Offender Management Bill

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, for the way in which he moved his Motion and made clear what assurances he is seeking from the Minister. I also pay tribute to him for the key role he has played in our close deliberations on the Bill. I still believe that the Government are not in a position to roll out the Bill’s provisions satisfactorily. Like the noble Lord, I still believe that we are not in full possession of information about likely costs and the mechanisms by which, for example, contracting will be satisfactorily carried out. That indeed was the basis of a letter sent by Mr Straw to his honourable friends in another place dated 16 July—the first of two rather interesting letters sent last week. The first letter was a ““dear colleague”” to all; the second seemed to be to a more selected group. But certainly the first letter appeared to have one objective: to persuade Labour Members in another place to fall in behind the Government and not misbehave. The letter set out what appeared to be an assurance that the Government were going to take a very long time indeed to implement the proposals in the Bill. It was a case of saying, ““Don’t worry. Even if we don’t know what we’re doing now, we will by the time we do it””. That is our concern—that we should hear satisfactory assurances about the way in which these matters will be implemented. The Government are determined to press ahead with this Bill. The probation services in this country have suffered enough from the Government’s twists, turns and delays over the past 10 years. It is now time to let the Government’s proposals splutter into life, but I hope that none of us lives to regret it.