Retail Crime Prevention

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Kate Green

Tuesday 5th November 2019 Westminster Hall

[Kit Malthouse]

I will come on to that. I am not wholly convinced that we are without the tools that we need to deal with the issue, but we might need to address whether we are using them correctly.

On serious violence, we published the serious violence strategy, which has a particular focus on early intervention, in April 2018, so there has been action in that area. We allocated £22 million to the early intervention youth fund and, in the long term, £200 million to the youth endowment fund to ensure that those most at risk are given the opportunity to turn away from violence and to lead more positive lives. We launched a public consultation on a new multi-agency public health approach to tackling serious violence, following which we announced that we would introduce a new legal duty on statutory agencies to plan and collaborate to prevent and reduce serious violence. We gave the police extra powers to tackle knife crime through the Offensive Weapons Act, including new knife crime prevention orders.

Those wider measures will help, but we recognise the importance of focusing our efforts on measures that are specifically targeted on tackling retail crime. This year, the Home Office provided £60,000 for a targeted communication campaign, led by the Association of Convenience Stores, to raise awareness of the existing legislation to protect shop workers. We published guidance on gov.uk about the use of the impact statement for business, which provides victims with the opportunity to tell the courts about the impact that a crime has had on their businesses. We also worked with the police to develop guidance for staff and retailers to use when reporting emergency and violent incidents.

The right hon. Member for Delyn and other hon. Members have asked the Government to consider introducing a new offence of attacks on shop staff, or to increase the severity of existing offences. I hope that he is aware from previous discussions that powers are already available to the police and the Crown Prosecution Service to deal with that type of offending and to provide protection to retail staff.

There are a number of assault offences and corresponding differences in maximum penalties. At the higher end of the scale, causing grievous bodily harm with intent and wounding with intent carry maximum penalties of life imprisonment. The sentencing guidelines on assault include an aggravating factor of

“offences committed against those working in the public sector or providing a service to the public”,

which should be taken into account by the courts when deciding what sentence to impose and may be applied to retail staff conducting their duties. In addition, the Sentencing Council is reviewing its guidelines on assault. A consultation on the revised guidelines is anticipated in 2020. I advise hon. Members to respond to that consultation with a specific focus on assaults on retail workers.

Let me turn to some of the specific points raised. Several hon. Members called for me to publish the review of the call for evidence as quickly as possible. The fact that we are going into an election will make that quite difficult, but I give my undertaking that, as soon as we come back, if I am in the job, we will try to get it out as quickly as possible. Obviously, the five-week election campaign gives officials a bit of an easier time, so they can digest the responses and get it out as soon as they can.

The hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) raised the issue of facial recognition technology. Obviously, we are supporting the police as they trial the use of new technology across the country. It has become clear that facial recognition technology has significant crime-fighting possibilities. A recent court case established that there is a sufficient legal framework for its use and operation in this country, but as its use is expanded, possibly by police forces, in the months and years to come, I have no doubt that it will have to come to the House for some sort of democratic examination at some point. Thus far, however, where it is being deployed, we are seeing significant benefits from it.

[Kate Green]

I am pleased that the Minister believes that there will need to be a full debate about facial recognition technology in the House. He will be aware of concerns about personal privacy and the possibility that it is, in some respects, discriminatory against certain groups. If he and his party are returned to government, will he commit to ensuring that the House has an opportunity to have that full debate?

[Kit Malthouse]

There has already been a debate in the House on the use of facial recognition technology, and it is obviously within the purview of Members and Select Committees and others to examine the issue. It has just been through the courts—South Wales Police has been challenged on its use of facial recognition technology, and the courts found the current framework satisfactory. I have no doubt that when we get back from this election there will be an urge for the issue to be debated in the House, given the enormous success that is being seen with facial recognition technology.

The right hon. Member for Delyn raised the issue of local police plans, suggesting that we put pressure on police and crime commissioners to include retail crime in their plans. If this was a pressing issue in the high street, one would hope that the police and crime commissioner would commit to having it in their plan anyway. However, we have created a new National Policing Board, which is looking at systemic issues across the country that should be addressed by the whole policing family in a concerted effort, and one area we are looking at is neighbourhood crime. What we put into that basket has yet to be fully agreed, and I will certainly consider putting retail crime in there.

I am very alive to the connection between drugs and alcohol misuse and the impact on shops and retail crime. First, on alcohol, I hope Members will have noticed that we are planning to roll out alcohol abstinence monitoring orders across the whole country. From memory, we have been given about £22 million to do that. The orders have been very successfully used in Croydon and in a pilot in Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Humberside recently. They are for low-level offending and those convicted of a crime where alcohol was the compelling factor in its commission. Compliance rates with that disposal are up at 93% or 94%, and there is enormous potential there.

With drugs, we have been given some money to start to combat the awful scourge of county lines, which is causing mayhem in many small towns across the country, not least in my constituency. I hope that when we return after the election we will see even more assertive action on that.

There is more that we can do on treatment and rehabilitation for those who fall into drug addiction. We must look imaginatively at schemes around the world that can be used to divert from offending those who have been convicted of a drug offence and are out in the community on probation. I point Members to a very interesting programme in Hawaii called the HOPE programme—Hawaii’s opportunity probation with enforcement—which I would be very keen to try to establish in this country as a way to deal with people who are low-level offenders because of a drug addiction. That could be managed in a much better way than I think we are managing it at the moment.

A number of Members mentioned the £200 threshold. I hope they are aware that police can still prosecute somebody who steals something worth less than £200.

Social Security

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Kate Green

Monday 5th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

With the forbearance of the hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) for any prior confusion, I move the motion. In my view, you will pleased to hear, Mr Speaker, the provisions in both orders are compatible with the European convention on human rights.

The draft Guaranteed Minimum Pensions Increase Order 2018 is an entirely technical matter that we attend to each year in this House and I do not imagine that we will need to spend much time on it today. The statutory instrument provides for contracted-out defined benefit occupational pension schemes to increase members’ guaranteed minimum pensions that accrued between 1988 and 1997 by 3%.

I turn to the rates that are included in the draft Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order. The Government continue to stand by their commitment to the triple lock guarantee, which means that, this year, the basic state pension and the full rate of the new state pension will go up by the increase in prices, at 3%, as outlined in the autumn Budget on 22 November last year. We will increase the pension credit standard minimum guarantee by more than the growth in earnings to match the cash increase in the basic state pension, and we will increase benefits to meet additional disability needs and carer benefits by 3% in line with prices.

The Government’s continuing commitment to the triple lock for the length of this Parliament means that the basic state pension rate for a single person will increase by £3.65 to £125.95 a week from April 2018. As a result, from April 2018, the full basic state pension will be £1,450 a year higher than it was in April 2010. We estimate that the basic state pension will be around 18.5% of average earnings—one of the highest levels relative to earnings for more than two decades.

In 2016, the Government introduced the new state pension for people reaching their state pension age from 6 April 2016 onwards, with the aim of making it clearer to people at a much younger age how much they are likely to get and providing a solid base for their saving and retirement planning. We are committed to increasing the new state pension by the triple lock for the duration of this Parliament. As a result, the full rate of the new state pension will increase by 3% this year, meaning that, from April 2018, the full rate of the new state pension will increase by £4.80 to £164.35 a week—around 24.2% of average earnings.

The benefits of the triple lock uprating will also be passed on to the poorest pensioners through an increase in the standard minimum guarantee in pension credit to match the cash rise in the basic state pension. That will be paid for through an increase in the savings credit threshold. To match the cash increase in the basic state pension, the standard minimum guarantee will rise by 2.29%, which exceeds growth in earnings of 2.2%. That will mean that, from April 2018, the single person threshold of this safety net benefit will rise by £3.65 a week, to £163.

On the additional state pension, this year, state earnings-related pension schemes will rise in line with prices by 3%. Protected payments in the new state pension will be increased in the same manner. Consistent Government support for pensions has seen the percentage of pensioners living in poverty fall dramatically in the past few decades; it is now standing close to the lowest rate since comparable records began.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

The Minister will know that state pension is deducted from pension credit, leaving those pensioners no better off than if they had not contributed to qualify for a state pension. Because state pension is also taxable if other income is brought into the household, the pensioner may have both to pay tax on it and to see it deducted from their pension credit. Therefore, they could be worse off than if they had not contributed to qualify for a state pension. What are the Government doing to address that long-standing inequity?

[Kit Malthouse]

Significant measures have been taken by the Government to deal with pensions and, in particular, pensioner poverty over the last few years. We have seen that fall from something approaching 46% to around 16% in the last few years. One measure, in particular, that will have benefited many millions of pensioners is raising the personal tax threshold. That has taken millions of people out of the tax system altogether and particularly those, such as pensioners, who are on a fixed income.

I turn to disability benefits. The Government will continue to ensure that carers, those who cannot work and those who have additional needs as a result of disability get the support that they need. We continue to follow the principle in our welfare reforms that more of the money should get to the people who need it most. That results in disability living allowance, attendance allowance, carer’s allowance, incapacity benefit and personal independence payment all rising by 3% in line with prices from April 2018. Disability-related and carer premiums paid with pension credit and working-age benefits will also increase by 3%, as will the employment and support allowance support group component and the limited capability for work and work-related activity element of universal credit.

All in all, the Government will spend an extra £4.2 billion in 2018-19 on uprating benefits and pension rates. With that spending, we are upholding our commitment to the country’s pensioners by maintaining the triple lock on their state pension, helping the poorest pensioners who count on pension credit, and providing support to disabled people and carers. I commend the orders to the House.