Leaving the EU: Security, Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice
Debate between Ben Howlett and Brandon Lewis(7 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point. As I clearly outlined in the Committee, the decision to opt in was made in the context of our being a member of the European Union, and at the moment, and over the next couple of years, we are still a full member of the European Union. It is important to make sure that we take the opportunity to play a full and strong part in that. We want to continue to play a very strong role as a partner for our colleagues across Europe, and indeed globally, particularly in law enforcement.
The prime objective of Europol is to strengthen and facilitate co-operation in preventing and combating serious organised crime and terrorism, in which we have a clear interest in playing an important part. I have yet to meet a senior police officer across our country who does not value our membership of Europol. By providing a platform for members to share intelligence and information, and through a strong analysis function, it offers unparalleled opportunities to prevent serious crime and to protect EU citizens, including those here in the UK. Concretely, this means that 86,629 suspected criminals were identified on the Europol information system in 2015 alone—up by 40% on the year before. There were 1,800-plus decisions for referrals of terrorist and extremist online content between July and December 2016 alone, with 1,600-plus removals, and numerous ongoing large-scale organised crime and trafficking cases. Indeed, the UK staffs one of the largest national desks in the organisation and is one of the biggest contributors of information to Europol systems.
Another mechanism that we have at the moment is Eurojust, which supports the fight against transnational, serious organised crime by co-ordinating multinational investigations and prosecutions. It works through a co-located network of national liaison desks staffed with prosecutors and investigators from across the EU. Later this year, we will start operating the EU’s Prüm system for the exchange of DNA, fingerprints and vehicle registration data, following this House’s overwhelming vote in December 2015 to join it. In 2015, we conducted a pilot of Prüm, exchanging DNA profiles with four other member states. This gave us an impressive number of hits, many against suspects who would not have been identified otherwise, and enabled the police to arrest people for a number of serious offences, including burglary and attempted rape.
Since 2015, we have taken part in the second-generation Schengen information system, which circulates law enforcement alerts around the EU in real time. This ensures that vital intelligence is shared internationally to help prevent threats from across the world. Joining has seen us arrest and extradite wanted people including drug traffickers, murderers and paedophiles whom we would not otherwise even have known about.
Ben Howlett (Bath) (Con)
The National Crime Agency has said that joint investigation teams are incredibly important to the UK. Will my right hon. Friend join the National Police Chiefs Council and the Met police in agreeing that Eurojust is hugely valuable and that co-operation agreements must be guaranteed as soon as we leave the EU?
Brandon Lewis
When I talk to the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners and the National Police Chiefs Council, they are clearly uniform in their desire to make sure that we keep as many toolkits as we can actively working for the benefit of our residents. The work that we have to do in the years ahead must reflect the fact that we have been very clear that, as the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister have said, when people voted on 23 June last year they did not vote to be any less safe.
The European arrest warrant, which has already been mentioned, facilitates the extradition of individuals between participating countries to face prosecution for a crime they are accused of or to serve a prison sentence for an existing conviction. We have managed to extradite some 7,000 people as a result of that. The European criminal records information system provides a secure electronic system for the exchange of information on criminal convictions between authorities of participating countries. It ensures that UK authorities are made aware when our own nationals are convicted in any EU country. That means that we can secure criminal records information on EU nationals so that when UK courts are making sentencing decisions they can take into account previous offending behaviour abroad.
Housing and Planning Bill
Debate between Ben Howlett and Brandon Lewis
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point about the importance of having this flexibility. In London, local authorities from across the parties have asked for the ability to work together to deliver on this front. We need new homes to be built in this country, and the amendment would limit the Government’s ability, and that of local authorities working with us, to ensure that the right mix of housing is delivered as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Ben Howlett (Bath) (Con)
My hon. Friend is being incredibly generous with his time. As he will know from his visit to Bath a couple of weeks ago, we do not have high-value assets, but housing costs are high in the area. Given the earlier announcement about the shift from high-value assets to higher-value assets, which will not be applicable in Bath, how can our authority combine with other authorities to bid for additional funds following the Budget announcement?
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point. When I visited him and met constituents, developers and the local authority, I saw a really good example of an area that wants to deliver the right type of housing locally by understanding its local needs. Whether that involves working with the Government to bid for some of the £4.7 billion in the shared ownership fund or the £1.2 billion for starter homes on brownfield sites—
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Ben Howlett and Brandon Lewis
Brandon Lewis
As I am sure the hon. Gentleman knows, here in England we built more council houses in the five years of the last Parliament than were built in the entire 13 years of Labour before that. We are very ambitious for our housing programme and we make no apologies for being very ambitious about having one extra home or more built for every home sold through right to buy. The reinvigorated scheme is on target and in London it is almost at two for one.
Ben Howlett (Bath) (Con)
As a young person myself, I am acutely aware of the difficulties of getting on to the property ladder. I, too, have been struggling to get on to it for the past 10 years, because of the lack of housing that was built in 13 years of Labour. Will the Minister join me in celebrating the work that Bath and North East Somerset Council is doing in building 7,000 new homes in Bath, of which 2,300 will be affordable? He will, thus, explain how the Housing and Planning Bill will end up benefiting my local authority.
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point, not least about his age. I do not think anyone in this House would argue with the fact that this country has built far too few homes for far too long. We are ambitious about ensuring that we correct that. On that Bill, I suggest that he looks at the starter homes programme, where we will be looking to build some 200,000 homes for first-time buyers, at a 20% discount.