Sarah Sackman MP: speeches

Speeches

• 11 Mar 2025 · Court Backlogs · Hansard source

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  I am sorry to hear how long victims in my hon. Friend’s constituency are waiting. That is why we are taking urgent action to bear down on the Crown court backlog, not only by increasing sitting days this year, but by committing to record numbers of sitting days next year. Of course that will not be sufficient to bring down the backlog and deliver swifter justice for victims, and that is why we need to hear from Sir Brian Leveson and implement reform in due course.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Court Backlogs · Hansard source

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  The magistrates court is being run in a sustainable way. We extended the sentencing powers in order to free up capacity in the Crown court, and that has been sustainable, and we are increasing capacity in our magistracy by recruiting an additional 2,000 magistrates from diverse backgrounds every year. But that is why we are looking at system reform, whether in the magistrates court or the Crown courts. We are going to need once-in-a-generation reform, and when Sir Brian Leveson reports back, that is what we will get.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  As the Lord Chancellor has said, our priority is delivering swifter justice for victims and bearing down on the Crown court backlog. That is why we have asked Sir Brian Leveson to consider all options, which have to include reclassification of offences and the intermediate court. We have to have a whole-system reform, but I fear that if we were to exclude those options, we would not be gripping the problem.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I am really horrified to hear of that case. Of course, as I mentioned earlier, the transcript of sentencing remarks should have been made available free of charge, but I am happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss how transcripts of trials more broadly can be made available.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  As the hon. Member well knows, the solicitors profession is highly regulated. We have the Solicitors Regulation Authority, which itself is regulated by the Legal Services Board. All our professionals, whether they are practising in criminal or civil law, are highly respected and highly regulated, and we are indebted to them.

• 11 Mar 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I am sorry to hear about that tragic case in my hon. Friend’s constituency. Encouraging or assisting suicide is an offence under the Suicide Act 1961, and sending communications that encourage or assist serious self-harm is an offence under the Online Safety Act 2023, but we are going to tighten up the law to address the situation that my hon. Friend has described. Of course, this is about not just the law, but the enforcement of the law as well.

• 26 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Common law.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eleventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  I know that Members will be eager to engage, and have already engaged, in a robust discussion about the issue of safeguarding, and how best to protect and prevent individuals from being forced or coerced into seeking assistance to end their life. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aberafan Maesteg has said throughout the debate, I will not be offering a Government view on the merits of any proposed amendments tabled by Members. Instead, I will offer some observations on the legal and practical effects of the amendments, to assist Members in undertaking line-by-line scrutiny. As a starting point, we have heard a series of concepts discussed in this debate, including manipulation, pressure, coercion, undue pressure and encouragement with coercive ends. There is a range of terms that some Members have used interchangeably, and fairly so. It is important to say that there is a consensus that all those things are unacceptable; the point, and the Government’s view, is that the current provision in clause 1(2)(b) would cover that behaviour with the currently used terminology “coerced or pressured”. Amendments 23 to 33 set out to include consideration of whether a person has been unduly influenced, in addition to having been coerced or pressured by another person, in the determination of whether that person is accessing assisted dying voluntarily. As I have already indicated, the Government’s view is that the terms “coerced” and “pressured” would cover the term “unduly influenced” as it is understood. If the Bill is voted into law, the guidance and training for the healthcare professionals who would apply the tests would need to be developed to cover that sort of behaviour in this specific context. Similarly, amendments 82 to 92 and new clause 5 seek to introduce an additional safeguarding requirement that a person has not been encouraged into undergoing the assisted dying process. It is important to contextualise the amendments, which would introduce this new safeguarding requirement into all the relevant clauses of the Bill where a doctor—or a court or panel, if that is what transpires—must already make an assessment as to whether the person has the relevant capacity, has a clear and settled wish, is making the declaration voluntarily and has not been coerced or pressured by any other person into making it. I have listened to the debates about what encouragement may or may not mean in this context. As I understand it, new clause 5 states that the definition of encouragement is that which would constitute an offence under section 2 of the Suicide Act 1961. In reality, that Act does not specifically define encouragement in legislative terms, so there is a risk that the definition becomes somewhat circular. As I will come to in a moment, as with the terms “coercion” and “pressure”, the meaning given to “encouragement” by the courts, where it is not defined by Parliament, is its natural meaning. I now turn to amendments 113 to 115 and 118 to 122. Let me deal first with amendments 113 to 115. As the Bill is currently drafted, registered practitioners who act as co-ordinating and independent doctors are required to establish that the person seeking assistance has not been coerced or pressured. People seeking assistance to end their own life are also required to confirm in the first and second declarations that they have not been coerced or pressured. The amendments seek to add an additional requirement to establish that the person seeking assistance to end their own life has not been manipulated by any other person into making the decision.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eleventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  I am going to make a little more progress; we will come back to that in a moment. It is really important that we have these concepts in other parts of criminal law and other parts of our legislation. I come back to the point that we run a risk, which runs counter to the intent that lies behind the amendments, if we add additional language into the Bill. I will develop that point and then take further interventions. As we have seen, clause 1 includes the terms “pressured” and “coerced”. The ordinary meaning of the word “pressure” is the use of persuasion or intimidation to make someone do something. There are broad types of behaviour, many of which have been eloquently brought into this debate, that would come within that. The ordinary meaning of the word “coerce” is to persuade someone to do something against their best interests by using force or threats. That could be subtle or it could be very blatant, but the word “coerce” is understood in that way by our courts and in other areas of our legislation. One can readily see how an act of manipulation such as in the examples used earlier, or the exertion of undue influence—I think the term “unduly pressured” was used—would all fall within the terms “coerced” and “pressured”. That is the settled view of the Government. There is a consensus that none of these things, including applying undue pressure, are desirable or acceptable in this or any other context, but there is a risk that adding terminology does not do what hon. Members intend, which is to create more safeguards. The risk is that by adding new words, those tasked with applying and interpreting legislation, if it comes to court, will assume there must be some specific reason for their inclusion. They will assume that the words must have some meaning distinct from the other words in the list—coercion and pressure—notwithstanding the fact that, on their natural meaning, the terms overlap and, in the Government’s view, are inclusive of those sorts of behaviours. That risks the effect of narrowing the interpretation of the words used rather than inviting our courts to give them their usual expansive meaning. In turn, that risks casting doubt on the current interpretation of those words in existing statutes such as the Serious Crime Act, which created an offence for coercive and controlling behaviour, and limits any read-across on interpretations from previous decisions into the application that we are debating. In short, it may actually serve to limit, not to add, to the safeguards in the process. It may risk adding confusion and uncertainty where what is already provided for in clause 1, with the words “coercion” and “pressure”, are simple, readily understood, expansive definitions that would cover precisely the behaviours that I think the hon. Members who tabled the amendments are concerned about.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eleventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  To bring it back to the specific debate about the amendments, the terms “coercive” or “coerce” and “pressure” appear in the criminal law and have broad definitions. That is how they have been interpreted by the courts. Others have referred to section 76 of the Serious Crime Act 2015, which created an offence of controlling or coercive behaviour. In that context and the relevant Bill, Parliament chose not to make a specific legislative definition, but the way in which it has been interpreted, in accordance with its natural meaning, has vindicated the proposition that a broad meaning is given to those terms. For example, that offence could include coercive behaviour such as repeatedly putting somebody down, telling them they are worthless, seeking to control their daily routines or isolating them from friends and family to put pressure on them. As my hon. Friend says, we understand those sorts of behaviours in a much broader way in a changing society.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eleventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  I am certainly not saying that those are bad Acts, and I do not want anyone to quote me as saying that. We could in theory sit here and come up with a whole set of terms that would be descriptive of types of pressure and coercion. We have come up with a number of those, including “undue influence”, “manipulation” and “unduly pressured”. There are other types of behaviour that we might seek to describe. Indeed, if one refers to the Crown Prosecution Service’s guidance in respect of the offence in section 76 of the Serious Crime Act 2015, there are a whole load of descriptors of different types of behaviour. We could name and enumerate all those different types of behaviours, but, in the Government’s view, that is not the best way to create legislation that is workable. It is the Government’s settled view that the words “coercion” and “pressure” cover off the types of behaviour that Members suggesting these amendments would wish to include. The risk is that such amendments create more confusion and shed more heat than light, if you like. Indeed, there is then the risk that the definition of coercion is narrower than it in fact is under our law as it is understood in our courts and in the body of common law and case law, which has been developed in construing those sorts of terms. We are still on clause 1, and we have spoken a little about the interplay between clause 1 and later clauses, particularly clause 26, which engages the criminal offence as drafted in the Bill. I want to stress that while the procedural clauses 1, 7, 8 and 12 may use the same language as the criminal offences in clause 26, they are conceptually distinct, as others have noted. Although it is right that a court could be expected to construe legislation as a whole, case law in relation to one provision will not necessarily flow through directly to a later provision. It may be helpful to illustrate that with the word “encouragement”, which has been raised. As we know, it is an offence to encourage or assist a person to commit suicide. As the hon. Member for Reigate pointed out earlier, it will continue to be so if the Bill is passed, outside of the specific exemption in the Bill. It is generally also an offence to encourage or assist a person to commit any other offence under the Serious Crime Act 2007. Specifically, it is an offence to do an act capable of encouraging or assisting suicide or another offence. The term “encouraged” is not defined in either statute. While it is true to say that section 2A(3) of the Suicide Act—which was added in 2009—clarified that doing an act that is capable of encouraging suicide includes a reference to a person doing so “by threatening another person or otherwise putting pressure on another person”, that was intended to be illustrative of the meaning of “encouraged” in that context; it does not serve as a general definition. Within the Bill, it is important to keep in mind the difference between the procedural requirements—which is what we are discussing in this group—and the criminal offence requirements. Adding words to one provision because they are found in a criminal offence elsewhere risks, in the Government’s view, unintended consequences. Adding “encouragement” to the procedural clauses is perhaps an example of this.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Eleventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  On the hon. Gentleman’s first point, there is no suggestion that we should somehow accept any weaker form of provision in this Bill to protect other parts of the law. Having said that, he would well expect me, as a Government Minister, to be concerned with the integrity of our statute book as a whole. It is because the Government take a holistic view of how the criminal law and other areas of our law operate and define these concepts, and how they are read across the piece, that we make our contention in respect of these particular provisions, because the terms “coercion” and “pressure” are given their natural meaning and are expansive. In the Government’s settled view, they would be inclusive of the types of behaviour that are described in the amendments before us—namely manipulation, undue pressure and the sort of encouragement that I think, when he keeps coming back to it, the hon. Gentleman is referring to, which is not encouragement in a benign way as might exist between two perfectly supportive family members in a normal conversation, but the sort of encouragement that is intended to lead to coercive ends. The hon. Gentleman says that pressure is a subset of encouragement; the Government’s view is that coercion and pressure would cover off the other behaviours that are described in the amendments. It is not necessary to include those additional concepts, because it risks sowing confusion that somehow they are not included in the concepts of coercion and pressure.

• 12 Feb 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Tenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It might help if I offer—with the usual caveat that of course the Government are neutral—the Government’s position with respect to what the hon. Lady has been discussing. It is important to point out that the terms “coercion” and “coercive behaviour” and “pressure” that are used on the face of the Bill appear in existing legislation without statutory definition. In other words, they are given their ordinary meaning and they operate effectively in that manner in the criminal law. The hon. Lady is absolutely right that clause 26, which we shall come to in due course, is a separate matter, but of course it will be important to review the Bill as a whole and to understand the interaction between the different provisions in clause 1, as we trace it through to the criminal offences. It is the Government’s view that manipulative behaviour or undue influence—the terms that the hon. Lady is using—would come within the normal meaning as understood in case law by the judiciary of the terms “pressure” and “coercion”. In terms of the integrity of the statute book, there is a concern that by adding additional terms, we run the risk of creating confusion, because when it comes to the interpretation of those provisions, judges will be looking to understand and ascertain what Parliament meant by “undue influence” that was not currently covered by coercion. Given that those terms are commonly broadly interpreted, it is the Government’s view that the sorts of behaviours that the hon. Lady is describing—“undue influence”—would be covered by the terms used on the face of the Bill. For simplicity, given that our existing body of law interprets those provisions widely, and to ensure consistent application of the law in this context and other contexts where coercion arises, it is important from the Government’s point of view to retain the Bill’s current wording.

• 4 Feb 2025 · Bereaved Parents: Birth Certificates · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to reflect on the growing number of couples in this country who cohabit and for whom marriage is not something they have chosen. It is right, too, that in general the law keeps up, to reflect that sort of societal change. I will come in due course to discuss more widely what the Government are doing in that space. I return, however, to the essential point that while clarity, simplicity and affordability are important in the registration process, particularly to support bereaved parents, we must have a process that instils confidence in what the birth certificate contains. I thank the hon. Member for South Devon for drawing attention to Widowed and Young’s campaign. As she rightly points out, it does some absolutely amazing work, particularly for those younger people who have tragically lost a spouse or life partner. I can reassure the hon. Member now that the Government take the matter incredibly seriously and we are working hard to improve the family justice system for children and families. Widowed and Young advocates for a simplified court process. We know that delays in the court process add to the distress when someone is going through bereavement. That can have a significant impact on children and families. We are committed to improving timeliness and reducing the outstanding caseload in the family court. That is why we have set ambitious targets for reducing delays in 2024-25 and have focused on closing the longest-running cases, not least so that can free up court time to deal with precisely the sorts of processes to which the hon. Member draws attention. To further support those who use the family court, we are committed to improving digital solutions to support families with exploring various options for resolving child arrangement disputes early and away from court whenever possible. That is an area where digital solutions can be brought to bear on the sorts of issues that have been raised today. The Ministry of Justice is working on testing and developing various digital innovations that aim to support users in the private family justice system to help those families find the right information at the right time for them to reach agreements where that is appropriate, and particularly in the sorts of processes and proceedings under focus, which in the vast majority of cases are entirely non-contentious. Let me turn to the wider issue of cohabitation reform. The subject that the hon. Member for South Devon raises and that others have raised today speak to the broader issues for cohabiting couples in our society who, under existing law, have only limited financial protections compared with those who are married or in a civil partnership. I know that a number of colleagues across the House have written to my Department about this, and my noble friend Lord Ponsonby was pleased to attend a parliamentary roundtable to discuss it last November. We know that the limited rights and protections available to cohabitants can affect the most vulnerable in our society who are often affected at the most difficult stages in life, such as when a partner dies, or at the point of separation. We know, too, that those limited rights and protections disproportionately affect women, including victims of domestic and economic abuse, as well as their children. With the number of cohabiting couples in the UK having more than doubled over the past 30 years, it is important, as others have said, that law reflects the society in which we now live. That indeed is why the Government set out in our manifesto a commitment to strengthen the rights and protections available to women in cohabiting couples. We will be setting out the next steps on this manifesto commitment—how we intend to implement it—as soon as possible. The issue raised by the hon. Member for South Devon speaks directly to those challenges that sometimes face parents who are unmarried. I would like to thank her once again for securing this important debate and pay tribute to her bravery in coming forward to talk about it. I hope that this is the start of a conversation. I hope that she and I can discuss in more depth very soon the sorts of changes that might be necessary to better protect people in law, and I look forward to working with her to that end. While I am on my feet, let me also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Northfield (Laurence Turner) for the related issue that he raises and let me extend my personal condolences to the family involved. They have been through one of the worst things imaginable in my view. Certainly, processes of administration—of registration—should not be designed to exacerbate that. If he will write to me with that particular case, I would be happy to take a look at it, and I look forward to working with him on how we can address and mitigate the distress of parents of children who die in childbirth. Once again, let me thank the hon. Member for South Devon for securing this important debate. I look forward to working with her on how we can ameliorate the situation for those for whom she is campaigning. Question put and agreed to .

• 4 Feb 2025 · Bereaved Parents: Birth Certificates · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for South Devon (Caroline Voaden) for securing this debate on an important and emotive subject. I start by saying how sorry I am for the loss that she and her family suffered, and how much I admire her resilience in coming to this House to share her story. That takes a huge amount of courage. The circumstances in which the hon. Lady and others have lost co-parents are heartbreaking indeed. The Government are determined to ensure that the justice system is better able to support children and families, and particularly mothers who have lost the father of their child. The hon. Lady helpfully outlined the current process for registering a parent’s name on a birth certificate when that parent has passed away, but it is important to set out precisely how this works. Under section 55A of the Family Law Act 1986, in situations where a child is born to unmarried parents and the father is deceased prior to birth, a declaration of parentage must be issued by the court for paternity to be established. It is right that a fee is attached to this application, but it is important to say that there are mechanisms in place to support those who cannot afford the fee. The help with fees scheme considers a range of factors, including an applicant’s income, their savings and whether they receive any benefits, so that the fee can be waived in certain circumstances. Once a declaration is issued, the birth can then be re-registered to include the father’s details or, to put it another way and as we have heard, to fill in that blank space. To recognise the challenges that mothers face when seeking a declaration of parentage, a key intention of the provisions in family proceedings is to make the process as simple as possible in the most difficult of circumstances, while at the same time ensuring that the court has the means to establish parentage if one parent is deceased and is not, of course, able to convey their views themselves. That process, while we have to emphasise simplicity and ease for those going through the toughest of circumstances, is an important one. It is important because in some cases the process can bear on significant financial implications for others, such as children from previous relationships, and can bear on issues such as nationality and others that touch on the best interests of the child. While ensuring the process is clear and simple to support bereaved parents, the courts must therefore have a process that instils confidence in the important details that a birth certificate contains.

• 30 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Seventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  Further to that point of order, Mrs Harris. I want to clarify the Government’s position. As the Committee knows, the Government are neutral on the Bill, but once the Committee has concluded its work and prior to Report, we are committed to publishing the ECHR memorandum, a delegated powers memorandum, the economic impact assessment that was committed to during the money resolution debate, and an assessment of the equalities impact of the Bill. In terms of the timing, it is necessary that the impacts that are assessed be of the Bill as it is brought forward. If the Bill is liable to change via amendments proposed by members of this Committee, it is important that we know what it is that we are assessing the impact of. That is why the proposed timing is to publish the impact assessment at that stage. The point is that before Members of the House come to a vote on Report and Third Reading, they will all have before them the impact assessment in respect of equalities and all those other aspects of the Bill.

• 30 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Seventh sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q To be clear, I am here as a Government Minister on this Committee, and the Government are entirely neutral on the Bill, so we do not take a position on the substance of the issues you have raised. Clearly, the draft Bill is intended to apply in both England and Wales, as you say, and your note is extremely helpful in highlighting some of those issues that will need to be worked out. As a Government, we will work closely with the Welsh Government to assess the legalities and practicalities of any potential changes to the law. You have highlighted in particular the distinctions between health law, which is a devolved matter, and the law on suicide, which currently is not devolved. On the first page of your written evidence, you draw out clauses 32, 31, 33 and 34 in particular as issues that we should focus on in ironing out those legalities. Is there anything else you want to add to that that you think that we as a Government should focus on in our work consulting with the Senedd? Professor Lewis: I think it is important that both Governments understand how the implementation of what will be a pretty radical change in the law will happen on the ground within the health service and among those who are responsible for delivering social services. I am thinking of issues such as adult safeguarding, which in Wales has its own specific law and is slightly different from the arrangements in England. There are those kinds of nuances between the two territories, and I think it would be prudent to focus on them. I also think it is wise to bear in mind that Wales has certain statutory bodies whose interests might extend to the Bill. For example, there is the Older People’s Commissioner for Wales, in particular; there is the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales as well. I think it is important that there is some forum, some scope, for those people also to be involved in how this is shaped.

• 29 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  We can take that suggestion away. Thank you.

• 29 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Lord Sumption and Dr Graham, you will have seen that clauses 26 and 27 include criminal offences. Do you have any views on the operability of those criminal offences? Dr Graham: My only contribution here can be that similar offences in other jurisdictions have been held to be perfectly compatible with European human rights law. Lord Sumption: I have no problem about the criminal-isation of people who abuse or distort the system, which is what those two clauses envisage.

• 29 Jan 2025 · Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q It may flow from what this third layer of a panel or court is doing, but what sort of information would be desirable for the panel to have before it in order to add a meaningful layer of scrutiny? Lord Sumption: That is really the critical question when you ask yourself how useful this process is. Obviously, they will have the opinions of the two referee doctors—they will have their rather pro forma statements, and possibly statements they will make by way of expansion of those—but if they are going to add something of value in the way of safeguards, it seems to me that they have got to carry out an independent investigation of those same matters. That would involve getting, presumably, a third expert adviser and proactively seeking evidence about, for example, the patient’s state of mind. It seems to me that that is duplicative. Obviously, there is no system that you cannot have a greater degree of assurance about, but I am struck by the fact that no other jurisdiction has felt it necessary to have a process as elaborate as this for the purpose of duplicating the expert views already required.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right to make that point. Our family courts should never become sites of retraumatisation for victims of domestic abuse. We are reviewing the presumption, and when we are ready, we will publish the findings and our policy response to that review.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  As I have said, the Government are committed to halving violence against women and girls within a decade. It is an important ambition, and the criminal justice system has a vital role to play in it. In November, we launched a pilot promoting domestic abuse protection orders in selected areas, and we have ambitions to roll that out further. We will also introduce independent legal advisers for adult rape victims, ensuring that victims have the legal support that they need and deserve.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Violence against Women and Girls · Hansard source

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  The hon. Member is right to remark on the low charging and conviction rates for domestic abuse. We have an ambition to drive those up. That is why we are putting more funding and more prioritisation into this area and calling on our agencies, whether it is the police or the Crown Prosecution Service, to really focus on it, because right now we are not doing enough for women and girls.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Support for Domestic Abuse Survivors · Hansard source

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  Tackling domestic abuse is a priority for this Government. The Domestic Abuse Act 2021 sets out a broad statutory definition of domestic abuse, which is improving our understanding of the wide range of behaviours that can constitute this abuse. While not constituting a stand-alone offence, domestic abuse is considered an aggravating factor routinely throughout our criminal justice system, and rightly so. That is the reason why that data is not collected, and that is the position we will maintain.

• 28 Jan 2025 · Support for Domestic Abuse Survivors · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend will know that this Government have a landmark ambition to halve violence against women and girls, and the criminal justice system has an important part to play in that. While setting that priority, whether it is for the CPS or our police, we want to drive charging decisions and drive up the conviction rate. Providing swifter justice for victims is going to require once-in-a-generation reform to bring down the Crown court backlog.