Offender Management Bill

I support the amendment. I must say that I was glad to be in the Chamber to hear the remarkable, heartfelt and entirely appropriate tribute that the noble Lord, Lord Judd, paid to the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, and to the Ministers on the Front Bench. On behalf of the rest of us I thank the noble Lord for that. The amendment offers a welcome and excellent opportunity, in the light of the major changes which have taken place in the Home Office and the creation of the Ministry of Justice, for a moment of valuable reflection. It requires a report to be laid before Parliament, which would include a review of the proposals in Managing Offenders, Reducing Crime and the responses to the consultation Restructuring Probation to Reduce Re-offending, for the reform of the Probation Service. That would give Parliament an opportunity to debate thoroughly all the issues surrounding the reform of the Probation Service and the management of offenders. This breathing space would be really helpful and creative. It would mean that in the new world of offender management, with contestability, wider welcome involvement of the voluntary and private sectors, trusts, training, arrangement with prisons in both the public and private sectors and the future of child detention—to name just a few—coupled with the myriad of wider contextual issues which the new Ministry of Justice will be dealing with, we would have the opportunity to reassess the new landscape and reach far better informed conclusions than currently we are able to do.