Policing and Crime Bill

Baroness Hamwee Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee (LD)]

My Lords, another day, another 323 pages of Home Office legislation. I realise that for the noble and learned Lord, who has had to immerse himself in it, this must be a bit like having his client settling at the door of the court, as he will not be able to continue with it. We have a Long Title which is long enough for the antennae of many noble Lords to twitch with the prospect of introducing their specialist subject—the noble Lord, Lord Moynihan, demonstrated that amply.

As it always does, the House has demonstrated much expertise in, and practical experience of, aspects of policing. This is called the Policing and Crime Bill but, from the preponderance of briefings that I have received—other noble Lords will, no doubt, have as well—I wonder whether a significant part of it should have been led by the Department of Health. The noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Alverthorpe, made a similar point, though perhaps coming from a different perspective. There are four clauses, out of more than 150, on powers under the Mental Health Act. While the organisations from which I received briefings gave some welcome to these, the concern to do more and better comes through loud and clear. As Mind pointed out—and the noble Baroness, Lady Howe, reminded us—the Mental Health Act 1983,

“allows people to be deprived of their liberty when they haven’t committed, or are not suspected of having committed, a crime”.

Concerns about the places of safety provisions have been expressed in the Chamber and from outside including, most recently, from Black Mental Health, some of which came through on my iPad after we had started the debate.

Inevitably, there has been a focus on resources. I hope we might hear something positive from the Government—a Government who acknowledge that mental health services are a Cinderella. My right honourable friend Norman Lamb had seven amendments in the Commons. Reference has been made to some of his concerns, but not to disallowing the use of tasers by police officers on psychiatric wards. They have no place in mental health care—I stress care—nor, really, do the police. We will pursue his concerns and, I suspect, more, as we have more scope in this House.

According to the Long Title, the Bill will,

“make provision to combat the sexual exploitation of children and to protect children and vulnerable adults from harm”,

but not as extensively as the children’s organisations which work so effectively together point out. We have heard concerns about extending child abduction warning notices, online offences, disrupting grooming and therapeutic support for victims of abuse, which is something I feel strongly about.

As the noble Lord, Lord Blair, said—and I think the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, did too—the Bill was introduced as “finishing” the job of police reform. Will it ever be finished? Some 42 police forces provided information to a Liberal Democrat FOI request about 101 calls. This is nothing to do with Nineteen Eighty-four—I have not got my Bills mixed up. From 2012 to date, 3.5 million calls were unanswered. These 101 calls may not be about emergencies, but that does not mean they are not about serious matters. To the citizen, any call to the police which is unanswered is serious.

I share doubts about whether the administrative arrangements will lead to increased confidence. Much has been said this afternoon about local collaboration between the blue-light services. Along with my noble friend Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, I feel that local authorities should have a leading position in decisions around this. Allowing police and crime commissioners voting rights at local authority meetings is, at the least, questionable. My noble friend referred to the term “good will”, which is an immensely important point, and I remember the chambers of commerce report to which she referred.

I turn to governance issues. Maybe the summer holidays will re-energise us all and enable us to come up with an enormous raft of amendments to debate the points to which our attention was drawn by the noble Lord, Lord Harris, and by the noble Lord, Lord Bach, in his compelling speech. We are told all this is based on efficiency and effectiveness, but whether that is fulfilled rather depends on the criteria you set.

On the subject of confidence, I take the point made by the IPCC—as it still is—that a change of name to Office for Police Conduct is likely to be read by the public as meaning a police body, not an independent one, as my noble friend Lady Harris of Richmond said. There is far more to be addressed on conduct and complaint matters, but I will indulge myself by saying that “super-complaint” seems to me to be a very unfortunate term.

There is also appropriate concern about what has been called the constitutional novelty of directly elected politicians taking on a quasi-judicial function.

How the police use civilian staff seems to have swung to and fro over quite a short period. When I was first concerned with the Metropolitan Police’s budget, through my membership of the London Assembly, we often questioned what seemed to be a widespread view that you could not, for instance, handle human resources if you did not wear a uniform. The pendulum has swung a lot. Whether expanding the role of civilian staff and volunteers—no doubt driven by cost-cutting—jeopardises the service, is something which we must discuss. I recognise a lot of what the noble Lord, Lord Blair, was talking about. I do not know whether I should be concerned, but I am, about the impact of all this on neighbourhood policing. Its status, and the investment in it, seems to have been reduced—I might even say downgraded—over not a very long period.

The provisions about the detention of 17-year olds show the value of the European Convention on Human Rights. We have a 35-page human rights memorandum and there are, of course, enhancements of human rights in the Bill. Like others, I suspect this is because of the scrutiny role of this House. I do tend to go straight for the problem areas and forget to acknowledge the good bits. There is also an 85-page delegated powers memorandum, so that might turn out to be material for scrutiny.

The requirement to confirm nationality will take us to human rights issues and, for the second time in a matter of months, to the confusion of the roles of police and immigration officers. This was raised by the Joint Committee on Human Rights, of which I am now a member. In a letter to the then Home Secretary, the chair of the committee wrote:

“Although the Government has accepted that Article 14 of the Convention may be engaged in respect of foreign nationals, the ECHR memorandum does not consider any potentially differential impact on BAME UK citizens”.

She referred to the,

“discretion to the individual officer as to whether or not to ask the arrested person to state their nationality. This raises the prospect of UK nationals who are members of ethnic minorities being more likely to be asked to state and then prove their nationality than other UK nationals”,

with a risk of discrimination contrary to Article 14 in conjunction with Article 8. On behalf of the committee, she asked the Government to,

“address this issue of possible differential impact and explain how this differential impact can be avoided or justified”.

The answer was that:

“it is considered that such interference”—

requesting proof of nationality—

“is proportionate and justified to the pursuit of a legitimate aim—namely being able to properly exercise an effective immigration control”.

There is either a circularity or an assumption about what the problem is there. It does not answer the question but answers another point entirely. The Minister replying pointed out that,

“both immigration officers and the police must comply with public law principles”,

including,

“the requirement to act reasonably in all circumstances”,

and that their actions or decisions,

“may be challenged in the courts by means of judicial review”.

I have to say that I do not find that convincing.

Maritime enforcement also raises human rights issues and issues around the refugee convention. We do not seem to have a Minister with particular responsibility for refugees now, which is a pity because their plight must not go out of the headlines and I know that this House will not relegate the matter.

The noble Lord, Lord Condon, referred to a long list of problems that will have to be addressed because of our exit from the EU. Would that we could sort them out in the Bill.

I have said enough for today except for my last note, which says, “Whinge about the timing of Committee”. I am not sure whether this Policing and Crime Bill will be light relief from the Investigatory Powers Bill, as jam in the sandwich during our two weeks in December—

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

It is in September.

[Baroness Hamwee]

I meant September; that was wishful thinking. I do not suppose that that sandwich arrangement would be particularly welcome to Ministers either, but it will not deter us from raising issues on either Bill which we feel must be raised. On the same basis as it takes longer to write a piece for the Sun than for the Guardian, there may be rather a lot of amendments.