Point of Order

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Holly Lynch

Tuesday 6th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I hope that you can help me. Earlier this morning, we were notified that today’s planned line-by-line scrutiny session of the National Security Bill, which was due to start at 9.25 am, would be adjourned. That followed a tweet from the Minister for Security, the hon. Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland), late last night, announcing his intention to resign from the post. However, he committed to continuing to serve as the Security Minister until a new Minister could be appointed. Despite the fact that no new Security Minister has been appointed, the Minister was not in the Bill Committee this morning and the Whip moved to adjourn.

This is the second time that a Security Minister has resigned immediately before a Committee sitting on this Bill was due to start. We have now had three Ministers and acting Ministers over the course of the Bill Committee, as well as some very late substantial additions to the Bill. In order for us to have scrutinised the Bill in accordance with the programme motion, a new Minister will have to be in place for Thursday’s sitting, but that means that someone will likely have less than 24 hours to familiarise themselves with the complexities of the legislation, making a mockery of the process. This is literally national security; the security services need this new provision. We will be up to four Ministers by the end of the week, which means that so far we have had more Security Ministers on the Bill than there have been days of scrutiny.

Madam Deputy Speaker, have you been notified of the Government’s plans to get the vital National Security Bill moving again to plug the serious gaps in our national defences?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I thank the hon. Lady for her point of order. I am sure that the whole House agrees with her that the National Security Bill is an extremely important piece of legislation and it is vital that it should be properly scrutinised by the Committee, but I have to say that I am little surprised at her surprise that there is a ministerial reshuffle going on. I do not think that is a surprise to anyone, not just in the Chamber, but across the country or indeed the world. When a change of Government is occurring, there is by necessity a change of Ministers. It is unfortunate that this important session of this important Bill Committee happened to be taking place this morning—the day on which there is a changeover of Prime Minister.

The hon. Lady says that the situation makes a mockery of the system. I would say to her that this is how our democracy works. It is true, as somebody once correctly said, that democracy is the most inefficient form of government, but I think that we would all agree that it is still the best and fairest. I have every sympathy with the hon. Lady’s frustration at not being able to get on with this important piece of work, but I am pretty certain that within 48 hours, if not 24, there will be a Minister in place—[Interruption.] Sorry, is the hon. Member for Llanelli (Dame Nia Griffith) interrupting me when I am answering a point of order? Would she care to make another point of order? If not, would she please not interrupt me while I am answering this one?

Clearly the Bill needs to be scrutinised. Nobody disagrees with that. While I understand the frustration felt by the hon. Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch), this is how our democracy works. I am sure that there will be a Minister in place in very short order. I hope that if perchance there is no Minister in place within the next two days, the hon. Lady will come back to the Chamber, so that we can address what by then will be a situation that needs to be addressed by the Chair.

Police Officer Safety

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Holly Lynch

Tuesday 11th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Holly Lynch]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that staggering and depressing intervention. We have seen what he has described far too often, and the statistics are very serious. I hope that the Minister will respond with what could be easy and effective ways of dealing with sentencing to ensure that the greatest possible deterrents exist. We quite often see repeat offenders, and that cannot be allowed to continue. We must give police officers every protection that we can possibly provide.

What additional protections might officers need? Perhaps controversially, I want to refer to spit hoods. I am all for informed debate about the issue, but the truth is that if people are politically uncomfortable about spit hoods, I can promise them that somewhere, right now, there is a police officer who is being spat at and who is even more uncomfortable. As well as being thoroughly unpleasant, spitting blood and saliva at another human being can pose a real risk of transmission of a range of infectious diseases, some with life-changing or even lethal consequences. We have a duty of care to protect officers from that, whenever possible.

The Centre for Public Safety has published a briefing on the issue, and I thank it for the work that it has done in this regard. The briefing cited a recent occasion on which the Metropolitan police were called to a disturbance and arrested a 20-year-old woman on suspicion of a public order offence. The woman, who had hepatitis B, then bit her own lip and spat blood at three officers who had to be taken to hospital for anti-viral treatment. Anti-viral treatments are not guaranteed to prevent the transmission of infectious diseases, and an officer may have to endure a wait of over six months to find out whether the treatment has been successful.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I hesitate to interrupt the hon. Lady, who has been very generous in giving way, but she might wish to be aware that if she would like a reply from the Minister, he has only until 7.42 to give her that reply.

[Holly Lynch]

I am getting there, Madam Deputy Speaker. Thank you for that reminder.

As I was saying, I am open to a debate on spit hoods, but they might not be so necessary if sentencing was more effective and offered a tougher deterrent. However, the Sentencing Council’s 2011 guidelines removed spitting as a factor increasing seriousness. In the council’s assessment of the guidelines, published in 2015, sentencers attributed a shift towards less severe sentencing to that decision. A district judge went so far as to say that

“a spit in the face can’t be identified as a sustained or repeated assault for greater harm. Yet in my view it is one of the most serious ways of assaulting.”

I am asking the Minister to ensure that the Home Office is collecting accurate data about assaults on police officers—data that will give us a much greater insight into the scale of the problem and empower decision makers to respond accordingly. I am asking him to work with colleagues to explore options for much tougher sentencing. If an officer is the victim of a category 1 assault, I would expect to see a sentence that sends a strong message. Assaulting the police shows contempt for our collectively agreed laws and all those who uphold them, and it will not be tolerated. It worries me that the ever-growing demands on the police are undermining their ability to do some of the basics. I am calling on the Minister to recognise that officers are routinely deployed on their own, that when an officer calls for back-up, only boots on the ground will do, and that numbers matter.

Finally, I want to take this opportunity to pay tribute, on behalf of all of us here, to the brave unarmed West Yorkshire police officers who apprehended the man who took Jo Cox from us on the streets of Batley and Spen earlier this year. Their actions demonstrated that we ask the police to walk towards some of the most dangerous situations, and we have a responsibility to offer them all the protection we can in doing so. We are grateful to them, and their courage is a testament to all our brave policemen and women across the country.