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Paul Goggins: I am sure that we all admire the hon. Gentleman's liking for legislative tidiness. However, the Colonial Prisoners Removal Act 1884 is still used, as the hon. Member for Beaconsfield said. It is old and has been amended on many occasions, but there are no current plans to consolidate.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 34 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 7
Minor and consequential amendments
Amendment made: No. 106, in schedule 7, page 37, line 27, at end insert—
'Colonial Prisoners Removal Act 1884 (c.31)
In section 10 of the Colonial Prisoners Removal Act 1884 (application of Act to removal of criminal lunatics), in subsection (3), in paragraph (a) for the words from ''give'' to the end substitute ''by warrant direct that he is to be detained in such hospital, within the meaning given by section 145(1) of the Mental Health Act 1983, as may be specified in the direction; and any such direction shall have the same effect as a hospital order under section 37 of that Act together with a restriction order under section 41 of that Act, made without limitation of time;''.'.—[Paul Goggins.]
Paul Goggins: I beg to move amendment No. 95, in schedule 7, page 38, line 32, at end insert—
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The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Government amendments Nos. 96 to 100, 94 and 101.
Government new clause 35—Surcharge payable on conviction.
Government new clause 36—Increase in maximum on-the-spot penalty for disorderly behaviour.
Government new clause 37—Higher fixed penalty for repeated road traffic offences.
Paul Goggins: I must ask for your forbearance, Mr. Benton, and that of the Committee as I go into the amendments.
The amendments add a surcharge to criminal convictions in the courts, to fixed penalty notices for road traffic offences and to penalty notices for disorder. The proposal to add a surcharge to criminal convictions and fixed penalty notices was one a number of measures set out in the consultation paper ''Compensation and Support for Victims of Crime'', which was issued on 12 January. There was overwhelming support for more and better services for victims of crime, although opinion was divided on the introduction of the surcharge. The majority of objections were to the addition of the surcharge to fixed penalty notices for speeding. The amendments will add the surcharge only when a driver seriously or persistently speeds and/or seriously or persistently commits other endorsable motoring offences that attract fixed penalty notices.
Mr. Grieve: What does that actually mean?
Paul Goggins: In practice, it means that the surcharge will apply to anybody who currently has points on their licence or has been disqualified at any point in the previous three years.
Mr. Grieve: To be clear, if a driver gets speed-camera'd—if I can use that expression—as happens frequently in my constituency, he pays a £60 fine and gets three penalty points. If that is the first time that it has happened and there are no other points on his licence he will not be surcharged, but if it happens to him again he will be.
Paul Goggins: That is correct. If he has no points on his licence he will not be surcharged, and if he has points on his licence he will be.
Our aim is to make offenders pay a small sum to a fund for the victims of crime. The fund will provide practical and emotional support to a range of victims. There is no provision for the establishment of the victims fund because we can do that without primary legislation by agreeing with the Treasury that a certain portion of the Consolidated Fund will be ring-fenced. A recent precedent for that is the recovered assets fund, into which were paid the proceeds of crime recovered through confiscation orders.
To assist the Committee, I will go through the proposed arrangements in some detail. I will speak first about the surcharge and criminal convictions. New section 161A of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 would impose a duty on the court to order payment of
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the surcharge with a criminal conviction except when the court makes an absolute discharge or mental health disposal. However, a compensation order would take priority over the surcharge, and if the court considers that the offender should pay compensation and has insufficient means to pay the surcharge as well, it must reduce the surcharge accordingly—if necessary, to nil. The Secretary of State would have power to prescribe further exceptions. If the experience of operating the surcharge shows that certain categories of defendants are being unfairly penalised by it, we envisage using that power.
New section 161B deals with the amount of the surcharge, which it states will be specified by order of the Secretary of State. That will enable higher surcharges to be ordered for more serious offences. However, the intention is that the surcharge should be a relatively small amount: on our current figures, up to £30, so as to maximise payment by the vast majority of offenders to a wide range of victims.
Subsection (3) of new clause 35 would have the effect of ensuring that the surcharge will be treated as a fine for the purposes of collection and enforcement. Under subsection (4), the new provisions in the Courts Act 2003 on the collection and enforcement of fines would apply. Subsection (5) provides that the Secretary of State may amend the way in which the relevant provisions of that Act apply to the surcharge: the measures are being piloted and the evaluation of the pilots may necessitate changes. Section 97 of the 2003 Act provides a power to amend the provisions in light of the pilots, but that would not extend to the surcharge, which will not be part of the pilot. The order-making power simply makes sure that we can ensure that the Courts Act provisions in their final form apply properly to the surcharge. It would be subject to the affirmative procedure by virtue of amendment No. 94. Amendments Nos. 95 to 101 are consequential to new clause 35.
We also aim to add a small sum—£5 is proposed—to penalty notices for disorder. That would enable those who perpetrate such offences and wreak such havoc in our neighbourhoods to give something back to victims. The victims fund will support victims of antisocial behaviour and disorder. That can be done principally through secondary legislation. Section 3 of the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001 allows the Secretary of State to increase the amount of penalty payable under a penalty notice for disorder and to amend the prescribed form for a penalty notice. Our intention is to use that existing power to increase the penalty payable and to include on the penalty notice a statement that part of the penalty will go into the victims fund. We can then make administrative arrangements for the amount representing the surcharge to go into the fund.
However, new clause 36 amends section 3 of the 2001 Act to increase the maximum penalty that may be prescribed; currently, it is one quarter of the maximum fine payable. The amendment will ensure that the amount of the penalty representing the surcharge is taken into account by providing that the maximum is one quarter of the maximum fine plus one half of the
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surcharge payable. I stress that our proposals in the consultation paper would not require an increase in penalties for disorderly behaviour to the extent that the additional headroom would be needed. The purpose of the amendment is to ensure that the surcharge is taken into account in fixing the maximum penalty payable.
On higher fixed penalties for road traffic offences, again the aim is to add a small sum if a person has seriously and/or persistently committed endorsable offences punishable by fixed penalty notices. We have listened to the consultation responses and believe that that is the right way forward. The victims fund will provide support to the many victims of road traffic accidents. In exactly the same way as for penalty notices for disorder, most of that can be done by using the existing power to increase the amount of a penalty in section 53 of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988 and by making administrative arrangements for the amount representing the surcharge to go into the victims fund. Section 88 of that Act requires us to consult representative organisations before making any secondary legislation.
New clause 37 broadens the section 53 power to enable the surcharge to be added only for persistent offenders—those who already have points on their licence or have been disqualified from driving in the last three years. Without the provision we would not be able to differentiate persistent offenders and other offenders.
Mr. Grieve: There is an alternative, is there not? Fixed penalty offences could be entirely exempt from the surcharge scheme on the basis that if a person is photographed by a speed camera and the circumstances or speed are such that he is not dealt with by a fixed penalty, he can always be summonsed to court and fined more than the fixed penalty there. The fixed penalty system could therefore be taken out of the surcharge scheme quite simply and without difficulty.
Paul Goggins: That may be true, but the purpose of fixed penalty notices is to deal swiftly and fairly with people who break the law. That is our purpose and there is no reason why such people should escape the surcharge just because they have been subjected to a fixed penalty notice.
Hon. Members may be aware that a review of penalty points for motoring offences is under way. We intend it to feed into the decisions that we make about the surcharge. If any primary legislation follows the review, we will consider whether we need to make further changes to reflect any new system.
New clause 37 also amends the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988 so that we can make regulations dealing with the situation where a conditional offer has been made of a fixed penalty notice and the driver is subsequently identified as a persistent offender. The fixed penalty clerk may issue a separate notice asking him to pay the surcharge. The power is necessary because where conditional offers are issued, for example in the case of speed cameras, we do not
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currently have the technology to discover whether or not a person is a persistent offender at the time that the conditional offer is sent off.
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