Crime and Policing Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 10th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendments 1 and 21 in the names of the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, and the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, which have just been moved so well. I agree with all the amendments in this group, although I am not quite sure and have reservations about Amendment 2 on lowering the age to 16.

The proposition seems to me straightforward. The powers to tackle anti-social behaviour are currently contained in the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. So, before the state affords itself even more powers—which, by the way, often duplicate what we already have—should we not assess whether what we have actually works in improving outcomes for victims and fundamentally reducing anti-social behaviour, which is what we want? We should note that 82% of anti-social behaviour practitioners surveyed by Justice have called for such a review of existing powers and criticised the lack of proper consultation, or even engagement, by the Government. It is shocking that there has never been a formal review of the 2014 Act, and that data on the use of existing orders is not collated centrally, nor their use monitored, by government. Surely the Minister agrees that the Government should be working to identify and address problems that are inherent in existing anti-social behaviour powers and orders before creating more, and that that would be an evidence-based approach to this question.

We are largely focusing on respect orders in this group. They are almost duplicates of anti-social behaviour injunctions but will provide, the Government has argued, more effective enforcement. Experts and practitioners in fact suggest that they could confuse enforcement agencies. What is more, as respect orders are so close to ASBIs, the fear is that they will just reproduce and increase the problems with those injunctions, which research shows are overused, inconsistently applied and sweep up relatively minor behaviour problems alongside more serious incidents. At the very least, can the Minister explain why the discredited ASBIs are staying on the statute book? Why not just dump them?

If, as the Government tell us, the key difference with respect orders is to deal with persistent and serious anti-social behaviour, that should be made explicit in the legislation. Otherwise, the danger is that they just become another overused part of a toolkit, handed out promiscuously. That is a particular concern because of the use of the phrase by the Government and in the Bill that these orders are “just and convenient”.

“Convenient” is chilling, because—here is the rub—respect orders are formally civil orders but, in essence, are criminal in character. I am worried about the conflation of civil and criminal in relation to respect orders, which the noble Lord explained so well. The Government are removing that rather inconvenient problem of a criminal standard of proof because it has all that tiresome “beyond reasonable doubt” palaver that you have to go through. However, if you are found guilty, as it were, there is a criminal punishment doled out via a respect order and you can, as we have heard, receive up to two years in prison, which rather contradicts some of the emphasis in the Sentencing Bill on trying to stop people going to prison and keeping them in the community—so this is not entirely joined-up government either.

At Second Reading I quoted Dame Diana Johnson, who made clear the “convenience” point by explaining that the problem with a civil injunction such as an ASB is that,

“if a civil injunction is breached, the police officer has to take the individual to court to prove the breach”,

and she complained that there was no automatic power of arrest. That bothersome inconvenience has been overcome by creating a new respect order, which Dame Diana enthusiastically states

“combines the flexibility of the civil injunction with the ‘teeth’ of the criminal behaviour order”.—[Official Report, Commons, 27/11/24; cols. 795-96.]

However, that convenient mash-up of a legal solution is something that we should be wary of. It has a dangerous precedent, showing that a cavalier attitude to legal norms and justice can lead to great injustice.

When I read all this, I thought of the single justice procedure, which we were told would allow public authorities to bring cheap and speedy prosecutions for law breaches, such as not paying the BBC licence fee or dodging transport fares. However, with quick prosecutions conducted in such a way—and, in that instance, behind closed doors, as exposed brilliantly by Tristan Kirk, a journalist at the Evening Standard—we have seen thousands of people on an industrial scale being found guilty, often of small unintended mistakes. We have to remember that, if you try to bring about justice quickly and using these new methods, you can cause huge amounts of problems. There are harrowing stories of people who are very ill, people who have dementia and even people who have died, who have been victims of these single justice procedure issues.

I hope the movers of the amendments in this group will recognise that fast-track systems of convenience can lead to some terrible unintended consequences. I am reminded, in similar vein, of the growth of those monstrous non-crime hate incidents—again, a legalistic mash-up that have caused so many problems for free speech, using paralegalistic language and confusing us over what constitutes guilt. I was therefore glad to see the amendments by the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, in this group, and I look forward to his comments later.

This group of amendments is one to which I would like to hear the Minister respond positively. They are well intentioned—no one has been dismissive of anti-social behaviour—but we do not think respect orders are fit for purpose and, on the other hand, anti-social behaviour orders in general are in a mess. At least let us review what works and what does not before we move forward.

[Baroness Whitaker (Lab)]

My Lords, I add my support for Amendment 1. There should be a review of all these orders before layering another one on. In fact, some of that work has been done: freedom of information data demonstrates that people from minority ethnic communities are far more likely to be subject to this range of orders—Gypsy and Irish Traveller people are also more likely to receive disproportionate criminal punishments on breaching the orders—so the lack of monitoring of the use of behavioural orders is disturbing. I am sure that my noble friend the Minister does not want to continue this cycle of criminalising vulnerable and disadvantaged communities, so please can we have a formal review of the impact of the orders currently in place?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I have tabled and de-grouped this clause stand-part notice because it would be helpful to the Committee to probe the real purpose of respect orders. We have no plans to insist that this part of the Bill be removed on Report.

This Government appear to be making the same errors as those of the previous Labour Administration. The Blair Government seemed to believe that, the more they legislated on crime and anti-social behaviour, the less of that behaviour there would be. We saw Act after Act, many repealing or amending Acts that they had passed merely a few years before. This flurry of lawmaking meant that, by the end of its term in office, Labour had created 14 different powers for police to tackle anti-social behaviour and criminality. My noble friend Lady May of Maidenhead undertook to simplify this system by condensing all these measures into just six powers. However, with this Bill we see that old pattern of the new-Labour years re-emerging. This Bill creates four new powers: respect orders, youth injunctions, housing injunctions and youth diversion orders. I cannot see what real-world impact this will make.

As I said at Second Reading, the concept of respect orders appears to be little more than a gimmick. It is legislative action to make the Government appear to be tough on anti-social behaviour when in fact they are not. Respect orders are no different from the existing anti-social behaviour injunctions. Applications for both are made by the same list of people to the same cause. The requirements that can be placed on the respondent are the same for ASB injunctions and respect orders. Both permit the making of an interim order or injunction. Both permit the exclusion of a person from their home in the case of serious violence or risk of harm. Both permit the variation or discharge of the order or injunction. They are, in almost every aspect, exactly the same.

The only difference is that one is a civil order and the other a criminal order. The Bill creates a criminal offence of breaching a condition of a respect order. A person found guilty of that offence on conviction or indictment is liable to a jail sentence of up to two years. Anti-social behaviour injunctions, however, do not have a specific criminal offence attached to them. A person who breaches a condition of an ASB injunction does not commit an offence of breaching the injunction. The Government have argued that this difference makes their respect orders tougher and therefore justified. However, this overlooks two important facts.

First, the court granting the ASB injunction can attach a power of arrest to the injunction under Section 4 of the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. Section 9 of that Act states that

“a constable may arrest the respondent without warrant”

where they believe that the person has breached a condition of their injunction. The person arrested for a breach of their injunction can then be charged with contempt of court, which carries a punishment of up to two years’ imprisonment. It is entirely understandable that the Government wish to introduce a specific criminal offence of breaching conditions. It is easier to prosecute someone who breaches their respect order than to prosecute someone for contempt of court for breaching their injunction. That is not least because a police officer would have to know that a person had an injunction against them, that they had breached the condition and that their injunction contained a power of arrest. It is also because, even though ASB injunctions are civil orders, the criminal standard of proof is applied when determining whether a person has breached a condition.

I understand this entirely, but it does not explain why the Government are seeking to replace injunctions in their entirety. Surely, given that every other aspect is the same, it would be far easier and more expeditious to retain the injunctions and simply amend them to create an offence of breach of conditions. That would mean that the ASB injunctions remain in place but they have the same power of enforcement. Why did the Government not follow this route? Why did they not simply amend the anti-social behaviour injunctions, as opposed to creating a whole new class of order?

The answer cannot be that one is a civil order and one a criminal order because, as I have demonstrated, the civil order could easily have been upgraded to criminal status by way of legislative amendment. I would hazard a guess and say that the reason is perhaps bluster. Is it not the case that the Government wanted to seem to be tough on crime, so they came up with a rehash of ASBOs with a slightly catchier name? These new respect orders will likely have little effect on reducing anti-social behaviour. What would have a positive impact would be to increase the number of police officers. Unfortunately, the Government have failed on that front. Since they entered office, the total police officer headcount has fallen by 1,316. That record to date stands in stark contrast to the previous Government’s successful recruitment of 20,000 additional police officers during the last Parliament.

If the Government are serious about getting tough on crime, they should stop the gimmicks and start with enforcement. I beg to move.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have listened to the quite detailed discussion that we have had so far in our attempt at line-by-line scrutiny of the Bill in relation to respect orders. Weighing up the pros and rather more cons, I am very aware that what I am going to say might seem glib about anti-social behaviour. People listening in might think, “This crowd who are raising problems of civil liberties are not aware of the real scourge of anti-social behaviour and the impact and the misery that it can cause on ordinary people’s lives”. The noble Lords, Lord Pannick and Lord Blencathra, gave us a taste of what that anti-social activity can feel like in local areas. I recognised the descriptions from the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, of young people potentially running amok in local areas. Where I live, that has been known to happen, so I recognise that.

--- Later in debate ---

Part 2 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, which deals with confiscation, has 86 clauses and 2,000 hoops for prosecuting authorities to jump through before they can get their hands on criminal money or property. If noble Lords flick through the Bill to Schedule 16, they will find 39 or 40 pages of detailed amendments to that Act. I shall probably deal with a few of those amendments when we come to it. That is a huge number of amendments just to confiscate the proceeds of crime. We do not need any of that here, and I suggest that all financial penalties or fines, such as we will have in this clause, should have an automatic confiscation order attached for failure to pay within a reasonable time. There would be no need to go back to court and no more bogus sob stories about inability to pay. Society and victims deserve that the convicted person pays his dues. My amendment would ensure that that happens.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, of course I support the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, opposing the increases in these fines, but I think we need to go further and for a variety of reasons abolish these on-the-spot penalties per se, which is why I have tabled this clause stand part notice.

You cannot overestimate how much public space protection orders and community protection notices trivialise what we understand to be dealing with anti-social behaviour. We have just had a long discussion about what anti-social behaviour is. These orders are part of the toolkit to deal with anti-social behaviour and they end up targeting individuals for the most anodyne and mundane activities, and banning everyday freedoms.

The use of fines has, in a way, led us to not take seriously what real anti-social behaviour is, because these fines are given out for such arbitrary, eccentric reasons. PSPOs and CPNs can be issued on a very low threshold, are entirely subject to misuse—there is lots of evidence showing that—and often criminalise, as I said, everyday activities. For example, PSPOs are often used to ban young people gathering in groups—which seems to me to be a dangerous attack on our right to assembly—despite the fact that the statutory guidance states that PSPOs should target only activities that cause a nuisance and should not criminalise

“everyday sociability, such as standing in groups”.

That is what it says, yet they are constantly used in that way and seem to be unaccountably doled out.

There are now over 2,000 PSPOs in England and Wales, and each of them contains up to 35 separate restrictions. That means that tens of thousands of new controls are being issued on public spaces all the time. As we heard earlier, they are imposed in different geographic areas, making prohibitions on different types of activities for different citizens from one place to another. You can be in one town where an activity is legal and then go to the next town and the same activity is illegal. We discussed some of that earlier.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, pointed out and as Justice has drawn our attention to, the inconsistent use of PSPOs creates a “postcode lottery” for victims but also for perpetrators. Justice says that this

“undermines the rule of law by making enforcement dependent on the victim’s location rather than the circumstances”.

I hope we can send the Minister the research done by Justice and by the Manifesto Club that has already been referred to so that he can see from the freedom of information requests to local authorities just what kind of activities are being issued with PSPOs and CPNs, and therefore what these fines are being used to tackle. I assure the Committee that it is innocuous activities, not anti-social behaviour. There are councils that are banning kite-flying, wild swimming, as we have heard, and using camping stoves.

I thought it was interesting that, recently, the Free Speech Union forced Thanet District Council to scrap its imposition of a sweeping public spaces protection order that would have banned the use of foul or abusive language in a public space in the Thanet area, so you would have been able to swear in one area but not in another. I understand that it might have raised a lot of money, but that is not necessarily the same as dealing with anti-social behaviour.

Actually, the councils themselves do not do the dirty work of enforcement. Instead, they outsource that to private companies, and the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, has explained so well the dangers of using these private firms. We have a geographic breakdown of the national way of dealing with anti-social behaviour, and now we have an almost feudal way of collecting fines from it. These kinds of fines mean that orders might well be issued for all the wrong reasons—for income-generating, commercial purposes to meet targets that are about raising money rather than tackling anti-social behaviour—and increasing the fines will surely only incentivise that practice further.

I urge the Minister to consider that the noble cause that the Government are associated with here is dealing with anti-social behaviour, but using private companies to fine people in such a cavalier way discredits the whole cause. It is damaging the reputation of that noble cause. There is no transparency or oversight mechanism for these companies. There is one ban that I would like to bring in, and that is fining for profit. I hope the Minister will consider at least reviewing this and looking at it closely.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

My Lords, I do not intend to rehearse the arguments already put so effectively by my noble friend Lord Clement-Jones. Suffice to say that we on these Benches fully support Amendment 23, as £500 is an extortionate amount of money for the type of behaviour that fines are designed to address and will simply result in private companies making even greater profits than they do at the moment while pushing those already struggling further into debt. For these reasons, we have serious reservations about the implications of the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra.

The orders create a postcode lottery for victims. Charities warn that, in some parts of the country, orders are handed out like confetti. This undermines public trust by making enforcement dependent on the victim’s location.

Overall, the use of these powers needs to be subject to much stricter safeguards. The Government must ensure that there is proper oversight of their use and that the law is applied equally, openly and proportionately.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 5th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Goschen (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend’s Amendment 35. We really need the data to understand the problem and how efficacious our measures to control it are. My noble friend asked a number of different questions in a number of different ways, and he has not been given the information the House requires. We need to understand why that is. I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Hanson of Flint, is not in his place, because I was about to pay him a compliment. I managed to extract a truly startling statistic from him when I asked what proportion of people in these circumstances—those who have arrived through what is now termed irregular routes—are removed from the country against their will. The answer was 4%, so there is a 96% chance of success in remaining.

In order to understand the reasons why people typically want to come to the UK, one needs to understand the strength of the regime that deals with those applications, and the chances of staying versus being deported or removed from the country through one means or another. Unless the Government can really come forward and answer my noble friend’s question, or agree to his amendment, it is very difficult to take seriously the actions the Government are taking. We know that the Government do not know who is in the country at any one time; our systems do not record exits from the country as they do people coming in. It will probably lead us to a much wider discussion about how we can get the data and know who is here and who has overstayed the terms of their visa. It is entirely reasonable for my noble friend to ask those questions, and it is the Government’s duty to respond in detail.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I am particularly interested in the student visa amendments, which are both very helpful. There is now an informal assumption that there is a problem with some overseas students playing the system and potentially using their student visas as a mechanism for seeking asylum. The noble Baroness, Lady Lawlor, presented a balanced and sensitive case so that all of us can understand, first, the importance of overseas students to the UK and, secondly, the legitimate use of asylum seeking if circumstances change, while at the same time understanding that there is potential abuse of the system. The problem is that while there is a focus on, for example, small boats, maybe a focus on universities does not feel quite as newsworthy and headlines will not be generated, or it seems somehow more legitimate if they have come to do even a media studies course—they cannot be criminals. None the less, there is a problem if the system is abused.

There are two additional points that have not been referred to. I fear that UK universities themselves have mis-sold universities to overseas students, treating university courses as cash cows. One of my first more militant acts at university, many decades ago, was a week-long sit-in to defend overseas students from increased fees, and I have always thought that it was an important part of our education system to defend them. However, universities simply sell inappropriate courses for money to students who often cannot to speak adequate English for a degree. That is not to criticise them; I am criticising the university managements who sell their courses in that way. That kind of cynicism is likely to rub off on students, who will not necessarily come here and think, “I must take seriously my duties and responsibilities to higher education and the pursuit of knowledge”, because the universities have, in an entirely instrumental, business-like fashion, sold them a course that is maybe not very good and not taken any notice of their facility for education. Why would you not become cynical in those circumstances?

Finally, I hope that the Government will take the opportunity provided by both these amendments to think about universities and overseas students, because this is very much in the news in the context of Sheffield Hallam University. We now know that Sheffield Hallam’s management betrayed one of its own academics and compromised academic freedom to guarantee a continued flow of Chinese overseas students, stopping that academic’s research because the Chinese state found it inconvenient. It is not in any of our interests to allow universities to become politicised instruments of overseas students, be it the state, using them in a particular way, or those who recommend that, if you study in the UK on one of these courses, you will easily get asylum. I know that this happens. It is a form of people trafficking that is just not hitting the headlines, but I can assure you, it is happening. I therefore support both amendments and I was very pleased to see them.

[Lord Sentamu (CB)]

My Lords, as the House knows, I have sat in a lot of these debates and never stood up to speak, but I feel compelled to speak today. I declare my interest as having been chancellor of two universities, York St John University and the University of Cumbria, for well over 12 years. We had a lot of overseas students. I am not persuaded by what I am hearing today. It is very easy to cast aspersions when you are not within the university itself. Most of our universities do a fantastic job in registering people who really want to study here. Both York St John and Cumbria had training centres in China, so the students had a good command of English before they got here. All the students in those years actually went back, unless they remained to do some research, which was also allowed. Please let us not have these generalised statements about universities all being the same.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

I want to clarify, in case there was any confusion, that I have worked with and have great admiration for many Chinese students in this country. My contribution was not an attempt, in any way, at smearing them. That is not to say that there is not an abuse of the system in some instances. I was querying whether we should be attentive to that, because the students are betrayed when they are not given proper education in this country and are used in a particular way for political ends. That does not mean, at all, that all Chinese students are doing that.

[Lord Sentamu (CB)]

My experience is quite different. I have been a chancellor of two universities that have actually recruited students from all over the world—for education, not for any other purpose. They were also wonderful universities for students within our own country. Before the founding of the University of Cumbria, students used to leave Carlisle to go to different universities in our country and they never went back. The creation of the University of Cumbria benefited local businesses —we have talked about manufacturing in places such as Barrow—so it has been wonderful seeing our own local students rising up to the possibility of being very good engineers, manufacturers, nurses and doctors, or being trained in other ways. I stood at the podium giving out degrees to students from all over the place. At York St John, there were always four ceremonies, each with about 400 students at a time. That is what I know from what I experienced—it is therefore possible for me to say that.

I must declare a second interest: I came here on a student visa in 1974, which was renewed every 12 months until I was ordained in 1979. Later, when I became Bishop of Stepney, I was given indefinite leave to remain but I never applied for naturalisation in this country, which was a possibility, until 2001. I was a faithful student who came here on a student visa. It is no good anybody telling me that if some Ugandans come here—let us say there are four of them—and involved themselves in criminal acts, we can then use those four as a test case to say that people from that country should not get visas. From all that I know, most of the students from Uganda went back—my circumstances were part of something different. Please can we not express guilt by association, where we say, for example, that if some people from Nigeria do something, all of them must be the same, so we must always gather the figures and numbers?

This has always been a free country for me, and it has helped quite a lot of people who have been in great difficulty. I came here because of Amin’s trouble; I had to give up my law job. My staying here has to do with me continuing to study and then being invited to become a chaplain of a prison in Richmond, which I did for four years. Indefinite leave was quite a different thing. I always resisted naturalisation to become a British citizen; at the time I thought that I was natural and that there was no need to be naturalised. Still, occasionally, whenever I hold my British passport, I say, “To get this, I had to be naturalised”. That term is pretty offensive, because there is nothing unnatural about me that needed to be naturalised.

My dear friends, yes, there is now concern about people, who either are on student visas or came here on asylum, having committed offences, but these amendments make it seem that Britain’s history has nothing to teach us. For that reason, should the amendments be voted on, I will move in the direction of the Not-Content Lobby.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 3rd November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Con)]

My Lords, it has been a fascinating debate, and I support the amendments in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Cameron and Lord Jackson. This is the type of debate that we need to have in this Chamber. These are wide moral issues that go to the heart of what we do with our justice system.

Something that has been forgotten in the debate is that the purpose of some measures—which have been described by some as extreme and, somehow, a little too far reaching—is to have a deterrent effect. We sometimes forget that that is the purpose of some law. It is not about having something in place so that, after an event has happened, we can do something that is proportionate to the person who did it; it should be about the knowledge of the wider public, whether that is our standing population or those who are living among us and seeking refugee status, that there are normalities and reasonable behaviours expected of us all. If we have what some describe as extreme measures on our statute book, they could perhaps facilitate better behaviour. I do not think we should be frightened of this.

We need to have a wider debate and for the Government to open up more countries to be deemed acceptable and safe. We hear that our European neighbour countries are taking a rather different view of what is deemed a safe country, including Afghanistan, from ours in this country. I do not think that their human rights industry has quite got to the advanced state that we have in the UK. We have an opportunity here for the British public to realise that these Houses of Parliament are listening to them and their concerns, so I welcome this wider debate. If we do not adopt these amendments today, the Government should take on board how they can move towards the position of the wider public.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, it is entirely positive that we can say, “Let’s look at the wording of this”; we might have some qualms about whether we need to reword it to avoid unintended consequences—that is fine. The noble Lord, Lord Mackinlay, made a good point: this is a very important moral debate. It is one that more and more people in the country are frustrated that Parliament is not having, so it is positive that we are doing so today.

I will emphasise three things. First, we often consider what will happen to the safety of people if we deport them to countries that we deem unsafe. But the key question is actually: what about the safety of British citizens? They get forgotten in that whole discussion. We end up with this ridiculous situation where we say, “Oh, I’m really worried about this person who has committed a serious sex crime. If they are returned to their country, they might be thrown into some terribly unsafe prison. They might be beaten up or killed for the fact that they’re a sex criminal. We’ve got to save them”. We say that rather than emphasise the victims of that person. That is why people get frustrated about the topsy-turvy nature of this.

Secondly, until we legislate on this, the British public could rightly say that the Government have no control over a decision, which they want to make, to deport foreign nationals who commit crimes in this country. That is entirely appropriate for legislation, even if we need to work out the wording so that it is proportionate.

Finally, we are about to start the Sentencing Bill, which I am very interested in. The state of prisons is incredibly depressing at the moment. In fact, while we are talking about unsafe places, I do not know that going to prison here is safe for anyone. They are overcrowded and there are serious problems with our prison system. It is unexplainable that we would have people in that prison system, taking spaces that we just do not have, when we should, by right, be able to say that they do not deserve to be in this country. They broke the social contract after they were given an opportunity to be here. Sometimes they are illegal—that is different—but if they are given the right to remain, and then they murder, rape or steal from their fellow citizens, they have broken the basis on which we trusted them to stay. That is reasonable to say.

The noble Lord, Lord Deben, made a good point: this is not an extreme position but a normal, commonsensical position. Based on everything I have heard from the Government, I think they agree with that. If they do, they need to legislate accordingly, which is what these amendments are trying to do.

[Lord German (LD)]

My Lords, I think it will be no surprise to Members of the Conservative Party that we oppose Amendments 34 and 72. It is quite interesting that, once the rat had been let out of the sack that the amendment was not capable of being put to the House, of course, this debate turned into a Second Reading debate about other issues on the way we should be talking about this matter. I will turn to that in a moment, but let us just take these amendments at face value as they are written, because that is what the Report stage of a Bill is about: reporting about amendments which we are discussing, not about raising other issues which should have been raised at Second Reading way back in the beginning.

These amendments embody an approach of absolute and mandatory deportation that sacrifices judicial discretion and proportionality in favour of unworkable rigidity, thereby undermining fundamental legal safeguards and international obligations. Amendment 34 proposes a sweeping new deportation regime. The explanatory material states:

“This new clause would require the deportation of any foreign national who is convicted of any offence in the United Kingdom”.


Further, it seeks to amend the Immigration Act 1971 by requiring a court to sentence a non-British citizen over the age of 17 convicted of “an offence” to deportation from the United Kingdom. You might call this the “Mars bar” scheme, whereby anybody who steals a Mars bar will be deported, or, perhaps, if that was not serious enough, you may have to steal a multi-pack of Mars bars rather than a single one.

We must oppose this proposal on multiple grounds. First, there is a lack of proportionality and balance. The amendment would introduce an obligation to make a deportation order with no exceptions and no discretion. Such an absolute provision ignores the circumstances of the offence, mitigating factors or the length of time a person may have lawfully been in this country. It comes to something when a noble Lord prays in aid the ECHR to support us against an amendment from the Conservative Party. That is an extremely interesting way forward.

Secondly, on risk of torture and human rights breach, this obligation to deport would apply even if removal would send the person concerned to a country where they would face torture or even, in some countries, where they have capital punishment. The proposal is unworkable and contrary to our international obligations.

Thirdly, on vulnerability in modern slavery, Amendment 34 would remove protections for under-18s and victims of human trafficking. For example, a small child who arrived in the UK, committed a crime, was sentenced to prison and was subsequently found to be a victim of modern slavery for the purposes of forced criminality would be subject to automatic removal without any court or tribunal mechanism to consider the circumstances of their case.

Fourthly, on eroding criminal safeguards, Amendment 34 seeks to amend Section 24 of the Immigration Act 1971 by omitting instances of “knowingly” from certain immigration offences. Removing this element of mens rea—a lack of knowledge as a defence—will likely result in consequential deportation decisions being subject to more challenges under the European Convention on Human Rights.

Amendment 72 would place a duty to remove foreign offenders on the Secretary of State. It mandates that a deportation order must be made against any non-British citizen who

“has been sentenced to a term of imprisonment”—

this is different in this amendment—and “has completed their term”. Crucially, it dictates that:

“The Secretary of State must make the deportation order … within the period of seven days”.


This amendment falls foul of some of the critical flaws in Amendment 34—first, in terms of an unworkable timeline and mandatory duty. Placing a statutory duty on the Secretary of State to execute a deportation order within a rigid seven-day period against any person sentenced to imprisonment disregards the complex process required for removal, particularly when a human rights for protection claim is lodged.

Secondly, there is an absence of scrutiny and due process. Such an absolute obligation removes necessary judicial oversight and requires deportation without considering the individual’s human rights. The objective of mandating deportation in this manner risks encouraging offending behaviour and would not necessarily increase removals from the UK.

Thirdly, the amendment conflicts with legal principles. In mandating deportation for any offence, conviction without exception, it ignores the fact that deportation orders can be made against those who are victims of coercion or human trafficking. To support these kinds of absolutist amendments, especially in the context of deportation, is incredibly difficult for anyone who believes in the rule of law and due process.

We must remain resolute in our commitment to deport those who abuse our hospitality by committing crimes in the UK, but the paths produced and proposed by Amendments 34 and 72 substitute effective, balanced legislation with measures of legal absolutism. We must empower the Government to act decisively, but we must do so in a way that respects fundamental rights, due process and proportionality. These amendments fail all those critical tests.

Non-crime Hate Incidents

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Monday 27th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The noble Baroness makes a very sensible point. Ultimately, the bottom line is that the Government believe that we should focus on real crime as a priority. That is why we are putting in 13,000 new police officers, police community support officers and special constables over the next few years, and it is why we have asked for the review of non-crime hate incidents. But in reviewing those issues, we should not lose sight of the importance of intelligence-led information-gathering, as the Metropolitan Police has said.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the noble Minister talks about—

[Noble Lords]

No!

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

The noble Lord the Minister—

[Noble Lords]

Hear, hear!

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

I feel as though I am about to be issued with a non-crime hate incident.

The noble Lord the Minister talked about the importance of not speaking out ahead of the review yet stated that the police were collecting and recording valuable information. Can I challenge that? How does the Minister know that the information is valuable, as it is based on perceived, subjective versions of what is hateful, not illegal? That information could well be used to the detriment of people receiving references for jobs later on. Will the Minister clarify that, regardless, that information should not be used to stop anybody gaining employment, because it is based on subjective rather than objective criteria?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her question. Again, I fall back on the central point, which is that we have commissioned a review, the results of which we are expecting shortly. It will explore a range of issues, including how non-crime hate incidents impact on police resources, responsibilities, intelligence gathering and the issues she mentioned about individual responsibility or records. Having commissioned a review as a Minister, it is best that I wait for that review’s outcomes. We will report back to the House on what measures we need to take as a result.

Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The noble Baroness makes a very fair point. The confidence of victims and survivors is central to the effectiveness, quality and outputs of this inquiry. As I mentioned in response to the earlier question from her noble friend on the Front Bench, the Government have engaged NWG, a very respectable charity, to engage with victims and survivors on their behalf, and to give a sounding board to the issues that we are involved in. I regret that people have walked away from that process, but there are many others involved in it, and I want to ensure that they reflect strongly both on the appointment of the chair, on the terms of reference and, ultimately, on the recommendations of the inquiry, which is the most important aspect of this business.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, one reason why the survivors resigned was that there were very different accounts from them and the Minister for Safeguarding. Indeed, the Minister for Safeguarding implied that anyone who was saying different was using misinformation, in effect, accusing those survivors of lying.

In fact, the account from Home Secretary was very different from that of the Minister for Safeguarding. I think we can safely say that this is not being handled well. It is not like other inquiries. The Minister might want to reassure us that the inquiry’s terms of reference will be absolutely watertight, that it will not be frightened of saying that the rape grooming gangs were predominantly Pakistani Muslim, and that those things will be faced head on. At the moment, there is not enough reassurance that that is happening. The Home Secretary reassured me; I am not sure that the Minister for Safeguarding did.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Let me first defend the Minister for Safeguarding. I know nobody else in the House of Commons who has committed so much time, energy and passion to ensuring that these issues are addressed. She is paramount in her ambition to secure some outcomes on safeguarding women and girls and on violence against women and girls. As I have said to other noble Lords and noble Baronesses today, the Home Secretary has been clear that the terms of reference will be determined and that the focus will be on grooming gangs and on ethnicity and background. That also means that we need to look at grooming gangs in the round, but there is a real focus on the ethnicity and background of a number of grooming gangs that have operated, which have caused distress and have led to this inquiry in the first place.

Alleged Spying Case: Home Office Involvement

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Tuesday 21st October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Yes. They have not been charged with or convicted of any offence; therefore, as far as the law is concerned, they are not guilty of any offence. That is the self-evident state of play at the moment. That does not hide the fact that the Government are extremely disappointed that the matter did not go to trial, but that was a matter and a decision for the CPS and the DPP.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the Government keep saying, and the Minister has reiterated today, “What can we do? We’re as frustrated as everyone else”. From the point of view of the British public, we have allegations of spying on elected MPs and a Government who basically say, “What can we do about the fact that we can’t do anything?” Does the Minister understand that this feels like an impotent response, which is either a cover-up, if you are conspiratorial, or, at best, saying to the British public: “What can we do? Not our fault, guv”. It is frustrating and demoralising, and makes it seem as though the Government have no power or will to resolve this.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Government are not saying that there is nothing we can do; we will robustly defend the rights of parliamentarians to be free of spying influence, and robustly defend and work with the intelligence services to ensure that we disrupt and destroy spying efforts on United Kingdom agencies, businesses and parliamentarians. But this case, which would have been brought had the evidence been brought by the CPS, is now gone, as it collapsed due to the decision not to take it forward. I find that decision frustrating, but it does not stop the Government doing their best to ensure that we protect our citizens against malign foreign influence.

Crime and Policing Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

2nd reading
Thursday 16th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, a lot of today’s speeches have been on abortion, which is weird in a Bill boasting that its aim is to make our streets safer. I support Clause 191’s aim of disapplying the criminal law for women acting in relation to their own pregnancies, but I do not think this Bill was the right vehicle for such an important law change. I have some sympathy with the public backlash about a lack of debate on the issue. You can see how it happened: the Bill is so disparate and unfocused that even the Government keep adding to it. Ministers introduced 90 amendments, 66 new clauses and four new schedules at Committee and on Report in the other place, and apparently there is more to come here. But where does all this chopping and changing leave us? Recent tensions over our scrutinising role have led to accusations of filibuster and time-wasting, but how can we keep on top of what the Government intend when it is so scattergun and expansive? As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Garnier, explained so well, the Bill exemplifies the trend of excessive lawmaking as a substitute for enforcing laws that we already have.

We have heard a lot today about the Bill creating a specific offence of assaulting retail workers. Well, call me old-fashioned, but I have always been opposed to assaulting retail workers—as far as I knew, it was against the law. Now we are creating a new law which avoids crucial questions: why has there been a shocking increase in attacks on shop workers, often accompanied by mass shoplifting, and why has this not been dealt with by the police? Inevitably, other workers say, “What about us?” For example, in an unlikely outbreak of consensus, the RMT, National Rail and the Rail Delivery Group are united in demanding that there should be a specific offence of assaulting or abusing transport workers. To counter lots more special pleading, perhaps the Government should use their energy in ensuring that assault laws lead to prosecutions.

Another worry is that the public’s civil liberties and free speech are being carelessly jeopardised by this trend of criminalising ever more aspects of everyday life. For example, in relation to Clause 118, the Joint Committee on Human Rights warns that criminalising all forms of identity concealment could unjustifiably interfere in the right to protest. Yet again, the police already have powers to require individuals to remove such face coverings. Maybe the Government should investigate why the police do not use that power when, for example, dealing with pro-Palestinian marchers chanting Jew hatred behind their keffiyehs and balaclavas. No, it is far easier to ban all face coverings instead. As Big Brother Watch notes, there are many law-abiding individuals who might want to conceal their identities on demos. Topically, why do we think Hong Kong dissidents cover their faces on protests? Here is a hint: their own authoritarian government agents are watching. These proposals are made against a backdrop of other attacks on privacy, from facial recognition technology to digital ID.

Then there is Clause 4, which many civil libertarians are concerned about. First are those much-vaunted respect orders. It seems the epitome of technocratic governance to imagine you can tackle the breakdown of social respect, so well described by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, by creating a new civil order called a respect order. These are almost a duplicate of the overused, discredited and ineffective anti-social behaviour injunctions, which will continue, but respect orders will have criminal sanctions of up to two years in prison but only use the lower civil standard of proof, and recipients will not even be told when they are put on an order. Meanwhile, the proposed increases in penalties for breaching the misnamed public spaces protection orders and CPNs from £100 to £500 is pettily punitive but, outrageously, they are predominantly issued by private enforcement agencies which are paid by the state per fine.

I am afraid too much of the Bill will continue this trend of eroding our everyday liberties. I will be working with groups such as Manifesto Club and Justice to ensure that we focus on keeping our streets safe, but what are not safe with this Bill are our civil liberties and our free speech.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 13th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulks (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, the amendment is legally coherent and that is very much in its favour. It contains a tacit acknowledgment of the dualist system that we have in this country. That means that we are bound by domestic law and bound by international law only in so far as it has it has been incorporated in domestic law. The noble Baroness is right that there are references to the refugee convention in domestic law—for example, Section 2 of the Asylum and Immigration Appeals Act 1993.

The main provision of the refugee convention that attracts attention is Article 33, the non-refoulement provision. Does membership of the refugee convention require a particular response from the courts of this country? There is reference to it in the Supreme Court decision on the Rwanda policy, although it was not entirely clear, to me at least, what effect it had on the outcome of the case. The much greater part of the judgment was taken up with the review of the relevant articles of the ECHR, which are incorporated into our law by the Human Rights Act.

What is quite clear is that it is always open to Parliament to exclude references to international law from domestic legislation. In which case, any obligations that this country has under the refugee convention exist only as a matter of international law. I say that without meaning to diminish the importance of international law; we should comply with international obligations as far as possible. However, there is an increasingly recognised view that the 1951 convention was of its time and that it is necessary to look again at its application in the light of the challenges that immigration now presents not just to this country but to other European countries and to countries such as Australia that have signed up to the convention.

If the leaked memo reported in Saturday’s Times is correct, the Attorney-General himself acknowledges that the time may have come to look again at the convention and its application to the immigration and asylum system. It is important to stress that no body or institution is empowered to determine authoritatively what the convention means. This distinguishes it from the ECHR, where the European Court of Human Rights performs that task.

My view is that it would be best to remain a member of the refugee convention but to remove any references to it from domestic legislation, so that Parliament can determine the proper policy in relation to immigration and asylum without fearing interpretation of that legislation by reference to the convention. This amendment does precisely the opposite of that, which is the reason that I oppose it, despite its legal coherence. I anticipate that the Government may not altogether be inclined to accept the amendment either, because to do so would hard-wire the convention, with all its imprecision, into our domestic law. This would create just the sort of difficulties that we have had with the European Convention on Human Rights and the obligation, under Section 2 of the Human Rights Act, to take it into account.

It should be possible to remain signed up to the refugee convention without unduly or unnecessarily hampering our obligations. Australia has managed this, as I said. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, in his 188-page analysis of the various issues that are thrown up by the convention. He is right that we may have to think again, even without this amendment, if our courts interpret domestic law in a way that appears to incorporate international law. Important though it is, it confuses the issue. Parliament ought to be sovereign in these matters and to decide the correct policy.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I really support the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, who very articulately and with legal adeptness explained some of my reservations. I will raise just a few other points.

I am particularly opposed to Amendment 184, because it would further institutionalise—this is even its title—the primacy of the refugee convention. I think that emphasising that primacy undermines democracy.

I listened carefully to the expansive debate on refugee family reunion in the first group. One of the most insightful comments came in the very moving contribution from the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, about her family’s experience of refugees fleeing Nazi antisemitism. It was a reminder of that historic period, but also of the importance of historic specificity. This matters today—which is such a joyous day, by the way, with the return home of the hostages; I spent most of the morning crying, but with joy in this instance. Jew hatred is alive today—it is still happening—but it is not the Nazis or the Second World War. This is a completely different version; something else is happening.

That issue of history is one of the reasons why I wanted to speak on this group. I have long argued that the refugee convention is long past its historic sell-by date and that it is time for us to consider leaving it or maybe amending it in some way, as has been discussed. So I am glad that the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, has given us a chance to consider the issue.

Of course, when the refugee convention was established in 1951, it had noble aims. It was designed for a world coming to terms with the aftermath of a world war and mass displacement. But if you think about the way that the term “refugee” is used today, you will find that it has become so expansive and flexible that it has been used recently to describe a trans-identifying burglar from Algeria and a Zimbabwean paedophile, both of whom say that they are entitled to the same protection as women and children fleeing a war zone.

Earlier today the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, said that language and words matter, and I agree. In this instance, “refugee” has become completely corrupted and confused. So we urgently need to review terms such as “refugee”, as interpreted by today’s reading of the refugee convention, because these stoke resentment among the public and actually harm the interests of those who might legitimately be refugees in need of protection. It bundles up a whole lot of things.

The history of the convention means that it is not the rule of law—an act of God that cannot be challenged at any time—because it has an interesting history. Established in 1951, as I say, it was a practical solution to the existence of hundreds of thousands of people in Europe who had still not been resettled after the Second World War. It is interesting that, when it was introduced, the convention applied only to refugees in Europe, and only in respect of those who had acquired that status due to the events that happened before 1951. The convention has therefore changed because it did not assist with refugees who fled Hungary in 1956. That did not mean that people were not humane in 1956; the convention was not something that could be used—as is regularly done—just to say, “Where’s your humanity? Don’t you care about refugees?” It was very specific.

It was only in 1967 that the regional and temporal limits of the refugee convention were lifted to give rights to refugees around the world. That was motivated, as many historians have noted, by the Cold War. It was used to say that all refugees are welcome in the West and to show the superiority of democracy over communism. Actually, rather a small number of refugees came on that basis.

With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the refugee convention seemed to lose its raison d’être. It is interesting that, in 2004, Tony Blair, no less, noted how the convention,

“first introduced in 1951, at a time when the cold war and lack of cheap air travel made long-range migration far more difficult than it has become today, has started to show its age”.

Following Blair’s lead, in the 2005 general election the Conservative Party had a manifesto commitment to withdraw from the convention. There have been discussions about whether it is showing its age. I would say that the refugee convention is not just showing its age but has outlived its usefulness and shackles democracy.

My concern about this amendment is that it tries to do something that is already a problem. We spend all our time in this Chamber scrutinising pieces of law. If we are then told, “No, you can’t do that because of the refugee convention”—or if we pass laws and they are usurped by the refugee convention through the courts—what is the point of democracy and the decision-making here if they are so undermined by international treaties? The refugee convention therefore betrays democracy and the public.

If we in this place get frustrated that laws are made and conventions are then used to undermine those laws, can noble Lords imagine what it is like to be a voter? I know it has been a while for a lot of us, but it is worth remembering that voters’ frustration is even more palpable. This does not help refugees; it is a way of bypassing democratic accountability and is a hindrance, rather than a help, to refugees and the British public.

Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 3rd September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Horam (Con)]

I am very interested in the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Kerr. He always makes a very pertinent point, but this is surely wrong in common sense. I do not speak as a lawyer, as the noble Lord, Lord Faulks, did, but this is common sense. Surely, as my noble friend Lord Murray said, the refugee convention as it stands would want someone from Afghanistan to be accepted in a country near Afghanistan, and they would probably prefer that. But that person is given four or five alternatives. He need not stop in one country or another country. Surely it is designed to discourage “asylum tourism”, whereby you decide which countries suit your purpose.

That is surely something we shall consider. It is not necessarily the case that someone coming from Afghanistan will be sent back to Afghanistan. They may come from France, in which case they may stay in France, where they are in no danger. If they go via Italy, they are in no danger there, either. Surely this is the logic of the situation, which ordinary people cannot understand. Why do we have to accept these people who come through multiple countries when there is a refugee convention which accepts that they need not be accepted if they have come through more than one country?

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, it is not just ordinary people who do not understand it. I do not understand it at all, logically. Mind you, I am an ordinary person.

The discussion so far has been very helpful in raising some key issues that the country is preoccupied with. The sensible way to approach this, which people have started to do, is to say that there should be a proper, open debate on it. We need to have a proper discussion about whether the 1951 refugee convention is appropriate for 2025 and very different circumstances. Some of the amendments have allowed us to reflect on that.

Every word of the speech by the noble Lord, Lord Empey, was on the money—absolutely hear, hear. We sometimes have discussions in this Chamber that bear little relationship to the political, social and cultural context of what everybody else in the country is talking about. There have been times during this debate in which the discussion about what constitutes safety and fleeing unsafe countries gives us a hint as to how we have got into a very serious political crisis in this country. The definition of what constitutes unsafe, the definition of what constitutes asylum and the definition of what constitutes refugee have become so expansive that it is a miracle or a mystery to me that anyone has been deported. If anyone was listening, you would just think, “Oh well, we can’t do anything”.

To give an example of some of the things that were argued, I was involved in a debate on the radio some months ago about whether Albania was a safe country. The example given was one that has been cited here today about the levels of domestic violence in Albania. I pointed out that most of the people that I had seen in the small boats who were Albanian did not look like they were the victims of domestic violence. Given the historic split, sex-wise, in terms of domestic violence, they might well have been the abusers.

I point this out only because, every time you say, “Surely, there is no reason why they should be in this country; they are from a safe country”, people will say, “No they’re not”, and you get left in a situation where you cannot remove them.

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, I will make the point, before the noble Baroness moves on, that that is exactly the point that many of us are making—you cannot generalise. I will just put it that way.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

I was about to go on to quote the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, who said that a country may be safe generally but not for a particular section of the population. The noble Baroness more or less made the point there that she has just made now about not generalising. I agree that it is difficult to say, “This is a safe country” or “This is not”. The problem I have is that we have a situation where we either say, “These countries are not safe” or “Every country can be safe, but not to some groups of people”. We end up, therefore, saying that the whole world, and sections of the whole world, are likely to be unsafe and the people there can come to the UK. We cannot be in a situation where we open up to everybody from around the world who is in an unsafe situation.

By the way, that would also be true of this country, when it comes to the threat of violence against women and girls. You could say that the UK is a safe country. Let me tell you that it has not been a safe country in hundreds of towns for thousands and thousands of young women, girls and children who were sexually abused and raped in their thousands, in an industrial fashion, in the “safe” country of the United Kingdom. I am not prepared to generalise, but we cannot simply say that, because of the lived experience of those individuals who have suffered at the hands of others in other countries, it should be automatically assumed that they can move to the United Kingdom.

Finally, therefore, I want to ask for some guidance from the Minister on the status of the Bill. I read through a lot of the sections and notes in preparation for what I was going to say today and for other forthcoming days in Committee, and I thought, “Oh my goodness, this Bill is completely out of date”. I do not mean it is out of date as far as I am concerned but rather as far as the Government are concerned. Looking at a number of the amendments I have put my name to, I now look like a lily-livered liberal type in comparison with some of the comments made by Labour Government Ministers on the Front Benches. I suddenly thought, “Oh, I was being rather tentative there on the European Court of Human Rights and so on”. But it is full throttle—the Home Secretary covering herself in Union Jacks and flags, as she has told us. I thought, “I don’t know where to go now”.

In all seriousness, the Government have said, perfectly reasonably, that parliamentary time is short in general, and we all know that the Bill is under a lot of scrutiny. There are an awful lot of amendments to the Bill. Would it be possible for the Government Front Bench to assess all the amendments from across the House in different directions and tick off all those that the Government might now agree with, so that we do not waste parliamentary time on things on which there is general unanimity on the Government Front Bench, if not on their Back Benches?

As we continue to discuss the Bill, we should constantly bear in mind that the reason why there is concern about international conventions, the European Court of Human Rights and so on, is that this Parliament—the whole point of us being here—has to pass legislation it considers to be in the best interests of the people who live in this country and are of this country, the national interest being important. If the will of the people, as expressed in Parliament, cannot happen because of international conventions and human rights laws, as liberally interpreted by a plethora of lawyers, then it means that democracy is threatened. I therefore agree with the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, when he said we should look at some of this again. I hope the Government will look at it again and that we do not have to waste time on amendments that they will, broadly speaking, agree with.

Asylum Hotels: Migrant Criminal Activity

Baroness Fox of Buckley Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness, who possibly knows that constituency better than anyone else in the House today; she brings her wise counsel with her comments this afternoon. It is important that everyone who holds office in society, elected or otherwise, ensures that they consider the situation there in a favourable way to ensure that the police have their support and that the criminal justice system is allowed to take its course. Community cohesion and community engagement is the most important issue before the House today.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, first, does the Minister recognise the legitimate fury and frustration of local people, whether in Epping or Diss, because they feel their voices are not being heard in relation to their concerns about the hotels? They genuinely fear for their children because of crimes committed by people staying in the hotels, even if it is a minority of those staying in them. Secondly, does the Minister acknowledge that some of the misinformation includes calling those local people “far-right thugs”, which, to a certain extent, is the most insulting thing you can call people who are genuinely protesting? Will the Minister distance himself from that misinformation as well as the other misinformation that he has mentioned?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Any potential crime committed anywhere—be it in a hotel or a town centre —is a matter for the police to investigate. It is then for the police to charge people and for a jury of peers to make a determination in due course. In this case, an individual has been arrested and charged and will be before the court in due course, so I cannot comment on the specific circumstances.

If people have legitimate concerns about the hotels, asylum, migrants or people crossing the channel, they have a right to express that view in a peaceful, orderly way. The line is drawn where that protest leads to other potential crimes. In this case, the police have acted to arrest and potentially to charge individuals for crimes, which, equally, will go before the courts and be determined upon in due course. It is the job of us all to appeal for calm in those circumstances and to ensure that we find political solutions to some of the challenges that we have—but not, in any way, shape or form to encourage inflammatory action against the police, the community or people who are not committing crimes and who happen to reside in a particular place at a particular time.