‘Nothing will bring James back’: Why we must change the law on death by dangerous driving - Claire Perry MP
Agnes Chambre
| PoliticsHome
Following the death of a constituent, Conservative MP Claire Perry spoke to Agnes Chambre about why the penalties for dangerous driving must change.
Last year, James Gilbey died after he was hit by a car being driven by two men racing each other at 90 miles per hour, in a 40 mph zone, through the streets of Leeds. The perpetrators fled the scene, stopping only to pick up their number plates, and went to ground for three days, burning their clothes so nobody could find them out.
They ended up being given a tariff of eight years which was automatically cut to four when the pair pleaded guilty. James’ father, Major Gilbey, came to Claire Perry’s constituency surgery earlier this year to ask for her help.
The Tory MP says she was struck by the army physical training instructor telling her how he watched the families of the drivers celebrate because of their light sentence, while he was facing a life sentence of the loss of his son.
Ms Perry recalls that on hearing the story, it was a case where she just thought “yes there's something not quite right in the current system". So, now that she is no longer a minister, she has decided it is a good opportunity to try and argue for a change in the law from the backbenches.
She has scheduled a Westminster Hall debate to attempt to make the change, and will ask the Ministry of Justice for three “simple things”.
First, the Tory MP wants the worst cases of death by dangerous driving to be tried as manslaughter, the current maximum sentence for which is life. Alternative she wants a life sentence to be possible as the maximum penalty for Level 1 offences.
“If you read the definition of involuntary manslaughter, which is that you didn't mean to kill somebody but you behaved so negligently or unlawfully the death happened. How is that not a description of what happened to Major Gilbey's son?”
Secondly, she wants the Government to urgently complete the review of guidelines for sentencing in this area, promised in 2014, to make sure there are fewer loopholes in the law that reduce current prison sentences.
“You can have up to 14 years imprisonment for this worst kind of offence but very few people are actually given those tariffs and there's a whole series of things you can get points off for, like a reduction in tariffs if you're not drunk or drugged at the scene – in this case the perpetrators fled the scene so nobody could find out.”
Finally, she wants to end the offer of an automatic reduction in sentence for a guilty plea or automatic release on licence for Level 1 offences. She believes these reductions should be at the discretion of the courts.
“It just seems odd to me that you automatically get a reduction in tariffs by pleading guilty – and in this case one of the two guys refused to plead guilty for racing his car until his mate was convicted of it, and yet he walked away with a reduction in tariff of a third. So I want an end to these automatic loopholes, I think they should be at the judge's discretion.”
The former transport minister believes the judge was “completely hamstrung” by a whole series of automatic sentencing guidelines which meant he was only able to send the men to prison for four years.
She says the law should reflect the crime, and explains that not every death by dangerous driving should be treated the same.
“There's a world of difference so that's why having different categories is the right thing to do. Clearly it's a massive tragedy if somebody loses their life over a driver behaving carelessly, but sometimes the sorts of cases we see are people who have multiple driving convictions. In this case the chap driving the car had 39 convictions, several of which were for driving offences, some were convictions for providing class A drugs.
“These were people who had a different view on what driving responsibly is. Ultimately, you get in a car, you're driving at 90 in a 40 mile an hour area, you are in charge of a lethal weapon.”
Ms Perry is optimistic about the chances of the law being changed; after the debate today, she and Major Gilbey are going to meet Justice Secretary Liz Truss and make their case to her personally.
“The Justice Secretary completely gets the logic of these things,” Ms Perry says. “We will have a better sense after the debate but it appears to me that there's an appetite to change, so yes I am optimistic that we will see some good results.”
“Nothing brings James back, nothing makes his family any less devastated, but it's about what we can do to stop this happening again.”
