of which you often almost go straight in front of the cycles. I must tell your Lordships that when you are coming down a steep ramp, you are not in control of your speed. Are there any plans to monitor accident numbers and to assess the risks associated with this new bus stop/cycle lane arrangement?

I thank the noble Baroness for that question. The phrase used for these stops is “floating bus stops”. Local authorities are bound by the public sector equality duty, and it is for them to ensure that any infrastructure they install is safe, fit for purpose and delivered in a way that enables them to comply with equalities legislation. The department is aware of concerns raised by some groups about these floating bus stops, and that is why we co-funded research into the issue, led by Transport Scotland. This concluded recently and we will consider the findings carefully in deciding the next steps.

My Lords, in fact, bus deaths and injuries are coming down quite dramatically compared with car deaths and injuries. The latter have barely moved, whereas bus and coach injuries have come down by 40% in the last year. I want to congratulate the Government because, clearly, their policy of depriving local councillors of funding means that there are fewer bus services and therefore fewer deaths and injuries from buses.

I note the noble Baroness’s comments.

My Lords, there are concerns, and this issue arises from a Question we had about road safety. In view of some recent unsatisfactory accidents, is any consideration being given to obliging cyclists, particularly those on e-cycles, to have proper accident insurance in place, and to follow speed limits, like all other users of the road?

My Lords, like all road users, cyclists are required to comply with road traffic laws in the interests of the safety of other road users. This is also reflected in the Highway Code. Dangerous cycling is completely unacceptable, and that is why there are already strict laws in place for cyclists who break the law. The police have the power to prosecute if these are broken.

My Lords, can the Minister say how many cyclists were prosecuted last year? My own background tells me that very few are.

I am afraid I am unable to help the noble Lord with a number. I do not know whether we keep a record of that. I shall find out and if we do, I will write to the noble Lord.

In answer to a previous question, my noble friend said that the bus companies themselves investigate such accidents and the cause. Is that information shared among the bus industry as a whole, or with any regulators or departments, to make sure we learn lessons from these accidents and that they do not happen again?

I am not aware of that, but I take my noble friend’s point. It is a question of bus companies taking their own steps to ensure that people are safe while they travel, and that drivers are trained properly.

Does the Minister agree that, for all the points that have been made in this short discussion, in the vast majority of cases, bus drivers, particularly in our cities, deserve our thanks and respect for safely and successfully navigating the multiple and increasing challenges they face on our roads? Since buses are the main means of transport for the elderly, the young, young mothers with children—the less well-off in our society—should they not be valued by society as a whole for the public service they offer us day in, day out?

I could not possibly disagree with that. I am a regular bus user and I agree that they provide a tremendous service, whether it is in our cities, towns or, indeed, our rural areas.

My Lords, does the Minister agree that pedestrians, cyclists and e-scooter riders make themselves even more vulnerable and dangerous to others, including bus drivers, through the increasing and distracting use of headphones, AirPods and smartphones in general while on pavements and roads? Are the Government taking any steps to address this?

I agree with what the noble Lord says, but it is an individual responsibility. It is not for the Government to say, “You should take care”. A Government can encourage people to take care, but it is a matter of your own assessment of the risks on the road. If you wish to wear headphones and take that risk, more fool you.

My Lords, if the present level of injuries, which has been described, continues, is there not a strong case for introducing greater regulation? In ordinary circumstances it would not be necessary, but it does seem to be very necessary in this sphere.

There is quite a bit of legislation on reckless and dangerous cycling—the penalties are quite high—and on drinking alcohol or taking drugs while cycling. The penalties and offences are there; it is a matter of the police enforcing them.

My Lords, the Minister says that it is a matter of the police enforcing them. Will he tell us how exactly they are expected to do that, given their current level of resourcing and that there is no system of licensing or, indeed, of identifying cyclists, who may simply cycle away having committed the offences to which he refers?

The noble Lord asks how the police are supposed to do it. It is a matter of being out there and patrolling. I did it myself for 32 years, and I managed to nab a few cyclists.

To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to reduce waiting times for ‘conclusive grounds’ decisions under the National Referral Mechanism for modern slavery.

My Lords, the Government remain committed to ensuring that victims are identified promptly. We have taken steps to shorten the timelines for making decisions in the national referral mechanism, including new guidance for making reasonable grounds decisions, changes to the online referral form and setting timescales for information to be provided to the competent authorities. We have also significantly increased staffing for the competent authorities and are seeing the results through increased output of decisions.

I thank the Minister for that Answer. The median waiting time for conclusive grounds decisions in 2023 was 526 days but, for women, the median waiting time rose to 904 days, nearly double that for the whole group. This has a negative impact on them, their families and their children, and it makes it very difficult for swift enforcement action to be taken against perpetrators. What assessment have the Government made of why this discrepancy is so large and what steps are they taking urgently to reduce waiting times for women?

I thank the right reverend Prelate for that question. We are working to improve the timeliness of all decisions from all angles. That includes increasing the capacity for decision-making, testing alternative approaches, improving the quality of the information provided as part of the decision-making process, and reducing opportunities for misuse. The statistics are trending in the right direction. In the past two years, almost 30,000 people have had access to the protections of the NRM. Last year, 9,825 conclusive grounds decisions were issued, the highest number since the NRM began. In the first quarter of this year, 5,161 reasonable grounds decisions and 3,893 inclusive grounds decisions were issued, far higher than in any other quarter since the NRM began.

Can the Minister answer the question about the discrepancy between women and men in the cases cited?

I apologise; I should have addressed that. I do not know the precise reason for those discrepancies, but I will look into the details and come back to the noble Lord.

My Lords, I declare that I am co-chair of the parliamentary group on modern slavery and vice-chair of the Human Trafficking Foundation. Can the Minister say how the NRM will deal with potential victims of modern slavery when the Illegal Migration Act is in force?

These are discussions that we have had at considerable length over the past few months. When the IMA is commenced, its modern slavery provisions will strengthen the UK’s continued efforts to mitigate risks to public order by withholding modern slavery protections from those who enter the UK illegally and who therefore put themselves and first responders at risk and place acute pressure on public services. Where someone has entered the UK illegally and is identified as a potential victim of modern slavery, we will ensure that they are either returned home or sent to another safe country, and away from those who have trafficked them.

My Lords, I declare my interest as the chairman of the Human Trafficking Foundation. Home Office figures for 2023 include bad faith disqualifications, where someone has been disqualified from protection because the referral or claim was made in bad faith. As it appears that there were zero bad faith disqualifications last year, can my noble friend the Minister say what the evidence is for the claim we hear that the NRM is being abused?

The public order disqualification is part of the Nationality and Borders Act, which has also been discussed extensively from this Dispatch Box and over a number of debates. It provides a definition of public order which makes it operationally possible to withhold the recovery period in certain circumstances, in line with Article 13 of the European Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings. All decisions are made on a case-by-case basis.

My Lords, can the Minister explain why the last annual report on modern slavery, as required by the Modern Slavery Act, was published in 2021? When will the Government publish the next annual report? Would that not help us to understand the statistics?

My Lords, I have already highlighted that a lot of statistics have been published. I do not know specifically when the next report is due to be published, but I will find out.

My Lords, will not the new provisions that the Government introduce make it less likely that witnesses come forward? Will that not be welcomed by traffickers, who will see it as an easy way of not getting caught?

No. I do not see why it would make witnesses less likely to come forward.

My Lords, does the Minister not recognise that delays with the NRM leave potential victims without the security that they would otherwise have and—following on from the last question—make them more open to further exploitation and re-trafficking? Does he also recognise that many victims of trafficking are British citizens?

What I recognise is that this is very complicated. Referrals into the national referral mechanism are made by a number of public authorities, including the police, local authorities and so on, as well as non-governmental organisations. Then, one of the two competent authorities takes a look and makes an initial reasonable grounds decision, following which a potential victim is entitled to a minimum 30-day recovery period, unless there are grounds to disqualify them from that entitlement. The recovery period lasts until a conclusive grounds decision is made. These cases are very complex. In many cases, there is insufficient evidence and information in the referral form, so the competent authorities must consider all the information available to them and request it from various other authorities over which they have little or no operational control, and they do not have investigatory powers. This is extraordinarily complicated, but of course I recognise the victims’ distress.

My Lords, the Minister must have had in mind the Salvation Army when he was talking about non-governmental agencies. Over the past 13 years, it has dealt with over 22,000 cases that it has referred to the national referral mechanism. Yet, in data that it has produced, it points out that the delays have risen from the very modest five-day target in 2023, which was often realised, to 47 days now. It also says that there are technical deficiencies with the NRM. Will the Minister agree to meet senior officials from the Salvation Army to discuss the practicalities and issues arising as a result of the delays?

Yes, I am very happy to do so. The Salvation Army deserves great credit, because it is contracted to offer a lot of the services that are delivered via the NGOs to the victims.

My Lords, as the Minister has said, assessments to identify and support victims of trafficking, for whom any delay is harmful, can be complex and time-consuming. How many children are involved in the increasing backlog, either as victims themselves or as the children of victims? Do cases involving children receive any priority—and, if so, how?

Of course, there are a lot of age-disputed cases in the system, so it is difficult to give the noble Lord a precise answer on that. There are decision-making pilots for children which are much quicker at making decisions. They are taken through a multi-agency structure of the local authority, health and police as a minimum. The safeguarding partners have a responsibility to obtain and present evidence at meetings where decisions are taken, so they are dealt with slightly differently.

My Lords, this morning in the High Court in Belfast, a judgment disapplied certain elements of the Illegal Migration Act as they contravened Article 2 of the Windsor Framework. What assessment does the Minister, who brought the legislation through this House, have of that judgment?

I am afraid that is the first I have heard of it, so I have no opinion on it.

My Lords, the Modern Slavery and Human Rights Policy and Evidence Centre’s paper on the 2023 national referral mechanism statistics notes with some concern that the data raises

“significant questions over the decision-making process”

as a result of changes to the statutory guidance that came in in January 2023 and not changes in the number of likely victims of modern slavery. Can the Minister say that the systems do not put victims of modern slavery at further risk?

I go back to an earlier answer I gave, that these are extraordinarily complex cases and, therefore, the guidance has to be refined in light of those cases periodically. I do not know to what specifically the noble Baroness is referring but, as far as I am aware, it does not make it any more complicated.

My Lords, I should have referred to my interest as a trustee of the Human Trafficking Foundation, as laid out in the register, at the beginning of my question. I apologise for that.

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the potential benefits of bringing the rate of Universal Credit for care leavers under 25 in line with the rate for over-25s.

My Lords, the Government have assessed the impact of raising the rate of universal credit for care leavers under 25 in line with the rate for the over-25s. While we are not currently planning on changing the rate, we understand the challenges that care leavers face. That is why we continue to provide additional, dedicated support to simplify and improve their interaction with the benefits system and help them into sustained employment and rewarding careers.

I thank the Minister for that Answer. Care leavers are those for whom the state has been the corporate parent. Parenting does not stop at the age of 18; indeed, the rationale for the lower level of benefits for under-25s was always that they should continue to be supported by family until they achieve that full independence to which the Minister referred. I have to say that my own local branch bank of Mum and Dad is still very much taking on new business even though my kids are in their 30s. Will the Minister commit to looking again at the evidence, including that in the recent YMCA report on young people in supported accommodation, something that care leavers disproportionately need to access? Will he consider how we can be a better parent to the many wonderful but vulnerable young people who leave our care system each year?

This is an important subject. As I said earlier, we recognise the challenges that care leavers face as they move out of the care system. We look forward to continuing our very close partnership with the Department for Education, to ensure that care leavers can access the right skills, opportunities and wider support to move towards sustained employment and career progression. It might be helpful to the right reverend Prelate to know that we are providing over £250 million across this spending review to support care leavers on a whole range of issues, including housing, improving access to education, employment and training, and to help them develop social connections and networks, which can be very helpful to them as they set out in life.

My Lords, can the Minister confirm that the acquisitive crime rates among care leavers under 25 are significantly higher than the acquisitive crime rates for care leavers over 25? We know that these care leavers are exceptionally vulnerable. If there is this discrepancy between the acquisitive crime rates, can he say clearly that we need to increase the universal credit rates for under-25 care leavers?

The noble Baroness’s first point is correct: there is an element in the crime rate. I have the statistics somewhere here. We are well aware of it and are working very closely with the MoJ on it. Putting that aside, it is ever more important that care leavers have the best possible help to move on from the pretty challenging start that they have had in life, to show them the light—the way forward into work or education—and see them into a better life.

My Lords, we have been talking about universal credit, but international research shows that stable relationships are essential to care leavers’ resilience. They enable them to hold down jobs and live independently, hence support to form and maintain relationships is mandated in councils’ local offers for care leavers. Guidance refers to helping them to keep in touch with people who were important to them when they entered care. This is what the Lifelong Links approach achieves. It was very positively evaluated by the Department for Education, so are councils using it?

The subject of relationships is very important indeed for care leavers. Judgments on the quality and breadth of a local authority’s so-called local offer for care leavers forms part of Ofsted’s inspection framework for local authority children’s services, hence the link with the Department for Education. The reports published following an inspection include a judgment on the experiences and progress of care leavers and a supporting commentary on the local offer. The Department for Education is providing £99.8 million to local authorities through the Staying Put programme to increase the number of care leavers who stay living with their foster families in a family home up to the age of 21. Again, this links into the relationship angle.

My Lords, further to the excellent Question from the right reverend Prelate, I say that young parents are one group particularly disadvantaged by the differential rates. As many of us probably know, having a child is very expensive, and is not made cheaper for the parent by their being under the age of 25. This was reflected under legacy benefits, where the higher rate was paid to young parents. Last year, the price of nappies—that well-used product—went up by about 30%. Will the Government review the rate paid to young parents to help them to do the vital work of caring for children? I hope that the Minister will be able to give us some assurance that this disparity in allowances is under review.

The noble Lord makes a good point. The Government and local authorities should work in tandem, particularly in relation to care leavers who may have married young; I think that is the implication of his question. Local authority children’s and housing services should and do work together to ensure a range of suitable, move-on options, including for accommodation, because housing is often one of the key factors. Personal advisers should help young people to plan—particularly those who might be married—and agree which option is best to see them forward. This includes paying for items such as nappies.

My Lords, would the Minister not agree that the price of rent and food was similar for those aged 25 and those aged 24? Will the Government review this policy, which is not fair to young people?

In my opening Answer, I already alluded to what we might or might not do about that. In addition to the £250 million help that we give to care leavers, there is much cross-government support. For example, the Second Chance Learning scheme supports care leavers between the ages of 18 and 21 who wish to catch up on their education, particularly secondary education. I have already mentioned housing. There is an exemption from the shared accommodation rate—the SAR. Importantly, we are improving the transition from local authority support to DWP benefits, so that those who are not able to find a job immediately can be transitioned quickly on to the universal credit system; that was alluded to in a previous question. I do not think that the noble Baroness should be shaking her head; these are genuine issues.

My Lords, the savings threshold to qualify for universal credit is £16,000, and that has been the case for years. Do the Government have any plans to increase it?

We do not have any such plans, although the noble Lord will know that we keep all these matters under review. I have already outlined a number of initiatives that we have taken to help this important sector and to be sure that care leavers are given a better start in life, where they might have had a challenging and troubling start.

My Lords, the Minister will well understand that, sad to say, the vast majority of care leavers leave care much younger than 25. It must be really rather frightening to find themselves in that situation at a young age, often with few educational qualifications and little to rely on in terms of future employment prospects. Does he agree that we as a state have a responsibility for those children who have been in public care, and therefore that we need to do everything we can to support them at a critical stage in their lives?

That is absolutely right and I could not have put it better myself. That is why it is so important that at particular stages of life—that is, from the age of 14, and particularly 16, until the age of 25—initiatives are taken forward to look after this often very vulnerable group. I have outlined a number of those, and the initiatives are kept under review. I do not think I have yet mentioned the DWP Youth Offer, which is designed to help work coaches to support young people aged 16 to 24 and to encourage them to get into work as soon as possible.

My Lords, the Minister will be aware that in 2017 the Children’s Society did some research into care leavers and benefits. It reported that care leavers were five times as likely as anyone else to be sanctioned by the benefits system, and that they were less likely to challenge that. Since then, the DWP now has a care leaver covenant saying that there should be a special point of contact who has to be notified before such a sanction can be applied. Can the Minister tell us how that is going and whether it has reduced the numbers?

I cannot tell the noble Baroness whether it has reduced the numbers, but it has been a considerable success. It is all part of what I was saying about our joined-up thinking in working with local authorities, as well as across government. She will be aware that we have a cross-government support group for care leavers, covering in particular the DfE, the DWP, DLUHC and, as mentioned earlier, local authorities.

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the challenges for craftspeople in (1) travelling to and from, and (2) trading with, the European Union.

The Government recognise the value of the crafts sector, which contributed £400 million gross value added to the UK economy in 2022, as well as the importance of trade between the UK and the EU. We acknowledge that UK crafts exporters may face challenges regarding export requirements, visas and work permits. To help businesses navigate those challenges, including the visa and work permit rules of EU member states, the Government have published detailed guidance on GOV.UK.

I thank the Minister for that Answer. However, official advice about trading with the EU is not really tailored to self-employed craftspeople, nor to crafts microbusinesses, and in some cases it has simply been wrong. In addition, makers exhibiting or selling their crafts have to pay considerable sums for their own work to be imported back to the UK from the EU. As a result of all this, and various other challenges, the easy movement of those wishing to learn, teach and train in craft from and to the UK and the EU has now virtually ceased. Bearing in mind the contribution made by crafts that the Minister has underlined, would he consider going further than he suggested and agreeing to look at existing short-term routes to exempt the immigration skills charge, in line with the sciences; reducing the cost of the certificate of sponsorship, in line with sports; and an immigration health surcharge, based on shorter work durations?

I thank the noble Baroness. I recognise her detailed involvement in this sector, which is part of the creative industries sector—one of the five identified by the Chancellor that will power our economy in the 21st century. It is a small part, run and characterised by microbusinesses, which no doubt have more difficult travel arrangements than they had before. The Government are working to support the creative sector. We see good growth in the creative sector—higher growth than in many others. We are working with the EU on a state-by-state basis and 23 of 27 countries now have bespoke arrangements and rules for travel for crafts folk, as well as, for example, our musicians. We will continue to encourage that bilateral.

My Lords, the problems the Question alludes to are undoubtedly mutual; they are problems for British craftsmen trying to go to Europe and the other way around. The trade and co-operation agreement produced 24 committees to look at issues between Britain and the EU. Could the Minister tell us which committee is charged with looking at this issue? Can he assure us that that committee does have this on its agenda?

I thank the noble Earl. I am well aware that there is a large number of committees. In DBT we are trying our best to remove barriers to trade and perhaps reduce the number of committees. In this case, I will need to go and ask the question to find out which committee is looking after craftspeople.

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, is participating remotely.

My Lords, crippling restrictions on working in Europe are blighting the lives of 2 million people employed in our creative industries. This is because the Government completely omitted our largest sector after financial services from the Brexit trade deal, and then spent four years failing to fix their blunder. Will the Minister take this opportunity to apologise to those who previously had a career in music, dance, theatre or fashion but are now having to drive taxis or flip burgers?

I thank the noble Lord for that question. We have a trade and co-operation agreement. In fact, our Brexit deal was one of the most progressive trade deals we had at the time of Brexit, which has been capitalised upon now, to 73 countries comprising 60% of global trade. Therefore, we have no tariffs and quotas for UK-EU goods trade. The Government’s aim is to maximise and make the best of that. The British people voted for Brexit to release the benefits of Brexit, which are increasingly coming through in our economy and trade. There are some costs to be borne along the way.

My Lords, could the Minister explain to the House how it is that you do a deal with the EU on a state-by-state basis?

I refer the noble Lord to my colleague in the other place, Greg Hands MP, who is the Minister for Europe. He is spending an increasing amount of time in European capitals. We also have 300 embassy staff working in the EU on deal-by-deal arrangements with countries to help, for example, our musicians and crafts folk. It is working very well.

My Lords, craftspeople, like all other travellers to the EU from the UK, face increasing delays again in the autumn when new strictures come in, with new requirements for fingerprinting, et cetera. Can the Minister bring the House up to date with what is happening on that front? Will there be yet more postponements?

I thank the noble Baroness for that. The craft sector is being supported. My own department, DBT, is delivering a programme of trade promotion activity in Europe and elsewhere. We also have a new means of trade, by way of digital, as well as by having to go there. Perhaps our carbon footprint has been reduced by making fewer trips to some of those shows. For example, we will be doing one in Dubai in July, for Middle East design and hospitality week. We are taking a group of craftspeople to sell their wares.

My Lords, one of the other great issues facing the skilled craft industry today is that 98% of skilled practitioners are solo traders or microbusinesses, as we have heard. That means that without effective apprenticeship schemes, their skills and knowledge will retire with them—knowledge and skills such as clock-making, Scottish carpentry, paper marbling, tinsmithing and cricket ball making. Despite this, apprenticeship starts have fallen by a third over the past decade, and £1 billion raised by the apprenticeship levy goes unspent each year. What steps are the Government taking to address this decline and to save some of those 150 varieties of craft apprenticeships or craft businesses?

I thank the noble Lord for that. He is basically describing the characteristics of this sector, which is populated by a large number of small, individual microbusinesses, quite often sole traders, all of whom are passionate about what they do and many of whom come to this as a second or third career. Therefore, it is a difficult sector to organise with a top-down approach from government. There is no question that many schemes are available to help and encourage people, not least in the charitable sector. I was a trustee of DofE, which does a lot around the crafts sector, and we know what the King does in terms of his programme at Dumfries House. We see how popular “The Repair Shop” is on television; the most popular charity in my town of Greenock is called the men’s shed.

My Lords, when Henry III ordered the rebuilding of Westminster Abbey a mere 750 years ago, there were craftsmen from Italy, France, Germany and the Low Countries working on it. Many of the English masons and others had also worked on cathedrals in France, the Low Countries and elsewhere. Now it seems much more difficult to get that sort of easy exchange between highly skilled craftsmen. Have we gone backwards?

I thank the noble Lord for that question. We should get a report on the rebuilding of Notre Dame Cathedral and work out exactly where the tradesmen and craftsmen have come from. I think we will find that the French are very keen to promote that as an opportunity for their own craftspeople, not necessarily for the wider community.

My Lords, I treat scientific research as a craft. Will the Minister, either now or later in writing, give us the numbers of PhD students studying scientific research coming from Europe to the United Kingdom and flowing in the other direction, from the UK to other European countries in the European Union?

I am very happy to write to the noble Lord with that information.

That the draft Order laid before the House on 11 March be approved.

Considered in Grand Committee on 7 May.

That the draft Order laid before the House on 25 March be approved.

Considered in Grand Committee on 7 May.

My Lords, I shall now repeat in the form of a Statement the Answer given in the other place on 8 May by my right honourable friend Minister Argar, concerning an extension of the end of custody supervised licence scheme to a maximum of 70 days. The Statement is as follows:

“Protecting the public is our No. 1 priority, so it is right that we take tough and decisive action to keep putting the most serious offenders behind bars, and for longer, as the public rightly expect. We are carrying out the biggest prison expansion programme since the Victorian era, and we are ramping up removals of foreign national offenders.

We have a duty to ensure that the prison system continues to operate safely and effectively, with offenders held in safe and decent conditions. This means ensuring that no prison exceeds a safe maximum operating limit. ECSL allows lower-level offenders to be released before their automatic release date. In March, the Lord Chancellor stated that we will

‘work with the police, prisons and probation leaders to make further adjustments as required.’.—[Official Report, Commons, 12/3/24; col. 157.]

This extension is in line with what the Lord Chancellor said.

ECSL operates only when absolutely necessary and is kept under constant review. I know that many Members of this House will be concerned about the early release of offenders into the community, but I make it clear that only offenders who would soon be released anyway will be considered for ECSL.

We have put in place safeguards, including that the Prison Service retains the discretion to prevent the ECSL release of any offender where early release presents a higher risk than if they were released at their automatic release date. There are strict eligibility criteria, and anyone convicted of a sexual offence, a terrorist offence or a serious violence offence is ruled out. Public safety will always be our No. 1 priority, and all those released will be subject to probation supervision and stringent licence conditions”.

My Lords, the ECSL scheme was launched last October as a temporary response to the capacity crisis, which has seen the prison population soar to 88,000. At that time, it was for 35 days’ early release. The Government’s narrative was that this would relieve increasing pressure on prisons and allow probation staff to manage clients back into the community safely and effectively. That has not worked sufficiently, so they are increasing the early release to 70 days. Does the Minister agree with me that this shows that the Government have failed to properly manage the prison estate for capacity, safety and basic decency? Does he also agree with me that there needs to be a renaissance in our probation services so that we make more use of community orders and suspended sentences, rather than ever increasing the prison population?

My Lords, I think the House is well aware of the pressures on the prison estate. We have had considerable difficulties in recent times, particularly with a highly increased remand population and the ongoing effect of Covid. The Government have embarked on the largest prison building programme since Victorian times. We have opened two new prisons, and there are two more on the way for which outline planning permission has now been achieved. We are working as well as we can to deal with the situation, but temporary measures are unavoidable, I am afraid, as the Labour Government found when they were in power some time ago. I agree with the noble Lord that sentencing, in terms of community orders and suspended sentences, is very much a subject that should continue to be considered fully.

My Lords, the Government’s approach to this has been rather haphazard. We have moved from 18 to 70 days, and it does not look as if this is getting any better. Has the Minister any news on the Sentencing Bill and the Government’s proposals for people with sentences of 12 months or fewer generally not going to prison? Secondly, when does the Minister expect Dartmoor to be able to take its full quota of prisoners again, having been emptied of most of them?

My Lords, I am not in a position to update the House at the moment on the Sentencing Bill, except to say I understand that it will indeed be progressing through the other place in early course. I will write to the noble Lord about the situation at Dartmoor, on which I am not at this moment informed.

My Lords, I declare my interest as a trustee of the Prison Reform Trust. Would my noble and learned friend accept that there is much of merit in the ECSL scheme, but there are not just prisoners who are going to be released early but also IPP prisoners who are still in prison 10 to 15 years after their tariff? Only last month or the month before, we heard how an IPP prisoner took his own life because he was beyond hope. There are far too many people in prison far too long. Could targeting that not be a way of reducing the prison population and emptying those cells that the Government seem so keen to fill up with other people at the other end?

My Lords, the subject of the IPP prisoners will be fully discussed in the Report stage of the Victims and Prisoners Bill, now scheduled for next Tuesday. Noble Lords will be aware that extensive government amendments have been tabled with the clear intention of reducing the population of IPP prisoners.

As somebody who has faced the dilemma that the current Lord Chancellor faces, I am not unsympathetic to the position of the Government. I understand they are doing it because the prisons are too full. Could the Minister explain what effect the fact that the prisons are too full is now having on the way the Government are dealing with the backlog in the Crown Court? There are 66,000 cases waiting to be tried in the Crown Court. I assume there is no desire to speed them up, because the prisons will get fuller and fuller.

My Lords, the Government are working as closely as possible with the judiciary to reduce the backlog in the Crown Court as early as possible.

My Lords, more prisons are now in special measures than have been for some years, including flagship prisons such as Wandsworth. Reports on how they got into this position mention low morale, drug use, violence and some terrorist elements exercising control over prisons. While having sympathy with the Government in so far as they do not, in and of themselves, determine how many people are in prison, I ask: have we not reached the point where the system is in part broken? Therefore, we need a radical appraisal of how it is going to continue. With so many significant prisons now in special measures, it is perfectly clear that something is radically wrong with the whole system.

My Lords, there are certainly problems in some prisons, but the overall picture is by no means as painted. We have had major refurbishments at sites including HMP Birmingham, HMP Liverpool and HMP Norwich. Your Lordships may have seen the picture of Liverpool the other day in the papers. It was a most impressive refurbishment. Constructions of new houseblocks at four prisons are going on; we have opened HMP Fosse Way and HMP Five Wells. I would encourage noble Lords to visit those very modern and effective prisons. We now have outline planning permission for two more.

My Lords, I declare that I am a trustee of the Clink Charity: we are involved with training people in prison for qualifications for restaurants, catering and the like. Those last few weeks in prison are often a crucial time for prisoners gaining the qualifications they need to get a decent job when they are released. I am sure every prisoner wants to go as soon as they can, but is the Minister aware, and will the Government take consideration, of the effect of prisoners not receiving their qualifications because they have not quite been completed by the time their advanced release date comes?

My Lords, it is a priority of this Government to improve employment opportunities for persons in prison. I would like to pay particular tribute to the Clink Charity, which has done excellent work over the years. The rate of prisoners in employment six months after their release has significantly increased under this Government, and various steps, which I think I have outlined on previous occasions, have been taken to improve the qualifications of prisoners leaving prison.

My Lords, is it not incumbent on this and future Governments to focus on prolific offenders, those who have committed more than 16 offences, and hyper-prolific offenders, who have committed more than 45? In so doing, we could cumulatively redirect funding for less serious prisoners to rehabilitation and reducing recidivism to make sure that that group has a better chance of making good when they leave prison.

My noble friend makes a very serious point, which has considerable force. The Government are well aware of it and will take it forward.

My Lords, 50 years ago, when the prison population was about 40,000, some of us proposed radically—and, it was thought at the time, dangerously—that non-state or semi-state organisations, institutions and enterprises should play their role in reorganising the Prison Service and that there should be a radical appraisal, as we heard called for a moment ago, of the nature of custody and penalties so that we could be more in line with other countries on the proportion of people in prison in relation to population. We are still miles ahead, except for America. Can my noble friend reassure us that, whichever party is in government, there will be a serious, organised effort to grip this custody issue and bring us into line with civilised patterns in other countries and away from the problems with overcrowding and drugs and the endless stories of difficulties to which we are at present subjected?

My Lords, if my noble friend is suggesting that we need a radical and thorough debate on sentencing policy and the use of custody, I entirely agree with him. Any Government would need to take that very serious issue forward.

My Lords, has any assessment been made of the impact of prisons being so full and there being such a long backlog in court? One of the biggest drivers of crime in the poorest communities in this country is the idea that you will get away with it. I have been speaking to a number of people at street level who are saying that the jails are too full to send anybody there, which they say is a driver for new criminals to get involved.

My Lords, the purpose of this measure—the increase in the early release under licence scheme—is absolutely to make sure that there is always space in jail for offenders. People who commit offences can expect to go to jail if their offence merits it.

That the Bill be now read a second time.

My Lords, I am pleased to present the Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Bill for Second Reading today. Noble Lords will have followed the passage of this historic Bill through the other place and will be well aware of its significance and the cross-party support it has received. This legislation will address one of the greatest miscarriages of justice in our nation’s history. It will quash the convictions of those affected by the Post Office Horizon scandal in England and Wales, and, following government amendment in the other place, Northern Ireland. This will ensure that postmasters are not disadvantaged by the unique challenges of expediting legislation faced by the Northern Ireland Assembly. The Government will continue working closely with the Scottish Government to support their approach to addressing the scandal, ensuring that every postmaster who has been affected, irrespective of where they are in the United Kingdom, receives the justice they deserve. The financial redress scheme will be open to postmasters throughout the UK, regardless of where or how their conviction was quashed.

This Bill will clear the names of postmasters whose lives were destroyed because of the Horizon scandal—those who received wrongful convictions or cautions for offences, including false accounting, theft and fraud, because of the Post Office’s faulty IT system. The legislation cannot undo the damage caused by the Horizon scandal. However, it is a crucial step in restoring the good names of those affected and ensuring they can access fair and full redress.

This new legislation will quash all convictions which meet the following clear and objective conditions: that the case was prosecuted by the Post Office, the Crown Prosecution Service or Northern Ireland’s prosecuting authorities; that the alleged offence was committed between certain dates in 1996 and 2018; that the postmaster was convicted of theft, false accounting or similar offences listed in the Bill; that the convicted individual was working in a Post Office which was using the Horizon system; and that the alleged offence was carried out in connection with running the business of that Post Office or with the person’s work in that Post Office.

The Bill will not quash convictions that have already been considered by the Court of Appeal, as defined in the Bill. The safety of those convictions has been considered by judges in the senior appellate court. The Government’s view is that, given the constitutional sensitivities, extreme caution must be exercised over whether Parliament should interfere with these decisions. Convictions will be quashed automatically when the Bill receives Royal Assent, removing the need for people to apply to have their conviction overturned. This will ensure that those affected receive justice as soon as possible.

The Bill includes a duty on the Secretary of State—or in Northern Ireland, the Department of Justice—to take all reasonable steps to identify convictions that have been quashed. It also creates a duty to notify the original convicting court, so that records can be updated. Other records, such as police records, will be amended in response. Similarly, the Bill makes provision for records of cautions relating to this scandal to be deleted.

I am well aware that the approach we are taking in the Bill is novel. In the Bill, we are using legislation to fulfil a function that in normal circumstances is rightly reserved to the independent judiciary. I am equally aware that these are not normal circumstances. Given the number of postmasters involved, the passage of time since the original conviction, the loss of evidence over that time, and the loss of trust in the system—meaning that many affected simply will not come forward to appeal—it is right that the state provides an exceptional response. Postmasters have suffered for too long, and we must end their fight for justice as swiftly as possible.

However, it is vital to make two points clear to your Lordships’ House. First, the Government’s position is that it will be Parliament and not the Government that is overturning the convictions: there will be no intrusion by the Executive into the proper role of the judiciary. Secondly, we have been clear throughout the passage of the Bill that this legislation does not set any kind of precedent for the future. It is also important to be unambiguous that the passage of the Bill is in no way a reflection on the courts or the judiciary, which have dealt swiftly with the cases before them.

Upon Royal Assent, this legislation will quash all convictions in its scope with immediate effect, as a matter of law. This means that victims will not have to take any action to receive exoneration. It also means that this unprecedented provision expires once it has done its job on the day of Royal Assent. This supports the Government’s aim that the Bill should not be seen as a precedent for Parliament’s acting outside its usual constitutional role. The Government will take all reasonable steps to notify the relevant individuals and direct them to the route for applying for financial redress. Further details of this process will be set out in due course. Importantly, there will also be a process for anyone to come forward where they believe their convictions meet the criteria. If they meet the criteria in the Bill, their records will be amended to reflect the quashed conviction in the same way.

Turning to financial redress, this new legislation will be followed by a rapid route to financial redress, on a similar basis to the existing redress arrangements for those with overturned convictions currently administered by the Post Office. However, the Government, rather than the Post Office, will be responsible for the delivery of the scheme for those whose convictions are overturned by the Bill. Final decisions will be made by independent panels or individuals, where they cannot be agreed with the postmaster.

We do not need provisions in the Bill to deliver that scheme; the legal basis on which redress is made is already in place. We place great importance on ensuring that this redress is delivered promptly. Information about redress will be provided to each individual alongside the notification that their conviction has been overturned. Each exonerated postmaster will have the choice between accepting a fixed offer of £600,000, which will be paid rapidly, or having their claim individually assessed. This new scheme will join the three schemes already being run by the Post Office and my department. In total, over £200 million has already been paid to over 2,800 claimants. Some 72% of claims received have been settled, but the Government continue to strive to accelerate matters. Ministers are advised on these issues by the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board. We are very grateful to the board’s members, notably the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, in his usual place, who has done so much to drive the resolution of this scandal.

In summing up, this Bill amounts to an exceptional response to a scandal which is wholly exceptional in nature. It is a scandal that has shaken the nation’s faith in the core principles of fairness and equity that underpin our legal system. We recognise the constitutional sensitivity and unprecedented nature of this legislation, but we believe that it is essential for us to rise to the scale of the challenge. The hundreds of postmasters caught up in this scandal deserve nothing less. Of course, no amount of legislation can fully restore what the Post Office so cruelly took from them, but I hope this Bill at least begins to offer the closure and justice for which postmasters have so bravely campaigned over so many years. I hope that it affords them the ability to rebuild their lives. I beg to move.

My Lords, I thank the Minister for setting out the provisions of this very important legislation in such plain language. I think that most, if not all, of your Lordships understand what this Bill sets out to do. I feel honoured to be the first speaker from these Benches to welcome this Bill, particularly when I see who the next but one speaker in your Lordships’ debate is; my admiration for the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom, goes back to even before his work on Horizon. I admire him greatly for what he has done, and he is deserving of the recognition of that work that he and my right honourable friend Kevan Jones did for years in trying to get proper redress for this egregious miscarriage of justice.

There is no doubt that the Post Office Horizon scandal is, if not the worst, one of the worst miscarriages of justice in British history. I think I remember that, in January, when the Prime Minister made a public statement that this Bill would come before Parliament, he described it as the worst miscarriage of justice in British history. I am inclined to agree with him: I do not always, but in this case I think I do. As we know, it robbed many people of their good character, their livelihood, their liberty and, in some cases, their life. Because of the nature of the damage that was done to the sub-postmasters, it has been carried down and will be carried down in generations of their families; it has influenced very badly the families of these great public servants. It caused unimaginable pain and suffering, which can never be fully compensated or fully alleviated.

To make matters worse, the fight for justice for the sub-postmasters has become bogged down in a great many delays and barriers, and some of those affected, tragically, as I have already alluded to, have passed away before having the chance to see the justice they deserve. What we do know is that this Bill will free hundreds of innocent people of their wrongful convictions. It will not restore their character, because that can never properly be fully restored, but it will give them an opportunity to try to put it behind them. Importantly, it facilitates the opportunity to make much-needed progress in otherwise righting the wrongs. Those are the reasons given by my honourable friend Jonathan Reynolds in the other place, and they are why Labour will give this Bill our full support.

However, not only must the convictions be overturned but, thereafter, compensation must be delivered at pace. Justice and accountability must follow the conclusions and recommendations of the ongoing independent public inquiry.

I was struck by the words of Sir Robert Buckland at Second Reading in the other place. On more than one occasion in debates and questions on these issues, he has hit the nail on the head. In his first intervention, he said that

“it is important that we emphasise the wholly exceptional nature of this legislation, but we are dealing with wholly exceptional circumstances”—

which were described very clearly by the Minister. I also agree with his emphasis that we have to look again at our evidential

“presumptions about machines and what they produce when it comes to criminal litigation”.—[Official Report, Commons, 20/3/24; col. 960.]

This is unfinished work that should be done in lockstep with the work that is being done to try to resolve the challenges of Horizon.

I wish to pause for a moment from talking about the Bill itself to recognise the work of the many people who have brought us to this landmark occasion. The postmasters themselves demand a great deal of credit for that. I cannot imagine what it must have been like for people who had been so badly damaged to pick themselves up and fight over tens of years, as some of them have, to get justice not just for themselves but for their colleagues. They deserve the greatest amount of credit.

I have already referred to the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot, but the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board also requires a great deal of credit for getting us here. As I understand the chronology of how we got here in the last stages, its letter of December last year to the Minister explained in some detail just how difficult it was for anybody to get redress in the Court of Appeal. I think the statistics when the letter was written to the Lord Chancellor showed that there had been 900 prosecutions, but only 93 people had had their convictions overturned at that stage. I cannot work out what that meant and how long it was going to take, but I recently overheard somebody say that, at the pace that those convictions were being overturned, it was going to take the Appeal Court process 50 years.

For the reasons set out in the letter, the board told the Lord Chancellor that the only viable approach was to overturn all the Post Office-driven convictions. Remarkably, within a matter of days, Kevin Hollinrake, the Minister with responsibility for this, said he was taking legal advice on what could be done. By 10 January, the Prime Minister announced publicly that this Bill would be brought before Parliament. Anything would be fast compared with the alternative that was going through, but that was remarkably quick for a Government, because of the number of people who have to be satisfied, and I congratulate and thank all persons involved in getting us to where we are.

In many ways, this is a very unusual piece of legislation, but it is also unusual in this sense: I do not think anybody can make a speech saying that it has come to this House without having had the attention that it deserved in the House of Commons. I know the other place did it all in one day, but it did go over the Bill very carefully and Members deserve some credit for that. There is not much in it that we will need to look at carefully, although I did get an email from the Law Society—as I am sure did all Members who are on the speaking list—which goes on for about four pages. I have not had a chance to consider it, but the Law Society recommends some probing amendments to reinforce the idea that this is not a precedent. I do not think it needs to be reinforced, to be honest; I think enough Ministers have said enough about that at the Dispatch Box for people to establish that it is not a precedent.

However, I am a recovering lawyer, and I must say that, although this is not my Law Society, I am a bit disappointed that there was not a word in it about the number of lawyers involved in getting us to where we are. I will be in correspondence with it and will raise that point. I will ask it whether at some point it might want to say something about the number of lawyers who must have been involved in helping to create this system that has got us to where we are.

Noble Lords will be pleased to hear that I do not intend to speak for much longer, but I want to make two points, which I think we should consider. First, I fear that the issue of extending the Bill to cover Scotland will come up again somewhere in our debates. The Justice Minister in the Scottish Government, the former First Minister Humza Yousaf, and any number of SNP Members in the other House have used some quite critical language about the Government and this Parliament for not extending the Bill to Scotland. The simple answer to that is to remind them that justice is a devolved matter in Scotland. They usually defend devolved matters quite strongly.

My second point is regarding the Lord Advocate—a woman I know well and who is a very good lawyer. For those noble Lords who do not know what the Lord Advocate does—this is important in terms of their requests that the Bill be extended to Scotland—she is, among many other things, the principal legal adviser to the Scottish Government. She is also the head of the system for investigation and prosecution of crime in Scotland. Essentially, she is a public prosecutor, and she spoke to the Scottish Parliament at length about the Horizon cases. She made a statement there on 16 January 2024. I will not read it all to your Lordships because it is four to five pages long, but the important part of it is that, as the Scottish Government’s legal adviser and head of the prosecution service, and having spelled out the circumstances of the Horizon cases as far as they apply to Scotland, she said:

“It is important to recognise that in Scotland, there is an established route of appeal in circumstances such as this. That route involves the SCCRC”—

the equivalent of the committee in England and Wales that looks at cases before sending them back to the Appeal Court—

“considering cases in the first instance prior to referring appropriate cases to the Court of Appeal. This is an important process because not every case involving Horizon evidence will be a miscarriage of justice and each case must be considered carefully and with regard to the law. It is also important to recognise the important and established constitutional role of our Appeal Court in Scotland and that due process must be followed”.

That is the Scottish Government’s lawyer’s position. She is part of the Government. That is how it should be done.

There is another way it could be done in Scotland. The Lord Advocate could, as a prosecutor, say to the procurators fiscal and to the Crown Office, “Look at these cases, tell us whether they can be sustained on appeal and, if they can’t, just take them to the Appeal Court and say that you no longer stand by these convictions”. There is a very simple way—in my view, and this is a view held by many lawyers in Scotland—for the devolved Administration in Scotland to get these cases dealt with through the existing prosecutorial system.

I have a final point I would like to put to the Minister. Why do we persist in excluding from this Bill those who have had their convictions held up on appeal? There is no doubt that the public inquiry has revealed considerable further evidence since those appeals were refused. There is no question that if any of those cases involve Horizon-generated evidence, they should be given the same consideration as the cases that have been prosecuted to conviction but not appealed. Every single witness who gave evidence to the Justice Committee in the other place when it was considering the Bill said that that should be the case. I urge the Government to reconsider that issue.

I have nothing further to say. I will participate in further debates but will continue to support the Bill.

My Lords, the wrongful conviction of sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses as a result of prosecutorial misbehaviour has caused personal harm—indeed, tragedy—and a national scandal. Wrongful convictions must be quashed, and a bespoke process is necessary to accelerate justice. But the legislative solution His Majesty’s Government have chosen was described in a Written Statement in February by the Minister, Kevin Hollinrake, as raising “constitutional sensitivity” and being “unprecedented” in nature. The constitutional sensitivity arises from the fact that Parliament does not quash convictions; that is a matter for the courts. What the Bill proposes is indeed unprecedented since the constitutional settlement that followed the Glorious Revolution at the end of the 17th century.

The Lord Chancellor, in his recent appearance before the Constitution Committee, said:

“Anybody who cares about the system has misgivings”.

Indeed they do. In the House of Commons, Sir Robert Neill said:

“Frankly, it is most undesirable that we should ever go down that route”.—[Official Report, Commons, 13/3/24; col. 317.]

The Minister responded by saying:

“We agree that this is unprecedented and undesirable, but we believe it is the least worst option”.—[Official Report, Commons, 13/3/24; col. 317.]

I endorse the Government’s sentiment that this legislative proposal is undesirable, but not that it is the least worst option. An alternative scheme, which would have kept within the well-understood constitutional boundaries that separate the roles of Executive, Parliament and the judiciary, was considered but rejected by the Government. I declare an interest in having sketched out such a scheme in early February; I will identify its key features in a few moments.

First, it might be useful to bring together some of the facts. The Bill seeks to capture 950 or more convictions over a period of a little more than 20 years. The helpful Library briefing note tells us that the Post Office has identified 730 individuals it prosecuted where evidence from Horizon may have been used. The balance was prosecuted by the prosecuting authorities in England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. I shall focus on England and Wales, which accounts for most of that total. Those cases were pursued in the magistrates’ court as summary offences, and in the Crown Court on indictment—about half in each court. In answer to a question on Radio 4 on 26 March, the Lady Chief Justice explained that in over 90% of cases the defendants had pleaded guilty.

The High Court judgments in civil proceedings before Mr Justice Fraser in Bates v Post Office at the end of 2019 exposed the flaws in the Horizon system; the first tranche of appeals in the Court of Appeal Criminal Division in 2021 revealed more. The evidence heard by the public inquiry has raised further questions about non-disclosure, the suppression of evidence and worse, and so the original grounds of appeal to the Court of Appeal are now much expanded.

More than 100 appeals have been allowed in England and Wales—about three-quarters in the Court of Appeal on appeal from the Crown Court and about one-quarter in appeals from the magistrates’ court to the Crown Court sitting in its appellate capacity. Some have involved appeals brought out of time by the convicted defendants themselves; others are references by the Criminal Cases Review Commission. A few appeals have been dismissed by the Court of Appeal because the court concluded that the conviction was safe. That is the statutory test. An appeal to the Court of Appeal will be allowed only if the conviction is unsafe. By contrast, an appeal from the magistrates’ court is a complete rehearing. If the prosecution does not call evidence, the appeal will be allowed. No appeal to the Crown Court from the magistrates’ court has been contested by the prosecution.

Both the Post Office and the Criminal Cases Review Commission have contacted all those they can identify to help get their cases back to the appeal courts. The response has been disappointingly poor. Many may just have had enough. That has raised the question of what to do. The Government’s answer is this Bill, but what of the alternative? The outline was simple: legislate to confer power on the Secretary of State to refer cases to the relevant appeal court if she considers that the conviction may be unsafe—that could include cases that have already gone through the courts—and give the Court of Appeal Criminal Division the powers of the Crown Court sitting in its appellate capacity, so all appeals could be dealt with in one place.

The burden on an appellant from the Crown Court to the Court of Appeal is to demonstrate that the conviction is unsafe. The reality is that if an appeal of this sort were not contested in the Court of Appeal, the appeal would be allowed. But any doubt about that could be resolved by reversing that burden with a statutory presumption that the conviction is unsafe. The prosecution would have to rebut it positively to sustain the conviction. The appellants would need to do no more than identify the grounds on which they rely, which are now almost pro forma. To cater for the cases where a defendant has died or lacks capacity, the Attorney-General could be given a representative role. In this scenario, the Secretary of State would be able to inform all those whose cases she intended to refer. Representation could be lined up. The cases would go thought the courts en bloc and be dealt with swiftly.

What, then, of the objections? At their heart is the proposition that many of those affected will not initiate proceedings. The outline scheme caters for that. Next, it is suggested in the Explanatory Notes that an appeal

“relies on there being sufficient evidence that the conviction is unsafe and in many cases that evidence no longer exists”.

The reversal of the burden in the Court of Appeal caters for that and, in any event, the point does not run for appeals from the magistrates’ court. I have also heard it suggested that the courts could not deal with these cases quickly. That has been flatly contradicted in public by the Lady Chief Justice and is confounded by the speed at which appeals are being dealt with at the moment.

All schemes have rough edges but, for the sake of conforming to accepted constitutional norms, a scheme of the nature I have outlined would—with respect to the Minister—be preferable. It would avoid the Executive inviting Parliament to do something about which Ministers themselves have said they have “misgivings” on constitutional grounds and have described as “undesirable”.

It would also avoid one of the anomalies of the Bill: that there is no scope to exclude convictions which are sound. As Sir Robert Neill has pointed out, the Bill sets out to quash convictions

“even if Horizon evidence did not form part of the prosecution”.

That is right. Condition E is simply

“that, at the time of the alleged offence, the Horizon system was being used for the purposes of the post office business”—

not that it was being used by the defendant, nor that it was material to the conviction, but simply that it was there. There may be no Horizon evidence at all in many cases that this Bill would quash. This Bill would quash convictions not affected by the Horizon scandal. It might be thought that that matters not only for constitutional reasons, but because of the Government’s plan, which the Minister explained, to give anyone whose conviction is quashed by this legislation at least £600,000.

It may be that this Bill can be improved by amendment, but its flaws are fundamental. It seeks to achieve a desirable outcome by a novel and unconstitutional route when a satisfactory alternative is available. It will provide food for academic debate and will long feature in university courses on the rule of law, the independence of the judiciary and the separation of powers. The repeated suggestions from the Government and the Opposition that it provides no precedent are perhaps the clearest indication that its proponents know that it is wrong in principle to ask Parliament to quash convictions. However, it does provide a precedent, as no future Parliament can be bound by what is said in connection with this Bill. Whether any politicians in the future will try to use it as a precedent, we shall have to wait to see.

My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board, although I think it has now been renamed the Horizon redress advisory board. It is a genuine honour to be able to follow a speech such as that from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett. I am grateful for what he said and for the immense amount of work that he has put into this most terrible of problems. I want to comment on some of the points that he made during his remarks, but I am grateful to him.

In the face of one of the most widespread injustices in this country—we all know the background—we needed to do something. This Bill is the Government’s answer, and I welcome it. I am extremely grateful to my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, my noble friend the Minister in this House and the Post Office Minister in another place, Kevin Hollinrake, for their astonishingly fast appreciation of the need for urgent, dramatic action and for following it through in this way. I am also grateful to my right honourable friend the Lord Chancellor for having some really difficult discussions, as we have just heard, with the judges about this.

As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, has told us, the Bill could have gone two ways: it could have gone his way, or the way that it has. The argument in favour of involving the judges, based on the separation of powers, has been carefully set out by the noble and learned Lord. It is an uncomfortable thing—some would put it much stronger—to have the legislature overturning decisions made by the judiciary, because that could form a constitutional precedent, and I accept that it does form a constitutional precedent, which would take us in the direction of totalitarianism.

I will not express a preference between the suggestion of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, and the Government’s suggestion in this legislation, because this is the Bill that we have, and I am thankful for it. I understand—of course I do—the constitutional difficulty of Parliament overturning judicial decisions: I practised as a barrister, my wife is a judge and I value the separation of powers. But I also value timely justice and the early reversal of some of the greatest unfairnesses that this country has ever seen. I want to set out the arguments against involving the judges, if only for the record. I accept that the points made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, deal with many of the points that I will make, but, as I said—and as I know he accepts—we have the Bill that we have.

The Fraser judgments in Alan Bates’s group litigation came out in 2019. The clear consequence of those judgments was that many hundreds of convictions were unsafe. We do not know exactly how many—which is odd—but it was in the region of 1,000. Yet, by the beginning of this year, only a few more than 100 sub-postmasters had even applied to have their convictions overturned. There were several reasons for this. The first and the most important was that too many sub-postmasters wanted nothing whatever to do with a court system that had, in their view, treated them so badly. They had been utterly traumatised and wanted to put the whole ghastly experience behind them. They were simply not applying to have their convictions overturned. They wanted no contact with officials, lawyers, politicians, journalists or anybody else at all, for understandable reasons. Yet appeals rely on the appellant applying, and the current system has no procedure for mass appeals brought by the state itself. I did not quite get to the bottom of what the noble and learned Lord suggested to redress that, but it would have probably been workable. Nevertheless, we have the Bill that we have.

The second reason for not involving the courts was that, in many cases, there is no evidence. In some cases, the Post Office will have taken the evidence away from the sub-postmasters and destroyed it; in other cases, the sub-postmaster himself or herself will have given up and destroyed it; and in yet more cases, the sub-postmaster will have died. To overturn a conviction on the basis that it is unsafe, you need to establish with evidence that it is unsafe. I approve of the suggestion of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, of a presumption of unsafety, but we have the Bill that we have.

The third reason was that appealing against convictions must be done through several different stages. Appeals go to the Post Office, then to the Criminal Cases Review Commission and then to the court at different levels, with the application of different tests, sometimes leading to different outcomes, which is strange in itself. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett, touched on that.

The fourth reason was that the Court of Appeal overturned only those convictions for which Horizon computer evidence was essential to the prosecution. That was an arguable limitation—although, in my personal view, wrong and unfair—in the earlier stages of the process. However, as the public inquiry has uncovered new facts about the behaviour of the Post Office, I suggest that it is a limitation that is no longer tenable. I tread carefully here because the inquiry has yet to report, but it seems that the Post Office investigators, incentivised as they were to recover money rather than to achieve justice, and the Post Office lawyers, intent on concealing evidence, tainted all the evidence produced by the Post Office in any trial.

The deaths of many of the sub-postmasters makes me remind your Lordships that this is urgent. We have to get on with it, and this Bill does that. The Bill quashes certain convictions and, by doing so, it gives rise to redress being paid to hundreds of sub-postmasters. The Bill does not itself deal with that redress. When people say that only a small proportion of sub-postmasters have received redress, they are right, but that will rapidly change with the passage of this Bill. It is an essential step to getting us to where the country wants us to be.

The question of which convictions are to be quashed is a difficult one, but nothing about this saga is easy. The Bill quashes convictions in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, but not in Scotland. I listened with interest to the suggestion from the noble Lord, Lord Browne, as to how the procurator fiscal could operate in Scotland. The Scottish Government are legislating to achieve something similar; I hope that that can be looked at carefully in Committee.

The quashed convictions under this Bill have to have been prosecuted by the Post Office or the CPS, or by the Northern Ireland authorities, but those prosecuted by the Department for Work and Pensions, for example, are not included. This too will need careful consideration in Committee. Certainly, the DWP will need to give very careful thought to the extent to which it relied on Post Office evidence and investigations, and to consider whether the convictions that it secured were any more safe than those secured by the Post Office and the CPS. Should we consider perhaps in Committee widening the scope of the Bill, so that those convictions too are overturned? I have to say that I do not know. I should very much like to hear why the Government consider that DWP convictions are safe when CPS convictions are not. I should also like to hear what the DWP is doing to re-examine its convictions to ensure that it has not relied upon tainted Post Office evidence and investigations.

Another category of convictions not quashed by this Bill is those that have already been considered by the Court of Appeal. I listened carefully to what the noble Lord, Lord Browne, said about this, and I agree with what he said. There are 13 of these cases. I am very uncomfortable indeed about this, for the following reason. The Bill overturns many hundreds of convictions. The Government accept, as they should, that some of the convictions overturned will in fact have been of sub-postmasters who were guilty of a crime. That is the price that we pay for the exoneration of the innocent. Those who have been in front of the Court of Appeal, in exactly the same way as those sub-postmasters who have been in front of other courts, may or may not be guilty. I do not think it is acceptable to tell them that they can go back to the Court of Appeal if there is new evidence, because other sub-postmasters are not being required to provide individual evidence of their innocence—a reversal of the burden of proof. These 13 sub-postmasters are being punished for their efficiency and courage in being early in taking their convictions to the Court of Appeal.

There is, of course, one new bit of evidence which the Court of Appeal did not consider in relation to these 13 cases: that all the sub-postmasters, other than these 13, are about to be exonerated. It stretches credulity to believe that the Court of Appeal would say that, out of all the hundreds of convicted sub-postmasters, it would choose for these 13 to remain convicted. Can it be fair that they should be the only sub-postmasters in the country to be left with convictions? I cannot see that the Court of Appeal would welcome a new application from them, because how could it consider anything other than the facts of these individual cases? We shall need to consider this very carefully in Committee.

The Government are to be congratulated on their speed and courage in bringing the Bill to us, but I first became involved in this matter in 2009 and Alan Bates did so in 2003. “Speed” is obviously a relative term. Let us get on with it.

My Lords, the heroes of this story are Alan Bates and the sub-postmasters. Having been wrongly convicted, and in order to establish their innocence, they brought a piece of incredibly expensive civil litigation. This was fought all the way by the Post Office. As Sir Wyn Williams will tell us, there are signs that it deliberately suppressed evidence even then. Alan Bates won in front of a judge in the civil courts. That began the exoneration process.

As everyone else in the House has done, I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom, and Mr Kevan Jones. They pursued a terribly unfashionable cause for literally decades, and never gave up on it when the whole establishment was against them, including all the senior Post Office executives and its board, senior civil servants, and Ministers who did not pay enough attention. There was absolutely nothing in it for them, but they persisted. They make one admire politicians and they shame most of the rest of us.

I welcome and support the Bill. I actively support the solution adopted by the Government. I do not support the solution proposed by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett of Maldon. I say that with enormous trepidation because he is someone whom I greatly admire. His judgment is good. He took the courts through the pandemic, making good legal and wider judgments throughout. With the greatest respect to him, I think he is wrong in relation to this case.

The miscarriages of justice span a period of 22 years. The number of people wrongly convicted of serious offences and who had their lives comprehensively ruined is not known. Maybe it was 700, maybe 900. The number of people who went to jail is not known. Maybe it was 230, maybe more. The period of time in which the miscarriages lasted, the number of people affected and the lack of reliable information is quite unprecedented. The destruction of the lives and livelihoods of the sub-postmasters and their families is unspeakable. The responsibility for this lies first and foremost with the Post Office, which pursued and prosecuted them on a false basis, and Fujitsu, which knew the truth and colluded in its suppression.

As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett of Maldon, has said, a significant number—I do not know how many; I am not sure about that figure of 90%—of the convictions were on guilty pleas, often to a charge of false accounting.. Do not be comforted by that. No doubt those guilty pleas were obtained by a combination of what lawyers would have advised the defendants was the irrefutable evidence of the Horizon system. It was irrefutable not because of some principle of law but because there was simply no evidence to undermine that system—because the Post Office had suppressed such evidence. There was also the prospect of the Post Office not pursuing more serious charges if they pleaded guilty to the lesser charge—as it was presented—of false accounting.

The Bill addresses only one aspect of the scandal: how to extinguish the wrongful convictions. In many of the cases, as everyone who has spoken in this debate has identified, much of the underlying written and other material has been lost, partly because the Post Office has destroyed it and partly because the defendants want nothing more to do with what was a terrible period in their lives.

As far as the process of appealing successfully against the convictions is concerned, there have been an unspecified number of appeals against conviction in magistrates’ courts, which have generally been heard in Southwark Crown Court. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett of Maldon, has said, in all those appeals the Post Office called no evidence and in consequence the appeals, being by way of rehearing, were automatically allowed.

In relation to the appeals from the Crown Court, up to the end of January 106 appeals were completed in the Court of Appeal, of which 70 were allowed, 26 were withdrawn by the appellant sub-postmaster upon sight of the Post Office’s response, and seven were dismissed. I appreciate that that leaves three cases unaccounted for, which I cannot explain but which is symptomatic of the lack of reliable information about the scale and extent of the problem. The Court of Appeal, as the noble and learned Lord said, accepted the unreliability of the Horizon system. Other reasons have come to light, as he said, that should justify appeals, including and in particular the withholding of exonerating material by the Post Office in the prosecutions.

As the noble and learned Lord said, there are already well-established processes for setting aside wrongful convictions in our system. His proposal is that we would let the existing processes take their course with modifications, some of them no doubt required by primary legislation. In my view, that has a number of problems. First, it would not be possible to identify all the cases, simply because there are not the records. Many innocent sub-postmasters would not connect with the process, whether or not they wanted to, and as a result would not be exonerated.

Secondly, it would take a long time. Some 50% at least of the English cases would have to be dealt with in the Court of Appeal. I have absolutely no doubt that the Criminal Division of the Court of Appeal would do its bit as quickly as reasonably possible, but time would be required to identify the cases, to prepare the appeal material, to undertake some form of investigation on the part of the prosecution, and then to list those appeals.

Thirdly, as the noble Lord, Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom, said, a significant number of sub-postmasters would refuse to participate because of their lack of faith in the system. The current system, as everyone has said, does not allow for an unwilling defendant, unless they lack capacity, to have their case referred to the Court of Appeal against their wishes.

Fourthly, it will be for the Post Office—or the Crown Prosecution Service if it replaces the Post Office as the prosecuting authority—to determine which of the appeals to contest. The evidence that Sir Wyn Williams is hearing in the inquiry suggests that little faith can be placed in the Post Office properly performing any duty placed on it in connection with Horizon. No doubt the obligations of the prosecutor can be passed to the Crown Prosecution Service, at least in England, but that would create yet further delay.

As the noble and learned Lord has said, the Lord Chancellor could be given power to refer the cases of unwilling postmasters to the Court of Appeal. There could be a presumption that the defendant was innocent unless the prosecution could actively convince the Court that the convictions were safe. None of that would obviate the need for investigation within, if not by, the prosecution at a time when the material is limited, and it would not prevent some appeals being resisted on the basis of which documents had survived. The Court of Appeal could no doubt hear cases en bloc of, say, 50 or 60 cases at a time and list them within weeks of the court being told they were ready.

All that is possible, but it would be bending our justice system out of its normal shape. Our justice system prides itself, rightly, on providing a fair and reliable system of adjudication, where above everything it decides cases on the evidence before it in accordance with settled principles of law. The courts have the key role of deciding disputes between private individuals and between the state and private individuals, without fear, favour or interference of any sort—particularly from the state. As the Executive control the legislature in our system, they can interfere with court processes by legislation. If unfavourable court decisions were overturned by legislation, the rule of law would be undermined—not where the legislation was to change the law, but where it was to overturn an inconvenient finding of fact. That is the argument of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett.

There are three alternatives. First, you could legislate to exonerate in a Bill like this. Secondly, you could use a royal pardon. Thirdly, you could adapt the current system of appeals to allow for mass exoneration by the courts. A royal pardon is inappropriate. It involves pardoning somebody for committing a crime, maybe because modern practice would not regard the act a crime. The sub-postmasters did not commit crimes. They should not have pardons; they should have exoneration.

Of the other two routes, I favour legislation like this, because it best does justice, which is the best protection for the rule of law. It is no criticism of the courts. It involves neither a slur on the judges nor the setting of a precedent which undermines the rule of law to say that the exceptional facts of this case cry out for legislation and not appeals.

This legislation identifies the group—sub-postmasters convicted in connection with their Post Office work while the Horizon system operated—and automatically and immediately exonerates them. A court process will take time. It will be much quicker than normal, but for many it will take years and not months. The court process will miss people because of the bad record keeping. If it is exoneration by court, when those missed emerge, as many will, they will not have been exonerated. Then they will have to go through a court process, when all the urgency has gone, to petition for acquittal.

The court process will produce anomalies and inconsistencies, bred very often by the uneven loss of documents and the unreliability of the Post Office. For those postmasters challenged to establish their innocence, wherever the burden lies in the court process, it is difficult to imagine that they would have faith in the conduct of such a prosecution. The legislature should take responsibility for putting this mess right, and not the courts.

What precedent does this Bill set? I completely accept what the noble and learned Lord said; it does set a precedent. It is a precedent that, where the court system, because of the exceptional nature of the miscarriage of justice, cannot effectively right the wrong, intervention by the legislature is appropriate. I cannot imagine this precedent ever being repeated. The Irish terrorist cases in the 1970s and 1980s demeaned and besmirched our court system, but they were put right by a process of appeals. The court system was able to remedy it, and to have intervened by legislation there would have been hugely undermining. The hallmarks of this exception are, first, the time it has lasted—24 years. Secondly, the need to use bulk hearings suggests that the courts cannot deal with it in a normal manner. Thirdly, justice must come soon. Fourthly, only legislation provides consistency and clarity.

Separation of powers is vital to the rule of law. The courts must be copper-bottomed, protected from interference by the legislature and the Executive. In a constitution based on parliamentary sovereignty, that separation also involves Parliament and the Executive providing necessary support for the courts in funding and in judicial appointments. It involves support in the face of public pressure, not legislating in any way that undermines the rule of law, and—very exceptionally—legislating where justice cannot be done without it.

This legislation is supportive and not undermining, so I support it in principle. I have a number of points on the detail: first is the decision to exclude from exoneration those cases which have already been dealt with by the Court of Appeal. I am strongly against that; I support the noble Lords, Lord Arbuthnot and Lord Browne, in saying that everybody should be exonerated. The fact that someone has got to the Court of Appeal is not a reason for not exonerating them. Those postmasters who got to the Court of Appeal almost certainly had the strongest cases because they got through; they should not be left out in the cold.

Secondly, I would be interested to hear from the Minister about the position in Scotland. If the Scottish Parliament is willing for one Bill to do it, it should be done by one Bill. Thirdly, I would like to hear why the DWP cases are being separated from everyone else. Maybe this House could contribute to this Bill by dealing with the Court of Appeal cases and the DWP cases and streamlining the position with Scotland.

My Lords, I admit to being a little nervous as a non-lawyer entering a debate that has already heard from so many distinguished minds. Some may think that they have heard enough from the lawyers and do not need to hear from me.

I am grateful to the Minister for introducing the Bill. I concur with other noble Lords in hoping that it will be swiftly passed into law. The many victims of this long-running scandal and injustice must now benefit without further undue delay. As the noble Lord said in opening this debate, Parliament is not the usual route by which we overturn wrongful convictions. I echo others today, as well as what I have said in debates on other matters, in believing that we need to tread very carefully when acting in ways that move us on to territory more normally occupied by the courts and the judiciary. That is particularly important in Britain, because we give such huge weight to precedent. The Minister has, I am pleased to note, assured us that this Bill should not be considered a setting of precedent, and others have concurred. However, I think that that aspect of what we are doing merits, albeit briefly, deeper consideration. What one Government do today, no matter how warily, may be drawn on by future Governments in ways that stretch the original intentions well beyond breaking point. Our best defence against that, perhaps our only defence, is to set down very clear principles, not merely general assertions, at the outset.

Things happen very differently in different places. American presidents have regularly pardoned political cronies who have committed crimes in their support. I doubt whether many of us in your Lordships’ House would be surprised if a Republican victory later this year resulted in mass pardons, even for convicted insurrectionists. Closer to home, it is not beyond imagination that far-right movements in Europe, notorious for combining political organisation with street violence, might, should they gain a say in government, seek to overthrow their criminal associates’ convictions. Let me pick a cause closer to my own heart: let us suppose a future coalition Government here, needing the support of a minority party more to the left, were told that the price to pay included quashing the convictions of environmental protesters.

The question is how we in Britain safeguard the rule of law for the long term, while ensuring that the Post Office victims are speedily exonerated. Let me briefly offer four simple criteria; I hope that in responding to the debate the Minister will indicate whether he agrees, or has better ones to propose. I am not at all precious about my suggestions, but I am precious about respecting the role and political independence of our judges and courts. I believe that this is how we can best avoid future claims of precedent.

First, evidence has emerged since those original convictions that sets out so clearly the failings of the Horizon software that had that information, which was known within the Post Office and to Fujitsu at the time, been made available to the defence, it is unimaginable that any jury would have convicted. Indeed, it is doubtful whether any judge would have allowed a case to proceed that far. For me, this is the most compelling argument for the course of action we are taking today. Our justice system is based solidly on evidence, and where fresh and powerful evidence emerges, we need to be able to take it into account in a timely and effective way.

Secondly, I note the arguments of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett of Maldon, who reminded us that, unless cases are looked at individually, there is a risk that someone who had stolen money might now be let off. However, the principle that it is better that a guilty person go free than an innocent one be convicted lies at the root of our British justice system. It is enshrined in the requirement that guilt be proven beyond reasonable doubt—yet it goes back much further, to the Book of Genesis and a conversation between Lot and God over the fate of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. To save time, I will leave noble Lords to look that up for themselves.

Thirdly and importantly, we are well clear of partisan political territory here. Although I know that we in this House and the other place can proceed to legislate on a simple majority, were any major grouping in your Lordships’ House to feel that the Bill contained political bias in any direction, it would not be safe for us to proceed.

Finally, as so many noble Lords have said, we are dealing with such a large number of convictions that handling them in any other way would tie up the court system and delay justice for the Post Office victims and even for others in unconnected cases, who could not get their matters to court. Hence it is that combination—the compelling new evidence, the presumption of innocence, the political neutrality and the sheer number of cases—that allows me to offer my support to the Bill.

I look forward to hearing what other criteria noble Lords adduce in favour of its passing—some have already done so—and I look forward to the response of the Front Benches in their winding-up speeches.

My Lords, I congratulate the Government on moving swiftly with this process. This saga has dragged on for 20 years. A trusted public body has been guilty of the most appalling want of care, and others might say much worse. I leave that to the judgment and observations of Sir Wyn Williams’ inquiry and of my noble friend Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom, without whose fantastic work we would not be here today.

It is evident now—we must remember this—that individuals pleaded guilty out of fear when offered charges of a lower gravity that offered the chance to avoid imprisonment. Fear in the face of overwhelming but fatally flawed evidence is what induced those pleas. Since then, the courts have in many cases, notwithstanding those guilty pleas, overturned those convictions. That highlights where we are. It is an exceptional and appalling situation, and anyone who has appeared in the Crown Court, as I used to in the first 10 years of my practice, will know what it is like when you say to someone, “Come on, the evidence is overwhelming”. Just occasionally, they do not plead guilty and, very occasionally, you get an acquittal. That is where we are; that is really important.

The Secretary of State for Justice and his Ministers have rightly seen it as a priority to go as far and as fast as they can to close this down, to bring justice to these sub-postmasters who have suffered so grievously. Speaking as a lawyer—but not so distinguished a lawyer as some who have spoken today—I have great admiration for our judges and for legal process. I thought hard about whether this statutory approach is right. Like others, I have had my misgivings, but I have come to the view that it is undoubtedly the right course. In saying this, I have the greatest respect for, and fully understand, the serious and powerful reasons for concern advanced by the former Lord Chief Justice, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Burnett. We are right to be concerned about interference by Parliament with the courts. It must not happen. We have lived many happy years, relatively, since the Bill of Rights, and we must continue to do so. These two pillars of our constitution must remain separate, and we cannot interfere with the courts.

While I say that, we have to accept what has happened here. I am sure the courts could move fast, but the process of renewed appeals would none the less be complex. It would take longer than the process we are embarking on here. Quite possibly, some of the deserving sub-postmasters would die before their names were cleared. A pardon does not overturn a conviction; the conviction is still there. Innocent individuals will fall through the cracks if left to ordinary process. Some will simply not come forward; they have had enough of the courts and legal process and are exhausted. Understandably, they do not want to engage. We have to do everything we can to help them, and we cannot leave others wrongly convicted in these cases. It is clear that the Post Office’s own records relating to these prosecutions are lacking, and it has the potential to drag on however hard the judges push, so the knot must be cut. In this sense, I am happy to adopt what has been said by Dr Robert Craig, a lecturer in law at the University of Bristol. He has expressed the clear view that the legislation is justified and necessary. The whole process, he says, has been

“an affront to the conscience of the court”.

I could not put it better myself.

Looking forward, can I suggest a practical step—and I have another to suggest later—that does not require primary legislation? I suggest that it is important that, once the process is set in chain by this Bill when it becomes statute, there is established a website where any individual who wishes to know if they have in fact been cleared by the process or are eligible to be cleared but have not yet heard should be able to log on and request that they be informed where they stand and notify the powers that be of their interest. Publicity must be given to the existence of what is, in effect, a central clearing house, to make certain that people whose records may be in a brown folder somewhere are not left unhelped.

We know that, in the landmark case of Hamilton in 2021, the Court of Appeal quashed the convictions of 39 sub-postmasters and found their conviction by the Post Office to be an “abuse of process” and an “affront to justice”. The main issue in those appeals, we know, was the reliability of Horizon. Notwithstanding this, since that decision, 13 cases have been back to the Court of Appeal and have been held to have been safe convictions. Those are the category in Clause 3 who will stand; their convictions will not be quashed. My noble friend Lord Arbuthnot has expressed profound concerns, which I understand, about this. But the Government are in something of a dilemma here, and I understand where that starts.

None the less, Hamilton was in 2021. Since then, much more evidence has come out. Sir Wyn Williams will report within the next year. It is undoubtedly the case that much evidence will have come to light, which may cast a different light on those 13 convictions. If that is so, of course those persons can apply to the Criminal Cases Review Commission and ask for their appeals to be reopened. I suggest a simple, practical step. In those 13 cases, the Ministry of Justice should, in the near future when this Bill is passed, personally inform those 13 individuals that they will not be acquitted under the Bill and are in a different category but that the inquiry may well have produced new material to justify reopening it. For that purpose, they should be provided with a reasonable sum to enable them to consult solicitors and review the dismissal of their appeal in light of any fresh evidence that the inquiry or other investigations since 2021 may have brought to light.

I invite the Government to put in train the two practical measures I have indicated: namely, a website to give access to verification for individuals that they are in fact among those who will stand acquitted as a result of this legislation; and a resource for the 13 who have been convicted and whose appeals have been dismissed since 2021. With that said, I commend this Bill and wish it a safe and swift passage.

My Lords, I welcome this Bill, as it enables some postmasters wrongly convicted to secure some compensation and wipe the slate clean, though the scars of injustice will remain with them and their families for ever.

I will raise four broad areas of concern. First, as has been pointed out, Clause 1 quashes convictions prosecuted by the Post Office and the Crown Prosecution Service only. It does not quash the 61 cases prosecuted by the DWP against postmasters in England and Wales. The DWP was the state prosecutor of postmasters until the end of 2012, when its prosecutorial function was assigned to the CPS by the Director of Public Prosecutions. Can the Minister say whether any of the CPS prosecutions being quashed were initiated by the DWP?

The omission of the DWP prosecutions from the Bill is utterly unfair. Just like the Post Office and the CPS, the DWP used Horizon-generated data and faced lies and cover-ups from the Post Office. It has now been conclusively shown that the Post Office and the CPS convictions were unsafe because of unreliable evidence, lies and cover-ups. It is hard to see why the same data, evidence and channels of generating evidence are somehow considered reliable for prosecutions by the DWP.

The DWP convictions were mostly prosecuted between 2000 and 2006, when there was a clear conspiracy of silence and cover-up around the flaws in the Horizon system and when the Post Office concealed a lot of information. Since then, many of the Crown Court transcripts and bundles of evidence relating to those convictions have been destroyed. Therefore, the Government’s argument of investigating these on a case-by-case basis is pretty much impossible and unlikely to provide any fairness to those individuals.

The DWP position is stated in a letter signed by Mrs Alison Riley, a senior lawyer with the DWP legal advisers in the Government Legal Department, from 28 September 2023, addressed to Professor Christopher Hodges of the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board:

“I can say with some confidence that in the majority of cases we have found that those cases prosecuted by the DWP did not rely on evidence from the Horizon system but rather relied on physical evidence such as order books, vouchers and date stamps”.

Let us look at those words again. The letter used the phrase

“with some confidence”,

instead of “with absolute certainty” or “with 100% confidence”. The letter seems to suggest that there is some doubt. It also used the phrase

“in the majority of cases”.

Does that mean that there were cases where somebody was wrongly prosecuted by relying upon Horizon-generated data? Were there cases in which the DWP used Horizon-generated data to secure prosecutions? How many cases were there, which this letter is perhaps not identifying? I hope the Minister will be able to tell us.

Can the Minister say whether any convictions secured by the DWP have ever been quashed by the courts, at any time, from the year 2000 onwards? Has any DWP investigator, official or witness retracted evidence given on oath? If so, that makes all the convictions unsafe. Can the Minister categorically say that all 61 cases have been independently reviewed? Which documents were reviewed, when was this done and by whom? Were the victims invited to respond to the review? Has any post-conviction disclosure ever been made to postmasters who were previously prosecuted and convicted by proceedings brought by the DWP? Were they given the appropriate information? Against a wall of silence and lies by the Post Office, some people convicted by the DWP may even have been denied appeal, but the revelations of last three years surely change that. Can the Minister say how many of those prosecuted by the DWP have actually been denied appeal and are perhaps now deserving of it?

I am reminded of the maxim of the English jurist, William Blackstone:

“It is better that 10 guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer”.

I therefore urge the Minister to amend the Bill and quash the convictions of those prosecuted by the DWP. If not, he should at the very least appoint an inquiry to examine the safety of the DWP convictions.

My second point is this. On 16 January, at Second Reading of the then Post Office (Horizon System) Compensation Bill in this House, I urged the Minister to remove the Post Office’s involvement in setting the terms of compensation and in administering any aspect of compensation schemes, as that would only multiply the pain for postmasters. I understand from some postmasters—one of whom I spoke with earlier today—that the Post Office is still involved with the group litigation order scheme. It is also involved with the Horizon shortfall scheme, at least where some 360 to 370 disputed cases are concerned. It is good to know that there is a panel of King’s Counsels, but the problem is that the Post Office set the terms of reference, the guidance and the principles of the scheme. No matter how independent the panel, it is duty bound to follow those guiding principles. The Post Office basically cannot be trusted, and its involvement is a source of discomfort. Can the Minister shed some light on why the Post Office is still involved in these schemes, and what is to be done to remove it from them?

Thirdly, the Horizon inquiry has provided strong evidence of wrongdoings which warrant criminal charges. However, whenever any question is asked, the Minister’s standard response is that we must wait until the end of the Horizon inquiry and the subsequent report before any action is taken. That position is deeply unsatisfactory. It is hard to know why prosecutions have not already begun on the basis of evidence which has already been provided to the inquiry. Any delay would mean that many would escape justice altogether. It is quite conceivable that, in time, many will simply say that they are fragile, too old and have selective amnesia so simply cannot remember.