Police Dogs and Horses

Debate between Brandon Lewis and David Crausby

Monday 14th November 2016 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Brandon Lewis)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Crausby. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South (David Mackintosh) for sponsoring the debate, and I thank all Members who have contributed on an issue that is close to many of our hearts.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland) said, I am a dog lover. I have two dogs, and I never thought I would see the names of Oz and Buzz in Hansard, but they will be in there now—my followers on Instagram and Twitter will know who Oz and Buzz are. The hon. Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown) is right that our pets are part of our family. I am a hardcore dog lover. My current dogs are both Labradors, but I have also experienced the joy of being a basset hound owner, which got a lot easier when I realised that bassets do not have owners—they have staff. Life got a lot easier after Bertie and I worked that out.

I will slightly reverse how these debates normally work. I will address some of the issues, but I will outline the journey of travel as I see it and what I think we can and should be doing, before touching on the challenge of doing that and outlining where we are. As we have a couple of hours, I will leave time for my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton South to respond, should he wish.

The petition response outlines the current position. As I will outline over the next few minutes, this afternoon’s conversation has highlighted some of the challenges in how we address the situation and just how far we want to go. I have huge sympathy for those who are trying to do something, but this is not the simplest thing in the world. I will explain exactly why in a moment.

Before I come to that, I congratulate and thank the campaigners, whom I met last week to discuss some of the issues. They have been conducting the “Finn’s Law” campaign in a positive, constructive way to get to a result, and they understand the mechanisms within which we work. They also appreciate, as do a large number of people in the police force—I met the Hertfordshire police and crime commissioner this morning to discuss this issue, as Finn is a member of that force—that the available sentencing powers, if used correctly, are as severe as we see elsewhere. The powers are not as severe as we would like, but it is about how they come across, whether they are used and the context in which they are used. I will return to that point.

I express my horror and disgust at the attack on PC Wardell and police dog Finn in Stevenage in October. Without touching on the case, I will say that the photographs taken of Finn after the operation are deeply distressing. I understand the public outrage that has followed the media coverage of the attack and its aftermath. That response is entirely human and expectable. The extent of the public support not just for Finn but more widely is clear.

[Mr David Crausby (in the Chair)]

Order. I ask the Minister not to refer to the court case, as I indicated at the beginning.

[Brandon Lewis]

Absolutely. I have been very careful not to do that.

[Mr David Crausby (in the Chair)]

You are getting quite close. I want to help you.

[Brandon Lewis]

I appreciate that. Like my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Sir Roger Gale), I have received a huge amount of emails and correspondence on this issue, none of which, I am sorry to say, asked about the welfare of PC Wardell—it was all concerned about Finn, which highlights just how much the public and we care about animals. I am pleased that both are recovering well.

As I said earlier this month, when we twice debated officer safety at length, any kind of assault on a police officer, or on the animals and people who work with them, is completely unacceptable, so I am grateful for this opportunity not only to reiterate that message but to restate my personal commitment to moving forward on this issue.

The particular abilities of dogs make them a vital part of the police team, and indeed the police family. Part of the complication, as one of my hon. Friends mentioned, is that the issue is wider than police dogs. We also have police horses and fire dogs—I met Reqs from Hertfordshire, and he is a fine specimen of a Labrador—and there are other service dogs too. Anyone who thinks it is appropriate, excusable or acceptable to mistreat, abuse or attack a guide dog or a hearing dog also needs to understand the severity of the crime they are committing. If we move forward on this issue, it is important that we encapsulate the kinds of dogs that serve our community and are extensions of the community that they serve.

Dogs provide important support in many areas of our public services. I have met Reqs, a fire and rescue dog, but there are other dogs working within our military or working to keep our borders safe. We often ask such animals to take on dangerous roles that we either would not ask humans to do or that it would simply not be practical for humans to do. These animals play a hugely important part in ensuring our safety and security.

Police dogs, for example, make a fantastic contribution in searches for suspects, vulnerable people and evidence, in specialist searches for drugs, explosives, firearms and bodies, in crime scene work and, of course, in tracking suspects. The pictures of Finn after the attack remind us of the specific dangers faced more widely by police dogs that are working in pursuit and public order situations. They and their handlers show incredible bravery and go about their work with dedication and courage to keep us safe and fight crime. They show remarkable courage and discipline.

Another police dog, PD Ghost of Merseyside police, lost his life last week while carrying out his duties. He was hit by a car in a tragic accident. The media coverage of his illustrious career—chasing and holding dangerous criminals to keep the local community safe—shows just how much we have lost with his passing. I offer my condolences to his handler, PC Dave Bartley, too.

Much of today’s debate has understandably focused on dogs, but it is important to remember that horses are also an important part of the police family. As well as making a contribution to local policing in our rural communities, police horses are often called on to perform their duties in the face of danger, including in serious public order situations. It is hugely upsetting to read stories such as those reported in the media following the million-mask march in London last year, when people looked to bring down a police horse and its rider, which is a cowardly and dangerous act. The images are still clear in my mind of a football match that I attended when I was young: police horses were brought in to ensure safety and security, and some fans decided to throw darts at the police horses. That is simply not acceptable.

On Friday afternoon I saw the preparation for the safety and security of the visitors and spectators at the England-Scotland football match. As my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet said, the vision of a police horse rider goes beyond anything that somebody at ground level can see. They therefore play an important role in ensuring that the policing is conducted and structured in the right way. More generally, we should all seek to encourage the Police Federation to consider adding a category at the police bravery awards to recognise the bravery shown by police animals.

The language used to describe attacks on police assault animals goes to the core of how we move this debate forward. I absolutely understand that the language used in the charging of assaults can be completely unpalatable. My hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) made that point directly. We do not simply see these brave and important members of our policing family as property. They are more than property. They are a living, breathing thing, but a charge of criminal damage can suggest that they are nothing more than property. I appreciate how that can be upsetting and can seem wrong. I see how for many it can be the crux of the issue, and I agree with them.

The issue is complicated, because it goes more widely than police dogs. None of us thinks of police animals as just equipment. They are an important part of the job, but they are not just equipment. That does not seem to me to convey properly the respect and gratitude that we rightly feel for those animals, for their contribution to law enforcement and public safety more widely. That is why I have written to my ministerial colleagues at the Ministry of Justice and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to explore whether we can do more in law to offer appropriate protection to working animals.

I appreciate Members’ earlier calls about the Policing and Crime Bill, but I think it unlikely that we will do something in that Bill, partly because the Bill is at Report stage in the House of Lords and is likely to receive Royal Assent at the turn of the year. We need to do some work with the Sentencing Council. I will come to penalties in a moment; the point made about them was fair. There is work to do on ensuring that the penalties—which are severe and match those elsewhere in the world—that are linked to the Criminal Damage Act 1971 apply to animals in a way that is appropriate and correct in language, as well as on ensuring the ability to prosecute.

We must also consider using the law not just for police dogs and horses, but more widely for service and working dogs—that might cover guide dogs and potentially those used by the fire and rescue service and others. It is important that we do that piece of work. Other work is going on—I will come to it in a moment; it touches on some of the points the hon. Member for West Ham made about assessing—that means that we might not be able to put something in the Policing and Crime Bill, but if there is a need for legislative change, I will consider opportunities to do so in 2017.