Clearly, I need to take my right hon. Friend around with me in a knapsack, particularly when I am speaking in the Market Harborough Conservative club. He is just the chap they want to hear more from.
To return to the serious point we are discussing, a longer period to enable charities, the Charity Commission and the Government to work out how best to move forward with the clause 9 provisions would be to the advantage of all. That would enable us to get rid of any glitches and look out for any Heffalump traps that may be lying there for the unwary.
My hon. Friend the Minister was very kind and met me in his Department with his officials on Tuesday 19 January. It came across to me that he was in listening mode and that the Government are very likely to move towards me to some extent. If he does, that would be very helpful. If he is able to say so on the Floor of the House, that would be even more helpful. That would enable me to do what I promised him and not press my amendment to a Division. I am here to try to produce clarity and better legislation. If he and I can do that together, in partnership, then everybody goes home happier.
I would like to touch briefly on a number of the paragraphs in my amendment. There are 11 areas specified. I appreciate that the Government have tabled their own amendment, which to some rather limited extent alleviates some of my concerns, but to be honest with my hon. Friend the Minister, the Government will need to go a little bit further than amendment 3 if all the concerns the charities I speak for, or have some connection with, are not to have their worries continue.
Subsection 23(a) deals with the first problem area:
“the number of people employed by charities who will be affected by the extension of the disqualification framework to cover senior management positions”.
For reasons of time only, I will not set out extensively the arguments that apply here, but we are concerned about an absence of detail so far expressed in Committee or in any other public pronouncements made by the Government in relation to this particular impact. I urge the Government to do a bit of work to see how many people employed by charities will be affected by the extension of the disqualification framework insofar as it relates to senior management positions.
Subsection 23(b) relates to
“the number of people who are trustees of, or employed by, charities who will be affected by the extension of the list”.
Again, will the Government please have a think about this and recognise that it is not a negligible problem? This is not just a whinge from a trustee of the Prison Reform Trust. This is quite an issue, which needs to be thought about. The impact of clause 9 needs to be considered in co-operation with the charities and the Charity Commission, so we can get this right for the long term.
I will provide just one example in relation to paragraph (b): a glitch caused by an unwitting failure to consider the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974, as reformed in 2014. Under the 2014 amendments to the 1974 Act, rehabilitation periods for a convicted person were to some extent reduced. For example, an individual convicted of a sexual assault is sentenced to three years in prison. Assuming the individual does not reoffend, that conviction will become spent seven years after the end of the sentence. However, they will remain subject to the notification requirements indefinitely, with a right to review after 15 years. Under the Bill as currently drafted, the individual would automatically be disqualified from being a trustee for at least 15 years and potentially for the rest of their life. Under the 1974 Act, as amended, once an individual has been convicted, if they remain conviction-free for a defined period of time they are legally recognised as being rehabilitated. That is just a simple discrete example of where the Government, the Charity Commission and the charities sector need to get together and see how best to move forward.
Subsection 23(c) relates to
“the impact of the new disqualification framework on former offenders who are seeking, or intend to seek, employment in the charitable sector, including on their recruitment, retention, career prospects and long-term rehabilitation and resettlement”.
I made this point in general at the outset of my remarks. The one thing we, as people interested in reducing recidivism, need to concentrate on is getting people back to work, or getting people into work—of course, many people in prison have never been in work. If we want to get them back or into work, we need to reduce the barriers to that as sensibly as we can.
Subsection 23(d) relates to
“the impact of the new disqualification framework on former offenders who are currently employed in the charitable sector, including on their retention, career prospects and long-term rehabilitation and resettlement”.
That is the same point, but with a different shade.
Subsection 23(e) deals with
“the impact of the new disqualification framework on people with criminal records who are trustees or employees of charities which are partners in, or are contracted by, community rehabilitation companies (CRCs) and its impact on the successful running of those organisations”.
In line with Government policy under the coalition Government in the previous Parliament, community rehabilitation companies have been set up. They are contracting with charities to deliver rehabilitation and probation services. It would be a pity if good policy was undermined by making it much more difficult for ex-offenders to work with more recent offenders in order to rehabilitate them. Again, we need think very carefully and collectively about that.
Subsection 23(f) deals with
“the effectiveness of the existing waiver process provided for under section 181 of the Charities Act 2011”.
Charities have significant concerns regarding the effectiveness of the existing waiver application process and the ability of the Charity Commission to administer the additional applications that will result from the introduction of the new framework without any additional resources. In the past six years, the Charity Commission processed only six waiver applications. The Government suggest that this shows it is effective in granting waivers but that fails to recognise the disproportionately low numbers of waiver applications compared with the number of trustee positions and the estimated number of people with unspent convictions for existing disqualifying offences. Once one has expressed the point, I hope its obviousness becomes clear to the Government. Again, the charities I speak for, the Charity Commission and the Government need to sit around a table and thrash out how best to deal with that. As we say, six to 12 months is not long enough for that to be achieved.
Subsection 23(g) deals with
“the impact of the new disqualification framework on the number of applications for waivers to the Charity Commission”.
It must follow, surely, that the extended disqualification framework is highly likely to increase the number of waiver applications, not simply as a result of the extension but of an increased awareness of the framework that will inevitably flow from the production of guidance and general awareness raising. The Government, however, have not provided any assessment of a likely increase in waiver applications as a result of the extension of the disqualification framework. More troubling is that the Minister has confirmed that no additional resources will be provided to the Charity Commission to administer the waiver application process. The obvious inference is that the process will slow down and become more sclerotic. I hope it will not, but let us discuss the matter and iron out the problem in advance.
2.30 pm
Subsection 23(h) deals with
“how the working group set up by the Charity Commission on the waiver process will be constituted, how it will be resourced, what timelines it will be working to, its working method and intended outputs, and how it will work in consultation with people with criminal records and charities that work with, or employ, ex-offenders”.
Unlock has already been contacted by the commission about its internal working group, but specific details about the nature of the review remain unclear. Unlock and I would be grateful for further clarification from the Government about how the review will be constituted and resourced, what timelines it will work to and so on. As I said, we urge the Government, at the very least, to guarantee more than 12 months’ notice so that charities can prepare for the new framework.
Subsection 23(i) deals with
“the criteria the Charity Commission will adopt in considering applications for waivers, and the weight it will attach to the views of the trustees of the charity or charities concerned.”
Unlock’s direct experience and the support it has provided to other organisations have shown the waiver process to be inadequate and not workable in a way that allows charities such as Unlock to fulfil their charitable purposes. To ensure the process is fair and transparent, much greater clarity is needed regarding the criteria adopted by the commission in assessing waiver applications and the weight given to the views of the trustees of the charity or charities concerned. Again, I am sure this could be sorted out around the table by the Minister, his officials and his interlocutors.
Subsection 23(j) deals with
“how the waiver process will operate in relation to prospective candidates for senior management positions in charities, including the timescales for decisions and mechanisms to ensure that ex-offenders do not suffer indirect discrimination as a consequence of delays in assessing applications for waivers while a competitive recruitment process is underway”.
For example, the backlog of enhanced disclosure and barring service applications being processed by the Metropolitan police leads to an average turnaround time of 75 days, as a consequence of which people with spent criminal records who are applying for jobs are suffering indirect discrimination. Again, we all need to sit around the table and solve the problem.
Finally, subsection 23(k) deals with
“the impact of the new disqualification framework on the resources provided by the Charity Commission to administer the waiver application process.”
At some stage of any argument, anyone interested in public policy will come to the question, “Where is the money?” Somebody has to pay. If the Charity Commission does not have the money, if the charities are pinched for money and if the applicants do not have the money, which, as ex-offenders, they are unlikely to have, unless they are highly successful ex-offenders, we will need to think about how we can make the process as efficient and economic as possible.
I apologise for detaining the House, but I thought it important to put on the record the concerns of charities involved in the criminal justice sector and the reform and rehabilitation of offenders. I invite the Minister to extend the consultation period at least to 12 months and to have further meetings with the charities so that these glitches can be ironed out. Mr William Shawcross, the chairman of the Charity Commission, kindly telephoned me yesterday and offered the hand of friendship. He made himself and his staff available to me and those for whom I speak today. So avenues are open: the Minister has already been very open to me, and Mr Shawcross has now been very open to me. I hope, therefore, in the spirit of co-operation, that the Minister can give me reassurances so that I can tell Unlock and the Prison Reform Trust that the Government are a listening and thinking Government who want to produce a Bill that works in the long term and which we can collectively design for the public benefit.