Forum Report: 'Women in the Justice System'

26-Jun-2012: The CWO forum on ‘Women In The Justice System’ took place at 30 Millbank, Westminister on the 26th of June 2012.

The speakers for the evening were:

Fiona Phillips- QC
Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Sebire- Metropolitan Police
Margaret Vallance- Director- Prisoners’ Families and Friends Service
Julie Iles- JP- Surrey

CWO Chairman, Pauline Lucas welcomed our guests on behalf of CWO and outlined that the purpose of the ‘Women In The Justice System’ forum was to allow exploration of the reality of being a Woman involved or effected by the British Judicial System.

The panel was selected to provide insights into: breaking into the male dominated legal arena, female sentencing and rehabilitation and support thereafter and the underlying treatment of woman within the criminal world.

Pauline Lucas encouraged the panel to discuss candidly their own experiences and also what they were recognising from a wider study of the demographic.

Fiona Phillips is a highly qualified QC wh was instrumental in the building of Portcullia house. Fiona led the discussion by painting the scene for what it is like being a QC whom has climbed the career ladder in what still is a male dominated profession. Fiona explained that the first set of challenges present themselves when Woman are embarking on the role from a litigation stage. The early stages of law bar exams normally have a 50/50 split between Males and Female uptakes which continues until pupillages when the gender split is around 55/45 in favour of men.

The real challenges present themselves as Woman work their way up the Judicial system. Woman tend to be overly generous with their time and the work load which they are prepared to take on just to get ahead or on an equal footing as their male counterparts- This can often mean working 18 hour days, 6 days a week.

The approach to handling cases also varies between Male and Females. Fiona recognises that when she is in discussions with a Female opponent they will be upfront about their angle of defence and stick to that in court. Fiona’s experience is that Men will play games by claiming one position within the consultation and very much change their tact in court.
Overt Sexism is a daily occurrence and upon reaching The Queens Council Woman normally fall into two areas; those whom become deliberately ‘Steely’ to maintain and compete for work and those whom try to balance a family and as a result face ostracism and a diminished workload dictated and enforced by their male counterparts.

The Lord Chancellor is actively promoting getting more women into the judicial system but whilst Fiona says you often face loyalty from clients, the perils of being within this vocation are the pressures to stay ahead of the competition, win the work and also balance a family.

Jackie Sebire spoke of her 20 years experience as a Super Intendant investing serious and complex crime including high profile murder cases and paedophilia. In line with Fiona Phillips, Jackie touched upon the idea of having to work above and beyond the recognised standards in order to make a name for yourself and get promoted. Of the Senior Management team at Hackney Constabulary all have chosen to put their careers above starting a family.

Jackie has extensive experience of dealing with Women suspects, witnesses and victims and the largest area of concern across the UK today is the notable Gang Culture which often results in younger girls and women being introduced to living a violent life of crime and/or becoming sexual abuse victims often at the mercy of the Male gang leaders.
In support of this notion of exploitation, in London specifically, murder is on the decrease but Woman being killed in domestic violence is increasing by 40%. These are grim statistics and on average it takes 35 incidents of abuse for a Woman to come forward and report an issue.

Jackie feels the only way to combat this issue is to start to work with Woman at a younger age to install a sense of confidence and self respect. In conjunction with this the level of data sharing from force to force needs to become more fluid so the Police can spot patterns emerging.

Margaret Vallence summarised her career so far by discussing her work within male dominated environments. Margaret explained the resistance she felt when she was asked lead a 40 headcount male team of fraud investigators within the DWP. Margaret acknowledges she had to prove herself to her peers and those in her charge and demonstrated this through increasing the conviction rate bye introducing a more analytically detail focused ethos to a team who previously seems to just ‘Dive In’
Within Margaret’s career she has witnessed abuse of young females and children on a number of occasions. Some of her achievements in combating this were the 1989 Children’s Act which she pushed through the Home Office and the closing down of Banardos.
At all stages victims of abuse, specifically paedophilia are lured in emotionally on a basis of trust from a perpetrator whom is very good at covering their tracks and in a clear position of power.

Today Margaret devotes her time to a Voluntary Organisation called Prisoners’ ,Families and Friends which was established in 1967.  The organisation recognised that there was little or no support for the families of those whom were sentenced in prison and as a result families of those convicted were stigmatised and condemned.

The organisation works at the core of issues surrounding confidence and self esteem, mental well being and relationships. The main completed the idea is that children develop better.

Some interesting facts support the work of this organisation:
· More Woman than partners use the service.
· Children of offenders are more likely to commit offences themselves.
· All of the Woman within the service suffer some degree of depression and anxiety at some stage.
· 5% of prisoners are female.
· 51% of woman leaving prison reoffend within 1 year.
The aim is to keep families together and reunite them as in Margaret’s word the state is a poor parent.

Julie Iles sits on the bench for Her Majesties Court and Tribunal System, a institution which has been in place as the first point of call for all legal cases for the last 650 years. It is served by volunteers whom wish to engage within their communities to assist with the jurisdiction and enforcement of law.  Over the last 20 years being a woman within the justice system has changed significantly with trousers only being acceptable court room attire in the last two decades. The scope of influence within HMS is broad with 97 % of all criminal cases starting life in a magistrate’s court. 

Decisions as to the granting of bail or remanding someone in custody are often heard in magistrates court and Julie says they are decided by taking a number of factors in to account including the likely outcome of the case, ties to the community, any previous failures to comply with court orders and the nature of the alleged offence. This is to ensure that the community is protected.

Julie chose to work and specialise within the Youth Court matter sector as she feels that this is highly relevant to making a real difference to local communities as good methods and practises within this area can prevent re-offences and steer the demographic back on the right track. The ethos is the idea of prevention of re-offending rather than criminalisation.

Julie says one of the challenges is female detention particularly when children are involved. The circumstances must be deemed grave for this to be enforced as emphasis and consideration is made to any remaining children and what would happen to them should their mother be detained.

Questions and comments from the floor concluded that there needs to be much more groundwork done behind the reasons that Woman turning to criminality and why they may fall victims to abusive situations as a result of being victims of crime. The common thread was that there needs to be a ‘Big Society’ in respect of teaching woman from an early age what they should and how they should expect to be treated. In turn the concept of teaching young men what is acceptable was also discussed. There needs to be more inspirational role models for woman and that it is vital to teach families how to parent in the right ways to break the cycles of abuse and crime from replicating in the future for next generations.

All of our panel said that at some point in their careers they have had a strong, female mentor whom helped them to learn best practice and that they found motivation from.

Each of the speakers summarised their final points and the chairman thanked them for participating in what was an immensely informative discussion.

With thanks to: Sophie Stratton, CWO Director of Forums and Charlotte Argyle

http://www.cwoforums.co.uk/index.php/archives/238

CWO Report: Forum 'Business Budget 2012'

24-Apr-2012: The CWO forum panel on the ‘Business Budget 2012’ took place in a committee room of the House of Commons on Tuesday 24^th April.

The speakers for the evening were:

Andrew Tyrie    MP for Chichester and Chairman of the Treasury Select Committee.

Susan Hayes      Head of Business Banking, Barclays

Gillian Cardy      Managing Director of the Independent Financial Adviser (IFA) centre.

CWO Chairman, Katy Bourne welcomed our guests on behalf of CWO and outlined that the purpose of the ‘Business Budget 2012’ was to allow exploration of the impact of the recent budget announcements on small businesses.  Katy encouraged discussions around the role of women in business and in what ways the budget will have an impact on economic growth for all demographics.  

CWO Forum: Sophie Stratton, Gillian Hardy and Susan Hayes

Sue Hayes led the discussion by explaining her role as Head of Business Banking at Barclays and went on to discuss how and why banks are making a concerted effort, through their growth agenda to help small businesses.

Currently 50 % of start-up businesses fail within their first three years; Sue discussed the challenging conditions that a start-up company is likely to face based on her assessment of the core issues she sees arising daily within her client’s environment.  The three main reasons she identified for the failure of new businesses are: the economic climate and reduced demand, the competitive landscape and cash flow issues.

 Sue observed that there is a general feeling of uncertainty around the regulations in respect of setting up a new business which serve to deter people from venturing into this territory due to a lack of confidence and understanding of the basic logistics involved in setting up a new business.

Homing in on the budget, Sue thought that there had been modest changes but nothing which would make a substantial difference to promote entrepreneurial growth.  However, the reduction in the higher rate of personal income tax and the increase in personal allowance would mean that greater disposable income could potentially have the effect of stimulating consumer spending, albeit not aiding initial investment.

Sue went on to explain how banks can help to stimulate confidence via a number of fiscal initiatives and support services such as;

-The National Loan Guarantee Scheme  which creates lower interest rates for lending and gives a percentage of cash back to the applicant.

-Business support units and seminars proactively advising business on any issues they are experiencing and discussing ways to increase revenues for a new business.  E-commerce for example, if conducted internationally, gives a business a fourfold chance of being successful in the critical 36-month window.

-Networking forums to link customers and business together.

CWO Forum: Susan Hayes, Theodora Clarke, Margaret Bird, Pauline Lucas, Gillian  Cardy and Katy Bourne

The overall message was that banks do want to loan to businesses to aid the UK’s economic recovery.  Last year alone £4.7bn was invested by Barclays into small businesses and Barclays hit their Merlin targets.  Given the current economic situation today around 42% of people will have to rethink their retirement plans and 25% of people will have to work over the age of 65.  Barclays wants to encourage a stimulus for growth to give people greater flexibility over their retirement options.

Gillian Cardy spoke about her role as Managing Director of the IFA centre and how she perceived the budget would have an effect on the financial planning strategies of individuals and businesses alike.

Gillian sees the budget in its current form as having only nominal changes which directly affect the role of an IFA in giving client advice.  In her view, present regulations need simplification to stimulate economic growth as the increased complexity of rules around taxation are making it challenging for both employers and employees to understand their responsibilities and, as a consequence, more costs are being incurred by businesses.

Prohibitive costs make it more challenging for new business to flourish.  An example of these increasing costs for employers is the new National Employee Savings scheme which all business must start to contribute to.

 An example of change suggested by Gillian was in regards to rules around National Insurance; she suggested a revision of the current 13.8% which has to be paid even into retirement.

To summarise, Gillian brought the discussion to an employee level and discussed the current missed opportunities for road-mapping a real savings plan and taking advantage of tax free opportunities such as ISA’s and personal allowances.

Finally Andrew Tyrie discussed how he saw the budget from his perspectives as an Economist, an MP and as the Chairman of the Treasury Select Committee.

CWO Forum: Andrew Tyrie MP

 Andrew supported the defining strategy of the budget which is a deficit reduction programme to deal with the current economic conditions.  He believes in turn this will promote confidence from the markets.  The budget has been set by the Chancellor with little scope for manoeuvre as there are real fiscal targets to be met and the government is in the early stages of implementing a long term strategy to restore economic growth rates to 2.4%. Andrew is confident that this coalition budget will prevent a UK replication of crises seen in Greece and other Eurozone countries.

In line with his co-speakers, Andrew agreed that an overhaul of regulation in certain areas affecting business is overdue and that a simplification of employers’ legislation and a focus on making it easier for sole traders to create the jobs, are needed to boost the economy.

CWO Forum: Theodora Clarke

In agreement with Gillian Cardy, Andrew went on to say that the British taxation system is one of the most complicated taxation systems in the world.  There are issues around tax avoidance which could be addressed by less ambiguity on the subject and clearer tax models.  Tax cuts at the top end of the market are designed to retain wealth within the UK and avoid overseas relocation in line with Laffa principles.  In addition to this, improvements via the Loan Guarantee scheme will serve as a much needed catalyst for bank and consumer lending and UK entrepreneurialism.

    

Questions and comments from the floor examined issues such as: why has the tax code not been simplified since the 1980’s; why income tax has not returned to the previous 40% level and will there be more efforts put in place to incentivise start up businesses and support their growth?  Each of the speakers summarised their final points and the Chairman thanked them for participating in an informative panel discussion on the budget.

With thanks to: Sophie Stratton, CWO Director of Forums and Charlotte Argyle.

Report: CWO Forum 'Caring For The Elderly'

The CWO Forum Panel on “Caring for the Elderly” took place in a Committee Room of the House of Commons on Tuesday 31st January 2012.

The speakers for the evening were:
Margot James MP
Esther Rantzen CBE
Cllr Lady Flight
Dianne Jeffrey, Chairman of Age UK.

CWO Chairman, Niki Molnar, welcomed everyone on behalf of the CWO and explained to those attending that the Forums were established to give women the opportunity to debate topical subjects and challenging issues that affect them and their families every day.

Diane Jeffrey introduced the topic and explained her role as Chairman of Age UK and the relevance of the Forum with tomorrow’s publication of the Care in Crisis report. She discussed the current challenges that older people face in the UK. Life expectancy is increasing with the population of over sixties set to rise by 50% in the next 25 years. The country’s ageing population raises questions about how to care for the elderly and concerns about future burdens on society and the state. Diane argued that the elderly should be celebrated and supported in later life. She said that the current care system was in crisis, where people need help but are being failed by the system. For example, many people are being forced to sell their homes and assets to pay the costs of care.

The current system is too complex, underfunded and in need of urgent reform. She cited three main issues with the system at present: lack of support; failure to plan for long-term care needs; and underfunding. She described how many people were unaware that social care was not provided free like the NHS and that instead it was means-tested within strict guidelines. Anyone who owns assets worth more than £23,250 has to pay for their own residential care including accommodation and food. As a result, many people were being forced to sell their homes to afford their payments especially as many private sector insurance companies will not insure personal care needs. In 2012, 18% of councils had raised their eligibility criteria to substantial or critical which means that many older people were no longer meeting the new standard.

Age UK was also concerned about what she termed the ‘glass of water placed out of reach’ syndrome and a lack of concern by staff regarding patient dignity. She concluded by arguing that the central challenge facing the care for the elderly was a lack of funding. The current cuts in social care of 4.5%, equivalent to £331 million, was directly impacting on frontline services. An urgent reform of social care was needed now in order to deal with the growing, long-term problems of the UK’s ageing population.

Cllr Lady Flight spoke of her role as the champion for older people in Westminster, with CONTACT group and as Editor of Westminster Plus. Four years ago, Christabel raised the idea of an ‘Older People’s Day’ as a UN day on Wednesday 1st October every year. She would like to resurrect this idea to have a specific day in the calendar to celebrate older people.

Popular culture impacts on our everyday life in numerous ways. She argued that we should feed narratives into television and radio such as the ‘Archers’ and ‘Eastenders’ which can depict issues with life far better than politicians. A recent example was a storyline focused on dementia on the Archers which resulted in a huge amount of publicity and considerably raised the profile of dementia as a direct result of the programme. Several ideas of how to celebrate ‘Silver Sunday’ and ‘Older People’s Day’ were discussed. A central concern was the invisibility of older people. She suggested that everybody was asked to find an older person such as a neighbour and to bring that person back into society so they were less lonely.

Through her role with Westminster Plus, she has seen the importance of getting older people together such as with their annual tea dance for nearly 1000 older people. If we could replicate events such as this across the country, then we could successfully engage older people. Her central message was that older people need to feel that they are visible and that ‘Silver Sunday’ would be a good way to recognise them.

Esther Rantzen CBE spoke of her experiences as the President of ChildLine and the work she is currently doing to support older people. She agreed with Age UK that there was a problem with the current system and the ‘glass of water out of reach’ syndrome. However,
it is not simply a case of underfunding but one of attitude. ‘Silver Sunday’ was an idea she supported but asked the audience how they would define old age. Arbitrary age brackets, such as 60 plus, were perhaps no longer helpful. Esther said that she believed the central problem facing older people was that they were increasingly isolated and lonely.

Recently she wrote an article in the Daily Mail on loneliness and was overwhelmed by the response she had. Many people ranging from children to widows wrote to her. Problems that they brought to her attention included the challenges that disabled people faced in isolated rural communities where it was possible to be alone for weeks at a time. She quoted from one letter where one elderly correspondent wrote that the public “shun us like empty restaurants”. Another issue raised was how many older people did not want to become a burden on their children or families.

Esther announced that tomorrow she would be launching Silverline which was to be a telephone advice and help service for the over fifty-fives. Her experience with Childline had shown that having a number that anyone could ring with no agenda was essential. The helpline will take the time to listen to the concerns of older people and to discuss any issues they may have. For example, there are instances of abuse by carers where it is very difficult for people to ask for help. Having a national resource which provided information and would signpost problems would therefore be of great use. Another purpose of the helpline was to become a resource, providing information on local agencies and opportunities for older people in their area. She concluded by arguing that, if we help each other, then we can change attitudes and make our society more inclusive of older people.

Finally Margot James MP spoke on her role as Vice Chairman for Women in the Conservative Party and her role in the Women’s Policy Group. Her previous experience as a Councillor in Kensington and Chelsea and her work with the NHS Trust meant she had worked with several branches of Age UK. In her constituency of Stourbridge there are two day centres which are open 364 days a year and provide a vital break from loneliness for older people. Margot discussed the legislative challenges facing elderly care and the Government White Paper expected before Easter. She acknowledged that legal reforms of the current system were needed and that there were funding challenges. Her experiences dealing with residential and home care in Kensington were used as examples of the current problems with the system. In 2005, half of councils funded home care for people with moderate needs. However, now less than 20% of councils do the same. Several good residential homes had been closed as they no longer met the stringent new regulations, such as not having the requisite on-site facilities. Home care has been contracted out to private health care providers who offer cheaper services. The private sector was doing a good job but the problem is with local councils who are cutting funding to care services. Margot pointed out that the population of over 55’s was increasing and that NHS funding had been increased by 27% so more funding should be available for adult social care. She suggested that the solution could be to raise the threshold for which elderly people pay for care, perhaps to a capped amount of £100,000. The current £23,000 threshold was far too low and residential care in London is particularly expensive. Residential care homes were important and provided a sense of community to individuals living alone. The challenge is one for the NHS which had to make £20 billion in savings over five years under the last Labour Government. The new Health Bill aims to integrate health and social care and increase the power of local authorities.

Questions and comments from the floor explored issues such as perceived bias by GPs and doctors against elderly patients, how to define elderly and the eligibility criteria for admittance to care homes. A member of the audience raised the Dilnot Report and asked whether care for the elderly was not a matter for society and that we needed to ensure the next generation understood social responsibility. Several members of the audience also asked about resources in rural areas and what Age UK was doing for people in inaccessible areas who were frequently neglected. Each of the speakers summed up their final comments and the Chairman thanked them for contributing to such a fascinating panel discussion.

With thanks to Sophie Stratton, Director of Forums and Theodora Clarke, Director of Communications.

For further information about the CWO, or to arrange an interview with anyone named in this release, please contact:
CWO Chairman
Tel: (020) 7984 8139
E-mail: media@conservativewomen.org.uk
www.conservativewomen.org.uk