Offender Management Bill

I am also grateful to the Minister for giving us time to speak. My contribution is not huge and I had thought it appropriate to speak a little later after other noble Lords. I am glad that the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, mentioned the Cheshire Probation Board. Noble Lords may be interested to know who it consists of, because it seems to be a model of what trusts could be. It is chaired by the ex-chief probation officer of Manchester who well understands the whole process, and includes the director of corporate banking of the Royal Bank of Scotland, a senior manager from the Liverpool and north-west Land Registry who understands regional government, a personal manager and senior diversity officer from the Post Office in the north-west, a local councillor, a magistrate who happens to be the chair of a local NHS trust, the assistant chief constable, the assistant director of the Children’s Society who represents the voluntary sector, the head of the Youth Service, the head of heritage tourism who represents the corporate sector and the ex-governor of Her Majesty’s Prison in Manchester. That is eleven people. I was surprised to hear the Minister suggest that boards wanted the quorums reduced. In fact, that board deliberately wanted to expand to obtain representation of all sectors in the area. Its members feel that they are ideally placed to do precisely what trusts are meant to do. They are also represented on the local area criminal justice board and the criminal justice consultative committee—so they have fingers in all pies. This is precisely what trusts want—to be linked into the local community, if they are allowed to be. My only query with the amendments remains the issue of the judge, which has already been discussed. The key factor in all of this is the triumvirate of the police, the courts and probation, which has been at the heart of the management of offenders in the community since 1907. That factor must be retained and represented on the sort of trust that I mentioned.