Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Monday 12th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

5. What steps she is taking to prevent abuse of the family migration route into the UK.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

7. What steps she is taking to prevent abuse of the family migration route into the UK.

[The Minister for Immigration (Damian Green)]

The Government launched a consultation on family migration on 13 July. This sets out proposals for tackling abuse of the family route, including sham and forced marriages. It also contains proposals to promote integration and reduce burdens on the taxpayer.

[Damian Green]

That is an important point, because sham marriages not only undermine our immigration system; they damage the institution of marriage. Forced marriage is, if anything, even worse. It represents a breach of human rights, and it is a form of violence against the victim. That is why we are proposing in our consultation to define more clearly what constitutes a genuine and continuing marriage for the purposes of the immigration rules, to help to identify sham and forced marriages. We are also exploring the case for making sham a lawful impediment to marriage in England and Wales.

[Graham Evans]

Does the Minister agree that British citizens who cannot support their foreign partners should not expect the British taxpayer to do it for them?

[Damian Green]

My hon. Friend makes another good point. Part of our consultation involves ensuring that those who arrive here to get married come into a family that has sufficient means to support them. One of the problems that we inherited was the fact that the institution of marriage was being exploited to circumvent the immigration rules. In tightening up on this, we are not only restoring confidence in the immigration system but helping to bolster the institution of marriage. Both of those are extremely worthwhile efforts.

Metropolitan Police Service

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I might remind the hon. Gentleman and the House that in fact, the appointment of Neil Wallis—or, to be correct, of Chamy Media—was undertaken not under this Government, but in September 2009, under the previous one.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

The whole House will remember when Damian McBride planned to smear the wives and families of Opposition Members. Does my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary agree that those who live in glass houses should be more careful about throwing stones?

[Mrs May]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend, and as I pointed out to the shadow Home Secretary, the communications director advising the Leader of the Opposition is a former News International employee, Tom Baldwin.

Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Monday 27th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

T6. Cheshire police have successfully made £13 million of efficiency savings while maintaining front-line services and dramatically cutting crime. Does the Home Secretary agree that that superb achievement highlights a fundamental difference between this Government and the last? While Labour judges things by how much is spent, we focus on the services delivered.

[Nick Herbert]

I strongly agree with my hon. Friend. I visited Cheshire police a few weeks ago and was impressed by what they are doing to drive savings and, in particular, by a pilot scheme that they are running in Runcorn, which returns discretion to police officers and improves the service to the public. In the pilot, when police officers are dealing with an offence, they are asked to look at the causes of that offence—

National Crime Agency

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend obviously has a particular interest as chairman of the all-party group on human trafficking. I know that he is waiting, I hope with some interest and excitement, for the Government’s publication of our human trafficking strategy in a matter of weeks, when we will be able to set the matter in more context. The aim is that human trafficking will come within the National Crime Agency’s remit. Whether it is in a specific unit in the organised crime command or dealt with in another way will be a matter for the NCA when it is set up, but once we have an individual in place who is driving the creation of the NCA, I expect that to be exactly the sort of issue that they will want to examine.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend reassure me that the National Crime Agency will build on some of the good work of SOCA in tackling organised crime?

Women (Government Policies)

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend makes an important point that I was about to deal with. In the longer term, we want to take reforms even further. The state pension Green Paper proposed a single-tier state pension combining the state pension and the state second pension to provide an estimated £140 per week, which would be of particular benefit to women who have had to take time out of the labour market because of their caring responsibilities. The coalition Government are not just talking about this—we have actually made proposals to help women in this regard.

On health, we are pursuing policies that give real help to women. We have stuck to our promise to increase health spending in real terms; we are sticking to our coalition agreement commitment to increase the number of health visitors by 4,200 by 2015; and we are making available £400 million over the next four years to support breaks for all those hard-working carers, many of whom are women.

I have made it absolutely clear, as has my hon. Friend the Minister for Equalities, that tackling violence against women and girls is one of my top priorities, which is why in March we published an action plan to tackle the problem; it is why we have provided more than £28 million of stable Home Office funding until 2015 for local specialist services; it is why we have provided £900,000 until 2015 to support national helplines; and it is why for the first time we have put funding for rape crisis centres on a stable footing. We will provide more than £10 million over three years to support their work, and we will open new centres where there are gaps in provision. This should not be a party political issue. It is about helping the 1 million women who suffer domestic abuse each year; the 300,000 women who are sexually assaulted; and the 60,000 women who are raped. As the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford said, one in four women will experience domestic abuse in their lifetime, and that will often be accompanied by years of psychological abuse. That is why the Government take violence against women and girls so seriously.

We will only change damaging behaviour, however, after we have changed the underlying attitudes that cause that behaviour. Those attitudes are fundamentally affected by the culture and society in which children grow up. We share the concern of many parents that children are now being exposed to sexualised images and an increasingly sexualised culture from an early age, which is why we commissioned Reg Bailey, the chief executive of the Mothers’ Union, to lead an independent review of the commercialisation and sexualisation of childhood. He has listened to parents’ concerns about explicit music videos, outdoor adverts and the increasing amount of sexual content in family programming on television.

Reg Bailey’s recommendations call on businesses and broadcasters to play their part, and they include putting age restrictions on music videos, covering up explicit images on the front pages of magazines and newspapers and restricting outdoor adverts near schools, nurseries and playgrounds. He also recommends that retailers sign up to a code of practice that checks and challenges the design, display and marketing of clothes, products and services for children. There has been a great deal of goodwill from the broadcast, retail and advertising industries throughout this review. They know that family-friendly practices make good business sense, and the Government will now look to work with business to implement the review’s proposals.

As well as helping women in this country, we are doing more than ever before to help women overseas. We are putting women at the heart of our international development policies, because in development there are few better options than investing in women. In Ivory Coast, for example, an increase of just $10 in women’s income achieves the same nutritional and health outcomes for children as an increase of $110 in men’s income. On international women’s day, the Department for International Development published its new strategic vision for girls and women. It sets out that, by 2015, our international development work will have saved the lives of at least 50,000 women in pregnancy and childbirth and 250,000 newborn babies; will have allowed at least 10 million women to access modern methods of family planning; will have supported more than 9 million children in primary education, of whom at least half will be girls, and 700,000 girls in secondary education; and will have helped 2.3 million women to access jobs and 18 million women to access financial services.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

The majority of part-time students studying for first degrees are women. Ten years ago I graduated as a mature part-time student—and I was pleased to note then that the majority of students were women. However, will my right hon. Friend confirm the Government’s decision to extend loan support to part-time students, which will give women the opportunity to advance their careers through further education?

[Mrs May]

I commend my hon. Friend on his experience and how he got his qualification—I am choosing my words carefully, given what he said about the number of females on the course. However, it is important that we support part-time study, because it is an option that people are increasingly considering. The extra support that we have provided and the way we have dealt with the issue are important steps forward. As he said, such support will have a particularly significant impact on women, given that many part-time students are women.

Prevent Strategy

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

The last time I looked, there was a different education system in Scotland, and I reassure the hon. Gentleman that I am not suggesting that I will touch it. However, I think that people across the United Kingdom share a belief in the values of democracy, human rights, equality and the rule of law, and those are the values that we are talking about.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

I welcome the teaching of British history in our schools. Will my right hon. Friend reassure the House that the police and security services are content with the new package of proposals?

[Mrs May]

I am very happy to give my hon. Friend that confirmation. We have of course been talking to the police and the intelligence agencies about the issue, and there will be particular interaction with the police because a significant part of the Prevent money is spent by them. I will write to chief constables and others today to set out the new strategy.

Immigration

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Thursday 18th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

I am pleased to have the chance to talk on such a vital topic. For far too long, politicians of all parties have ducked debating immigration and, in my view, that has done Britain considerable damage over the past few years. I therefore congratulate the Backbench Business Committee on organising this debate, which is an important step forward. I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field), who is a near neighbour of mine on the Mersey estuary. I was a long-time admirer of his before I joined the House. Like the Prime Minister, I want immigration to cease being a political issue. We certainly cannot achieve that by deliberately ignoring it or shrilly shouting down anyone who tries to raise it, but we can achieve it through calm and sensible public discussion.

To my mind, there are three areas of overwhelming public concern that need to be addressed: enforcement, integration and pressures on public services. Unless we have faith in our ability to control our borders, immigration will inevitably remain a major concern for many of my constituents. It is right that the Government are creating a border police force, but if we are to get to grips with enforcement, the UK Border Agency must become more efficient. My hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) talked eloquently about the staff who man those borders. I recently went on a trip to Auschwitz with a group of schoolchildren from my constituency and from the north-west. When we landed at Krakow airport, we were under no illusions about who was in charge, which I found quite ironic given the number of Poles that come to our country and the fact that we were only there on a day trip. I believe that the idea of a uniformed force—and, dare I say it, even an armed force—as a welcoming committee should be discussed.

There are still hundreds of thousands of outstanding cases, however, with many applicants waiting years for a decision. That regrettable hangover from the years of Labour mismanagement not only undermines faith in the system but is deeply unfair on those left waiting, not knowing whether they are coming or going, unable to plan for the future and truly to integrate into society. Decisions on applications must be reached quickly and fairly, a point that was made earlier.

Let me turn to the issue of integration. It is a concern of mine that in some of our towns and cities there are real divisions along racial, cultural and religious lines. A few years ago, the head of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, Trevor Phillips, expressed his concern that Britain was sleepwalking into segregation. Such divisions are deeply unhealthy and need to be tackled head-on.

In my view, instead of the phoney posturing about Britishness of which the previous Government were so fond, we should focus on the biggest barriers to integration, such as language. Making learning English an absolute requirement for those who wish to settle here will not only strengthen community cohesion but help to reduce pressure on our public services. Studies have shown a strong correlation between poor school performance and the number of children on the roll who come from homes in which English is a second language. That is just one of the many additional pressures that high levels of immigration have placed on our public services. My conversations with many of my constituents have left me in no doubt that the main reason for public concern about immigration is the pressure that it places on our schools, hospitals and housing. People are frustrated that for the past 13 years, Labour Ministers have seemed completely oblivious to those pressures, particularly on housing. I recommend that hon. Members read “The New East End”—an excellent study on this subject that was carried out not far away in Tower Hamlets.

It is vital to balance the need to reduce those pressures against the need for specialist, highly skilled workers. Earlier, I asked a question about Daresbury science and innovation campus, which is an outstanding institution in my constituency. It is an international campus that relies totally on attracting the brightest and best scientists from around the world. For that to be successful, we have to look outwards and allow people from all over the world to access it. I am concerned that that might not have happened under previous Administrations, but it is vital to allow the brightest and best to access our universities and businesses.

I would be interested to consider more closely the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles) about surety deposits, with discounts for immigrants with particularly sought-after skills. That would allow businesses to benefit while new migrants pay their way for public services. It would also help to reduce the sense of unfairness that some feel about free-riders getting immediate access to schools and hospitals without having contributed through taxes.

I conclude by supporting the motion wholeheartedly. Those of us who believe in the values of one-nation conservatism know that we need to be more effective in managing migration if we are to be a truly united kingdom.

Crime and Policing

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Wednesday 8th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

I have spent a lot of time in my constituency since being elected three or four months ago, and during the recess I managed to meet and have a good discussion with two chief constables. Indeed, I am very lucky to have two very good chief constables residing in my constituency. We have some tough times ahead, as they know, but they struck me as two powerful individuals who know where they can make a difference in their forces.

We will have to make cuts of 20%, but the two chief constables struck me as business people who realise that times are bad. This is not the first time that we have been in this position, and those cuts have to be made. Some 85% of the police budget goes on people, so there will inevitably be a reduction in numbers, but just because there is going to be a reduction in police numbers and in recruitment, that does not necessarily mean that crime will go up. They went through in detail how they were planning and hoping to limit the effect on front-line policing.

[Toby Perkins]

I am fascinated by the hon. Gentleman’s conversation, because I am sure that many Members have met their local chief constables. He mentioned that they would be able to limit the effect of the reductions that we will have to make, but did they explain what they would have to do? Will the hon. Gentleman touch on what they said they would no longer be able to do? I am interested to hear that they did at least admit that the cuts would affect the service that they are going to provide.

[Graham Evans]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. They went on to talk about backroom staff and how they can reduce significant labour costs among the back office, civilian staff whom the police employ. They also discussed putting back on to the beat those policemen who, for whatever reason, undertake back-office duties.

Unnecessary paperwork also keeps front-line police officers in the station, and the two chief constables talked about ways of reducing it, as the House has discussed over the past few hours, and ensuring that officers return to front-line services. I do not try to paint a pretty picture, however, because there are some difficult decisions to make. Those chief constables have to make them, but they are going to do their utmost to ensure that front-line services are not affected.

I come from a business background and have personal experience of trying to cut costs while adding value and ensuring that, at the front end, customers do not see the consequences of those cuts. The police are in a very good position to do something similar. Time will tell, but I hope that it bears out my belief that the situation is not as gloomy as some people say it is. However, there are some difficult decisions to make.

Having spent some time with the two chief constables, I visited Runcorn police station, where a new inspector was in town. He told me that he was bringing a new broom out of the cupboard and going through the police station. He had managed to increase the clear-up rate in that area by 20% within a few short weeks. I asked him what sorts of things he did to enable him to achieve that, and he said that he had found that there was misinterpretation of correct procedures and of who are the best people to clear up the casework. I was struck by the fact that there are examples of best practice that can be shared between divisions and, indeed, police forces. Many police forces do not communicate with one another. If cases of best practice were communicated between one constabulary and another, efficiency savings could be made.

A lot of it can be down to leadership and management. A sergeant in Runcorn who had been in the Cheshire constabulary for 25 years told me that he had spent most of his career arresting members of the same family. I found it quite disturbing that one could spend a 25-year career arresting the grandfathers and fathers of the same family. I cannot help feeling that we do not go to the core of the problem of continuous crime. Antisocial behaviour orders have a lot of merit. However, unless we get in to see the families who have blighted the community of the right hon. Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears), and so many communities in my constituency, and stop them repeating these crimes, it goes on and on, with three generations of the same family being unemployed, facing social deprivation, and causing unnecessary and disproportionate problems within their communities. If we could get into these families, one by one, their communities would not have these problems.

[Neil Carmichael (Stroud) (Con)]

Of course we must keep our eye on the public sector deficit, but I hope that my hon. Friend will join me in celebrating the fact that the Gloucestershire constabulary will end up with more policemen out and about as a result of reforms driven by the recent expenditure announcements. That is good news for the good people of Stroud, Dursley, Cam and elsewhere. There are more policemen out and about compared with last year, which is great news.

[Graham Evans]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s contribution.

If we keep on arresting and dealing with the same families within the same communities, we will keep on going round in circles and having these conversations time and again in years to come.

I pay tribute to some of the good work that was done by right hon. and hon. Members on the Opposition Benches during their time in government, with measures such as Sure Start, which gets into families at a very early stage to try to give them the best start in life, so that as the children grow older they should become responsible citizens. In my experience as a police officer, and when speaking to the police officers in the Cheshire constabulary, I have found that too many young people go off the rails too soon. That is why I would like some of the good work of Sure Start to be followed up. Other agencies, working with the police, need to get involved in getting individuals off drug and alcohol abuse. Jobcentre Plus should get involved with these people to try to get them making a proactive and genuine contribution to the communities that they have blighted. I appreciate that this is a long-term thing that was started by the previous Government during the past 13 years, but an awful lot of work still needs to be done in certain communities in my constituency.

I will be supporting the amendment, because something has to change. Directly elected commissioners may or may not be a good idea that may or may not work. In my experience as a police constable, having worked in these communities, I have seen that the Cheshire constabulary is doing a good job, but I believe it could do better, and I would like directly elected commissioners to be given at least a fighting chance.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anna Soubry]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman and, in due course, I will touch on my hopes for a much improved police force.

As a criminal barrister, I could speak for ever about this subject, but the clock is against me. I am pleased that one of the first things that the coalition did, to enable our police officers to get on and do the job that they want to do, was to allow our custody sergeants to charge some minor offences. I would like custody sergeants to revert to having the decision about charge on all matters, working in co-operation with the Crown Prosecution Service. They should take the responsibility that they always used to have for the charges that the accused should face. Changes can always be made as more evidence is gathered and leading counsel and other counsel can also play their part.

We all want to see less form filling and bureaucracy. Opposition Members have to accept that for ordinary police officers—whom many of us have dealt with on almost a daily basis in our working lives—that is a true and real frustration. It holds them back from doing the job that they want to do. We have to restore and build confidence, not just in some of the communities to which the right hon. Member for Tottenham referred, but across Britain. We have to restore the confidence of the public in our police. How many times have Members gone along to a residents’ meeting, or knocked on a door while canvassing, and someone says, “You know what, there’s a real problem with kids hanging around outside the Co-op”? It is called antisocial behaviour, but it is actually often low-level criminality. One hears that complaint and asks, “Well, have you rung up and complained about it?”, but then one hears the riposte, “Well, what’s the point? The police never come out, and if they do come out, they won’t do anything about it, and if they do do anything about, it won’t get to court.” And so it goes on. We have to break that cycle, and that sort of work has to start now. By reducing the form-filling and bureaucracy, we will begin at least to make our police more efficient. However, we have to stop this idea that there is no point in contacting our police because they do not have the time or will to do the job.

When it comes to the police and what they give back, I want to see some big changes in how they think and operate. When police officers commit offences, whether like the assault on Ian Tomlinson that lead to his death or like the case in which a police officer recently received a custodial sentence of six months, I want police officers prosecuted fairly, vigorously and swiftly, just like anybody else. There should be no bounds, and the police must be prosecuted properly.

I also want police officers to be prosecuted when they give perjured evidence in court—[Interruption.] I see hon. Members nodding. I know of the work of the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner). Like many in the criminal justice system, we have sat in court and heard officers on oath tell lies. That has happened, and we know of it. We also know that they have never been brought to book. That has to change. There is a duty on the Crown Prosecution Service, judges, counsels and solicitors to make those complaints and for them to be taken up, if we are to restore confidence in our police service.

When police officers fail to do their job—I suspect there might be a few more nods of agreement from hon. Members—when they fail to disclose material, as they are statutorily obliged to do, when they fail to seize the CCTV or, if they have seized it, to view it rather than destroy it, or when they fail to disclose it to the defence or put it on to the schedule of material to be disclosed to the defence, those are important matters that should not be left to rest, but must be taken up by the police and acted on in order to restore confidence in our police.

I do not want to sound overly critical of the police, because I have real sympathy for many police officers. In my previous work, I dealt with them on almost a daily basis.

[Graham Evans]

New police officers have a two-year probation period, during which they have to prove themselves to be hard-working, conscientious individuals, and if they get things wrong or do not work hard enough, they can be asked or forced to leave the force. However, after that two-year probation, it is very difficult to remove police constables from the police force, so some police officers can—how shall I put this?—work less hard than others. Does my hon. Friend have a view on that?

[Anna Soubry]

Absolutely. That concerns me. I had a case in my constituency involving somebody whom I thought had been wrongly removed from the police force. He quite rightly said to me—indeed, I knew from my own experience—that many officers had done far worse than him, in my opinion and, more importantly, the opinion of others, but had retained their jobs.

I am concerned about the training of police officers. Why are all police officers not at least taught keyboard skills? Those of us involved in the criminal justice system know that it still takes two police officers to take a section 9 statement. In this day and age, that is bonkers. There must be a better way. Think of how many police hours would be spent back on the streets or doing other work if it did not take two police officers, in most instances, to take a written statement. There must be better ways of doing that.

I am concerned that so many cases are no longer investigated by an officer of the right rank. I was involved in a prosecution case—unusually, because I did not prosecute much—involving a section 20, grievous bodily harm offence. The investigating officer was a police constable who had only come out of his training two years before. I have defended people accused of rape where the investigating officer was a detective constable. I know I sound the age I undoubtedly am, but in my day—many others would say this—a detective inspector always investigated the offence of rape. No disrespect to the many detective constables I know, but what happened in those cases was quite wrong. Rape is a serious offence and it requires a senior officer to investigate it. I am concerned that serious offences such as section 20s are no longer being investigated by properly trained detectives, but by the uniform branch, to use that term. I am far from convinced that things are being properly investigated; in other words, that justice is being done to everybody—victims and those accused.

Let me turn briefly to what underlies this debate, which is the cuts. It is disingenuous of Labour Members not to face up to the reality of their legacy and the situation that we have been left with. Even if they had won back in May, they know in their hearts that they, too, would be faced with a deficit and would have had to make the sort of decisions that the coalition is now making. That would mean chief constables being placed in a position, as they all are, of having to make serious and long-term cuts in their budgets. I have been to see my chief constable. She has spoken to me frankly and we have discussed the situation. I have no doubt that one of the consequences in my county will be a reduction in police stations. That does not please me, but a clever, thoughtful and resourceful chief constable will use this situation as an opportunity to say, “How can we improve the service that we give to people? How do we become a better police force in this county? In facing these cutbacks in our budget, we could actually be brave and radical in how we operate.”

I know that the clock is against me, but I have to respond to what has been said about CCTV cameras and to bundle in something about ASBOs. I have no difficulty with the concept of ASBOs, but I support much of what my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon (Mr Buckland) said. They have been used effectively, like CCTV, as a sort of sticking plaster. Let me refer hon. Members briefly to a case that I have in Stapleford, a town in my constituency. We have a problem with antisocial behaviour, and there are those who, if I may say so, do not really think outside the box who say, “Put a CCTV camera up. It’ll solve the problem.” However, it will not, because the trees are overgrown, and even if there were a camera, it would not catch the street. However, the real point is that a CCTV camera will only move the problem on. The real solution, especially to so much youth offending, is to do what we have said we will do, which is look at the causes of crime and begin to tackle the social problems that have led to this increase in criminality.

Policing in the 21st Century

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Monday 26th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

As the hon. Lady will know, the question of party allegiance does not arise in relation to chief constables, because members of the police force are not able to be members of political parties. We are absolutely clear that chief constables will retain their operational independence. It is important that they and the police in this country are able to operate without fear or favour, and we will maintain that. However, according to a Cabinet Office survey conducted under the last Labour Government, at the moment, only 7% of people in this country know that if they have a problem with the police, they can go to their police authority. We will clearly be ensuring democratic accountability for the police at local level through the introduction of police commissioners, although I am sorry that the hon. Lady has such a jaundiced view of the views of the British people.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

As a special constable who served in the Cheshire constabulary, I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement about increasing the number of special constables. Does she agree that these unpaid volunteers are an excellent and cost-effective way to fight crime?

[Mrs May]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising the issue of special constables. I thank him for what he did as a special constable and place on record the thanks of the whole House for the work that all special constables do in helping the fight against crime. They play an important role, and we intend to encourage more people to take it on.

Terrorism Act 2000 (Section 44)

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Thursday 8th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I am concerned about the point that the hon. Gentleman has made, although I thank him for his comments on the statement. I assure him that the statement that I have made is the one that was drafted and that I saw this morning in the Home Office before I came to the Chamber. I am concerned if he has seen an alternative version, and I will look into that matter. I am very conscious of the possible impact in Northern Ireland. That is precisely why the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and I have been discussing this issue over a number of days, and he has been consulting in Northern Ireland on the statement’s impact. I believe that the PSNI had been exercising its powers under the legislation in relation to necessity and reasonable suspicion, and it can continue to do so as a result of the statement that I have made today. As I indicated in an earlier response, other powers will still be available to the PSNI.

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

Will the Secretary of State reassure the House that the police can continue to use existing stop-and-search powers to combat drug dealers and those carrying knives and guns, and that counter-terrorism legislation ought never to be used for those purposes?

[Mrs May]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question, which enables me to be clear that the other stop-and-search powers are not affected by the statement. The statement relates to the Terrorism Act 2000, particularly section 44, although other sections are part of the change. I am changing the guidance on section 44, but other stop-and-search powers are still available to police.