Forced Marriage (Civil Protection) Bill [HL]

My Lords, it is a great privilege to reply to this debate. I, too, am very sorry that my noble friend Lady Scotland is not with us—she would do a much better job than me, given her expertise and knowledge. I know that noble Lords will not mind that I sent her a text message just before the start of the debate to say that we would all be thinking of her and that we look forward to seeing her back soon. I pay tribute to her commitment and energy—which I am not often able to do in your Lordships’ House, because the occasion does not allow that—particularly on these matters and on issues concerning domestic violence. I have worked with her on these issues for some time and it will come as no surprise to your Lordships that no one is more committed and dedicated to the work that she undertakes. I also pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Lester. Very few people can stand up and state, ““Thirty years ago, I said this””, and, without wavering, continue to press their concerns. Sometimes I wish that he would not continue to press those concerns—but what an important contribution he has made. It is also fabulous to stand here and watch him looking extremely embarrassed, which he has done from time to time when people have paid him tribute; I cannot resist it, too. I welcome and salute the noble Lord’s work and his incredible contribution. As a Minister for human rights, I say that, without him, I would find my job far more difficult. I want to pay tribute to another group of people who I have met only recently—in fact, I met them only yesterday—the people who work in the Forced Marriage Unit. I had the privilege of spending only an hour with them but I came away with the overwhelming impression that they are completely dedicated to their work. I said to one of them—I shall not embarrass her by naming her—that I could not work out how on Earth she did her job without working 24 hours a day, seven days a week; her wry smile suggested that neither did she. It is a small dedicated band and I thank them on behalf of your Lordships for the incredible work that they do. I want to explain a little more about that work. I think that it is worth doing so, even considering the expertise in your Lordships’ House. The Forced Marriage Unit is a joint Home Office/Foreign and Commonwealth Office venture. It has six members of staff at present, and the team leads on policy development and outreach work. It has three dedicated caseworkers—one from UK Visas—and one office manager, and all members of the unit handle casework. The FMU has a budget of almost £690,000, including staff wages, and it covers 250 to 300 cases a year, 15 per cent of which are male cases of forced marriage. Our embassies and high commissions overseas assist, rescue and repatriate around 200 people each year. Around a third of the cases that the unit deals with concern children, some as young as 13. It also assists reluctant sponsors—those forced into marriage and subsequently forced to sponsor a visa application—and it has dealt with more than 100 cases since May last year. In the past two years, the Forced Marriage Unit has produced guidelines for the police, social services and health and education professionals on tackling forced marriage, and it has started work on producing similar guidelines for registrars. As well as commissioning international guidance for lawyers, the unit will shortly be publishing a handbook of legal remedies for family law professionals, holding a series of seminars for practitioners, and exploring ways of introducing forced marriage on family law courses at universities and colleges. The Forced Marriage Unit is producing a survivors’ handbook to offer information and practical support to survivors of such marriages. In partnership with Jasvinder Sanghera’s group, Karma Nirvana, the unit is also funding a pilot survivors’ network in Derby to provide emotional support to survivors of forced marriage and to create opportunities to build new friendships and relationships. The unit also undertakes a great deal of publicity, outreach and awareness-raising work in key communities, speaking at about 75 events each year. In 2006, it ran a national publicity campaign on forced marriage, involving radio, TV, and national and local press. That shows what the power of six people can achieve. I pay real tribute to their work. The noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, asked about the criminalisation issues. As she knows, we carried out consultation on introducing a criminal offence, but the primary reason that that did not happen was that 74 per cent of the police respondents and all those from the CPS and probation services said that it was not an appropriate way forward. As the noble Baroness indicated, at the end of the consultation, we said that we would look at the gaps that existed and at identifying ways to fill them. The debate on this Bill will make an extremely important contribution to that. My noble friend Lady Scotland will no doubt have far more information on the consultation process, and I shall ensure that the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, receives it. Some common themes developed very quickly in the debate. They included consent, or mutual respect, as the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, described it, and the fragility of marriage. The noble Baroness, Lady Falkner, in particular, talked about consent under duress, where young people do not know what they are agreeing to. The issue of human rights is critical: the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, said that they are universal. The noble Lords, Lord Sheikh and Lord Taylor of Holbeach, and the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, talked about the difference between arranged and forced marriages, and said that it is critical that we differentiate between the two. But, as my noble friend Lady Rendell said, sometimes there is blurring around the edges, and that is also important. It was said that, more than anything else, these young vulnerable people need protection and the law should ensure that they are protected. I was delighted that my noble friend Lady Uddin was the first person to speak after the noble Lord had introduced the Bill. Yesterday, I had a conversation with my noble friend about her blood pressure. She rightly said to me that this is also about the emancipation, education and training of women so that they feel they can resist this. They need to know where to go, and they need to feel that they have the right skills and attributes and that they are not held captive by their own culture by not being allowed to participate more fully. My noble friend and my noble friend Lord Ahmed will recognise that, whatever else we do, it is important to continue to work very closely with young people and to give them those skills. However important the legislation is, we must not forget that. I agree with her completely. We must also consider other forms of legislation and whether the domestic violence legislation applies here. I know that the Equal Opportunities Commission has raised that interesting and important point. My noble friend wanted us to look at the definition of force. I shall summarise some points that need to be considered. The resources dedicated to the Forced Marriage Unit will not be cut. It is important to have that on the record. However, noble Lords might want to press for more resources for that. When debating the Bill, we have to consider existing legislation.