Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Baroness Howarth of Breckland and Lord Condon

Monday 20th January 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Condon (CB)]

My Lords, I declare my registered interest in policing. I support the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, broadly for the reasons that he set out, reinforced by my noble friend Lord Blair.

We have 30 years of academic underpinning for this theory. It started with notions of defensible space by Oscar Newman. That was reinforced 10 years later by Wilson and Kelling, with their broken windows theory of maintaining property at the highest standards to prevent crime, and so on.

We have 20 years’ pragmatic experience of how Secured by Design has dramatically helped to reduce crime and in particular burglary and made neighbourhoods safer. In the ongoing environment of economic challenge to policing, I think the Secured by Design mark and all that it stands for as well as all the experience we have built up remain very valuable. Sadly, I fear it would be a step backwards if we are not allowed to bring forward this amendment successfully in the terms that the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, has set out. I hope the Government will find that they are able to give some way on this, because the Secured by Design legacy is a very important one.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland (CB)]

My Lords, I shall speak briefly in support of this amendment and make three points. First, during my life, I have worked in some of London’s most insecure areas and seen insecure estates in the rest of the country. In north Brent and Brixton, crime was rife and burglary, in particular, was at a very high level. On a huge estate—I will not name it, because it has improved so much and I do not want to give it another bad name—I saw design improvements which removed some of the interconnecting corridors and looked at locks, considering the way in which the whole design process was put together so that it reduced crime substantially. If we start with design and local authorities have the option of putting design in place, we will ensure from the beginning that we do not create new estates where problems begin and residents suffer great dismay.

My second point is the localism argument, which has already been made very successfully. The third point is that anything that prevents burglary anywhere must be supported. Like other speakers, I do not understand how it is possible to assess where burglary is going to take place before an estate has gone up. In any case, people should be protected equally. Anyone who knows people who have been victims of burglaries, particularly some of the most vulnerable, will know that we should do everything in our power to prevent the emotional trauma—it is almost like rape—that they feel when they go into their homes and find tremendous damage. It is not just that things have been stolen; it is the feeling of intrusion into their lives.

There are very good reasons to support this amendment. The technical reasons have been put clearly by the noble Lord who moved the amendment and other speakers, and I support it on those grounds.