The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Karen Bradley)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi) on securing today’s debate and I wish her a happy birthday. I hope she will have some remaining time this evening to enjoy it.
Hate crime of any kind, directed against any community, race or religion has absolutely no place in our society. I reiterate my message from last week: this Government are utterly committed to tackling hate crime, and we will provide extra funding to do so. We will also take steps to boost reporting of hate crime and support victims, issue new Crown Prosecution Service guidance to prosecutors on racially aggravated crime, provide a new fund for protective security measures at potentially vulnerable institutions and offer additional funding to community organisations so that they can tackle hate crime.
I do not propose to repeat the many points discussed last week. Instead, I shall reflect on the comments made today and answer the questions put to me. It is worth repeating, however, that the scenes and behaviour we have seen in recent days, including offensive graffiti and abuse hurled at people because they are members of ethnic minorities or because of their nationality, are despicable and shameful. The examples cited today across the House show that this is a real problem affecting our constituents up and down the country, including in my own constituency of Staffordshire, Moorlands. I know of comments and abuse that have been directed at Polish friends in my constituency —people who have lived and worked there, who have contributed to our communities, and whom we value and want to protect. We must stand together against such hate crime, and ensure that it is stamped out.
The right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) gave the House some statistics. Let me now give some statistics from True Vision, the police online reporting portal, and from the letter to which he referred. Between 23 and 29 June, 331 reports of hate incidents were made to True Vision. When compared to the weekly average of 63 reports in 2016, that shows a 525% increase. However, although those figures undoubtedly seem shocking, I urge people to be cautious about drawing conclusions from them, because they represent a snapshot of reports rather than definite statistics. We should bear in mind that the extensive media coverage of hate crime will have increased awareness of True Vision, and may have encouraged increased reporting—which we welcome. We should also bear in mind that some of the reports may relate to non-criminal hate incidents, and that some may be duplicated. As I have said, I urge caution because this is an early snapshot, but we nevertheless take it very seriously.
The right hon. Gentleman referred to figures included in a letter from the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, which showed that there had been 599 incidents of race hate crime between 24 June and 2 July in the Metropolitan police area. As he said, that is an average of 67 per day. However, it is worth noting that the average daily number before 24 June was 44 per day, and that the number of reports normally varies between 25 and 50 per day. We are seeing an increase in reporting of hate crime, which I greatly welcome, but when we have definitive figures, we will need to establish whether it is an underlying increase in prevalence or an increase in reporting. We need to know how the figures break down.
Much of the reporting of hate incidents has been through social media, including reports of xenophobic abuse of eastern Europeans in the United Kingdom, as well as attacks against members of the Muslim community. However, we have also seen messages of support and friendship on social media. The hon. Member for Bolton South East referred to an incident on a tram in Manchester. I am sure that the whole House will join me in commending those we have seen stand up for what is right, upholding the shared values that bring us together as a country.
When we debated this matter last week, the hon. Member for Belfast East (Gavin Robinson) asked us to ensure that the hate crime action plan did not include the words “tolerate” and “tolerance”, and he was right to do so. We cannot “tolerate” incidents such as these, because they are not acceptable. We cannot say, “You received 40 messages of hate on Twitter today, so if you receive 50 tomorrow that is worse, but if you receive only 30, that is OK.” We cannot tolerate any such crimes. We must make it clear that they will not be tolerated, that they need to be reported, and that the police must take them seriously.
The hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) made a couple of interventions about social media and online messages, and I agree with much of what he said. What is illegal offline is illegal online. We have seen some prosecutions for online hatred, but there is no doubt that more needs to be done. We have been talking to social media companies, and I am pleased to say that the European Commission and IT companies recently announced a code of conduct on illegal online hate speech. We must now work with those companies to ensure that hateful content online is removed and perpetrators are brought to justice, but we must also recognise the scale of the challenge. Facebook receives 4 billion posts a day—4 billion pieces of content are uploaded on to it each day, globally. The task is therefore very difficult. More responsibility must be taken by the social media companies, and I am pressing them on exactly that matter. However, we must also recognise that this is something that we must change in society as a whole.
The hon. Member for Bolton South East talked about hate speech in the media, and again there is no place for hate speech anywhere in society. Freedom of speech is a vital cornerstone of our society, but everybody must remember they have responsibilities not to spread hatred or fear. Anyone using freedom of speech as an excuse to break the law should face the full force of the law.
Karen Bradley
The hon. Lady asked about Leveson, too, and I note all the points she makes. The press have a responsibility, but she will know there are still some outstanding cases, and we do need to complete them before we can move on.
The hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth talked about how this is not a new kind of incident, and probably all of us experienced this through the general election campaign. Some of my posters were defaced and I received the most vile abuse. I have young children. This is why I am not on Twitter any more—because, frankly, they do not need to have that coming into our kitchen on a Sunday morning over breakfast; it is just not necessary.
The point is that this is not new. I went to the launch of the latest Tell MAMA report last week. It shows a 326% increase in 2015—compared with 2014—in street-based anti-Muslim incidents reported directly to Tell MAMA, including verbal abuse in the street and women’s veils being pulled away, with 437 incidents reported to Tell MAMA. The report also finds that 45% of online hate crime perpetrators are supportive of the far right.
This brings me to the work we are doing on our counter-extremism strategy. There has been some confusion about its aims. It is important to set this in context. Extremism is the public supporting and promotion of ideology that can lead to crimes. Those crimes might be terrorist activity or violence against women and girls. The public promotion of FGM, while not in itself a crime, might lead to somebody carrying out FGM, a violent crime against women and girls that we simply do not tolerate. It can lead to division in society and hate crime. That is why the Government are working on that strategy with communities and others. We need to make sure as a society that we are clear about how we tackle those ideologies, be they far right, Islamist or promoting violence against women and girls. Those are the kinds of ideologies we cannot tolerate in this society and that is what we are working on in our counter-extremism strategy.
I want to reassure the House that there is currently no police intelligence to suggest any significant public order risks following the referendum result. There has been a variety of spontaneous demonstrations both in support of and against the referendum result. To date, those have caused only minor disruption and have remained largely peaceful. Police forces are remaining vigilant around any tensions and potential for disorder, and will plan accordingly.
The right hon. Member for Leicester East, Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, referred to the hate crime action plan. This is a follow-up to the hate crime action plan we had in the last Parliament, and we are making progress: we are seeing more reporting and investigating and prosecuting of hate crime, but there is still a lot more to do. That is why we will publish a new hate crime action plan, which will cover all forms of hate crime, including xenophobic attacks. It is a plan we developed across Government and with communities and society, including schools, to make sure that point is included and encouraged in schools from a very early age, so that it is clear that such behaviour is not acceptable.
The hon. Member for Bolton South East talked about working across Government. I am looking at the best way for us to come together to make this point. I look forward to working with her, the Select Committee and others to show a united front in this House and in the leadership of this House on this issue.
Citizens of other EU countries no doubt have concerns, but I reiterate the point that the Prime Minister made last week: we are a full member of the European Union today and we will continue to be a full member until two years after article 50 is invoked. During that period, there will be absolutely no change to the status of EU nationals.
Keith Vaz
The Minister has faithfully reported what the Prime Minister said, but three senior members of the Government who are contestants for the leadership of this country have decided to say that EU citizens can stay. Why does the Home Secretary not agree with them? This issue is not about the Conservative party leadership; it is about the rights of citizens in this country.
Karen Bradley
I understand the point the right hon. Gentleman makes, but he will be aware that the Home Secretary is the Home Secretary, whether she is a leadership contender or not.
The reality is that we have to get into a negotiation and to understand what the position is. We are all entering uncharted territory. This is the first time that any country has voted to leave the European Union. It is the first time that any country has been in this situation. We have to be clear about what the future looks like, and that involves grown-up negotiations not just for those EU nationals who are in this country, but for UK nationals who are overseas. I want to ensure that we get the very best deal for Britain, and that includes the EU nationals who are here and the UK nationals who are living in the European Union.
Keith Vaz
The point that my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), I and others are making is that it is this uncertainty that leads to prejudice; it is this uncertainty that leads to one seven-year-old boy saying to another, “You’ve got to leave.” That is why we need to be certain.
Karen Bradley
I disagree with the right hon. Gentleman. I do not think that is what leads to it. It is about a lack of understanding and we need to work very carefully to make it clear that such comments are not acceptable from a seven-year-old boy or anybody else.
We are in uncharted territory. We need to go into the negotiation clear-headed about how we will get the best deal for Britain. To suggest that that is using people as bargaining chips is irresponsible, because everything that we negotiate in the deal will have an impact on people—on people living in this country and on people living overseas. We need to get the very best deal for this country. We need to ensure that it is the best deal for trade and for our citizens, including EU citizens who are living in this country. I want to be clear that it will be a priority to get that status cleared up as soon as possible, so that we can all learn how to live in the new world of the United Kingdom being outside the European Union as soon as possible.
The Government are clear that hate crime of any kind must be taken very seriously indeed. Our country is thriving, liberal and modern precisely because of the rich co-existence of people of different backgrounds, faiths and ethnicities. That rich co-existence is something we must treasure and strive to protect. We must work together to protect that diversity, defeat hate crime and uphold the values that underpin the British way of life. We must ensure that all those who seek to spread hatred and division in our communities are dealt with robustly by the police and the courts.
Question put and agreed to.