Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading - Day 1
Monday 15th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab) [V]]

Ask almost anyone involved in the criminal justice system for their priorities, and they will not say, “More new offences, types and lengths of sentences, and further layers of complexity masquerading as action”; they will point to the backlog in the courts, the lack of resources for everything from legal aid to prisons, and the systemic failure at every turn from investigation and charge, to trial and disposal. Some measures in the Bill are helpful, but parts are oppressive and downright dangerous. I refer particularly to parts 3 and 4, which amount to a sustained attack on civil liberties, free expression and movement by an intolerant Government who are increasingly careless of the rule of law.

Given the time restraints, I will set up the case against part 4 of the Bill. Gypsies, Travellers and Roma are the most discriminated against and marginalised ethnic minority in UK society—indeed, the action of Pontins management reminded us of that only days ago. The Bill targets those communities, and it criminalises what has hitherto been the civil offence of trespass on land. It makes the direct threat of imprisonment and heavy fines for matters that were previously resolved through negotiation or in the civil courts. The Bill threatens, not just for the act of trespass but for an intention to trespass, to seize and forfeit any vehicle involved in that trespass, which in the case of nomadic people means losing their home and all their possessions.

Only 3% of Gypsy and Traveller caravans are on unauthorised sites. The police response to the proposals was unequivocal:

“trespass is a civil offence and our view is that it should remain so…no new criminal trespass offence is required.”

No family willingly stops somewhere they are not welcome, and which has no running water, waste disposal or electricity. They do so for the lack of either permanent or transit sites. Only 29 councils in England provide transit sites—a mere 354 places.

Evictions will run for 12 months, and it is not difficult to imagine a concerted campaign to exclude Travellers from whole areas of the country, contrary to the recent judgment in the London Borough of Bromley v. Persons Unknown. The judge in that case concluded that

“the Gypsy and Traveller community have an enshrined freedom not to stay in one place but to move from one place to another.”

Preventing that potentially breaches both equality and human rights law, as the shadow Home Secretary said earlier. The Home Secretary may not care about any of this, but many people do. She would be well advised to drop these racist and draconian proposals from the Bill before it progresses any further.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

3rd reading
Monday 5th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

That sums up the balancing exercise that the Government are drawing on the advice of the independent police inspectorate. The Bill does not stop the freedom to demonstrate; it balances it with the rights and liberties of others. The existing laws are 35 years old. We want to update them and also implement the recommendations of the independent Law Commission.

It will continue to be the case that the police attach conditions to only a small proportion of protests. To put that in context, in a three-month period earlier this year, the assessment of the National Police Chiefs’ Council was that of more than 2,500 protests, no more than a dozen had conditions attached to them: 12 out of 2,500.

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Victoria Atkins]

I will not because I genuinely have other matters to address.

In deciding whether to attach conditions, including in respect of the generation of noise, the police will continue, as they do now, to take into consideration protesters’ freedom of speech and assembly.

I move on now to unauthorised encampments. Similarly, there seems to be misunderstanding about what the Bill is attempting to do. It is not an attack on the nomadic lifestyle. Proposed new section 60C(4) of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 sets out conditions applicable if

“significant damage… significant disruption”

or

“significant distress has been caused or is likely to be caused”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andy Slaughter]

Will the Minister give way on that point?

[Victoria Atkins]

I have one more minute.

We are trying to tackle harmful behaviour, and Opposition Members need to ask themselves just how much damage, disruption and distress is acceptable for their constituents to bear.

I will quickly deal with the extraction of information. This is an important part of the Bill, because we want to ensure that strong privacy safeguards are in place when dealing with people’s sensitive personal information. This Bill, coupled with the rape review, is an absolutely critical part of that effort.

Mindful that the House will want to vote on these matters, I will conclude. We promised our constituents that we would take measures to make our society safer and to crack down on crime. As my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (Miss Dines) set out, that is the promise we all made to our constituents. We are delivering on promises made to the electorate and standing up for the decent members of society who do not commit the sorts of crimes that we in this Chamber have sadly had to hear about. I therefore have no hesitation in commending the Bill to the House.