Child Sex Abuse (Rotherham)

James Morris Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

That is one of the issues. Obviously, there are different processes that take place, depending on whether the individuals are council officials or members of the police. As I have said, South Yorkshire police are bringing another police force in to look at the whole question of how, from their point of view, the situation was managed. We will be discussing the issue of council officials with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government as he looks at the implications across local authorities.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

One of the most devastating aspects of this case is the impact on the long-term mental health of the victims. Will the Home Secretary say a little more about what resources have been made available to ensure that the victims get the long-term help they need to cope with the catastrophe that has befallen them?

[Mrs May]

This is an important aspect. The Department of Health is considering the mental health needs of those who have been the victim of sexual exploitation of this type, and what action is necessary. I believe that that has also been looked at in a very real sense in terms of the Rotherham experience, but it is being looked at by the Department more widely.

Oral Answers to Questions

James Morris Excerpts

Monday 10th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman to the extent that I absolutely value the work of PCSOs, but he is deluding himself if he thinks that the streets are becoming less safe and that neighbourhood policing is in retreat. Neighbourhood policing is at the heart of the policing model operated by this country’s forces. Over the past few years, they have collaborated better with local government and the NHS so that every pound they spend is more visible on the streets and is being shown in the consistent reduction in crime.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

The reality is that crime is falling. Does the Minister agree that it is precisely at a time of pressure on budgets that the police should look at innovative ways of working with local authorities, the voluntary sector and other partners to deliver services that keep people safe in their communities?

[Damian Green]

My hon. Friend is right. He represents part of the west midlands, as does the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham) who asked the original question. My hon. Friend will know that the police innovation fund had a successful bid from the west midlands. That will mean that a new public sector intelligence hub will be created, bringing together local councils, the NHS, other services and the police. That will enable them to share information in a way that will make them much more effective at fighting child sexual exploitation. It is that kind of work that reduces crime.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

The hon. Lady raises an important point. Last year, the figures showed that 76 women lost their lives at the hands of a partner, ex-partner or lover. That is lower than in previous years, but even one such case is one too many, and we are all agreed on that across the House. My hon. Friend the Minister for Crime Prevention is doing work on such issues, looking at prosecutions and at ensuring that the right response is available so that women can indeed see justice when they have suffered at the hands of a partner or ex-partner.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

T4. The all-party parliamentary group on mental health, which I chair, recently launched an inquiry into crisis care. Will the Home Secretary outline what the Government are doing to ensure that when vulnerable people with mental health problems come into contact with the police, they get an appropriate level of care?

[The Minister for Policing, Criminal Justice and Victims (Damian Green)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his work on the all-party group, to which I gave evidence last week. On vulnerable people, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has commissioned Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary to undertake a specific inspection of the treatment of all vulnerable people in custody, because that is an extremely important area, which requires improvement in the performance of the health service and the police and across the criminal justice system, which we are determined to make happen.

Oral Answers to Questions

James Morris Excerpts

Monday 28th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

A number of discussions have been held at EU level in relation to Syrian refugees both at the Justice and Home Affairs Council and at the European Council that took place at the end of last week, on which the Prime Minister will be making a statement after questions have finished. We have been considering, and the UK is supporting, a regional programme close to Syria to enable us to work with those countries that have borne the brunt of accepting refugees from Syria, to ensure that the right and appropriate support is given. The United Kingdom has given more humanitarian aid for Syrian refugees than all the other members of the European Union put together.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

I recently took part in a knife crime summit in Birmingham following a series of incidents that have taken away more young lives. Does the Minister agree that stop-and-search powers for the police can be an effective way of clamping down on the carrying of knives in certain of our inner-city communities?

[Damian Green]

I absolutely agree that stop-and-search is an extremely important tool in the hands of the police. My hon. Friend will be aware that the consultation is not about reducing police effectiveness in the use of stop-and-search, but increasing it by making it more targeted, so that it is more effective for the police and gives rise to more confidence in communities.

Oral Answers to Questions

James Morris Excerpts

Monday 15th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

MASHs are being established literally by the week so I cannot give the hon. Lady an exact figure, but I completely agree that the early successes in some areas of the multi-agency safeguarding hubs suggest that that is an extremely important way of improving our response to child sexual exploitation. I will be visiting one over the next few days and intend to see for myself exactly how they can be most effective.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

T5. Too many teenagers in Britain are still the victim of knife crime, which can destroy individual lives and leave families in grief. What steps is the Home Secretary taking across Government to improve education about the folly of teenagers carrying knives?

[The Minister of State, Home Department (Mr Jeremy Browne)]

My hon. Friend is right to draw the attention of the House to this particularly dangerous form of criminal activity and its occasional prevalence among young people in particular. We are working with police forces across the country and we have put in place a programme of action specifically aimed at gang violence to try to reduce the incidence of knife crime. I am pleased that violent crime as a whole is falling across the country.

Abu Qatada

James Morris Excerpts

Thursday 19th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

As the hon. Gentleman might have noticed on Tuesday, were he in the Chamber then, I have not made any estimate of when the gentleman concerned will be sent back to Jordan. I am absolutely clear—I made it clear on Tuesday and have repeated it today—that this could take many months, because various legal avenues are available to Abu Qatada and it would be no surprise if he chose to try to use them.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

I commend the Home Secretary’s efforts in this case, but does she agree that it is intolerable to my constituents that a perception has been created that she is unable to act in what they perceive to be their national interest?

[Mrs May]

I am well aware of the concern that people have in the UK, across the board, in relation to their desire to see Abu Qatada deported, which of course the Government share. That is why the Government will be ensuring that, at the first opportunity, we resume deportation.

Metal Theft

James Morris Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

There have been many disturbing instances in my constituency relating to metal theft. Just before Christmas, tenants had to be evacuated from their flats after a gas leak was discovered on an estate in Halesowen. Lives are clearly being put at risk by criminals stealing this metal. We know that most metal dealers take all appropriate steps to check the provenance of the scrap metal they are buying. Soon after I was elected, I toured the Mason Metals recycling centre in Halesowen. Mason Metals was working with Dudley police on “Scrap Yard Watch”, an appointment-driven collection scheme to help householders to dispose of large white goods legally and responsibly. It has now launched a new membership card programme for its customers. That scheme is in addition to the statutory waste transfer note records and is run alongside other measures.

I very much welcome the Government’s announcement that cash transactions for scrap metal will be outlawed. I understand the concerns voiced by legitimate metal recyclers, but the growing problem of metal thefts cannot be tackled effectively without proper traceability. We also need tougher penalties for those who are caught and convicted so that punishments are more proportionate to the scale of the crime. A £1,000 fine is hardly a deterrent for the unscrupulous minority. The Home Secretary has said that sentences will be significantly increased, which is very good news. Scrap metal dealers who offer a market for stolen metal, whether knowingly or by failing to carry out adequate checks—

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Order. I am terribly sorry. I call Mr David Hanson.

Oral Answers to Questions

James Morris Excerpts

Monday 6th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Damian Green]

I agree completely, and I know the hon. Lady rightly takes a great interest in this area. As I say, it is a question of spreading best practice around all the agencies—not just local authorities but the police as well. We try hard to ensure that all police forces are much more aware of the specific symptoms of these types of problem so that they can treat anyone affected in the appropriate way.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

3. What recent assessment she has made of the level of cybercrime.

[Jessica Lee (Erewash) (Con)]

7. What recent assessment she has made of the level of cybercrime.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (James Brokenshire)]

A report by Detica and the Office of Cyber Security and Information Assurance estimates that cybercrime could cost the UK as much as £27 billion a year. The Government published their cyber-security strategy in November, which sets out how we intend to tackle this threat.

[James Morris]

Tackling cybercrime requires a co-ordinated response across government, including liaison with the business community. What is the Minister doing to ensure that we get that level of cross-government co-ordination, and what is he doing to ensure that we get business involved in coming up with some of the solutions we need to tackle that growing problem?

Immigration

James Morris Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

It is fair to say that immigration is a source of frustration for many of my constituents. Despite any number of Government initiatives over the past few years, the number of people entering the country continues to be much higher than it was 20 years ago. At a time when economic conditions are causing great difficulties, families do not understand why so many people can come from overseas to compete for the finite number of available jobs.

At a time when people in the public services are having to bear their share of the savings that are needed to tackle the spiralling deficit created by the previous Government, they do not see how this is helped by allowing large numbers of additional people to move into concentrated areas. When they try to express their legitimate concerns, they are too often viewed as racist. However, it is not racist to talk about immigration. In most cases, the concerns are based not on race but on numbers.

Many of my constituents who contact me about immigration policy are from ethnic minorities. They desperately want an immigration system in which the public as a whole can have confidence, because that is a prerequisite for effective and sustainable community cohesion.

My constituents want a legitimate debate about the numbers of people coming into the country and about restricting the number of visas. Halesowen and Rowley Regis is fortunate to have a strong local community that is made up of people of different backgrounds, races and faiths who work well together and alongside each other. When local people do not feel able to voice legitimate concerns over immigration policy and do not believe that mainstream political parties are reflecting those concerns, we have seen first hand how that creates a vacuum, which those who seek to divide our society are all too eager to fill.

Earlier this year, the Ahmadiyya Muslim community’s book stall in Cradley Heath was attacked by thugs from the English Defence League. I have worked closely with the community and know how much good work it does to promote cohesion across the area through its outreach programmes and community work. It does not differentiate people of different faiths or different backgrounds. Its efforts to raise money for Russells Hall hospital and its work to sell poppies for the Royal British Legion benefit the whole community.

The EDL’s attack was based on ignorance and fear. Although we should never base our response on its agenda, it is important that we look at some of the factors that allow extremist groups to gain support. The Government’s actions to limit the number of economic migrants coming into the country from outside the EU are an important start. It will take some time before the effect of this ceiling feeds into official figures, but an appropriate limit that is properly enforced is essential if we are to restore faith in a system that has run out of control.

However, we must also recognise that any quota is in addition to the large number of people coming to work in Britain from within the European Union. The free movement of workers is a key part of the European single market and one of the most important benefits that we gain from our membership of the European Union. The ability of workers to move from one member state to another benefits not only the workers concerned but many businesses that are able to transfer highly skilled workers between offices in different countries.

Issues clearly arise when large numbers of workers from less wealthy member states wish to move to other countries where wages and benefit payments are much higher. The previous Government’s decision not to implement transitional agreements to restrict the number of workers entering Britain from the new EU member states in 2004 was little short of a disaster. Only Britain, Ireland and Sweden chose to allow, from day one, an unrestricted right to work, and as a result Britain attracted far higher migration from those new member states than would otherwise have been the case. That seriously undermined public confidence in the immigration system, and that problem remains. Last week, Croatia signed its accession agreement to join the EU in 2013. It is essential that we do not repeat the mistakes of the previous Government.

A third area that must be addressed if we are to build confidence in the system is bureaucracy, because few things are more guaranteed to destroy that public confidence than cases in which people with no right to stay in this country cannot be removed. Most of us will be aware of cases in or near our own constituencies where red tape has prevented the rules from being properly enforced, and the Minister will be aware of a recent one involving a patient at Russells Hall hospital in Dudley just outside my constituency. The patient was a Pakistani national whose visa had expired four years before. The hospital declared him fit enough to be discharged in August last year, but he remained at the hospital until this autumn because of difficulties in arranging a medical escort to accompany him home and problems in finding suitable nursing care in Pakistan. The 14 months that he spent at the hospital cost the NHS about £100,000. We must make it easier to remove people who have no right to remain in Britain more quickly and effectively.

We must never forget the important contribution that migrants have made to our society, economy and culture over many centuries, and we can take pride in our history of welcoming people from around the world and, on the whole, in Britain’s record of creating strong and diverse communities, but the Government are right to recognise that sustainable community cohesion within an integrated society is possible only if people have faith that the immigration system is not a floodgate. My constituents look to the Government to build on their positive actions so far and to deliver on our promise to bring immigration levels back under control.

Gangs and Youth Violence

James Morris Excerpts

Tuesday 1st November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I have commented favourably on the Strathclyde project but it is not the only project that is working across the UK. The Matrix project in Merseyside, the Excalibur project in Greater Manchester, and the work of the Met in certain parts of London have also been effective, and in Birmingham, the West Midlands police are also doing very good work in this area. I come back to a point that I have made on a number of occasions in response to questions from Opposition Members—this is about ensuring that money is spent in a way that will be effective. Sadly, in nearly an hour of questions, no Opposition Member has sought fit to recognise that the cuts in spending taking place across the public sector are because of the financial deficit left by the previous Government.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

May I welcome the cross-government approach to solving this problem? Does the Home Secretary agree that the most important thing in relation to resources is that they are genuinely devolved to the local areas and communities that are best placed to tackle difficult underlying problems?

[Mrs May]

We are taking a different approach. It is important to recognise that there is no one-size-fits-all model that can be imposed on every local area. Local areas will need to come to an understanding of what is going to work in their particular communities. That is why it is important that responsibility is devolved and that funding is available at the local level. It is also why the ending gang and youth violence team that we will be setting up will be available at a local level to work with the agencies to ensure that they are getting the answers that are going to work.

Public Disorder

James Morris Excerpts

Thursday 11th August 2011 Commons Chamber

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

Even before the disturbances of the last few days I had become increasingly concerned about active antisocial behaviour in my constituency, but the acts that we have seen over the past seven days have succeeded in crystallising that concern in my mind. We have seen astonishing and completely unacceptable acts of mindless violence in communities across Britain. I am bitterly disappointed and appalled that in recent days they have reached parts of Birmingham, West Bromwich, Sandwell—part of which I represent—and Wolverhampton in the west midlands, very close to my constituency. The perpetrators must and will be punished by the full extent of the law.

However, we also need to reflect on how this has happened. Let me quote from an e-mail that I received from a constituent:

“I may be wrong but I believe that the riots are symptomatic of a disrespect of values and we can trace the causes to a lack of discipline in schools; to a contempt of values ranging from litter, graffiti, antisocial behaviour through to more serious crime. I am convinced links exist.

I hope, perhaps in vain, that on this occasion, that sympathy will not be extended to the culprits of riots but to the victims. Instead of sympathising with the perpetrators, I hope that the Government will look to discipline in society that is currently weak and is a major factor in our present circumstances…Now is the time and the responsible public will be with you.”

It is important to stress that the overwhelming majority of people have been appalled by these actions, and are decent, law-abiding citizens. However, in my constituency there have been plenty of examples of low-level antisocial behaviour and crime which I believe could lead to wider problems. For instance, a couple of months ago there was a case of arson in a factory in Malt Mill lane, Blackheath. Metal theft has been a big problem throughout the black country, and the roof of Halesowen Church of England primary school has been stripped on several occasions. Graffiti in Stourbridge road and other parts of Halesowen have been a persistent and constant problem. My local police commander, Inspector Steedman, recently arrested five youths for that offence. They went before the magistrates court, and were fined a total of £29.

[Margot James]

I thank my hon. Friend and constituency neighbour for giving way. Is he shocked to learn that there are reported to be more than 1,000 arson attacks a year in the borough of Dudley, and that I believe that to be a gross under-report? Every day when we read the Express and Star, we learn of arson attacks.

[James Morris]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. That is very worrying.

I am a great believer in the “broken windows” approach to tackling crime. Allowing low-level disorder simply encourages further criminality in the same area.

The next point to consider is why this situation was allowed to spiral out of control more broadly across the west midlands. The police acted bravely, and I want to pay tribute to the chief constable of West Midlands police, Chris Sims, and his officers in Birmingham and other areas of the west midlands, who did an excellent job in quelling this disorder.