Coroners and Justice Bill

My Lords, with the leave of the House, and in no way to suppress discussion, I think it might be helpful if I were to set out briefly the Government’s position. I thank the noble Baroness for providing a further opportunity to debate this serious issue. We need to ensure that the criminal law meets the needs of victims, who we have always said should be at the heart of the criminal justice system. I thank the noble Baroness and the organisations that have also worked in this field, such as Liberty and Anti-Slavery International. They have done an important job in bringing this matter to the attention of the House. I am pleased that it looks as if we have reached agreement on the way forward in this important area. As noble Lords will recall, we debated the issue of servitude and forced labour in Committee, and we said at that time that we wanted to consider this further. The behaviour at which the new offences are targeted is already covered by extensive legislation and regulations. There are a number of existing offences that may be relevant. They include offences of trafficking for labour exploitation, complicity in such trafficking, assault, false imprisonment, blackmail, harassment and a range of employment-related offences. Some of these offences rightly carry tough maximum penalties. However, we appreciate that justice may not be done, not least to victims, if there are real problems in bringing successful prosecutions that reflect the seriousness of this conduct. We are open to the suggestion that investigations and prosecutions might be easier if an offence existed that clearly encompassed all of the elements that comprise servitude or forced labour. I promised in Committee that we would explore this issue further. I shall now explain what we have found out over the summer. We held meetings with the Association of Chief Police Officers, the Crown Prosecution Service and the UK Human Trafficking Centre, which is a multi-agency centre that provides a central point for the development of expertise and co-operation in relation to the trafficking of human beings. We also met the Gangmasters Licensing Authority, which was established to regulate labour providers in the agricultural sector. They provided us with some useful examples of cases that bear further consideration. We have also, as we said we would, contacted the Crown Prosecution Service; I understand it has brought this matter to the attention of the Director of Public Prosecutions. It agrees that it may be useful to introduce a further bespoke offence. We have looked closely at the cases of which we have been made aware, and we are grateful to everyone who has provided us with these details. There can be no doubt about the appalling treatment and working conditions found in these cases, some of which were harrowing. They describe victims who have been trafficked for exploitation, threatened, assaulted and blackmailed. They also describe unsafe and overcrowded working conditions, illegal wage deductions and forged contracts. We have listened carefully to what has been said during this debate and particularly in our conversations before it. In light of that, we accept that improvements could be made to the current law through an additional offence in this area. That said, and as the amendments before us make clear, this is a complex subject. This would be an important offence that was subject to serious penalties, and it is important that it should be as clear as circumstances permit. With that in mind, we have reservations about the amendment, although this is not the occasion on which to go into detail. We think that a slightly different approach is preferable—an approach that seeks to achieve the same aim but that relies for its core substance on Article 4, on the prohibition of slavery and forced labour, of the European Convention on Human Rights. This approach is used for the offence of trafficking for such purposes. Our proposed formulation would follow this approach but without the requirement that the person has been trafficked. We discussed this approach earlier today with the noble Baroness, Lady Young, and are hopeful that it will offer a solution on which we can all agree. We need to finalise the details and are actively working on this. We intend to bring the result before your Lordships to consider at Third Reading.