This group covers several issues, but let me start with the Government new clauses and amendments. New clause 44 creates a new offence of police corruption. Police officers ensure our safety in the Palace of Westminster, and they put their lives on the line every time they go out on patrol. Many police officers regularly serve the public bravely up and down the country, but as my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said on 6 March, the findings of Mark Ellison’s review of the investigation of the murder of Stephen Lawrence are “profoundly shocking” and
“will be of grave concern to everyone in the House and beyond”.—[Official Report, 6 March 2014; Vol. 576, c. 1063.]
The public expect the police to act with honesty and integrity at all times, which is why the Government are introducing a range of measures to improve both the integrity and the transparency of the police. In the small number of cases where police officers fall short of the high standards we expect, it is right that the full force of the criminal law is available to punish and deter acts of corruption or other improper exercise of power.
Police corruption is currently dealt with in the criminal law as part of the common law offence of misconduct in public office. Although the number of prosecutions for misconduct in public office has increased in recent years, they have spanned a range of occupations, not just police officers. This Government believe that the British public expect on-duty police officers, as the
guardians of the law and the Queen’s peace, to conduct themselves to a higher standard than other public servants. If police officers fail to conduct themselves to those high standards, it is right that we should seek to uphold that higher standard by means of the criminal law.
We believe that the best way to do that is to create a new offence of police corruption that applies solely to police officers, alongside the existing broader common law offence. The new offence will be triable only in the Crown court, and it will carry a maximum sentence of 14 years’ imprisonment. It will send a clear message that police corruption is serious, and that Parliament has expressly set a high maximum sentence for those convicted.
We have deliberately cast the behaviour covered by the new offence more broadly than the existing common law offence to ensure that it catches all acts of corrupt or other improper exercise of police powers and privileges. For example, were an officer deliberately to focus lines of inquiry away from a suspect with whom he had a corrupt relationship, such as by arresting a person they knew to be innocent, they would commit the offence. The offence applies whether or not the benefit or detriment came about, and regardless of whether the officer was on duty at the time of the corrupt behaviour. It covers cases where an officer fails to act for a purpose that is improper, such as if the officer knows that a suspect did not commit a crime, but conceals that knowledge because of an improper relationship with the person who committed it. It also applies where an officer threatens to act or not to act, and that threat is made for an improper purpose.
Amendments 45 and 46 are minor consequential amendments to the Bill’s extent and long title that arise from new clause 44.
New clauses 45 to 50 and new schedule 2 introduce new criminal offences of ill-treatment or wilful neglect by an individual care worker, and ill-treatment or wilful neglect of someone following a gross breach of a relevant duty of care by a care provider. The House will well remember the appalling events that occurred at Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust. Much work has been put in train since February last year, when Sir Robert Francis published the final report of the public inquiry into those events, including the establishment of several reviews into specific issues.
The inquiry on patient safety, led by Professor Don Berwick, identified a small but significant gap in the existing legislation. It recommended the creation of a new offence of ill-treatment or wilful neglect to fill that gap. Of course, no sort of ill-treatment or wilful neglect of patients or those receiving social care is ever acceptable. Yet at the moment, no matter how egregious the conduct, prosecutions are difficult to pursue unless the victim either lacks capacity, is subject to the provisions of the Mental Health Act 1983, or is a child to whom section 1 of the Children and Young Persons Act 1933 applies. That means that a significant group of patients and service users are denied the protection of an offence directed explicitly at ill-treatment or wilful neglect by those entrusted with their care, both individuals and organisations. There is a range of existing legislative and regulatory safeguards that may apply in some cases, but we share the view that they are not sufficient to cover all the situations that might arise from ill-treatment or wilful neglect.
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New clauses 45 to 50 fill the gap identified, and ensure that there is consistency in the protections available to people should they suffer the very worst sorts of behaviours. They create new statutory criminal offences of ill-treatment or wilful neglect by individual care workers or care provider organisations. The formulation of the offences was informed by a full public consultation in March this year.
New clause 45 makes it an offence for a care worker to ill-treat or wilfully neglect anyone in their care. A care worker is defined as anyone who, as paid work, provides social care for adults or health care for children and adults, other than the excluded health care listed in new schedule 2. The offence is triable either way, with a maximum penalty of five years’ imprisonment and/or a fine. The objective is to ensure that only formal arrangements, where the provision of such services represents part of a care worker’s employment or contractual obligation, are captured by the offence. Informal or family carer arrangements will not be caught, nor will cases in which the provision of such care is incidental to an individual’s formal duties.
New schedule 2 sets out the range of children’s settings and services excluded from the scope of the offence. It includes all schools and children’s homes. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education is clear that children’s and education services are already governed by a comprehensive regulatory and legislative framework that provides protection for individuals in the settings where those services are provided. All such settings are subject to rigorous regulation and inspection, and other criminal and civil law applies. That reflects the views expressed by the majority of key stakeholders in response to the consultation.
New clauses 46 to 50 establish a new offence applicable to care provider organisations. It is modelled on the approach to dealing with corporate failures and liabilities first developed in the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007. Rather than needing to identify a so-called controlling mind in the senior hierarchy of a care provider, the offence focuses on the way in which the provider manages or organises its activities. The offence is committed if the care provider’s management or the organisation of its activities amounts to a gross breach of a duty of care owed to a victim of ill-treatment or wilful neglect and, without that breach, the ill-treatment or wilful neglect of the victim would not have occurred or is less likely to have occurred. The offence will apply not only to organisations such as NHS trust hospitals or adult care homes, but to other types of providers, such as general practitioner partnerships or single-handed GP practices.
Just as the offence is modelled on the 2007 Act, so the penalties on conviction of the care provider are modelled on it. In addition to the imposition of a fine, a court will be able to make remedial orders and publicity orders, which will effectively compel a care provider to both publicise the fact that it has been convicted and to take steps to put right the practices or procedures that led to the conviction. That reflects the approach of the Care Act 2014 to the offence of providing false or misleading information, so there is precedent for its use in a health and care setting.
Amendments 47, 48 and 49 are minor consequential amendments to the Bill’s extent and commencement
provisions and to the long title that arise from new clauses 45 to 50 and new schedule 2.
Finally, I want to stress that the new offences are not about hounding a hospital worker who makes an honest mistake, or punishing an organisation for fair and informed prioritisation of services, but about holding to account the worst and most unacceptable acts and failures to act.
Government amendment 2 is a minor consequential amendment to the Bill’s extent provisions to ensure that there is consistency and clarity in relation to clause 16. It clarifies that, because clause 16(5) amends the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, the extent of clause 16(5) is the same as that of the 1984 Act. That is in line with the general approach to extent that is set out in clause 66, which provides that where a clause in the Bill amends another Act, the extent of that clause is the same as that of the Act it amends.
I will turn to the new clauses that have been tabled by my hon. Friends the Members for Shipley (Philip Davies) and for Bury North (Mr Nuttall), starting with new clause 34. The House may recall that the offence of squatting in a residential building in section 144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 was introduced following widespread concern about the harm that squatters can cause when they occupy other people’s homes. The offence is working well and has provided welcome relief for home owners who have found their property violated.
I recognise that there are also concerns about squatters who occupy non-residential buildings and land, particularly when it has a damaging effect on business, jeopardises the livelihood of the owner or causes anxiety among the neighbouring community. I hope that my hon. Friends will be pleased to hear that we have been monitoring the situation closely and do not rule out further action if it is needed. However, it would be premature for us to make any changes until we have fully considered what they might mean in practice. The reforms that we made in respect of squatting in residential buildings followed a full public consultation exercise. We would need to think carefully about the impact of such a change on all the different groups affected.