Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe Excerpts

Lords Hansard - part two & Committee stage
Monday 25th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, for his remarks. It will come as no surprise to the Minister that I have a few things to say about alcohol over the course of our deliberations.

The Home Office’s outcome delivery plan, published on 15 July 2021, highlights alcohol use as a principal driver of serious violence and other crimes. However, the plan does not include any measures to reduce alcohol use. Reducing alcohol availability, increasing alcohol price and limiting alcohol marketing are powerful levers already in the hands of the Government for reducing serious violence, but none of these is included anywhere. As drafted, the Bill appears to be blind to the ubiquitous role of alcohol in serious violence both in and outside the home.

In 2019, 176,000 people in England and Wales needed emergency hospital treatment after being injured in violent incidents. Most of this serious violence takes place after 10 pm and is alcohol related. This is just the tip of the iceberg, as the Crime Survey for England and Wales demonstrates so clearly. People living in the most deprived areas are six times more likely to be affected than those in the least deprived areas. Quite apart from triggering violence, intoxication increases vulnerability, including to sexual violence, as physical decision-making capability is eroded. Hate violence increases as inhibition decreases.

One of the solutions is pricing. Even tiny alcohol price increases make a big difference. A 1% increase across the on and off-licence trades is estimated to reduce the number of people injured in serious violence by at least 6,000 in England and Wales. But at the moment, the Government’s action is in the opposite direction: they freeze or even reduce the levies and duties on alcohol. We wait with interest to see what the Chancellor will do this coming Wednesday, because effectively what the Government have done in recent years by reducing the price of alcohol in relative terms is give a licence for people to drink more and commit more violence, particularly after 10 pm. I hope there is some chance that we will start taking a different view of that. The statistics should not be ignored; they have got worse, and we should be taking action.

I bring apologies from my friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Finlay, who is unable to speak today. Had she done so, she would have talked about the related issue of drugs. Drug-related homicides are increasing. There were 311 such homicides in England and Wales in 2018-19 and 337 in 2019-20.

If one takes the consequences of the abuse of alcohol and drug taking, one sees that we have not a diminishing problem but an increasing one. We need to take all the steps we can in any way open to us to try to ensure that we start moving in the opposite direction. The amendment that I bring to the Committee seeks to ensure that the consequences of alcohol, and the need for those consequences to be recognised, are recognised in the strategy that will be drawn up, which I hope will be worth while and worth pursuing.