Crime and Policing Bill

Ben Coleman Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 10th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Baggy Shanker (Derby South) (Lab/Co-op)]

I encourage all hon. Members to visit us in Derby and in Derby city centre. They will find a city that is firmly on the up, with a bright future ahead. Our city centre regeneration projects are full steam ahead. We are creating fantastic cultural and community hubs in Derby, whether that is our multimillion-pound revamp of our market hall, the completion of the Becketwell Live arena or the University of Derby’s new business school, all of which are set to open their doors in the coming months. I want everyone in our community to be able to take a walk around our city and feel proud and safe.

However, although we are rightly excited about the future that Derby holds, we have to acknowledge the problems that the city centre faces. Our pride is tested when we see fly-tipping on the side of the road. It is tested again when we are worried about walking on the pavement because e-scooters are being used antisocially, and it is tested further for shop workers who are worried about going to work because the previous day they were threatened during a shoplifting incident. Lots of fantastic work is under way on these issues at a local level, such as the work of our police and crime commissioner, Nicolle Ndiweni-Roberts, and of Derbyshire constabulary. They are clamping down on illegal e-scooters, seizing and disposing of more than 200 since last November alone. However, I and my constituents know that more needs to be done so that they can feel proud and safe in the city we call home.

For that reason, I welcome the measures introduced in today’s Bill, which will go further to protect city centres such as Derby and their residents from antisocial behaviour and crime. Whether they are employees at our central Co-op in Osmaston or at the Asda superstore in Sinfin, it is right that this Bill will introduce specific measures to protect them from retail crime. Shockingly, 18% of shop workers were assaulted in 2023. Nobody should fear going into work, which is why I am pleased that this Bill will make assaulting a shop worker a stand-alone offence.

[Ben Coleman (Chelsea and Fulham) (Lab)]

May I associate myself with my hon. Friend’s remarks? Does he find it as absurd as I do that under the Conservatives there was effective immunity from shoplifting goods under £200? That meant that shoplifting rose by 60%. Does he therefore welcome the fact that that effective immunity is ending, and that we are introducing a new criminal offence that will protect shop workers from being attacked and assaulted, including those in my constituency who have complained about that?

[Baggy Shanker]

I thank my hon. Friend for that timely intervention. It is important that the £200 limit is being scrapped. I have spoken to many shop workers across Derby who have said that, literally on a daily basis, people are walking into the shops, loading their bags and walking straight out, almost apologetically.

This Bill also introduces tougher action on knife crime, more power to support councils to tackle fly-tipping and measures to let police seize vehicles such as e-scooters much faster if they are being used for antisocial purposes. The Bill will tackle violence against women and girls by introducing a specific new offence for spiking.

I want every single person in Derby—I am sure everybody in this House wants this for every single person across the country—to feel safe and to enjoy our city and the places where they live. This Bill represents a huge step forward in achieving that, and that is why I fully support it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jon Pearce (High Peak) (Lab)]

In High Peak, our five major towns—Buxton, Glossop, New Mills, Chapel-en-le-Frith and Whaley Bridge—have all been affected in different ways by the crimes the Bill seeks to address. Our town centres are the hearts of our community. At their best, they bring people together and create a sense of pride and belonging. When antisocial behaviour, theft and shoplifting are allowed to take root, it affects not just the victims, but the whole community. Sadly, the previous Government all too often wrote those crimes off as low level and left our communities feeling powerless. This Bill is for all the people I have met on the doorstep and who have come to my surgeries in High Peak—people who wanted a Government on their side, who would take these crimes seriously.

This Bill is for the retail workers and business owners who have to deal with shoplifting day in, day out. The previous Government effectively decriminalised shoplifting of goods worth less than £200, but this Bill will end the Tory shoplifters’ charter and go further by introducing a new criminal offence to better protect retail workers from assault.

This Bill is for all those who want our streets to be safer and pride to be restored to our communities. At the end of February, Derbyshire police had to put in place a dispersal order for two whole days in Glossop in order to tackle antisocial behaviour. The Bill will extend those powers to 72 hours. Through the new respect orders, it sends a clear message to persistent troublemakers: “We see you, we will disrupt you, and we will make your life as difficult as you have made the lives of others.”

[Ben Coleman]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is good news that at last we have a Government who are doing something about the scourge of off-road bikes and dangerous e-scooters on the pavements and in our parks by giving the police new powers to seize those vehicles immediately, instead of letting the problem continue? Although this should have happened much sooner, it will make the lives of my residents in Chelsea and Fulham, and people across the country, happier and safer.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Order. By way of being helpful, I remind right hon. and hon. Members that when they make interventions, they should address them to the Chair, and not to other Members, so there can be no confusion in the debate.

Antisocial Behaviour and Illegal Bikes

Ben Coleman Excerpts

Wednesday 5th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Antonia Bance]

My hon. Friend is completely right. It is neighbourhood policing that will make the difference, and I am so pleased that we are bringing it back.

Most of the bikes in my area are stolen and are often used for other crimes, such as robbery and drug dealing. But this sort of targeted action works, and police reports of nuisance bikes in Friar Park, our biggest hotspot, have halved this year compared with last year. They are still not gone completely, and there is more work to do, but I want to say thank you to the police officers and the Sandwell council teams who got on this issue and kept on it. There is still more to do to spread this approach across my constituency to all the estates blighted by illegal bikes and ASB—from Tipton Green, Princes End, Great Bridge, Ocker Hill, Hateley Heath and Tantany, to Stone Cross and Coseley, too.

We have to make sure that the police have the powers, money and kit to stop these bikes once and for all. Over the years, they have been hamstrung by huge cuts to policing from the Conservatives, meaning that we lagged far behind similar-sized forces. When Labour was elected last summer, there were fewer officers in the west midlands than in 2010—800 fewer officers and 400 fewer police community support officers. That is why I am so pleased that, after 14 years of the Tories, who wrote off these crimes as low-level and left our communities alone to deal with the consequences, things are changing under Labour. Having a neighbourhood police team who know the places, faces and times to expect trouble makes all the difference.

[Ben Coleman (Chelsea and Fulham) (Lab)]

In my constituency, illegally modified motorbikes and e-scooters are a huge problem, because of not just the noise, but the thefts, shoplifting and antisocial driving in general, as other hon. Members have mentioned. The police are under-resourced and I agree that they need more powers to clamp down on this, but does my hon. Friend agree that the police need to take the initiative to work more closely and co-operatively with councils’ local teams, such as the law enforcement team in Fulham and the street enforcement team in Chelsea, to crack this problem?

[Antonia Bance]

I absolutely agree. Chelsea and Fulham may be some way from my constituency, but councils and the police working together, and consistency of approach, is precisely what will make the difference, just as he outlined.

Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse

Ben Coleman Excerpts

Thursday 16th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

We will ensure that Welsh voices are heard loud and clear.

[Ben Coleman (Chelsea and Fulham) (Lab)]

Many of my constituents have contacted me to share their concerns about child abuse and child exploitation. They will be relieved that, unlike the previous Government, this Government are no longer allowing this matter to be kicked into the long grass and are taking action, not least through Baroness Casey’s rapid review. I think my constituents will be concerned that the official figures woefully underestimate the scale and nature of grooming activities. How can the Home Secretary reassure the House, me and my constituents that in future the reporting systems will be such that they can guarantee the confidence of victims and survivors?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is right. Some of this is about giving victims and survivors the confidence to come forward and report abuse, some of it is about getting agencies and organisations to take seriously the risk factors so that they identify potential crimes and pursue them, and some of it is about making sure that we have much stronger data requirements on police forces and local authorities so that we collect information and data. That was the first recommendation of the independent inquiry, and we are taking it forward. It has not been taken forward for far too long.

Immigration and Home Affairs

Ben Coleman Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Ben Coleman (Chelsea and Fulham) (Lab)]

Thank you very much for calling me, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is a great honour for me to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Erdington (Paulette Hamilton), who spoke with passion about the NHS and her great expertise in this area, and to follow the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Mr Kohler), who talked about the joys of canvassing, which I found interesting. It has been really lovely to hear so many other fantastic maiden speeches from my hon. Friends.

I am incredibly proud to be standing here as the first ever Labour Member of Parliament for Chelsea and Fulham, and I thank all those voters who put their trust in me.

I realise, with a majority of 152, that that was not everyone, but I also realise that many people there will have voted Labour for the first time and I promise to be on the side of all my constituents.

Boundary changes mean that I follow in the illustrious steps of two people. My Conservative predecessor Greg Hands served 19 years in this House, and for 11 of them he was a Minister. He held senior roles in the Treasury, in Trade and in Business, and he was twice Minister for London. He was also the chair of the Conservative party at one point. He approached his job, as he approached all his jobs, with impressive energy, determination and loyalty to his party, and I know he will be missed by many of his constituents.

I am also delighted to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for the new constituency of Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter), two of whose former wards I now have. I am extremely grateful for his generosity to me, both during the campaign and since. He is an absolute local legend with voters. Plenty of people said, “Well, I’m going to vote Labour, but it has to be Andy, not you.” I am going to try very hard—maybe I will fail—to live up to that local legend, and the challenge and high standards that he has set.

Chelsea and Fulham really is a wonderful place to represent. It runs along the River Thames from just by Charing Cross hospital down to Chelsea bridge. That is three bridges away from this House, if any of you want to go and visit it. A walk of less than an hour takes you from the 150-year-old market in Fulham’s North End Road to the world-famous King’s Road in Chelsea, with its iconic role in pop, art and fashion culture in the swinging ’60s and the punks and the new romantics of the ’70s and ’80s.

There are also four world-class hospitals. We are incredibly lucky to have the Royal Brompton, the Royal Marsden, the Charing Cross hospital and the Chelsea and Westminster hospital. There are too many outstanding schools across the primary and secondary sectors to name. We are also blessed with two premier league teams: Chelsea football club and Fulham, and both of them are steeped in sporting history.

Like so much of London, Chelsea and Fulham is enriched by a diverse community. We have people from African-Caribbean, Somali, Arab and European backgrounds. Indeed, the French MP for Northern Europe—yes, there is a French MP for Northern Europe—told me that two thirds of all the French in this country live in my area and the area represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington and Bayswater (Joe Powell), so it is quite a French area as well.

Chelsea and Fulham is also home to hundreds of Army veterans who have sacrificed for their country, from the residents of Stoll Mansions in Fulham to the Chelsea pensioners at the Royal Hospital. I have to say that championing the Stoll military veterans as they faced losing their community recently was one of my greatest privileges, and I am grateful to the Secretary of State for Defence for visiting them with me and lending his support to the campaign. I know that many of the veterans will be delighted that he now represents veterans in Cabinet, and I hope he will visit them again when they move to their new home in Fulham.

Fulham, together with Hammersmith, has the distinction of being the only place in England where the council—a Labour council—provides social care at home for free. I was responsible for overseeing that as the council’s former cabinet member for health and adult social care, and I very much look forward to joining the debate about the funding of social care across our country.

But against all this, I am afraid there is trouble in paradise. Alongside the great wealth in Chelsea and Fulham, there is also painful poverty. I cannot tell you how grateful I am to all the local charities who provide essential support to the many people in need. Food banks have been mentioned by several hon. Members on both sides of the House during today’s debate. For me, if anything is an indictment of the past 14 years, it is that food banks have become part of the British way of life.

The food bank that serves Fulham today feeds more people in one month than it did in the whole of 2012, when it started. At the food bank that serves Chelsea, demand has gone up by 800% since it opened its doors in 2018. People who are in work are using food banks, as well as children and pensioners. The demand for them is growing, and poverty, locally and nationally, is made much worse by the persistent inequalities, both in Chelsea and Fulham and across our country, not least of race and disability. These are also issues that I feel passionate about and will be pursuing in my time here in this House.

And then we have Charing Cross hospital. I am proud that I helped to save this wonderful hospital when the previous Government tried to sell most of it off. At the time, they promised to give the hospital a floor-by-floor refurbishment. It desperately needs modernisation and rebuilding, and they promised to do so by 2030, but then they broke their promise.

Another problem facing my constituents is that Thames Water constantly dumps sewage into the Thames by Chelsea and Fulham. Last week alone, it just chucked the stuff in for nearly 24 hours. There has been no regulation and no proper controls over the last 14 years.

The wonderful houseboat community down by the river in Chelsea faces an existential threat from a predatory, secretive landlord, and I will be doing more to stick up for that community, too.

I have mentioned the King’s Road, and its residents are very worried about the huge office blocks spoiling the area. Marks & Spencer seems to have become a property developer, not just a purveyor of sausages, sandwiches and underwear.

My constituents are also worried about crime and the lack of neighbourhood policing. High prices and rents are pushing families and young people out of the area and, as it has been so incredibly difficult to build social housing over the past 14 years, thousands of my constituents are living in overcrowded conditions or are waiting years to be offered a secure, genuinely affordable home. This is all in Chelsea and Fulham.

Against that backdrop, the good news for my constituents is that we now have a Labour Government who are determined to renew the country. We have a new approach, we are focusing on growing our economy and we are, thank goodness, resetting our European relationships, which is very much welcomed by my constituents—Chelsea and Fulham is one of the most pro-European constituencies in the country.

The other good news is that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has already pledged to rebuild and modernise Charing Cross hospital, and the Government have already started cracking down on the water companies. They have started to develop a new child poverty strategy, and they are starting to take back our streets, which my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Erdington mentioned—earlier today, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary set out so well the steps we are taking. People who rent privately will get new rights and protections from this Government, and we will build 1.5 million decent homes in which people can actually afford to live.

As the Government begin their journey of repairing and rebuilding our country, I come back to the words of a good friend of mine, Phil Storey, who runs the food bank that serves Fulham. He said to me the other day, “We want to stop people ever needing food banks. The day we can close our doors because we are no longer needed is the day I dream of.”

I make this pledge to my constituents. As the Member of Parliament for Chelsea and Fulham, working with the Labour Government, I will do all I can to strengthen our economy, to build a fairer, safer and kinder society, and to bring Phil’s dream closer to reality.