Government’s justice reforms aim to restore public trust in system – minister

The Government has said its reforms to protect victims of crime will help restore people’s faith in the justice system.

The measures in the Victims and Courts Bill include restricting the parental rights for rapists whose children were born through rape.

Similar powers will be brought in to restrict parental responsibility when they have been sentenced to four or more years in prison for serious child sexual abuse – even if they are not the parents of one of the victims.

The Bill passed its final stage in the Commons on Monday and will be sent to the House of Lords for further scrutiny.

Speaking at third reading, justice minister Alex Davies-Jones said the measures will ensure “victims are heard, supported and treated with the dignity that they deserve”.

Under the legislation, criminals who refuse to attend their sentencing hearings will also be given further prison time under the changes.

Cheryl Korbel, whose nine-year-old daughter Olivia was murdered by Thomas Cashman in August 2022, was in the public gallery.

Cashman did not appear at the sentencing.

Ms Korbel had said she wanted to “look him in the eye” when he was jailed for a minimum of 42 years in April 2023.

Ms Davies-Jones said: “This Bill is about people. Victims who have suffered unimaginable trauma, their families, and ensuring that they receive justice.

“It is about restoring faith in our justice system that can often feel cold and confusing.”

She added: “The House knows that this is a system that requires large-scale reform after years of neglect. There is a long road ahead, but this Bill takes an important step forward.

“At its core are victims’ experiences. This Government is bringing forward real, tangible measures to ensure that victims’ voices are heard, that their needs are recognised, and that their rights are respected.”

Ms Davies-Jones paid tribute to Natalie Fleet, Labour MP for Bolsover, and said the clause to limit the parental rights of rapists was down to her.

Ms Fleet said she was groomed by an older man when she was a teenager, which led to her giving birth to her eldest daughter aged 15.

Ms Davies-Jones said: “This amendment will of course protect children. But it will also help shield the victim from their perpetrator interfering in their lives, because those who commit this horrific crime should clearly never be able to use parental rights to control or torment their victim.”

Ms Fleet welcomed the Government’s plan to restrict rapists’ parental responsibilities, so “rapists will no longer have access to children conceived by their crimes”.

She told the Commons: “It puts the rights of survivors above the rights of criminals.

“It protects mummies and their precious babies.”

Ms Fleet warned that rape was something happening “to our women by our men” and added: “For too long, we have told ourselves that rape only happens in far-away countries, that ‘it’s a recent crime that arrives on boats’.

“Before that, rapes only happened ‘when a woman is dragged down an alley by a stranger’ or ‘when a vulnerable girl is targeted by a gang’. No – rape is happening here and now just as much as it always has.”

On plans to compel offenders to attend sentencing hearings, Knowsley MP Anneliese Midgley said: “This law is for Olivia Pratt-Korbel and other victims.”

The Labour MP added: “Under our current justice system, the ball is in the criminal’s court and they can choose to opt out of attending their own sentencing.

“That’s exactly what Olivia’s murderer did. Cashman chose to remain in his cell, refusing to face the court, to hear Cheryl’s words or look her in the eye.

“It was an act of a coward.

“But instead of collapsing under this weight, Cheryl fought back. She and her family have campaigned with their all, so no other family will suffer what they suffered.”

Knowing an offender has heard what impact their crimes have had can give victims a “small semblance of justice and closure”, Ms Midgley told MPs as she backed the law change.

Shadow justice minister Kieran Mullan raised “concerns about the restrictions placed and what victims are allowed to say” in victim impact statements.

“Many victims and family have said they were told to remove parts of their statements or to avoid expressing their true feelings, that’s deeply unfair and undermines the purpose of the statement,” he said.

Intervening, Ms Davies-Jones said there are “things that are not in the remit of what should be openly discussed in a sentencing hearing”.

“We don’t need legislation for this. What we need is proper guidance, proper support, proper training to support victims and families so they can have their say in a sentencing hearing,” she added.

A Conservative amendment which would require the Government to review how to make victim personal statements less restrictive and clarify what can be included was rejected by 152 votes to 337, majority 185.

The Tories also pressed an amendment which called for the window for applying to the unduly lenient sentences scheme to be increased to one year for a victim of a crime or a deceased victim’s next of kin, but this was thrown out with MPs voting 153 to 332, majority 179.

A Liberal Democrat bid to expand the scope of the victim contact scheme and require annual reporting on the scheme’s uptake and accessibility was rejected by 165 votes to 323, majority 158. 

MPs voted down an amendment which would add an appendix to the Victims’ Code to outline how it applies to people whose close relatives are victims of murder, manslaughter or infanticide outside the UK, by 166 votes to 322, majority 156.