Police: Independent Inquiries

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 19th April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I should clarify that it is the Independent Office for Police Conduct rather than misconduct, as the noble Lord knows. The IOPC can investigate a matter referred to it, but it also has call-in powers to require referral. In terms of investigating a police force, the IOPC is independent of government and the Home Secretary does not have the power to direct it to investigate a force or any of its officers. The key functions of the IOPC include providing independent oversight of the police complaints and discipline system, considering appeals when people believe that a police investigation into a complaint has got it wrong, and carrying out its own investigations into the most serious and sensitive matters relating to police conduct.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I understand the concern of noble Lords about the reputation of the right honourable Sir Edward Heath, but what about Bishop Bell, Lord Brittan or Sir Cliff Richard? It pains me to say this, but the police and the media cannot be trusted to comply with their own regulations on this issue. Will the Minister meet me to explore how my upcoming Private Member’s Bill to legally preserve anonymity before charge might be supported by the Government?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I am always happy to meet the noble Lord; we meet regularly. I understand all the cases that he talks about, which have gone through various mechanisms of investigation, and am happy to meet him to talk about his Private Member’s Bill.

Operation Conifer

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Tuesday 17th April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I am certainly aware of the very strong feeling in your Lordships’ House. I am also aware, and have made it clear to others, that there is a clear process in place should the PCC wish, as he indicated a year ago, to set it in train.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, this is not the only case. In the Cliff Richard case in the High Court yesterday, it was revealed that the police had tipped off the BBC, resulting in South Yorkshire Police feeling “forced” to tell the BBC when Sir Cliff’s home was going to be raided. Does the Minister not agree that the National Police Chiefs’ Council’s guidelines are clearly insufficient and that the time has come for legislation, as recommended by Sir Richard Henriques, to prevent the publication of the names of subjects until they have been charged with an offence, unless authorised by a Crown Court judge?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

There is certainly a presumption of anonymity before charge. I know the noble Lord will appreciate that it is not appropriate for me to comment on that specific case as it is currently the subject of legal proceedings.

Brexit: Border Control

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 29th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I am glad that the Minister mentioned technology. At the moment, because of EU citizens’ free movement, they use the e-passport gates at Heathrow, whereas non-EU citizens have to prove that they are not coming here to work illegally before they are admitted and cannot use the e-gates. Non-EU citizens can queue for more than two hours at the passport gates. How long will the queues be when EU citizens cannot use the e-gates?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, what this Government want when we exit the European Union is for there to be a smooth process at the border. The noble Lord is absolutely right to mention the e-gates because they have been a great innovation and demonstrate how technology is so helpful at the border, saving customers a huge amount of time. Obviously, the Government want to see a smooth process at the border.

Manchester Arena Attack Review

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

On the national counterterrorist reaction and response, I think the noble Lord will agree that generally the overall response was excellent. There was an issue with the telephony system. Part of that issue was that there was no backup system. That has been thoroughly reviewed and a backup has been put in place. It was not something we would have wished to have happened on such a terrible night. I hope that that sort of issue will never arise again because of the measures we have put in place.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I associate myself with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark. As a senior policer officer, I have been directly involved in the immediate response to terrorist incidents, including the attacks on London on 7 July 2005, and the aftermath is typically chaotic for several hours. Secondary explosive devices and/or marauding gunmen are real possibilities, as we saw in the November 2015 Paris attacks. If either of those alternative scenarios had transpired in this case, the criticism could well have been of the police and the ambulance service for putting their unarmed crews in danger. Does the Minister agree that these are extremely difficult calls to make but that once the decision has been made by the police, who are the lead agency in such situations, that decision needs to be communicated to all the emergency services so as to provide a united response? Can the Minister tell the House who in government is taking responsibility for ensuring that communication between emergency services is effective in these situations?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I pay tribute to the noble Lord and the part that he played in the Metropolitan Police. He must have some incredible experience of such things. He is absolutely right about the immediate aftermath, which is why there are various phased processes for the police and emergency services to go through afterwards. On the terrible possibility of a secondary attack, he is completely right to point out that communication is key, and the joint emergency services interoperability principles come into play. Events such as the 7/7 bombings, through which I am sure the noble Lord was operational, identified the need to improve that joint working between the emergency services. The JESIP, as it is called, was set up to improve how the police, fire and ambulance services work together when responding to those multiagency incidents when they are not specifically CT focused. That was not the case in this instance; it is most relevant in major incidents involving mass fatalities and significant numbers, such as those seen in Manchester and London last year—therefore, providing a key component to the UK’s ability to adequately prepare for a terrorist incident.

Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) (Custodial Premises) Subordinate Provisions Order 2018

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Tuesday 27th March 2018 Grand Committee

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, in bringing forward this statutory instrument the Government are seeking to restore the long-established principle that responsibility for enforcing fire safety regulations across the whole of the Crown’s custodial and detention estate should lie with those who have been appointed or authorised as Crown inspectors by Ministers in England and in Wales. At present, Crown inspectors in England and Wales are not the enforcing authorities for fire safety in the small number—about 7%—of custodial and detention premises where the Government have contracted out the provision of services to private providers.

That this was a significant issue became apparent in 2016 when responsibility for Crown inspectors in England transferred to the Home Office. Crown inspectors, the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice instigated an investigation into the contractual arrangements in place for the provision of custodial or detention operations. As a result of this detailed review of contracts and ownership arrangements, it became clear that a number of contractual arrangements had been put in place for the operation of these premises, which had had the effect of transferring ownership or occupation for the purposes of the fire safety order away from the relevant Crown departments to private companies. Where this has happened, the responsibility for enforcing compliance with fire safety regulation has similarly been transferred away from our dedicated teams of Crown inspectors, and lies instead with the individual local fire and rescue authorities in which the relevant premises are located. This is not what was intended when the fire safety order was enacted in October 2006.

At that time, the then Government were clear that, irrespective of any contractual arrangements that were in place with the private sector for the provision of services, they wanted Crown inspectors to be the sole enforcing authorities in these types of premises. Indeed, they went so far as to spell this out in the guidance on enforcement that they published, to which all those with enforcement responsibilities under the fire safety order are required to have regard.

Now we are aware that the policy intent no longer aligns with the law, we want to rectify the position and ensure that the original policy of Crown inspectors inspecting, and where necessary enforcing, fire safety regulation across the whole of the Government’s custodial estate is re-established. We want to ensure that there is absolute clarity, both now and in the future, about the scope of enforcement responsibilities for the fire and rescue authorities and the Crown inspectors. This order therefore amends article 25 of the fire safety order to set out specific legal definitions of the full range of custodial premises for which the Crown inspectors are to be responsible. These will be established beyond doubt and will not, as is currently the case, be contingent on the often complex contractual leasing or ownership arrangements that may now be in place. Essentially, this order delivers through legislation the clarity that was intended by the 2007 policy guidance on enforcement.

It is the Government’s intention, shared by our counterparts in Wales, for there to be a single national organisation in each of our areas of jurisdiction: an organisation charged with the responsibility and invested with the specific skills and expertise necessary to provide three key things.

First, we want Ministers and relevant departments—which of course have the ultimate responsibility for fire safety in these types of custodial and detention premises—to benefit from the strategic oversight of fire safety compliance across the whole of the Crown’s custodial estate that is available where a single national body is in place. Secondly, we want there to be a clear and easily accessible route established for ensuring that any concerns relating to fire safety in our custodial estate can be raised immediately and addressed promptly by those with day-to-day responsibilities for fire safety management. Where reluctance or poor communication militates against appropriate action, we want an immediate escalation mechanism—direct to Ministers, if necessary—to be in place and delivered through our national fire and rescue advisers. In England, this means the Chief Inspector of the Crown Premises Fire Inspection Group. In Wales, as in Scotland, it means the Welsh Government’s Chief Fire and Rescue Adviser. Thirdly, we want a dedicated cadre of fire safety inspecting officers, each with the necessary training, maintained and regularly updated, to operate safely and effectively in this unique type of premises, where the risk to life in the event of a fire is generally high.

The order will re-establish robust national arrangements across all of the Government’s custodial estate. As such, it will specify the full range of custodial premises for which the Government are responsible, providing absolute clarity on the scope of the Crown’s responsibility for inspection and enforcement. This will ensure that our dedicated team of experienced Crown inspectors are clear that they have the powers to ensure that appropriate fire safety standards are in place to protect the lives of those living in, working on or visiting the Government’s custodial or detention estate. I beg to move.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for introducing the order. I heard from what she said that this anomaly, whereby privately run prisons and custodial premises were not being inspected by national inspectors, was stumbled across when responsibility for Crown inspectors was transferred from the Ministry of Justice to the Home Office. Will she confirm that that is the case, and is it not a little worrying? How long might it have continued if that transfer had not taken place? Clearly, it is very important to have consistency across all privately run prisons and other places of detention, rather than to have the potential for different standards being applied by local fire and rescue services. On that basis, we support the order.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, I am very happy to support the order before the Grand Committee. It is certainly very sensible to have the experts in fire safety and security to be looking after the whole of the estate. I am very happy to support it.

I have one query; it is a little disappointing—I refer to page 5 of the impact assessment at paragraph 1.9. I am surprised that we still have this ridiculous “one in, three out” rule. It does not apply here because the Government have clearly tested it against that ridiculous rule. It is an example of the worst kind of ideological, political dogma. You would have thought, in the aftermath of a tragedy such as Grenfell, we would not be using it, but clearly the Government still are. I hope that any regulation is in force at any time because it is necessary and proper. I cannot believe we still have this arbitrary rule. It is a matter of much regret, which I will probably take up elsewhere. Other than that, I am very happy to support the order, but I was surprised to see this when I read through the papers this morning.

Police Powers of Designated Civilian Staff and Volunteers (Excluded Powers and Duties of Constables) Regulations 2018

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Tuesday 27th March 2018 Grand Committee

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for introducing this statutory instrument. I recommend that it is used by Radio 4 as one of its puzzles of the day because the complexity of the legislation had me going for a little while.

As I understand it, the Policing and Crime Act 2017 allows chief constables to confer powers of a constable to community support officers and community support volunteers unless the power is specifically excluded by its inclusion in Part 1 of Schedule 3B of the Police Reform Act 2002. I am getting reassuring nods from the Minister’s officials. The Government have woken up to the fact that this would include the power to conduct an intimate search if a police inspector or above—it used to be a superintendent but that was changed in other legislation—considers that an intimate search by a registered medical practitioner or registered nurse is not practicable. This would be, presumably, where there was concern that something was concealed that might cause harm to the individual or to other people, or that important evidence might be concealed which could be lost if the search did not take place straightaway.

I was going to ask the Minister to explain how this power was highlighted as not being suitable for PCSOs or volunteers to undertake but she has already explained that it was the Police Federation which raised this as an issue. However, I wonder how many other powers should be included in Part 1 of Schedule 3B of the Police Reform Act 2002 that we are yet to discover. I was also going to ask how many times the power had been used by PCSOs or volunteers but the Minister said that it had been used three times in the past 15 years.

During the passage of the Bill we made quite clear our concerns about powers that should be reserved for police officers potentially being given to police community support officers and police community support volunteers. However this is an important and welcome addition to Part 1 of Schedule 3B of the Police Reform Act 2002 and therefore we support it.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, I am happy to support the regulations before the Grand Committee. It is obviously sensible that civilians are designated as having certain additional police powers as and when an appropriate police officer believes they are needed. Equally, of course, it is important that certain things are prohibited, and certainly an intimate search should not be in the hands of anyone but a warranted police officer. That is why I fully support this order.

Police: Emergency Calls

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 22nd March 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Paddick]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they are taking to improve police force response times to emergency calls.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask a Question of which I have given private notice.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, no one in need of urgent help should have their emergency call unanswered. While answering 999 calls is an operational matter for the police, we have maintained protection for police spending so that forces have the resources that they need to carry out their important work. It is for the police to determine how best to allocate their resources and manage their communications with the public.

[Lord Paddick]

My Lords, today Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services has highlighted major concern that policing is under significant stress.

“About a quarter of forces are all too often overwhelmed by the demand they face”,


and are not meeting the one-hour standard for responding to 999 calls that require an immediate response, with one force taking an average of 14 hours to respond to such calls. Although these calls are not those where life is immediately in danger, they include domestic assaults where a partner has left the scene but could return at any moment, a category of call that has increased by 88% over the past year.

This week, the UK Statistics Authority ruled that the Government misled the public with the claim of an extra £450 million for local forces when, in fact, central government funding is falling in real terms—and has been for years. Would today, as we remember the sacrifice of PC Keith Palmer, be a good day for the Government to finally admit that the police service is now underfunded and say that they are going to increase central government funding for the police service?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I first join the noble Lord in remembering today the sacrifice that Keith Palmer made to protect people in the Palace of Westminster. There will be a memorial in, I think, about 20 minutes’ time in Westminster Hall to remember the attack a year ago. The MPCC and the APCC called for £440 million of extra funding in 2018-19, with additional counterterrorism funding and increases in council tax precepts on top. They wanted this funding for an extra 5,000 front-line officers for proactive policing by 2020. The funding increase for next year is made up of main government grant, protected at flat cash; up to £270 million from increase in council tax precept income; a £15 million increase in counterterrorism police funding; and a £130 million increase in national priorities, mostly special grant, for exceptional costs and technology. On the point about domestic violence, I totally agree with the noble Lord. We have provided £11 million through the police transformation fund to support new police interventions to tackle domestic abuse, with a focus on early intervention and prevention.

Domestic Abuse

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 22nd March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I warmly congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, on raising this very important issue.

I declare a personal interest, not to raise the point that men too can be survivors of domestic abuse—as we have heard, the overwhelming majority of survivors are women—and not to make the point that women are sometimes, albeit very rarely, the perpetrators of abuse, but because I was myself the victim of male violence in a same-sex relationship. It started lovingly but, gradually and almost imperceptibly, the coercive control, the isolation from friends, and the demanding of explanations of where I had been and who I had been with eventually culminated in physical violence.

The noble Baronesses, Lady Donaghy and Lady Newlove, talked about the courage that is required of victims of domestic violence to come forward. I think it was the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, who said that 80% of abuse is not reported. I was a police officer and never understood why people who had been assaulted by their partners wanted to go back to them after being patched up in casualty. I did not understand until I was in one of those relationships myself. Until you are in that situation, you do not realise that you can have love without violence, and sometimes you do not even recognise the situation that you are in.

As we have heard, providing accommodation for survivors of domestic abuse can be complex. As the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said, about two-thirds of women who have to leave the home they share with their abusive partner are often so fearful that they want to go not to the local refuge provided by their local authority but to somewhere where they hope their partner will never find them. As the noble Baroness said, we need to drop the local funding model to ensure that the funding for that is available.

Many local authorities, under financial pressure because of central government funding cuts, seek to outsource the provision of refuges to private companies, which provide only a physical place to stay and no other support. That is not enough. Even then, as the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, said, in 2016-17 60% of referrals to refuges were declined. However, as I said, providing a safe space is just one aspect of the support that survivors need.

Eighteen years after ending the three and a half year relationship with my abusive partner—even after separating, he repeatedly left messages on my voicemail threatening to kill me—I am sure that my mental health and the ability that I have now to be a loving partner are still adversely affected by the trauma I suffered then but for which I received no help. The trauma of being attacked by someone you love and who you believe loves you, of not feeling safe in your own home, are things that you have to experience to truly understand.

Although refuges are important, community-based responses, outreach advocacy, drop-in services, support for women who wish to stay in their own homes, information and advice—for example, for women who feel that something is not quite right, the same feeling I had, not realising that this was unlawful domestic violence—are just as important, if not more so, for more survivors, than for those survivors who require a safe place to go and live. Very often, children and young people are caught up in these unhealthy relationships and they also need support, as the noble Baroness, Lady Bertin, has said.

I regret to say, and I am becoming increasingly frustrated, that it is all too common for the Government to respond to these sorts of issues through legislation as an alternative to appropriate funding. What is needed, as for example in this case, is for both of these things to happen. As the noble Baronesses, Lady Donaghy and Lady Gale, said, these are issues where the funding of people who provide refuges and who provide this emotional counselling support for the survivors of abuse are as important, if not more important. Can the Minister please acknowledge the unique challenges facing those wanting to provide the services for survivors of domestic abuse and give us some hope today that the Government are going to provide long-term, sustainable funding to ensure that support can be provided?

Online Hate Speech

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 15th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Pearson of Rannoch (UKIP)]

My Lords—

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, on the basis that the House cannot get enough of the European Union at the moment, I ask whether the Minister has seen the Reuters article dated 19 January entitled “Social media companies Facebook, Twitter, Google’s YouTube have accelerated removals of online hate speech in the face of a potential European Union crackdown”. Does she agree that pressure brought to bear on social media companies by the 28 countries of the European Union is likely to be far more effective than the UK dealing with these companies alone?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I hope I can assure the noble Lord that in fact the UK does not come from a position of thinking that it can deal with these things alone. It is not just a European problem; it is a global problem. On the European point, one of the key aims of the EU code of conduct on countering illegal hate speech online is to increase the proportion of illegal hate speech online that is reported within 24 hours. We fully support that.

Incident in Salisbury

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Thursday 8th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I too thank the Minister for repeating the Statement and pay tribute to the emergency services, an issue I shall want to return to shortly. We are also concerned for the police officer and the other victims, their families and friends.

I appreciate that the investigation is ongoing, but can the Minister confirm that one of the victims was a Russian citizen who was a British spy or double agent, and that President Putin has in effect made death threats against such individuals? The Government should be telling Parliament as much as they can about such incidents, not as little as they can get away with while hiding behind the fact that there is an ongoing investigation.

The Statement talks about well-rehearsed CBRN procedures, but these are deployed when it is a known CBRN threat. What reassurance can the Minister give that such procedures will be reviewed so that first responders are not put in danger, as the police officer who first attended this incident has clearly been put in danger? The Statement talks about protecting British citizens, but what risk assessments are carried out on Russian citizens living in the UK, particularly those who may have risked their lives to assist the UK in the past?



We on these Benches have repeatedly expressed concern about reductions in Border Force, with reliance placed on electronic gates and remote ports and small airfields not having sufficient protection—a situation that is likely to be made worse if we continue to Brexit.

I understand that hostile foreign powers might produce very convincing fraudulent documents to get their assassins into the UK, but can the Minister speculate how on earth a highly toxic nerve agent was smuggled into the country, assuming it was not stolen from a government facility in this country? Is the Minister satisfied that Border Force is properly funded and that our borders are secure?

I pay tribute to the emergency services but I also pay tribute to the security and intelligence services. In the interactions that I have had with those services, I am confident that we have among the best security and intelligence services in the world. Clearly, however, in an arms race with hostile foreign powers, we need to ensure that those services are properly funded.

I pay particular tribute to the police service—as in this case, they are often the first to arrive at the scene of incidents, never knowing what dangers they face. I wish the officer in this case a speedy recovery. The Government have continued to say that we need fewer police officers because crime is falling, but this incident is just one example of the police being the service of last resort. They have to deal with people in distress and, as we saw last week, respond to people trapped in the appalling weather—nothing to do with crime. These brave police officers never know the sorts of dangers that they are facing and can end up, as this officer has, seriously ill in hospital. Sometimes they give up their lives in order to protect us, as Keith Palmer did nearly a year ago in this place. Yet the Government appear in the eyes of operational police officers to be treating the police service with contempt—freezing their salaries, cutting their pensions and reducing police budgets in real terms. Will the Minister tell the House when the Government are going to reverse their anti-police agenda?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

First, I echo the words of the noble Lords, Lord Kennedy and Paddick, in praising our emergency services in the highest possible terms for what they risked to help these two individuals, which of course led to one of the policemen being taken ill. He is still in hospital. It brings into play the question of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, about the danger to our emergency services and whether all risk assessments are done to mitigate such injury to the police.

Certainly I can say that in the CBRN area these procedures are constantly reviewed and people are trained to the highest possible level—but in an emergency like this we can all appreciate that sometimes people’s lives will be at risk. People are put in danger, and that is why we have the highest regard for the police. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, talked about police budgets. The police told us last year the number of additional police officers needed to do their job. We feel that in the budget they can attain this year they will have those police numbers—and more—to do the job that they do. That does not detract from the fact that the injury to this police officer, and indeed the death of PC Palmer some months ago, bring into sharp focus the dangers that police put themselves into.

The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, asked me to reiterate the Government’s determination to bring the perpetrators to justice. I said that in my Answer to the Question earlier and I repeat it now: we are absolutely determined to bring the perpetrators to justice.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, asked whether I could confirm that one of the individuals was a Russian spy. I am not in a position to comment further on the victims, other than in the Statement where I confirmed their names.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, also asked about borders, how the substance came into the country and how sure we are of effective border control. I am not prepared to comment on an ongoing operation; I know that the House got slightly exasperated with me earlier, but I cannot. We adopt a rigorous approach to border security, and agencies work together at the border to manage a range of threats, including those posed by terrorism and serious and organised crime. This includes carrying out 100% immigration and security checks at the primary control point, advanced checks where available and intelligence-led targeting at ports. Border Force has at its disposal a range of capabilities to detect, target and identify substances and materials that could cause harm.