Times Online examines the small print of Tony Blair's final legislative programme, as contained in today's Queen's Speech
Immigration controls
A new Border and Immigration Bill will seek to bolster laws to tackle immigration crime and make it easier to deport foreign law-breakers. The foreign prisoners fiasco earlier this year - which led to the sacking Charles Clarke - highlighted a host of shortcomings in the system.
The legislation will make it clear that there is an "automatic presumption" that foreigners who commit serious crimes should be deported. The appeals system will be simplified to allow deportation to take place more quickly.
Immigration officers will also get stronger powers, including new powers of arrest, and extended powers to seize cash and assets. The legislation will widen the way the government can take biometrics - such as fingerprints - from foreign nationals.
Crime and victims of crime
A new Criminal Justice Bill will include a host of tough new powers which the Government insists will put victims at the heart of the law and order system. The Queen’s Speech said that it would be "the next stage of reform" which would bolster the powers of the police and probation services to protect the public from violent offenders and anti-social louts.
The Bill will include measures promised by John Reid, the Home Secretary, in July, including raising the maximum penalty for carrying a knife from two years’ imprisonment to four. It will expand use of "conditional cautions", which allow offenders to be handed a punishment by prosecutors without being taken to court.
New "violent offender orders" will be created to impose restrictions on dangerous criminals even after they are freed from jail. The orders have been dubbed "super Asbos" - and in extreme cases they could last for the rest of an offender’s life.
Other measures will include changes to the Court of Appeal’s test for overturning a conviction. In July, Mr Reid said that he planned to change the law so the courts did not quash convictions on technicalities when an offender was "plainly guilty". This aspect is sure to attract vociferous opposition from civil liberties campaigners and lawyers’ groups.
The new legislation will bring compensation for those who are wrongly convicted of a crime into line with the sums paid to victims - capped at a maximum of £500,000.
Controlling gangsters
A powerful new tool to restrict gangsters who cannot be prosecuted for lack of evidence will be created by the Organised Crime Bill, which will put forward plans for a "criminal control order" based on the regime currently used to deal with terrorists. Formally known as serious crime prevention orders (SCPOs), the measures would be issued by the civil courts against suspected underworld leaders.
The Home Office, which calculates that organised crime costs the country £20 billion a year, has said that police have identified "over 1,000 individuals of interest" who could face the new orders. At present, many of these "untouchables" regard themselves as above the law. They cannot be taken to court because they successfully hide their activities, and witnesses are too scared to speak out.
The proposed SCPO would work like an anti-social behaviour order or a control order. Conditions would be imposed on an individual such as a curfew, limiting contact with other people, access to bank accounts, mobile phones and the internet. It could even specify how much cash a suspect was allowed to carry. The orders could also be imposed on a business that was suspected of helping criminals, restricting its financial dealings and other operations. Breaching an SCPO would be a criminal offence punishable by up to five years’ imprisonment.
Privatised probation
An Offender Management Bill will allow private companies and voluntary groups to take over some of the Probation Service’s work. It will enable the Home Secretary to try to raise standards by commissioning services from the "best available provider". Mr Reid has already confirmed that he will contract out about one third of the service’s budget within 18 months.
A previous attempt to bring privatisation to the probation sector had to be dropped due to massive opposition but Mr Reid insists that further reform was "non-negotiable". He has highlighted the cases of City financier John Monckton and mother-of-one Naomi Bryant, who were both murdered by offenders under probation supervision.
Road pricing
A national road pricing scheme, with drivers having to pay to use certain routes, moved a step closer with the announcement of a draft Road Traffic Bill. The Bill will look at the scope for developing a national scheme for road pricing and will be published next year.
A number of areas have already been earmarked for trials of road pricing by the end of 2009. The new Bill will give local authorities greater freedom to implement congestion-combating schemes and £200 million is being made available to help support innovative local transport packages. If the pilot schemes prove successful, a national scheme, with drivers possibly paying around £1.34 a mile to drive on the busiest roads in the rush-hour, could be in place by the middle of the next decade.
Global warming
The Government says that the science on climate change is now indisputable and urgent action is needed. The Climate Change Bill put the Government’s long-term goal to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 60 per cent by 2050 into statute. The Government would also consider appropriate interim targets - although it is opposed by calls from environmentalists, backed by some Labour MPs, to set annual targets.
The Bill also proposes an independent body - the Carbon Committee - to work with Government to reduce emissions and improved monitoring and reporting action.
Mental health
The Mental Health Bill will amend existing legislation to ensure that people with serious mental problems receive the treatment they need to protect them and others from harm. Changes will include the introduction of supervised treatment in the community for some patients discharged from compulsory treatment in hospital.
Supervised Community Treatment would be designed to ensure patients continue to take medication following discharge and prevent relapses. Every year, around 55 to 60 murders are committed by mental health patients and the provisions announced today are intended to make such tragedies less frequent.
Free bus travel
Older and disabled people will be able to travel free on buses anywhere in England at off-peak times from April 2008 under legislation announced in the Queen’s Speech. The Concessionary Bus Travel Bill will implement Gordon Brown’s announcement in this year’s Budget about extending the existing deal for the disabled and those aged 60 or more.
Child support
The troubled Child Support Agency is finally to be abolished. The Child Support Bill will bring down the curtain on the CSA and replace it with a new, smaller body intended to provide a simpler and more effective way of collecting child maintenance.
The Bill will end the requirement that all lone parents with care responsibilities who claim state benefits - mostly mothers - must also submit a claim to receive child maintenance. The Bill will also include tough new enforcement powers to deal with parents who repeatedly fail to pay maintenance, such as the suspension of passports and the imposition of curfews.
Embryo research
The Government is to set out plans for a single regulatory body to oversee the development and use of human reproductive technologies. Proposals to set up the Regulatory Authority for Tissue and Embryos (RATE) will be included a draft Tissues and Embryo Authority (RATE) Bill for pre-legislative scrutiny next year. The new body will replace the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority and the Human Tissue Authority.
Ministers have already made clear that they intend to retain the basic components of the existing system as the bedrock for the new legislation. These enshrine the special status of the human embryo outside the body while permitting embryo research within defined limits. The ban on human "cloning" will remain, as will the principle of donor anonymity.
Incapacity benefit
The Government is to press ahead with controversial reforms of incapacity benefit tabled in the last Parliament,. The changes, replacing the old benefit with a tougher Employment and Support Allowance, are included in the Welfare Reform Bill, which was introduced into the Commons in July this year and carried over to the new session when it failed to reach the statute book before the end of the parliamentary year.
The Department for Work and Pensions says that the reforms are intended to help an estimated 1 million people who want to work in their efforts to get off incapacity benefit and into jobs. But critics say it could lead to disabled and sick people being coerced into taking on work they are not fit enough to do.
The Welfare Reform Bill, which applies to the whole of the UK, also introduces changes to housing benefit designed to combat fraud by giving local authorities greater powers to investigate and prosecute.
Judicial reform
The Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Bill is to include moves to make people from a wider spectrum of backgrounds eligible for judicial posts. It will also set out a new statutory framework for tribunals - said to be the biggest change to the system for almost 50 years.
The Bill is also to feature measures to "clarify and consolidate" the law relating to bailiffs, including changes to the regulatory regime for private-sector bailiffs, aiming to stamp out malpractice and abuse of the system. The legislation will set out moves to enable creditors to enforce civil court judgements more effectively.
Red tape
Ministers are to set out plans for a new body to cut the burden of red tape on business, it was announced today in the Queen’s Speech. A draft bill to establish a Local Better Regulation Office (LBRO) will be published in the new Parliamentary session.
The aim of the new body will be to encourage trading standards and environmental health services to adopt a "risk-based" approach to inspections, focusing their efforts on "rogue" traders. It will also seek to promote consistent approaches to regulation across all local authorities,
Further education
Heads of failing colleges will be sacked under plans for new powers to tackle poor quality further education - even principals at colleges that are merely "not improving" will face dismissal. The tougher sanctions will be part of a new Further Education and Training Bill, announced in the Queen’s Speech.
A Government spokesman said that the Bill would "establish an effective intervention regime" where colleges are "unsatisfactory or not improving". This would give the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) a "new duty to direct removal of principals and senior post holders". The LSC would take on the Education Secretary’s powers to intervene in failing colleges under the plan. Between 2001 and 2004, inspectors judged 10%-14% of colleges as inadequate.
Council powers
There will be more powers for the Mayor of London and local councils in two Bills flagged in the Queen’s speech. The Local Government Bill aims to reduce the amount of "top-down" control from Westminster, and strengthen leadership systems within councils. It will feature moves to devolve powers for making by-laws to local authorities, and enable their enforcement through greater use of fixed penalty notices.
Meanwhile, the Greater London Authority Bill aims to bolster the mayor’s leadership in order to "meet future challenges" faced by the capital. These challenges include the staging of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, providing more homes for Londoners, having a more strategic approach to planning, and combating climate change,
Later pensions
The Queen's Speech confirmed plans to raise the state pension age to 68 for both men and women and relink pensions to earnings. The proposed legislation will raise the state pension age gradually to 68 by 2046 in response to increasing longevity of life. According to the Government, this would ensure fairness between generations while at the same time secure the long-term financial stability and sustainability of the pension system.
Other parts of the proposed Pensions Bill are aimed at modernising existing rules to make it fairer to women and carers. As such, the number of years it takes to build a full basic State Pension will fall from 44 years for men and 39 years for women to 30 years for everyone. According to the Government, by 2010 70 per cent of women reaching State Pension Age would have a full basic pension compared to only 30 per cent today. This proportion would increase to more than 90 per cent by 2025.
Rogue estate agents
Estate agents will have to join redress schemes under legislation which aims to step up consumer protection. Regulation of estate agents will be strengthened to make them keep records of their activities open for inspection by trading standards officers, according to the Consumers, Estate Agents and Redress Bill.
Jury-free trials
The Government is to make a new attempt to get rid of juries in some serious fraud trials. Ministers believe too many people accused of major fraud escape punishment because complex and long-running trials - sometimes running into years - are ill-suited to the jury process. Officials said that the new Fraud (Trials Without Jury) Bill will "prevent evasion of justice".
Tesco law
A Legal Services Bill will introduce the so-called "Tesco law", permitting outside companies to own law firms for the first time. Until now, solicitors’ or barristers’ chambers could only be owned by the lawyers themselves as partners.
The Bill will also strip the legal professional bodies of the ability to handle complaints against their members, setting up an independent Office for Legal Complaints. Another new body - the Legal Services Board - will be created to oversee the regulation of the legal profession, while day-to-day control will remain with existing bodies such as the Bar Council and the Law Society. The Lord Chancellor has indicated he will allow lawyers and other professionals such as accountants to go into business together for the first time.
No terror Bill
The Queen's Speech specifically referred to the battle against terrorism and ministers have indicated that a giant Bill bringing together all UK anti-terror legislation may be on the cards. It will have to wait until John Reid and his department completes a review of the country's anti-terror capabilities.
This Bill could also seek to reintroduce the proposal to lift the limit for holding terror suspects without charge from 28 days to 90. Moves to review the outright ban on using "intercept" evidence, such as from phone taps, could also feature.
