Public Services

Paul Beresford Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)]

Perhaps the hon. Member for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan) will take an interest in the new immigration Bill.

It will come as a big surprise to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, to learn that I am an ethnic minority immigrant. I cheer for England in Japan, but I put my money on the All Blacks! I came here as a newly graduated health professional just before the UK entered the common market. I was allowed in on a work permit. That system enabled the UK to encourage the people whom it needed to come here, and they came from a number of countries, most of them in the Commonwealth.

Many of those countries were our kith and kin, and many supported the allies in world war two. Immigrants were selected for their expertise on application from outside the UK. That stopped when we entered the common market, and even visitors from those nations entered through the “alien” gates at our airports. A considerable proportion of the people who might have brought their expertise to the UK transferred their interest to nations such as Canada and America, and we lost out. I hope that we will now broaden our intake to include those countries under the new system, attracting the people whom we need.

Let me now raise a second and parochial point. I am delighted by the proposed boost to research and development funding and the launch of a comprehensive UK space strategy. In Holmbury St Mary, a tiny village in the southern hills of Mole Valley, is the UCL space station. It is hidden in the forest, in an old manor-type house. Just inside the front door is a huge entrance hall, where there are two 20-foot old-fashioned—now—rockets. Behind the manor are modern research buildings enabling world class research to take place. The station has research partnerships across the world, leading space research for the UK, and has been providing advanced, state-of-the-art instruments in many international space ventures. I hope that the Government’s proposed comprehensive space strategy will help that unit to increase the contribution that it already makes to this country.

Also of personal interest to me are the proposed new regulations for internet companies. The main aim—but not the only aim—is to protect children and young people from sexual abuse and radicalisation. Notwithstanding what some Members have said today, the UK leads innovations on child protection. It is one of a number of issues on which Members on both sides of the House, whatever Government have been in power, have worked closely together over the past few decades. For example, in 2002 and 2003 I joined a number of professional experts working in a team for the Home Office and reporting to David Blunkett, the then Home Secretary, and we introduced the groundbreaking legislation that made it a crime to groom a child for sexual purposes. I hope that the same co-operation will apply when the new regulations are introduced. I also hope that Members with an interest in child protection will be aware of the need to reflect further on some aspects of the serious violence and victims Bills in the context of child protection and care.

In 1994, I was the MP for the then constituency of Croydon Central. In one of the big council estates, a popular, well-liked Metropolitan police officer, Sergeant Robertson, was murdered by Robert Eades. Eades and two brothers, Terry and Christopher Snelling, attempted to rob a local post office on the estate. Sergeant Robertson, on his own and armed with a truncheon, tried to stop the robbery. The three escaped, although they were later caught. As they escaped, they fought with Sergeant Robertson, who was knocked down, and Eades stabbed that gallant police officer persistently with a weapon called a black widow dagger. The police officer died in minutes. He left a wife as a widow, and two small children.

The Snelling brothers went down for 12 years, but at least one of them was released after six. On conviction, Eades was sentenced to life with a minimum of 25 years. That means he can apply for parole next year. Mrs Robertson and her children lost a husband and a father for life—not for six years, not for 25 years, but for life—and for this reason and many others I will be specifically watching the new sentencing Bill with deep interest.

There are quite a number of other Bills in the Queen’s Speech that I am enthusiastic to see through to the statute book either before or with a returning Conservative Government after the election. I suspect that many Members on both sides are in their heart supportive of many of the proposed Bills in the Queen’s Speech and, in the past, whatever the Government, cross-party support has happened.

Far-right Violence and Online Extremism

Paul Beresford Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Lady makes some very valid points. First, on the money to protect vulnerable places—whether places of worship, schools or large public areas where people might gather—we of course continue to fund that where the threat requires it. We will continue to review the places of worship fund. The last round of ’18-19 was not oversubscribed despite efforts to advertise it to a number of mosques and other places of worship. We will continue to build on that, and if there is more requirement for it we will certainly stand ready to do that, to make sure my constituents in Preston in their mosques and the hon. Lady’s constituents in theirs get the support they need. Every single police force has a national counter-terrorism security adviser whose job is to go out and advise businesses, communities and places of worship about what they can do to mitigate any threat, even if it is threat unseen, and how they can make sure the people who use their premises are kept safe, and I urge people to do that.

On top of that, the National Counter Terrorism Security Office publishes an online manual to help places of worship, specifically, with tailor-made areas. The Home Secretary and the Communities Secretary are absolutely determined to make sure that the threat of attacks such as what we have seen in New Zealand is headed off. There are different factors at play in the United Kingdom but nevertheless, as I said this morning, it is perfectly possible that this type of thing will happen here.

We are already seeing a growing threat from people moving into the extremist mindset of the extreme right wing and neo-Nazis, and that is the pool that terrorists of the future will recruit from. We must all get together—all of us—to make sure that we teach our children about tolerance and equality and that we understand that just because someone disagrees with us, they are not lesser people. If someone comes from a different religion, they are not lesser, and if they have a different colour, they are not lesser. Until we embrace that, extremism will grow. Doing that is the best way of heading off far-right and neo-Nazi extremism.

[Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)]

With my New Zealand passport in my left pocket, may I thank the House and the nation who, with a very few exceptions, were extremely sympathetic? That was spread throughout the media. Although in New Zealand the armed forces and sports teams, such as the All Blacks, are fearsome in the field, as a nation the people are known for their friendliness and acceptance of different races, colours, and religions. What is most disturbing is that even with such community integration, a case such as last week’s, which “could not happen in New Zealand”, did. The All Blacks I just mentioned are a positive example, as they are of different races, colours and religions but are brilliantly effective at playing as a team.

One positive point, as I am sure the Minister will agree, is that our gun laws are much tighter at the moment than at least those of New Zealand, if not those of all nations. Does he agree that our laws are sufficient, but the difficulty is the importation of illegal weapons? Will he go for that rather than changing our gun laws?

[Mr Wallace]

My hon. Friend, as a New Zealander and a Brit, makes a valid point about the strength of the New Zealand nation. He makes the correct observation that the gun laws in this country make it much harder for people to acquire weapons that could wreak mass murder very quickly, as we have seen following the use of semi-automatic assault rifles in places such as New Zealand and the United States. That does not mean that we should ever stop ensuring that when such threats present themselves we put all our resource and, if necessary, our legislation behind making the restrictions that are needed.

Although many people have considered such attacks, they have been unsuccessful in this country because they have simply not been able to get their hands on the type of weapon system that we saw being deployed in New Zealand. Our law enforcement agencies will continue to target both the legal acquisition of weapons by unsuitable people and illegal acquisitions through smuggling, so that we can ensure that our places are safer.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Paul Beresford Excerpts

Friday 11th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)]

I certainly support the hon. Lady on one thing and that is on thugs. Throughout my political career, both in the House and in local government, there have been right and left-wing thugs, and some of them are beyond imagination, especially in the dark corners of some of the inner-city areas in which I have worked.

For further safety, I need to declare a number of interests: I am a very part-time dentist, a member of the National Farmers Union, and an ethnic minority immigrant holding dual nationality. Unlike those on the Front Benches, I am the immigrant.

In the referendum, I voted to remain in spite of growing discomfort over the EU’s progressive political integration, but I have changed. As the negotiations have gone on, the EU appears to have moved closer to unity. It was a great relief to me that we did not join the euro. That was brought home to me by someone who had visited the visitors’ centre at the European Parliament and informed me that there was a plaque that said:

“National sovereignty is the root cause of the most crying evils of our times.”

It then goes on to say:

“The only final remedy for this evil is the federal union of the peoples.”

Marx lives.

As I have said, I voted remain and lost. I accept the vote and am fully committed to the UK leaving the EU with a reasonable compromise deal. I say that because, having been a Minister many years ago who negotiated with the Europeans, I can say that they are tough negotiators, but then, too, so are we. We always ended up, to some measure, with a compromise. Those colleagues who say that we should go back and demand this or that are really away with the pixies. I expect a response from my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Sir David Amess) with whom I agree to disagree on many things, including on this particular issue. The thought that the EU and the 27 will roll over to the demand of colleagues on either side of the House after two and a half years of tough negotiations beggars belief.

Like all colleagues, I listened and talked to my constituents, or, rather, mostly, they talked to me. They have moved, too, especially the business people. They are saying, “Get on with it. What are you doing in the House of Commons? Stop it and get on with it.”

As I have mentioned, I belong to the NFU. Over the past few weeks, my local NFU members, in classic farmer speak—and there is a classic farmer speak—have been asking, “What are you lot mucking about with in Westminster?” Some of these families have farms here and in France. Many, if not most, export their agricultural products to Europe. All whom I have spoken to want us to take this deal and move on. Their livelihoods depend on trade, as do those of my Mole Valley manufacturers.

An additional factor raised by manufacturers and farmers is the relief that is felt over the new attitude appearing on immigration. I arrived in the UK under a work permit as a needed professional and spent a considerable time working in London in the national health service. Many of my doctor and dentist colleagues from New Zealand and Australia did the same, but when we went into the EU, or the Common Market, that flow stopped. The importance of that was brought home to me a couple of years ago when I ran an Otago University alumni dinner—Otago is my old university—in the Members’ Dining Room. About 30 medical, dental and other distinguished academics from the university flew over from the United States and Canada. They pointed out to me that huge numbers of New Zealand and Australian academics, doctors and dentists in America would have preferred to come here, and they may do so in the future if these new immigration approaches happen. But, as ever, one of my farmers had the last word. He said that, in recognising skills, we need to accept the many forms. Considering my background—I left a very large sheep farm in New Zealand, which now, after lambing, has 50,000 sheep—it is clear why I was caught and amused by his remark. He said to me that we used to like New Zealand and Australian sheep shearers coming to this country to shear our sheep. Does sheep shearing, I ask the Home Secretary, count as a skill?

I am backing this deal. I hope that we will wake up, grab the deal next week and move forward, because we have spent too long negotiating and too long waiting for it to happen.

Mental Health Act 1983

Paul Beresford Excerpts

Tuesday 11th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)]

I am delighted to see the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton), in the Chamber. I hope—she is still smiling—that she is in a benevolent and co-operative mood.

As the Minister will be aware, I am raising a small but important matter, in my opinion and that of others, by seeking a small change to section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983. She will probably have been made aware that I have raised the matter twice before, for the first time when I presented a ten-minute rule Bill in 2014. I did not proceed with that measure because there was an ongoing Government review of the whole section. Although that review was extensive, it did not consider the specific point that I am raising this evening. The second occasion was almost exactly a year ago, when I raised the matter in an Adjournment debate.

I was initially prompted to seek the change having seen the need for it at first hand on the streets of London. I was with a couple of young officers from the Met in a response car, and our first call was a dash to a flat on the 14th floor of a council residential tower block. The mother of the household nervously let the officers in, and we saw her daughter, aged 22, standing on the window ledge threatening to jump. We quickly established that the daughter had a history of genuine suicide attempts. As the young lady was clearly put out by the uniformed police officers, we were joined very promptly by three further officers, two of them in plain clothes. Fortunately, one of those officers was female.

That officer was very astute and persuasive, and managed to get the young woman to come down off the window sill, sit down on the bed and talk matters through. The young woman made it quite clear that she needed psychiatric help. Much effort was made to persuade her to go to a place of safety for psychiatric and medical aid. The young woman vehemently refused and, when pressed, she struggled to head for the window and jump yet again.

--- Later in debate ---

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Rebecca Harris.)

[Sir Paul Beresford]

The other four officers stood on tip-toes waiting to catch the young woman on each occasion when she looked as if she was going to dive through the window. Fortunately, they managed to stop any action. In the meantime, contact was made with St George’s Hospital’s psychiatric unit to seek urgent hospital psychiatric assistance. After some considerable time, the appropriate psychiatric individual arrived with an ambulance and crew. This immediately inspired further alarm, rejection and, ultimately, a huge struggle. In due course, a sad young lady was transported to the hospital as the designated place of safety, and we had prevented the suicide.

The whole pantomime had occupied five officers and three NHS staff, and took about four hours to sort out. It was obvious from the very beginning that the police themselves could have taken care of the young lady quickly, as indeed they did after instruction from the NHS staff. Immediate action by the police would have taken the lady into care quickly, thus reducing the continuing risk over those four hours, and saving the police and NHS staff a large number of man hours. Under section 136 of the Mental Health Act, the police would have been able to act promptly if this pantomime had taken place in a public place. However, the incident took place at the young lady’s mother’s home. That was deemed, correctly, to be a private place, which meant that no direct police action was legally possible. I have had discussions with officers in the Met, and I have found that this was not an unusual case.

A more tragic case was the death of Martin Middleton in 2010. He was taken to a Leeds police station by officers who had visited him at home, having been made aware, and then seeing for themselves, that Mr Middleton was making serious preparations for committing suicide. The officers incorrectly believed that they could arrest Mr Middleton and take him from his home under section 136. When they arrived at the police station, the custody sergeant refused to detain Mr Middleton as the arrest had taken place in his home. The officers were therefore required by the custody sergeant to return Mr Middleton to a relative’s home, hoping that that was some form of safety. Sadly, Mr Middleton still managed to hang himself there.

At the inquest, the coroner had no hesitation in agreeing with Professor Keith Rix, who was called to give expert evidence, that Mr Middleton fell into a category of mentally disordered persons for whom there is no provision under the 1983 Act. Subsequent to raising the issue, I have heard from many frontline police officers, including those who have campaigned on the issue, and I have also had extensive conversations with Professor Keith Rix, who is an academic psychiatrist and an expert in this area. I am reliably informed that the Garda in the Republic of Ireland have a clear operational advantage over our police because, under section 12 of the Irish Mental Health Act 2001, they can act promptly, even in a private residence.

As the all-seeing Minister will be aware, over the 10 years between 1997 and 2007, admissions to hospital as a place of safety went up from 2,237 to 7,035—those are the latest figures that I have been able to get. The Minister is quick with arithmetic, so she will be able to note that that is a threefold increase. The difficulty facing the police is that the powers on which they can act are limited to persons found by the police in a public place. There is ample anecdotal—and perhaps stronger—evidence that the police in desperation sometimes persuade a person to leave their home, or contrive to remove them to a public place so that they can use the section 136 powers of arrest. In fact, one London-based social services authority’s audited figures estimated that 30% of section 136 arrests were recorded as having been made at or just outside the detainee’s home. The police do that in sheer desperation to save the individual’s life, which would be lost unless they acted. Put bluntly, a tiny adjustment to the legislation would allow the police to act in a private home, as they can in a public place. That would save an enormous amount of time and, potentially, a considerable number of lives.

In my discussions about this, it has been suggested that the police already have sufficient powers—they do not. The second argument is that an amendment would extend the right of the police to enter private properties—yes, it would. There are many legal reasons for the police to enter a private property; perhaps the most obvious and linked one is that if the mentally ill person was threatening, or in the process of murdering, somebody in that private place, rather than killing themselves, the police could act immediately.

There is a simple solution to this: amend section 136 by simply removing the words

“in a place to which the public have access”.

When I raised this issue in the Adjournment debate about a year ago, the Minister’s predecessor gave a clear indication that change was being considered. He gave me a commitment that if the Government could not get this right using the measures they were considering, an amendment to section 136 might be exactly what was required.

[Dr Dan Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making an important and thoughtful speech. Does he agree that it is possible at the moment for a mental health professional who wants to put someone under section 2 or section 3 of the Mental Health Act to gain entry to their house with the police and a locksmith? It therefore seems strange that the police do not have powers to deal with a very similar situation when they have concerns about someone’s mental health and believe they need to exercise section 136 powers.

[Sir Paul Beresford]

I thank my hon. Friend, who is, of course, on his way, with a bit of luck, to being a very senior academic psychiatrist in a couple of years. He is right. In situations such as this, no one rings up St George’s Hospital in Tooting and says, “Please could I have a psychiatrist?” They ring the Met police, who then have the difficulty of dealing with the situation, and who stand there holding the detainee in the private home while the psychiatrist is brought in from the hospital.

I shall be grateful if my hon. Friend the Minister will at least be prepared to meet me and Professor Rix to discuss how this difficulty can be sorted out. If necessary, I am prepared to resort, as I have in the past, to the ten-minute rule Bill procedure to bring about this tiny change.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Sarah Newton)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) not only on securing the debate, but on the measured way he has approached it. He highlighted some of the really serious challenges faced by the police and the emergency services in dealing effectively, but also humanely, with those who are in a mental health crisis. We can all agree that this is a very important topic.

For far too long, the subject of mental ill health has not received appropriate attention. The services for those experiencing mental ill health are sometimes not what they should be, and people have been faced with long waits for the help and support they should have received.

However, the Government have made clear their utter determination to improve mental health services, and we have made considerable progress in recent years to address the serious concerns we are discussing tonight. In particular, the use of police cells as places of safety under the Mental Health Act has fallen significantly. Last year, it was down to as few as only 2,100 instances. Some forces, such as Hertfordshire and Merseyside, have achieved zero use of police stations, while others, including West Midlands, Suffolk, Nottinghamshire, Lancashire and Lincolnshire, have very low usage—right down in the single figures. We expect to see significant improvement when the numbers come out in October.

This has been brought about by a lot of good local partnership working. Only last week, I was with the police and mental health services in Kent, introducing their new strategy, which involves innovative working between the police and local health partners so that they can respond effectively and swiftly to those who are suffering mental ill health. It is also about bringing together the voluntary sector to enhance the support for local people. There are similar partnerships all over the country as part of the crisis care concordat partnership networks, which are driving forward really good improvements.

Most police forces will now have street triage schemes. This means that, although they are quite different in different parts of the country, most police officers will be deployed alongside mental health professionals, so if a call comes into the centre that somebody is experiencing a problem of the type we have heard about, mental health professionals will be sent along with the police officers as they respond. Alongside the reduction in the use of police cells, we have seen a reduction in the use of section 136 powers as these decisions are being made by health professionals to make sure that somebody in such a crisis can get the care that they need immediately. We have seen really good examples in Norfolk and in the west midlands, with dramatic falls in the number of people being sectioned. I am very happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss this excellent work. In the meantime, I will send him examples that he could perhaps take up with his local police force to make sure that it is drawing on the best possible practice from around the country.

We have increased the availability of liaison and diversion schemes so that those entering the criminal justice system who have mental ill-health or substance misuse issues can be immediately identified and referred into suitable assessment or treatment. These schemes now cover about 75% of the population of England, and we are on track to provide national coverage by 2021. We have provided some £15 million to 88 local projects to increase the provision and capacity of health-based places of safety, focusing on the areas with particularly high use of police cells and limited places of safety. We have announced a further £15 million of funding to continue this vital work.

Just as importantly, we are also bolstering our mental health services. We are investing record levels in mental health and improving access by introducing the first-ever waiting times standards for treatment. We have invested £400 million to improve mental health crisis care in the community and £250 million to establish liaison mental health services in every emergency department by 2020. Since 2010, we have increased spending on mental health to a record £11.6 billion in 2016-17, and a further £1 billion will be invested every year by 2020-21 so that we can deliver the mental health services that people richly deserve.

In addition to this, we are making £1.4 billion available by 2020 for children and young people’s mental health services.

[Sir Paul Beresford]

I do, of course, applaud the Government’s work in this field. However, I am talking about the particular emergency situation where someone is sitting in a police car, a radio call comes through, they tear up to the incident, and they are two miles away from St George’s hospital and the psychiatrist who visits it. They need to do something on the spot.

[Sarah Newton]

I very much appreciate my hon. Friend’s specific point. I wanted to set the scene and describe to him the scale of the investment to ensure that we do have the appropriate medical professional to accompany the police. I think we can all agree that we need those trained mental health professionals to be able to assess the person and to make the best judgment call on the best way to treat them. It is unreasonable to expect a police officer to have enough clinical experience to be able to make that call.

Like my hon. Friend, I have spent time with my local armed police officers. I have been out on the beat. I have seen the extent to which, in the course of their everyday working, they encounter people who have mental health problems, and how brilliant they are at handling the situation. We have heard vividly about how well they are able to manage it, as he has seen himself, but that is usually about containing it. They are not qualified to assess the best clinical approach for the individual in the way that a mental health professional is.

[Sir Paul Beresford]

I completely agree. If section 136 is used in a public place—and if it were used in a private place—the individual goes into care in a mental hospital environment and must be assessed within 72 hours. That is an added protection. No one expects policemen to be wonders on psychiatry, but the assessment follows very quickly.

[Sarah Newton]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point and he will be pleased with recent legislation that has reduced that timeframe from 72 to 24 hours. That is a big step forward. Whether an incident happens in a public place or in someone’s home, we are working towards a situation where a mental health professional will be with the police when they attend. That means that there will be no delay similar to that described so vividly by my hon. Friend. I think that some of the examples he gave happened some time ago. As a result of investment, particularly in the work of the crisis care concordat, which has created the framework for police forces to work with mental health services in their community, all kinds of innovative measures have been introduced to ensure that resources, including mental health nurses routinely working with police officers on the beat and specialist back-up to deal with situations similar to those we have heard about this evening, are planned and delivered locally. That is how we want things to happen.

As I have said, we are putting the resources in place. Although these services are working in most of the country, additional investment is being provided where that is not the case. There is also support through the crisis care concordat to fill those gaps and to ensure that everyone everywhere has the same experience.