Police Officer Safety

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Tuesday 11th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Holly Lynch]

Of course, sentencing plays a big part in deterring those contemplating assault on a police officer. I very much welcome that recruitment drive, but we have seen the loss of 1,200 officers in West Yorkshire, so the faster those new boots are on the ground, the better.

I welcome the work of the Police Federation’s John Apter in Hampshire, which has been an effective means of establishing best practice. I would encourage all forces to consider rolling out similar schemes for recording and investigating assaults on officers. Police officers who are assaulted deserve the full backing of the justice system, as the hon. Gentleman has just said. Since my shift with West Yorkshire police, I have become aware of at least five more assaults on officers in my constituency in the days that followed and have been made aware of some absolutely horrific incidents reported to me by serving officers all over the country—indeed, we have already heard many more today. What has shocked me, and what thoroughly depresses police officers, is that sentences handed down to offenders for assaulting the police often fail to reflect the seriousness of the crime or, more crucially, serve as a deterrent.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this debate. After 32 years of policing in London, I can tell her that I was involved in several scuffles, with only the protection of a small piece of wood in a side pocket and a radio that was only good for throwing at decamping suspects. Does she agree that poor sentencing reduces the seriousness of assaults on police and has the effect of lowering morale and, above all, respect for law enforcement?

[Holly Lynch]

The hon. Gentleman he is absolutely right. Morale is essential in the police force. We have to get this right or we will start to lose good officers as a result.

To reiterate, we make the law here, but we ask the police to uphold and enforce it out there. To assault a police officer is to show a complete disregard for law and order, our shared values and democracy itself. That must be reflected in sentencing, particularly for repeat offenders. To give hon. Members just a couple of examples, a man who assaulted four officers in the south of England earlier this year, causing serious injury to one officer in particular by gouging their eyes, was ordered to pay compensation and received a two-month suspended sentence.

One of the most harrowing attacks on officers brought to my attention was on the front page of the Scottish Daily Mail in September. A man set upon two officers, one male and one female, subjecting them to an onslaught of blows after initially seeming to comply with a body search. Footage of the incident, which was widely shared on social media, shows onlookers beginning to film the assault on their smart phones, while the officers struggle to defend themselves. In court, the offender was ordered to carry out 200 hours of unpaid work, pay compensation to the officers and placed under supervision for 18 months.

I could go on—and I really could go on—because since securing this debate, I have been sent examples from officers all over the country, most of whom have themselves been on the receiving end of violent attacks, and who feel thoroughly let down by the system.

Having looked into sentencing in more detail, I referred to the “Assault Definitive Guideline” publication, produced by the Sentencing Council in 2011. The guidelines assist all members of the judiciary who deal with sentencing. They list the measures of both harm and culpability to assess whether an assault on an officer is a category 1, 2 or 3 offence. They then state the starting point for an appropriate sentence in each of the categories, with the factors that may be taken into consideration in arriving at a final sentencing decision.

The starting point for sentencing following a category 1 assault on a police officer, which represents the greatest harm and the highest culpability, is a 12-week custodial sentence. However, the guidelines then go on to say:

“When sentencing category 1 offences, the court should also consider if the custody threshold has been passed? If so, is it unavoidable that a custodial sentence be imposed and can that sentence be suspended?”

I really struggle with the notion of a suspended sentence. It feels as though the custodial element of the sentence itself does reflect the seriousness of the crime, but its suspended nature means that victims often leave court feeling that it will have zero practical impact on the offender.

I appreciate that the Minister will most likely stress the independent nature of the Sentencing Council, which I understand, but when sentencing has the potential to be such a significant part of the package of measures used to deter those from using violence against police officers, as the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Jason McCartney) said, I am asking the Minister to consider any and all means available to him to work with his colleagues in the Department for Justice to ensure that we use sentencing as a means of offering the police all the protection we can. In addition, there are no two ways about it, and as we have already heard, the cuts have had consequences. The danger of assault is heightened when officers are on the front line with diminished support due to pressures on officer numbers.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Monday 5th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Brandon Lewis]

I disagree with the right hon. Lady. She needs to think about the fact that crime is changing, so the way in which police forces fight crime needs to reflect the modern world that we live in and the crime that is happening in local areas. That is why it is absolutely right that the Government have moved crime fighting to be locally driven, with PCCs and chief constables having the powers that they need to fight crime locally in the way they see best.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

4. What steps she is taking to ensure that the police and security services have the necessary powers to apprehend people planning terrorist attacks in the UK.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Amber Rudd)]

We continue to strengthen our counter-terrorism powers. The Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015 provided the police with new powers and created a general duty on public bodies to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism. To apprehend terrorist suspects, the police and security agencies need to collect intelligence to support arrests and develop evidence to secure prosecutions.

[Byron Davies]

A major terror threat to the United Kingdom comes from people who are trafficked into this country. It is vital that we maintain the strongest possible intelligence-sharing relationships and agreements with other nations. What steps will the Home Secretary be taking to ensure that these agreements are prioritised and protected following the vote to leave the European Union?

[Amber Rudd]

I thank my hon. Friend for that important question, and I am aware of his expertise as a former police officer. We are leaving the European Union but I can reassure him that our co-operation on security with our European and global allies will be undiminished. We are about to begin negotiations and it would be wrong to set out unilateral positions in advance, but I share his view on this important matter.

--- Later in debate ---

[Amber Rudd]

We take our obligations under the Dublin agreement very seriously, and will always look into how we can help unaccompanied refugees. We have seconded officials working with Greek, Italian and French counterparts, and we hope to be able to speed up the process.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

T6. As the Minister will know, last week the Police Federation called for a review of the position regarding police officers and visible tattoos. Can he assure me that the Home Office has no intention of relaxing the current guidelines?

[The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Brandon Lewis)]

Obviously, decisions on whether to recruit individuals are for the chief officer of the police force concerned and each case should be treated on its merits, but I can say that we have no plans to change guidance, and the college guidance is very clear: the candidates

“should not have tattoos which could cause offence…or undermine the dignity and authority”

of the role of the police constable.

Immigration Bill

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Monday 25th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

There are two minutes to go.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

I would have liked to have more of an opportunity to speak, as I was a member of the Immigration Public Bill Committee, but I will confine myself to the Lords amendment calling on the Government to relocate 3,000 refugee children. I am sure that there is no one who could possibly disagree with that. It would be morally wrong and would not befit our nation, which has supported many different religions, races and nationalities in their hour of greatest need, if we did not reunite these children with their families. We must work along with other EU states to make sure that utmost priority is given to ensuring that children are not left unaccompanied and in danger. Along with other countries such as Spain, Greece, Italy and France, we must provide the very best protection and support for these children until they can be reunited with their families. The right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) was absolutely right: it can take the French authorities up to nine months to pass on applications to the Home Office. Although all authorities are under huge pressure on these matters, this delay cannot be tolerated, and an application cannot be accepted as just another application when it relates to an unaccompanied child.

In 2015, over 3,000 asylum applications were received from unaccompanied asylum-seeking children—a rise of 56% on 2014 and 141% on 2013. That puts unprecedented pressure on our system and our local authorities, as detailed by my hon. Friend the Member for Rochester and Strood (Kelly Tolhurst). These numbers raise serious questions as to whether other EU countries are fulfilling their child protection obligations. It is vital that we continue to do what we are doing now, and more, but this must not stop us raising and tackling these issues with our European partners on a wider scale.

We need to ensure that we support these children and others who make the journey in the best way possible, using our heads and our hearts. While all may not agree, I think the actions that the Government are taking—

Investigatory Powers Bill (Ninth sitting)

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Committee Debate: 9th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 21st April 2016 Public Bill Committees

[The Solicitor General]

To deal with the thrust of the hon. and learned Gentleman’s argument, we would say that the amendments are unnecessary because the draft statutory code of practice already requires an application for a targeted warrant to set out what the conduct is and how collateral intrusion is being managed, which is the really important public interest here. That should rightly be in the warrant application itself, and the detailed requirements should be in the statutory code; that was recommendation 5 in the report by David Anderson QC, so we are faithfully following his recommendation.

On the code of practice, the hon. and learned Gentleman will find the requirements under the heading “Necessity and proportionality”, particularly in paragraphs 3.26, 3.27 and 4.10, which deals with collateral intrusion.

I note that amendment 453 is part of this group, so I will speak briefly to that. We have concerns that I have expressed before in other contexts about the problem of the police being asked to exhaust alternative methods even where there is unlikely to be any effect. That is not only wasteful and costly, but could unintentionally lead to further undue intrusion into people’s privacy. For those reasons, I have grave concerns about that amendment.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

Will the Solicitor General accept our plea—I speak as someone who has operated this in a practical situation—that what is being asked in this amendment is completely impossible?

[The Solicitor General]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who speaks with many years of operational experience in the Metropolitan police. When he was a senior officer in that force, he had responsibility for investigations and took his responsibilities extremely seriously. I am grateful to him for his contribution. We have to balance any concerns about a jump to these powers with real-world responsibilities. I want clarity, but also an element of flexibility for those who investigate crime, so that they can get on with the job in an effective way and catch criminals. That is what we all want. I am worried that the amendment, well intentioned though it is, would complicate the process. For those reasons, I urge the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras not to press the amendment to a vote.

Investigatory Powers Bill (Tenth sitting)

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Committee Debate: 10th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 21st April 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Joanna Cherry]

It may not be, but it is an indication of how easy it is for people to abuse the rules, and an indication that the rules are abused. I am not seeking to impugn the security services. I am seeking to draw the attention of members of the Committee and the public to the fact that the rules are sometimes abused. If we are to afford the security services generous and intrusive powers, we have to be sure that they are proportionate and necessary. My point is that we do not have sufficient evidence that they are.

I am conscious that I have taken up quite a bit of time with that submission. I will not take it any further. I have alluded to the fact that there are outstanding legal challenges, and I will make one or two more comments on clause 119. I have already made the point that the clause seeks to put bulk interception programmes that are already in operation on a statutory footing. They were disclosed for the first time by Edward Snowden in June 2013, and their existence has now been avowed by the Government. They have never before been debated or voted on by this Parliament. That is why I am taking my time with this point.

The approach that has been held to date is maintained in the clause. The bulk interception proposed by the clause will result in billions of communications being intercepted each day, without any requirement of suspicion, or even a discernible link to a particular operation or threat. I have information from Liberty that the agencies currently handle 50 billion communications per day. To put that in context, there are only 7 billion people in the world, and only 3 billion of them have access to the internet.

The Intelligence and Security Committee reported at the end of 2014 that there were just 20 warrants in place under section 8(4) of RIPA authorising this vast volume of interception. It is clear from the wording of the clause that although it purports to collect overseas-related communications, it will, for the reasons the hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras gave, collect the communications of persons who are resident in the United Kingdom. Internet-based communications have eradicated the distinction between external and internal communications. He told us that posts on social media sites overseas, such as Facebook, use overseas cloud storage, so the material there would be covered by clause 119.

Searches on Google are counted as an external communication. I do not know about other hon. Members, but I must do at least a dozen searches on Google per day. Those are external communications, even though I am a citizen of the United Kingdom. Be in no doubt: the handful of warrants that will be issued under this clause will be scooping up billions of communications by the United Kingdom’s citizens. Those communications will then sit somewhere and certain people in the security service will have unwarranted access to them. There are some people who do not respect the rules, as we know from the disclosures in The Guardian today, so there is that concern, as well as the concern about the security of the data. The vast majority of those communications that will be scooped up will be the communications of innocent people.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

Does the hon. and learned Lady not accept that the primary object of the security services is to prevent crime—serious crime—and that is exactly what this measure is doing?

[Joanna Cherry]

Of course I do, but to give some comfort to the hon. Gentleman, who has a distinguished career in law enforcement behind him, I worked for many years as a senior prosecutor with the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service in Scotland, so I am fully aware of the public duty of the security services and law enforcement agencies to prevent serious crime. However, I am also aware of the duty of parliamentarians to protect their constituents and to ensure that surveillance powers are proportionate and necessary. My point is that the Committee and this House do not have sufficient evidence at present to justify these breathtakingly wide powers, and that is why the Scottish National party wishes that part 6—

[Byron Davies]

rose—

[Joanna Cherry]

I am coming to a conclusion now, so I will let the hon. Gentleman intervene.

[Byron Davies]

I am grateful to the hon. and learned Lady for taking a further intervention. This is about proactivity and preventing crime. I am afraid I am not persuaded, so far, by what she is saying.

[Joanna Cherry]

I am sorry the hon. Gentleman is not persuaded, but I think others outside this room will be. It is important that somebody voices these very serious considerations while the Government attempt to railroad this legislation through the House. This is not right, and my party will not hesitate to hold the Government to account for it, not because we are troublemakers, but because we are a constructive Opposition. Having the responsibilities of a constructive Opposition, we have looked at what is happening in other countries and at their experience, and we do not consider that this degree of surveillance of our constituents’ and British citizens’ personal communications has been justified as proportionate and necessary.

We are not saying that the security services should not have any powers. We have a nuanced approach to the Bill. Members of the Scottish National party did not sit on their hands and do nothing on Second Reading; we made a constructive contribution to the debate. However, I will not be dissuaded from holding these very serious concerns. They are not just my concerns; they are widely held, and there is strong evidence from one of our closest allies that they are well founded.

Investigatory Powers Bill (First sitting)

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Thursday 24th March 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

I do not know this witness, Chair, but Mr McClure, a witnesses this afternoon, is my constituent and is known to me personally.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

I was a member of some of the agencies that will attend today.

[Suella Fernandes (Fareham) (Con)]

I was a Treasury counsel, representing Government Departments.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lucy Frazer]

Q Do you accept that, if some communications data in an old form of technology is helpful, then in a modern form of technology exactly the same powers will also be useful?

Sara Ogilvie: I agree that there are powers that are absolutely necessary and helpful. I do not think that there is a direct comparator between old and new powers in this case. I completely agree that the security services and law enforcement need targeted powers to gather communications data, so maybe they can use those to target particular websites where we know that paedophile information is provided. They can be used to target suspected criminals. That is all completely adequate use of powers; but what we have is this broad power in the Bill that targets absolutely everyone and is not focused on those individuals, and that is what I have the problem with.

[Byron Davies]

Q Mr King, you have mentioned a couple of times now, in the first part of your evidence, you talked about formidable intrusive powers. You quite agree that the agencies should have these powers. So in view of what has happened recently in Paris and in Brussels, I am really somewhat confused as to what you are trying to tell us in your evidence as to what the agencies should have. Do you know? Are you clear in your own mind what these powers should be?

Eric King: Yes. The Bill’s structure—some of the core powers there—you do not disagree with. The question is often about the scale of the powers—how they are used and the safeguards that are put in place around them. To my mind, the mass collection of material in a generalised form for analysis is not a proportionate activity, and I think this is something that particularly the European Court are confirming. I heard David Anderson say that there was a split view on that. It will be important to hear the judgments later this year, but they have to have very strong powers; but it is how they are used, and the scale of them, and the targets of them, which are so vital to get right. I am afraid that for me this is the bit in the Bill that is not in the right place at the moment, I suppose.

[Byron Davies]

Q But criminals and terrorists would not regard it in that respect.

Eric King: They would not—

[Byron Davies]

Q They would not see it the way you see it, obviously.

Eric King: I do not know what criminals and terrorists would think about this Bill.

Investigatory Powers Bill (Second sitting)

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Thursday 24th March 2016 Public Bill Committees

[The Solicitor General]

Q So the scenario of the authorities holding this information and being able, at a whim, to breach anonymity is nonsense, isn’t it?

Richard Berry: We certainly very much follow the procedure of looking at each application and testing it for its necessity against its purpose, the proportionality, the levels of collateral intrusion and things like the timescales involved. If you look at the annual reports of the Interception of Communications Commissioner’s Office in 2015, you will see that they even go to the extent—I think it was done on about 100,000 applications— of looking at the amount of time a decision maker, a designated person or, under the new legislation, a designated senior officer, actually takes to consider all the tests that are required to ensure that the parameters are tight and that justification is in place.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

In my experience, the UK is regarded as a world leader in intelligence-led law enforcement and I am sure that you agree that the Bill will enhance your capability. Can you tell me how important to your work it is that this legislation applies extraterritorially?

Chris Farrimond: It is rare for serious crime to be investigated and to have no international aspect to it at all. Certainly in the case of the National Crime Agency, almost every single case that we investigate has got an international aspect to it, but I suspect that that is the same for both my colleagues as well. That means that communications data will almost certainly be held in a third country at some point, because we have been communicating with people in other countries. The extraterritoriality will at least give us the ability to ask for those data. I do not doubt that there will be some complications when it gets compared with the host nation legislation along the way, but, nevertheless, at the moment we have a very lengthy process to get material back from other countries, so if this can help in any way, shape or form in speeding that up, that will be a good thing.

Richard Berry: It certainly is a strategic priority for law-enforcement policing to look at how we can ensure, as Chris said, this fragmentation of data across server farms, in clouds and across several countries is increasingly a challenge for us, so any legislation that can help with that process will be particularly useful.

The other point that I would make, building on what you said in your introduction, is also quoted by the commissioner in the 2015 report. Communications service providers, certainly in the US, very much favour the British SPOC system, because there is a dedicated, rigorous system, whereas they could perhaps be approached individually by—I think, to quote them—one of “10,000 FBI agents”, all adopting a slightly different process. So we have got the right systems in place; I think it is really the relationships and the access that is critically important.

Simon Grunwell: I will just add that the internet obviously provides mobility and anonymity. We could have an attack from anywhere in the world, online, so we need to keep pace effectively with digital changes. Sometimes the only clue that we have as to who is criminally attacking us is a digital one. The ability to go extraterritorial to pursue that one clue could be vital.

[Victoria Atkins]

Q In the Government’s response to the pre-legislative scrutiny, they refer to a sample of 6,025 referrals to the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre—CEOP—with which, I imagine, Mr Farrimond, you are very familiar. It says that of those more than 6,000 referrals, 862 could not be progressed and would require the ICR provisions in the Bill to have any prospect of being progressed. In other words, for at least 862 paedophiles out of that sample, you can go no further because you do not have the tools. Does that accord with your day-to-day working knowledge of this field?

Chris Farrimond: Yes, we get around 1,500 referrals per month, some 14% of which we cannot resolve. We cannot take them any further. Whether it is that number of paedophiles, or whether it is a smaller number who are sharing the same images, we cannot be sure, but the bottom line—the important thing—is that we cannot protect the child because we cannot resolve the data.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hayes]

Q Yes. Obviously you know, as you are very familiar with it, that that is the kind of baseline requirement. I presume that the case that was made to you was mindful of that requirement and that, for the most part, you felt it met the requirement. I just wanted confirmation of that.

Lord Reid: To give you a straight answer, yes. When I was Home Secretary, I refused a warrant. On other occasions, I refused to renew a warrant. I cannot remember specific cases in Northern Ireland, but I did it there as well. In the first instance, when a warrant is put to you, you are exercising a degree of judgment. And very often you are exercising a judgment based on other people’s judgment, and their judgment is often based on fragmentary evidence. That is the problem with all intelligence, as we know to our cost in some cases. You exercise a judgment, and that judgment is hopefully exercised diligently on the criteria: “Is this proportionate? Is it necessary? Is it reasonable? What is being asked here?” There were occasions on which the answer was no. Before you said no, the normal process would be to call in the various officials—the people who put the submission to you—if necessary, and to go through it orally and ask them questions. The answer to your question of whether I ever refused a warrant is yes.

[Byron Davies]

Q You have answered the main question I was going to ask, but this is carrying on from that. Times have moved on since your days in the Home Office in terms of technology, with smartphones, et cetera. If you were sat in the Home Office now, would you be looking at introducing this Bill?

Lord Reid: I don’t think it is entirely up to the Home Secretary to introduce it. There are two countervailing pressures. One is the development of cyber, which is something that, having stepped down from the Cabinet, I have voluntarily spent a lot of time working on. By the time you get this Bill through, in whatever form, we will no doubt be faced with artificial intelligence and a whole new era of communication. Yes, it would be necessary to take into account the changes, as I was saying to Ms Cherry earlier, in the world of cyber, and particularly the global nature of communications.

Secondly, there are undoubted pressures from the other end, not just the wish from the intelligence services and the policing side. I don’t think their motives and objectives have changed; what has changed is the world around them. Therefore, to meet the same objectives, they have to employ different methods on the old principles. However, at the same time, I am well aware that there has been widespread—“discussion” is a very light word—controversy about access to people’s information. Sometimes it is a paradox, because people are willing to supply all sorts of information to all sorts of private companies. That information is not only being put in a databank but is being mined, matched, sold and used for commercial reasons. Nevertheless, whatever the paradox, the concern is there, and I think the Bill tries to meet the needs of addressing technological change on the side of security at the same time as giving the reassurances necessary because of the public’s concerns about the new world in which we live and about intervention into it. That is against a background where, as the Committee will know, one of the constant characteristics of the world of cyber and communications is constant entrepreneurial innovation by black hats and white hats. It is literally changing every day. Therefore, the equivalent of today’s microdot, where we used to put secret messages, can be a webpage—an apparently innocent webpage that can be sending all sorts of instructions, propaganda or whatever. There are very bright people in both the black hats and the white hats who are constantly inventing things, vis-à-vis each other.

[The Chair]

We really are pressed for time, gentleman. Can we have shorter answers so I can get as many colleagues in as possible?

Charles Clarke: My short answer is yes, I would have been in favour of introducing such a Bill. I think the question of updating with future-proofing is very important. On the timing, I cannot comment on whether the Home Secretary was right to introduce it now as opposed to in five years, or five years before, or whatever. The only factor that I would add to John’s remarks is that the capacity of the organisations that we are trying to contest is a very important issue and they are very wealthy, very effective, very scientific and very powerful, as John said. An assessment will be being made, which I am not privy to now, of how effective those organisations are now, which undoubtedly would have informed the Home Secretary.

Investigatory Powers Bill

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Tuesday 15th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

This significant Bill has the potential to overhaul the framework that governs the use of surveillance by the intelligence, security and law enforcement agencies in obtaining the content of communications data, and it will clearly continue to garner much serious and forensic debate.

Members will clearly have their own stance on the Bill, given their knowledge of certain areas. In that vein, I would like to look at it, not as a lawyer, but as somebody who provided plenty of business to lawyers—as a former Metropolitan police counter-terrorism officer and National Crime Squad officer. I will therefore look at the issue from an organised crime and operational law enforcement perspective.

The legislation governing much of the framework on the powers of the security, intelligence and law enforcement agencies to intercept communications—the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000—is no longer fit for purpose. I have spent many an hour burning the midnight oil trying to construct applications under the Act, and it is not easy.

When the Act was created, broadband internet barely existed; now, we have iPhones, which were a real game-changer for law enforcement, because people could access the internet almost anywhere. Indeed, end-to-end encryption is now so widespread that it is coming to a point—indeed, it may even be at a point—where some criminals are untouchable. That simply cannot be allowed to continue.

If I do nothing else in my three minutes, I should say that equipment interference is a key part of the Bill. There are hardly any investigations into major crimes that do not require equipment interference—it is that crucial to building up a pattern of criminality, determining links between people and organisations and providing key evidence to investigate and prosecute crime. Many cases I was personally involved with used equipment interference, including cases involving major currency counterfeiting, drugs importation and firearms importation. Many of the criminals involved in such cases are not caught in a matter of days; it takes months and years to build a picture of their movements and associates, and the Bill will support that.

In 1829, one of the joint commissioners of the Metropolitan police, Sir Richard Mayne, said:

“The primary object of an efficient police is the prevention of crime”

and the detention and arrest of offenders. With that in mind, we must give law enforcement agencies the tools to do their job. There is an operational need for changes to the law. The three reviews have clearly stated that law enforcement agencies need powers to access communications and data about communications.

There has been no Paris in this country, I am pleased to say. British law enforcement is renowned as the best at intelligence gathering. If, God forbid, something did happen here, Opposition Members would be the first to ask the Government why they did not do anything. This is an opportunity to do it tonight.

Policing and Crime Bill

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Monday 7th March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

I have had the privilege of hearing everybody speak in this debate, and I am delighted that I, too, now have the opportunity to participate. As a former Metropolitan police officer, I speak with some pride on this issue. I wish to make some brief observations, but, like my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse), I will start by saying that the Government are of course committed to finishing the job of reforming the police. It is not an easy task, but a very necessary one, and I broadly welcome the Bill.

The Bill is the cornerstone of police reform, which has now been going on for the past five years. It is the last part of the solid foundations that have been laid for the future of policing in the UK. It will help to build up public confidence in policing at a time when policing is becoming ever more complex.

I am pleased that the Government are committed to improving the efficiency of the police force. It is about not just numbers, as we hear so often, but efficiency. It is something about which I feel quite passionate. Enhancing the democratic accountability of the police is crucial. The public must have confidence in those who serve them, and ensuring that there is a direct democratic link to their police forces only serves to enhance that confidence.

This Bill will not only provide justice for the victims of crime, but ensure that those who have come into contact with the police have the correct protections in place. Recently, we have seen that we cannot allow confidence in the police to be undermined by what has now become a media frenzy surrounding many high-profile cases. We must guarantee that, if there is evidence to take a case forward, the correct safeguards are in place to ensure that all those involved in any police investigation are tried not by public opinion, but in the courts.

Briefly, let me make a number of points about this Bill. First, I am pleased that the police complaints and disciplinary systems will be altered and that there is greater protection for police whistleblowers. It is crucial that people feel enabled and protected if they bring forward a serious complaint or issue.

I have to admit that, when police and crime commissioners were first mooted, I did not particularly agree with them, but after seeing them in operation over the past three and a half years, I have changed my mind. I now fully support them and think that they are one of the best things to happen in the police service. None the less, I do have concerns about them becoming the appellate body for appeals—currently, that is the job of the chief constable. I look at that measure with a deal of trepidation as there could well be political connotations to such a move. I ask the Minister this: can we have full confidence that dealing with complaints will be both fair and impartial? It is such a crucial part of policing, that we must ensure that public confidence in policing is not subject to any level of doubt. I need absolute assurance from the Minister that there will be no unfair element to this process. As a police officer, I spent a number of years investigating complaints against fellow officers. Although it is often said that police should not investigate the police, I have to say that a more rigorous method and form of investigation would be hard to find. I say that as the standards that we expect of each other are so high. When an officer transgresses criminal law or indeed the disciplinary code, the investigations are ruthless.

Let me move on now to the concerns surrounding the extension of powers to police and community support officers and other staff. Although I am not against chief officers having greater control and powers over volunteers, I believe that there is no substitute for a fully trained, warranted police officer. It is important that there will be a list of core powers available only to police officers, and it is crucial that volunteers are not supplementing roles and duties that should be undertaken by officers who are thoroughly trained and who have experience of the duties of policing day after day. That said, the special constabulary has an important role to play, and its contribution should not be underestimated.

Although I appreciate that the initiative of using volunteer police officers in Lincolnshire has been seen as a success, the proposal requires greater scrutiny and discussion before any major changes to the structure of policing is made. This Bill, as I have mentioned, is crucial in ensuring public confidence in the police, and supplementing police duties with people who are not adequately trained could possibly undermine that confidence. I look forward to hearing the Minister address those points, as I know that he has given this Bill a huge amount of thought.

I do have concerns about collaboration between the emergency services, but, as much has been said on that subject in this debate, I will not dwell on it too much, except to say that success of such collaboration will be very much down to whether local police and fire chiefs can make the arrangements work. Indeed there is some intrigue over the single employer model, which could be fraught with problems. I am unsure how chief officers from very different services who have to tackle their own distinct problems can oversee the duties of another agency of which they have very little experience. I know that the Bill mentions training, but I would like to hear what training will be given to prepare them for such a role.

Importantly, I also have concerns about transferring the power to appoint assistant inspectors of constabulary from the Home Secretary to Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary. I believe that the Home Secretary, as an informed and impartial judge on matters to do with policing, is best placed to ensure that these crucial roles are filled with people who are robust, experienced, independent and up to the task of the vital role of inspecting how the police operate and whether they are up to standard. The current system has worked admirably, and I am, as yet, not convinced of the need to change it. Sir Tom Winsor, Her Majesty’s chief inspector of constabulary, is a competent leader of the organisation, but, as this is all about independence, the Home Secretary is best placed to do the job.

May I move on to the amendment of police powers under sections 135 and 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983? I have heard what has been said by my hon. Friends the Member for Halesowen and Rowley Regis (James Morris) and for Broxbourne (Mr Walker). The review of the Department of Health and the Home Office was right to highlight the overuse of police cells as places of safety, especially for children and young people. Will the Minister tell us what locations will be used as places of safety given the reduction in the use of police cells, and how will the definition of places of safety be drafted correctly to ensure that it reflects local capacity and is flexible enough to ensure that different police forces with diverse capacity issues can respond to local needs?

There is some difficulty around understanding the practical role of police officers in the situations in which they find themselves. It could be the middle of a wet, windy night, under Archway bridge in Holloway, or it could be on a railway track between Euston and Scotland. It is very difficult. It could be a domestic scene, with somebody who has gone absolutely berserk and wrecked the house, and now holds his or her family with a knife. It is about getting in there, getting hold of that person and ensuring the safety of others, as well as their safety. Sometimes, the police station is the only place or the most immediate place that somebody can be taken to. It does not necessarily need to mean a police cell, of course. It could be a detention room or a surgeon’s room. I believe that there is further discussion to be had about that.

I strongly support the changes that will be made to arrangements for how the National Crime Agency enters into collaborative agreements with other law enforcement agencies to enable the quick identification of foreign national offenders. The Bill will supplement powers to give the police and immigration officers more opportunities to establish identity and nationality on arrest and obtain documents from foreign nationals when they cannot use existing search powers, which has always been a stumbling block in the past.

There will be a statutory requirement on all defendants, regardless of their nationality, to state their name, date of birth and nationality in court. These are strong measures that will enable the police and immigration officers to identify and detain foreign national offenders. Like probably most Members, I received an email from Liberty talking about the dangers of this provision for foreign nationals, but if we travel abroad to eastern Europe, to places such as Romania where they carry ID cards, as a visiting foreign national we have to carry our passports—it is the law. I see nothing wrong in having to state where one comes from.

Generally speaking, this is a strong Bill that is crucial to reforming the police service in England and Wales. I look forward to scrutinising it and discussing it with Members from all parties as it makes its passage through the House. I commend the Home Secretary and the Policing Minister, as well as their support staff who work so diligently, on this key plank of police reform. As a parting shot, I would say that there is only one thing missing for me, and that is the regionalisation of police forces, but perhaps that is for another day and another Bill.

Police Funding, Crime and Community Safety

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Wednesday 24th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

I want to pay tribute to the hard work of the police in my constituency, which often goes above and beyond the call of duty. In addition to investigating crime, apprehending criminals and keeping us safe, in the current context of cuts to other public services, the police are too often the service of last resort for residents with severe mental illness and other vulnerabilities. Yet in London our hard-working officers are being let down and undermined by the current Mayor. We have seen enormous cuts to policing in London over the past five years, with the loss of more than 5,600 uniformed officers, including PCSOs.

[Byron Davies (Gower) (Con)]

Does the hon. Lady accept from me—I spent 32 years as a police officer—that the issue with mental health is not a new phenomenon but has always been the case?

[Helen Hayes]

The officers in my constituency tell me that the problem is more acute at the moment than it has been for many, many years, and that is my experience.

While I welcome the change in recruitment policy by the Metropolitan police to recruit only Londoners, the cuts are clearly limiting the progress that this policy has the potential to make in terms of black and minority ethnic representation in the Met, which still stands at only 11.5%. Much of the reduction in officer numbers is being achieved by not replacing retiring officers. Without new recruitment, the diversity of the Met will continue to lag behind that of the population it serves.

The devastating cuts have had a major impact. Every police officer I speak to is stretched more than they can ever recall having been in their working lives. Violent crime is going up, and last week HMIC announced that the Met requires improvement. Of all the reforms that the hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) has made, the reorganisation of safer neighbourhood policing into the local policing model is the most damaging. Through that reform, the police are losing visibility, vital sources of intelligence and the ability to address minor problems before they escalate.

The Dulwich area of my constituency was recently dubbed the UK’s burglary hotspot on the basis of data from insurance claims relating to burglary. I have spoken to many residents who have been the victim of that horrible crime in recent months. Many have had windows and doors smashed in during broad daylight. In one shocking attack, a resident had the contents of a petrol canister poured over him. In that context, our local police have been forced to be reactive instead of proactive, visiting the victims after the crimes had taken place and responding to emergency call-outs. However, a proactive approach, through neighbourhood policing, is vital to addressing some of the most serious and pressing challenges that we face, such as gun and youth crime, sexual exploitation, radicalisation and terrorism, forced marriage and honour-based violence. To investigate and prevent those crimes, the police require a depth of knowledge and relationship with the communities that they serve, which cannot be fabricated in the heat of a rapid response once a crime has been committed.

One community activist in Brixton, who has engaged with the police for many years, said at a Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime roadshow meeting that the erosion of safer neighbourhood teams had

“taken the heart out of policing”.