Protection of Freedoms Bill

Andrew Miller Excerpts

Tuesday 11th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hanson]

I am grateful for the Minister’s support for my comments about my hon. Friend. I assure the Minister that I will try to kick him very hard on some of the political issues, but I hope that we can enjoy a similar relationship to that he had with my predecessor. Having dealt with the hon. Gentleman from the Government side of the Chamber when he was in opposition, I am sure that we will have a positive relationship.

I welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero), who has joined the shadow team and is graciously supporting me in this debate.

[Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

She is not the only one.

[Mr Hanson]

Indeed. I strongly appreciate my hon. Friend’s support in dealing with the proposals before the House.

I will move on to the meat of the issue, because that is important for the House. Part 2 of the Bill proposes the introduction of a surveillance code covering the operation of CCTV by public authorities in England and Wales, and the creation of a commissioner to promote compliance with the code. The code will operate as a mechanism of self-regulation and will be set by the Secretary of State. Our new clause and amendments would do several things which we want to explore with the Minister to get a feel for the approach he is taking. These matters were considered heavily in Committee. Perhaps fortunately, on some levels, I was not there, so we may need to revisit some of them today. It is important that we examine the concerns about CCTV; the amendments are designed to get a flavour at least of the Government’s thinking and to place on record the Opposition’s views.

Labour Members want to ensure that the role of CCTV is strengthened and its importance is recognised. We want to ensure that the code operates in an effective way and does not hamper the development of CCTV. We want to have a presumption in favour of the police being able to set up CCTV in our communities to tackle crime through prevention and through bringing perpetrators to justice. The purpose of new clause 16 is to put in place a review by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary to ensure that we examine, quantify and agree on the definitive benefits of CCTV so that we know exactly the baseline.

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[Mr Hanson]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, but he should not put words in other Members’ mouths. What I have said is that CCTV should play a role. I do not expect ever to see one in three houses in my street or in his street with CCTV cameras, but there is no strategic need for us to put obstacles in the way of CCTV being put in place if there is a need for it.

[Andrew Miller]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Hanson]

I am trying to make progress, but of course I give way.

[Andrew Miller]

Is it not better to put it slightly differently? Many of our constituents who have suffered nuisance and criminality in their environment come to us and ask, “Why can’t we have CCTV?” Should this not be a matter on which we liaise with local communities to ensure that the scope of CCTV meets their needs?

[Mr Hanson]

As ever, my hon. Friend speaks common sense. Perhaps part of the guidance to be issued in due course could be about such consultation. I have not yet, in nearly 20 years as a Member of this House, had anybody come to me to say, “Mr Hanson, please do not put a CCTV camera in our street.”

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[Mrs May]

I am happy to confirm that to my hon. Friend. At the general election, Conservative Members, of course, stood on a manifesto that promised to do just that. As I have said, we will also bring forward some changes to the immigration rules to ensure what we consider to be the correct balance in the operation of article 8 of the human rights convention.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) was trying to tempt me to go down a road that I know I should not go down any further on Third Reading of this Bill. Let me return to the point I was making about the balance between keeping the public safe and defending our liberties.

For 13 years the previous Administration chipped away at those freedoms and liberties, and in doing so, they did not protect the public. They chipped away at the notion that a person is innocent until proven guilty. Not only did they fail to take the DNA profiles of all of those guilty of a crime; they also provided for the indefinite retention of the DNA profiles of more than 1 million innocent people. They treated more than a quarter of the whole work force—some 11 million people—as potential abusers of children and vulnerable adults, by requiring them to be monitored as part of an overbearing vetting and barring system.

The previous Government chipped away at the right to liberty by seeking to extend the maximum period of pre-charge detention to 42 and even 90 days—until forced by the will of this Parliament to settle for 28 days. They then made 28 days the norm rather than the exception. They chipped away at the historic right of trial by jury; they chipped away at the notion that people should be able to live in safety and security in their own homes by creating hundreds of new powers of entry; and they chipped away at our right to privacy by creating a number of enormous Government databases—the national identity register and ContactPoint being but the worst examples.

The Bill continues the work of this Government in repairing the damage done to our traditional freedoms and historic civil liberties, while at the same time taking a careful and proportionate approach to protecting the public. In adopting the protections of the Scottish model for the national DNA database, it strikes the right balance between protecting our communities and protecting the rights of the innocent. When people are convicted or cautioned for a recordable offence, their DNA and fingerprints will be retained indefinitely, exactly as happens now. In all cases in which DNA and fingerprints are taken on arrest, they will be subject to a speculative search so that past offenders cannot evade justice, exactly as happens now. Under this Government, criminals who leave their DNA at a crime scene will not be able to escape justice if they are arrested again.

Moreover, we are now taking the DNA of all convicted prisoners, including hundreds who were convicted for the most serious offences such as murder and rape. That is something that the last Government failed to do. In June last year, we started a programme to identify individuals in the community who have previously been convicted of either a sexual offence or homicide, and whom the last Government failed to place on the DNA database. That process has so far identified more than 13,000 people whose identities have been passed to local police forces, and we are now working with the police to find the individuals and obtain samples. When someone is not convicted of an offence, however, there will be strict limits on the period during which that person’s DNA and fingerprints can be retained. That is exactly as it should be: justice is not served, and our communities are not made safer, by the stockpiling of the DNA and fingerprints of hundreds of thousands of innocent people for year after year.

The Bill includes sensible measures to help to maintain public confidence in the use of CCTV and automatic number plate recognition systems. CCTV is a valuable crime-fighting tool, which also helps to reduce the fear of crime—we saw that most recently after the summer’s riots—but it will not be able to continue to deliver such benefits if cameras are perceived to be spying on communities, or if they simply do not work as they should. We saw that most recently in the west midlands, where the installation of CCTV systems without the support of the local community meant that public confidence was lost and the cause of community safety was set back. By providing for a code of practice overseen by a new surveillance camera commissioner, the Bill will help to ensure that CCTV retains public support and therefore continues to be an effective tool in fighting crime.

The Bill also applies much-needed common sense to the criminal records regime and the vetting and barring scheme. Let me make one thing absolutely clear: the protection of children and vulnerable adults is of paramount importance to this Government, and robust systems for employment vetting play a vital part in ensuring that it is provided, but tying up employers and voluntary organisations in red tape and bureaucracy does no one any good. I do not think it is sensible to force some 11 million people to register with a Government agency, and I do not really think—and I doubt that the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) really thinks—that 11 million people should be continually monitored.

There was a real danger that the very scale of the vetting and barring scheme designed by the previous Administration would create a culture of irresponsibility in which employers felt that it was not up to them to protect children or vulnerable adults in their care. Employers must take their responsibilities seriously, and when innocent people are treated like suspects, it is society that suffers.

The Bill has been much improved by the process of scrutiny undertaken by this House. I thank all the members of the Public Bill Committee for their detailed and forensic examination of it, and I thank all Members who contributed to the debates on Report.

[Andrew Miller]

Unfortunately we did not manage to complete our scrutiny, because of the timetabling of the Bill. One issue that was brought to my attention by Universities UK was the potential for application of the Freedom of Information Act to impede international collaboration in research. That was dealt with in the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002, and I tried to insert a parallel provision in this Bill. Will the right hon. Lady instruct the appropriate Minister to meet representatives of Universities UK to discuss the issue as a matter of urgency?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we are discussing the Bill as it is now, not the new clauses that were not reached.

[Andrew Miller]

I was trying to improve it.

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

I understand that, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman has been very helpful.

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[Mr Redwood]

Constituents have put to me the case against and in favour; it depends where the CCTV is, what it is going to be used for, whether it is going to be effective and whether it provides value for money. It needs to be properly appraised and used so that people feel that it makes a contribution.

I am also glad that the Government have had another look at stop and search; we want stop-and-search powers to be used only when the police have good reason to be suspicious and the response is therefore proportionate. Abusing or over-using the power is not proportionate. Good police would not do that, but the Bill makes the Government’s intentions clear.

I know that other Members wish to speak in the limited time available, so I shall sum up. The Bill is an extremely welcome contribution to restoring the liberties of the British people, and it should be our prime duty to uphold those. I have identified some that I think are most important. If I had to single out just one, it would be the change in the approach to detention without trial or without a proper charge having being made; that is absolutely fundamental to our civil liberties.

The Government can go much further on the intrusion and powers of entry, which have got out of control. One of the reasons why we have so many criminals now is that we have so many laws that make people criminals. It would be welcome if there were fewer crimes in our laws and if we concentrated on the really serious crimes instead of giving the state enormous powers to turn anybody’s conduct into a crime if they do not happen to agree with a particular part of the bureaucracy or if they make a mistake under the bureaucrats’ methods of procedure.

[Andrew Miller]

How does the right hon. Gentleman square that statement with the fact that crime is falling?

[Mr Redwood]

If overall crime is falling, that is extremely welcome news, although there are disputes about the figures. But it is obvious that the last Government created an enormous number of new offences, without which we lived perfectly well for hundreds of years. We need to review how many criminal offences are on the statute book.

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[Nicola Blackwood]

The decision to go for three years is based on the recommendation of the Home Affairs Committee, which took extensive evidence on the issue. Three years versus six years is merely a matter of judgment. Furthermore, it will be three years plus an extension of two years, to ensure that there would be the option of retaining the DNA for five years. I weigh that against the fact that the Bill will remove the DNA of 1 million innocent people from the database—people who feel that they have been criminalised by the system that was put in place. It was done with the best of intentions, to ensure that victims are protected—that is well understood—but it is important to bring proportion into the system, and that is what the Government’s proposals are designed to do.

[Andrew Miller]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Nicola Blackwood]

I will move on to CCTV, as another colleague wishes to speak.

No one is claiming that CCTV does not have a valuable role to play. The claim that violent criminals will go free because the Government intend to reduce the number of CCTV cameras by introducing a voluntary regulatory code is unimaginably inaccurate. The regulatory code is intended to ensure that it is possible to know where cameras will be placed. There will be consultation with the community so that there can be support from the community. Given that a major concern is the fear of crime and the escalation of the fear of crime, I feel that this is a move in the right direction.

One concern that police have raised is that they struggle to deal with many CCTV cameras being turned in the wrong direction, switched off or not functioning properly. A regulatory framework will give the opportunity to improve quality across the CCTV network and ensure that we improve crime detection by having a CCTV network that is functioning properly across the board.

The concern of everybody in this House is first and foremost the protection of children. There is not one Member of this House who does not want to ensure that children are protected in every possible way. There is no doubt that that is the case, but even with the current vetting and barring system, under which 9.3 million people are routinely monitored, problems of child protection have persisted. I was particularly concerned by evidence given to the Public Bill Committee that the Independent Safeguarding Authority has not been passing on to the police concerns that it has received about individuals or information about individuals who have been barred. People in schools who have had concerns passed to them have also not been passing those concerns on to the police, although that might be because of concerns about children’s privacy or their being upset. I welcome the Government’s move to produce guidance and I urge that that guidance be written in the strongest possible terms, because I find it inexplicable that the ISA has not considered it a primary duty routinely to inform the police of its concerns about child protection.

Of course, I also welcome the reforms of stop and search, the reduction of pre-charge detention periods and the requirement for consent to use biometrics in schools. I cannot imagine why anybody would want to take fingerprints or obtain biometric information from children in schools.

I know that another colleague wishes to speak, so I will conclude by saying that over the past 10 years, the Labour party has given away liberties without evidence, as far as I can see, that doing so would make us safer. Our democracy and our people’s confidence in their country are weaker for that. I am happy to support the Bill.

[Stephen Phillips]

I rise, of course, to lend my support to this welcome Bill and to thank the Government for starting to deal with the plethora of inroads into our civil liberties that were made by the last Labour Administration.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake) said that this is a Christmas tree of a Bill. It deals with a number of separate matters or, as he described them, baubles on the tree. It is none the less welcome for the simple reason, of which the House will be aware, that inroads into the fundamental freedoms that this House exists to protect and that we have taken for granted for the entirety of our lives and our history need only be made, in short order, for us subsequently to see further inroads made into those liberties, in a way that none of us in this House ought to welcome.

One has only to consider the point I put to the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) about the retention of the DNA of innocent persons to know that the last Labour Government struck the wrong balance. The proposals in the Bill, in my judgment—and it is a question of judgment, as my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood) made clear a few moments ago—strike the right balance.

[Andrew Miller]

The hon. and learned Gentleman is mathematically wrong. It is not a question of judgment, it is a matter of probability, tending towards certainty, because 23,000 people will now be out there with the potential to commit crimes.

[Stephen Phillips]

The hon. Gentleman expresses a view with regard to his judgment, but it is a view—

[Andrew Miller]

It is not judgment, it is a fact.

[Stephen Phillips]

It is an exercise of judgment, and in my judgment and that of the Government whom I support, three years is sufficient to retain DNA. Making inroads into the civil liberties that we have come to expect and respect, and that we wish to have in this country, is not a reason to go beyond three years. The hon. Gentleman debates whether to retain for three or six years, but I ask him and the whole House, where is the magic in the six-year figure? If six years, why not nine? If nine, why not 15? If 15, why not retain the DNA of 11 million people never convicted of a crime for the entirety of their lives and into the future?

[Andrew Miller]

Simply because the curve produced by the self-same Home Office that produced the Bill demonstrates what the former Home Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), said: that there is a clear mathematical relationship and in six years we have a way of dealing very neatly with a substantially greater number of potential criminals than the three-year period offers.

[Stephen Phillips]

So there we are, the House has it—it is a curve. Does that not savour of the statistics, initiatives, targets and strategies that we had from the last Government? Is it not about time that hon. Members started exercising judgment with regard to what is important? In my judgment, what is important is that the British people are entitled to have their liberties respected. They were not respected under the last Government, and this coalition Government are beginning to address the inroads that the last Government made into the liberties of the British people.

I am going to draw my remarks to a close—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] Well, I am pleased to have some assent from the Opposition Benches. We have a Bill before the House of which we can all be proud, and I urge right hon. and hon. Members on the Opposition Benches who sat idly by while the liberties of the British people were not respected to go through the Aye Lobby tonight and give the Bill the Third Reading it deserves.

Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time.