David Lammy MP: speeches

Speeches

• 19 May 2026 · Jury Trial Proposals · Hansard source

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  If the hon. Gentleman were serious, he would get on top of the detail. We are not scrapping juries; juries remain a cornerstone of our system. Just as Margaret Thatcher made changes to the jury system, and just as the Blair Government made changes to the jury system, we are making changes to bring down the backlog.

• 19 May 2026 · Jury Trial Proposals · Hansard source

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  I know that the hon. Gentleman gets excited about this, but he should recognise that.

• 19 May 2026 · Jury Trial Proposals · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman makes his point with real force. However, he never talks about victims, and has not explained how we should bring down the backlog. The truth is that we are determined to bring down the backlog, and that is why— [ Interruption. ]

• 19 May 2026 · Jury Trial Proposals · Hansard source

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  We are determined to bring down the backlog. The hon. Gentleman knows that Governments of all stripes stand by our jury system and stand by Magna Carta. We are not scrapping jury trials.

• 19 May 2026 · Jury Trial Proposals · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend makes a very good point. It is fundamental that people have confidence in our justice system, wherever they are across these isles. That is why this Government are seeking to do all they can to get both the court system and the prison system out of the crisis that we inherited.

• 19 May 2026 · Jury Trial Proposals · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the hon. Lady for recognising that we have seen a small reduction because of the increased investment I have put in, and because of the extra sitting days; the modernisation that we have talked about, and enlisting artificial intelligence in particular, will also make a difference. However, given the size of the backlog, if we are serious about bringing it down over the next few years, we will need reform as well.

• 19 May 2026 · Jury Trial Proposals · Hansard source

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  We inherited a justice system in crisis, with a backlog of over 80,000 cases—double what it was in the pre-covid era—and with victims, witnesses and defendants waiting years for justice. That is what truly undermines confidence in our justice system. Justice delayed is justice denied. Only by pulling every lever—investment, efficiency and reform—can we turn the tide.

• 19 May 2026 · Criminal Justice System: Support for Men and Boys · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for allowing me to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) for her tremendous work. I think the whole House will recognise that, as a Minister, she was entirely on top of her brief and she commanded the respect of victims groups right across our country. The hon. Gentleman makes an important point and I will look closely at what more we can do for young people who experience domestic violence.

• 19 May 2026 · Criminal Justice System: Support for Men and Boys · Hansard source

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  I am keen to work with my hon. Friend on this issue. I recognise that there are real issues in her constituency in this regard. She will be pleased to hear that last month I attended a roundtable with some of the leading figures in the men and boys sector to hear their concerns directly from them. I am also chairing the interministerial group on men and boys. There is real excitement, right across Whitehall, about the fact that we can do something about this over the next two years.

• 19 May 2026 · Criminal Justice System: Support for Men and Boys · Hansard source

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  A few years ago, I set up the all-party parliamentary group for fatherhood. The hon. Lady is right: the role of fathers in all children’s lives is vital. There is nothing more affecting than programmes in prison, for example, where fathers who are illiterate and unable to write are helped to do so in order to stay in communication with their children. I will look closely.

• 19 May 2026 · Criminal Justice System: Support for Men and Boys · Hansard source

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  It is an excellent question. My hon. Friend is quite right; there are many concerns about the online space and what it means for men and boys in a modern society, and there is an important role for Ofcom. I encourage him to write to the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, and I will take a close interest. I hope that he gets a meeting with a Minister.

• 19 May 2026 · Criminal Justice System: Support for Men and Boys · Hansard source

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  The Prime Minister asked me to lead work across Government to improve outcomes for boys and men. That includes a specific focus on convening and co-ordinating the brilliant work being done across Departments, including on health and wellbeing, education and employment, and masculinities and connection. Furthermore, yesterday we set out a plan for youth justice reform, which was the first in many years.

• 19 May 2026 · Family Courts · Hansard source

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  The whole House will have sympathy for Olivia. The family courts must never be a place for perpetrators to continue their abuse. Repealing the presumption of parental involvement will ensure that children’s wellbeing continues to be the court’s primary focus when considering contact. Under the child-focused model, independent domestic violence advisers can provide victims with specialist family support.

• 19 May 2026 · Family Courts · Hansard source

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  The Government are reforming the family justice system to better support families and children. We are rolling out the child-focused model nationally, developing a cross-system family justice strategy and legislating for new child safety measures that ensure that child welfare continues to be prioritised.

• 19 May 2026 · Family Courts · Hansard source

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  I can confirm to the Chair of the Select Committee that the family mediation voucher scheme will be extended for another year, giving separating families £500 towards their mediation costs to help them solve issues with childcare and finances without going to court. I will look carefully at the permanency of those arrangements.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to my hon. Friend for championing these issues. I hope that she sees an indication of what she seeks from the fact that two Ministers are working hand in hand and sitting on the interministerial group to direct this activity. There is more to do on education in the youth custody context and more to do on neurodiversity and its prevalence among this cohort of young people. We have to extend that work into communities and join up better with local child and adolescent mental health services as well.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  On the issue of restorative justice, we are working with Jacob Dunne in particular to make a difference—he was involved in that punch situation. I hope to get to Northern Ireland particularly over the coming months, because I know that very good work in this area goes on there.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  I should call to mind not just the work of the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, but the youth guarantee introduced by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport and all her work to ensure that young people have opportunities wherever they live in the country. Turnaround is making a difference in bringing those services together. We are remodelling the Youth Justice Board, bringing more back to the centre so that we can ensure consistency across the country. At this time, expertise in these areas, particularly in online harm, does not always exist in communities, so we need to do better.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  Exactly—we used to have them, and the Tories abolished them. We want to bring them back and grow their numbers so that we can support these young people. There are a range of things we can do through this White Paper, and I encourage the hon. Member for West Suffolk to read it in detail. A lot of his predecessors would agree with it. It is good work, and we need to get on with it.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to the hon. Lady for the manner in which she made her remarks. She understands that we have seen this revolving door, where two thirds of children and young people released from custody go on to reoffend, and many of those young people are extremely vulnerable. We have to do something about it. I thank her for mentioning the cohort of young people —way too many—who are within the care system. I am very grateful that the Minister responsible for children in care, my hon. Friend the Member for Whitehaven and Workington (Josh MacAlister), is on the Front Bench today alongside me. He takes a huge interest in the work that our Departments do together to deal with this area. The hon. Lady mentioned young people who are adopted. She knows that I am a parent of an adopted child, and I take these issues extremely seriously. She is right, and we are looking in totality at the way in which parenting orders have worked. There must be something going wrong if the number of parenting orders issued has fallen over the last decade from more than 1,000 to just 33 last year. We have to look at it in the round and ensure that judges have the right tools to support parents and guardians over this next period. The hon. Lady raises the reforms we are making to the Youth Justice Board. It is still the case, if we look across the country, that there is a postcode lottery. We have to eliminate that postcode lottery, which also exists because of online harms, because of grooming, because of mental health and because of neurodiversity. I was in Feltham recently and I saw the good work that it is doing with young people who are neurodiverse. It is important that the Department, working with our colleagues in the Department for Education and the Department of Health and Social Care, bring some of these powers back to the centre so that we can get coherence across the country and end that postcode lottery.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  At this point, it is important to mention the county lines programme, which sits with the Home Office. We in the Ministry of Justice work very closely with it, and it is making a difference. It is an absolute scandal that young people—as young as 10 or 11—have been travelling up and down the country ferrying drugs. No one knew where they were or what school they went to, and they had no support, but we are bringing that to an end. For the first time in a long time, we are seeing knife crime falling, and the number of young people falling into county lines is coming down.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  I hope the hon. Gentleman will recognise the work that Turnaround is doing in Birmingham to make a difference and create effective diversionary activity for these young people, so that they do not continue in a life of crime. He is absolutely right about the devastating cuts to youth centres that we saw across the country. It will take some time to rebuild them, but I know that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, working with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, has a strategy. It has set about that strategy, alongside the youth guarantee that also exists for the young people of Birmingham.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  The right hon. Gentleman and I have been friends for many years. I know that, like me, he has a deep Christian faith; one heard the power of redemption in his voice. I have long believed that the phrase “looked after” is one of the biggest oxymorons in the English language. Those kids are not sufficiently looked after, which is why I am so grateful that the Under-Secretary of State for Education is sitting beside me and doing such considerable work to turn this system around.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to my hon. Friend for mentoring turnaround, which is an important scheme that began under the last Government and has continued under us. It is making a big difference by diverting these young people. I will look closely at its use in her constituency, but we are absolutely clear that it is about not just diverting them but ensuring that we are diverting them to quality. We can see from the recidivism rate of 7% that turnaround is an exceptional programme.

• 18 May 2026 · Youth Justice · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right, and he knows from his long experience that the role local government plays, alongside mental health services and education, is vital, and we must do much better to join this up. Whenever something goes badly wrong, it is usually because services have not been sufficiently joined up. That is why the new intensive supervision course in this area can make a real difference for young people.