10 March 2013 by Ted Jeory
Judge's fury as justice is
lost in translation
Britain’s
creaking court system has
been forced to use a Polish call centre to help run trials and deportation
hearings involving foreign criminals.
The Sunday Express has discovered that staff based
in a Krakow office block have been put in charge of booking interpreters for
legal proceedings under an outsourcing deal that barristers say is “wrecking”
justice.
Trials are collapsing and are routinely delayed due
to mistakes centring on a contract between Capita Translating and Interpreting
and the Ministry of Justice.
The Government claims the deal saves money but
Britain’s top barrister, Michael Turner QC, who chairs the Criminal Bar
Association, says the claim is a “con” and that in reality it is a costly
“disaster”.
Only four days ago, Judge Richard Bray branded
Capita “hopelessly incompetent” after he was unable to sentence and expedite
deportation proceedings against a Vietnamese drug king because no interpreter
arrived at Northampton Crown Court.
In some trials, interpreters supplied by Capita
cannot even speak fluent English, lawyers say.
In one trial a barrister was left to do the
translating himself because he happened to speak Romanian.
The contract has been the focus of controversy for
more than a year and was condemned as “shambolic” by the Justice Select
Committee in January.
A critical report by the National Audit Office in
September 2012 failed to mention the Polish link and not even the chairman of
the Commons committee, Sir Alan Beith, was aware of it until told by the Sunday
Express on Friday.
He said his committee would investigate, adding:
“When we’ve had a contract that has been as shambolic as this one has been, we
are entitled to know whether having this call centre in Krakow has actually
added to the problems.”
The contract, worth £90million over five years, was
initially awarded in 2011 to Applied Language Solutions, a company founded by
former Dragon’s Den reject Gavin Wheeldon who later admitted he had been
ill-prepared for the task.
His recruitment of interpreters was so chaotic that
a pet dog was added to the company’s register, while a cat, described by its
owner as an expert in “cat language”, was invited to an interview following a
joke application.
ALS was taken over at the end of 2011 by Capita and
by February last year, requests for interpreters from UK court staff where
being routed through Krakow. The 500 Polish staff are meant to match those
requests with translators on Capita’s register who are then called or e-mailed
with offers of work.
One Capita registered interpreter said
communication with Krakow was “not efficient” and that it was sometimes
difficult to understand the Poles’ English. She said working for Capita had
been a “dreadful experience”.
The company has slashed pay and travel expenses to
the point where for many it makes no financial sense to accept jobs. It now
faces a significant shortage of translators due to a boycott and it is
currently advertising for experts in Akan, Armenian, Malayam, Tigre and
Galician.
A survey by Professional Interpreters for Justice
umbrella group suggests 81 per cent of interpreters are refusing to work for
the company. It says that has led to a lowering of standards, resulting in poor
quality interpreters in court.
Michael Turner QC said it risked seeing foreign
criminals escape justice. He said Government claims that the contact was saving
£15million a year were an “illusion” born of creative accounting.
“This is merely one example of where the Government
pretends it is saving money but in reality it is not,” he said. “It is wrecking
the system and screw-ups are now endemic. It is a con on the taxpayer and a con
on the victims of crime.
“The problem is that interpreters do not turn up or
when they do turn up they do not speak the right language or they do not speak
English.
“Capita in order to make their profits screw wages
to the floor, the good translators refuse to work for that, so they produce
translators that cannot translate and cannot speak English, and then because
they have not got enough translators on their books they have to outsource, so
they spend millions more on outsourcing. So the savings are a complete
illusion.
“It costs £110 a minute to run a court room with a
jury, so if an interpreter doesn’t turn up for half a day or an hour the
oncosts are huge and the Government ignore that. If you want proper
interpreting services these are professional people and you have to pay them
properly. It is as simple as that.
“All politicians are interested in is producing a
headline saying ‘we’ve saved you X millions of pounds’. They are not interested
in building a structure which is going to last over time.”
A spokeswoman for Capita said: “Employees in Krakow
help Capita Translation and Interpreting to locate interpreters for bookings
but have no direct contact with court staff.
“Our interpreters are qualified to at least the
minimum standards required to provide services to the Criminal Justice System
and many are qualified well beyond this.
“All interpreters have been appropriately vetted in
line with the requirements of the framework. Any complaints received about
interpreters are investigated thoroughly.”
Regarding the case in Northampton last Wednesday,
she said the interpreter had cancelled his appointment two days earlier and
Capita had been trying to find a replacement.
Court Minister Helen Grant said Capita has been
making “dramatic improvements” but added: “However we are aware further
improvement is still needed, we are monitoring the contract on a daily basis
and demanding further steps from the contractor.”
Her spokeswoman said it was a matter for Capita
where to base its call centre.
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