Policing of Marches and Demonstrations

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Monday 13th November 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The noble Lord makes a very good point. The Home Secretary has reserve powers and some legislative tools that enable intervention and direction, but those powers may be used only in line with statutory tests and public law principles and in very exceptional circumstances. The Metropolitan Police has not asked for that sort of intervention. He is quite right that the Government have been in regular contact with the police over the use of their powers to manage protests. Where we identify gaps in the legislation, we will seek to address them. As was widely reported this morning, that is still under review.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, any violence and threat is to be deplored, wherever it comes from. I congratulate the police, who did a superb job in very difficult circumstances. Of course there will be groups of people pushing the boundaries and acting unacceptably. The danger of the media is that it gives the impression that the only game in town is the marches and demos, but many on these Benches and other Members of this House have been meeting leading Israelis and Palestinians in our local communities and finding that there are people desperately trying to reach out to others and thinking about how we can take this forward. What are His Majesty’s Government doing at the moment to mobilise some of our leading Israelis and Palestinians to try to enable talks about how we might find a more positive narrative as we go forward?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The right reverend Prelate makes an extremely good point. I commend his activities and those of his colleagues and other faith leaders in trying to find civilised solutions to this problem. I am afraid I do not know what His Majesty’s Government are doing to try to encourage the sort of interactions he mentioned, but it deserves to be mentioned, on proportionality, that the organisers of the pro-Palestinian marches have a responsibility. Peter Tatchell, whom many in the House will know, was blocked from marching with the pro-Palestinians for carrying a sign that said:

“End Israel’s occupation! End Hamas’s sexist, homophobic, anti-human rights dictatorship!”


That is pretty disgraceful. Everybody needs to exercise proportionality in this.

Climate Change: Migration

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Thursday 14th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, I thank the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth, for securing this debate, for his excellent and comprehensive introduction and particularly for setting out so clearly some of the work undertaken by international bodies. I will not repeat any of that, because he spelt that out very clearly for us. As he noted, the climate crisis is at the heart of famines, conflicts and food insecurity across the globe today. We have already seen the disastrous effects of climate change in many parts of the developing world.

I want to focus on a few thoughts, particularly on the Horn of Africa, where we see this perhaps most clearly at the moment. Indeed, a terrible natural humanitarian disaster is unfolding before our very eyes, with thousands now fleeing the region in search of food security and water. It is vital to develop an effective strategy to mitigate the impacts of climate change in the developing world. The Horn of Africa is currently facing a climate-induced drought and a serious food crisis affecting more than 36 million people, more than half of whom are children. UNICEF estimates that up to 5.7 million children need urgent treatment for acute malnutrition.

I have spoken repeatedly in your Lordships’ House of the need for a decisive emergency response to this crisis. As a country, our current pledge is £143 million to that region. Yet back in 2017 we were investing £861 million a year, as we were responding both to the immediate crisis and to long-term development. While I continue to urge His Majesty’s Government to scale up their short-term response, this debate is more centred on our long-term climate strategies. As well as the immediate need for emergency aid, it is vital that wherever possible we think creatively about the money we are investing to increase trade. We need these economies to get a much higher level of resilience so that, wherever possible, they are able to deal with the problems of internal displacement themselves.

Therefore, the focus of what we are doing, which in the long run will benefit the wider world—and indeed may benefit us indirectly—needs to be on how we are attending not only to those great trade deals with some of the wealthier countries in the world but to parts of Africa. Let us be quite clear: many other major players—some with what one might say are more dubious motives—are now investing hugely in parts of Africa. We need to see this as an absolute priority, both for the sake of the people there and as we seek to build long-term peace across the world. Africa has now become the scene and centre of the most extraordinary battle for hearts and minds. So this is really in our own interests, as well as helping those in desperate need.

The approach from the UN and the various NGOs has shifted focus towards promoting climate adaptation and the creation of economies and societies that are more resilient to climate impacts. Such adaptation includes building more resilient infrastructure, large-scale planting of trees, trying to stop erosion and problems with the environment, helping and training farmers, and providing resources to switch to more drought-resilient crops. This is all key.

Getting it right early on will not only save lives and cut costs but lessen the impact of climate migration down the line. Therefore, although we know that some international organisations are now looking at long-term strategies for climate adaptation, can the Minister tell us His Majesty’s Government’s plans for us to adopt a similar long-term strategy based and rooted here in the UK? The only sensible course of action for us, based on present trends, is to anticipate a significant rise in climate-related migration. It is, in the modern world, a relatively new phenomenon—hundreds of years ago it was quite common—but it poses some associated challenges and questions that we must address urgently.

I want to mention one further area, which is the importance of family. Earlier this year the Justice and Home Affairs Committee released a report, All Families Matter: An Inquiry Into Family Migration. It opened with Article 16 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

“The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State”.


It is terrible to think that in some cases Governments are breaking up families because of some of the laws on migration. Families are the foundation of a good society and a building block of community. Here in this country we need to invest, as always, in how we support family life, which is the basic place where values are nurtured and where people are brought up and provided for.

The report speaks of how bespoke routes created to address emerging crises are often inconsistent on which family members are allowed and helped in migration and on what terms that takes place. With climate migrants potentially being one of the greatest challenges that we are going to face, it is important that we try to get this right and ensure a fair and consistent approach to family migration rules. We have witnessed the catastrophic effects that climate change can have on the developing world, and we can expect it only to get worse, so our immediate focus needs to be on providing climate-vulnerable countries with the tools necessary for adaptation and resilience. This will, as the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, said, require international co-operation. Surely, with our honourable tradition of seeking to be a leader in our world when such crises emerge, this is now the time for us to step up and take a leading role. I hope the Minister will be able to set out His Majesty’s Government’s approach to this important area as we seek to work on the role that we can play in trying to solve or ameliorate the worst effects of the crisis emerging in front of us now.

Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 11th May 2023 Grand Committee

[Lord Coaker (Lab)]

Good afternoon, everyone. I want to make just a few remarks on my Amendment 106D, which is obviously a probing amendment seeking some information on the Government’s thinking with respect to compensation for victims of economic crime. The proposed new clause to be inserted by this amendment would require the Government to prepare and publish a wide-ranging strategy on efforts to ensure that the necessary financial compensation is made available to victims of economic crime, wherever they may be. This could and should be applied to victims of international crimes, of which the war in Ukraine is without doubt an example, but it could also be applied more broadly as a means of providing a measure of justice to the victims of any other kleptocratic regime around the world. As I say, the proposed new clause would provide a mechanism for compensating victims of economic crime in the UK, including thousands of British victims of online scams every year. That briefly sets out the purpose of my Amendment 106D.

I thought it might also be helpful to the Committee for me to read into the record from the Government’s Fraud Strategy. As the Minister will know, it is dated May 2023; it does not state the day so I do not know whether there is a later version but that is where we are. I want to do so in case the Committee has not had an opportunity to read the report. I have not read all of it—I have just dipped into it for the purposes of this amendment—but it is quite staggering when you read the statistics. I will quote the report; I hope that the Committee will bear with me because it is important for those who read our proceedings, as many people do, to see the facts as laid out by the Government.

The report—the Government’s own words—states:

“In the year ending December 2022, 1 in 15 adults were victims of fraud. 18% of those victimised became victims more than once. The sums of money involved are staggering. The total cost to society of fraud against individuals in England and Wales was estimated to be at least £6.8 billion in 2019-20. This includes the money lost by victims, the cost of caring for victims, and the costs of recovery, investigation and prosecution of fraudsters”.


It continues:

“In the year ending March 2021, Action Fraud received victim reports totalling a loss of £2.35 billion … There is also considerable cost to business and enterprise. UK Finance, the trade body for the banking and finance industry, reported that in 2021 its members lost over £1.3 billion to fraud”.


The figures just go on. Clearly, this is a huge problem, as all of us recognise.

Can the Minister outline something for us? Among all the points made in the strategy, I could not find anything concrete and specific with regard to compensation. It would be helpful if the Minister could spell out the current arrangements on compensation for victims of fraud. Given the scale of the problem, which the Government have helpfully just published in their Fraud Strategy, what are their proposals in respect of compensating individuals? I know from speaking to Members of the Committee here and many people, including friends and family, that the cost to individuals is immense. It is not just a financial cost but an emotional one; I know that the Minister understands that. It is important for us to know the answers to these questions.

The other point is what the current rules on compensation are, how much someone could expect to get back, what the Government propose to improve that situation, and the perennial question we keep coming back to: how that will be made real.

I found paragraph 7, on page 4 of the strategy, particularly interesting. The Government say:

“We will ensure victims of fraud are reimbursed and supported”.


Again, we go back to previous questions: does that mean under the current reimbursement regime, or are the Government proposing a new one? How will people be “supported”?

I think the noble Lord, Lord Agnew, will be particularly interested in the next sentence, the first part of which says:

“We will … Change the law so that more victims of fraud will get their money back”.


Where in the Bill before us is this change to the law so that more victims of fraud will get their money back? It may well be in here. I am not trying to trip anyone up; I just could not find it myself. It would be helpful if the Minister could point out where it is. If it is not in the Bill, where will that change in the law be put, when is it coming and what change do the Government propose?

The second part says that the Government will:

“Overhaul and streamline fraud communications so that people know how to protect themselves from fraud and how to report it”.


Again, how will the Government “overhaul” and “streamline” those communications? Added to that, how do people know what their rights are and—a question we keep coming back to—how does an individual citizen take on a bank, financial institution or whoever to assert the rights that the Government say they will give them to get compensation back for the money they have lost through fraud? Those are really important questions.

I will stop there. I could go on and on repeating the same thing in different words, but I think the Minister gets the nub of what I am saying, and I think the Committee would be interested to hear the Government’s views, as well as those of other Members of the Committee. With that, I beg to move Amendment 106D.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

I am sorry I have been unable to engage more fully and consistently with this Bill, but this amendment prompted me to come here when I had a few minutes. I was recently speaking to someone I met at a social gathering. In the course of the evening, we were talking about a whole range of things, and he was talking about the fact that he had been defrauded of some money and how it is now materially affecting his retirement. His comment was: “I feel so embarrassed, because I’ve always tended to think it was simple people who didn’t understand financial matters who were likely to lose money. I’m highly literate, I’ve done all the right things, but I’ve been defrauded”. This is having a big effect.

Also, as we are becoming increasingly cashless and more and more transactions are online—it looks like that will be the trajectory for quite some while—there is far more potential for these sorts of frauds. For example, I note that fraud on lost and stolen cards had increased by 30% by 2022 and card ID theft, where a criminal opens or takes over a card account, had almost doubled in the previous year. In other words, this crime is getting worse.

It is in everybody’s interests that we encourage people to use what is, for most of us, a great convenience being able to pay with our cards—but we need to make sure that people have confidence. The statistic that the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, gave us—that one in 15 adults has been a victim—is particularly interesting. In other words, it is now widely assumed among groups of ordinary people chatting that this is a very real problem. There is a good side to that—hopefully, we are being far more cautious and savvy—but, nevertheless, that will not encourage people to invest and use some of the financial services that we might hope they will as they plan their retirements.

I just want to add my words of encouragement and ask the Government whether they can give us some idea about whether this amendment, or something similar, might be a way forward. It would give people confidence if they knew that there was clear and simple way to find redress when they were a victim of fraud. Also, could this be built on in some way, not least because the proceeds of property recovered under this future Act could then be directed towards compensation?

[Lord Fox (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans for their words. I am not going to try to add to the issue of individuals; instead, I note that we should remember that this also involves businesses. The Home Office survey said that one-fifth of businesses have been hit by fraud. Such fraud can be existential to those businesses—at the very least, it is a tax on growth because money that is stolen is not reinvested in that business—so this matters.

In earlier debates, we have talked about the other side of this: stemming the cause of fraud. We have talked about the failure to report as well as the facilitation issue. The Government seem much more interested in picking up on the failure to report side than on the facilitation side. I ask the Minister to go back and find a middle way between what was being proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, and her committee and what we have now, which is nothing—that is, to find some sort of code of conduct with teeth that starts to address the facilitation issue. It is through facilitation that this fraud is happening, in many cases. At the same time as addressing questions about compensation, we must go back and find effective ways of preventing this happening.

With noble Lords’ indulgence, I will slightly broaden the scope of my speech because, over the course of the last day or so—since we debated this issue—the United States has repatriated seized assets to Ukraine. Can the Minister ask his officials to have a look at how that was achieved? Which international laws were used to facilitate that repatriation? In previous Committee debates, we have discussed freezing and seizing, so it would be very useful for your Lordships to know more about this before we get to Report; it is an issue that we remained concerned about. Although I realise that the United States is a different legal domain, it sits in the same international climate of law. Therefore, it would very much help our deliberations if the Minister was able to talk to the department’s officials and get some sort of readback as to how this seizure and repatriation to Ukraine was achieved.

Otherwise, Amendment 106D is a good way of trying to find out where the Government sit on compensation, although I would open it up to include business compensation as well. Perhaps there are also issues around the insurance industry that the Government should be thinking about.

Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 9th May 2023 Grand Committee

[Baroness Altmann (Con)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 92, so ably and powerfully moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer. I have added my name to it because, as I have personally seen, this issue is potentially beneficial yet in practice harmful in the financial services sector. It is very often a career-ending move if somebody decides to blow the whistle on fraudulent practice or wrongdoing in their place of work. I had a friend in the City who ended up blowing the whistle but only because she had already decided she was going to retire. She knew that it would be the end of her career and she did not wish to go to the expense of a tribunal, but it was the early warning that the authorities needed to discover that wrongdoing was going on. The problem we have is that those who are inside are best placed to identify the wrongdoing before it becomes more widely known and before more people are perhaps damaged by whatever the wrongdoing is, yet, as the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, described, there is inadequate protection to recognise the benefits of having a canary in the coal mine being able to identify directly that something is amiss.

Therefore, I hope that we would be able to accept that having an independent office that can oversee and provide a safe space for individuals to notify their concerns, presumably having raised them internally first, could be very helpful in fighting economic crime and fraud. Normally, you would suggest that somebody raises a concern internally, but they might feel that that could be detrimental—there have been threats to people’s lives when they have blown the whistle, so it is not just a financial matter.

I warmly welcome my noble friend to his place. I look forward to hearing his answer and thank him for his engagement with me so far. I look forward to speaking to him on this issue and perhaps others as we proceed with the Bill. I hope that he will be able to accept that there are reasons why the Public Interest Disclosure Act is inadequate and why putting an amendment of this nature in this Bill makes enormous sense. I hope that we will therefore be better able to uncover criminal offences, fraud and deliberate cover-ups that it is in the public interest to expose rather than waiting for after-the-fact things to emerge having caused much more damage.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, I think I can be quite brief thanks to the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, as I have been able to ditch most of what I was going to say because she has already made it so clear. I was persuaded to put my name to this amendment simply because I met a woman in one of my churches on a Sunday after worship who is currently in precisely this situation, and her whole life has basically fallen apart.

She came across something that it was clear to her was wrongdoing; she agonised for weeks and tried to take advice, which was difficult to get because of confidentiality. Eventually she decided that she needed to blow a whistle. She was immediately suspended, taken through a disciplinary process and dismissed. She is now trying to decide whether she can afford to take this through the courts. Her view is that she would probably have to sell her house to do so. It really is a David and Goliath situation.

As has been said, often the best people to spot what is going on are not necessarily the auditors—they try their best, but it is difficult for them; we see constantly how they do not always manage to spot what is going on and get an accurate picture—but those on the inside. Since the whole of our financial services sector, which is one of our great achievements and a fantastic part of our life, relies ultimately on trust—our greatest currency in this country—the integrity issue absolutely kicks in. In a world in which trust is at a low ebb, this is terribly important.

The reason people give for not wanting to be a whistleblower is the cost. A public consultation conducted by the European Commission revealed that the most common reason for not wanting to come forward with allegations of wrongdoing was simply the fear of legal consequences, which 80% of individual respondents reported as their primary reason. After that came fear of financial consequences at 78% and fear of what it would do to your reputation at 45%. As the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, said, an informal blackballing goes on behind the scenes. The woman I mentioned is now fairly clear that, even if she wins this case, it is very unlikely that she will ever get another job in the financial sector. These are legitimate fears. A 2021 survey conducted by the charity Protect found that over 60% of whistleblowers reported experiencing negative consequences such as being dismissed, victimised or subject to harassment or bullying.

I hope that His Majesty’s Government will look closely at this or at somehow strengthening how we can support whistleblowers, for the long-term prospering of financial services in this country. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response to this amendment.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

I support Amendment 92 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer. I have for a long time supported the better treatment of whistleblowers, who are treated appallingly badly. It is a difficult task, because many organisations—no matter how big their policy on whistleblowing—immediately close ranks against the whistleblower, who often starts out as someone trying to help and not even feeling that they are a whistleblower.

I will illustrate this briefly with two points. When I asked an Oral Question on whistleblowing some time ago, one of our esteemed colleagues, who is no longer with us, was sitting near me and said, “What are you asking about? Whistleblowers? Do you mean snitches?” In my Question, I was going to name someone in the financial services world whose solicitor contacted me minutes before I stood up to say that they had changed their mind and asked me not to name them, because they were so frightened of what would happen to them as a result. That makes a strong case—as do the powerful speeches that we have heard—for having a body such as an office for whistleblowers.

I was on an interesting call a little while ago with people interested in whistleblowing in America. It struck me how interested the investors were. One of them said, “I’ve put several million into this company; I want to hear from whistleblowers and know what’s going on with my money”. You do not hear that often enough. Investors have a direct interest in whistle- blowers delivering proper information about what is going on.

To help bolster even further my emphatic support for this amendment, I have a couple of questions for the noble Baroness, Lady Kramer. First, how would the office do what it is required to under subsections (4)(a) and (4)(b) of the proposed new clause? Secondly, can she clarify—the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann, touched on this—when the office for whistleblowers would come into play? Is it from the beginning or at the end, as a last recourse? How would it interact with the employer? I am not quite clear about how that would work. Fear not: I am entirely in support, but it would help me to have some clarity on those points.

Migration and Economic Development Partnership with Rwanda

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Tuesday 20th December 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

The noble Lord is entirely right to say that there is an international crisis with migration given the conflicts and national issues that are at present troubling our world. There is clearly room, as was canvassed during the debate held two weeks ago, and proposed by the most reverend Primate. Clearly these are very broad issues, and the world needs to address the question of migration. However, the Government cannot tolerate illegal and unlawful flows of people in circumstances where those people are putting themselves in danger in the channel.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, in the recent Statements, and in the Prime Minister’s comment piece in the Telegraph, there was a stated commitment to create more safe and legal routes, but no information was given on the timeline or the proposed numbers, and there was no indication of the sorts vulnerabilities that have been identified. The Rwanda partnership is one among many deterrence policies, but the worry is that, in the absence of safe routes, it seems very unlikely that that will be sufficient. When will the Government bring forward plans and proposals for these additional safe and legal routes?

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

As the Prime Minister has made clear, the initial priority for the Government is to prevent the continuation of dangerous journeys across the channel. It is the Government’s intention in due course to open fresh, safe and legal routes. However, for the present, we have in this country a significant number of people seeking refuge and asylum, and we need to process those claims. In the view of the Government it is simply not the case that further safe and legal routes at this stage would have any effect in reducing channel crossings.

Asylum Seekers: Accommodation

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Tuesday 15th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for his question. I, too, was at Manston last week and I am sure that he will share my admiration for the hard work of the staff at Manston in very difficult circumstances. I can assure the noble Lord that the current figure for those at Manston as of 8 am this morning was 1,428. I am afraid that I am unable to give the noble Lord information about the longest period of any person detained there. I will endeavour to find that information and write to the noble Lord. On the noble Lord’s Oxford question, I am afraid I do not know the answer but I will find out and write to him.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, of course we are delighted at the hard work that the people at Manston are putting into this, but there is a very serious problem indeed. Just a few days ago, I had an email from one of my clergy who said that, during the week, large numbers of asylum seekers were moved in, without any warning to the local authority or local partners, and it has caused chaos. That means not only that we do not have the statutory support in place but that voluntary groups such as churches, which are trying to offer support, simply have no warning. Will he go back to his officials? We simply need to get the communication right and we will all work with the Government and other partners to try to solve this very difficult, agonising problem.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I entirely agree with the right reverend Prelate. The issues surrounding the allocation of accommodation are certainly the subject of concentrated effort by Home Office officials, and it is the intention to improve notification. I add that we are incredibly grateful for the activities of church groups and others who help provide assistance to those accommodated in hotels.

Public Order Bill

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 1st November 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, I think many of us in this debate will have a feeling of déjà vu. No matter how many pieces of legislation come through here granting the police additional powers, it seems that they are never enough. It seems we are always one more public order provision away from solving the problem.

Along with other noble Lords, I want to support the police and the rule of law. We are grateful for all the police do; they stand in our place and, very often, have to take very difficult decisions. But we already have the Public Order Act 1986, which grants the police powers to place restrictions on protests and to prohibit those which threaten to cause serious disruption to public order. We already have the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, which introduced the offence of aggravated trespass. We have the offence of obstruction of a highway and the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, which allows for civil injunctions to prevent protesters demonstrating in a way which causes harm or harassment. As recently as last year, remarkably extensive powers, including on noisy and disruptive protests, were granted in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022.

Surely history indicates two things: first, that many protest groups are highly sophisticated and very knowledgeable about their rights and the law around protest, and are better and faster able to adapt than it seems the Home Office is able to legislate; and, secondly, that in attempting to outflank that speed of adaptation, Governments have thrown increasingly and worryingly broadly drawn powers to the police. It is clear, by the very fact that the Government deem this new Bill a necessity, that this is unlikely to succeed. It is hard to see how one more piece of legislation will be any more effective at reducing disruptive protests than the previous many pieces of legislation. It would be very instructive if the Minister could go through those previous powers in some detail to explain to your Lordships’ House how often they are used and what their impact has been.

Certainly, the case for new extensive police powers needs to be carefully constructed given the previous history. It is not a small thing to place such significant powers in the hands of the police. Some of what we are discussing today could see someone who has not been convicted of any protest-related offence—despite all the offences and laws which already exist—nevertheless being subject to electronic monitoring and prevented from attending protests, or even encouraging or enabling protests. What seems to be proposed in these serious disruption prevention orders is an incredible set of restrictions which could be imposed on nothing more than a civil standard of proof. It is our duty to look very closely at each of these proposals as the Bill passes through your Lordships’ House.

I am not here in any way to make the police’s job more difficult. As I have said, I think we all deplore unacceptable demonstrations and the huge amount of money that they have cost the public purse. However, in a democracy—as the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, said—sometimes that is the cost of freedom of speech and expression. It is a huge responsibility to maintain public safety and order and to balance that with the freedoms of expression and association. Not one of us here is under any illusion of the difficulties that we face.

I am sure the Minister will tell us that the powers created here will be rarely used and only in the most limited and exceptional circumstances, but I note what other noble Lords have already said: that many of these powers have not been sought by the police. I am not convinced that a “trust us” approach is sufficiently robust to protect against a possible future Government, or police force, who might on occasion, for other reasons, be tempted to overreach their powers. It is very easy to be complacent over rights and the inherent goodness and propriety of our institutions, and we are fortunate in this country to have been more blessed than almost anywhere else in the world in this regard. But we do not need to look very hard around the world to see rights undermined, slowly at first and then dramatically. Surely it is our responsibility to guard against that possibility. We have concerns about the scope of SDPOs, and I will certainly listen carefully to what others with experience in this area have to say on these provisions.

I briefly mention Clause 9, introduced by amendment NC11 in the other place, on abortion clinic buffer zones. I have serious concerns about this clause as it stands. The term “interferes with” is so broadly defined that it includes seeking to influence, merely expressing an opinion, or attempting

“to inform about abortion services”.

I cannot believe that this is proportionate given the existing powers possessed by the police and local authorities, and I am sure that we on this Bench will wish to look again at this clause.

I will listen with interest to the Minister’s response, but at this stage I express grave reservations on a number of aspects of what is being proposed. I hope that the Minister will provide rather more robust evidence of why the Bill will be effective where all the previous ones have apparently not been.

Violent Crime, Gang Activity and Burglaries

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Thursday 20th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Snape, not only for obtaining this timely debate but for his introduction to it. I declare my interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

I will focus on just one specific area of this huge topic, which I imagine many of us will want to address: knife crime. The diocese I serve encompasses Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire; in Bedfordshire, knife crime has increased by a third since 2010. There are various estimates about the increases over the last year, but it is something in the region of 10% across our nation. There was a fall during the lockdowns, but we are now rapidly reaching the same levels as pre Covid and the projections are stark—so it is deeply worrying.

It is engendering huge levels of fear: as I go around talking to people, many of the elderly are fearful of their houses being broken into, although they are statistically unlikely to be the victims of knife crime. However, when you go into schools, it is a topic of which many young children are terrified, not least as they make their way to and from school. Hospitals are dealing with soaring numbers of stab victims: 4,112 cases were recorded last year, a 2% increase on the previous year. Of those, 855 were in London, 405 in the West Midlands, 310 in Greater Manchester, 240 in West Yorkshire hospitals, 175 in South Yorkshire and 140 in Merseyside. In other words, this is not just a case of stories being particularly highly reported in the papers of London; it is something that affects areas—particularly urban but even sometimes rural—across our country. It is particularly concerning that a recent report suggests that only one in six crimes involving a knife in London has been solved by the police over the last two years.

I know that others will comment on the police, but we need to start by thanking them for being on the front line, which is the most terrifying place to be when you are confronted with a knife. Having been out sometimes with a night shift to watch what our police are having to cope with, I have nothing but admiration for them putting their lives on the line and having to deal with situations I would not know how to begin with—and some of them are doing it night after and after. We really need to support our police. This is why we need to ensure that the promises that have been made to recruit 20,000 new police officers are met, and that we get those people in place. The latest I can find out on recruitment is that we are sort of half way there. I will ask the Minister a bit more about that at the end. We need to have people on the ground who are policing, and we need to support our police and everybody in our criminal justice system.

Having said that, when someone is convicted, it is too late: we need to get far ahead on preventing it before we are simply dealing with the effects. As noble Lords know, some people say it costs—we hear various figures—something like £40,000 a year to keep someone in a young offender institution. It would be far better if we were spending that money on preventive work with youth workers and other people to get ahead of the game. We need to try to work out how we can support the police and get ahead of this terrible problem that is affecting so many communities.

How can we work to beat our swords into ploughshares and our knives into useful tools? In the areas where I work with voluntary groups and churches, there is an awful lot of work going on and a lot of analysis about how we can build the sort of communities that are likely to reduce the levels of knife crime. This is not a problem for just the left or the right; we need solutions from all political sides if we are going to get on top of this. According to a very interesting analysis I read, there is poverty of resources, poverty of relationships and poverty of identity.

On the poverty of resources, we are not investing in the way that we used to in youth work, and we are not investing in enough groups, sports and other activities to give young people activities to engender their sense of competition, pride and so on. We really need to think about how we are investing in this. In the communities in which I work, so many of our youth centres are being sold off. I think I am right in saying that my diocese now employs more youth workers—as a voluntary organisation—than Hertfordshire County Council and the Bedfordshire unitary authorities combined. That is good, but we need to invest more and recognise that there is a poverty of resources.

From the perspective of the right, there is a poverty of relationships. We have a crisis of children being brought up in families with absent parents and where there are no role models. A lot of the extended family has gone—where, for example, when a marriage broke up there was probably an uncle who would come round and be in loco parentis. A lot of that has gone. We need to look at how we can invest in our family life and how we think about young people having real mentors who can hold them responsible. It is vital that we think about these role models.

Finally, on the poverty of identity, many young people feel as though there is nothing to which they can aspire. They are being sold an awful lot of guff in the media about how everybody can be successful and famous. It is no wonder that they are dismayed when they know there is no way out of their local community. How can we provide ways for these young people to see that there are alternatives to finding their identity and role in society that are not based on holding a knife and saying, “Do what I say, or else”? Some of the very interesting work that has gone on with our churches has involved knife amnesties. Some noble Lords will have seen the extraordinary sculptures made of the knives that have been handed in; we had one recently in one of our churches in Luton.

I will ask the Minister three questions. First, may we have an update on the recruitment of police and police community support officers? That needs to include how many are leaving, not just how many we are recruiting: are the total numbers going up, because we need to ensure that we have the resources on the ground? Secondly, may we have an assessment of the success of serious violence reduction orders in reducing knife crime? Thirdly, may we have an assessment of the troubled families programme, which ran from 2013 to 2020 and worked with over 400,000 families? What lessons did we learn and are we implementing them?

Emergency Services: Ministers of Religion

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Tuesday 26th April 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I do not think there is any doubt that the police chaplaincy service is fully supported by the Government. It provides a vital service at critical times to people in need. I cannot say further than that, but what I will say to the noble Baroness—and I congratulate her on the work she does —is that the Government fully support the service.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, this is a delicate area, especially when we are dealing with crime scenes or potential crime scenes. Nevertheless, do Her Majesty’s Government have any plans to ensure how this information will be rolled out in training people who are going to be in charge of these scenes? Is there going to be any monitoring to ensure that this is available? The sacrament of the last rites is a fundamental religious principle for many people. Can we have some assurance that this is going to be monitored?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I am sure it will be monitored, for the very reason that we need to be very clear that the police should be able to do the job that they have to do at the scenes of what might be quite critical incidents. They need to have the freedom to make those judgments but also be mindful of the wishes of people who might want to have a priest or religious leader with them at the time of critical illness or nearing death. I say to the right reverend Prelate that there is certainly further learning to be done on this, but I think this is a very welcome step forward.

Home Office Visas for Ukrainians

Lord Bishop of St Albans Excerpts

Thursday 10th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I understand my noble friend’s points, but we will continue to carry out security checks on anyone who comes in. The point is that Ukrainians with passports will be able to come straight here and have their biometrics taken. That will free up the system much more quickly.

[The Lord Bishop of St Albans]

My Lords, perhaps the Minister could help us a little. Ukrainians are arriving, some of them with leave to remain, but they have no recourse to public funds. For example, yesterday my chaplain at the airport in Luton was phoning me saying, “We have 12 people. They have been put up for a week in a hotel by Border Force, but that is going to come to an end on Monday.” We are currently trying to raise money and funds, and to identify places for these 12 people. This is a really serious problem facing us immediately. We want to help, but there is a very real danger that, if we cannot get the legalities sorted out, there are going to be people—particularly single people—sleeping rough by next Monday. Will clear guidance be given to local authorities, and can we try to find a way through some of these problems, which need to be addressed now?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I am assuming that the right reverend Prelate is not referring to people coming in under the family scheme, because clearly they would have recourse to public funds. I am assuming that he is talking about Ukrainians seeking asylum here. Ukrainians coming here under the family scheme, by its very nature, will have family members here. I will take this offline and discuss it with the right reverend Prelate, because certain things in what he is saying do not seem to fit the scheme that we are talking about.