This Bill creates two new offences in Clause 56: child criminal exploitation and cuckooing. These are important steps. They recognise forms of exploitation that front-line workers, police officers and charities have been grappling with for years. However, the Bill currently does only half the job. It recognises the exploitation, but not the victim. When vulnerable children or exploited adults are used as tools by criminal networks, the criminal justice system should not compound their suffering by treating them as willing participants. These amendments I have tabled would complete the logic of the Bill and ensure that the law protects those who need protection most.

My speech on Day 3 of Committee Stage: Amendments 232A and 262A are in my name. I have also signed Amendment 232, in the name of Lord Hampton, and Amendment 263, in the name of Lord Randall of Uxbridge. Lord Hampton, has given an excellent explanation of his amendment, so I will just say that I agree with him.

Both my amendments provide a defence for victims of child criminal exploitation and cuckooing who are coerced into committing offences. Both amendments have a simple purpose: to ensure that victims of exploitation are not treated as criminals for acts they were compelled to commit. The amendments are supported by academics and charities such as the Children’s Society.

The Bill, as it comes before the House, creates two new offences in Clause 56: child criminal exploitation and cuckooing. These are important steps. They recognise forms of exploitation that front-line workers, police officers and charities have been grappling with for years. However, the Bill currently does only half the job. It recognises the exploitation, but not the victim. Unlike the long-established offences of modern slavery and human trafficking, these new offences do not come with a bespoke defence for victims who commit unlawful acts as a direct result of their exploitation. Unless a victim can prove duress—a notoriously high bar—their only option is to argue that what happened to them also amounted to slavery, servitude, forced labour or trafficking under the Modern Slavery Act. That is a legal contortion, and it is simply impossible for many victims.

It leads to outcomes that I do not believe this House would wish to endorse. For example, a child forced by older criminals to store drugs or weapons, a young person threatened into carrying out low-level offending under fear of violence, or someone whose home has been taken over by a gang who is then compelled to assist in their criminal activities would all be vulnerable to finding themselves before a court, even though their exploiters are the ones truly at fault.

We have been here before. When Parliament passed the Modern Slavery Act in 2015, we accepted, rightly, that victims sometimes commit offences because they see no realistic alternative. Section 45 of that Act created a defence for those victims, carefully limited, and subject to important exclusions. It has not opened any floodgates. It has provided protection only where the courts are satisfied that the offence was the direct consequence of the exploitation, and that a reasonable person in the same situation and with the same relevant characteristics would have acted in the same way.

These amendments have the aim of applying the same principle to the new offences that we are creating today. The amendment on child criminal exploitation mirrors the structure of Section 45. It would not excuse all behaviour and would not allow serious offences listed in Schedule 4. It would apply only where the prosecution cannot disprove that the child acted because they were compelled to do so, that the compulsion arose directly from their exploitation and that a reasonable child of the same age, sex and vulnerabilities would have seen no realistic alternative. In other words, this is a defence grounded in both common sense and compassion.

The same is true of the amendment concerning victims of cuckooing. Anyone familiar with this phenomenon —and many police forces now are—knows that victims have often been threatened, groomed, manipulated or assaulted. They may be obliged to let their home be used for criminal activity, and they may then be forced to play a role within that activity. The amendment would make clear that, where the compulsion arises directly from the cuckooing, those victims should not be criminalised for acts they were compelled to perform.

These defences would not apply in most cases. They would apply only when the court is satisfied that the offending was the direct result of the exploiter’s conduct, not incidental. They offer a fair and proportionate safeguard. They would also prevent the injustice, indeed the absurdity, of Parliament recognising exploitation on the one hand, while punishing its victims on the other. When vulnerable children or exploited adults are used as tools by criminal networks, the criminal justice system should not compound their suffering by treating them as willing participants. These amendments would complete the logic of the Bill and would ensure that the law protects those who need protection most. I hope that the Minister will look at these amendments and see the validity of what I have explained.

Debate available here