Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Debate between Lord Sharpe of Epsom and Baroness Taylor of Stevenage

Report stage
Monday 18th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Sharpe of Epsom) (Con)]

My Lords, I thank both noble Baronesses for their comments. I am pretty sure that that will be the only time I am mentioned in the same speech with Beethoven.

In response to Amendment 277 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, I am still clear, as are the Government, that the Vagrancy Act is antiquated and not fit for purpose. I am happy to reassure the noble Baronesses, Lady Pinnock and Lady Taylor, that we will repeal the Vagrancy Act at the earliest opportunity, once suitable replacement legislation has been brought forward. Given that we remain committed to repealing the Vagrancy Act, there is little value in carrying out an assessment of the kind described in the amendment. The House will have ample opportunity to debate the matter when further details on any new legislation are set out.

Amendment 304A, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, is on the timing of the statement of levelling-up missions. We have committed within the Bill to publish this within one month of Part 1 of the Act coming into force, which will be two months after Royal Assent. This is already an appropriate and prompt timescale, which includes time to collate materials and data across government departments before the publication and laying of the report. Reducing that time would be unnecessary and may undermine the purpose of the missions: to ensure focus on long-term policy goals. I hope that provides reassurance for the noble Baronesses and that Amendment 277 can be withdrawn, and the other amendment not moved.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Sharpe, for his response, and I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for her comments. The Minister repeated the assertion that the Vagrancy Act will be repealed at the earliest opportunity. I do not know quite what “earliest” means in the Government’s mind, but it is certainly longer than the amount of time it has taken since the original commitment to repeal the Act.

The fact is that this Act is still being used to penalise homeless people every day in this country. I am not convinced that this is going to move quickly enough without some further steps being taken, so I would like to test the opinion of the House.

Police Uplift Programme

Debate between Lord Sharpe of Epsom and Baroness Taylor of Stevenage

Tuesday 2nd May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Lord is quite right. I am sorry if I seemed to evade the question. The simple fact of the matter is that I cannot comment on the strategy because I have not seen it, it is due to be published this week, and it will address all the various questions that the noble Lord has asked me—in other words, I do not know.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, as we have heard from my noble friend Lady Lawrence, even with the police uplift programme, there is still a shortage of over 9,000 police officers. As well as the decimation of neighbourhood policing that that has caused, many of the officers lost in earlier rounds of cuts will have been among the most experienced and highly trained; for example, officers trained in specialist intelligence, firearms and dealing with sexual offences. This has put immense pressure on those left behind to hold the fort and may explain, for example, why only 1% of rape offences reach a conviction. What assessment have the Government carried out of the impact of this loss of experience, and how long will it take to build back up so that the specialist officer posts can be filled?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The noble Baroness is right to talk about specialist skills and experience. I do not recognise the 9,000 number: as I have said repeatedly this afternoon, we have record numbers of police. I am afraid I cannot answer, as with the question that the noble Lord, Lord German, asked, about age distribution and so on. I can say that certain specific programmes, such the one I referenced earlier, Operation Soteria, are delivering very strong results. The necessary people are being trained in the right way in dealing with some of the things that are of significant public concern.

Police Conduct and David Carrick

Debate between Lord Sharpe of Epsom and Baroness Taylor of Stevenage

Thursday 19th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

The noble and gallant Lord makes some extremely good points, if I may say so. They echo some of the points from the noble Lord, Lord Dear, a couple of months ago when I was answering a Question, which piqued my interest. He raised the subject of the closure of the Bramshill police college, which trained police officers for senior leadership and ensured a degree of consistency across forces. As a consequence of that Question, which was asked of me a couple of months ago, I had a chat about this issue with Andy Marsh at the College of Policing, where a leadership academy is being established. Progress is not particularly fast at the moment—there are all sorts of reasons for that—but conversations will be ongoing because it has certainly piqued my interest. I have the Policing Minister’s agreement to continue to pursue this particular subject.

On the Metropolitan Police specifically, Sir Mark Rowley is setting up a leadership academy. The noble and gallant Lord raised the subject of degrees and what have you; I think that there is a problem with the consistency of delivery of degree services across police forces. It is certainly true that there is a problem of consistency of leadership across police forces. The noble and gallant Lord also hinted at an interesting point, towards the end of his question, about the types of officer that are now recruited. Obviously, the skills required to break up a fight in a pub and those required to tackle online crime are very different. They really ought to provoke some serious thinking about who, how and why we recruit.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am grateful to the Minister for his points about the violence against women and girls strategy. The measure of that, of course, will be whether we stop losing 140 women a year at the hands of domestic abuse attackers.

Although PC Carrick was a Metropolitan Police officer, he lived in my hometown of Stevenage. I express my great thanks to Hertfordshire Constabulary for the very thorough investigation that it carried out into this issue. I join noble Lords in expressing my shock at the disgraceful and troubling revelations regarding this case and others. I worked in policing for many years. I feel deeply for the thousands of officers out there who do amazing things in our communities every day and who will feel so badly let down by the appalling conduct of PC Carrick and the other cases that we have heard about. They have damaged the trust and confidence of the communities that our good officers serve.

With the Met Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, saying that he has a further 800 officers suspended or on limited duties because they are under investigation for serious misconduct, what reassurance can the Minister give about the liaison between the Metropolitan Police and the surrounding areas and forces where these potential offenders may live?

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

I echo the noble Baroness’s comments about the vast majority of serving officers who do such a fantastic job, whom I have already referenced. As the noble Baroness says, their work is undermined by situations such as this. As regards liaison with the surrounding areas, I am afraid that I really do not have the answer to that question. I shall ask Sir Mark and see whether he is willing to say something in public on that subject.