Retail Crime Prevention

Clive Betts Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2019 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. Looking at the number of Members who want to speak, I will give a guideline speech limit of six minutes for each Member. If Members exceed that, those at the end of the debate will get less time.

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[Kit Malthouse]

I always say the same thing when people tell me about under-reporting, which is that we must urge everybody to report every possible crime, because modern policing is all about data. The police respond to numbers. If they see numbers, feel the numbers and see the pattern of behaviour, they will respond. It is a bit like that old philosophical aphorism: if a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, did it actually happen? If a crime is committed, particularly in a large rural constituency such as mine, and it is not reported, as far as the police know, it never happened. Data is absolutely key. I urge all shop owners to report every crime.

The right hon. Member for Delyn raised the impact of serious and organised crime. He is quite right that high-profile thefts by serious and organised crime need to be addressed, not least the demolition and stealing of cash machines, which we see in quite a lot of rural constituencies, including my own. As I hope the right hon. Gentleman knows, we are undertaking a serious and organised crime review over the next few weeks, which I hope will give us some strategy and point us to the future.

I am grateful to hon. Members for what has been an important debate. I hope that I have outlined some of the work that the Government have done, and will hopefully do more of in future, to make sure that everybody—shop workers and shoppers alike—will have fun and will exchange money for presents and gifts in the run-up to Christmas, safely and happily, now and in the years to come.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I thank all Members for their co-operation in keeping to the time guidance. I call David Hanson to wind up.

Public Services

Clive Betts Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to raise that ongoing issue. Young people need to be protected. Through the public service duty announced in the Queen’s Speech, much more can be done by agencies and Departments working together to provide support and preventive measures. Quite frankly, far too many young people are being exploited. The Government are recruiting 20,000 new police officers and investing in not only their training and equipment, but their protection, so that they are empowered to tackle such crimes. [Interruption.]

While Opposition Members chunter from a sedentary position, it is worth reminding them that the Labour party would recruit 10,000 fewer police officers and, importantly, fail to back our brave police officers. Police forces and officers have told us that they need backing to search people for bladed weapons to tackle the appalling knife crime we are seeing. That is why we have lifted restrictions on emergency stop-and-search powers for all forces in England and Wales—something described by the shadow Home Secretary as “unhelpful”.

When our frontline officers told us they needed to be better able to defend themselves against reckless armed violent criminals and thugs, we listened. That is why we have announced a new £10 million fund to give police chiefs the ability to equip officers with Taser. Again, we have not heard from shadow Ministers, who have refused to back this measure. I urge them to back this investment in our frontline officers, who protect our people, our communities and our country.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

The Home Secretary says that the Government are backing the police, but does she accept that in South Yorkshire there are 700 fewer police officers to back than there were in 2010, as a deliberate result of the policies and cuts pursued by the Government of which she was a member?

[Priti Patel]

I had hoped the hon. Gentleman would welcome the 151 additional police officers who are coming to South Yorkshire, along with the 6,000 who will be coming over the next year up to March and the 20,000 that we are recruiting. I think all hon. Members should recognise that crime has changed and, rather than criticise our police officers, get out there and back them.

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[Angela Rayner]

All I can say to the hon. Gentleman is that he needs to get out more.

The Secretary of State’s predecessors, and even the former Prime Minister, have now admitted that the abolition of maintenance grants was a mistake, but unless the Government act in this Session another generation of 18-year-olds will go to university next summer without maintenance support. The Education Secretary has already accepted that the system is unfair. In a recent letter to the Office for Students, he raised the possibility of moving to a new system of post-qualification admissions. I am delighted that he is keen on one of Labour’s many evidence-led radical policies on education. If only that had been in the Government’s programme this week, and if only they had fully acted on the recommendations of another of their independent reviews on school exclusions. So far, they have promised to take up only those relating to formal permanent exclusions, but if they take no action to deal with the problem of children falling off school rolls without any formal process at all, they risk making that situation worse.

The Secretary of State’s predecessor did manage to get almost the whole House to support the passing of one signature piece of legislation: the regulations implementing statutory sex and relationships education. I was proud to support that step from this Dispatch Box. Before I became an MP, I was a volunteer for the Samaritans, a charity that was founded after a young girl took her life because her periods had started. She did not know what was happening to her; she thought she had a disease. If she had had sex and relationships education, she might have been here today. So now we have legislated, but we must support the schools that are teaching the curriculum. We need to set down the resources that they need and the moral leadership that they deserve. I hope that the Education Secretary will make it clear later that there is no opt-out from equality in schools, and that he will stand with teachers and heads in delivering that.

[Mr Betts]

My hon. Friend is making a really important point. Will she emphasise the importance of saying to schools that they are required to do this form of education? If they leave it open as an option, that is when they come under real pressure from those who want to undermine this whole agenda.

[Angela Rayner]

Absolutely. There is a majority across the House to ensure that we push forward with this important legislation and support teachers and heads in delivering it in our schools. We have to lead the way, taking communities with us, in ensuring that our children and young people feel safe, secure and valued. Every young person deserves that in our education system.

School support staff are another section of the workforce who deserve that support, which the Education Secretary rightly acknowledged in our first exchanges. He will have been told at close quarters about the value of teaching assistants as he is married to one, so I will not question his commitment. However, as his predecessors found, commitment from the Education Secretary is not enough if they do not have it from their Prime Minister, so I hope that the Education Secretary will stand firm and make it clear that he will not countenance balancing the books on the backs of our support staff. Perhaps he could look again at the abolition of the national body for school support staff, because restoring it would be another step that he could take with the support of the House.

There is no doubt that the Education Secretary will talk about investment in schools as if they have not faced a decade of cuts. The Prime Minister promised to reverse those cuts, forgetting to mention, of course, that he sat around the Cabinet table and supported those very cuts time after time. Far worse is the gap between his words and his actions, because the Government are not even reversing their own cuts. Not only did the package ignore the cuts to capital funding, central education spending, further education and so much else, but the Institute for Fiscal Studies found that the announcement made in the spending round would not even undo the cuts to schools since 2010 in its final year—another broken promise from a Prime Minister who cannot be trusted. He promised £700 million next year, but councils are already facing such a shortfall. The Local Government Association has put next year’s deficit at £1.2 billion.

The Education Secretary has warm words about further education, but the spending round included less than £200 million for increasing the base rate—little more than a real-terms freeze. If the Secretary of State truly believes in investing in further education, why did the spending round not include a single penny for adult education? After a decade of managed decline and billions of pounds of cuts, why are the Government refusing to give that vital part of the system the investment it needs? Even in apprenticeships—apparently his passion —we are far from on course to meet the Government’s target of 1 million this year. We do not even know whether that is still the target. We have been told it is an ambition, an aim and an aspiration, so perhaps the Secretary of State will tell us which of those it is and what on earth that means?

The story of decline and neglect is the same in perhaps the most vital area: early years provision. The hourly rate for child care providers has not increased since 2017, Sure Start funding has collapsed, and the additional funding for maintained nursery schools runs out at the end of the next financial year. Will that be addressed, or have the youngest children been forgotten?

Even in schools, the extra money promised by the Government is not only years away but is being deliberately skewed to schools with the wealthiest intakes. The Education Policy Institute put it plainly, stating that

“almost all schools serving the most disadvantaged communities would miss out.”

The EPI found that the average pupil eligible for free school meals would attract less than half the funding of their more affluent peers. That comes on top of the research conducted by my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) last week, which found that over £200 million has been lost since 2015 thanks to the freeze in the pupil premium. The EPI concluded:

“If this is the Prime Minister’s idea of levelling up, then his legacy might be even more disappointing than his predecessor’s.”

Frankly, the funding that the Prime Minister has promised for future years will be rendered a fantasy if it comes after a bad deal or a no-deal Brexit.

We are yet to hear, of course, what all this means for higher education. Will the Education Secretary tell us any more about the fee status of EU students or our participation in Horizon 2020 or Erasmus? We are no wiser this week than we were before. The Queen’s Speech may have had nothing to say about education, but I can promise parents, children and educators across the country that a Labour Government will not neglect our education system, as the Conservatives have.

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[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

I want to deal first with the myth that is perpetuated about the so-called economic mismanagement of the last Labour Government. Until 2008, that Government had an excellent record of controlling both the national debt and national deficit as a percentage of GDP. From 2008 to 2010, the increase in deficit and debt was not due to overspending; it was due to the collapse in revenues because of the banking crash, which affected every Government in the western world—that is the truth of the situation.

I will concentrate my comments on matters relating to the remit of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee, not because I am not interested in matters to do with the police, education and the national health service—of course I am—but because of time restrictions.

I want first to deal with local government spending. The Government have said that there will be extra spending power for local councils. It has now become clear that that depends on councils putting their council tax up by 4%. A 4% council tax increase is what the Government are requiring of councils to deliver the spending power that the Government say they will have, including a 2% increase to fund social care.

As Councillor George Lindars-Hammond said the other day, 2% for Sheffield is very different from 2% for Westminster. The position is even worse for some other small authorities, which will simply not be able to raise the money to provide the social care their citizens need. Of course, it is all right—isn’t it, Mr Speaker?—because we will have social care reform. The Queen’s Speech says that we will have legislation on social care. I welcome that, as I have welcomed the similar promises on the seven or eight occasions they have been made before. When will we get at least a Green Paper on social care? Will social care be kicked into the long grass once again?

I welcome the reference in the Queen’s Speech to devolution, which has been on the back burner for too long. Good work was done with the deals and setting up mayoral combined authorities. I am just a bit disappointed that the Queen’s Speech refers to more of the same: city deals, other sorts of deals or enhancing those already in place. We need a comprehensive devolution framework, which as of right devolves powers to all local authorities—urban or rural, cities or towns— throughout the country that want to take them up. We should move towards that, and the Select Committee on Housing, Communities and Local Government is holding an inquiry on devolution. I am sure all members of the Committee will push for devolving powers to local authorities. We want more progress on devolution, but I welcome at least the mention of it in the Queen’s Speech and the commitment to doing something about it.

[John Stevenson (Carlisle) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Betts]

I will because I know that the hon. Gentleman is very interested in devolution.

[John Stevenson]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, I am quite sympathetic to what he has just said. Does he agree that, if we are to have a White Paper, no council should necessarily have a veto on any changes in its locality and that, if a number of councils want change, one should not be allowed to stop it happening?

[Mr Betts]

I am very sympathetic to the point the hon. Gentleman makes about the situation in Cumbria. Having one council holding everything up certainly needs addressing, and I understand the problem he highlights.

I will move on to building safety. The Government have finally accepted that they will legislate to bring in the recommendations of the Hackitt review. When Dame Judith came to the Select Committee last December, she said she was disappointed that it had taken the Government seven months to accept that they would implement all her recommendations. I am a little bit worried that the Queen’s Speech refers to legislating, but no specific Bill is mentioned in the list of measures. Building safety is really important, but it needs to be accompanied by adequate funding.

Thousands of people in this country still live in high-rise blocks and other properties with dangerous cladding. The Government have put money in place for social housing, and they have now put it in place for the private sector, but there needs to be greater urgency to ensure that it is spent, and in particular that reluctant private owners are made to do the work. There is an additional problem. Not only high-rise but high-risk buildings, such as old people’s homes and hospitals, need addressing, as well as cladding other than ACM—for example, zinc cladding material. The Government are reviewing all that, but there are many concerns and suspicions. The hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) has pushed hard on the matter in the Select Committee. Cladding needs addressing and the Government will have to find probably billions more pounds to deal with the problem to ensure that not merely homes, but hospitals, schools and every form of accommodation are safe.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

I thank the Chair of the Select Committee for giving way. On safety in high-rise buildings, does he agree that it is repugnant that leaseholders could end up paying the cost of making the buildings safe and that the freeholders should take responsibility?

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[Mr Betts]

Absolutely. The Select Committee has welcomed the Government’s indications that that is their intention. The pressure now has to be on how that intention will be put into practice, because clearly there are many examples of where that is not happening.

I want to raise one or two other issues that are not in the Queen’s Speech—I am disappointed about that—on which the Select Committee has asked for Government action. Leasehold reform is a major issue across the House; 700 pieces of evidence were submitted to our Select Committee inquiry. The Government’s intentions are set out for new properties, particularly for new houses not being leasehold, and restrictions on service charges and other costs on leasehold flats. However, we still have not got a clear commitment to legislate for existing leaseholders who have been mis-sold leases and ripped off by service charges and other permission fees. That is simply not acceptable. I think that we produced a very good Select Committee report, which was widely welcomed by Members across the House. It is disappointing to see no reference in the Queen’s Speech to leasehold reform.

The other area that is not mentioned is the private rented sector, but again there seems to be cross-party support from Members on both Front Benches for reform of section 21 provisions to ensure that there cannot be no-fault evictions. Where is the legislation to deal with that and to tackle rogue landlords who abuse the situation and exploit their tenants? It is very disappointing that there is no reference to the private rented sector in the Queen’s Speech. The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government will come before the Select Committee in the next couple of weeks. I am sure that we will push him further on that point.

There is no reference to fracking in the Queen’s Speech. Perhaps that is a good thing. One constituent asked me the other day, “Does that mean that the Government have given up on fracking because they are not referring to it?” We have been waiting 18 months for a Government response to our last inquiry into fracking, in which we opposed the Government’s proposals to extend permitted development rights and to include fracking in the national infrastructure arrangements. There is still no answer from the Government. I said to my constituent that perhaps the most significant thing is not the lack of mention of fracking in the Queen’s Speech, but the fact that Cuadrilla has now pulled out of its arrangements and exploration in Lancashire. That probably means that the commercial sector is reaching a view that fracking is no longer viable. Why do not the Government accept that and transfer that funding into more renewable energy investment, which is surely what we all want?

Just before the Queen’s Speech, the Government announced that they would put up the cost of borrowing from the Public Works Loan Board, which particularly affects local authorities, from 0.8% to 1.8%. That is more than doubling. It is one of the things that are supposed to have no consequences. The Government tucked away the announcement on a Friday afternoon before the Queen’s Speech. However, the cost of that borrowing will fall particularly on housing revenue accounts, and all the good work that the Government have encouraged by lifting the housing revenue account cap will be undone by the extra cost of borrowing, which will distort and put back all the business plans that local authorities have to build more council homes. It is a backward step. I want Ministers to explain why they have done that and whether they had any understanding of the consequences.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Overseas Students: English Language Tests

Clive Betts Excerpts

Tuesday 30th April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) on raising this issue and pursuing it so strongly. People’s lives have been put in limbo. Since 2014, my constituent Mr Muhammad Arsalan has not been able to work, study or get access to the NHS. That is not because he has been found guilty based on any evidence, but because he has been found guilty by association. If people have cheated, they should face the full force of the law. However, my constituent has not been able to appeal, because he is in country. Yes, he can now challenge on human rights grounds, but that takes time and money. Will the Minister therefore look at the suggestion from my right hon. Friend that, dependent on the outcome of the current investigation, she consider the idea of these people being allowed to sit another test to prove that they are competent in English?

[Caroline Nokes]

As I have said, we are going to wait for the findings of the NAO. However, it is important to confirm that the Home Office is looking at a range of options as to how we can find a way forward from this situation. The Home Secretary has been pleased to meet a number of Members on this subject. It is a recurring subject of parliamentary questions and Westminster Hall debates. We are looking at it closely, and I hope we will find a way forward when we have had a chance to reflect on the NAO findings.

Modern Slavery and Victim Support

Clive Betts Excerpts

Wednesday 27th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Mr Duncan Smith]

That is absolutely right. It is a matter of balance—it is not only about supporting someone but ascertaining who has done what, and making sure that there are prosecutions. As my hon. Friend points out, we must ensure that practical and effective victim support is in place to prevent re-trafficking, while redoubling efforts to prosecute traffickers.

To be fair, over the past two years the Government have matched commitment with action, allocating the necessary resources, but I believe that they are not getting value for money, owing to restrictions in the 2015 Act. In 2017 a report by the Select Committee on Work and Pensions concluded that although the Act was a great step forward it did not establish a pathway for victim support. The National Audit Office noted:

“The Home Office has no assurance that victims are not trafficked again, potentially undermining the support given through the NRM”.

The national referral mechanism is the gateway for adult victims to receive support, and the NAO makes an important point about what is happening to people, and whether it happens to them again and again. It is vital for us to establish that. There is significant evidence of victims with a positive conclusive grounds decision being left homeless and destitute, and therefore at risk of being re-trafficked at the end of the NRM process. Not only are victims at risk of re-trafficking, but limited support creates a barrier to increasing conviction rates for traffickers. If we want to get after them, we need to reduce those barriers.

A Cabinet Office report has concluded that the lack of sustained support for victims is a key factor affecting the bringing of successful prosecutions, so I would like to ask my hon. Friend the Minister what steps are being taken to respond to that report. It is not the view only of the Cabinet Office. Many police forces will say the same. I accept that the Government have recognised some of these challenges and they announced new plans for victim support in October 2017. However, having talked to those involved in supporting people who have been trafficked, I believe that the proposals do not address the primary problems.

The extension of the move-on period following a positive conclusive grounds decision from 14 days to 45 days still leaves insufficient time for victims to establish a stable foundation for the future. In particular, it is not long enough to enable non-UK nationals to apply for and be granted discretionary leave to remain, which in turn gives victims access to housing, benefits and other services for a period of 12 to 30 months. The Government have stated that rather than a period of leave being provided to all victims, leave to remain should be provided only on a discretionary, case-by-case basis. However, there is evidence that victims fall through the gaps. A victim who is later granted leave to remain can even become homeless while waiting for a discretionary leave decision to be made, because the 45 day move-on period is not long enough to bridge the gap.

I do not want to seem ungrateful, because I believe that the Government’s heart is in the right place. However, the extension to 45 days will in all likelihood just postpone the point at which a victim faces homelessness, and not prevent it. If prevention is what we are after, we should try to achieve it. I therefore ask the Minister what information she has about the length of time taken for a discretionary leave application to be processed and how she proposes to guarantee that no victim will fall off the edge of support while waiting for a decision.

I understand that there are plans to offer up to six months’ access to drop-in services and improve local authorities’ response to victims. That appears on the surface to be helpful, but I am none the less concerned that it will meet the needs only of victims with a right to stay in the UK. That will leave an awful lot of people without such protection. Importantly, charities that support victims and that have left the NRM have told the Home Affairs Committee that drop-in services

“will not be sufficient for somebody who has more complex needs, who needs much more intensive intervention”.

I saw the chairman of the all-party parliamentary group nodding at that. It is a fact that there is now strong evidence coming in from the charities involved in this.

I have a third question for my hon. Friend the Minister. Can she explain, when she has the opportunity, what types of support the drop-in services announced in October 2017 will provide, and whether they will be open to those victims who do not have leave to remain in the UK? That is a critical question.

The Government have, I believe, expressed concern that offering all confirmed victims leave to remain for 12 months could create what they called a “pull factor”, increasing false claims and potentially creating a loophole in the immigration system. I have sympathy for my Government’s view, yet I believe those fears are well overstated. After all, victims cannot refer themselves in to the national referral mechanism; that can only be done by a designated first responder, which is an accountable organisation. It is also the role of the two-stage national referral mechanism process, as specified, to filter out any false claims that are not immediately identifiable by first responders.

The Government have also cautioned that false claims may be made by foreign criminals to avoid deportation. Yet, surely, if one really thinks about it, anyone seeking to avoid deportation by claiming to be a victim will be able to enter the NRM, irrespective of what support is or is not available after the NRM process. That argument does not seem to stack up when one considers it.

In the case of confirmed victims who also have criminal records, it is important to balance their vulnerability as a victim with the need to protect the public. That is precisely what the victim support Bill does, through an exception that excludes serious sexual and violent offenders who pose a genuine and immediate threat from receiving leave to remain. That is made clear in the Bill that Lord McColl initiated in the Lords and that is still sitting without, I think, much chance of a Second Reading in the Commons.

The suggestions that people will game the system mask the sad truth—this is perhaps the most dangerous part of what I am saying—that many victims are very reluctant to disclose their genuine circumstances or identify as a victim because of threats from their traffickers. We should not underestimate that: those threats and that fear and the system making them worried mean that they will not disclose those things to the authorities.

The Home Office is aware of that. After all, as I understand it, it has been made explicitly clear in the guidance provided to frontline staff, which is an interesting point. Surely the far greater problem is the sizeable number of people identified as potential victims who do not consent to enter the NRM each year. That must be the giveaway as to where the problem arises. Persuading victims to provide the police with information about their traffickers is often difficult, with a perceived lack of long-term protection as a key factor.

Of all that I am saying today, this is the bit that worries me the most; we are forcing many people to dive down again, back into that black place, because they are genuinely scared of what will happen and they believe the protections are simply not there. It is our purpose in this place to speak for them.

A support service that leaves people at risk of further trafficking cannot be cost-effective. The National Audit Office highlighted this in its 2017 report, saying the Home Office has

“no assurance that victims are not trafficked again, potentially undermining the support given through the NRM”.

That is an important point; the NAO is basically opening up the question of whether this really works and, if it does not work, how it can be cost-effective.

I genuinely welcome the digitised NRM system that is being introduced—it is a good move—but recording that victims have been re-trafficked is only a start and cannot be a proper answer to this problem. The issue is ultimately one of prevention, ensuring they are not vulnerable to re-trafficking, stopping that as early as possible and giving them that assurance.

To conclude, although I understand that time is running out for the victim support Bill to receive a Second Reading in the Commons during this parliamentary Session—time is running out for quite a lot of other things as well, it must be said—the legislation is none the less incredibly well suited to inclusion in the Queen’s Speech later this year. I would love nothing more than for the Government to look to adopt the provisions and recommendations in the Bill. It is not a single-party issue but a cross-party one, as I hope will be reflected in the comments made by my colleagues on both sides of the House.

I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to give this matter serious consideration. Such a Bill would show a genuinely compassionate Government, as I believe them to be, who have every right to be proud of their record but none the less seek to reaffirm their commitment to eradicating modern slavery. I hope she will also make time to meet me to discuss the proposed section 50 regulations prior to their being tabled.

I am committed to ensuring that the necessary steps are taken to ensure that the Modern Slavery Act is effective and offers victims the support they very much need. We have made a good start, but we should not sit back. We must recognise that all we have done is expose the problems that exist within the system. If we exist for anything in this place, ultimately, we exist to be the spokespeople for the most vulnerable, who have nobody else to speak for them. That is why I asked for this debate.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I have seven hon. Members wanting to speak, which gives us about six minutes each. I ask hon. Members to respect that, please.

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. I ask the remaining three speakers to limit their speeches to five minutes.

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[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith)—I nearly said “north London”, to be quite honest—on securing this debate. I also thank the Minister, as I know she takes this issue very seriously.

I will echo some of the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker) about the non-party political nature of this debate. I have been to a number of debates on this issue in this House where, regardless of political party, of where a Member comes from in the country and of our personal politics, there is a clear understanding that this is a problem that we can tackle. Collectively, we have the ability to tackle it and Lord McColl’s Bill gives us the vehicle to tackle it. If we can make progress with that, we will take a huge step forward in securing equality and justice for those people who have suffered at the hands of some of the most unscrupulous people in our country.

I also agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris) about the work being done by the right hon. Members for Birkenhead (Frank Field) and for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller). The Modern Slavery Act 2015 was a starting point; it was never an end point. It was never meant to be the be-all and end-all of the process. It was introduced to say, “We have a problem. Here is how we can start to fix it, but this has to evolve over time to reflect the nature of the problem that we have in this country.”

I fear that modern slavery on a small scale—the individual cases—does not necessarily get the traction that it deserves. I will just tell a little story, if I may, about a constituent of mine, who contacted me regarding concerns that he had about social care. He is an elderly gentleman who lives in a very nice part of my constituency. He did not want to sell his house to go into residential care, so he told me that he had read about a scheme, one that he thought was very sensible and very logical, whereby he could have somebody come from abroad who could live in his house, who he would feed and give a bit of pocket money to, and in return they would help him with his domestic care arrangements. In his mind, that was a perfectly acceptable, almost magnanimous, thing that he could do to help somebody from overseas who he knew was less fortunate than him. I talked him through it, explaining that that was actually modern slavery—that was somebody who would be in tied employment to him. He did not see it like that. He does now, I hasten to add, but at the time he saw it as a way both to help somebody and to get some of the help that he needs.

As we talk about the process going forward, we need to be very clear that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North said, the big companies will be covered by the 2015 Act and by the declarations, but these smaller situations, where individuals do not realise that they are perpetrating a crime and the victims do not realise that they are being subjected to a crime, need to be teased out.

The hon. Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) talked about asylum seekers versus those who are victims of modern slavery. I think the reason for that is that somebody can self-refer to the asylum programme but they cannot self-refer to the modern slavery referral mechanism. Could the Minister say whether that is something that the Government will look at?

I will not take up any more time, Mr Betts, but all I will say finally is that we know, because we have debated this in this Chamber and in the main Chamber on numerous occasions, that there is a growing problem, a growing need for change and a growing opportunity for change. Organisations such as the Co-operative party, whose charter has been signed by many cross-party councils, show that there are practical solutions to offer help. The Co-operative Group, through its Bright Future programme, offers jobs to people who have been found to be victims of modern slavery. However, these are all ad hoc things that are being done in spite of Government rather than with Government.

All I hope is that, at the end of this debate, the Minister can take back to the Government and the Leader of the House the message that some time to debate Lord McColl’s Bill is all we are asking for, so that we can make progress and help those people who need our help most.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I thank all Members for their co-operation; that is very good indeed. We move on now to the Front Benchers, who will have 10 minutes each, so that there are a few minutes for the Member who secured the debate to wind up at the end.

Offensive Weapons Bill

Clive Betts Excerpts

Ping Pong: House of Commons
Tuesday 26th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend. She has taken a keen interest in this matter both as a constituency MP and in her contributions to this place. She is absolutely right to raise the example of Asda. Asda and other major retailers are signed up to our voluntary commitments when it comes to the sale of knives online, and we believe that that is another way in which we can ensure that retailers are doing what they should be doing in terms of selling bladed products and sharp knives responsibly. I am delighted that Asda has taken that decision of its own volition. I know that other retailers are doing great things in this space as well, but we all want to ensure that those standards are met not just by the large retailers, but by smaller ones, too.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for meeting my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield) and me and I also thank her colleague in the House of Lords for doing the same. I also thank them both for listening. What clause 17 does is recognise the importance of making sure that knives are not sold to young people, but here it establishes a procedure for proving that young people are 18, as they are checked at the point of sale and at the point of delivery. The measure also protects small businesses such as Taylor’s Eye Witness, which manufactures knives in my constituency, from the effects of the original legislation. I also want to say that the real thanks go to my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central and his assistant Paula who have done an incredible amount of work on this. They, along with Lord Kennedy in the House of Lords, deserve particular thanks for getting this far.

[Victoria Atkins]

I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his words and for that meeting I had with him. He is absolutely right that we wanted to listen on this. As I said at the beginning, this Bill has been, I hope, a good example of collaborative work across the House and I am extremely grateful to hon. Members for that.

Police Grant Report

Clive Betts Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

Yes, my hon. Friend’s point is an important one. He knows that with PCCs there is a lot of independence in setting priorities, but we work carefully and closely with police forces, including his, which will benefit by an additional £9 million through this settlement, to make sure that those strategies are the right ones.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for Policing and the Fire Service for the supportive comments he has made about the improvements that South Yorkshire police force has made in the past year. However, it has the legacy issues of Hillsborough and child sexual exploitation in Rotherham to deal with, and each year it has to come to the Government with an application for a special grant. It has been given that, but the grant has to be top-sliced, putting an additional burden on police funding. Will the Home Secretary agree to a meeting with the South Yorkshire PCC and local MPs, involving either him or the Policing Minister, to see whether we can find a better way to deal with these issues in the future?

[Sajid Javid]

The hon. Gentleman highlights that there are sometimes special situations, and special grants are needed to deal with exactly what he has mentioned. I am happy to make sure that Home Office Ministers meet him to discuss that further, as it is a very important point.

Offensive Weapons Bill

Clive Betts Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 28th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

The conditions in the Bill require those who are selling such products to make it clear on the packaging.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

rose—

[Anna Turley (Redcar) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Victoria Atkins]

The hon. Lady’s constituent will be able to sell the products. We are not banning the online sale of bladed products; we are making it clear that retailers have to conduct proper checks as to the age of the person to whom they are selling. They should be doing that at the moment anyway, and this legislation means that they will also have to package the items up as they do if they are selling online or at a distance. The point is that the package has to be labelled, and that it will then be kept at the post office or wherever before being picked up by a person with ID.

[Mr Betts]

Sheffield is obviously the home of knives in this country—knives for proper purposes. I visited Taylor’s Eye Witness, a firm in my constituency that manufactures and wholesales knives. As it is a wholesaler, 10% of its business is by post, passing things on through other retailers. It says that that aspect of its business is threatened by this legislation. Will the Minister consider amendment 9 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield), suggesting a trusted trader scheme, to see whether the requirements of this measure could at least be reduced for trusted traders? This business employs 60 people, whose jobs could be at risk.

[Victoria Atkins]

Of course I acknowledge the great history of Sheffield as the centre of knife making in this country and, dare I say it, across the world. We have looked very carefully at the trusted trader amendments, but we believe they would introduce more bureaucracy for retailers, which is why we do not support them. This is simply a matter of conducting checks, and then the grown-up who is buying their kitchen knife going to a post office and showing their ID to prove that they are in compliance with the law.

Asylum Seekers: Right to Work

Clive Betts Excerpts

Wednesday 24th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[Afzal Khan (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. Hon. Members cannot intervene from the Front Bench.

[Caroline Nokes]

Oh. You have educated me, Mr Betts, but I will certainly be happy to take up any issues that the hon. Gentleman wishes to raise with me outside the Chamber.

Our position is also comparable and consistent with the immigration rules for non-EEA nationals wishing to come here and work in the UK, but that approach could be undermined if non-EEA nationals were able to bypass the rules by lodging unfounded asylum claims. It is an unfortunate reality that some migrants make such claims to stay in the UK, and it is reasonable to assume that they do so because of the benefits, real or perceived, that they think they will gain.

Currently, around half of those who seek asylum in the UK are found not to need international protection. Allowing earlier or unrestricted access to work risks undermining our asylum system by encouraging unfounded claims from those seeking employment opportunities for which they might not otherwise be eligible.

Non-EEA Visas: Inshore Fishing

Clive Betts Excerpts

Tuesday 17th July 2018 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. Five hon. Members have indicated that they wish to speak, so that leaves roughly eight minutes each to allow the winding-up speeches to start no later than half past 10.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right that they bring skill; I think if the Home Office looks at this issue it will see the skills that the Filipino fishermen have. They should fall into tier 2, where we can enable them to be accepted. I think the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar is right when he says it is a simple issue. I read the same article in the paper that he did. The Home Secretary accepted that there was a methodology that justified the right for doctors and so on to come in. By the same logic, that should happen here as well, and I would like to see it take place.

We want to see the Filipino fishermen allowed in. Under the transit visa provisions, non-EEA nationals cannot come to work on vessels that operate wholly or mainly within the 12-mile limit. People who work, or employ people to work, on inshore vessels after they have come to the UK on a transit visa or sought to enter at the border to join a ship are breaking immigration law.

Even more important, prawn trawlers, for example, operate by dragging a trawl net across the seabed to catch prawns, so only certain parts of the sea can be fished. The sea off the west coast of Scotland, containing the sea of the Hebrides, the Little Minch and the Minch, is a particularly good fishing ground for langoustines, but these areas are also well within territorial waters, as is most of the sea around Northern Ireland. Prawn trawlers have one of the highest demands for non-UK crew. Therein lies a key issue for my constituents and for the constituents of other hon. Members present. The difference is down to geography and, as usual, the postcode lottery does not work in favour of my constituents.

I, along with other interested MPs— the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael), the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar and the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (David Duguid)—met with the Minister for Immigration and had a very forthright meeting, in which we tried to press collectively, from our four different parties, the importance of this issue. I know that the fishing organisations in my area are currently working hard to address the fact that, despite the demands of their difficult and often dangerous job, fishing vessel crew members are not deemed to be sufficiently skilled to fall within the ambit of tier 2. We need these workers to be elevated to tier 2, or tier 2 to drop down to that level. I feel the frustration that the hon. Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar expressed; I am not always cool, but I try to make the case in such a way that people can understand the need to do it.

The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, which I sit on with other colleagues and hon. Friends, is doing an inquiry into fishing. One of our recommendations is that the issue of Filipino fishermen should be addressed. I am conscious of the time, so I will make one last comment. The Department for Infrastructure in Northern Ireland did a trawl—if I can use that pun—across the whole of the UK and Europe for 150 job vacancies. That is the Department, not Jim Shannon or the local councils; it was the Northern Ireland Assembly when it was functioning. We got some 30 replies to that from the whole of Europe, and only 10 applicants were suitable for interview. Eight attended the interview; six were chosen, of whom one did not turn up; five took the jobs. We have 145 jobs that Northern Ireland’s DFI cannot fill.

We have done everything we can on this. The local Assembly has tried. We now look to the Minister and the Home Office to do the same thing as for the doctors and nurses—to bring in the Filipino fishermen who would help our industry to thrive. When we are out of Europe, on 31 March 2019, we will need an industry that is able to respond to what we can do when we advance. I thank the hon. Member for Moray again for introducing this debate. Everyone is united in this. All we need now is for the Minister to say, “Yes, let’s do it.”

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I have two more hon. Members who wish to speak. Some hon. Members have not quite followed the guidance, and we have to finish Back-Bench speeches by half-past 10, so it would be helpful if the remaining speakers could look at that and split the time between them.

--- Later in debate ---

[David Duguid (Banff and Buchan) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Betts. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Moray (Douglas Ross) on securing the debate. I recognise many of his concerns, as well as those of other right hon. and hon. Members, and they are shared by fishermen in my constituency.

The confirmation in the Government’s fisheries White Paper that the UK will become an independent coastal state and will take back control of its waters is welcome. It lays the groundwork for the revival of fishing communities long neglected by the EU and by Governments of all parties. However, leaving the common fisheries policy is the start of the process, not the end. If the Scottish fishing industry is to achieve its full potential, it needs the full support of both our Governments. It would be painful to see the industry unshackled from the CFP, only to be held back by UK immigration rules. However, we face that risk if the Government do not act urgently to ensure that the Scottish inshore fishing fleet can access the non-EEA labour that it needs.

Of the roughly 4,000 crew working in the catching sector around Scotland, around 800 come from non-EEA countries, with a further 400 from within the EEA. After Brexit, 1,200 fishermen—30%—will need to be sourced from overseas. The industry has not always been so dependent on migrant labour; traditionally, almost all crew came from local coastal communities, with few coming from inland, let alone from further afield. Due to the constraints of the CFP over the years, there were simply too many UK vessels chasing too few fish, leading to decommissioning schemes at the start of the century that cut the number of jobs.

However, the industry is already working to encourage the resurgence of fishing as an attractive career, as other Members have said, and it must be encouraged to do so. Foreign crew rarely settle in the UK or climb through the ranks to become skippers, even though in many cases they will have been merchant seafarers or captains of larger vessels in their home countries. The talented skippers of tomorrow are the local recruits of today. Young locals leaving school today are probably not as inclined to join the industry as their younger counterparts, who will progress through their education with more certainty of a bright future in fishing, assuming that we make the most of the opportunities presented by Brexit.

The Scottish White Fish Producers Association says that, as we leave the CFP, even with Government support, greater innovation and further improvements in training and upskilling, it will take at least a decade or longer for the Scottish industry to close its current local labour shortage. Our coastal communities cannot afford to wait 10 years. Without access to experienced crew members, vessels will lie idle, as they do currently. We will take back control of our waters only to let them go unfished; in many areas, there will simply be no more fishing industry.

Access to skilled migrant labour—these people are skilled—is necessary if the industry, in Scotland and across the United Kingdom, is to truly reap the benefits of exiting the CFP. After Brexit we must work on increasing the capacity of our fishing fleet, but we can only do so if the industry has enough crew to cope with the increased supply of fish. Currently, as other Members have mentioned, the industry relies on transit visas, which are conditional on non-EEA crew working outside the 12-mile limit of UK waters. That adds unnecessary complexity to the job and limits activity to where workers are allowed to fish, rather than where the fish are. For smaller vessels, which tend to fish closer to shore, these visa rules are more restrictive, if not completely unworkable.

The UK Government previously operated a concession that allowed some visas to be issued to non-EEA fishermen to work on the inshore fleet. The re-establishment of such a scheme would be most welcome, at least until a longer term solution can be developed. Since 2012, demand for experienced crew has actually increased, which we hope to see continue as we leave the CFP. Such a concession would guarantee workers the same employment protections as anyone else. As the Fishermen’s Welfare Alliance has made clear, any new scheme must have these protections. We must ensure that the sector can access the labour it needs and end the bizarre idiosyncrasies of the 12-mile limit while ensuring the welfare of the non-EEA workers in the sector.

However, there is perhaps a simpler solution: recognising that fishermen are skilled workers and adjusting our visa regime to reflect that. The industry faces not only a labour shortage but a skills shortage. Fishing is most certainly not unskilled work, and many of the non-EEA crew working in the industry here are talented, seasoned deck hands. Like the home-grown fishermen of the past, they were born into, or least grew up in, a fishing or seafaring culture. As I mentioned, crew members from marine nations such as the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Ghana generally do not look to settle in the UK. In fact, much inshore fishing activity is seasonal, so a similar approach to that currently being considered for seasonal agricultural workers could be possible.

My constituents in Banff and Buchan, including in the increasingly busy ports of Peterhead, Fraserburgh and Macduff, elected me on a manifesto commitment to not only leave the CFP but to work to ensure that coastal communities enjoy the vitality and opportunity they deserve. That means ensuring that the fishing industry gets the access to the skilled non-EEA labour it needs. The industry cannot cope with the current restrictions any longer. If our coastal communities and fishing industry are to enjoy the revival offered by our leaving the CFP, we need change now.

While I am thankful that the UK Government have been willing to engage on this issue, I stress, as have other Members, the urgency with which we need that change. It is an issue that could make or break the future of our fishing industry and our coastal communities, and I look forward to the UK Government’s swift action on it.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I thank hon. Members for their co-operation in making their speeches in a timely way. We now move on to the Front-Bench spokespeople. They have roughly 11 minutes each in which to speak, which will leave a bit of time for the wind-up speech at the end of the debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Afzal Khan]

I agree with that comment. The sectors that are suffering will be central to the MAC’s recommendations. Even if they are, we will have to wait for a Government response and it will take time to implement whatever the proposed scheme turns out to be. The Brexit White Paper published last week contained only 20 paragraphs on immigration. They are very narrow. There is no mention of what the proposals will be for low-paid, so-called low-skilled workers, often found in the inshore fishing industry. At this point, there is no time for the Government to bring an immigration Bill before the recess. I hope that when we come back in September they will move quickly to provide clarity and reassurance to sectors already suffering from shortages.

I would like to address briefly the risk of exploitation in this sector. In the last 10 years, deeply concerning reports of slavery and human trafficking aboard British fishing ships have come to public attention. Isolated working combined with poor regulations makes fishing workers particularly vulnerable to abuse. Remedies are often out of reach. Living conditions are often poor. Many migrant workers live aboard their vessels while in port. These vessels are not designed for long-term living. This sector is already hard to regulate. Certain visa arrangements are leaving workers at a higher risk of exploitation. The current transit visa system and 12-nautical-mile exemption leave loopholes open for exploitation. Without the opportunity to build a network in the UK, workers are less resilient. It is vital that whatever scheme we end up with, workers are not tied to their employers in the way that we have seen with domestic workers.

The Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority has done good work in the area of labour inspection and enforcement, but its remit is very narrow, covering only food processing, agriculture, horticulture and shellfish gathering. The UK’s enforcement model is complex and confusing. A number of different bodies are responsible for different parts of the labour market. According to Focus on Labour Exploitation, the UK has one of the poorest-resourced labour inspectorates in Europe. The International Labour Organization recommends a target of one inspector per 10,000 workers. The UK falls well below that target, with one inspector for every 25,000 workers.

It is vital that proactive inspection efforts are increased as we leave the EU and new opportunities for exploitation arise. Self-identification among victims of exploitation is low. The most vulnerable to abuse are the least likely to come forward. This includes migrants, who, faced with a hostile environment, are fearful about their immigration status and potential immigration repercussions for them coming forward.

In conclusion, the Government’s migration policies have, so far, been driven by the net migration target and Tory infighting on Brexit. The inshore fishing sector provides stark illustration of the damage of this approach. The Government have again delayed the immigration White Paper. Sectors such as fishing cannot wait another year for clarity on their future workforce. The Government must get on with announcing their future migration policy and ensure that it provides adequate protection for vulnerable workers.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I remind the Minister to allow a minute at the end for the mover of the motion to respond.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Wallace]

The Northern Ireland Assembly has to be commended for making that effort, but we also have to mention salaries. Margins in fishing and agriculture are not large, which is a big challenge, because people cannot rustle up a high salary if they are not making much profit, but basic economics says that if someone cannot recruit, they have to look at terms and conditions, and obviously salaries.

My right hon. Friend the Immigration Minister and I have looked carefully at some of the good ideas put forward by the Fishermen’s Welfare Alliance. I am open to the idea of the temporary scheme that existed between 2009 and 2012, and I will press the Immigration Minister, and the Government more broadly, to explore that to allow some of those issues to be addressed. We have also had representations from the trade unions, which wrote directly to the Home Office to express their concerns about proposals to lower the bar for the admission of fishermen working in the inshore fleet. In their view, that might weaken our commitment to increase employment opportunities in the UK’s domestic maritime sector.

As a Home Office Minister, I understand the industry’s pressing need, but I also understand that that need is not unique to fishing but is clearly present in agriculture, whether that is soft fruit or other parts. It is also extant for other skills. When I was a Northern Ireland Minister, there was a need for skills in the tech and digital industries, because firms were moving from Northern Ireland to the Republic of Ireland because they could find the skilled workforce more easily there. We have to tackle the skills issue in a way that reflects the pressing need, and invest in our domestic workforce at the same time. The Home Office should be open to looking to relieve some of those pressures temporarily, however, as it has in the past. I will press the case for doing that for fishing in the Department and to the Immigration Minister, as they are doing for other parts of the economy that face those issues.

As we approach leaving the European Union, it will be easier to strike the balance between immigration policy and domestic skills policy. The Government will obviously be listening to the industry and stakeholders about that to inform a new immigration Bill, in line with the new fisheries strategy that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs published, which looks at what we will do with our fisheries after Brexit to ensure that we have the skills to match.

In the past, there have been successful short-term schemes, but we need to stimulate our domestic skills base as well and ensure that the terms and conditions are met in a way that looks after people who come here to work. In offshore fishing, where there has not been that restriction, we have seen considerable exploitation of workers in some cases. Border Force has stopped factory ships, where people are part of the human slavery that has been going on. We have to be alert to that position. [Interruption.] It is not independence, by the way.

We have to listen to the independent Migration Advisory Committee, which has previously looked at the issue. It is looking at several factors again as we approach Brexit, and we will be open to its research-based views and suggestions. The Immigration Minister has obviously heard the previous calls from hon. Members, and I will ensure that this debate is reflected to her when I see her later today.

Hon. Members should not think that the Government do not take the importance of the fishing industry seriously; we absolutely do. We do not think that people working on boats are unskilled—clearly, they are. I have been up to some of the fishing boats at places such as Fraserburgh and Peterhead, and my seat neighbour Fleetwood has one of the main fishing processors in England, so I am not blind to the industry. The tier 2 visa is for work at a graduate level. As a non-graduate myself, perhaps there is something to examine in the way we define skills after Brexit.

It is a serious matter, and we should be trying to get on and deal with it. We will listen to representations from all hon. Members, but we have to bear in mind the wider immigration picture, no matter which party is in government—the rules were set in 2008. It is true that immigration and skills affect the constituencies of the hon. Members present, who predominantly represent north-east Scotland, but also Northern Ireland and the Western Isles, but they also affect all industries, and we have to address that in future.

There is no substitute for long-term planning for skills. I am acutely aware that employment, long-term planning and education in Scotland have been the Scottish National party’s responsibility for a very long time. If the fishing fleets are desperate for workers, what have the Scottish Government been doing for the last 10 years to prepare their workforce and people to come forward and fill those places? The answer is that education in Scotland has declined under the SNP’s leadership, which is tragic, because my forefathers in Keith were teachers. That is potentially why there is a big problem. [Interruption.] Although they are crowing from the side lines, the SNP—

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

Order. Occasional comments are okay, but let us tone it down a bit.

[Mr Wallace]

The best way to approach a skills problem is through long-term investment, coupled with short-term measures to fill the gaps. At the same time, we need to address conditions and workforce problems so that people want to work in industries such as heavy industry, fishing or agriculture. I have listened to the genuine concerns constructively expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Moray, and I will take forward his ideas to my right hon. Friend the Immigration Minister and into Home Office policy.

Visit of President Trump: Policing

Clive Betts Excerpts

Thursday 12th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

I am not going to get into a debate about whether my hon. Friend looks American, but he makes a fundamental point: any visit by any President of the United States of America is a significant and historic event for this country. The reality, although I detect some discomfort about this among Opposition Members, is that President Trump is the democratically elected leader of our most important ally and this relationship has enormous consequences for the security and prosperity of all our constituents. Of course we should welcome him. We should also be absolutely professional, as everyone would expect, in making sure that the security arrangements for such an important visit are robust and fit for purpose, and I am satisfied that they are.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

The chief constable of South Yorkshire police—it should be congratulated on being the most improved police service in the country—has advised me that the cost of officers deployed to other parts of the country will be covered by the Government. However, where those officers have to be covered back in South Yorkshire, with overtime and rest day working, the costs will not be covered, and the chief constable has had to cancel all weekly leave, with the disruption that that will bring to services in South Yorkshire. Would it not be better if the Government just agreed to cover all the costs of the visit? After all, they invited President Trump.

[Mr Hurd]

First, I congratulate South Yorkshire police force on the fantastic progress it is making, and it is important that we should recognise that. I am very aware that this is a very significant policing operation, which has significant short-term costs but also has implications for the force management of local forces for some time. We do have a mechanism to help with the short-term costs. As I said to the Chairman of the Select Committee, we are doing serious work on the funding requirements for local police forces, and we will bring that back to the House for debate in late November or December.