Murder of Henry Nowak

Carla Lockhart Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood]

I join my hon. Friend and Members across the House in condemning the actions of the far right utterly. They are completely unacceptable. We should all take a stand against the far right weaponising this horrifying murder—this terrible tragedy for the Nowak family—to spread further division, which is not what this moment requires. I hope that that stand has broad support across the House.

[Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

My thoughts are with Henry’s family. As I listened to his dad yesterday, I could not help but cry at the loss that his family have suffered, and at the fact that the video footage will be etched on their minds forever.

It appears that we have an undercurrent of anti-white racism brewing in the UK. We see white people jailed for allegedly inciting racial hatred on social media, while members of other communities are not even prosecuted for viciously attacking police officers. Henry Nowak deserved better—he did not deserve to be attacked; he did not deserve to spend his final moments pleading for help and saying that he could not breathe; he did not deserve not to be believed; and, above all, he did not deserve to die. Why did it take this Government until yesterday to speak out on this matter, while they run to virtue signal on many other cases? Is the UK no longer a safe place for people like Henry Nowak?

[Shabana Mahmood]

The reason the Government did not comment until yesterday is because a criminal case was going through our courts. Members of this House, and certainly members of the Government, are not commentators for the purposes of social media. Ministers of the Crown must respect the independence of our criminal justice system and the ability of our courts and independent legal processes to function so that, when findings of fact are made, a conviction happens and a sentence is passed; it commands public confidence across the whole country, because everyone knows it was not interfered with politically; and that it was, in fact, an independent assessment of the facts of a case. I remind the hon. Lady and all Members that that is the responsibility we all have. I urge her to reflect on that.