Contribution
We might be slightly at cross-purposes here. The question is whether the Crown Courts have the ability to consider what is in the best interests of the child rather than automatically making the order when the threshold is reached. That is the difference. As I say, the point has been made most powerfully by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, and by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Thomas. The Crown Court is simply not equipped to go that extra mile of starting to look at things like reports from experts as to what is in the best interests of the child.
I turn to Amendments 18, 20, 24, 30, 31 and 32 in the names of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen of Elie, and the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst. The aim of these is to ensure that a prohibited steps order made under Clauses 3 or 4 would cease to have an effect if the offender was acquitted on appeal. I repeat what I have said. This is not a punishment; it is designed to protect the child. The measures require that, following an acquittal, the relevant local authority must, in very short order, bring an application before the family court to consider whether the prohibited steps order should be upheld, varied or discharged. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, mentioned an innocent parent. This is not about the rights of parents; it is about the rights of children and protecting them. It is not a punishment and therefore it is not something that should be automatically swept away on acquittal.
We recognise the need for a quick resolution in these situations, which is why both clauses state that the application must be made by the local authority within 30 days of the acquittal. This process brings the consideration of the child’s best interests and their potentially very complex family dynamics to the correct forum, which is the family court. It will mean that in every case a judge will undertake a review of all the circumstances, including whether the original prohibited steps order has already been varied by the family court while the appeal was under consideration, or whether other related orders are in place, before deciding what should happen in the best interests of the child. The family court is the right place for this to happen because that puts the interests of the child front and centre, where they should be.
I turn to Amendments 17, 21, 23, 26 and 29 in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Murray of Blidworth and Lord Meston. I think we can all agree that it is vital to have clear processes for identifying the offender’s children, notifying other parental responsibility holders of a prohibited steps order, and making the victims of a rape aware when the court has made an automatic order, but the Government’s view is that primary legislation is not the best way of doing this. These matters are better suited to being addressed in guidance, where we can work closely with those responsible for delivering it to ensure that we have a process that works in practice. We do not want a system that ties practitioners to an approach that cannot evolve with their own processes and where every time we want to make a change we have to come back and amend the primary legislation.
By way of example, we are not using primary legislation to prescribe the processes as we are working to implement Jade’s law. Instead, work is taking place across government—I ran through some of the things that we are doing earlier in relation to the previous debate—and with partners to develop a process that is clear and practical and that delivers the spirit of the aims of the amendment. In the case of these provisions, we will ensure that all relevant parties, including all other parental responsibility holders, are kept informed at each stage. We will take lessons from Jade’s law when this is implemented and, where possible, work with our partners to apply the same processes here. This will allow for consistency across all legislation in this space, rather than multiple processes for the same aim, which could lead to confusion and inconsistency in application. I warmly invite your Lordships to work with the Government to make sure that we get this right. I am more than happy to meet any of your Lordships who would like to discuss those matters with me, both in my capacity as Lords Minister and as Minister responsible for family justice policy.
In relation to identifying the children of offenders, this Government have separately committed to developing a mechanism to identify children who are affected by parental imprisonment to make it easier to provide support to them. I can assure your Lordships that the Ministry of Justice is working closely with the Department for Education to determine how we can best identify all children affected and ensure that they get support to enable them to thrive, but to legislate only for children in the scope of this measure risks distracting from the broader work intended to support all children.