Scrap Metal Dealers Bill

Debate between Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton and Lord Rosser

Friday 18th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

I have listened carefully to the arguments and seldom do I cross swords with the noble Baroness, Lady Browning, but surely, under the existing rules, all that the Government can agree is to put an amendment to this House, which this House must consider on its merits. It is not a matter of honour or honouring what has been done in the other place. We have been given an opportunity and personally, having heard all the evidence about the urgency of tackling this problem, I am grateful for being given the chance to consider an alternative proposal. But, as a Member of this House, it is my job to consider it and act on what I believe.

[Lord Rosser]

Clearly, it is a matter for this House to decide whether it wishes to consider the amendment on its merits. The amendment is not only not needed, it creates uncertainty in a situation where certainty in addressing scrap metal thefts is needed. The amendment would mean that nobody would know what the position would be in five years’ time. Nobody would know whether the changed practices and procedures provided for in the Bill will be permanent or whether we will be reverting back to the current arrangements in five years’ time.

What kind of message does it send to the law enforcement authorities? Are we to expect them to give some priority to enforcing the provisions of the Bill when we are also sending them a message through the sunset clause provided for in the amendment that we are so unsure about the need for the measures in the Bill that they will cease to be effective in five years’ time unless further legislation is passed?

What guarantees will there be that the Bill—

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Debate between Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton and Lord Rosser

Thursday 14th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

My Lords, my name is on this amendment. I fully support all the points raised by my noble friend Lord Bilston. If the Government feel unable to agree to this change today in the Bill, I hope that I could have some information and assurance that the matter will be raised through other channels. How soon could we revisit the issue if it cannot be done in this way?

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, I will certainly be brief. I do not think anybody seriously believes that non-profit-making clubs are the cause of some of the problems sometimes associated with other clubs. They do much good work in the community and for charities, as has been said. They are not now always financially strong, as my noble friend Lord Bilston explained. We hope that the Government will be able to look sympathetically on the amendment.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Debate between Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton and Lord Rosser

Wednesday 18th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

My Lords, does the noble Lord also agree about the importance of the two-way communication that is part of the local government scene? I recollect that, following the Toxteth riots, I talked to the chief constable after a police authority meeting. I said, “My children have heard that there is going to be trouble in Preston on Friday night”. He said, “You are the fourth parent from the locality who has come to tell me that”. It is a two-way flow of information. I also explained to my sons that, as a member of the police authority, I would be watching what happened and would therefore see whether they defied me and turned up. The fact that it is a two-way flow of information is a very important point. Local authority members gain information which they can pass on to the police service to help it in anticipating and therefore preventing crime.

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, this group of amendments deals with the need for close working between the police and crime commissioner and the local authorities within the police and crime commissioner’s area. Of course, the case for such close working was made at Second Reading, in Committee last week and again by my noble friends Lord Harris of Haringey and Lord Beecham and others in the debate this evening, and I certainly do not intend to repeat it.

I only add that the Government say that they want influence over decision-making, if not decision-making itself, devolved down the line as far as possible. That is the claimed intent of their Localism Bill. A new police and crime commissioner with considerable and largely unchallengeable powers covering an area as extensive as, say, the West Midlands could hardly be regarded as the standard-bearer for the Government’s claimed concept of localism and local accountability. One way of at least partially addressing that deficiency would be to go down the road of these amendments and place a requirement on the commissioner to meet representatives of each local authority in the relevant police area at least twice a year.

As has been said, local authorities and their elected representatives have a key role to play in reducing crime and articulating the policing needs and concerns not only of the local authority but also of those they represent. One would hope that police and crime commissioners would want to meet all local authorities in their area on a regular basis and work in partnership. However, perhaps based on our own personal experiences, we do not necessarily share the Minister’s view, expressed earlier this evening, on the principled approach that will be adopted by all those who are elected or appointed to positions of considerable power and responsibility.

These amendments not only seek to address that point but, as my noble friend Lady Henig said, by providing for such contact between the commissioner and local authority representatives in the Bill, they also seek to emphasise and highlight the importance of working together to reduce crime and reoffending rates and to achieve the goal of ever-safer communities. I hope that the Minister will be able to give a supportive response to these amendments.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, I begin by apologising profusely to the noble Lord, Lord Harris, because I had temporarily forgotten that paragraph 233 of Schedule 16 to the Bill clearly spells out that PCCs will be subject to the Audit Commission Act 1998, so that is part of the definition of “external audit”. I am sure that the noble Lord has already noticed that.

Many of us have been recollecting policing problems of years past. The noble Baroness, Lady Farrington, led me to have a flashback to when I was a university teacher in Manchester and used occasionally to lecture at the Lancashire police training college in Preston. The chief constable of Lancashire, as I remember him in 1969, was more politically incorrect in his language than would be acceptable for a police constable nowadays. That is part of the transformation in policing since then.