Offender Management Bill

My Lords, I support the amendment wholeheartedly. We have had briefing from the Disability Rights Commission and my noble friend Lord Ramsbotham has explained the background. Had my noble friend Lord Low been here, I am sure that he would have added a few more vibrant descriptions of some of the horrors that are experienced by disabled people, but we have been lucky enough—at least I have—to have received a briefing from his assistant, William Moy, who has done an effective job in setting out a range of areas where there are clearly problems and a lack of awareness. This equality scheme must go broader than just staff and apply equally to visitors and families, but surely it must also apply to the training of staff, so they understand and can look for the points at which they may wish to refer to a doctor or call in some other form of specialist help. With all that as a background, I do not want to repeat everything that has been said. We had some poignant cases at the end picked out from Sean Humber’s published prison report from the journal of the Prison Reform Trust, all of which make fairly horrifying reading, not to put too fine a point on it. Along with my noble friends who have already spoken, I hope that the noble and learned Baroness the Attorney-General will be able to see her way through to doing something.