My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Royall of Blaisdon, for her amendments relating to the Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements —MAPPA. Before addressing the amendments, I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Brinton and Lady Newlove, and the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, for making the time to meet me and my officials on this matter.
The Government agree that robust management of perpetrators of domestic abuse and stalking is crucial to help keep the public safe. We are in agreement with the spirit of these amendments. However, we believe that the objectives can already be met through current provision and policy and through separate legislation that we are taking forward. As the noble Lord, Lord Russell, kindly commented, that remains our view.
I will address Amendment 132 first. Under existing legislation, individuals who are convicted of specified violent and sexual offences and are subject to notification requirements and/or sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment or more are automatically eligible for management under MAPPA. These offences include offences which are committed in the context of domestic abuse, such as threats to kill, actual and grievous bodily harm, and attempted strangulation, as well as stalking, including fear of violence. The list of offences is kept under review and, in recognition of the seriousness of the offence, we are legislating in the Criminal Justice Bill to ensure that offenders convicted of controlling or coercive behaviour and sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment or more will automatically be managed under MAPPA. This will mean that many of the most serious domestic abuse offenders will be subject to stringent multi-agency management.
MAPPA in the 42 police force areas of England and Wales are delivered by independent strategic management boards. As well as representatives from the police, probation and prison services, SMBs will have representatives from other agencies, such as local authorities and health providers. To encourage consistency, SMBs must have due regard to guidance issued by the Secretary of State pursuant to his permissive power under the Criminal Justice Act 2003, while also responding to local needs.
As we committed to do during the passage of the Domestic Abuse Bill, we strengthened the Secretary of State's MAPPA guidance to include a chapter dedicated to domestic abuse and stalking. This mandates that all domestic abuse and stalking offenders who do not qualify for automatic MAPPA management must be considered for discretionary management, known as category 3. We have also worked with MAPPA agencies to improve practice, including the publication of additional guidance setting out the thresholds to be met for the various levels of MAPPA management to assist practitioners making these decisions, and, if we find that cases of domestic violence and stalking that need to be managed under MAPPA are still not being identified and referred for MAPPA management, to take further remedial action.
In response to the six harrowing cases that the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, mentioned earlier, while we cannot comment on individual cases, I express my and the Government’s sincere condolences to all individuals and families who have been impacted by domestic abuse or stalking. The MAPPA framework is available only for convicted offenders. All individuals with convictions for domestic abuse and stalking behaviour, where not automatically eligible, must already be considered by the responsible authorities for management under MAPPA. The statutory guidance makes this clear. MAPPA is not available in cases where individuals do not have convictions, but there are other measures that are either already in place or are due to be piloted shortly that serve to protect a victim; for example, the statutory domestic violence disclosure scheme, often referred to as Clare’s law, which provides a mechanism for the police to disclose information about an individual’s past abusive or violent behaviour, or civil orders, such as stalking protection orders and, later this year, domestic abuse protection orders.
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With regard to Amendment 133, also in the noble Baroness’s name, there are already provisions in place that allow information on perpetrators to be collected and used to manage risk. All individuals released on licence are subject to standard conditions for the duration of their sentence, which include the requirement for perpetrators to inform their probation officer of any change of name or contact details and to stay only at an address approved by their probation officer. There are numerous additional licence conditions which can be imposed to address specific risk factors. Breach of licence conditions can result in the individual being recalled to custody.
For individuals who are not subject to licensed supervision, noble Lords may be aware that the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 introduced provisions for domestic abuse protection orders. These orders, which will be
piloted in the spring, will allow notification requirements to be imposed on perpetrators, of which breach will be a criminal offence. A domestic abuse protection order is a civil order and can be imposed without a conviction, providing an opportunity to protect a greater range of victims than the proposed amendment. Sadly, a large number of perpetrators will not have a conviction, and so domestic abuse protection orders allow us to target all perpetrators of domestic abuse, not just those who are convicted of an offence. Piloting will allow us to evaluate and test the effectiveness and impact of this new model ahead of an expected national rollout.
Similarly, we introduced stalking protection orders—SPOs—through the Stalking Protection Act 2019. These can impose any prohibition or requirements that the court considers necessary, as well as notification requirements. Breach of domestic abuse protection orders and stalking protection orders can result in up to five years’ imprisonment. These orders are in addition to the domestic violence disclosure scheme, Clare’s law, which is central to providing a mechanism for the police to share information on domestic abuse perpetrators with those who may be at risk from them. We have put the guidance for the scheme on a statutory footing to strengthen the operation of the scheme, and we think it is right that the police focus on delivering this important service.
In addition to this, in April this year, we announced a suite of measures to mark National Stalking Awareness Week. We updated our guidance to police officers on the burden of proof for stalking protection orders. This advises it to be lowered from criminal to civil to enable more SPOs to be granted at the earliest opportunity. The announcement also confirms that the commencement date has been set for the public sexual harassment offence: 1 October 2024. This will make public sexual harassment a specific offence.
The Government have engaged with the investigating bodies of the police super-complaint. We welcomed the theme of multi-agency working for this year’s National Stalking Awareness Week, which is why we also announced that the Home Office will work across criminal justice agencies to engage openly with the findings and recommendations when they are published in the summer. I hope this also answers the specific question asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton. For these reasons, we feel that the aims of these amendments are already met through existing provisions, and I therefore urge the noble Baroness to withdraw Amendment 32.