Protection from Sex-based Harassment in Public Bill

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Chris Philp

Report stage
Friday 24th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

I completely agree with the hon. Lady. There is existing guidance and practice in other areas that quite rightly clarifies or confirms that the assessment of reasonableness includes what somebody ought to have known, and that inferences can be drawn from their behaviour. She is quite right to point to that existing guidance and practice, and I completely agree that we should be consistent on that. I am sure that looking at that would help to draw up the draft in a quick manner. A combination of the approaches suggested by the hon. Lady and by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch will quickly lead us to the right answer and enable us to publish something—a draft—and get views on it, as my hon. Friend suggested. It sounds to me as if there is a rapid, sensible, pragmatic and consistent way forward.

Let me turn now to the amendments moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch. On the topic of his good humour, I have been informed by the Government Whips—a source of unimpeachable reliability, obviously—that his Mobile Homes (Pitch Fees) Bill has successfully passed its Second Reading unopposed in the other place. I hope that that provides an early boost to his good humour. Although it does not relate directly to an amendment, I just want to respond to one important point that arose in his speech, on something that I have noticed, too: adverts on London underground tubes referring to people’s behaviour in terms of where they look. He said that those were produced by the Government. For the sake of clarity, those advertisements are in fact produced by the Mayor of London in his capacity as the head of Transport for London.

As the House has heard and would expect, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells has given the various amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch close and careful consideration, as have colleagues in the Home Office. We completely understand that my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch has tabled the amendments after a great deal of consideration, and we have taken them very seriously indeed, so I will go through them one by one.

First, amendments 2 and 6 would require the other person’s sex—the victim’s sex—to have been the principal motivation for the defendant’s behaviour. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells has set out, he has drafted the legislation in the way that he has so that we are following precedent, and, as the hon. Member for Walthamstow said a moment ago, it is best that, where possible, we are consistent in the way we legislate. If any component of the motivation for the defendant’s behaviour is concerned with the sex of the victim, that is, in itself, of great concern. It may not be the principal component in some cases—it may simply be one component or a subsidiary component—but it is serious none the less.

The aim of the House is to protect people from sex-based harassment, and it strikes me that, whether the sex-based component is the principal component or a subsidiary component, the seriousness remains. Having considered that very carefully and, of course, discussed it with the Bill’s promoter, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells, our feeling on balance is that the drafting as it was best translates the House’s intention into legislation and is consistent with the rest of the statute book.

Amendments 3 and 5 would replace the words “because of”. Once again, as my right hon. Friend has set out, those words appear in a number of other contexts, in other pieces of legislation, and although we cannot, as he said, dispute the command of the English language and elegance of expression of my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch, there is a great benefit to consistency with other pieces of legislation. We feel that following precedent and maintaining that consistency is a good idea.



Amendments 7 and 8 would restrict the new offence to cases in which the harassing is done because of the victim’s actual sex, rather than what the defendant presumes the victim’s sex to be. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch that getting into wider discussions about the distinction between sex and gender would probably not be helpful in the context of this debate. We are considering here a circumstance in which someone harasses someone else in the erroneous belief that that person’s gender is the opposite of what it actually is. I think that what matters is the intent to cause sex-based distress and harassment, and that even if the perpetrator, or the alleged perpetrator, was mistaken in their assumption about the sex of the victim—or the purported victim, the complainant—that does not minimise or mitigate the seriousness of the act, because the intention was there and the act was undertaken.

At this point I should say that I had meant to address at the start of my speech a question that arose while my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch was speaking. Let me deal with it now. I agree with my hon. Friend that concerns about prison capacity should not constrain what the House may do in framing new legislation. It is of course incumbent upon Parliament to legislate and set out criminal offences. The police will investigate, the Crown Prosecution Service will prosecute and the courts will, if appropriate, convict. It is then up to the Government to ensure that adequate prison capacity is available. I know that my right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice is engaged in a substantial prison building programme, and I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch that prison capacity constraints or availability should in no way fetter the House as it considers legislation.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister is making some very good points, with only one exception: I think that the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has had a good record in this general area. When it comes to the prison population, however, is it not about time that we did something about the 1,000 young people who are convicted under joint enterprise? That could open up so much capacity in our prisons.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Chris Philp

Monday 20th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

The intended consultation will cover topics such as the demand drivers of crime and how we should take account of the different costs of providing a police service in different parts of the country. In the meantime, Bedfordshire’s excellent police and crime commissioner, Festus Akinbusoye, is working incredibly hard to spend his budget effectively and to drive down crime in Bedfordshire.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Is the Minister aware that many police forces are struggling to obtain good forensic science facilities? Is he further aware that the Westminster commission on forensic science, with which I am involved, is deeply concerned about the instability of forensic science in our country?

[Chris Philp]

Forensic science is critically important, as the hon. Gentleman says. The Home Office is continually discussing forensic science provision with our colleagues in the policing family to make sure there is adequate provision. We are always looking at the funding arrangements and the range of providers, so I can assure him that this topic is the subject of continual scrutiny.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Chris Philp

Monday 19th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

My hon. Friend is quite right to say that the Home Secretary has acted, ensuring that there are record numbers of police in London, whereas the Mayor of London very often simply plays politics. In relation to Operation Tenacity, and the police commitment to attend every residential burglary, I am pleased to report that the Op Tenacity activity has been extremely successful. In fact, it saw 1,700 arrests in just six weeks.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

We now live, under this Government, in one of the most unequal countries in the world. Christmas is particularly hard for many people. Although I wish everyone in the House a happy Christmas, can we make sure that the police have the resources, back-up and backroom staff, without whom they cannot catch burglars? We need to stop burglary and reduce poverty in this country simultaneously.

[Chris Philp]

As I said, I am pleased to remind the House that since 2010, according to the crime survey of England and Wales, domestic burglary has fallen by an astonishing 53%. I agree with the hon. Gentleman about making sure that the police have adequate resources. That is why, as the Home Secretary said a few minutes ago, police and crime commissioners will receive next year up to £523 million in additional funding. By March next year, we will have an extra 20,000 police officers. Never in this country’s history have we had so many police officers, which is something that, I hope, people across the House can welcome.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Chris Philp

Tuesday 2nd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

What steps he is taking to tackle the backlog of court cases as a result of the covid-19 outbreak.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Chris Philp)]

The covid pandemic has had an enormous effect on public services, including the court system, but we have risen to that challenge, investing a total this year, as I said earlier, of an extra quarter of a billion pounds in court recovery. That has included installing 450 plexiglass screens in courtrooms to facilitate covid-safe hearings and installing the cloud video platform in 150 magistrates courts and 70 Crown courts to enable remote hearings, which last week delivered a record in excess of 20,000 remote hearings across all jurisdictions. We are not resting. There is more work to do and this Government will take whatever action is required to ensure justice is delivered.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Philp]

I recognise the considerations that the hon. Lady raises. I know that when judges make listing decisions, they carefully take into account the sort of considerations that she rightly outlined. Of course, many of the delays in bringing these cases predate coming to trial; they might be related to issues to do with disclosure or the time it takes to investigate and then assemble the case. We hope that many of those issues can be addressed via the rape review, in addition to the work that is being done on disclosure rules, and the extra money going into the CPS will help. As I said, we recognise that there is a problem in this area, which the rape review and the other measures aim to address, because delays do not serve the interests of justice; they cause distress for victims, as the hon. Lady rightly says. That is one of the reasons we have invested so much extra money in supporting victims, but I agree that delivering speedy justice in this area is critical.

[Mr Sheerman [V]]

From all the evidence in Yorkshire and the north-east from judges, retired judges and senior barristers, I get the feeling that there are serious problems. Is it not the case that the Government are using covid as a fig leaf for the fact that our justice system was in terminal crisis before covid, and we must have a renewal of our justice system and investment in it? When are we going to see the royal commission on criminal justice up and working?

[Chris Philp]

I am afraid that I do not recognise the hon. Gentleman’s characterisation of the justice system prior to coronavirus. Waiting times in the magistrates court prior to coronavirus were about eight weeks, which is an entirely respectable figure. The outstanding case load in the Crown court prior to coronavirus—39,000—was quite low by historical standards and significantly lower than the 47,000 it was when Labour left office in 2010. Moreover, the HMCTS budget in 2020 was higher by some £200 million that it was in 2010. There is, of course, a great deal more that we need to do. A lot of money is being invested this year, and more money will be invested in the future. My right hon. and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor is working at pace on the royal commission on criminal justice, and we are expecting announcements in due course.

Serious Criminal Cases Backlog

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Chris Philp

Wednesday 20th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

We are putting as many resources as we can into cases in the mental health tribunal, and we are using remote hearing technology as much as we can in tribunals generally, including the mental health one. My hon. Friend will have seen the recently published mental health White Paper, which aims to go even further in supporting the rights of people with mental health problems.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op) [V]]

Is the Minister aware that many lawyers and people using the courts are absolutely terrified of going to work? These are not covid-safe environments. As co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on miscarriages of justice, I have talked to a lot of people working in our courts. He is being very complacent. Many people think that courts are the place to catch the covid infection. What is he going to do to show the leadership and management to sort that out?

[Chris Philp]

The Government have spent a quarter of a billion pounds this year on making our court estate covid-safe. Public Health England and Public Health Wales find it to be safe. I hope that it reassures the hon. Gentleman’s constituents to know that the number of positive cases in the court system detected among court staff is no different from what we find in the general population. The measures that have been taken are working, and people who need to use the justice system do not need to be afraid in the way he describes.

We are not complacent. We aim to do more, particularly in the area of testing. I urge people using the court system to take a lateral flow test, administered by a local authority testing centre, before going into court where they can, and if they see anything that concerns them, they should report it quickly, because there are reporting processes available. We are committed to making sure that courts are safe, and that work will continue.

Stalking Protection Bill

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Chris Philp

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 23rd November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

I strongly agree with the hon. Lady’s comments. The House of Commons is at its best when we come together and find cross-party consensus on these issues. This is often evident only on a Friday when private Members’ Bills such as this are being debated. Perhaps it would be better if we could find similar common ground on other days of the week. Who knows, maybe we will do so in due course.

My hon. Friend’s Bill fills a lacuna in the current legislative framework. My hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk) laid this out with his characteristic forensic attention to detail during his speech on Report a short while ago. He made it clear, very powerfully, that the tools available are not adequate to deal with this particular category of emerging stalking that we are addressing today. For example, the measure of taking out an injunction in the civil court is extremely complicated and expensive, so it is unreasonable to expect a victim of stalking to have to take out their own injunction in the county court or the High Court. Restraining orders generally follow conviction, or at the very least they follow court proceedings, so that occurs only when the problem has become so serious that the threshold of criminality has clearly been crossed and, generally speaking, adjudicated on by a criminal court. Bail conditions only follow arrest. So the measures of restraining orders and bail conditions cannot be used at an early stage in the pattern of offending. That is why the measure that we are debating today is so welcome; it gives victims protection at a very early stage in the process of the offending behaviour.

In the consultation that the Government ran on this legislation, 69% of respondents felt that the current legislative arrangements were inadequate and that something more was required. There is no question but that these stalking protection orders will fill the gap identified by those respondents. The gap is powerfully illustrated by a conviction that was handed down yesterday by the Crown Court in Hove in Sussex. The defendant who was convicted was in fact a resident of my borough, Croydon, and unusually it was a female defendant. Most defendants in these cases are male. This defendant, Lina Tantash, aged 44, is a resident of Croydon and she was jailed yesterday for four years for stalking offences that had carried on over a period of 10 years. The conviction applied to three of those years. She had persistently harassed and stalked the victim by turning up unexpectedly at his place of work—even turning up at his office Christmas party—by making thousands of phone calls and by offering money to his colleagues to provide his personal mobile phone number. Eventually, the victim had to leave the country.

This was a serious pattern of behaviour that took place over many years. When the sentence was handed down yesterday, it was accompanied by a restraining order to prevent any repeat of the offence, but by then it was far too late. Had this legislation been in place some years ago, it would have been open to the victim to go to the police and ask them to seek a stalking protection order. That would have prevented the offending from getting to that serious stage and it would probably have prevented the need for a criminal conviction. It would have protected the victim, but in a sense it would also have protected the perpetrator, because they would never have reached the point of facing a four-year prison sentence. This legislation would have benefited both the victim and the stalker, because it would have prevented the stalker from ending up with a criminal conviction. One of the most powerful elements of this proposal is that it can prevent the offending from escalating in a way that is damaging to everyone.

[Mr Sheerman]

I have listened attentively to what the hon. Gentleman has said about that specific case. I served on the original stalking commission. Stalking is wrong, and it is women who are affected in a huge proportion of cases. Does he not think that this country should have some sort of universal Bill of Rights for women to be free of violence? We need to guarantee that women can be free from the fear of violence, whatever their ethnicity and whatever part of the country they come from.

[Chris Philp]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right to point out that the vast majority of victims of these terrible crimes are women. He is also right say that we should ensure that women from all backgrounds are protected. He made reference to a Bill of Rights that was gender-specific, but I believe that rights are universal and that they should be enjoyed by people regardless of their gender or race. However, his objective—that women should be completely protected—is one that I wholeheartedly agree with.

[Mr Sheerman]

I made a speech in Westminster Hall in 2009 about what I knew to be going on in the gangs working across our cities who were preying on women and on children in care. At that time, the police were saying to me, “Well, guv, it’s difficult. It’s expensive. And in their culture, certain things are acceptable.” No violence against women is acceptable in my book.

[Chris Philp]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. There can be no excuses, based on cultural background or anything else, for the mistreatment of women in any way, whether that is stalking, forced marriage or female genital mutilation. All those things, and others, are abhorrent. No woman of any age or of any ethnic background should experience them, and categorically cultural background is no excuse; it does not make it okay.

[Chris Philp]

Members on both sides of the House— and I hear agreement coming from the Government Front Bench—should all make it clear that it is totally unacceptable. There can be no excuses, and there can be no tolerance for these kinds of offences on any grounds at all. I am at one with the sentiments of the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman).

The hon. Gentleman also mentioned the prevalence of these offences. Indeed, there were 1,000 reported cases of stalking in London in 2017, and there may, of course, be many more that were not reported. There were a further 12,000 cases of harassment. This clearly is a wide-scale problem, and the police need to focus on it.

I am pleased to hear that the Metropolitan police—I am a London MP, so I pay particular attention to the Met—have recently set up a stalking unit, but that unit has only eight officers. Clearly, if there are 1,000 stalking offences being reported, eight officers strikes me as quite a small number. I encourage the Metropolitan police to consider increasing the size of its stalking unit, bearing in mind the scale of the problem.

This is an excellent and welcome Bill. Its provisions should in no way deter the police or the Crown Prosecution Service from pursuing prosecutions where they find evidence of criminal behaviour. This does not replace criminal sanctions; it is an additional tool that should be used at a very early stage in the pattern of behaviour.

Clause 12 provides for the Secretary of State to issue guidelines suggesting to the police how and when these powers might be exercised. It is important that the police are proactive in this area and that, when a victim comes to the police, they respond energetically and proactively. Those guidelines are important to making sure that police forces across the country actually use these powers. This worries me sometimes. We pass legislation in this Chamber on all kinds of topics, but legislation is impotent and ineffective unless it is used and implemented by the public bodies it empowers. In this example, it is critical that the police actually use this legislation when they are approached by victims, and the House should keep a close eye on it to make sure that, once this legislation becomes active, it is used by police forces across the country.

[Mr Sheerman]

A chief constable told a group of us only two weeks ago that the Crown Prosecution Service is very restricted in resources at the moment in taking cases forward. That was the police saying, “We can’t get the action because the CPS is in that position.” The budgetary concerns are broader than just the police.

[Chris Philp]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for putting that concern on record. As we go through the comprehensive spending review next year, laying out departmental spending limits for the four or five years to come, it will be a good opportunity for Members on both sides of the House to make submissions to the Treasury on such issues to make sure that the resources are in place to enable the CPS and the police to prosecute people, as appropriate.

My last observation, in passing, is that I notice there is no formal definition of stalking in the Bill or in the interpretations at the end. When stalking is referred to, it is with a lower-case s. Stalking does not seem to be formally defined. I consulted my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham, who drew my attention to the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, which lists some examples of stalking behaviour, but again it does not provide a precise definition. I wonder whether at some point, in future legislation, it might be worth our creating a more formal definition of what constitutes stalking to help police forces and the CPS in their work.

This is an excellent Bill and, again, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes on her fantastic work, her legislative dexterity and her perseverance in getting this Bill to Third Reading. The Bill fills an important gap in our current legislative framework. I am delighted to give it my enthusiastic and vocal support and, if necessary, to support it in the Lobby.

Christians Overseas

Debate between Barry Sheerman and Chris Philp

Tuesday 22nd May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Chris Philp]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right. I have been raising individual cases, because they tell a painful and powerful story, but behind those individual cases lie hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Christians being persecuted and displaced, particularly in the middle east. We cannot stand by or walk by on the other side. We must take action.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on bringing this important debate. I was reminded that when I was the parliamentary churchwarden for St Margaret’s, we did some good work trying to engage the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association to get an interface with some of these countries where we are not getting through. Could we be optimistic and get something moving back on that kind of track?

[Chris Philp]

I hope we can. The hon. Gentleman is driving at the point I was just beginning to make. We understand that there are terrorist organisations, such as ISIS, that do terrible things, and we are quite rightly combating them. However, I chose the examples I did very specifically, because in those examples, Governments of nation states—some of them Commonwealth members, and some of them allies of the United Kingdom—have either stood by and done nothing or, in some cases, actively encouraged and facilitated the persecution I have been describing. It is unacceptable that allies of the United Kingdom should stand by and allow this kind of persecution to take place. As a powerful western nation, we have levers at our disposal to influence these countries that are allowing the persecution of Christians to take place under their nose—and knowingly, deliberately and intentionally doing nothing.

The most obvious lever that we have was referred to by the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham), namely the overseas aid budget. It is a good thing that we spend £13 billion a year on overseas aid, which is 0.7% of GDP. That gives us enormous influence. Much of that aid is spent bilaterally. It goes directly to countries rather than via third-party agencies such as the United Nations or the European Union. I believe we should use the power that aid donation confers to achieve the change we want to see.

For example, the largest bilateral recipient of overseas aid is Pakistan, which receives about £350 million a year. Yet, Christians there are persecuted terribly with violent acts. The court system in Pakistan often prosecutes Christians using blasphemy laws, which are wholly contrary to any notion of free speech or religious freedom. I believe we should be looking at imposing some conditionality, particularly on aid we give directly to another Government. We should ask that they do more and not just pay lip service and say fine words, which generally speaking they do, but that they take real action to prevent the persecution of Christians, whether it is in the court system, or through the police and other armed forces standing by and doing nothing.