My Lords, the discussion on this group has been remarkable. I agree with everything that all noble Lords have said. Indeed, I went to many of the same meetings about which other noble Lords have spoken so eloquently.
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One of the particularly powerful parts of Poppy’s speech was when she said that the criminal justice system did not work too badly in her case. We heard of other examples where things had gone wrong and where systems could be improved, but her testimony— if that is the right word—was all the more powerful because the system actually worked for her.
The noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, is a governor of Coram. In my work as a family magistrate, I have given many lectures at Coram over the years. I recognise the central point he was making about the postcode lottery of provision for children in different circumstances.
I was trying to think of something additional that I could contribute to this debate because it has been so powerful. I was reflecting on my experience as a youth magistrate. The title of this group, if you like, is “child victims”. We have been talking about child sexual victims, but as a youth magistrate I have twice had child defendants who could not come to court because they had been murdered. They were young men who had been involved in a gang-based lifestyle, often including drugs or knife crime, and they were murdered before they could get to court. The spectrum of victims is wider.
The Minister has sat here and heard these moving speeches. I notice that the Government have tabled Amendment 74, which we will come to in due course. In a sense, it should really have been in this group; I do not know why it has been put where it is. The Government’s new amendment would replace the existing Clause 15 with a new clause that would require the Secretary of State to issue guidance about victim support roles and the various support roles for children. In a sense, this is the Minister’s defence to all the points that have been made in the debate on this group.
The point I was going to make was made by the noble Lord, Lord Polak, in speaking to Amendment 108. It reinforced the point I made at Second Reading. Rather than just having a rather sterile debate about whether everything in the victims’ code should be statutory or non-statutory, perhaps we should look at the particular elements of the code that would benefit from having a statutory basis because they have particular knock-on effects. The noble Lord, Lord Polak, was talking about commissioning victims’ services. I am advised that there is evidence that, if they were on a statutory basis like domestic abuse-type requirements, the funders would give more money to those sorts of services than when they are non-statutory. That is one important example. It is more productive, particularly in Committee, to look at the detail of the proposals, rather than having this rather sterile debate about everything or nothing being on a statutory basis.
It has been a privilege to speak briefly in this debate. I look forward to the Minister’s response.