No Vietnamese interpreter

http://www.shieldsgazette.com/news/crime/vietnam-pair-deny-drug-farm-charges-1-5511392
20 March 2013

"Dung Van Doan and Van Gian Hoang, both 32, of Croydon Road, Newcastle, had their case heard at South Tyneside Magistrates’ Court – despite the absence of an interpreter and with neither man being able to speak English. 
[…] 
No interpreter was able to be booked to translate for the defendants on the day. 
Mr Jones told the court that he had been able to arrange a three-way conversation between himself, the two defendants and an interpreter prior to the case to make them aware of how it was due to progress. 
But he admitted neither of the men, who are both remanded in custody, would be able to understand the proceedings of the court."

PQs - 19 March 2013

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2013-03-19a.790.5

19 March 2013

Topical Questions

Oral Answers to Questions — Justice

Grahame Morris (Easington, Labour)

I thank the Justice Secretary for his reply, but may I draw his attention to the Public Accounts Committee’s damning report on the Ministry of Justice’s handling of the court translators contract?

Again it is a case of being penny wise and pound foolish. Two hundreds cases in England and Wales had to be cancelled, costing the public purse millions of pounds. Experienced and trained translators are still refusing to work with Capita, which was awarded the contract. Will the Minister, as part of his action plan, rescue our justice service and abandon this failed contract?

Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald, Conservative)

I hear what the hon. Gentleman says, but we are working very closely with Capita. Our success rate is good, but it can, of course, improve, and it will improve. The British taxpayer will save some £15 million per annum as a result of this contract, and I am fully convinced that the new contract will be more accountable, transparent and effective than the old one.

Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent, Labour)

The failed contract with ALS/Capita is a year old. Does the Minister agree that her claims of massive savings

cannot be demonstrated, given that the Ministry refuses to publish details of how much is spent off-contract to purchase interpreting services?

Helen Grant (Maidstone and The Weald, Conservative)

I think that I have made the position clear, but I will repeat it. The contract is operating at a very good success rate, but further improvements can be made. Having worked as a solicitor in the old regime, I can say that it certainly was not perfect. I am satisfied that the new regime will not only save the taxpayer a considerable amount of money, but be more effective, transparent and accountable than the old regime.

Ministry doublespeak

http://www.lawgazette.co.uk/opinion/letters/ministry-doublespeak 
18 March 2013 by Malcolm Fowler

Ministry doublespeak

The embarrassing court interpreter outsourcing saga continues. Courts minister Helen Grant repeats the same old mantra of ‘a dramatic improvement in the interpreter contract’.

Who says, exactly? The Ministry of Justice has in all conscience been asked this often enough. When its responses are shorn of Sir Humphrey-esque verbiage and doublespeak, the answer seems increasingly clear: Capita itself. Its reports and statistics, it is shrewdly suspected, are regurgitated uncritically by the ministry. After all, the MoJ keeps no statistics of its own; we have its word for that.

How convenient for Capita and its shareholders. It can, with relative impunity, assert that everything in the garden is lovely while we at the coalface know how absurd a claim that is. Here, I mean advocates, court personnel and the judiciary.

Malcolm Fowler, Dennings, Tipton

Northampton judge brands interpreting service “hopelessly incompetent”

http://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/news/crime/northampton-judge-brands-interpreting-service-hopelessly-incompetent-1-4898681 
14/03/2013
 

Northampton judge brands interpreting service “hopelessly incompetent”

A top judge has labelled the company which provides interpreters to Northampton Crown Court, as “hopelessly incompetent”.

Judge Richard Bray was speaking at a hearing for Thanh Van Ha, a 20-year-old from Vietnam, who has admitted producing cannabis at an address in Falcutt Way, Kingsthorpe, Northampton.

No interpreter had been booked for the hearing, despite one being requested on January 13, the court was told.

Judge Bray described the situation as a “farce”, adjourning the case due to the fact that Van Ha could not understand any of the proceedings.

The judge asked for a representative from translation company, Capita Tl, to be summoned to the court to give an explanation.

He said: “They are hopelessly incompetent. They are holding up court business day after day after day.

“This is an absurd waste of time. It is an absolute farce. It costs £850 a day to keep this defendant in prison.”

The Ministry of Justice controversially privatised court interpreting in August 2011, awarding a five-year contract to Applied Language Services. The company was later sold by founder, Gavin Wheeldon, to Capita TI.

The contract has been fraught with problems, including accusations of cutting mileage rates for interpreters, and recruiting unqualified staff when some qualified interpreters refused to sign up with the firm.

Locally, there have been several instances in Northampton Crown Court when interpreters have not being provided when requested.

At one such case last month, barrister Dhaneshwar Sharma interpreted for two Romanian defendants in the absence of an interpreter.

Mirela Watson, an Essex-based Romanian interpreter, said other issues nationally have included a trial collapsing because an under-qualified interpreter failed to interpret properly, and another where a crown court judge recognised an interpreter as a convicted prostitute.

She also claimed Capita had taken interpreters from the National Register of Public Service Interpreters (NRPSI) database without their permission.

She said: “The Ministry of Justice decided, without consulting any organisation of interpreters, to outsource to ALS.

“We have been monitoring the situation and boycotting Capita. The pay is appalling. They are not paying travel time or expenses - sometimes you are lucky if you are in net [profit].

“Capita said they could cover the whole of the UK. There is a national database of 2,500 interpreters, and they started off with only 300.”

A spokesman for Capita Group said: “Capita acknowledges there have been challenges regarding the delivery of this contract and the business is investing in improving its performance.

No interpreters - Cases adjourned

http://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/10277651.Litter_louts___Pay_up_or_face_tougher_fines_/ 
12th March 2013 
"One case was withdrawn, while another was adjourned so a Bulgarian interpreter could attend." 

http://www.burtonmail.co.uk/News/Case-delayed-against-illegal-fag-duo-after-Mail-probe-20130312121723.htm 
12 March 2013 
"However, the case has been adjourned for an interpreter to attend."

Ministerial Statement - 12 March 2013

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wms/?id=2013-03-12a.5WS.4

12 March 2013

Translation into Foreign Languages

Communities and Local Government

Eric Pickles (The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government; Brentwood and Ongar, Conservative)

In February 2012, I published my Department’s approach to integration, “Creating the Conditions for Integration” and in December 2012, I published “50 ways to save: examples of sensible savings in local government”. The latter recommends:

“Stop translating documents into foreign languages: Only publish documents in English. Translation undermines community cohesion by encouraging segregation. Similarly, do not give community grants to organisations which promote segregation or division in society”.”

I would like to reaffirm my Department’s approach to the use of translation and interpretation services for foreign languages by local authorities.

Some local authorities translate a range of documents and other materials into languages spoken by their residents, and provide interpretation services. While there may be

rare occasions in which this is entirely necessary—for instance in emergency situations—I am concerned that such services are in many cases being provided unnecessarily because of a misinterpretation of equality or human rights legislation. Such translation services have an unintentional, adverse impact on integration by reducing the incentive for some migrant communities to learn English and are wasteful where many members of these communities already speak or understand English.

They are also very expensive and a poor use of taxpayers’ money. Independent research has suggested that local authorities alone spend nearly £20 million a year translating a variety of documents. Across the wider public sector, it has been estimated that translation and interpretation costs reached over £100 million in 2006.

Of course, local authorities must comply with the duties set out in the Equalities Act 2010, including the duty not to discriminate and the public sector equality duty. But this is not a legal duty to translate documents into foreign languages. Even if publishing only in English could put some people at a particular disadvantage, such a policy may be justified if local authorities can demonstrate that the integration and cost concerns pursue a legitimate aim and outweigh any disadvantage. The equality duty does not require a particular outcome, merely that public authorities consider all the relevant factors.

Obviously, there are broader challenges with communication with groups who may have poor levels of literacy or learning difficulties. But this can be addressed by use of plain English, easy read versions of documents and using pictures instead of translation. My Department will be practising what we preach in the materials we are producing as part of our Fire Kills fire safety education campaign.

Stopping the automatic use of translation and interpretation services into foreign languages will provide further incentive for all migrant communities to learn English, which is the basis for an individual’s ability to progress in British society. It will promote cohesion and better community relations. And it will help councils make sensible savings, at a time when every bit of the public sector needs to do its bit to pay off the deficit left by the last Administration.

For the avoidance of doubt, this statement effectively replaces the Department’s “Guidance for Local Authorities on Translation of Publications” published under the last Administration in 2007.

Judge's fury as justice is lost in translation

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/383219/Judge-s-fury-as-justice-is-lost-in-translation 
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.