Oral Answers to Questions

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Tuesday 18th March 2014

(10 years, 9 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Chris Williamson Portrait Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)
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2. What progress he has made on his plans for changes to the probation service.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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12. What progress he has made on his plans for changes to the probation service.

Grahame Morris Portrait Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)
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15. What progress he has made on his plans for changes to the probation service.

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Lord Grayling Portrait Chris Grayling
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The Opposition continue to refer to the planning document at the start of the project, and they cannot explain what they would do instead. Their policy is to leave 50,000 people walking the streets and likely to commit serious offences again with no support post-prison. Until the Opposition tell us what they would do to address the problem, which they identified when in government and did nothing about, they will have no credibility.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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In some large areas, there have been only a small number of bidders for the service, and the award-winning Northumbria probation trust is down to three bidders. Can the Secretary of State tell us exactly how many bidders have dropped out since the process started?

Lord Grayling Portrait Chris Grayling
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We have a strong slate of potential bidders in every part of the country, with a good mix of private and voluntary sector expertise and some attractive partnerships that can deliver real results for us. We will see later in the summer who emerges successfully from the bidding process, but I am completely confident that we have a strong candidate in every part of the country.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Tuesday 21st May 2013

(11 years, 7 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Damian Green Portrait Damian Green
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I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for saying there are practical difficulties in implementing this. We are looking at a range of measures. He will be aware that our consultation on the victims’ code closed only a few days ago, and the Minister for victims, my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant), will be publishing a response this summer. Obviously, that must align with the witness charter as well. I hope all these things will come to fruition shortly.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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7. What the Government’s plans are for the future of legal aid.

Lord Grayling Portrait The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Grayling)
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We are consulting on proposed reforms of the legal aid system, as set out in our consultation document, “Transforming Legal Aid”, which was published on 9 April. We are seeking views on proposals to ensure that the criminal legal aid system in this country operates more efficiently, that we live within our means, and that we have a system in which the public can have confidence.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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What steps is the Minister taking to make publicly available details of the amounts paid by the legal aid authorities to counsel and solicitors and the costs for the preparation of cases prosecuted each year?

Lord Grayling Portrait Chris Grayling
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That information is already available to a degree. It is available to hon. Members and has been published under the Freedom of Information Act. It is very important that at the same time as ensuring we have a proper legal aid system that provides access to justice to all, we ensure that the payments we make are payments we can afford.

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Helen Grant Portrait The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mrs Helen Grant)
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Our whiplash consultation closed on 8 March. We looked into the use of independent medical review panels and increasing the small claims compensation threshold. A response to the Government’s consultation will be published in autumn this year after the Transport Committee’s inquiry into whiplash.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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T2. What plans does the Minister have to monitor the banning of referral fees in personal injury matters and to review the payment of referral fees in conveyancing?

Lord Grayling Portrait Chris Grayling
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We have already introduced changes that ban referral fees, and we are looking at other reforms that will tighten up the whole culture that exists around personal injury and similar claims. There is good work in parts of the legal profession in doing genuine work on behalf of genuine claims. However, there are too many question marks in the system. Now that we have made those changes, the challenge is for the insurance industry to bring down policy prices. If it does not do that, we will not hesitate to take action in the other direction.

Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Tuesday 21st May 2013

(11 years, 7 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Caroline Lucas Portrait Caroline Lucas
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I am grateful to the right hon. and learned Gentleman for that intervention. I know he has had first-hand experience in his constituency of exactly this issue.

Paragraph 18 of schedule 9 to the Equality Act 2010 allows employers and pension providers to ignore the service and contributions of gay employees made before 5 December 2005 when it comes to assessing survivor benefits for their civil partners and occupational pension schemes. Paragraph 15 of schedule 4 to the Bill would extend that discriminatory provision to same-sex spouses.

As we saw in yesterday’s debate on opening civil partnerships to opposite-sex couples, the Government are comfortable arguing that unforeseen costs to pension schemes are a legitimate justification for sanctioning discrimination, yet their warning that the equalisation of treatment in the provision of occupational pension benefits will cost too much simply cannot be substantiated. No pension provider can accurately predict how many individuals in a pension scheme will be gay, never mind how many of them will marry or form a civil partnership with an individual who outlives them by a significant period of time.

Dealing with uncertainties around length of life, the possibility of illness, the decision to marry and many other issues is second nature to pension providers. Gay married people pose no more uncertainty than their straight counterparts. What is more, according to the Government’s figures, two thirds of pension providers already do the right thing, so any additional liability to pension schemes will surely be minimal. The financial implications of perpetuating discrimination could be very grave indeed, though, for those individuals who have paid into their pension schemes in the same way as other employees, yet will be denied the survivor benefits available to married mixed-sex couples.

One recent employment tribunal found that an occupational pension scheme was directly discriminatory because it provided a civil partner with only the benefit from pension rights accrued since 2004—in other words, when civil partnerships became available in the UK. John Walker and his civil partner have been together for 20 years and registered their civil partnership at the first possible opportunity, yet the pension scheme sought to restrict the survivor benefits available to John’s partner to just £500 a year. If John dissolved his civil partnership and married a woman today, she would be entitled to £41,000 per annum in the event of his death.

With the help of Liberty, John challenged that discrimination and recently won his legal battle to secure equal pension benefits for his civil partner. The employment tribunal relied on European Court of Justice rulings, which concluded that treating married and same-sex couples differently over the pensions payable to a survivor when national law recognises the relationships as equivalent in other respects breached the framework directive on equal treatment in employment. My amendment 49 would ensure full compliance with that directive and, crucially, ensure that the equality rulings made by the courts are applicable to all marriage relationships.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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Does the hon. Lady agree that if people are to have parity before the law, they must have not just emotional parity, but financial parity? Anything less would not be equality in any shape or form.

Caroline Lucas Portrait Caroline Lucas
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I absolutely agree with the hon. Lady. We are talking about genuine equality. That means legal equality, as well as symbolic or any other kind of equality.

That tribunal was a landmark case. Interestingly, the Government lost the case, so one could argue that agreeing to my amendment 49 might save them money, as they would not need to pay out in future legal cases that might go against them. If the law remains as it is for civil partners and that inequality is extended to those in same-sex marriages, it could be several decades before gay couples achieve real equality in pension provision. I see no justification for continuing to permit discrimination in this area. I hope very much that colleagues will support amendment 49 and join me in overturning an anomalous and discriminatory provision.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Tuesday 5th February 2013

(11 years, 11 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Jeremy Wright Portrait Jeremy Wright
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The straight answer to the hon. Gentleman’s question is that a public sector probation officer will make the judgment on whether a breach should be subject to action. Those providing interventions will be obliged to supply information about what has happened, but the judgment will be made by the probation officer.

The hon. Gentleman ought to recognise that, in a great many cases, a large number of the interventions provided for those who have been sentenced under community orders are made by the voluntary sector. It is not true that probation officers currently do everything themselves, and the flow of information between them and those who do is generally very good.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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3. What progress he has made on his plans for the probation service; and if he will make a statement.

Lord Grayling Portrait The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Grayling)
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The Ministry of Justice recently published the consultation paper “Transforming Rehabilitation—a revolution in the way we manage offenders”, which sets out our plans for reforming the way in which offenders are rehabilitated in the community. The consultation closes on 22 February 2013, and we will announce further details of our proposals once we have considered the responses.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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Under the Secretary of State’s proposals, services will be fragmented across a wide range of providers and will be rewarded through payment by results, which will prevent public sector probation trusts from competing for those services. So how will he ensure that the high levels of performance now provided by probation trusts in protecting the public and reducing reoffending will be maintained?

Oral Answers to Questions

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Thursday 10th January 2013

(12 years ago)

Commons Chamber
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Maria Miller Portrait Maria Miller
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The hon. Lady is right to raise the issue of the role of the Church of England and the Church in Wales. Our stance throughout has been to protect those organisations to enable them to make their own decisions. We are talking to them on an ongoing basis about the best way to do that. As to her question about whether they would be able to undertake these duties in the future if they decide to do so, the answer is absolutely yes.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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2. What assessment she has made of the implications for her policies on women of recent tax and benefit changes.

Maria Miller Portrait The Minister for Women and Equalities (Maria Miller)
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Departments always take full account of the impact on women of their policies, and the Government are supporting women and their families, for example by extending child care through universal credit and by lifting 2 million of the lowest paid workers—of whom six out of 10 are women—out of income tax altogether.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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Research from the House of Commons Library shows that women will be hit four times harder by incoming direct tax, tax credit and benefit changes. Will the Minister tell us why she allowed the Chancellor to get away with treating women so unfairly in his autumn statement?

Maria Miller Portrait Maria Miller
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The hon. Lady needs to look at the total package of measures brought forward in the autumn statement. We are absolutely mindful of the need to make sure that we support those who find it most difficult in today’s society. That is why 1 million women have been taken out of tax altogether and why we are putting £200 million more into child care for people who are working the shortest hours. Those things have never happened before, and I hope the hon. Lady will applaud and welcome those measures.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Tuesday 18th December 2012

(12 years ago)

Commons Chamber
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Jeremy Wright Portrait Jeremy Wright
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I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. It is right, and it is what the public expect, that prisoners do something productive while they are in custody, rather than simply sitting around in their cells. That could involve a range of things such as work, education or drug treatment, but he is right that his constituents and mine would expect them to be doing something.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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15. When he expects to announce the Government’s response to the consultation on the future of the probation service.

Lord Grayling Portrait The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Grayling)
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As I indicated a moment ago, following my meetings tomorrow with a series of stakeholders, I will finalise a paper setting out my proposals for delivering a rehabilitation revolution. The paper will include a response to the previous consultation on probation reform and set out how my proposals have developed. It will be published early in the new year.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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The Secretary of State will be aware that Northumbria probation trust has received the best inspection results so far from Her Majesty’s inspectorate. How will he ensure that probation trusts continue to be effective in protecting the public and reducing reoffending after the review, given that it is proposed that offender management will be fragmented across a wide range of providers?

Oral Answers to Questions

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Tuesday 15th May 2012

(12 years, 7 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Heidi Alexander Portrait Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)
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6. What progress he has made on reform of probation services.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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18. What progress he has made on reform of probation services.

Crispin Blunt Portrait The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Mr Crispin Blunt)
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On 27 March the Government published a consultation entitled “Punishment and Reform: Effective Probation Services”, which is looking at a wide range of options for service improvements. Alongside it is a consultation on the overhaul of community sentences, aimed at delivering effective and credible punishments. We will publish our response to both consultations in the autumn.

Crispin Blunt Portrait Mr Blunt
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The hon. Lady raises the proper concerns associated with the scheme: that is why it is a trial and a pilot. We will assess it, and the London Probation Trust will help other probation trusts come to a conclusion on the merits of such supervision.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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Northumbria Probation Trust has received the best inspection result of any trust from Her Majesty’s inspectorate of probation. How will the Secretary of State ensure that probation trusts continue to be effective in protecting the public and reducing reoffending following the probation review, which proposes that offender management be fragmented across a wider range of providers?

Crispin Blunt Portrait Mr Blunt
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Improvement of offender management for all our offenders is absolutely at the heart of the probation review. With the proposed reorganisation of probation we will be getting much greater offender management, with a focus by the probation service on reducing reoffending among those receiving community sentences. The outcome of our proposals will therefore be a very much improved offender management picture right across the country.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Tuesday 8th November 2011

(13 years, 2 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Jonathan Djanogly Portrait Mr Djanogly
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There is still a significant number of appeals, but the number is now being stabilised and the delays are being reduced.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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Given that probation trusts are experiencing major cuts in their budgets, can the Minister explain how he expects them to do more for less?

Crispin Blunt Portrait Mr Blunt
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Probation trusts have been relatively well protected given the current environment. The additional cuts are at least 13% less than the overall cut in the Ministry of Justice budget, which shows that we are making the protection of the front line a priority in order to ensure that services are delivered effectively. However, like everyone else, probation trusts will have to make their contribution to rescuing our nation’s economy from the wretched mess in which it was left by the last Administration.

Legal Aid Reform

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Thursday 3rd February 2011

(13 years, 11 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Makerfield (Yvonne Fovargue) on securing the debate. Unlike her, I do not have any experience of giving legal advice or doing legal aid work, but I did benefit from the legal aid system many years ago when I successfully pursued maintenance payments for my daughter.

My reason for speaking in the debate is that I was alerted to the Government’s proposed reforms by a constituent of mine who practises as a solicitor in a well-respected law firm in Newcastle upon Tyne. She spelled out to me just how devastating the cuts would be for many of my most vulnerable constituents who need legal aid now or might need it in future. The Government claim that they want to be fair, but removing the right to help with legal costs from those who need it to obtain appropriate representation when they are making a legal challenge is overtly denying those very people a right to justice. Indeed, the chairman of the Bar Council of England and Wales, Nicholas Green, QC, has described the cuts as a “shrinkage of justice”.

Like many MPs, I have been contacted by a number of organisations on this matter, each making a case for retaining the £350 million in the legal aid budget. They were all concerned about the range of areas being taken out of scope because of the huge cut in funds being made towards 2014. The Law Society has stated that

“the civil legal aid scope cuts, in social welfare law, appear to be targeted against areas of law, which are most relevant to the poorest and most vulnerable members of society”.

That is borne out by the information I have received from the director of the citizens advice bureaux that operate across the borough of North Tyneside, serving the constituencies of both North Tyneside and Tynemouth. He advised me that the cuts to legal aid are a double whammy, as the Government have just announced the end of North Tyneside CAB’s financial inclusion fund from April this year. So, with cuts to legal aid, North Tyneside’s CAB will lose two and a half debt specialist posts and one and a half benefit specialist posts, and the end of the financial inclusion fund means that a further four and a half posts will go.

Last year, our CAB handled more than 72,000 cases. Staff dealt with cases involving £25 million-worth of debt, not including mortgages, and managed to write off £4.5 million-worth of that debt for local people. Furthermore, with work carried out on benefits this year, the CAB in North Tyneside is projecting benefit gains of nearly £900,000. In the light of those figures, it is easy to imagine the hardship that will be caused by the loss of funding that to date has made such a difference to constituents, whose only avenue of help is the legal aid route.

Rehman Chishti Portrait Rehman Chishti
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On page 5.5 of the 2010 Labour manifesto, on which the hon. Lady stood for election, her party committed to

“find greater savings in legal aid”.

How does she intend to satisfy that commitment if she does not support the changes that the Government are bringing in?

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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Our Front-Bench team do not deny that certain efficiencies had to be made. In fact, as was said previously, they committed money to help during the recession.

Diane Abbott Portrait Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)
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The problem with the proposed cuts in legal aid is that they are wholly counter-productive. The Government may save money in the legal aid budget, but they will incur expenditure in other budgets. There are ways to save money in the Ministry of Justice budget, and I will touch on them in my speech.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Glindon
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Mark Almond made it plain to me that the work carried out by the citizens advice bureau with the help of legal aid funding definitely helps the most vulnerable—those whose lives are the most chaotic, or who have literacy and other language problems. Self-representation, as proposed in the Bill, is a non-starter for that group of constituents.

In debt advice, private debt advisers are not the answer. The Government’s own study on private debt advice found that more than 80% of those businesses provide incorrect and inappropriate advice, often at a cost to the client, and that they refer clients to advisers who are, in fact, debt collectors. Do the Government really want to impoverish the poorest more by directing them down that path?

The most vulnerable would, again, not benefit from the proposed telephone helpline. In North Tyneside, it is estimated that fewer than 10% of citizens advice bureau legal aid clients would be able to access the system, because of literacy or language problems. Such a system could be considered only as an adjunct to the present system.

Through the work of Lord Carter’s review, the Labour Government made efforts to find savings, always with the aim of striving to protect social welfare law. Labour Members believe that savings could be found in other areas to continue that protection. As the director of North Tyneside CAB told me, although losing jobs and expertise is a massive problem, his biggest regret is that the changes to legal aid will fail clients. The coalition Government need to take heed of this debate and of the views expressed by the many experts who are making the case for the 500,000 people who will lose out as a result of the cuts. The cuts are not fair and definitely not just.

Police Grant Report

Mary Glindon Excerpts
Wednesday 14th July 2010

(14 years, 5 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Mr Hanson
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I cannot be any clearer than to tell the hon. Gentleman that we would have implemented our deficit reduction plan and that police funding was ring-fenced.

Before I leave the subject of the Liberal Democrats, may I tell the House what the hon. Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward) said on ID cards? In March 2009, he said

“West Yorkshire Police Force could get an extra 362 officers if the government scrapped its plans for ID cards and use the money to recruit new front-line officers.”

I look forward to him walking through the Lobby to remove money from West Yorkshire police today.

Chief Constable Peter Fahy of Greater Manchester police was quoted saying recently:

“We’ve got the lowest crime in Manchester for ten years, the lowest gun crime for eight years. We are really determined as a force to make sure we maintain that record”.

However, he added:

“Eighty-six per cent of my budget is spent on people and if we want to make significant savings in policing there is only one way of doing it—which is to reduce the size of the workforce…. It is having a big impact on the morale in the force and the way it is affecting people.”

The chair of Durham police authority has said:

“If you are looking at cuts of this nature so quickly, clearly it will affect jobs”.

Devon and Cornwall police authority has said that these in-year cuts will result in the loss of at least 180 officers.

The cuts undermine the relationship between the Government and the 43 police forces that have already set their precepts. In my constituency in north Wales, we are set to lose £1.1 million this year, putting a real strain on the services provided. I met with the chief constable last week and I know that not only is his force worried about the £1.1 million cut, but it is bracing itself for far worse to come.

My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas), who is no longer in his place, mentioned the cut to the capital grant of £10 million. The cut of £10 million from the counter-terrorism budget is also of concern.

Mary Glindon Portrait Mrs Mary Glindon (North Tyneside) (Lab)
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Does my right hon. Friend agree that North Tyneside was fortunate to have its new police headquarters completed under the Labour Government? It is due to open in September. Does he agree that the 27% crime reduction that the people of North Tyneside enjoyed last year will not be improved on if these cuts are implemented?

Lord Hanson of Flint Portrait Mr Hanson
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My hon. Friend makes an important point, because there is a link between the investment by the Labour Government and the fall in crime. Whatever assessment we make, that investment in police officers on the streets and in other areas, including capital build on new police stations, has had a direct impact in reducing levels of crime—[Interruption.] The Minister is chuntering from a sedentary position to the effect that police buildings do not contribute to crime reduction. A brand new police centre in Newcastle will help to put together some essential savings and help the police to organise effectively to fight crime—[Interruption.] We could go on all day, but my contention is that the resources that the Labour Government put in—and had agreed to put in this year—made a real difference.