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Promotion of Volunteering Bill

Mr. Dobson: I support the new clause and the consequential amendments.

It is worth saying, as the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier) did, that our new clause is intended to deal with legitimate criticisms levelled at the Bill on Second Reading and in Committee by getting rid of any additional bureaucracy that might have been involved. It would also get rid of the concept of reckless disregard, which we accept may be going a little too far.

I have talked to various constitutional lawyers of some distinction, and it is evident that new clause 29 represents a fairly novel concept in English law—it is a declaratory measure. In other words, it declares what the law should be. Those who say that there is no problem should not object to it, because it states the law as they say that it already is.

Mr. Dismore: I do not.

Mr. Dobson: My hon. Friend does not agree, but I am at a loss as to how he thinks that the new clause would change the law or reduce the concept of negligence.

Lawrie Quinn: Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Dobson: No, I will get on, so long as my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon (Mr. Dismore) does not want to interfere.

As far as we are concerned, the new clause changes the law to what we would like it to be, while for those who think that the present situation is acceptable, it states the law as they claim that it already is. I therefore cannot see why any Member should speak against it or vote against it.

It is no good saying that there is not a problem. Some people say, "Oh no, there isn't", but we say, "Oh yes, there is." There may not seem to be a problem if one is a distinguished member of the Better Regulation Task Force or some such outfit, but if one is a scout leader, an adventure trainer, a teacher contemplating taking awkward children on school trips to relatively dangerous places, a sports organiser, or someone trying to run a playground, there certainly is a problem. It is not just a matter of perception.

To add a degree of topicality to my remarks, let me say that if something goes wrong for one of those people, they will not face a kindly Robin Butler-style inquiry that might conclude that things went wrong but nobody is to blame: they will face court action against themselves personally or against the organisation to which they belong.

If, as some people claim, there is no increase in this problem, why are insurance premiums soaring out of sight for volunteer organisations? [Interruption.] It may well be that some insurance companies are greedy—I do not know. Perhaps the Better Regulation Task Force should look into regulating insurance premiums, although that is a rather socialistic idea that may not go down too well with Conservative Members. The increase in premiums is clear evidence that increased costs are faced by organisations that try to provide volunteer services for their fellow citizens.
I was not originally a sponsor of the Bill, but it caught my attention because the hon. Member for Canterbury seemed to be trying to do the right thing. I say, with great respect for him, that he has never suggested that there was anything perfect about the wording that he proposed, and he has been happy to accept all sorts of amendments, even to the point of changing the whole damn Bill so long as it does what people want.

Our proposal is not intended, and never has been, to protect people who are negligent or disregard the safety of those for whom they are responsible. Its intention is to offer clear protection to people who take reasonable care and exercise reasonable skill, and to ensure that the courts recognise that. Some lawyers say that they already do recognise it—I think that that was the argument advanced by the organisation mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Lawrie Quinn). We say that the law and the courts—

Lawrie Quinn: Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Dobson: Let me just finish my sentence. We say that the law and the courts must also require that some activities involve an inherent risk over and above simply walking along the pavement.

Lawrie Quinn: I have great respect for my right hon. Friend, as he knows, but I am sure that he has taken a look at the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, and I ask whether he sees any potential conflict with that legislation in terms of negligence claims being stirred up in a different, ill-thought-out way, and does he accept that that might deter more people from volunteering instead of achieving the laudable aims of the hon. Member for Canterbury?

Mr. Dobson: Our new clause says that the person concerned should take reasonable care and exercise reasonable skill against the background of some inherent risk. As I understand it, that is one of the principles that applies to health and safety at work legislation. Obviously, a steelworks is slightly more risky than the office of an MP in the House of Commons, and that is recognised in law and in practice.

The other point that is causing a huge amount of difficulty is the personal exposure of people who are trying to provide voluntary services. It is difficult enough for them to find the time, make the effort and put up with the pressures and stresses of looking after young people. They do not want a lot of extra pressures slung on top of them by lawyers who urge parents to go to law.

Dr. Julian Lewis (New Forest, East) (Con): In support of the right hon. Gentleman's point, I should like to quote a letter that the commanding officer at the sea cadet unit in Southampton sent to his Member of Parliament. He wrote:

"I am ever conscious of the increasing amount of bureaucracy and the fear of being taken to court by a disaffected young person or their parents/guardian. I have tried to encourage other local people in supporting the cadets but they too are reluctant to commit themselves because of the fear of litigation."

Mr. Dobson: I agree. That view is commonly held among a range of people who are trying voluntarily to help young people. In my view, our proposals do not go quite far enough. If we are to encourage young people to take responsibility, I am not sure whether our proposal provides the cover that we need. For example, let us suppose that someone teaches a person canoeing in a two-person canoe, the supervisor goes out with the young person in the canoe two or three times, and the young person appears to behave fairly responsibly and have a grip on the technique and so on. If the person teaching says, "Okay then, give it a go by yourself", I am not sure whether that would be construed as exercising reasonable care or skill under our proposal. I should like the encouragement of responsibility in young people, which is automatically a discouragement of irresponsibility, to be included. However, perhaps we cannot do that today.

Last year, at the request of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, I carried out a review of play provision throughout the country. We visited every part of England and the devolved Administrations undertook consultations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. I cannot speak for those three parts of the consultation but in every part of the country that I visited, people who were responsible for providing play expressed concern about the problem that we are considering.
We concluded that far too many children have nowhere safe to play. They either do not get out to play or they play in places where they are not safe. They are either deprived of the pleasure and stimulation of playing with their friends or they put themselves in danger. That is bad for them and for their parents' peace of mind. We recognise that play cannot be made risk free. Learning to judge risk is one of the benefits that children get from play. Generations of children have survived bumps and scrapes. Children have not changed; society has. That hinders children's play. The blame culture, the increase in litigation and consequent rises in the cost of insuring playgrounds make life more expensive and difficult for voluntary organisations and councils. I said at the time:

"It is my personal view that Parliament needs to give special statutory protection to play organisations" and perhaps

"to help with their insurance problem."

That is why I got involved with the Bill.

It is no good saying that the problem does not exist, and that it is a modern urban myth or perception and not reality. I say in parenthesis that it is my understanding that part of the new Labour creed is that tackling reality is sometimes not sufficient—the perception must be tackled, too. We are trying to tackle the reality in the hope that it will change the perception. Nothing is currently changing the perception. The debate or something from the Better Regulation Task Force are unlikely to get much public attention whereas the next ludicrous court case will. Perhaps we would do better to listen more closely to the people who are trying to provide services to their local communities than to the Better Regulation Task Force, which does not perceive a problem, presumably because its members are not in much danger when they sit around their table, discussing the issue.

We have received representations from charity groups. I understand from some groups that representations against the Bill were helped by a few judicious telephone calls from, shall we say, one or two headquarters. One body, which purported to represent a group of voluntary organisations, wrote to me, and I rang the boss who had signed the letter to ask whether he had consulted the organisations that he represented. He replied, "Ah no, but I'm going to check with them now." That falls within no definition of consultation.

One of the worries seemed to be that the Bill applied only to volunteering, not to the public sector or possibly the commercial sector, and that that would somehow undermine the reputation and concept of volunteering and voluntary organisations and suggest that they did not have professional standards. I appreciate that everyone is trying to raise the standard of performance by volunteers but I believe that juxtaposing "volunteering" and "professionalism" makes for a bit of an oxymoron. We shall never get away from that unless we have "professional volunteers" in future. Perhaps there are one or two around nowadays.

The hon. Member for Canterbury mentioned a couple of spectacular cases. In some of the cases that have reached the Court of Appeal or the House of Lords, the final court has said, "We agree. This should not have come to court", and the claim has been rejected. That is a big deal for those involved in the case or those who feel that they might be involved in such a case. Who wants to go through several years of turmoil and stress, huge amounts of time, trouble and possibly money to prove that they acted reasonably and exercised reasonable skill? We will allow that to happen if we do not do something to change the law. In an interview or a newspaper article, Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, the Master of the Rolls, broadly said that the matter needs to be clarified. We are trying to clarify the law.

The Bill offers protection against recklessness by people in supervisory positions. It would punish or allow for the punishment of people who do not take reasonable care or exercise reasonable skill. It would protect those in the volunteers' care and the volunteers. Whether we are considering reality or perception, we owe it to thousands of volunteers throughout the country to change the law. We believe that it needs changing; lawyers say that it simply needs clarifying. Our proposal clarifies the law, does not increase bureaucracy and should be better for everybody. I do not understand why it cannot be accepted. If the Government have a few minor worries about the wording, there are plenty of lawyers in the Lords to make a few amendments there.