Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Consideration of Lords amendments
Monday 28th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Crime and Policing (Kit Malthouse)]

I beg to move, That this House agrees with Lords amendment 2.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Lords amendment 70, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) and (b) in lieu.

Lords amendment 72, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 114 to 116, Government motions to disagree, and Government amendments (a) and (b) in lieu.

Lords amendment 141, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 142, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 3 to 57, 59, 60, 108 to 113, 117, 147, 153 and 154.

[Kit Malthouse]

I propose first to talk about some of the key changes made to the Bill in the other place as a result of amendments brought forward by the Government, then to turn to the Lords amendments with which, sadly, the Government disagree for various reasons.

The Bill as passed by this House already included a number of significant measures to tackle violence against women and girls, and we have added to them during the Bill’s passage in the Lords. Lords amendments 13 to 15 make it clear in the Bill that domestic abuse and sexual violence are included within the meaning of the term “violence” for the purposes of the serious violence duty. It was always our wish that the serious violence duty should be all-encompassing, but following representations by Baroness Burton and others who were concerned to emphasise its importance, we are happy to agree to this being included in the Bill. The accompanying statutory guidance, which will be subject to public consultation, will make it clear that local areas, in drawing up their strategies to prevent and reduce serious violence, can and should include measures to tackle domestic abuse and sexual violence based on their local assessments.

With regard to Lords amendments 34 to 55, on Report in this House the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins), reiterated the Government’s commitment to ensuring that the provisions of the Bill relating to the extraction of information from electronic devices are accompanied by strong privacy safeguards. These Lords amendments deliver on that commitment. Among other things, they add a new clause setting out the conditions that must be met in order for a device user to be treated as giving agreement to the extraction of information. These changes will increase victim confidence and ensure that the individual’s right to privacy is respected and placed at the centre of all investigations.

Lords amendment 56 will create new offences to criminalise recording images of, or operating equipment to observe, a person at a time when they are breastfeeding, without the person’s consent or reasonable belief that they consent. On Report, the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) made a powerful case for introducing such offences. Although at that time we made it clear that the Law Commission is currently reviewing the law in this area, we do believe that this amendment will ensure that parents are protected from non-consensual photography and can feel safe to breastfeed in public, ahead of the publication of the Law Commission report later this year.

Another compelling argument was made on Report last July by the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) and my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), who is sadly not in his place, to address concerns that the time limit for bringing prosecutions for common assault or battery involving domestic abuse is unfairly short. Currently a prosecution for common assault or battery must be brought within six months of an offence occurring. However, victims of domestic abuse may often, understandably, take some time to report an offence, leaving the police and the Crown Prosecution Service with little time to conduct an investigation and prosecute the offender. In some instances, the time limit has expired before the victim even approaches the police. To address this issue, Lords amendment 57 will extend the time limit for commencing a prosecution for common assault or battery involving domestic abuse so that the six months runs not from the date when the offence occurred but from when it is formally reported to the police through either a witness statement or a video recording made with a view to use as evidence. A prosecution must be commenced within an overall limit of two years of the offence. This amendment will make a real difference to victims of domestic abuse and stop perpetrators hiding behind an unfair limitation on victims’ ability to seek justice.

Lords amendments 59 and 60 will ensure that the police’s processing of personal data in non-crime hate incident records is made subject to a code of practice issued by the Home Secretary. The amendments will address concerns raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies), also sadly not in his place, in this House and by Lord Moylan and others in the other place by bringing parliamentary oversight to this process. The College of Policing is currently responsible for producing non-statutory hate crime operational guidance. The Government’s statutory code of practice, once in effect, will replace the relevant section of this guidance on non-crime hate incidents. The college’s guidance will remain in place until the new code enters into effect. When drafting the code, the Government will work closely with policing partners, including the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council, to make sure that it will respect the operational importance of recording non-crime hate incidents to help to keep vulnerable people and communities safe while balancing the need to protect freedom of expression.

Let me turn to the Lords amendments that the Government cannot support—at least, not in their current form. Lords amendment 70 would require the Secretary of State to establish a review of the prevalence of, and the response of the criminal justice system to, the offence of administering a substance with intent under section 61 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003—commonly known as spiking. The Government share widespread concern about the offence that has prompted this amendment, whether spiking of drinks or spiking by needles, and we are taking the issue extremely seriously. I particularly commend my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) for bringing forward his recent ten-minute rule Bill on this issue. Everyone should be able to enjoy a night out without fearing that they will be a victim of this dreadful crime.

In September 2021, the Home Secretary asked the National Police Chiefs Council to review urgently the extent and scale of needle spiking. It is clear from what the police have told us that this behaviour is not exclusively linked to sexual activity and that it demands a response that goes beyond the criminal justice system. We have therefore tabled our amendment in lieu of Lords amendment 70, which is drafted more broadly than the Lords amendment and is not linked to any specific offence. It will require the Home Secretary to prepare a report on the nature and prevalence of spiking and to set out the steps that the Government have taken or intend to take to address it. In this context we are also exploring the need for a specific criminal offence to target spiking directly, as my hon. Friend recommended in his ten-minute rule Bill. The Home Secretary will be required to publish this report and lay it before Parliament within 12 months of Royal Assent. In preparing the report we will want to take into account the findings of the current inquiry by the Home Affairs Committee. This approach addresses the concerns that prompted the Lords amendment but in a way that enables the Government to consider the issue in the round.

Lords amendment 72 seeks, in common parlance, to make misogyny a hate crime. Hon. Members may be aware that in December last year, at the Government’s request, the Law Commission provided recommendations on the reform of hate crime laws. Looking very carefully at this issue, it found that adding sex or gender to hate crime laws may prove “more harmful than helpful”, as well as “counterproductive”. The principal reason is that it could make it more difficult to prosecute the most serious crimes that harm women and girls, including rape and domestic abuse. Obviously such an awful unintended consequence is not the intention of those who tabled the amendment in the other place. As such, the amendment seeks to exclude certain offences where the risks to their prosecution are acute.

The Law Commission looked at every possible model and unfortunately also found the one proposed in the amendment unsatisfactory. Time is short and I do not want to dwell on all its problems, but the review identified that to reflect sex and gender in some offences but not others would make the law very complex and imply that very harmful excluded offences such as rape are less serious, would result in tokenistic coverage of many misogynistic crimes, and would create new inequalities in how different groups are protected by hate crime laws.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

The inner house of the Court of Session, Scotland’s highest court, has recently clarified that in the Equality Act 2010 “sex” does indeed have the meaning set out in section 11—that is, that it refers to one or other sex, male or female. Does the Minister share my concern that this amendment has that definition of “sex” but the word “gender” is undefined? Is he aware that many feminists feel that gender is not the same as sex and that in fact gender is a tool of sex-based oppression?

[Kit Malthouse]

I acknowledge some of the problems with the amendment that the hon. and learned Lady sets out. I think it is Women’s Aid that rejected the amendment and said that it would do more harm than good on the basis that she outlined: it is not specific about targeting crimes against women in particular.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

I would like to correct the record, because that is not what Women’s Aid has said.

The Minister highlighted the issue of a carve-out as being the reason why the Government do not believe in adding sex or gender to ensure that any perpetrator who attacks a woman or someone they believe to be a woman can be captured by the offences in question. I think we would all agree that is important, but he argues that the carve-out is not the right thing to do. Does he also make the same argument then that it is tokenistic to carve out offences based on racial or religious hatred, which we already do in our legislation? We have carve-outs. Stephen Lawrence’s killers were not prosecuted for a hate crime, but we recognise the hate behind it. Why does he think that women do not deserve the same protection?

[Kit Malthouse]

I had hoped to avoid the approach that the hon. Lady takes. Of course we believe that women deserve strong protection—we absolutely do—but all I can say to the hon. Lady is that the Law Commission, in looking at the evidence over a three-year period and consulting widely across the sector and society more generally, found that the additional complexity was likely to make it harder to prosecute these crimes. I ask her to reflect on the fact that in proceedings in this House, she put her name to an amendment compelling the Government to adopt the Law Commission’s proposals in full. I am not sure why she has now reversed that position, but I hope she appreciates that we are as dedicated to and interested in the safety of women as she is.

[Sir Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend and I worked hard on the issues underpinning the Bill and on the Bill itself. May I press him on Lords amendment 72? I accept that the amendment is defective. It does not create a new offence, however, but is about aggravating factors in sentencing. I commend to him the positive findings of the Law Commission, namely its proposal to develop an offence of street harassment, albeit with a sexual motive. I take issue with that—I think it needs to be a wider offence of street harassment, because we need to deal with wider issues than sexual motive—but I press the Minister to commit the Government to getting on with work on the Law Commission’s important recommendation to create a new offence based not just on racial hatred, but on hatred motivated against gender or sex.

[Kit Malthouse]

My right hon. and learned Friend is right that we need to have a serious look at the suite of offences used in this area. He will know that many street harassment offences are classified as some kind of public order offence. That causes a number of problems, not least the lack of transparency with the police’s analysis of what is going on out there in our streets.

There are three further areas of work that we want to turn to, as we sadly reject this amendment, well motivated though it absolutely is, on the basis of the Law Commission’s evidence. Those three areas are first, as my right hon. and learned Friend says, to adopt the Law Commission’s other proposal of looking at a specific offence of public sexual harassment, as my neighbour, my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), asked for today. Personally speaking, I think it could be a new offence, but it could be some amendment to public order offences to allow us to deal with this particular issue.

The second area is police recording. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon has raised the issue a number of times with me outside the Chamber, and he is right that we need to look carefully at the forces recording data at the moment, what they are learning from it and what impact it has, because the Law Commission was equivocal about the value of that recording. I am not convinced personally, and I would like to understand what impact it is having from a policing point of view.

The third area of work I would like to see is encouragement of reporting. One of the key things, whatever the offence type, is that we know a lot of women, particularly in the public realm, who are harassed do not have the confidence to come forward or do not think anything will happen if they do. I am pleased that the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), is today launching an extensive communications campaign called “Enough”, encouraging bystanders and peers to report this kind of behaviour to the police.

[Sir Robert Buckland]

I have listened with care to my right hon. Friend, and I accept what he says. I am encouraged by what he says about development of the law. May I press him on reporting and recording? As part of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 process, we undertook to ensure that recording was rolled out nationally. That was more than a year ago. For that to happen, there must be proper expedition on this. It is no good saying that there is not a particular offence on which the police can hang this recording. We need to get on with it, because the time is coming, sooner or later, when there will be a relevant offence, and I would rather that the Government were ahead of the pack rather than behind.

[Kit Malthouse]

I completely agree with my right hon. and learned Friend, and I am as impatient as he is, not least because I am keen to kick off some analysis programmes looking at particular patterns of behaviour in particular postcodes. We men all know women who have been subject to this kind of abuse out in the public realm. My personal theory is that this sort of behaviour is not something a man does once. Much of this offending is repeated, and there are prolific offenders in particular neighbourhoods who could and should be identified, and they would be if we were better able to record it and had more transparency from a public order offence point of view. That is what we will be committing to do.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

I am grateful for what the Minister has said, particularly about the early amendment on spiking. On this particular offence of misogyny, can we have it on the record in this House that no one in this House has any time for misogyny? The issue is purely one of law and what will be most effective. Everything that my right hon. Friend the Minister has said in answer to my neighbour, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon (Sir Robert Buckland), is extremely relevant. Does my right hon. Friend recognise that some police forces, such as my own—Gloucestershire constabulary—are recording data on this and believe it to be useful? I hope he agrees that that could be an encouraging form of evidence towards the aggravating factor he referred to earlier.

[Kit Malthouse]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend, and he is absolutely right that we need to look carefully at the recording patterns and what they are telling forces such as Gloucestershire about how they can and should intervene in particular neighbourhoods. We then need to look to other forces exhibiting the same patterns of offending, but not necessarily recording it, so that we can act to spread this kind of practice more widely.

I am encouraged by my hon. Friend’s sense of cross-party enthusiasm for this issue. I know that some in the House—I am not sure necessarily anybody present here—would seek to make it a political issue, but as the person who devised and published the first ever violence against women and girls strategy in the entire country when I was deputy Mayor for policing at City Hall, I am proud of the work I have been able to do in this particular area over the past decade or so, and I hope I will do it for many years to come. This issue breaches all divides, because we are all sons, brothers, sisters, fathers—whatever it might be—and we all know people who have been subjected to this crime.

[Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)]

The amendment to the hate legislation does not create a new offence, and the Minister will be aware of that. I had a long discussion with the Law Commission last week, and it admits that not all women’s rights organisations agree with its view. Many organisations, such as the Fawcett Society and the Young Women’s Trust, support this amendment.

[Kit Malthouse]

All I can do for the hon. Lady is quote from the Law Commission’s report, which I assume she has read, extensive though it is. It specifically states:

“We recognise that many people may disagree with our conclusion and find it difficult to understand given the prevalence of sex and gender-based violence and abuse…our recommendations have been decided…on the strength of the evidence and policy considerations before us.”

I hope she will understand that notwithstanding the division of opinion there may be, the fact that the Law Commission—after three years, and with weighty legal minds—disagrees with this move, along with large women’s organisations, such as Rape Crisis, means that in all conscience we cannot support an amendment that they say will make things worse. We have to commit ourselves to making things better and by other means, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon (Sir Robert Buckland) has pointed out. That is exactly what I am doing today.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Minister for all his work. I am concerned about how ladies and girls will have confidence in the processes coming forward. He has clearly said that the amendment is not acceptable because he feels that, legislatively, the Government are addressing those issues, but the people who speak to me—the ladies and gentlemen, and the young girls in particular—need to have confidence in the processes. I do not see that, so how will he legislatively ensure that that is there for ladies and girls?

[Kit Malthouse]

I completely sympathise with the hon. Gentleman’s sentiment. Having been in this House for nearly seven years, I have often realised that we mistake the introduction of legislation for actually doing something out there on the street. Although we can and should legislate to make things crimes and to better dispose of them, we actually need somebody to take off their bicycle clips, walk out of the office or station and do something different out there on the street to make those of us in society who feel unsafe—particularly, sadly, women and girls—feel safer.

We are trying to give concrete life to that through schemes such as the safer streets fund, where we are specifically spending money on public realm improvements, whether that is CCTV or better street lighting, in areas where women and girls feel unsafe. I hope that the huge increase in police numbers that we are seeing at the moment will see more uniforms out there on the street in those areas where women and girls feel unsafe. There are wider cultural issues that we also need to address. The hon. Gentleman is right to point out, however, that legislation will only take us so far and that what is required is action out there on the streets.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)]

It sounds a bit like the Minister is saying that the words we say in here do not really matter, but the legislation that we pass here, including making misogyny an aggravating factor, sends messages to people out there. When I sat on the Committee of the Voyeurism (Offences) Act 2019, the Government were clear that although other laws could be used to stop the awful practice of upskirting, it needed to be in a clear law against it. During the passage of that Act, they promised that they would look at and bring forward a measure to make misogyny an aggravating factor in hate crime. Why are they delaying on the promises that they have made?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am sorry, but I am not sure that the Government ever made that promise. [Interruption.] Hold on, I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman has read the Law Commission’s report. Has he read it?

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

I have read the section that the Minister is referring to.

[Kit Malthouse]

The Law Commission report is unequivocal about the dangers that it may present. The hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) is shaking her head, but the report’s conclusion says:

“We recommend that sex or gender should not be added as a protected characteristic for the purposes of aggravated offences and enhanced sentencing.”

That is the specific recommendation in the report. The Law Commission has much greater and more skilled legal minds than mine, and other groups do not support the amendment.

I realise that the issue is of great importance to hon. Members, and we must all reflect on the feelings of insecurity that women and girls feel in the public realm, but we are being told by the experts—by the Law Commission—that the measure is likely to do more damage than good. That is not necessarily a substitute for us not doing anything and I have outlined what more we may do, but the point is that we have to listen to the experts. To be honest, I am quite surprised that a party led by a former Director of Public Prosecutions would seek to ignore the Law Commission.

[Stella Creasy]

I would like to correct the record, because the Minister seemed to suggest that I was against what the Law Commission has said. He is asking all hon. Members whether they have read it so it is worth checking whether he has, because it says that there is a case for there being offences motivated by misogyny—for example, stirring up incitement or public sexual harassment. Those of us who have constituents such as Muslim women who get attacked in the street for being both Muslim and a woman recognise that misogyny is about not just sex but power, so we need offences to tackle that.

Does the Minister recognise that if the Law Commission is saying that there are offences motivated by misogyny, the risk of not including it as an aggravating factor is that we could end up in a whack-a-mole situation? For example, we could end up saying, “In these cases of incitement, what is incitement? In these cases, what might be sexual harassment?” It would be simpler to include it and it would recognise what the police are telling us. I stress that the police are telling us that they want this data and they want the courts to back them. They want misogyny to be treated in the same way as racial or religious hatred, because they see it driving crimes on our streets. I am pleased to hear that he is concerned for women, but women have had concern for donkey’s years. What we now want is action.

[Kit Malthouse]

I can appreciate the hon. Lady’s requirement for action. As I say, action is what we are trying to put in place. To be clear, again, we are not saying that the fact that we are declining to make this Lords amendment means that we should not do anything. As I said to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon, there are further offences that we need to consider.

In fact, the Law Commission’s report went further and said that if we were to introduce that offence, it would complement other work on offences that may be coming forward, such as cyber-flashing, which my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) has raised several times in the House; rape threats; and intimate image abuse. There are several areas where we need to consider interlocking offences, and that work will take time beyond this Bill to get right. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North urged us, we are committed to adopting both recommendations of the Law Commission, and that is exactly the work that we intend to do in the months to come.

[Sara Britcliffe (Hyndburn) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree that it is important for Opposition Members to understand what Rape Crisis England & Wales has said, which is that:

“Rape prosecutions are already at an all-time low, and we believe adding sex/gender as a protected characteristic would further complicate the judicial process and make it even harder to secure convictions.”?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend has put her finger on the button of the problem. It is not that we are unsympathetic to the issue—of course we are not. I just do not see how, given the views of large organisations and of the Law Commission, somebody could, with any conscience, vote for something that they are being told might be damaging. I understand that the hon. Member for Walthamstow is exercised by the issue—as are all hon. Members present—but we hope to address it in other ways and to look seriously at the further offence that my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon has urged us to look at and bring it forward in future.

[Joanna Cherry]

In support of the English Law Commission—hon. Members should be aware that the legislation applies only in England and Wales—in Scotland, when the Scottish Government were looking at introducing hate crime legislation, they rejected misogyny as an aggravating factor after submissions from Rape Crisis, Women’s Aid and Engender in Scotland. Baroness Helena Kennedy is now chairing a panel to look at that with a view to reporting. There are arguments on either side.

I am most concerned that if we are to have an aggravation based on sex or gender, gender must be defined. We already have a protected characteristic of transgender identity, which is very important, but in this Lords amendment, sex is defined but not gender. Does the Minister agree that, in future, we should define what we mean by gender so that people know what it means?

[Kit Malthouse]

There are a number of definitional issues within the Lords amendment that produce fatal flaws, but I absolutely commend the spirit behind it. It comes from a good place and from a concern that we share. Given that legal expertise advises us against it and advises us to pursue another course, that is our intention and that is what we will do.

I turn now to Lords amendments 114 to 116, which relate to the piloting and national roll-out of serious violence reduction orders. I assure the House that we want to pilot them robustly, which is why the assessment of the pilot will be conducted by an independent evaluator and the Government will thoroughly consider the report’s findings before any decision is made to roll them out across the whole of England and Wales.

The report of the pilot will be laid before Parliament, but commencement regulations are not generally subject to any parliamentary procedure and the Government do not agree that that approach should be changed for SVROs. To assuage the concerns that have been raised in relation to the pilot, amendments (a) and (b) in lieu of Lords amendments 114 to 116 will set out in the Bill a non-exhaustive list of matters that must be addressed in the report of the pilot.

Lords amendments 141 and 142 seek to create two new offences to tackle so-called sex for rent. We are clear that exploitation through sex for rent has no place in our society and is a revolting phenomenon. We therefore fully understand the motivation behind these amendments. There are existing offences in the Sexual Offences Act 2003 that can and have been used to prosecute this practice successfully, but we do recognise the need to do more to stamp out this abhorrent practice and to support those at risk of exploitation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

On the consultation that the Minister will undertake, is it a very targeted consultation on the specific offence of sex for rent, or does it recognise the sexual exploitation of women in other areas and broaden it out to prostitution more generally?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am grateful to the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee. I cannot give her a definition as it stands, but I am happy to write to her about the scope of the consultation. If she wishes to make representations about the scope, I am sure we will take them into account. However, we are very focused on the notion of a specific offence, so my assumption is that the consultation will be relatively specific.

[Gavin Robinson (Belfast East) (DUP)]

It does sound, from what the Minister has shared, that this is seen solely through the prism of advertisements online—where there is a suggestion of sex for rent, but through an online medium—but is that right? Will any suggested proposal brought forward in this consultation cover media outside the online sphere?

[Kit Malthouse]

We do believe that the online harms Bill will cover the vast majority of the offending where this is advertised, and I have to say that the vast majority of that these days does seem to be online. However, the hon. Member raises a very good point, and I will make sure that the team putting the consultation together consider whether we should include that in the scope of the consultation and if a further offence is needed.

[Janet Daby (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

And finally!

[Janet Daby]

I thank the Minister for giving way on that point. Shelter states that over 30,000 women since the beginning of the pandemic have been pestered by landlords to exchange sex for a roof over their heads. Does the Minister not think that there is more the Government should be doing to move this forward? How long is the consultation period, and what will happen in the meantime?

[Kit Malthouse]

As I say, there are already offences being committed in those circumstances, and we have had successful prosecutions in exactly the circumstances the hon. Member outlines. Anybody who has been subjected to that kind of criminality should, I hope, feel in a position to report it. However, we need to look at whether there is scope for a more specific offence in this area, because at the moment some of the offending is dealt with through the prostitution legislation, which may not be entirely appropriate. The consultation that we will undertake before the summer recess will run for the normal period, and I hope we will then bring forward expedited legislation, possibly in the same vehicle in which we bring forward the further offences on street harassment. Let us see how we get on.

The other place has proposed some welcome improvements to the Bill, but it has also put forward some amendments that, while often well meaning and extremely well motivated, I am afraid we cannot commend to the House for the various reasons I have set out. I hope that the House will join me, as we support these various amendments, in sorting out what works and what does not, so that we can all move forward in this important area of policy.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Stella Creasy]

I hope the right hon. Member will understand what I am saying. The Law Commission did not look at this amendment, which has learned from the Bertin amendment. [Interruption.] She shakes her head, but the Bertin amendment, which sets out explicitly the offences we would carve out, did not exist during the time of its work. One argument the Law Commission made was with regard to the difficulty of carving those offences out. The amendment builds on where a carve-out can be made.

[Kit Malthouse]

rose—

[Stella Creasy]

I will happily give way to the Minister. I hope he is not going to tell me again to read the Law Commission review.

[Kit Malthouse]

This is an important issue and I am grateful to the hon. Lady, but I just wanted to point out to her that the Law Commission said in its consultation paper that it thought it might be possible to overcome the challenges involved in excluding certain violence against women and girls contexts and there would still be value in including sex or gender within hate crime laws for the remaining criminal contexts. It specifically considered the notion of carve-outs. However, following further reflection and analysis, and with the benefit of detailed and thoughtful consultation responses, it now believes that all the possible models to do so create more problems than they solve. So the Law Commission did look specifically at this model of carve-outs, and indeed it specifically considered the option of the full recognition of sex or gender in aggravated offences, with enhanced sentences on the same basis as for other recognised characteristics.

[Stella Creasy]

I am sorry, but the Minister is conflating two different things here. The Law Commission did not look at the Bertin amendment. What it looked at was whether one might inadvertently downgrade sentencing for rape or domestic abuse by including it within this hierarchy. That is why, for example, Rape Crisis was concerned about a generalist clause. I am sure the Minister has spoken to Rape Crisis since the Law Commission’s report was made. I certainly have. I talked to it about this amendment, and it has been much more positive about it. I hope, if the Minister is quoting Rape Crisis, that he will listen to it when it says that it recognises what is being tried here.

I am not here to say that the Lords amendment is perfect, but I am here to say the because there are other crimes that could be motivated by misogyny, which it is right to recognise within sentencing and to treat as serious—for example, exposure, cyber-flashing, assault or blackmail targeted at disabled women; we see a lot of that in the evidence base—that means that we should dismiss this entirely and say, “Well, we won’t do this at all,” is yet again to ask women to wait for something that will never come. That is the challenge we have here.

The Minister wants to say, “Let’s not politicise it.” I agree. I extend my hand to him to say let us work together to get this right, but let us recognise that misogyny is driving crimes and that the Law Commission has said that. Its arguments were technical ones about how to do the drafting, not about the principle. I hope that the Minister would acknowledge that, because he cannot both argue—

[Kit Malthouse]

I have said that specifically.

[Stella Creasy]

That is not what the Minister has said, but I am pleased to hear him say that—[Interruption.] Great. Wonderful—consensus is breaking out, but consensus will not deal with the fact that women right now are at risk and are being harmed. This proposal is helping to improve conviction rates and to track perpetrators in the areas where it is operating.

The Minister will be aware that an amendment to the Bill that became the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 was withdrawn in the other place because Ministers committed to making sure that all police forces would do the reporting, but they have not. We can agree that the reporting is necessary, but it is not sufficient to give the police the backing that they need or to say, “This is about street lighting”. We have to look at how we tackle violence against women and at why and how we could have a carve-out to make this work. That is essentially what an incitement offence would do—

[Kit Malthouse]

rose—

[Stella Creasy]

I will happily give way to the Minister; I can see him shaking his head and I am keen to hear his male voice about my experience of violence.

[Kit Malthouse]

I am sorry, but the hon. Lady seems determined to have a fight about this and I really do not want one. She keeps referring to street lighting, but that is one of a suite of things that we need to do generally in the public realm regarding safety. For clarity, I of course acknowledge that there are offences that are motivated by misogyny—I say that clearly, as I did in my opening speech—but this requires a number of approaches and solutions. We are merely saying that the evidence that the Law Commission and other groups put before us is that this particular approach is likely to cause more harm than good. We have committed to look at the other areas that it has highlighted, particularly the crimes that are motivated by misogyny, which I read out from its report. I reassure hon. Members that we are duty-bound to respond to the Law Commission’s report in six months, and we will do so.

[Stella Creasy]

I hope that the Minister will forgive me if I mention that there are, I think, more than 17 Law Commission reports that have been published since 2010 that the Government have not responded to and acted on—and that is just to look at the Law Commission. He also keeps saying that the Law Commission has looked at this proposal. No—the Law Commission looked at including sex or gender in all instances. It then looked at whether it was possible to have a carve-out, but we did not have the Bertin amendment, which specifically identified the offences in question and helped to shape this Lords amendment.

The Minister has said that he does not want to have a fight about this. Well, he is going to have one, because he is opposing the proposal and not coming up with any alternatives. He is not saying, for example, “We will introduce a proposal in the other place that addresses these issues” or that he will listen not just to all the chief constables across the country who have said that they want to see this happen, but to the organisations that have. Seeing as he is obsessed with major organisations, let us run through them: the Fawcett Society; Citizens UK; Refuge; Stonewall; HOPE not hate; Dimensions; Tell MAMA; the Jo Cox Foundation; and Safe & the City. Many of us have been talking to people who have expressed concerns to identify what those are and learn from them; that is where this amendment has come from.

The Minister will use the Government majority to vote this Lords amendment down, to say that violence against women is a complicated issue and that there are other approaches, and he will wait patiently and in fear that, yet again, there will be another moment as there was a year ago. The trouble is that, for us as women, waiting in fear is our daily experience, because we do not see things changing any time soon. We see the evidence base from Nottinghamshire and from the Met police. We want to know why there is a postcode lottery when it comes to the police taking violence against women seriously. We want to know why our courts want to exclude sex or gender from the protected characteristics that we rightly recognise when crimes are motivated by a hatred of somebody just for who they are, and we will tackle that.

People made many of these arguments 20 years ago on recognising racially and religiously motivated abuse. We now, rightly, all benefit from the protection and the freedom that has been given to people, so that they do not have to live in fear that they will be attacked just because of the colour of their skin or their religious identity. The Minister’s problem is that he says that he listens to and knows women and that he understands this area, but if he understands it at all, he should listen to the suffragettes, who told us that it was “deeds not words” that matter. All we have heard tonight is words.

This proposal is backed by the police. Opposition Members and many Government Members want to back the police and want to see the courts back up the police. If he does not accept this amendment, the Minister has the time and the opportunity in the Lords to come up with an alternative. He will have my support and that of the Cross Benchers to make that happen. However, if he continues to ignore women, to say that he understands the challenge and to blame them for not coming forward and reporting things—[Interruption.] He is right to shake his head, but he can probably go home without looking over his shoulder. Many of us cannot.

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[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. I call the Minister.

[Kit Malthouse]

With the leave of the House, I shall respond to the debate. I am grateful to all the Members who have spoken, and I hope that what has been exhibited is our shared concern for many of the issues we have talked about today, not least the safety of women and girls, which has naturally and rightly dominated the debate. A number of undertakings were sought from me, latterly by my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham), who has done so much work on the offence of spiking. I am happy to give him a commitment that we will come back within a six-month period, as he requested. Obviously we will be producing a wider report within 12 months, but we should be able to give him an indication at the time.

My right hon. Friend and neighbour, the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), asked for a specific legislative vehicle, but I am afraid that I cannot preview the Queen’s Speech, much as I would love to. I cannot give her a specific vehicle, but I can tell her that we will be responding to the Law Commission’s report within six months. We are giving serious consideration to the work streams that I have talked about. As I have said to her, it is my personal view that we have an issue that needs to be addressed, either through public order offending, through recording or through a specific offence. I hope that on that basis she will feel able to support us this evening.

The work that we will be doing in this area sits alongside an awful lot of other work looking at the issue of street harassment, including our safety of women at night fund and the safer streets fund. In September we launched the new StreetSafe tool, allowing the police to access greater information and data about where people feel, or indeed are, unsafe. I am told that more than 12,000 reports have already been submitted through that line. In December, the College of Policing published new guidance showing what the police can and should do when they receive a report of public sexual harassment. The criminal offence is already available and other protective tools can be used. As I hope my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North has just been to see, we have also launched a new communications campaign this evening. There is an awful lot to cover in this first group of amendments, but I hope that we have looked at a wide range of offences and I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester for pointing out that we have been listening. The number of amendments we have accepted weigh in the balance of support for the votes that we are about to undertake.

On the misogyny issue, I commend the motivation behind the set of amendments that we are sadly declining. We understand people’s genuine concern about the safety of women and girls in the public sector, and indeed we share it. We are determined to make significant inroads in this area. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller), my hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Craig Whittaker) and my hon. Friend and neighbour the Member for Newbury have pointed out so effectively, we cannot in all conscience support an amendment that the Law Commission and other large groups interested in this area believe runs the risk of damaging the cause of women’s safety. That puts an obligation on us to bring forward alternatives that will do something positive for women’s safety. That battle is under way, and we commit to doing exactly that.

Lords amendment 2 agreed to.

Lords amendment 70 disagreed to.

Government amendments (a) and (b) made in lieu of Lords amendment 70.

Motion made, and Question put, That this House disagrees with Lords amendment 72.—(Kit Malthouse.)

19:57

Division 194

Ayes: 314

Noes: 190

Lords amendment 72 disagreed to.

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20:12

Division 195

Ayes: 315

Noes: 189

Lords amendment 116 disagreed to.

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20:25

Division 196

Ayes: 304

Noes: 198

Lords amendment 141 disagreed to.

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Required life sentence for manslaughter of emergency worker

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Tom Pursglove)]

I beg to move, That this House agrees with Lords amendment 1.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Lords amendment 58, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 107, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 61 to 69, 94 to 106, 121 to 140, 144, 145, 149 to 152 and 155 to 161.

[Tom Pursglove]

There are no less than 161 Lords amendments for the House to consider this evening. To ensure that as many hon. and right hon. Members as possible who wish to speak can do so, I do not propose to detail all the amendments in this group, as many were uncontentious and will have the support of the whole House. I will, however, outline the key Lords amendments in this group brought forward by the Government, before commenting on the two amendments in this group that were agreed by their lordships contrary to the Government’s sound advice.

I know that MPs from across the House will want to share our support for the family and friends of PC Andrew Harper and their campaign to strengthen the law so that no other families go through the same heartbreak they have suffered. We were therefore pleased to announce our amendment in the other place, following our commitment to look at what action may be possible in this area. Lords amendment 1, known as Harper’s law, will impose mandatory life sentences on those convicted of unlawful act manslaughter where the victim is an emergency worker acting in the exercise of their functions as such a worker. The amendment will apply to adult offenders and 16 and 17-year-olds. The amendment will also contain judicial discretion for the court to impose an alternative sentence in exceptional circumstances.

In the case of Andrew Harper, the court did not impose life sentences on any of the defendants. Each received sentences of between 13 and 19 years for manslaughter—sentences that were subsequently upheld by the Court of Appeal. They will all be incarcerated for a significant period, but the Government believe that where a person is convicted of unlawful act manslaughter and the person who has been killed is an emergency worker, that should be punished with life imprisonment, except where there are exceptional circumstances relating to the offender or the offence.

The successful campaign of Lissie Harper, PC Harper’s widow, and the Police Federation drew this issue to the Government’s attention, and we are grateful for that. Lissie has shown incredible bravery, fortitude and courage in campaigning for this change, and I know that it has had a profound impact on Members from all parts of the House and on our constituents in communities across the country, who have come together to support this change.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

Will the Minister simply confirm that where an emergency service worker is off duty but an emergency occurs and they respond to that emergency, Harper’s law will apply to them?

[Tom Pursglove]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s question. If the scope of this measure was restricted to mandatory life sentences in situations where the emergency worker was directly responding to the unlawful act at the heart of the offence, it would not capture all the cases in which this Government believe the mandatory life sentence should apply. For example, offender A injures a defendant during a fight and, in their attempts to escape the scene, they run over the responding paramedic, who is on their way to save the life of the person injured by person A. In another scenario, offender B commits exactly the same actions, but in fleeing the scene, they run over and kill a police officer responding to a separate incident a mile down the road.

Both defendants have committed the same unlawful act, and in the same dangerous circumstances, and both have caused the death of an emergency worker as a result, but the grounds for implementing the mandatory life sentence would be based on the pure happenstance that one emergency worker was responding to that specific unlawful act, and the other was not. That disparity in sentencing would not accurately reflect the Government’s aim to ensure that those who commit the unlawful act manslaughter of emergency workers who are exercising their functions face a life sentence.

It is also worth setting out for the House’s benefit who counts as an emergency worker. We will define emergency workers in the same way as the Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Act 2018 and section 68 of the Sentencing Act 2020. This definition includes police officers, prison officers, National Crime Agency officers and those employed in fire services, search and rescue services and frontline NHS health services, among others.

[Barry Gardiner]

The Minister has given us a great deal of information, but has not actually answered my specific question. I am happy for the Minister to continue, and if he can get assistance from the Box and answer it later, I will be very content.

[Tom Pursglove]

If I may, in the wind-up, I will happily clarify for the House’s benefit the point that the hon. Gentleman has raised. The points that I have put on the record are relevant, but I want to ensure that the House has complete clarity around those matters as we move forward.

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[Sir Robert Neill (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)]

The Minister is absolutely right to pay tribute to Lissie Harper and to our emergency services. He also makes the point that these are not isolated incidents. Will he take on board the broader point that, although there is obviously great support for this piece of legislation, the area that has not been addressed is the difficulty that juries face in deciding whether the offence—the facts made out—is murder or manslaughter?

I hope that the Minister will revisit a missed opportunity, which is the definitions of homicide under our current law. The Law Commission and others have suggested that they ought to be revisited because they create some difficulty and uncertainty, particularly in the difficult area between the intention to kill or to commit grievous bodily harm and gross negligence at the top end. I hope that the Government will consider revisiting the Law Commission’s work on that, because other jurisdictions have different categories of homicide, rather than the perhaps now old-fashioned categories of murder and manslaughter. We might then find it easier for juries to more accurately reflect the culpability by their verdicts, which is what we want to achieve.

[Tom Pursglove]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s observations. We touched on those matters when we spoke last week when we engaged in advance of these proceedings. I said to him that that was something that I would certainly be willing to take away and consider, and I am willing to do that. He advocates that the Law Commission looks at the issue of homicide in the round and, as I say, I am happy to reflect on and consider that matter in the fullness of time.

To return to the question of the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), I am keen to provide the House with as much information as possible and to further clarify the position around it. If I understand his question correctly, it does apply to emergency workers who are off duty, but they must be acting as an emergency worker—off duty but still responding to an incident. I hope that that provides the House, in the correct terms, with the clarity that it is seeking on that point.

[Ruth Edwards]

Can I clarify whether the provisions will apply to volunteer emergency services workers, such as special constables or first responders?

[Tom Pursglove]

Again, I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the question. If I may, I will touch on those matters in the wind-up, because I am conscious that hon. Members have quite a lot of questions and that there are quite a few hon. Members who are keen to speak. I will gladly pick up those points in the wind-up later when we have concluded.

Lords amendment 104 places on statute an aggravating factor for assault committed against anyone providing a service to the public. It will send a strong message that assaults against public-facing workers are totally unacceptable and will reinforce the seriousness with which the courts treat such offences. It has been welcomed by those in the retail sector who have campaigned on this important issue. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers), who has assiduously argued the case in this House for a change in the law in this area. In earlier proceedings, the House expressed a strong desire for such a change and I am proud that the Government are helping to deliver that.

In earlier stages of the Bill in this House, there were also calls for the Government to raise the maximum penalties for child cruelty offences. For years, my hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat) has campaigned tirelessly for Tony’s law, which is named after Tony Hudgell. As a baby, Tony was abused to such an extent by his birth parents that he is severely disabled. No child should suffer such appalling abuse, especially from those who should love and care for them the most. It is right to ensure that, in such cases, the punishment can fit the crime. Such criminality is truly shocking and heinous.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

May I just place on record the extreme gratitude of Tony’s real parents—the parents who actually love him—who have cared for him since a few days after he was born and have restored him to an extraordinary and loving child? May I also place on record my enormous gratitude to the Lord Chancellor for his work on the matter, and to the Minister and the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge), who are both on the Front Bench, for showing the courage and determination to make sure the measure passes? This changes not, sadly, Tony’s life—thank God, he has been cared for well—but, with any luck, the lives of many in deterring such awful crimes from ever happening again.

[Tom Pursglove]

My hon. Friend puts the case very eloquently, and it is a privilege to be able to stand at this Dispatch Box and announce these changes in the House. He has been a tireless campaigner on this issue, and this change is a great credit to him, to Tony and to his adopted family, with their incredible care and their advocacy on these issues. I think all of them can be hugely proud of the work they have done to bring about this change. I am sure the House will agree, especially in the light of more recent appalling cases, that the courts should, where necessary, have the fullest range of sentencing powers available to deal appropriately with those who abuse children.

Lords amendments 121 and 122 extend the disregards and pardons scheme relating to historical convictions for same-sex sexual activity. The disregards scheme, introduced by the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, enables men with historical cautions and convictions for certain gay sex offences to apply to the Secretary of State to have their cautions and convictions disregarded. If successful, the applicant is treated in all circumstances as if the offence had never occurred, and also receives an automatic pardon. The Government accept that the scope of the current scheme is too narrow, as it is largely confined to the now repealed offences of buggery and gross indecency between men, and excludes other repealed offences that may also have been used to criminalise same-sex sexual activity. Lords amendment 121 will therefore extend the scheme to enable individuals convicted of same-sex sexual activity under any repealed or abolished offence to apply to have that caution or conviction disregarded. Lords amendment 122 ensures that pardons provisions will reflect the extension. Taken together, these amendments will help put right the wrongs of the past when people were unjustly criminalised simply on the basis of their sexuality.

In their lordships’ House, there was significant debate on the issue of imprisonment for public protection. Lords amendment 101 will put the Secretary of State’s policy of automatic referral of applications to terminate the IPP licence on to a statutory footing. This would enable all eligible IPP offenders to be referred to the parole board for consideration of a licence termination at the appropriate time.

Lords amendments 61 to 69 deliver the Government’s commitment, made in our action plan for animal welfare, to crack down further on illegal hare coursing. They do this by broadening the circumstances in which the police can investigate and bring charges for hare coursing-related activity, and by increasing the powers of the courts for dealing with this activity on conviction. In bringing forward these amendments, the Government have acted swiftly and decisively in response to the widespread concern about the impact of hare coursing expressed by hon. Members. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Sir Robert Goodwill), who raised this issue eloquently in Committee, and my hon. Friend the Member for North East Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller) for his private Member’s Bill on this subject. They have both been assiduous champions of this issue on behalf of their rural communities.

Let me turn to the two amendments in this group on which we have tabled motions to disagree. Lords amendment 58 seeks to confer certain police powers on the national food crime unit of the Food Standards Agency. We agree that food crime is a serious issue, costing billions of pounds each year, and it is right that the FSA should be empowered to respond accordingly, improve resilience and reduce the burden on police forces, but this is not the way to legislate on this issue. We are dealing here with the intrusive powers of the state. As such, we need to ensure that any exercise of PACE powers—powers under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984—by the FSA would be necessary, proportionate and legitimate, with suitable governance and accountability arrangements in place. Amendment 58 puts the cart before the horse. That said, we are committed to working with the FSA, its sponsor the Department for Health and Social Care, and other partners to frame legislation that is fit for purpose.

Finally, Lords amendment 107 would allow local authorities to establish and maintain secure academies, either alone or in consortia. The parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice, Lord Wolfson of Tredegar, made it clear in the other place that it would be legally possible for a local authority to set up an entity capable of entering into academy arrangements directly with the Secretary of State, and that is not prevented by the Academies Act 2010—so there is no legal bar, rendering the amendment unnecessary. Government policy is that academy trusts are not local authority influenced companies, and our position on secure schools is to mirror the procedures of academies. However, to repeat the commitment that Lord Wolfson made in the other place, my Department will assess in detail the potential role of local authorities in running this new form of provision, before we invite applications to run any future secure schools.

[Sarah Champion (Rotherham) (Lab)]

I hear what the Minister is saying, but looking into something is not the same as giving a clear commitment, here and now, that local authorities can run those secure academies.

[Tom Pursglove]

I am always grateful to the hon. Lady for her interventions, and I repeat my point: we do not believe there is a barrier, but as I say, we will review the matter in the way I have set out to the House. We of course recognise that local authorities have a long established role in children’s social care and the provision of secure accommodation for children and young people. In particular, the secure children’s home legal framework may present a more straightforward route to the expansion of local authority involvement in the provision of secure accommodation than does the 16-to-19 academies framework. I reiterate: there is no legal bar, and as such the amendment must be unnecessary. Fortunately, there is much agreement on this group of amendments in the House, and I will pick up on points raised during the debate when I wind it up.

[Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the Minister. I will not speak to all 58 amendments under debate, as some are straightforward and many in this group at least—I am sure the Minister will be pleased to hear—have full support from the Labour Benches. We particularly welcome Lords amendments 1 and 150, which introduce Harper’s law. That has the Opposition’s full and strong support, and I join the Minister in paying tribute to Lissie Harper’s extraordinary and powerful work. When facing pain and grief unimaginable to most of us, she has campaigned for reform to protect our protectors. My right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) and my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones) met Lissie Harper during her campaign, and I know they are particularly glad to see these amendments introduced by the Government. It is right that emergency service workers who put themselves at risk to keep the rest of us safe are protected by the strongest shield that the criminal justice system can provide.

We are also extremely pleased to see Lords amendments 27, 28 and 151, which will introduce Tony’s law, increasing penalties for those who commit child abuse. Again, I share the Minister’s admiration for the inspiring work of young Tony Hudgell and his loving parents, Paula and Mark. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), and my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) who have both done fantastic work throughout the passage of the Bill to increase protections for children, and supported Tony’s law in Committee. Cases as atrocious and horrifying as Tony’s are thankfully extremely rare, but it is right that when they do come before the courts, the judiciary can impose the full range of penalties that reflect the gravity of such horrific offending.

The Opposition welcome Lords amendment 104 which states that if someone who is carrying out a public service, such as a retail worker, is assaulted, the fact that they were carrying out a public service at the time of the offence will be an aggravating factor in sentencing. I am glad the Government have finally listened to the Opposition, trade unions and trade bodies who have been calling for greater protection, particularly for our shopworkers who have been unsung heroes and kept our country running throughout the pandemic. We pay particular thanks to the efforts of the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers, the Co-operative party, The British Retail Consortium, the Association of Convenience Stores, and Tesco, for their fantastic campaigning.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris) for his tireless work on this issue in recent years. I also pay tribute to the efforts of my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central and my noble Friend Lord Coaker, who throughout the Bill’s passage pushed for tougher penalties for those who assault shop workers.

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[Ruth Edwards]

Pointy black-tipped ears, furry and brown, and the ability to make a getaway at 45 mph. This is the description of the suspect I found digging in our veg patch the other week. I am, of course, talking about the brown hare. The occasional episode of vegetable vandalism aside, we feel privileged to share our home with these fascinating creatures that we often see streaking over the fields around our house or lolloping through our garden.

I strongly welcome Lords amendments 61 to 69, which create tougher penalties for hare coursing by increasing the maximum penalty for trespassing in pursuit of game to up to six months’ imprisonment. New offences have also been created: trespass with the intention of using a dog to search for or pursue a hare; and, secondly, being equipped to do so.

Hare coursing is a huge problem in rural parts of Rushcliffe and throughout the Vale of Belvoir. Last night, I spoke to a local farmer, who told me that hare coursers had been trespassing on his land for as long as he could remember; several times a month they vandalise his property, destroying locks and pulling gates off their posts to gain access. They destroy his crop by driving all over it and, obviously, they destroy the local hare population. He told me there were now hardly any left. Worst of all, he told me, “We know who is doing a lot of it. It’s a couple of local families but they seem to be above the law.” Farmers who had challenged them had their workshops broken into and vandalised, which is why I am not sharing his name today.

I hope these new offences will give the police better powers to target such criminals. I welcome the new powers for courts to order the reimbursement of the police for kennelling dogs seized in relation to hare coursing, because taxpayers certainly should not be paying for it. I also welcome new powers for courts to disqualify offenders from owning a dog—no one engaged in this sort of cruelty to animals should be owning one.

[Tom Pursglove]

I thank Members from across the House for their many and varied contributions to the various amendments we are considering this evening. I wish to respond to a number of the points made.

First, let me respond to my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill) on IPPs. I have heard his view that the amendment does not go far enough and does not take action to help IPP offenders who are still in prison. The number of IPP offenders in prison, having never been released, stood at 1,661 on 30 September 2021, which represents enormous progress when we compare it with the peak of 6,000 in 2012. The IPP action plan, produced and regularly refreshed by Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service, remains the best means of providing all those continuing to serve the IPP sentence with every opportunity to show they can be safely released by the Parole Board. The action plan sets out a series of measures designed to rehabilitate IPP prisoners, including through psychology-led reviews, and improved central and regional strategic oversight of IPP progression. There is clear evidence that these measures are working, and the number of IPP prisoners has decreased. IPP prisoners continue to be released in significant numbers and have a high chance of a positive outcome from Parole Board hearings. In 2020-21, more than two thirds of IPP Parole Board oral hearings resulted in a positive outcome, either a release or a progressive move to open prison.

Despite all that, I hope I can reassure my hon. Friend by saying that, as Ministers have said during the passage of this Bill, in this House and in the other place, we are mindful that the Justice Committee in this House is currently conducting an inquiry into IPP sentences, and we look forward to hearing the recommendations of his Committee and we will certainly consider them closely. I, along with my fellow Ministers, will continue to engage with IPP stakeholders in this House and elsewhere, and we will continue to give full consideration to any options recommended. I hope that that gives him the reassurance that he is looking for as to our intentions.

[Sir Robert Neill]

I am grateful to the Minister, as it does. I hope that he makes sure that we have a timely response; perhaps he can meet me once our Committee has reported.

[Tom Pursglove]

Yes, I am always keen that the Department is as timely as possible in engaging with my hon. Friend’s excellent Committee. We are always grateful for the tireless, thorough and considered work that he and colleagues do.

Let me turn to the issue of Harper’s law. Again, I was very grateful to Members from across the House, including the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) and my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Ruth Edwards), for their clear, full-throated support for these changes. I was able to address one of the technical issues to provide clarity for the House earlier, and I just wish to provide further clarity, as I promised I would, on whether volunteers can be emergency workers under Harper’s law. The answer is yes, it applies to emergency workers who are engaged to supply emergency services in a voluntary capacity as well as to paid employees. It uses exactly the same definition as in the 2018 Act, and I hope that that helps to put the technical aspects of this provision on the record for the House’s benefit.

Lords amendment 107 covers the issue of secure schools. I am always conscious that I do not want to disappoint the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion). We have always had a very constructive working relationship on a whole host of issues, including on the Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Bill, which I know she will be delighted completed its Commons consideration on Friday. None the less, on this occasion, I am afraid that I cannot deliver precisely on what she wishes to see. However, I reiterate the point that, before we invite applications for any future secure schools, the Ministry of Justice will assess in detail the potential role of local authorities in running this new form of provision. The Department for Education remains committed to moving towards a school system where every school has the benefits of being part of a family of schools in a strong multi-academy trust. The DFE will set out its plans in a schools White Paper to be published in the coming months.

[Sarah Champion]

Will the Minister give way?

[Tom Pursglove]

I will give the hon. Lady another opportunity.

[Sarah Champion]

Round 5, Minister.

Will the Minister please clarify what the objection is to making it very clear that local authorities can apply to run and maintain 16 to 19 academies? Moreover, is he able to explain why they were prevented from doing so in the first round of tendering?

[Tom Pursglove]

The hon. Lady is persistent in these matters. All I can do, I am afraid, is simply refer her back to the comments that I have already made during the course of this debate. I will happily take away—[Interruption.] The hon. Lady is chuntering from a sedentary position. I am not sure whether she was here for the duration of this debate. We have covered this matter in some detail. I will gladly take away a copy of Hansard and study the points that she has raised in the course of this debate. If there is any further detail that I am able to provide, I will happily do so.

[Sir Robert Neill]

Are local authorities ruled in or ruled out?

[Tom Pursglove]

I refer to the point that I made earlier, which is that we believe there is no barrier.

Lords amendment 58 covers food standards. I hope that I can offer some comfort to the House. We are broadly supportive of the intention to confer such powers, which would be consistent with powers available to other bodies, but reject the amendment on the basis that there is further work to do before any legislative amendments are made. The current chairman of the Food Standards Agency, Susan Jebb, wrote to the Minister for Crime and Policing on 11 August 2021 expressing concern that the existing powers of the National Food Crime Unit were insufficient for their purposes. The Minister responded in October, expressing support for the request and indicated the Home Office’s intent to work with the NFCU to find a suitable legislative vehicle. In order to fully support any extension of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 powers to the NFCU, we would need reassurance that this is necessary, proportionate and legitimate and that suitable governance, accountability and oversight of investigations and complaints arrangements will be in place. There is also a lack of clarity over the necessary protocols when PACE powers would be exercised, which will need consideration with the NFCU before legislative amendments are made, but we will of course legislate at the next available opportunity.

I am also grateful to Members for their strong support for the hare coursing changes that the Government are introducing, particularly the observations made by my hon. Friends the Members for Huntingdon (Mr Djanogly) and for Rushcliffe (Ruth Edwards), and by my hon. Friend the Member for North West Cambridgeshire (Shailesh Vara), who is my neighbour, from just over the border. This issue matters a great deal. We have listened carefully to a wide range of voices, telling us just that. Hare coursing is not a quaint country tradition. It involves horrible cruelty to a much loved wild animal. It is associated with illegal gambling and other criminality. It brings serious harm to the rural areas where it takes place. Subject to parliamentary approval, we intend to get the tougher sentences in place before the start of the next hare coursing season.

I conclude by again thanking Members from across the House for their thoughtful contributions to this debate and also Members in the other place for their thorough consideration of these matters and for the engagement that colleagues have provided throughout the Bill. As a Minister coming to this rather late in the day, may I also place on record my sincere appreciation to my hon. Friends the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins) and for Croydon South (Chris Philp) as well as to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon (Sir Robert Buckland) for all their work in getting us to this stage.

Lords amendment 1 agreed to.

Lords amendment 58 disagreed to.

Clause 139

Secure 16 to 19 Academies

Motion made, and Question put, That this House disagrees with Lords amendment 107.—(Tom Pursglove.)

21:50

Division 197

Ayes: 314

Noes: 190

Lords amendment 107 disagreed to.

--- Later in debate ---

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

We now move to the third set of amendments. When I call the Minister to move the motion, it would be useful if those who are trying to catch my eye indicate they wish to speak.

After Clause 54

Accountability of public authorities: duties on police workforce

[Kit Malthouse]

I beg to move that this House disagrees with Lords amendment 71.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Lords amendment 74, and Government amendment (a) thereto.

Lords amendment 88, and Government amendment (a) thereto.

Lords amendment 73, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 80, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) to (f) to the words so restored to the Bill.

Lords amendment 81, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 82, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 87, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) to (f) to the words so restored to the Bill.

Lords amendments 89 and 146, Government motions to disagree, and Government amendments (a) and (b) in lieu.

Lords amendment 143, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) to (c) in lieu.

Lords amendments 75 to 79, 83 to 86, 90 to 93, 118 to 120 and 148.

[Kit Malthouse]

Lords amendment 71 would introduce a duty of candour for the police workforce. I am sure that hon. Members know that the Government take police integrity and accountability extremely seriously. So much so that, in February 2020, we introduced a statutory duty of co-operation for serving police officers as part of wider integrity reforms.

A failure to co-operate in that way constitutes a breach of the statutory standards of professional behaviour by which all officers must abide and could therefore result in a formal disciplinary sanction. It is our view that the duty to co-operate puts a greater onus on officers than the duty of candour provided for in the Lords amendment, as they could ultimately be dismissed for a breach. In essence, the Lords is proposing a dilution.

Hon. Members will also be aware of the Government’s forthcoming response to the Daniel Morgan independent panel and to Bishop James Jones’ report concerning the bereaved Hillsborough families’ experiences, and we will set out our view on a wider duty of candour for all public authorities. Before the Government respond to those reports, however, it is clearly imperative that the Hillsborough families are given the opportunity to share their views.

None the less, we are closely monitoring the impact of the new legislation on police co-operation with inquiries and investigations. As we consider the case for a wider duty of candour for other public servants and bodies, we will determine whether there are gaps in the existing framework that need to be filled to ensure public confidence. I assure the House that we will set out our conclusions later this year.

Before I turn to the Lords amendments to part 3 of the Bill, I point out to hon. Members that over the last couple of years, with regard to public order, we have all seen that the police have struggled with some of the demonstrations that we have seen on our streets. Last autumn, Insulate Britain’s new tactics put a lot of police officers in danger, caused a significant amount of misery to many thousands of people who simply wanted to get to work or to otherwise go about their daily lives, and were difficult to address. Since, we have seen further examples of wholly unacceptable forms of protest. I am afraid that their lordships may regret the day that they voted down the significant number of measures that we had inserted in the Bill.

The House of Lords did, however, recognise that freedom of speech and assembly are qualified rights under the European convention on human rights, and there are times when it is appropriate to restrict those rights to protect the rights of non-protesters. For that reason, we are sympathetic to Lords amendment 143, which would introduce fast-track public space protection orders. The Government have listened to the concerns raised in the other place about the harm caused by disruptive protests outside schools and vaccination centres. We agree in principle with the amendment, and our amendments (a) to (c) in lieu of Lords amendment 143 will have a similar effect but will ensure that provision for expedited PSPOs works with the grain of the existing legislative framework.

[Jim Shannon]

I very much look forward to the tightening of the laws, but I am also conscious that I look for balance. As one who has protested on the streets of Northern Ireland on many occasions—legally—with an important desire to do so, I ask whether the Minister feels that the balance is right in this legislation. In our words, the right to protest should be done in a peaceful manner, not to obstruct anybody.

[Kit Malthouse]

I do indeed believe that the balance is right, but the hon. Gentleman does not have to take my word for it. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire & rescue services was specifically tasked with looking at the balance of legislation and protest. After some examination, it decided that the balance had swung too far in favour of protest and too much away from the rights of others to go about their daily lives.

[Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend knows that I have real concerns about the noisy protest legislation. How often does he expect it to be applied and how many past protests have been subject to something like that kind of police discretion?

[Kit Malthouse]

Obviously, it is hard for me to predict how often these things will be used. I will come on to talk about the noise provision more specifically, but it is worth pointing out that it is not common for conditions to be placed on protest generally. The National Police Chiefs’ Council tells us that in the three months to April ’21, there were 2,500 protests, and conditions were put on them no more than a dozen times. The Metropolitan police has confirmed that in 2019—hon. Members have to remember that in London, a protest takes place pretty much every day, and sometimes several in one day—it put conditions on only 15 times and, in 2020, only six times. Admittedly, 2020 saw a suppressed number of protests because of the pandemic, but this is nevertheless rare, and the police take care in placing such conditions.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

I will make a little bit of progress.

On my previous point about the Lords accepting the need for protection outside schools and vaccination centres, we believe it should not just be people working in those two types of facility who are protected from highly disruptive protests. The Government continue to believe it is essential that the police are able in some circumstances to place conditions on protests to prevent noise causing serious harm or impinging on the rights of others. The vast majority of protests in England and Wales will be unaffected by this legislation. The power may be used only in the most exceptional circumstances where police assess the noise from protests to be unjustifiable and damaging to others. I can assure the House that conditions will, by law, be imposed only where necessary and proportionate, with due consideration to all our freedoms of expression and assembly. The police are already legally bound to assess this balance with the powers they currently have.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Kit Malthouse]

I will come to the hon. Members in a moment.

I am sure that all hon. Members will recall vividly how proceedings in St Margaret’s church were intruded on by protesters’ noise when we were paying our respects to our colleague Sir David Amess. I am not sure we could call that intrusion damaging; if anything, it made us sing all the loudly and filled the church with an air of defiance as we mourned. However, we have to reflect on the fact that developments in amplification mean that noise can be used as a weapon and can cause significant psychological damage. This is why most local authorities have a noise enforcement team with powers to act. We need to recognise that, in a protest situation, noise could be used to make worship, business or residence impossible in particular premises, and our fellow citizens would expect protection from the police in those circumstances.

[Barry Gardiner]

To assure the House that there will be an objective standard rather than a subjective one, can the Minister explain either what decibel level there would have to be or for how long such a noise nuisance would have to continue for enforcing the powers to be reasonable and objective?

[Kit Malthouse]

As the House would expect, we are not prescribing limits in the way the hon. Gentleman is asking for, not least because the varying circumstances with which the police are presented mean that hard and fast rules do not necessary obtain. For example, it could be that one person with an amplifier attempting to drown out—I do not know—pursuit of worship in a particular church, temple or synagogue could be deemed over time to be a nuisance, and therefore be damaging and impinging on the rights of worship of others, whereas a crowd of individuals outside making a similar noise for a shorter time may not. As I have just laid out, I did not regard the noise that intruded on our grief in St Margaret’s as damaging—I would not have thought that that hit the bar—but if someone was outside the hon. Gentleman’s constituency office protesting day in, day out with a large and powerful amplifier, he might quite rightly in those circumstances seek protection from the police or indeed from the local authority. There is a series of these situations that the police are now presented with because of developments in amplification.

[Caroline Lucas]

Would the Minister acknowledge that our public order laws already make it harder to protest than in practically any other democracy, and that the kind of legislation he is bringing in now, as we have just seen, is completely subjective and puts the police in an impossible position? Laws already exist to deal with the so-called problems that he is raising. This is about throwing red meat to his Back Benchers so that he can try to get a bit more popularity, and it stinks.

[Kit Malthouse]

I do not know who is throwing the red meat here, but it is certainly not me. Obviously the hon. Lady has a constituency that will lap up her remarks, no doubt released on social media. In truth, the police have been asking for some time for improvements to the elderly public order legislation. We put the measures through consideration by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services, which felt they were proportionate and sensible for us to pursue.

[Joanna Cherry]

The Minister is implying that the police and Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services in some way wanted this new noise trigger. Will he accept that I am correct when I say that neither the police, nor Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services, requested the noise trigger at all?

[Kit Malthouse]

The inspectorate obviously would not request that because that is not its job, but we certainly asked it to look at the balance that we are trying to present with what I think are relatively modest improvements to public order legislation. Indeed, from memory of the report, it felt we should go further, which we are unable to do because of the structure of the Bill. That means that on the rare occasion where noise is causing other people’s rights to be impinged on, and where worship or business or residence is impossible, we would seek protection.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jesse Norman]

I think it would help me, and it might help others in the Chamber, if the Minister would consider putting in place a review, perhaps a year or two years into the use of this power, if the House chooses to grant it.

[Kit Malthouse]

I am happy to commit to reviewing the offence. I would love to put a time limit on it but, as I said when I outlined the number of times conditions would be met, this measure may be used on only a very small number of occasions. We will have to consider the range of situations in which it is used, and obviously review it as we do with all public order legislation. We take very seriously the fact that protest is a fundamental building block of any liberal democracy, and now more than ever that is writ large. This is an important freedom for us in this country, and I am sure that lots of Members from all side of the House have been on protests of all kinds over the years. We must ensure that legislation moves with the times and reflects changes in technology, and that we give the police the powers they need, albeit in rare and often exceptional circumstances.

[Anne Marie Morris (Newton Abbot) (Ind)]

The Minister is being generous in accepting interventions. Does he think that, while well intended, the Bill may have the unintended consequence that individuals who think they are within the law in the way they demonstrate, because of the Bill’s subjectivity find themselves unexpectedly criminalised? That for them would be devastating.

[Kit Malthouse]

No, not necessarily—[Laughter.] No, no. As a former Westminster councillor and London Assembly member for central London, who was subjected to dozens of protests of all sizes, shapes and forms, I would encourage all people who are protesting, wherever they are, to engage with the police first and discuss their own safety and the safety of others. In any democracy it is responsible to ensure that people give forewarning of what they are about to do.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)]

Does the Minister appreciate that many people listening to this debate will be very suspicious of his words? They will see in the proposed regulations and discussions with the police a fundamental desire by him and his Government to shut down, control, and eliminate protest within our society. People have a right to protest, a right to make their voices heard, and a right to dissent. Surely that is fundamental to a democratic society. It is no good praising people in Russia if we close down protest here.

[Kit Malthouse]

Of course we are not closing down protest. The right hon. Gentleman is right that people have a fundamental right to dissent, to protest and to make their views known in the public sphere as they do in the private sphere, but, as the House of Lords and the European Court of Human Rights have said, the right to protest is not unqualified, and I am afraid that, in the last couple of years, we have seen protestors using tactics that are massively disruptive to other people’s lives. People just wanting to go about their business have been so frustrated that they have been leaping out of their cars and taking things into their own hands. We have seen protestors running on to the fast lane of motorways, causing danger to themselves and motorists, and distracting police officers from stopping people from being stabbed or burgled in all our neighbourhoods. We have a duty to address that, and the role of the House and that of the police is to strike a balance between competing rights. That is what we do, and that is what we are trying to do with these modest measures.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

No. I have given way lots of times. There will be many speakers, and I do not want to use up all the time. We have only got until midnight to get through all of this stuff. I will move on from the noise powers, which, as I say, we think will be used only in exceptional circumstances but must be available given changes in amplification.

Lords amendment 80 would prevent the alignment of the police’s ability to place conditions on public assembly with their existing powers to place conditions on public processions. HMICFRS found that a distinction between processions and assemblies was no longer appropriate. In the light of the practical challenges of safely policing protests, there is an unjustifiable inconsistency in the current law. When does a procession become an assembly and vice versa?

Lords amendments 74 to 79 implement a recommendation to the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee to the effect that the term “serious disruption” should be defined in the Bill rather than in regulations. I trust that the amendments have allayed the concerns raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), who is not in her place, in our previous debates on the matter.

I am afraid that Lords amendments 81 and 82 arise from a misunderstanding of the effect of the provisions in clause 58, which are designed, in the words of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, to protect the rights of access to the parliamentary estate for those with business there. The changes to the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011, which governs prohibited activities in the vicinity of Parliament, will not prevent protests outside Parliament, nor will they prevent the Greater London Authority from authorising assemblies outside Parliament. Clause 58 will simply enable a police officer to direct an individual to cease or not to begin obstructing the passage of a vehicle into or out of the parliamentary estate. That is extremely important for those who are disabled or otherwise need a vehicle to access the estate, either to work here or to exercise their democratic rights. We expect police officers to use their sound judgements to determine when it is appropriate to make use of the power, and I do not see how it can lead to a prohibition of any kind on protests outside Parliament. Lords amendments 81 and 82 are therefore unnecessary.

Lords amendment 88 is a stripped-out version of the Government’s proposal to increase the maximum penalty for those who obstruct the highway. It would limit the increase in the maximum penalties to the obstruction of the strategic road network. Many major roads lie outside the SRN; indeed, some 98% of all roads in England do not form part of it. Were we to limit the increase in the maximum penalty in that way, protestors could continue to cause extensive and wholly disproportionate disruption to commuters and parents dropping their children off at school without facing sentences proportionate to the harm they have caused. Amendment (a) to Lords amendment 88 will ensure that the full extent of our road network is protected with the increase in maximum penalties.

[Tonia Antoniazzi (Gower) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

I thought I was going to get away with it. Yes, go on.

[Tonia Antoniazzi]

The Minister talks about the cost of demonstrations—those on the road networks in particular—to people’s lives, and he has made statements about the costs of those protests. I tabled a written question asking him what assessment has been made of the cost to the public purse of the prison sentences being given out to Insulate Britain activists. That is a problem, because those sentences are not proportionate to what is happening. Surely there are better ways that are more cost-effective.

[Kit Malthouse]

At the moment, those incarcerations are at the behest of a judge in a civil matter relating to the injunctions, and there is nothing that the Government can necessarily do about that. However, I point out that deterring people from such action may result in cost savings further down the line for the wider population. I urge Opposition Members, and anybody looking at this issue, to ask themselves whether they believe that protests should not be restrained in any way, shape or form, or that there is a balance to be struck. If they believe, as the ECHR does, and as the House of Lords has accepted in some of its amendments to the Bill, that a balance should be struck, the only question is where.

Our view, which is backed up by evidence from HMI and elsewhere, is that the balance has swung too far away from the general public, who want to go about their lives, recognising the very many important issues that are raised by protest. While they acknowledge those problems, they want to get on with their lives, and they want protection from the state of their right to get to school, to hospital and to work. That is not a right to be taken lightly. One of the most frustrating things about some of these protests has been their self-defeating result. Notwithstanding the cause, important or otherwise, the protestors have turned off millions of their fellow citizens and caused a level of intolerance towards issues such as climate change, which is regrettable. We have a job to balance those rights, and that is what we are attempting to do.

[Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister seeks to take public opinion as a whole, but people have had to take these matters into their own hands because air quality is killing their children, and because of the Government’s inaction on the very simple act of insulating housing. The proportionality is in the wrong place, and he is seeking to take on public opinion where it does not exist. If the Government took the right actions, surely there would be no need for the protests in the first place. People should be allowed to protest proportionately.

[Kit Malthouse]

We cannot operate a democracy on the basis that, unless the Government agree with everything that someone wants, they will protest. It is a crazy thing to say, I am afraid. Much progress in this country has been brought about by protest, but much more has been brought about by political campaigning and winning elections. Frankly, if someone wants to make a change in the country, as all Opposition Members are proving, that is the way to go about it. I hope that the House will appreciate that we are trying hard to strike a balance between competing rights.

[Tonia Antoniazzi]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

No, I have given away enough; I have to move on. We acknowledge the fundamental importance of the right to protest in this country. We live in a liberal democracy. The right of someone to dissent and to go out on the street and make their views known is critical, but so is my right to get to hospital, to work or to church, and to do so without somebody blasting me out with noise. We have been balancing competing rights for decades, if not centuries, in this country. We are a mature democracy that can cope with that kind of responsibility—have no fear. We are ringed around by independent courts, a bicameral Parliament, all sorts of checks and balances on the power of Government to strike this balance, legislation, and our participation in supranational treaties. There are lots of ways that we protect ourselves and our human rights, but in the end, fundamentally, all democratic Governments have to strike that balance, and that is what we are attempting to do.

Lords amendments 118 to 120 give effect to a commitment made by the Prime Minister following the final of Euro 2020, in response to disgraceful online racist abuse directed at certain England players. The amendments would enable a court to impose a football banning order against persons convicted of online hate offences connected to football. That will prevent such offenders from spreading their criminal, hateful views at football matches, and I very much hope that the measure will also deter others from engaging in similar behaviours that are so harmful to victims and to our national game.

Lords amendments 89 and 146 would repeal the Vagrancy Act 1824. The Government are committed to ending rough sleeping, and as a result of our actions we have seen an historic reduction in rough sleeping in recent years. We agree that no one should be criminalised simply for sleeping rough, and that the time has indeed come to repeal the antiquated Vagrancy Act 1824. I know that that sentiment is keenly shared by a number of hon. Members. I pay tribute to the campaign that has been run by my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Nickie Aiken), my right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) and my predecessor in my constituency of North West Hampshire, Lord Young, in the other place.

However, we must balance our role in providing essential support for the vulnerable with ensuring that we do not weaken the ability of the police to intervene where needed. Therefore, while our amendments in lieu will provide for the Vagrancy Act to be repealed in full in England and Wales, we intend to enact replacement legislation in the coming Session before bringing the repeal of the 1824 Act into force. To allow for that, and ultimately to ensure that the police have the tools they need, we will delay commencement of the repeal for up to 18 months. In the meantime, we will publish a bold new strategy to end rough sleeping. The strategy will set up how we will ensure that rough sleeping is prevented in the first instance and is effectively responded to in the rare cases where it does occur, and that our police have the ability to intervene where needed and keep everybody safe, including the person at issue.

--- Later in debate ---

[Allan Dorans (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (SNP)]

I wish to speak in support of Lords amendments 73 and 80, which would remove the ability of the police to impose noise-based restrictions on processions and greater conditions on static demonstrations. Peaceful protest is a legitimate and integral part of our unwritten constitution and for the Government to interfere with those rights and to try to impose restrictions and unnecessary conditions that affect and violate basic human rights is nothing less than appalling.

If Lords amendments 73 and 80 are not accepted, there are great concerns that police officers will be placed in the unenviable position of having to adjudicate between different stakeholders on the basis of broad and ambiguous criteria about whether to allow a “noisy” or “disruptive” protest to take place or continue. Far from enabling the police to maintain public order, these provisions will place an onerous burden on police officers in the exercise of their professional discretion, subjecting the police to even greater political pressure.

The police already have sufficient powers under the Public Order Act 1986. The additional powers in clauses 55 and 56 of the Bill are neither necessary nor welcomed by many senior police officers. As a uniformed police inspector in the Metropolitan police, I had extensive experience of dealing with public order and with processions and demonstrations of all sizes, and I can say honestly that none of them needed any further legislation; they could all be effectively dealt with by the current legislation.

There are serious concerns that the police, who serve a vital function in enforcing the law, are being instrumentalised for political purposes. That will erode the trust of the public, seriously damage the relationship between the police and the public, and adversely affect the cherished tradition of policing by consent that is at the heart of policing and our society.

Despite the disparaging remarks made by the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle), I pay tribute to the police officers out there policing our streets, who are overwhelmingly honest, trustworthy and hardworking. I commend them for putting themselves at risk and in danger to keep us all safe.

[Kit Malthouse]

I am grateful to all hon. Members who have spoken in what at times has been an impassioned debate. I have to say that it has been quite a rich experience to hear a defence of democracy from an Opposition whom I watched for month after month using every technical device at their disposal to try to overturn the democratic decision that the British people took in the 2016 referendum. Those months, happily, are long behind us, and the British people gave their verdict on that attempt to circumvent democracy in the 2019 general election, from which I am happy to say we all benefited.

Much of tonight’s debate has been about the difficult job for any democratic Government of balancing the rights of competing groups: the rights of people who own land, and of those who use land; the rights of public authorities that have parks, and of the Travelling community; the rights of those who want to go about their business and access hospitals, schools or businesses, and of those who wish to protest. These are difficult balances that democratic Governments have to strike from time to time. The Labour party has had to do it in the past; I well remember it banning any protest within 1 km of Parliament. The first arrest was of a woman reading the names of the Iraq war dead at the Cenotaph, if I remember rightly. That, I will admit, was a step too far.

We believe that the package of measures that we have put forward on protest represents a modest rebalancing.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Kit Malthouse]

I am not giving way. It is a modest rebalancing of the rights of the majority of British people who want to go about their business and the rights of those who quite legitimately want to protest. We yield to no man or woman in our desire to protect those inalienable rights of protest and dissent in this country. Our party has been in the position of protesting and dissenting in the past, as have many parties represented in this House. We do not take it for granted; we wish to protect it, and we believe that we are doing so while striking a balance.

On the undertaking that I was asked to give about the Vagrancy Act, let me say that 18 months is a maximum. If we can act faster, we will, but intensive work will obviously be required to get us there.

I believe that the Bill in its entirety represents a solid step forward, both for the safety of the country and for the difficult job of balancing our competing rights in what is now and will always be a liberal democracy.

Lords amendment 71 disagreed to.

Government amendment (a) made to Lords amendment 74.

Lords amendment 74, as amended, agreed to.

Government amendment (a) made to Lords amendment 88.

Lords amendment 88, as amended, agreed to.

More than six hours having elapsed since the commencement of proceedings on consideration of Lords amendments, the proceedings were interrupted (Programme Order, this day).

The Deputy Speaker put forthwith the Questions necessary for the disposal of the business to be concluded at that time (Standing Order No. 83F).

Motion made, and Question put, That this House disagrees with Lords amendment 73.—(Kit Malthouse.)

Lords amendment 73 disagreed to.

00:00

Division 198

Ayes: 288

Noes: 238

Clause 56

--- Later in debate ---

00:00

Division 199

Ayes: 289

Noes: 237

Lords amendment 80 disagreed to.

--- Later in debate ---

00:00

Division 200

Ayes: 298

Noes: 236

Lords amendment 81 disagreed to.

--- Later in debate ---

00:41

Division 201

Ayes: 292

Noes: 238

Lords amendment 87 disagreed to.