Police Recruitment: Reform

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The noble Lord raises an interesting point. Of course, the point of the police is that they are there to represent us all. According to the Peelite principles, they have to have our consent to do so, and therefore they should very much look like us.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, on these Benches too our thoughts are with Sarah Everard’s family at this time. The recommendations that Lady Elish Angiolini makes about vetting are what an ordinary recruitment agency would do as a matter of course: face-to-face interviews and home visits. Anybody in your Lordships’ House who has adopted a cat or dog will know that you have a home visit to make sure you are suitable as a potential adopter—this is basic stuff. They need to find out about the suitability and psychological suitability, taking notice of PNDs and revetting those on transfer from another force or military, or any government location. Taking it on trust that someone has been vetted by these agencies and therefore is okay surely does not work, so why does the Home Office not have a national vetting programme that is compulsory and that all police forces have to follow?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The noble Baroness raises some good points, and she is quite right about some of the recommendations made by Lady Elish. The Government of course recognise that there have been significant and justifiable concerns regarding police vetting, so over the past year we have worked to sort that out. As noble Lords will be aware, in early 2023 we asked the College of Policing to update the statutory code of practice for vetting, which was published in July 2023. It makes clear the expectation that chief officers will ensure that vetting standards are maintained within their forces. The vetting code is supported by the authorised professional practice guidance for vetting, which has recently been revised. There is much more to do on this—no one is denying that. I take the noble Baroness’s point seriously but, as I say, we will soon respond in full to the report and the recommendations.

Angiolini Inquiry Report

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, this damning report is about women’s safety. It is also about trust and confidence in policing, and whether we have the standards in place to maintain confidence in individual officers. The vast majority of police officers work immensely hard, and with integrity, to keep our communities safe. This is undermined when standards fail.

We thank Lady Elish for her inquiry and its comprehensive first report. The report exposes a catalogue of appalling failures in police misconduct processes. What is truly frightening is the line,

“there is nothing to stop another Couzens operating in plain sight”.

We can believe that that might be the case because of the story of PC Cliff Mitchell, who was vetted months after Sarah Everard was killed. He had an allegation of rape in 2017 and a non-molestation order against him, but that did not stop the Met recruiting him. At about the same time that the Met was telling us that vetting had been tightened up, it was simultaneously congratulating PC Mitchell on passing his police entrance and handing him a warrant card, which he used to get the trust of women he went on to abuse and rape.

This Government have been repeatedly warned about failures around vetting and misconduct. Independent inspectorate reports in 2012, 2019, 2022 and 2023 all highlighted serious failures in vetting processes, which is why, two years ago, we on these Benches called for mandatory national vetting standards. Why has this not yet happened?

As for the misconduct charges the Statement referred to, most of them are not even in place yet, three years after Sarah Everard was murdered. Will the Minister commit today to a new mandatory vetting framework, underpinned by legislation, that all forces must abide by, under which any evidence about past domestic abuse or sexual offending will be pursued—and not simply take convictions into account? At a minimum, he should surely accept recommendation 6:

“Review of indecent exposure allegations and other sexual offences recorded against serving police officers”.


As well as talking extensively about vetting, the recommendations also focus on indecent exposure. Indecent exposure is still treated as a joke by police—something “she” should not be bothered about because “he” is pathetic and harmless. It is seen as old men—past it and pathetic—trying to get attention. Many women, if not most, have experienced this at some point in their lives. But Couzens was in his 40s and did this five or so times, including one scary incident when he masturbated on a banking on a country lane as a lone woman cyclist cycled past. There was an incident just before Sarah Everard’s kidnap, rape and murder when he drove undressed through a McDonald’s. People got the name, model and licence number of his car and the vehicle was traced to him, but nothing followed after that.

Clearly, the sexual impulse that drives indecent exposure is to force attention to the man’s sexuality on a woman who does not want it. We have to ask the question: how far is that from the motive that drives rape? It is clearly a terrifying experience for a woman—often isolated and confronted with a man bigger and stronger than she is—who will be afraid of what might happen next. Getting away with it encourages a predator to feel that they can act more boldly next time, increasing the threat to women.

The recommendations in this report are absolutely clear, and they have a timetable. Will the Home Office insist that all police forces have a specialist policy on investigating all sexual offences, including so-called “non-contact” offences such as indecent exposure, by September this year? Will the Minister commit to guidance and training on indecent exposure being in place by December this year? Will he ensure that the College of Policing, in collaboration with the National Police Chiefs’ Council, will improve guidance and training on indecent exposure? Will there be an immediate review, called for in recommendation 3, which concerns treatment of masturbatory indecent exposure within the criminal justice system? The review needs to focus on recognising the seriousness of the offence, identifying it as an indicator of disinhibition by perpetrators, and understanding and addressing the wider issue of sexual precursor conduct, so as to prevent victimisation, to improve the response to victims when it occurs, and to bring more offenders to justice.

Recommendation 4 calls for research into masturbatory indecent exposure with immediate effect. Does the Minister have a schedule that he can tell us about today? Recommendation 5 is a public information campaign on indecent exposure by March 2025, which the Home Office should launch, together with the National Police Chiefs’ Council, to raise awareness about the illegality, criminality and legal consequences of any type of indecent exposure.

When it comes to women’s safety, the reality is that the number of prosecutions for domestic abuse has halved, rape prosecutions are still taking years, and early action and intervention still do not happen. As my honourable friend Yvette Cooper said on Thursday:

“There is a shocking drift on women’s safety and in what the Home Secretary has said today … How long must we go on saying the same things? The first women’s safety march was on the streets of Leeds nearly 50 years ago, and we are saying the same things about our daughters’ safety today”.—[Official Report, Commons, 29/2/24; col. 454.]


We really cannot stand for any more of this.

[Baroness Doocey (LD)]

My Lords, what happened to Sarah Everard was horrific, and made worse by the fact that this callous murder was committed by a serving police officer. The report says that Wayne Couzens should never have been a police officer and that numerous opportunities to end his career were ignored. It lays out a number of steps to ensure that this appalling tragedy is not repeated.

The Minister has promised decisive action and outlined several welcome measures, yet the vehicle required to take such action is available to him now. The Criminal Justice Bill is due to reach this House in the coming weeks. As it stands, the charity Refuge says it is seriously disappointed with the Bill’s measures on police perpetrators, which it believes will do very little to rid our forces of abusers.

The Government have so far resisted a series of amendments, such as one that would mean all allegations of police-perpetrated domestic abuse would be recorded —either as a police complaint or a conduct matter. This would inform vetting and any potential future investigations. Will the Minister reconsider placing such provisions in the Bill, rather than falling back on regulations and, worse still, voluntary codes of practice, which seldom if ever work?

Does the Minister accept that the time has now come to spell out, in no uncertain terms, that violence against women and girls is not acceptable if you are a police officer? That surely means being clear that domestic abuse is not just a criminal matter but a disciplinary matter within the police services themselves.

I also want to address the issue of consistency. At the moment, there is too much variation around the country, and the issue of warrant card removal illustrates this well. In some forces, officers are required to surrender their warrant cards if they are suspended; in other forces, they are not. Sarah Everard’s murder horribly underlines the power that comes with a warrant card. At the very least, surely suspended officers should be required to surrender warrant cards nationwide. This is something that the Domestic Abuse Commissioner is calling for.

Another matter of consistency is on the issue of suspensions themselves. The Government are now saying that there will be an automatic suspension of police officers charged with certain criminal offences pending trial. Can the Minister confirm that domestic abuse offences will be among those leading to suspension?

The Government are planning to change the rules to make it easier for forces to remove officers without vetting clearance. However, removing those who fail vetting or are guilty of gross misconduct will still not be a legal obligation. These measures will not be mandatory or backed by primary legislation. A Liberal Democrat freedom of information request last October revealed that 129 Metropolitan Police officers were still working on the front line while under investigation for allegations of sexual or domestic abuse, eight months on from the Casey review. This is, frankly, a disgrace.

Meanwhile, a clear issue with culture and leadership remains to be addressed. This is particularly critical in the context of an increasingly young and inexperienced workforce, a third of whom have less than five years’ service. The Police Foundation describes a

“culture of silence and complicity”,

where the default is to keep quiet if you want to get on or fit in. This report rightly says that our police must be held to a higher standard of behaviour and accountability given the powers that they have. Good officers will welcome anything that does this.

Time and again, we have had excellent reports which identify the issues and make recommendations to stop them happening again. Most of the recommendations are accepted, but they are seldom, if ever, implemented. Can the Minister explain what the Government propose to do to ensure a full and speedy implementation of the recommendations in this report? Crucially, can he also say what the consequences will be for those forces that fail to comply?

Female Domestic Homicides: Black, Asian and Ethnic-minority Overrepresentation

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Monday 22nd January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My noble friend raises some very good points. It links into part of the question put to me by the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, which I did not answer: about the police response to tackling domestic abuse. We have provided funding to support the rollout of the Domestic Abuse Matters training to police forces which have yet to deliver it, or which do not have their own specific domestic abuse training, to improve and ensure consistency in the police response to domestic abuse. I would imagine—I will check—that that includes the language barriers that my noble friend identifies. That programme has been completed by 34 police forces to date. Considerable work is also going on in building up the evidence base and, indeed, starting a library, which will help police forces to investigate these crimes.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, the opening words of the briefing from Home Office-funded project referred to by the noble Baroness say:

“The onus is too often placed on survivors from minoritised ethnic groups to navigate a system that has not been designed to take account of their needs, rather than addressing structural barriers that prevent their access to support”.


I suspect that not much has changed since that briefing was written and published in 2022. By the time a woman becomes a victim of domestic homicide, the truth is that she may have been repeatedly failed by the system. How is the Casey report into the Met Police feeding into the Government’s programme, and what targets do the Government have to reduce domestic abuse and violence against women and girls? Of course, the Labour Party does have a target for if and when we are in government.

Violence Against Women and Girls

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Monday 4th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, it is about how you do things. I have already referred to a few of the things the Government have done, and a significant amount of money is being invested into this area to improve outcomes for victims. Since 2010, we have criminalised forced marriage; criminalised revenge porn; criminalised failing to protect a girl from FGM; introduced Clare’s law, which is a domestic violence disclosure scheme; introduced two new stalking offences; introduced the offence of controlling or coercive behaviour; introduced legislation that recognises as victims children who see, hear or experience the effects of domestic abuse and are related to the perpetrator or victim; and criminalised virginity testing and hymenoplasty. There is so much more that the Government have done; it is not all about money.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

The Minister mounted a stout defence about the issues of 7 October, which he was right to do. I was proud to be at the conference organised by the noble Lord, Lord Hague, on sexual violence in conflict. It was an important moment for the UK. I am proud of our leadership in tackling violence against women and girls across the world. How will the Minister and his colleagues ensure that the perpetrators are held to account by putting pressure on the United Nations? How could the UK support the victims of these appalling crimes?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The noble Baroness raises two interesting points. I hope that we will support the victims by providing forensic expertise and other skills, as we have in other conflicts around the world. Obviously, the perpetrators have to be caught, and I believe that extensive efforts are under way to catch them. On the longer-term approach, I do not know, but if she would like to chat about it I will happily take her suggestions back to the department.

Abortion Clinics: Safe Access Zones

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Monday 20th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I quite agree with the noble Baroness—it is totally unacceptable for anybody to be harassed or intimidated simply for exercising their legal right to abortion services. Personally, I find that very depressing to see. However, in terms of the public consultation, this is new legislation on an emotive topic, and there are strong views on all sides of the debate. Determining the appropriate balance will not always be straightforward. Therefore, to make sure that the legislation can be implemented effectively—that is the point—the Government have decided to launch a public consultation on the non-statutory guidance for safe access zones.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, we need to take account of the fact that the previous Home Secretary voted against safe access zones and has a history of opposing abortion rights. The noble Lord needs to give us an example of where—when the will of Parliament is so clear, as it is in this case—it has been necessary to have this kind of public consultation. We are very familiar with pre-legislative scrutiny and consultation in this House, but why are we seeing months-long delays? Can the noble Lord please give us a timeline?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I say to the noble Baroness that I already have: it will be commenced by the spring of 2024, and I am very happy to commit to making sure that that happens. The guidance is not straightforward because of the broad nature of the prohibited behaviours. For example, it is a criminal offence to intentionally or recklessly influence, which means that members of the public, the police and prosecutors will benefit from being aware of what could be criminalised within the zones. I totally take the noble Baroness’s point: I want to see this happen as soon as possible too.

UK: Violence Against Women and Girls

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

I think it is a shame that the noble Baroness has tried to deflect what is actually an incredibly serious debate about violence against girls and women into some kind of culture war that she talks about in the House often.

Last Sunday morning at about 7.30 am, having dropped my husband off to get to Heathrow, I stopped for a coffee on the way home. As I crossed the road back to my car, a man stopped to let me cross the road, which was nice. He then slowed down next to me and through his window asked me if I was up for something or other—I hesitate to define exactly what. I was not interested and walked swiftly to my car. Disturbingly, he pulled up around the corner and turned to look at me. I was not sure what he was about to do—a U-turn perhaps—but, having locked myself in my car, I drove away, checking that I was not followed home, which I was not.

What do we do? Sometimes you make a joke of it, which I did when I was telling one of my Front-Bench colleagues about it. A 70-year old woman at 7.30 on a Sunday morning is not safe—for goodness’ sake. I admonished myself for not snapping his registration number, although quite what I would have done with it, I do not know. Actually, at the point where he pulled up around the corner, there is a bus stop with a camera, and he may end up with an £80 fine, so that would serve him right. The truth is, of course, that he may go on to do it again and again—and who knows where it might lead?

That is the everyday, low-level occurrence that every woman here today will recognise and have some experience of. It is frightening. Why should we live our lives being afraid that some bloke might feel he has the right to grope, shout sexist remarks, comment on our appearance, get nasty or violent when told to stop his unacceptable behaviour, and sometimes do worse: attack, rape, sexual assault or murder? These are the matters at the root of violence against women and girls in our society today.

When I look at my granddaughter and her friends, I worry about the oversexualised world they are growing up in, one where many boys learn about relationships and sex from watching porn, as many noble Lords have said. I absolutely agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Benjamin, who passionately explained the damage that this does.

So the debate today is important, and I thank all who have participated, and indeed the organisations which sent us briefings: the Girl Guides, Refuge, Women’s Aid and others. I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Warwick for stepping up so wonderfully as she did to take the place of my noble friend. I am also grateful for the comments of my noble friend Lady Gale; we have shared this platform on many occasions over the last 20 years or so that we have been here to talk about violence against women.

Like others, I want to start by looking at and thinking about girls’ experience. I was very grateful to the Girl Guides for the research that it sent us. I am also very grateful for the work it does in supporting young women and increasing their confidence. I was never a Girl Guide—I was only ever a Brownie—but they do a brilliant job today.

As noble Lords said, girls and young women regularly experience harassment and abuse in public places, such as on the street and on public transport. Some 53% of 11 to 21 year-olds do not feel safe when they are outside on their own, and over 60% have experienced unwanted attention. As other noble Lords said, they do not feel safe at school. This is a terrible thing—a place where they should learn and thrive is instead somewhere they do not feel safe.

Girls tell us that they regularly experience online harms such as harassment and abuse, including sexist and derogatory comments, also mentioned by many noble Lords. Some 79% of 13 to 21 year-olds have experienced online harms in the last year: sexist comments, cyberflashing, sexual harassment, catfishing—I suggest your Lordships look that one up—pressure to share nude pictures, and cyberstalking. Some 94% said that they experienced negative emotions as a result of online harms. However, the thing that really disturbed me is that only 15% of girls think social media is a safe place for them. That is terrible because, in this modern world, these girls need to feel safe on social media—of course they need to feel safe.

What these girls want is really modest and simple. They want public sexual harassment to be made a crime. They want their ideas to be listened to and their voices to be heard in the design and creation of safe public spaces. They want the reporting of sexual harassment to be made easier. They want—as many other noble Lords have said—the Online Safety Bill to be strengthened to address the issues of online harassment and abuse, and they want the Department for Education to renew its commitment to the delivery of RSHE and to aim for 100% of people to learn about consent.

When these girls become women, they will face the epidemic of violence against women and girls that has escalated, particularly in the last 10 to 15 years. Noble Lords have referred to the record 70,000 rapes reported to the police in the year to September 2022, just 2,600 of which resulted in a charge. Some 70% of the rape complainants who go to the police give up their case. There is a lack of trauma-informed police support, and most forces have scrapped rape specialist units through funding cuts. That means that experienced police officers who know how to deal with these issues have left, and young police officers who do not know how to deal with these issues are now having to do so, because the policy has changed and there has been a recognition that this is a serious issue, but they do not know how best to deal with rape. This is a problem. It is particularly a problem for black and minoritised women who, not surprisingly in recent times, do not trust the police in so many different ways. Independent sexual violence advisers are in short supply and rape crisis centres are underfunded. There are 10,000 victims on their waiting lists for rape trauma therapy.

The same set of abysmal statistics appears when we think about domestic violence. The criminal justice system is failing women and children who have experienced domestic violence and the current system is inefficient for domestic abuse spending. Women’s Aid research found that a minimum of £427 million per year is needed to fund specialist domestic abuse services in England. If domestic abuse services work and domestic abuse is reduced, that could deal with the fact that domestic abuse costs our economy £78 billion a year in England. Therefore, the economic as well as the social need is absolutely clear.

We now have what is being called the ground-breaking Victims and Prisoners Bill to address these issues. The Government may plan to attack the court backlog, increase charges for rape perpetrators and show that victims’ rights are upheld and supported through the system, but the problem is that none of those things is actually in the Bill. I hope that my honourable friend Anna McMorrin and her colleagues will deal with some of those issues in the Commons, and that when the Bill comes here we will deal with it. Without an enforceable victims’ code, it is nothing but words on a page, and without the legal support to guide survivors every step of the way through the system, from reporting a rape at a police station through to trial and driving up standards, the Bill is not worth it. So I hope noble Lords will join us in tackling those issues.

Labour has a mission to make our streets safe for women and girls. We have a Green Paper on Ending Violence Against Women and Girls which makes scores of commitments to tackle this epidemic, including specialist rape units in every police force, setting up dedicated rape courts, introducing minimum sentences for rape and for stalking, and making misogyny a hate crime. We will put specialist domestic abuse workers in the control rooms of every police force responding to 999 calls, supporting the victims of abuse, following the excellent example of Kim McGuinness as a Labour police and crime commissioner in Northumbria. We will also make sure that we have a Victims’ Commissioner. Since my friend Dame Vera Baird left, we have not had one of those—so that will be nice, too. We will lead the charge on the Human Rights Council for a global treaty to end violence against women and girls.

I thank all noble Lords for speaking in this debate. I particularly thank my noble friends Lord Winston and Lord Brooke for their distinctive and relevant contributions to tackling violence. My noble friend opened the debate with eloquence and force and asked the Minister about many issues. I am grateful for the outstanding contributions across the House. I do not envy the Minister his task, but do I know how seriously he takes these issues.

Baroness Casey Review

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Tuesday 21st March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I say to my noble friend, on the subject of the police officer she mentioned, that it is not for me to tell Sir Mark who he should speak to; I am sure he has a very good idea who he ought to speak to. It sounds to me as though that particular person’s experience is obviously relevant. Maybe it is part of an ongoing plan; I do not know. Obviously if I see him, I will ask him.

It is clear that the Met must have the confidence of all communities, including black and ethnic groups. If it manages to regain that confidence, that should help recruitment and all the other things that were identified by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones.

On competence, I think that the Met should be allowed to deal with the cultural side of this report over the coming days. I am sure that, if there were incompetence allegations, they would have been aired in a much more detailed and methodical way, rather than the anecdotal side of things—although I accept that those are very serious. Having said that, I think it is for Sir Mark to come back to us on this. Obviously, there is the crime survey, and the reported statistics will be very revealing.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, I was very pleased to hear the Minister agree with my noble friend that sexism, homophobia and racism were institutional in the Metropolitan police force, because that was certainly not what his right honourable friend the Home Secretary said at the other end of the building a few hours ago, and that is a great shame.

Here we are again; I think this is the third time in several months that we have been discussing the terrible conduct of our uniformed forces in this country, on whom we so depend. I just wonder what on earth has been going on that has allowed the same things to be said over and over again. We had the fire brigade a few months ago; now we have the Metropolitan Police.

I would like to ask the Minister about the examples of violence against women from police officers, because, if 43 police forces do what they like on vetting, training and misconduct, can the Government finally accept that we urgently need mandatory national standards on vetting, misconduct and training? That follows on from my noble friend’s statement that we will need primary legislation that deals with those issues.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I am going to defend my right honourable friend the Home Secretary, who said the following. I have already read this, but I am going to read it again. She said:

“I would like to turn to two particularly concerning aspects of Baroness Casey’s report. First, it addresses questions of racism, misogyny and homophobia within the Metropolitan Police. Baroness Casey has identified evidence of discriminatory behaviour among officers. I commend those officers who came forward to share their awful experiences with the review team. Discrimination must be tackled in all its forms, and I welcome Sir Mark’s commitment to do so.”


I do not see her avoiding the charges, as was suggested.

As regards vetting, the Government have asked the College of Policing to strengthen the statutory code of practice for police vetting, making the obligations that all forces must legally follow much stricter and clearer. This is currently out for consultation. That consultation process closes on 21 March. The Home Secretary has also asked the policing inspectorate to carry out a rapid review of police forces’ responses to its November 2022 report, which highlighted a number of areas where police vetting can be strengthened. The NPCC has also asked police forces to check their officers and staff against the national police database—I mentioned earlier that the parliamentary unit is having that fast-tracked—to help identify anyone who is unfit to serve. The data-washing exercise is on track to be completed towards the end of this month, following which forces will need to manually analyse the information received and identify leads to follow up. That exercise is expected to be completed by September.

Women’s Safety

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Wednesday 8th March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I entirely agree, and there is much in what the noble Baroness says. I do not, I am afraid, have the statistics to hand as to the level of women among recent recruits to the police in meeting the 20,000 target that was in the last manifesto, but I can certainly find that out and write to her.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, following on from my noble friend Lady Kennedy, evidence suggests that the impact on victims of indecent exposure can be considerable, as visual sexual violence. If the report of Wayne Couzens’ indecent exposure had been taken seriously and acted upon, he would have been apprehended and would not have gone on to rape and murder Sarah Everard a few days later. In the past, the stereotype of a harmless and possibly mentally ill—but not dangerous—flasher has informed the view of this offence. Is it time to take the offence of indecent exposure more seriously, and how might that be achieved?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

Clearly, the first answer is the one I gave to the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, a moment ago. We are supporting the Bill brought by Greg Clark. There is also the money that has been spent under the safer streets fund and the safety of women at night fund. If I may return to the example of the funding for the Basingstoke Canal programme, it had a very effective method of tackling the crime of indecent exposure. I entirely agree with the noble Baroness that the impact of these offences has often been minimised in the past and we must not fall into that trap again.

Violence Against Women and Girls: Stalking

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Thursday 23rd February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My noble friend asks a good question. We will be changing the law to ensure that dangerous offenders with a conviction for controlling or coercive behaviour who are sentenced to 12 months or more are automatically eligible to be managed under MAPPA. It will require primary legislation, but I am afraid that I cannot give an exact timeframe for that—I suppose the usual phrase is, when parliamentary time allows.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, what are the Government doing about the continuing downward spiral in charging, prosecutions and convictions for domestic abuse in England and Wales? Police referrals to the CPS are down again this year and are lower than they were before Covid shut down the justice system.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I accept that there is some regional variation in, for example, applications for stalking protection orders. Where those variations exist, the Safeguarding Minister is planning to write to the various chief constables whose forces applied for fewer than might have been expected, in order to encourage them always to consider these. Forces such as the Met and Kent have been making excellent use of the new orders, applications for which have risen by 31% in a year. So, as regards stalking, it is a very good story; it needs still to improve, of course, but it is getting better.

Public Order Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 30th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Manchester]

My Lords, in Committee I shared my concerns about Clause 9 as it then stood. I am grateful for conversations that have taken place since. I particularly thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Sugg and Lady Barker. The latter has listened patiently and sympathetically to me and my friends on these Benches at some length.

My concerns regarding Clause 9 had nothing to do with the moral merits or otherwise of abortion; they lie in my passion to see upheld the rights of citizens of this land, both to receive healthcare and to protest. Women must be able to access lawful medical interventions without facing distressing confrontations, directed at them personally, when they are identifiable by their proximity to the clinic or hospital. At the same time, anyone who wishes to protest in general about abortion law must be able to do so lawfully, with the least restriction on where and when they may do so.

I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Morrissey, for the proposals she sets out in Amendments 41 to 43, which build on the Australian example. Were they the only amendments put forward, they would have my support. However, what we now have in Amendment 45 is, I believe, something that strikes a more exact balance. It meets human rights requirements and contains sensible limits. It has widespread support and is, I believe, more likely to survive scrutiny in the other place. If it is moved, I intend to support it.

I accept the remarks of the Supreme Court regarding the necessity of proposed new paragraph (a) on influencing, but I have two brief questions on that matter on which I seek clarification. Much has been made in religious circles about whether silent prayer would be criminalised by this clause. We have heard it again tonight. As noble Lords might expect, I believe in the power of prayer, so I want to clarify on the record that the act of praying is not in itself deemed an attempt at influence, given that when I pray, I am trying to ask God perhaps to change the heart of a third party.

My second and rather less metaphysical question is intended to clarify that influence works both ways. Would a coercive and controlling partner, or ex-partner, determined that a reluctant woman should go ahead with an abortion and accompanying her against her wishes, be as guilty of the same offence as an anti-abortion campaigner?

Finally, I cannot support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Farmer. It would remove safe zones from this Bill without providing any obvious parliamentary process for us to re-engage with the issue in a timely manner.

[Baroness Thornton (Lab)]

My Lords, I very much welcome the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Beith. I am so glad to hear that he has considered this matter and come to the conclusion he has. Of course, I also welcome those of the right reverend Prelate.

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Morrissey, that this is a good try, but her proposals might well have benefited from testing had she been involved in Committee. She might have changed her mind about how we in this House need best to reflect the clear will of the elected House on this matter. Not only has the elected House had a clear view on this matter, so has this House. Our job today is to make sure we provide at this point in the Bill an amendment that does that job. Amendment 45 does that because it complies with the EHRC, recognises differences and proposes a framework that reflects the issues as they pertain to abortion provision in England and Wales.

However, Amendment 44 would in many ways do what we saw the last time we discussed this matter: kick it into the long grass. Indeed, I remind the House that last time, it was defeated by 138 votes to 39. It would bring about a delay, meaning that thousands of women, nurses and midwives going about their lawful business would be harassed and intimidated. This seems to me to be really very straightforward.

[Baroness Hoey (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I welcome the fact that there seems to have been a change in this House. No one really is pushing for Clause 9 just to stay as it was. I very much welcome that. I will speak in support of Amendment 44 from the noble Lord, Lord Farmer, and say a few words on what I thought was a wonderful speech from the noble Baroness, Lady Morrissey, on her amendments. I will support those when and if they are called, as well as Amendment 44.

Surely the role of this House must be to help enact laws that are necessary and proportionate, according to evidence. I have not seen the evidence to say that it is necessary to enact this whole area around abortion clinics when, as has been pointed out by other noble Lords, we already have legislation covering many—indeed all—of the activities that we would all find abhorrent. The importance of a review is that we can test whether, for example, the public space protection orders are working. It seemed that they were working when the lady who was silently praying was arrested. Have we looked in detail at what is working and what is not? Why do we need something else when these orders are in place? As a minimum, the House—and the Government—should be reviewing the PSPO regime to see whether it is working as intended. Good evidence makes good law, and the opposite is also unfortunately true.

Clearly, there is an appetite in the other place to “do something”. That is what politicians always call for. Something needs to be done, and they want to do it quickly; there is an appetite to act now. That being so, should Amendment 44 not be adopted, the House would do well to adopt a reasonable model based on a tried and tested approach. For that reason, I support the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Morrissey.