Crime and Policing Bill

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Wednesday 22nd April 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)]

I beg to move,

That this House disagrees with the Lords in their amendments 2H and 2J, but proposes in lieu of those amendments amendment (a) to their amendment 2F and amendment (b) to their amendment 2G.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following Government motion:

That this House insists on its amendments 439C and 439D and disagrees with the Lords in their amendments 439E and 439F in lieu.

[Sarah Jones]

It is with regret that we return to the Lords amendments to this Bill. The elected House has made its views crystal clear on the issues before us. We have already voted twice, by substantial margins, to reject the Lords amendments. It is time for the considered views of this House to prevail. Let me deal briefly with the two remaining issues before us.

In our earlier debates, I have been clear that the Government agree that the enforcement of public spaces protection orders and community protection notices must be proportionate. Fixed penalty notices must never simply be seen as a money spinner for enforcement agencies, but as an appropriate and proportionate means of tackling antisocial behaviour in our communities. We will make this distinction absolutely clear in our statutory guidance. To this end, we have already agreed amendments to provide that the statutory guidance issued under the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 must address the proportionate use of fixed penalty notices by authorised persons. I know the Liberal Democrats want early action on this, so we have brought forward a further amendment to provide that such guidance must be issued within six months of Royal Assent.

It is particularly regrettable that the Opposition have returned yet again to Lords amendment 359, albeit in modified form. The amendment is simply unworkable, and it is wholly contrary to the approach taken by successive Governments to the exercise of the powers in the Terrorism Act 2000 to proscribe terrorist organisations. There is no more important duty on the Government than to safeguard this country from terrorist attack, but requiring the Government to in effect give a running commentary on whether any organisation linked to the Iranian armed forces should be proscribed does not for one moment add to our security. Their lordships can keep insisting on this amendment, but our response will be the same. This is not an amendment that any responsible Government can or should entertain.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con)]

Those in the other place have asked us to reconsider Lords amendments 439E and 439F, which compel the Home Secretary to review the proscription of groups linked to the Iranian armed forces, including the IRGC.

There can be absolutely no doubt about the threat that Iran and its proxies pose to this country and our national security. In 2015, terrorists linked to Iran were caught stockpiling explosives on the outskirts of London. In 2020, amid protests in Iran, the IRGC sought to assassinate two journalists on British soil. Just last year, the IRGC was linked to an attempted attack on the Israeli embassy in Kensington, which was foiled by counter-terrorism police. The organisation has been linked to at least 20 credible threats in the UK.

Even beyond the direct risk posed by IRGC terrorism, the organisation is responsible for funding and supporting other extreme groups in this country, and has worked closely with criminal gangs to undermine our national security. We will be able to combat that threat only if we are willing to tackle it head-on, using every power available to us to do so. To that end, the very least we can do is make it harder for Islamist extremist groups to operate legally in this country. By proscribing the IRGC and other groups linked to the Iranian armed forces, Ministers would be able to protect not only those being attacked—actually, it is our Jewish community that we are really thinking about at this difficult time. These Lords amendments can only be a good thing. They would help to strengthen those protections.

When Labour Members were on the Opposition Benches, many of them agreed. In April 2024, the now Foreign Secretary called for exactly this policy. Yet now, they are refusing even to review the proscription of groups such as the IRGC, which fuel the Islamist cause and are directly linked to the Iranian armed forces. I urge the Minister and her colleagues on the Government Benches to change their minds and accept the Lords amendments. The threat is far too grave to be ignored. By burying their heads in the sand, they will not make the problem go away; they will only put our country and its people more at risk.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

I recognise that, since the last round of ping-pong, a concession was made on youth diversion orders in the other place and we welcome that. We are disappointed that the Government have not made suitable concessions on fixed penalty notices. However, we do not seek to force that to a vote this evening. We hope to work with the Government and we will pursue other avenues.

The shadow Minister set out the case very well for the motion on the proscription of Iran-linked groups. Recent activities in this country give us further cause for concern. The rise in antisemitic sentiment on our streets and the way in which Iran is clearly seeking to foment discontent on our streets by funding activities that further antisemitic hatred and terrorist outrages should give us pause for thought. I would hope that Members on both sides of the House recognise that—I know that they do. Even though the Government are clearly not going to vote for the motion this evening, we will.

Crime and Policing Bill

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Monday 20th April 2026 Commons Chamber

[Chris Vince]

I would say that he is not here, so my hon. Friend can carry on. I thank him for his contribution.

Having a rural crime strategy and having community police officers in place are both hugely important. I have often joked with the shadow Minister about this, so he will know that I have previously taught a number of my community police officers, which is something I am very proud of. It is hugely important that we have frontline neighbourhood police officers, and not just in urban communities. Obviously, they are really important in Harlow, but also in rural communities.

It is also important that we ensure that the police have teeth, so I absolutely welcome the Government’s move to put up to nine points on the driving licences of people who are caught fly-tipping. I really believe that this will make those who are thinking about doing that—perhaps as a favour to their mates—think twice about fly-tipping, which has a huge impact on communities. I recognise that there has been a bit of back-and-forth with the Lords on the issue of fly-tipping, and our noble Friends and Members of the other place came back and said, “We hope this matter has been discussed further,” in this place. I hope that my speech and the contribution from the shadow Minister have ensured that we have continued to discuss the issue of fly-tipping, because I take it very seriously. I hope that you do not see this particular speech as being a rubbish contribution, Madam Deputy Speaker.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

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[Amanda Martin (Portsmouth North) (Lab)]

I am very proud of my city and proud to be a resident, but my constituents tell me at my coffee mornings, at “Pint with your MP” events, at surgeries and on the doorsteps that they find it very difficult to feel pride when antisocial behaviour, fly-tipping, abandoned vehicles and electric scooters blight their everyday lives, the places where they live, the parks in which their kids play, and the high streets that they use. We should all feel and be able to feel pride in the place we live, so I am proud that this Labour Government are taking that very seriously not just with initiatives such as the Pride in Place funding, of which I was very fortunate for Paulsgrove to receive £20 million, and the impact funding, of which we have £1.5 million coming to my city, but with legislation and with action.

I therefore welcome the opportunity to speak in the final stages of this Bill, because it has genuinely significant consequences for communities such as mine in Portsmouth, but I want to start by thanking my neighbourhood police teams for the work they do and for allowing me to be involved when I go out on the beat with them on night shifts and day shifts. I would like to highlight some of the amendments to the Bill that will have the greatest impact on my constituents.

On fixed penalty notices and the fining for profit question—Lords amendments 2D and 2E—I understand why the other place has continued to press on this, and the underlying concern is legitimate. However, if residents in Portsmouth believe that authorised bodies are issuing fixed penalty notices to generate revenue rather than from a desire to deter antisocial behaviour, public trust and enforcement will collapse entirely. So I am glad that the Government have tabled amendments (a) and (b) in lieu, and I would like the Minister to confirm that they will directly address the issue of proportionality and ensure that no institutional financial incentive can distort enforcement decisions.

On fly-tipping, which other Members have talked about—Lords amendment 11—I simply note that this blights communities across Portsmouth. Only on Friday night, while I was out knocking on doors in Stamshaw, I saw evidence of this across the whole ward. So the Government’s offer of four amendments in lieu represents a substantive package in response to the Lords’ concerns. As we have heard, local authorities do have the powers they need, but I think there is a need for clarity and confidence to ensure the use of vehicle seizure powers. That will do two things: it will stop this crime in Portsmouth; and it will put beyond doubt whose responsibility it is, giving the local authority no excuse but to enforce the powers it has. To remove any doubt about this responsibility, I hope that the Minister will confirm that the statutory guidance accompanying these provisions will be issued promptly after Royal Assent, so councils can act without delay.

I am glad the Government are agreeing to the amendments about pornographic content depicting adults role-playing as under-16s. I said on Second Reading that this Bill needed to go further on child protection, and these amendments do exactly that. Content that mimics child sexual abuse, even when the individuals depicted are adults, normalises a deeply harmful behaviour, and it is abhorrent.

This Bill has been long in the making, as has been felt by residents across my city, and the remaining points of disagreement are very narrow. I hope that the other place will now accept the Government’s position, so that this landmark legislation can receive Royal Assent swiftly, and start delivering for my constituents and for communities right across the country. Further delays are felt every day and, indeed, every night on our streets and our coastlines, and in our parks and our housing estates. As someone elected to make my community a safer and cleaner place to live, I know this is what democracy is about and what democracy should do.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call Adam Jogee.

[Adam Jogee]

Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I can tell by your smile that you were not expecting to call me, but I am very grateful that you spied me in this corner at the back of the Chamber.

You will know because I have said it before, Madam Deputy Speaker, that waste crime, fly-tipping and the rest have, sadly, had too much of an impact in Newcastle-under-Lyme. I am thinking of Walleys quarry landfill site and the other examples that continue to blight my community, which I have talked about since my election to this place. As my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Chris Vince) noted, the impact fly-tipping can have on rural communities and our constituents’ lives speaks for itself not just in our surgeries, but in our inboxes. I am thinking of all the people in Betley, Bradwell and Audley who have shared with me the corrosive impact that fly-tipping, industrial crime and waste crime have on communities such as mine.

Conscious of the fact that you did not plan to call me, Madam Deputy Speaker—and judging by the looks of Members, they are keen to get to the votes—

Knife Crime

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Tuesday 14th April 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)]

Before I come to the statement, I want to echo the Home Secretary’s words yesterday following the publication of the Southport attack inquiry report. That was a truly sickening crime, and my thoughts, and those of everybody in this place, are with the families, victims and everyone who was affected.

With permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will make a statement on the Government’s plan to halve knife crime in a decade. That commitment, made in our manifesto, is rooted in recognition of a tragic truth: in too many places, a deadly cycle has taken hold, as fear and violence feed off each other, leaving people—and especially young people—feeling that they have no choice but to carry a weapon to stay safe. In the most devastating cases, that results in the loss of lives that have barely begun.

All that is wretchedly familiar to the House and to me. We know it from the long list of tragedies about which we have spoken with families across the country. We hear it in the anguished words of bereaved parents, whom many of us have met after fatal stabbings in our constituencies. We see it when we look at our children, whose safety is too often the cause of worry and sleepless nights. In these and so many other ways, knife crime is destructive and devastating, and has for too long been plaguing communities and destroying lives.

The task of putting that right falls to this Government. Since the general election we have acted decisively to deliver a response that matches up to the scale of the threat, implementing bans on zombie-style knives, zombie-style machetes and ninja swords; restoring neighbourhood policing to the heart of our communities; getting more than 63,000 knives and dangerous weapons off our streets; ramping up action against county lines gangs to record levels, with over 2,700 lines shut down last year; setting up the coalition to tackle knife crime; and legislating to deliver the toughest crackdown yet on online knife sales. The concerted effort that we have mounted, alongside our partners in the coalition, law enforcement and communities across the country, is having an impact. Since the start of this Parliament, knife crime is down by 8% and knife homicides are down by 27%, to the lowest level in a decade.

Together, we are making progress, but it is not enough. Knives are still being carried, stabbings are still occurring and lives are still being lost. Indeed, there have been several fatal cases in recent days and weeks, and I take this opportunity to express my deepest sympathies to the victims’ loved ones. For them, for all the families out there whose world has been forever changed by knife crime, and for the country as a whole, we must do more, and we are doing more.

We have published the “Protecting lives, building hope” plan, which details the action that the Government are taking and will take to further reduce knife crime and, ultimately, achieve our goal of halving it in a decade. The plan outlines activity and investment designed to drive progress across four key outcomes: supporting young people, stopping those at risk from turning to knife crime, policing our streets and ending the cycle of knife crime. I will address each in turn.

First, we will do much more to give every boy and girl the best possible start in life by addressing the root causes of knife crime; increasing investment in youth services; launching 50 Young Futures hubs to bring together wellbeing support, careers guidance and positive activities in areas badly affected by knife crime; stepping up support for children who are persistently absent from school; and investing in mental health support teams in schools. We do all that and more because we recognise that, to deliver the change that is needed, we must act early and prevent harm before it escalates into violence in later life.

Secondly, we are ramping up efforts to stop young people being drawn into knife crime, be they at risk of being an offender, a victim or both. A new Safety In & Around Schools Partnership, backed by Government funding, will see around 250 schools given targeted support to boost their capacity to tackle knife crime and reduce the risk of harm. We are also investing in the county lines programme and the highly effective network of violence reduction units, and strengthening crime prevention in the communities that need it most.

Thirdly, we will ensure that victims of knife crime get the justice that they deserve, and that dangerous criminals face the full force of the law, through a robust and effective police response. Visible local policing is central to our approach not just on knife crime but across the full breadth of this Government’s agenda on law and order. The severity of the situation that we inherited has been well documented, so I will not retrace that ground, except to say that we have made it a first-order priority to rebuild neighbourhood policing, by putting an additional 13,000 police personnel into neighbourhood roles in England and Wales by the end of this Parliament, with over 3,000 in place two months ahead of schedule, and by implementing the neighbourhood policing guarantee, under which every community has named, contactable officers devoted to tackling local issues.

Police boots on the ground are essential, but we must also ensure that forces are equipped and empowered to make interventions that are precise, timely and effective. We will therefore support the development of tools and approaches that have the potential to enhance prevention and detection, with substantial funding to enhance crime mapping, invest in research and development aimed at improving our capability to detect high-risk knife carriers, and enable targeted action in the police force areas that see the most knife crime through a new knife crime concentrations fund. We will also support forces in maximising the use of intelligence-led stop and search, and where the law needs strengthening, we will not hesitate, as shown by our commitment to introducing much tougher rules around the online sale of knives, through measures we know as Ronan’s law, after Ronan Kanda, who was fatally stabbed aged 16 and whose mother and sister have campaigned heroically for change since his death. That will all be underpinned by the most radical programme of police reform in 200 years.

Fourthly, we will seek to end the cycle of repeat harm by strengthening the youth justice system, improving the rehabilitation of adult offenders to reduce the risk of reoffending and developing a new national approach to identify, prioritise and manage habitual knife offenders who pose the greatest risk to public safety.

Each of those four strands is important on its own, and the steps that we are taking within them have been chosen because the evidence supports that. Equally, I am clear that this work transcends individual policies or initiatives. Ours is a whole-of-Government, whole-of-society mission aimed at building a safer, more hopeful future for all. The publication of this plan marks a significant moment in that mission, not because of what it says, but because of the action that it will drive.

Above all, we think today of the victims, and of the families that are smaller than they should be. Although we can never undo the pain inflicted on them, we can prevent others from suffering as they have. It will not be easy, but this Government will be unrelenting in the vital effort to protect lives and build hope. As Pooja Kanda so aptly put it,

“Every child deserves to grow up safely.”

She is right, and we must and will do everything in our power to make those words a reality in every part of our country. I commend this statement to the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the shadow Minister.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sarah Jones]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question; of course, all our thoughts are with the family of his constituent who has lost his life. These things are always tragic, and I know that he will be involved in trying to help the community heal from such a difficult situation. I know that arrests have been made on suspicion of murder and other offences; I think four people have been arrested. That is good, but of course, nothing will bring back that young lad.

We have to understand where knife crime is happening and why, and we are investing a huge amount of funding in exactly that. Through our work, we are able to identify exactly where the knife-crime hotspots are across the country, and we are working with local partners and the police to ensure that we understand exactly why there are these hotspots. In some parts of the country, this is happening just after school, because, sadly, this is a crime that involves young people. Sometimes the night-time economy is driving knife crime, and sometimes it is other things. We are absolutely focused on the causes of knife crime, and on providing a lot of support to young people to try to bring them out of a life of crime, but also on understanding exactly what is going on in some areas. As my hon. Friend says, there will be some areas where knife crime is going up, and some where it is coming down. We need to understand that and address it.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Luke Taylor (Sutton and Cheam) (LD)]

The Liberal Democrats welcome the publication of the strategy, and I am particularly glad to note the involvement of the Ben Kinsella Trust in formulating it. The trust does remarkable work with young students and teachers to make sure that we take a holistic approach to knife crime, which is badly needed. That is particularly true of its chief executive officer, Patrick Green, who I had the pleasure of meeting at Finsbury library last year. We Liberal Democrats have said time and again that we need a smarter approach to knife crime, not just to save lives but to improve them. Will the Minister commit to securing long-term funding for the measures outlined in the strategy? Without that guarantee, the strategy will be little more than warm words.

Secondly, will the Minister confirm whether the 13,000 new police officers in the neighbourhood teams that the Government claim to be deploying are actually a new resource, or is this an accounting trick, whereby existing officers are redeployed? The Minister may not want to talk about numbers, but they are particularly important in London; the Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley has said that it is increasingly difficult to keep Londoners safe with a shrinking force, and estimates suggests that there are 2,503 fewer police officers in London today than there were in May 2024. I am happy to be corrected on that number.

Finally, will the Minister explain why the Government continue to skirt around the edges of a meaningful public health approach, without adopting one outright? We know that knife crime is not just a policing issue; it is a public health crisis. If we are serious about tackling it as the epidemic that it is, we must treat it as one, and bring together every person who sees the warning signs: teachers, GPs, youth workers, social workers, sports coaches—trusted adults who know when something is going wrong—and, tragically, as we have read in the conclusions of the Southport inquiry report, parents too. Right now, all those groups are isolated and do not talk to each other. We need to break down the silo walls and build real partnerships across civil society. Until the Government recognise that and invest in a public health approach, our progress will be blunted.

[Sarah Jones]

I appreciate the Liberal Democrats welcoming the plan. I join the hon. Gentleman in praising the Ben Kinsella Trust and Patrick Green. Patrick has been brilliant throughout the development of the strategy, as have the members of the coalition that brought together a group of people, many of whom have lost loved ones in very difficult circumstances, to push for action to stop other people losing their loved ones. I pay tribute to all of them.

The funding for the plan will come from across Government, not just the Home Office. Home Office funding amounts to about £130 million—a substantial sum—but the Department for Culture, Media and Sport is leading on the Young Futures hubs, the Department for Education is leading on interventions in schools, and the Ministry of Justice is making a huge investment in the youth justice system, so there is a big cross-Government approach.

I have done a lot of work over the years on the public health approach. It is quite simple; it basically says that violence is catching. If people have violence in their life, they are more likely to be violent. Someone who was in a domestic abuse situation as a child is more likely to be violent; people who join a gang are more likely to become violent—it is relatively straightforward. The interventions that we are putting in place are designed to prevent those crimes and stop that violence spreading. That is why the figures on violence are coming down, and we are seeing the first shoots of success.

On the numbers, there has been a 0.6% drop overall in the number of police officers from March 2025 to September 2025—that is a very small drop. The key question is: what are our police officers doing? Having 12,000 officers behind desks is not right; they should be out in our communities. Obviously, some of them need to do jobs that do not involve being out on our streets, but we want our officers out on our streets. We have always said—we said it in our manifesto—that the 13,000 will be a mix of new officers, police community support officers and redeployed officers.

We are introducing new technology, so that we can free up the equivalent of 3,000 officers’ time. It is much better for that 13,000 to be a mix of officers; it means that we have already been able to deliver 3,000, some of whom are already trained officers, so they know what they are doing. If we were just recruiting new people, there would be the challenge of new officers not having the experience that others have. We have always said that we would be taking a mixed approach. The point is that we are putting 13,000 police officers into our communities and neighbourhoods, which is what the public want. Those officers will help to tackle the epidemic of everyday crime, and knife crime too.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Chair of the Justice Committee.

[Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith and Chiswick) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for agreeing to meet me and members of the safer knives group, which brings together experts on the type of knives most commonly used in knife crime. Does she agree that restricting sales of pointed knives, and moving to rounded-tip versions for kitchen use, could limit the number and type of injuries caused, especially in domestic and impulsive violence, potentially reducing death and serious injuries?

--- Later in debate ---

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I encourage Members to ask short questions. We have important business on crime and policing to follow, which I am sure Members will want to get through.

[Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)]

I welcome the publication of this strategy, and I pay tribute to the Minister for her strong commitment over many years to this area of policy and the depth of her thinking on it. In my constituency, we have seen far too many horrific tragedies. Out of those tragedies, however, has come some truly exceptional work in response from the community and from our grassroots youth-led organisations, in providing services that support young people. Those services provide positive opportunities for young people, help the community to come to terms with the trauma they have experienced and set young people back on a positive track. However, those organisations tell me that they struggle to access long-term sustainable funding. What is the Minister doing as part of this strategy to ensure that our youth organisations can keep the lights on and do their important work as part of the infrastructure of services that we need to tackle this problem?

Crime and Policing Bill

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 14th April 2026 Commons Chamber

Consideration of Lords amendments

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I must draw the House’s attention to the fact that Lords amendments 12, 256, 260, 264, 335, 361, 366, 367 and 369 engage the Commons’ financial privilege. If any of those Lords amendments are agreed to, I will cause the customary entry waiving the Commons’ financial privilege to be entered in the Journal.

[The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)]

I beg to move amendment (a) to Lords amendment 263.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

With this it will be convenient to discuss:

Lords amendment 263, and Government amendments (b) to (g) to Lords amendment 263.

Lords amendment 361, and Government amendments (a) to (e) to Lords amendment 361.

Lords amendment 2, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) to (c) in lieu of Lords amendment 2.

Lords amendment 6, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 10, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) and (b) in lieu of Lords amendment 10.

Lords amendment 11, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 12, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 15, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendment (a) in lieu of Lords amendment 15.

Lords amendments 256 and 257, Government motions to disagree, and Government amendments (a) and (b) in lieu of Lords amendments 256 and 257.

Lords amendment 258, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendment (a) in lieu of Lords amendment 258.

Lords amendments 259 and 260, Government motions to disagree, and Government amendments (a) to (d) in lieu of Lords amendments 259 and 260.

Lords amendment 264, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) to (f) in lieu of Lords amendment 264.

Lords amendment 265, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendments (a) to (c) in lieu of Lords amendment 265.

Lords amendment 311, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 333, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendment (a) in lieu of Lords amendment 333.

Lords amendment 334, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 339, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 342, Government motion to disagree, and Government amendment (a) in lieu of Lords amendment 342.

Lords amendment 357, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 359, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 360 and 368 to 372, Government motions to disagree, and Government amendment (a) in lieu of Lords amendments 360 and 368 to 372.

Lords amendment 439, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 505, and Government motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 1, 3 to 5, 7 to 9, 13, 14, 16 to 255, 261, 262 and 266 to 299.

Lords amendment 300, and motion to disagree.

Lords amendment 301, and motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 302 to 310.

Lords amendment 312, and motion to disagree.

Lords amendments 313 to 332, 335 to 338, 340, 341, 343 to 356, 358, 362 to 367, 373 to 438, 440 to 504 and 506 to 532.

[Sarah Jones]

I am delighted to see the return of this Bill—the largest criminal justice Bill in a generation—to this House. The Bill will support the Government’s mission to halve knife crime and violence against women and girls in a decade, and give our police and law enforcement agencies the tools they need to tackle antisocial behaviour, sexual violence, terrorism and online harms. The amendments made in the House of Lords support these aims.

Given the number of Lords amendments, I will focus my remarks on the Government amendments made in response to commitments given on Report in the Commons last June by my predecessor as Policing Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North and Cottingham (Dame Diana Johnson)—she was sitting on the Front Bench earlier—before outlining the Government’s response to the 19 non-Government amendments added in the other place.

First, my hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Jess Asato) rightly raised concerns about the depiction of strangulation and suffocation in pornography, an issue which was also highlighted by Baroness Bertin’s independent pornography review. As set out in our violence against women and girls strategy last December, the Government have announced our intention to criminalise the possession and publication of pornographic images that depict strangulation and suffocation, and Lords amendments 261 and 262 give effect to that commitment.

Secondly, my hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire and Bedworth (Rachel Taylor) rightly pressed the Government on when we would deliver our manifesto commitment to make all existing strands of hate crime an aggravated offence. I am pleased to commend Lords amendment 301, which extends the existing racially and religiously aggravated offences to cover hostility based on sex, sexual orientation, disability and transgender identity.

Thirdly, my hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi) pointed to the long-term impact, including on employment opportunities, for those convicted of the offences of loitering and soliciting while under 18. Lords amendments 270 and 271 therefore introduce a new disregards and pardons scheme for anyone convicted or cautioned as a child for those offences.

I will now turn to the 19 non-Government amendments added in the other place. First, Lords amendment 2 seeks to bar the issuing of fixed penalty notices by enforcement companies and contractors for profit. The Government do understand the concern about enforcement agencies issuing fixed penalty notices where there may be a financial incentive to do so. To be clear, local agencies are expected to issue fixed penalty notices only when it is appropriate and proportionate to do so. However, Lords amendment 2 risks weakening crucial enforcement action to tackle antisocial behaviour. Our amendments in lieu instead provide that statutory guidance will address the need to ensure that the issuing of fixed penalty notices by authorised persons is proportionate.

On Lords amendments 6 and 10 to 12, I fully appreciate and understand the damage that fly-tipping can do to our communities. The Government’s waste crime action plan, published on 20 March, sets out proposals to radically improve enforcement in this area, including by granting courts the power to impose between three and nine penalty points on the driving licence of those convicted of fly-tipping where driving a vehicle was used in or for the purposes of the offence. Our amendment in lieu implements this commitment.

Turning to Lords amendment 15, on its introduction the Bill provided for a maximum four-year prison term for those convicted of a new offence of possession of a weapon with intent to cause unlawful violence. While this was drafted in line with other possession offences, the Government accept that the intent element of this new offence justifies a higher maximum penalty. Our amendment in lieu therefore provides for a seven-year maximum rather than the 10 years provided for in the Lords amendment, which we believe is disproportionate given that this remains a possession offence.

Lords amendments 255, 256, 258 to 260 and 505, introduced by the Government and by Baroness Owen and Baroness Bertin, all seek to further tackle the proliferation of demeaning and degrading intimate images online. The Government share these aims, and we are clear that intimate image abuse is completely unacceptable.

Lords amendment 255, brought forward by the Government, will criminalise the making, adapting and supplying of nudification tools. These tools use artificial intelligence to create deepfake, non-consensual intimate images, many of women. While creating, sharing and threatening to share non-consensual intimate images is already illegal, this amendment goes further, and criminalises the developers making and supplying these tools. As well as the criminal duties, once this new offence is in force the requirements of the Online Safety Act 2023 will kick in. This means that social media services will be required to take down content that supplies nudification tools, and search engines will have to reduce the visibility of search results linked to these tools.

Southport Inquiry

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Monday 13th April 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Shabana Mahmood)]

With permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the Southport inquiry. I must thank all who participated in the inquiry and the chair, Sir Adrian Fulford, and his team. Today, Sir Adrian published the report of the inquiry’s first phase. This summer, the Government will provide a full response. That will also cover Lord Anderson’s Prevent review. Today, I will provide the Government’s initial reaction to an inquiry that exposes a series of tragic failures from which we must learn.

We do so in the shadow of the events of 29 July 2024. I will not name the perpetrator, nor dwell on the details of the crimes that saw three beautiful young girls murdered, the attempted murder of eight other children and two adults, and lasting physical and psychological harm to many more. I know that I speak on behalf of the whole House when I say that my thoughts today are with all those affected. In honour of them and the memory of three murdered girls, Elsie Dot Stancombe, Bebe King and Alice da Silva Aguiar, we must now act to prevent similar attacks. It was for that reason that my predecessor appointed Sir Adrian Fulford to lead a full statutory inquiry.

The inquiry’s work has two parts. The first, which reported today, considered the decisions made by the agencies and services that interacted with the perpetrator. That included a range of institutions in the criminal justice system, as well as in education, healthcare and local government. It also considered the actions of the perpetrator’s parents.

The findings of the inquiry are unsparing. Sir Adrian has uncovered systematic failures across multiple public sector organisations. The recording and sharing of information were poor. None of the agencies involved had a full understanding of the risk that the perpetrator posed, and many did not take steps to assess the risk he posed to others. There was a failure by the agencies involved to take responsibility, and nobody was clear as to who was in charge; so the failure, because it belonged to everyone, belonged to no one. Where individuals missed opportunities to intervene, lessons must be learned, but they did so within organisations that repeatedly passed the risk to others and where systemic failings existed.

The perpetrator came into contact with the state on countless occasions. Lancashire police responded to five calls to his home address. The police were called when he was in possession of a knife in a public place. He was referred on several occasions to the multi-agency safeguarding hub. He came into contact with children’s social care, the Early Help service and children’s mental health services. He was referred to Prevent on three occasions. He was convicted of a violent assault and referred to a youth offending team. All failed to identify the risk that the perpetrator posed, and so he fell through the gaps. The warning signs were missed: a growing history of violence, and a clear and continuing intent to commit harm.

In the Home Office, the focus falls on Prevent and policing. Sir Adrian is clear that police should have progressed the perpetrator to the multi-agency Channel programme. Channel could have actively assessed and managed his risk. Instead, he was not deemed suitable because he had no fixed ideology. That ran counter to the guidance at the time, but the thresholds were unclear and the guidance was applied inconsistently. The perpetrator’s multiple referrals were also considered individually, when they should have been seen as a cumulative and compounding risk. The perpetrator did not receive the correct interventions, and his autism diagnosis meant that professionals focused far too much on his vulnerability and far too little on the threat that he might pose to others.

The horrific attack was itself evidence of the ease with which it could be conducted. There were no restrictions to stop the perpetrator watching the violent content that inspired him, downloading instructions to make poison, or viewing terrorist materials online. He was also able to bypass the safeguards that should have stopped him buying and receiving dangerous weapons. These findings are devastating, but they are not surprising. Findings like these have been heard before in inquests and inquiries. This time, however, they must be a spur for change. The inquiry makes 67 recommendations. The Government are reviewing them and will respond to those which relate to national government this summer, and I expect local agencies to do the same.

Since this awful crime, the Government have already acted. That begins with Prevent. Since the Southport attack, the Home Office and counter-terrorism policing have reviewed historical cases to ensure that similar instances were handled correctly, with cases reassessed for any change in risk and managed accordingly. The Government have reviewed the Prevent thresholds and published updated guidance. We have introduced a new Prevent assessment framework, with mandatory training for counter-terrorism case officers. Oversight of repeat Prevent referrals has been strengthened, ensuring that cumulative risk is not missed and senior sign-off is required before a case is closed. To provide independent oversight of the whole system, we have created an independent Prevent commissioner. I thank Lord Anderson, whose term ends today, for so ably taking on that position on an interim basis. I am pleased to say that I have appointed Tim Jacques as the new Prevent commissioner, and he begins his role tomorrow.

This Government have also begun to place greater controls on a dangerously unregulated online world. The Online Safety Act 2023 requires companies to remove illegal content from their platforms. The Act is intended to limit children from encountering content that is legal but poses a risk of significant harm, although that is just the beginning of what can and must be done. The internet remains a dangerous place for children, and we are clear that tech companies have a moral responsibility to keep their users safe. The House should be in no doubt that, when they fail to do so, the Government will intervene. That is why we are consulting on whether to remove children’s access to social media entirely.

I can also announce today that we will legislate to prevent the spread of extreme violent content online. We have also made it harder for people to purchase weapons. The Crime and Policing Bill places new controls on the online sale and delivery of knives. We have banned the manufacture, purchase and possession of ninja swords and zombie-style machetes, and earlier this year we published new guidance mandating that any child caught with a knife must be referred to a youth offending team.

In the aftermath of the attack, the Government commissioned Jonathan Hall KC—the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation—to consider the legislative gaps exposed by the attack. That work identified an inconsistency that clearly needed addressing: unlike for terrorist attacks, there is no crime on the statute book for planning an attack without an underlying ideology. Jonathan Hall therefore recommended the creation of a new offence. That legislation will be brought forward as soon as parliamentary time allows.

The inquiry also identifies a wider issue: rising numbers of young men are fascinated by extreme violence—boys whose minds are warped by time spent in isolation online. That is a risk to us all. Where someone is vulnerable to terrorism, they can and should be managed through the Prevent programme. However, where they are not, there is no clear approach to that risk. Today, we publish the terms of reference for the second part of the Southport inquiry, which will face directly into that challenge. Sir Adrian will provide recommendations on the adequacy of the existing arrangements, across all arms of the state, for identifying and managing the risk posed by violence-fixated individuals. He will explore what specific interventions are required to reduce the risk to the public. He will also review the influence of the internet and social media, and the ease with which weapons can be procured. Sir Adrian begins this work immediately, and will present his final recommendations next spring.

In the summer of 2024, an act of unspeakable evil took place in Southport. Nothing will ever heal the pain of those who survive, including the families who suffered unimaginable loss. Responsibility rests with the perpetrator, but there was also responsibility within the family. The perpetrator’s parents knew the risk that he posed but did not co-operate with the authorities. There is also responsibility on the state, and on all of us here, to learn the lessons from failures, wherever they occurred. That lesson is that the failures happened everywhere. We must ensure that we do not find ourselves here again, grieving deaths that would never have happened had the state—and those who work within it—acted differently. That is our task. I commend this statement to the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the shadow Home Secretary.

--- Later in debate ---

[Shabana Mahmood]

My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point about the reliance that all of us place on the Prevent programme. We should rightly be able to place that reliance on the programme and ensure that it is as strong as it possibly can be when it comes to preventing tragedies, diverting people away from potentially committing a terrorist act and driving them away from extremism more broadly.

We have already been delivering a number of improvements to the Prevent programme. There is new statutory guidance, improved training, new case management systems and much stronger interventions for people who are already on the programme. We also have a strengthened approach to managing repeat referrals; where there are a number of referrals, which individually might not have led to an onward referral to the Channel stream, the cumulative impact is now being taken into account. There is also a much more robust risk assessment tool. The totality of the changes that we have already made has put the programme in a much stronger position, but in learning of the findings from this inquiry, we will take more action as necessary.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Jess Brown-Fuller (Chichester) (LD)]

I thank the Home Secretary for advance sight of her statement. It is truly heartbreaking to know that there were so many missed opportunities to stop the Southport attack. My thoughts today are with the bereaved families whose young daughters were so cruelly taken from them and with the many other victims who suffered unimaginable trauma that day. We owe it to them to make every attempt to prevent a senseless attack like this from ever happening again.

The report lays bare that agency after agency failed to step up and take ownership of the risks that the perpetrator posed. There are monumental failures across a number of authorities, from the police, Prevent and NHS mental health services to children’s social care, youth offending services and the perpetrator’s parents. That is simply not acceptable. Will the Home Secretary confirm how soon she plans to report back on whether the Government will accept all 67 recommendations? Will she commit to providing Parliament with an update on progress every six months?

Today’s report exposes serious oversights by online giants that allowed the perpetrator to collect an arsenal of weapons without effective age verification checks. Will the Home Secretary confirm whether the recently published knife crime strategy will address the ease with which knives are available for purchase online? Will it crack down on big tech companies, like Amazon, that are putting profit above protocol when it comes to the sale of dangerous items?

Finally, the Liberal Democrats have long argued that Prevent is not fit for purpose. It is deeply shocking that the perpetrator was referred three times yet no further action was taken. We understand that was because he did not possess a specific ideology—well, there should be no clearer sign of a system unable to address modern threats. Will the Home Secretary today commit to a full overhaul of Prevent within this Parliament so that future warning signs are not missed? Will she also commit to bringing forward the legislation recommended by Jonathan Hall KC in the next King’s Speech?

--- Later in debate ---

[Shabana Mahmood]

The hon. Gentleman is right: it is cultural change that is needed, and that is what Sir Adrian Fulford’s initial recommendations in phase 1 were designed to bring about, along with practical measures to change the way in which risk is assessed and ultimately mitigated. The Government will respond fully to those recommendations, and will bring together every part of Government—every part of the state—to ensure that people are doing all that they should be doing to assess risk, because the only factors that matter relate to the risk posed by an individual to other people of significant harm of the type that we have seen in this case. The Government will ensure that that happens in the future.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I thank the Home Secretary for her statement this afternoon.

Disclosure and Barring Service

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Monday 19th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Tessa Munt]

Madam Deputy Speaker, can you confirm that we can witter on until 10 o’clock? I believe that we are not limited.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Just to provide clarity, the Minister can indeed continue until 10 pm, but she does not have to.

[Jess Phillips]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. When I woke up this morning, I did not think that this debate would start until 10 pm, so any more time is a bonus. I apologise. The last time I replied in an Adjournment debate, I ran wildly over time, and somebody had to shut me up. I did not want anyone to be put in that position again.

The portability of checks was raised. I think people do not understand quite how many DBS checks are done a year—7.3 million. It gives me some comfort that quite a lot of the workforce in our country are undertaking checks. Incidentally, we do not have to undergo checks as Members of Parliament.

Grooming Gangs: Independent Inquiry

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Tuesday 9th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood]

On my hon. Friend’s point about cross-border offending, I can absolutely reassure him that it will not be allowed to slip through the net. The chair and her panel members have already confirmed that.

My hon. Friend made an important point, which nobody in the House should lose sight of, about the view that many in society took of the girls who were raped and abused. They were seen in many parts of society, in some local authorities and in some policing essentially as white trash. There was the view that somehow they were not really children or victims of coercion and serious abuse, but were making decisions, as if they were in control of their lives. That is why this process is so essential. It must ensure that the moment of reckoning that is required because of this shocking scandal is fair and true to the victims in every way. That applies both to the vile perpetrators of the crimes, who the criminal justice response will go after, and those in our state institutions who thoroughly let these girls down.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee.

[Dame Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con)]

I thank the Home Secretary for her statement, and I welcome the appointment of the noble Baroness Longfield as chair of the panel. She has a great track record. I have worked with her over many years and am sure that she will do a very thorough job. I am very grateful that victims are being put at the centre of the inquiry. This is about the victims, and we cannot forget their terrible suffering. They must be front and centre of everything that the inquiry does. What would happen if, during one of the local inquiries, new evidence or a new issue arises? Will it be possible to go back and look at previous inquiries, including those that have already completed, if certain issues were not identified, but are raised through this new work?

--- Later in debate ---

[Shabana Mahmood]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I strongly endorse every point he just made. There will be no place to hide for those who hurt these girls, those who let them down, and those who allowed them to be hurt. It is important that this inquiry finally provides us—all of us as a country—with the answers we need, so that we can learn lessons, bring a measure of justice to the victims in this case, and make sure that this never happens again.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I call the Father of the House.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

The Home Secretary knows that I admire her personally. She is a devout Muslim lady, and I share many of her values. I think she is uniquely well placed to comment on this, explain and give us confidence. What is it about these Muslim men that meant that they felt that they could behave in this way, and can she explain that this is—if it is—a very small minority? Can she see what I am trying to get at? She can approach this, and explain this, in a way that some of us cannot, because nobody can ever accuse her of being racist, and nobody can ever accuse her of not wanting to get to the truth.

Migration: Settlement Pathway

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Thursday 20th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Shabana Mahmood)]

With your permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will make a statement on a fairer pathway to settlement for migrants.

The story of migration in this country is woven through my own. My father came here in the early ’70s, my mother a little less than a decade later. Both came to seek a better life, and they found one here. In time, while always proud Kashmiris, they became British citizens themselves—Brummies, too—and brought up four children just as proud as them to be a part of this country and that great city. This is not just my story; it is the story of many of my constituents in Birmingham Ladywood, and of many millions more across this country.

Like so many others like me, I am a patriot. Mine is a love of a country that is forever changing, while something essential about us always endures. It is a patriotism that finds room for those who trace their roots back many generations and for those who, like me, do not. However, I worry that for some, that broad patriotism is narrowing, and that a vision of a greater Britain is giving way to that of a littler England, as anger turns to hate. Some will choose to scorn this analysis; they would rather that we simply wished it away, but those who look like me do not have that luxury. Our lives and those of our families are more dangerous in a country that turns inwards, so we have no choice but to ask what the cause of our division is, and how this country might be united.

As I said earlier this week, the pace and scale of migration in this country has been destabilising. I spoke on Monday of the 400,000 people who have claimed asylum since 2021, but that figure pales in comparison with the net migration figure for the same period. In that time, 2.6 million more people moved to Britain than left. To place that in perspective, around one in every 30 people in this country arrived in those four years. This is the result of the extraordinary open-border experiment conducted by the last Conservative Government.

In that period, now sometimes called the Boriswave, immigration controls were drastically lifted. This was most notable in the case of the health and care visa, for which minimum salary requirements were dropped. An attempt to fill between 6,000 and 40,000 jobs led to the arrival of 616,000 individuals between 2022 and 2024. Over half of those individuals were not even filling jobs in the sector—rather, they were dependants of those who were—and as any Member of Parliament could tell us, abuse was rife.

I would have thought that my support for migration did not need to be stated, but after some of the questions I faced on Monday, I think I had better do so. Migrant communities have been woven into the tapestry of British life for generations. While I will never believe in assimilating communities, we have achieved cohesion because different communities have integrated, retaining their distinction within a single, pluralistic whole. This makes demands of those who are already here to remain open to new arrivals, but more than that, it demands something of those arriving. To settle in this country forever is not a right, but a privilege, and it must be earned. Today, that is not the case; settlement, or indefinite leave to remain, comes almost automatically after five years’ residence in this country. At that point, a migrant gains access to many of the rights of a British citizen, including to benefits.

As a result of the unprecedented levels of migration in recent years, 1.6 million people are now forecast to settle between 2026 and 2030, with a peak of 450,000 in 2028—around four times higher than the recent average. That will now change. As this Government announced in their immigration White Paper, the starting point for settlement will move from five years to 10. To ensure that this is earned, new criteria will be added, which will act as a disqualifying bar for those who do not meet them. First, the applicant must have a clean criminal record; secondly, they must speak English to A-level standard; thirdly, they must have made sustained national insurance contributions; and finally, they must have no debt in this country.

While these criteria set the bar that everyone must meet, there are a series of other tests, which today have been published for consultation. These either add to, or subtract from, the 10-year qualifying period. To recognise the particular value to society they play, the Government propose that those who speak English to a degree-level standard could qualify for a nine-year path to settlement; those paying the higher rate of tax could qualify at five years; and those on the top rate could qualify after three, the same as those on global talent visas. Those who work in a public service, including doctors, teachers and nurses, would qualify after five years, while those who volunteer—subject to this consultation—could qualify at between five and seven years. Not subject to consultation, the partners of British citizens will continue to qualify at five years, as is the case today. This is also true of British nationals overseas from Hong Kong, who will qualify at five years in honour of our unique responsibilities to them. All grants under the Windrush and EU settlement schemes will also remain unchanged.

While some people will be able to qualify for settlement earlier than 10 years, others will be forced to wait longer. Once again, these proposals are subject to consultation, but the Government propose that those who have received benefits for less than 12 months would not qualify for settlement until 15 years after arrival. For those who have claimed benefits for more than 12 months, the duration would rise to 20 years, and to encourage the use of legal routes into this country, those who arrive illegally could see settlement take up to 30 years. As has already been set out, refugees on core protection will qualify for settlement after 20 years, although those who move to a work and study visa could earn settlement earlier, and those arriving by a safe and legal route would earn settlement at 10 years. This consultation is open regarding settlement rights for some cohorts of special interest, including children, members of the armed forces and victims of certain crimes.

As well as considering the responsibilities that are expected of those who seek a permanent life in this country, the consultation also raises the question of the rights that will be provided. Specifically, it proposes that benefits might not be available to those who have settled status, reserving them instead for those who have earned British citizenship. Finally, the consultation addresses the question of the so-called Boriswave, specifically the cohort of lower-qualified workers who—along with their dependants—entered the country through the health and care visa, and some of whom are never expected to be net economic contributors. It is right that we apply more stringent controls for this group. For that reason, we propose they should wait 15 years before they can earn settlement. Crucially, for these people and for every other group mentioned, we propose that these changes apply to everyone in the country today who has not yet received indefinite leave to remain, although we are seeking views on whether some transitional arrangements should be available.

May I make one thing absolutely clear, though? We will not change the rules for those with settled status today. These are people who have been in our country for years, or even decades. They have families here— wives, husbands and children. They have worked in our hospitals and taught in our schools, and have been contributing to our society for years. Fairness is the most fundamental of British values. We made a promise when we gave those people settlement, and we do not break our promises.

The Reform party—whose Members, I note, are not in the Chamber today—has said that it will do this most un-British of things. The Tories have said that they will, but then said that they will not; I am left in as much of a muddle about their policy as they are, although perhaps the shadow Home Secretary might enlighten the House today. But I can be clear that this Government will not change the rules for those with settled status.

As this consultation shows, we listen to the British public, and I encourage all those interested to make their voices heard. Today I have set out what we propose and, perhaps more importantly, why. I love this country, which opened its arms to my parents around 50 years ago, but I am concerned by the division I see now, fuelled by a pace and scale of change that is placing immense pressure on local communities. For those who believe that migration is part of modern Britain’s story and should always continue to be, we must prove that it can still work, with those who come here contributing, playing their part and enriching our national life. While each will always retain something of who they were and where they came from, they become a part of the greatest multi-ethnic, multi-faith democracy in the world. I commend this statement to the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the shadow Home Secretary.

Asylum Policy

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Monday 17th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Before I call the Home Secretary to make her statement, I am sorry that Mr Speaker has once again had to ask me to remind Ministers of the requirement in the Government’s own ministerial code that major new policy announcements should be made in this House in the first instance and not to the media. This afternoon’s statement has already been the subject of very extensive media coverage, both over the weekend and this morning, including a lot of policy detail. Hon. and right hon. Members on the Government Benches were very quick to criticise Ministers in the previous Government for this kind of behaviour, but the Home Office seems to have a particular problem with making media announcements before Ministers come to make statements to the House. I know that the Committee chaired by the hon. Member for North Dorset (Simon Hoare) is looking at this matter, and I look forward to reading the Committee’s recommendations. I call the Home Secretary.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Shabana Mahmood)]

With permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will make a statement about how we restore order and control to our borders. I do so as this Government publish the most significant reform to our migration system in modern times.

This country will always offer sanctuary to those fleeing danger, but we must also acknowledge that the world has changed and our asylum system has not changed with it. Our world is a more volatile and more mobile place. Huge numbers are on the move. While some are refugees, others are economic migrants seeking to use and abuse our asylum system. Even genuine refugees are passing through other safe countries, searching for the most attractive place to seek refuge.

The burden that has fallen on this country has been heavy: 400,000 have sought asylum here in the past four years. Over 100,000 people now live in asylum accommodation, and over half of refugees remain on benefits eight years after they have arrived. To the British public, who foot the bill, the system feels out of control and unfair. It feels that way because it is. The pace and scale of change have destabilised communities. It is making our country a more divided place. There will never be a justification for the violence and racism of a minority, but if we fail to deal with this crisis, we will draw more people down a path that starts with anger and ends in hatred.

I have no doubt about who we really are in this country: we are open, tolerant and generous. But the public rightly expect that we can determine who enters this country and who must leave. To maintain the generosity that allows us to provide sanctuary, we must restore order and control.

Rather than deal substantively with this problem, the last Conservative Government wasted precious years and £700 million on their failed Rwanda plan, with the lamentable result of just four volunteers removed from the country. As a result, they left us with the grotesque chaos of asylum seekers housed in hotels and shuttled around in taxis, with the taxpayer footing the bill.

My predecessor as Home Secretary picked up this dreadful inheritance and rebuilt the foundations of a collapsed asylum system. Decision making has been restored, with a backlog now 18% lower than when we entered office. Removals have increased, reaching nearly 50,000 under this Government. Immigration enforcement has hit record levels, with over 8,000 arrests in the last year. The Border Security Bill is progressing through Parliament, and my predecessor struck an historic agreement with the French so that small boat arrivals can now be sent back to France.

Those are vital steps, but we must go further. Today, we have published “Restoring Order and Control”, a new statement on our asylum policy. Its goals are twofold: first, to reduce illegal arrivals into this country, and secondly, to increase removals of those with no right to be here. It starts by accepting an uncomfortable truth: while asylum claims fall across Europe, they are rising here, and that is because of the comparative generosity of our asylum offer compared with many of our European neighbours. That generosity is a factor that draws people to these shores, on a path that runs through other safe countries. Nearly 40% come on small boats and over perilous channel crossings, but a roughly equal proportion come legally, via visitor, work or study visas, and then go on to claim asylum. They do so because refugee status is the most generous route into this country. An initial grant lasts five years and is then converted, almost automatically, into permanent settled status.

In other European countries, things are done differently. In Denmark, refugee status is temporary, and they provide safety and sanctuary until it is possible for a refugee to return home. In recent years, asylum claims in Denmark have hit a 40-year low, and now countries across Europe are tightening their systems in similar ways. We must act too. We will do so by making refugee status temporary, not permanent. A grant of refugee status will last for two and a half years, not five years. It will be renewed only if it is impossible for a refugee to return home. Permanent settlement will now come at 20 years, not five years.

I know that this country welcomes people who contribute. For those who want to stay, and who are willing and able to, we will create a new work and study visa route solely for refugees, with a quicker path to permanent settlement. To encourage refugees into work, we will also consult on removing benefits for those who are able to work but choose not to. Outside the most exceptional circumstances, family reunion will not be possible, with a refugee able to bring family over only if they have joined a work and study route, and if qualifying tests are met.

Although over 50,000 claimants have been granted refugee status in the past year, more than 100,000 claimants and failed asylum seekers remain in taxpayer-funded accommodation. We know that criminal gangs use the prospect of free bed and board to promote their small boat crossings. We have already announced that we will empty asylum hotels by the end of this Parliament, and we are exploring a number of large military sites as an alternative. We will now also remove the 2005 legislation that created a duty to support asylum seekers, reverting to a legal power to do so instead. We will continue to support those who play by the rules, but those who do not—be that through criminality or antisocial behaviour—can have their support removed.

We will also remove our duty to support those who have a right to work. It is right that those who receive support pay for it if they can, so those with income or assets will have to contribute to the cost of their stay. That will end the absurdity that we currently experience, in which an asylum seeker receiving £800 each month from his family, and who had recently acquired an Audi, was receiving free housing at the taxpayer’s expense, and the courts judged that we could do nothing about it.

The measures are designed to tackle the pull factors that draw people to this country, but reducing the number of arrivals is just half of the story. We must also enforce our rules and remove those who have no right to be here. That will mean restarting removals to countries where they have been paused. In recent months, we have begun the voluntary removal of failed asylum seekers to Syria once again. However, many failed asylum seekers from Syria are still here, most of whom fled a regime that has since been toppled. Other countries are planning to enforce removals, and we will follow suit. Where a failed asylum seeker cannot be returned home, we will also continue to explore the possibility of return hubs, with negotiations ongoing.

We must remove those who have failed asylum claims, regardless of who they are. Today, we are not removing family groups, even when we know that their home country is perfectly safe. There are, for instance, around 700 Albanian families living in taxpayer-funded accommodation having failed their asylum claims—despite an existing returns agreement, and Albania being a signatory to the European convention on human rights. So we will now begin the removal of families. Where possible, we will encourage a voluntary return, but where an enforced return is necessary, that is what we will do.

Where the barrier to a return is not the individual, nor the UK Government, but the receiving country, we will take action. I can announce that we have told Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Namibia that if they do not comply with international rules and norms, we will impose visa penalties on them. I am sending a wider message here: unless other countries heed this lesson, further sanctions will follow.

Much of the delay in our removals, however, comes from the sclerotic nature of our own system. In March of this year, the appeals backlog stood at 51,000 cases. This Government have already increased judicial sitting days, but reform is required, so we will create a new appeals body, staffed by professional independent adjudicators, and we will ensure that early legal representation is available to advise claimants and ensure their issues are properly considered. Cases with a low chance of success will be fast-tracked, and claimants will have just one opportunity to claim and one to appeal, ending the merry-go-round of claims and appeals that frustrate so many removals.

While some barriers to removal are the result of process, others are substantive issues related to the law itself. There is no doubt that the expanded interpretation of parts of the European convention on human rights has contributed. This is particularly true of article 8: the right to a family life. The courts have adopted an ever-expanding interpretation of that right. As a result, many people have been allowed to come to this country when they would otherwise have had no right to, and we have been unable to remove others when the case for doing so seems overwhelming. That includes cases like an arsonist, sentenced to five years in prison, whose deportation was blocked on the grounds that his relationship with his sibling may suffer. More than half of those detained are now delaying or blocking their removal by raising a last-minute rights claim.

Article 8 is a qualified right, which means we are not prevented from removing individuals or refusing an application to move to the UK if it is in the public interest. To narrow article 8 rights, we will therefore make three important changes, in both domestic law and to our immigration rules. First, we will define what, exactly, a family is—narrowing it down to parents and their children. Secondly, we will define the public interest test so that the default becomes a removal or refusal, with article 8 rights only permissible in the most exceptional circumstances. Thirdly, we will tighten where article 8 claims can be heard, ensuring only those who are living in the UK can lodge a claim, rather than their family members overseas, and that all claims are heard first by the Home Office and not in a courtroom.

We will also pursue international reform of a second element of the convention: the application of article 3, and the prohibition on torture and inhuman, degrading treatment or punishment. We will never return anyone to be tortured in their home country, but the definition of “degrading treatment” has expanded into the realm of the ridiculous. Today we have criminals who we seek to deport, but we discover we cannot because the prisons in their home country have cells that are deemed too small, or even mental health provision that is not as good as our own. As article 3 is an absolute right, a public interest test cannot be applied. For that reason, we are seeking reform at the Council of Europe, and we do so alongside international partners who have raised similar concerns.

It is not just international law that binds us. According to data from 2022, over 40% of those detained for removal claimed that they were modern-day slaves. That well-intentioned law is being abused by those who seek to frustrate a legitimate removal, so I will bring forward legislation that tightens the modern slavery system, to ensure that it protects those it was designed for, and not those who seek to abuse it. Taken together, these are significant reforms. They are designed to ensure that our asylum system is fit for the modern world, and that we retain public consent for the very idea of providing refuge.

We will always be a country that offers protection to those fleeing peril, just as we did in recent years when Ukraine was invaded, when Afghanistan was evacuated, and when we repatriated Hongkongers. For that reason, as order and control are restored, we will open new, capped, safe and legal routes into this country. These will make sponsorship the primary means by which we resettle refugees, with voluntary and community organisations given greater involvement to both receive refugees and support them, working within caps set by Government. We will also create a new route for displaced students to study in the UK, and another for skilled refugees to work here. Of course, we will always remain flexible to new crises across the world, as they happen.

I know that the British people do not want to close the doors, but until we restore order and control, those who seek to divide us will grow stronger. It is our job as a Labour Government to unite where there is division, so we must now build an asylum system for the world as it is—one that restores order and control, that opens safe and legal routes to those fleeing danger across the world, and that sustains our commitment to providing refuge for this generation, and those to come. I know the country we are. We are open, tolerant, and generous. We are the greater Britain that those on this side of the House believe in, not the littler England that some wish we would become. These reforms are designed to bring unity where others seek to divide, and I commend this statement to the House.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Leader of the Opposition, Kemi Badenoch.

[Mrs Kemi Badenoch (North West Essex) (Con)]

I thank the Home Secretary for advance sight of her statement, most of which I read The Sunday Telegraph. I am pleased that she is bringing forward measures to crack down on illegal immigration. It is not enough but it is a start, and a change from her previous position in opposition of a general amnesty for illegal migrants.

I praise the new Home Secretary. She is bringing fresh energy and a clearer focus to this problem, and she has got more done in 70 days in the job than her predecessor did in a year. She seems to get what many on the Labour Benches refuse to accept, and she is right to say that if we fail to deal with the crisis, we will draw more people to a path that starts with anger and ends in hatred. We will also allow our English channel to operate as an open route into this country for anyone who is prepared to risk their life and pay criminal gangs. That is not fair on British citizens, it is not fair on those who come here legally, and it is not fair on those in genuine need who are pushed to the back of the queue because the system is overwhelmed.

Anyone who cannot see by now that simply tinkering with the current system will not fix this problem is either living in la-la land or being wilfully obstructive. It is a shame that it has taken Labour a year in office to realise there is a borders crisis—[Interruption.] I don’t know why Labour Members are chuntering. What was their first act in government? The first act of the Home Secretary’s predecessor was to scrap the Rwanda plan, which was already—[Interruption.] Yes, they are cheering. It was already starting to act as a deterrent before it even got off the ground, and before it started, Labour Members threw away all our hard work and taxpayers’ money—they are the ones who have wasted that money, not us.

The statement is an admission that the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill of the Home Secretary’s predecessor will not work, but I am glad to see Labour Members now changing course. The powers they are using in the Bill are ones they all voted down when we were in government, and they would not be able to do that if we had not got those measures through. None of them know the work that was done; they are just cheering nonsensically, but we know what has happened since Labour came to office. The Home Secretary will know that 10,000 people have crossed the channel in the 70 days she has been in office, and we have seen record levels of asylum claims in the last year. The problem has got worse since Labour came into office, and it is getting worse by the day.

I am afraid that what the Home Secretary is announcing will not work on its own, and some of these measures will take us backwards. I say that to her with no ill will, and I hope she believes me when I say that I genuinely want her to succeed. Conservative Members are speaking from experience: we know how difficult this is— [Interruption.] We do, and we will not take any lectures from the people who voted down every single measure to control immigration. Some of the measures that the Home Secretary is announcing today are undoubtedly positive steps—baby steps, but positive none the less. We welcome making refugee status temporary, and we welcome removing the last Labour Government’s legislation that created a duty to support asylum seekers—she is right to do that. However, some of what she is announcing simply does not go far enough.

Conservative Members believe that anyone who arrives illegally, especially from safe countries, should be deported and banned from claiming asylum. Does the Home Secretary agree that anyone who comes to this country illegally should be deported? I would like to know, and I think the country would like to know, because this announcement means that some people who arrive will be allowed to stay—they just need to wait 20 years before getting permanent settlement. That does not remove the pull factor. The main problem is that for as long as the UK is in the European convention on human rights, illegal immigrants and those exploiting our system will use human rights laws to block anything she does to solve this. I know that because I saw it happen again and again over the last four years, and I know she has seen it too. We even saw it this year with the Prime Minister’s one in, one out scheme, which has seen people return to France and come back on small boats yet again.

I guarantee that the Home Secretary’s plan to reinterpret article 8 will not work. We tried that already, and Strasbourg and UK case law will prevail. I agree with her that the definition of “degrading treatment” is over-interpreted, but renegotiating article 3 internationally will take years—years we do not have if it were even possible, but the fact is that it is not. We know that because a small group of EU countries tried that earlier, and they were dismissed by the Secretary General of the Council of Europe. Her Government did nothing to support them, so I am not convinced it is the Prime Minister’s negotiating skills that will sort out that problem.

We have looked at this issue from every possible direction, and any plan that does not include leaving the ECHR as a necessary step is wasting time we do not have. Just like the Government’s plan to “smash the gangs”, or the one in, one out policy, it is timewasting, and it is doomed to fail because of lawfare. We have seen this all before. The tough measures will be challenged in the courts and blocked, the new legal routes that the Home Secretary is talking about will be exploited, and the numbers arriving on our shores and disappearing into the black economy will keep on rising. If the Home Secretary is serious about reducing these numbers—I do believe that she is—she must be bolder. She must take steps to deter illegal immigrants from coming to Britain, and deport them as soon as they arrive. Our borders plan does just that, and I know that she has studied it in detail. I have seen the looks, and I know that she knows that we would leave the ECHR and the European convention on action against trafficking to stop the Strasbourg courts from frustrating deportations, and establish a new removals force to ensure that all illegal arrivals are deported. We would end the use of immigration tribunals, judicial review and legal aid in immigration cases, as those are the things that are slowing us down, and we would sign returns agreements that are backed by visa sanctions to ensure that we send illegal arrivals back to their place of origin. I welcome what she says about Angola and Namibia, but we all know that those countries are not the ones that are creating the biggest problems.

We need to be bold, serious and unafraid to do what the British people demand: secure our borders. That is what is in our borders plan, so I urge the Home Secretary to take me up on my offer to work together, not just because we have some ideas that she might find useful, but because judging by the reaction of her own Back Benchers today, she may find our votes come in handy. Earlier this year, we saw what happened when the Government tried to make changes through the welfare Bill: the Prime Minister was defeated by his own Back Benchers and ended up passing legislation guaranteeing that more money would be spent on welfare. It does not appear that his grip on the party has improved since then, so we can be sure that Labour Back Benchers are already plotting to block any serious changes that she tries to make, so we can help her with that—[Interruption.] Why are Labour Members shaking their heads? We have seen them do that time and again.

Our offer to work together is a genuine one and in the national interest. We will not play the same game that Labour Members did by voting things down for no reason. However, the Home Secretary must be clear with the House on these questions: how many people will be able to take advantage of the new work and study visa routes? What will be the level of the cap? Will it be 10,000 people or 100,000 people?

The Government have separately confirmed that they will allow Gazan students to bring dependants. We oppose that, but can she clarify how the Government will ensure that people brought to the UK from a territory under Hamas control are not a risk to our security? If she finds that the Human Rights Act 1998 and the ECHR prevent her from enacting those proposals, will she use primary legislation to resolve that? Has Lord Hermer agreed? By her own admission three weeks ago, the Home Office is not yet fit for purpose, so why are we creating a new legal route for the Home Office to run?

Will she take me up on my serious, genuine offer to meet and to discuss how we can work together to resolve the asylum crisis—yes or no? I urge her to put party politics aside, meet me and my shadow Home Secretary, so that we can find a way to work together—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Order. I was very generous with the time I allowed the Leader of the Opposition. I call the Home Secretary.

[Shabana Mahmood]

I thank the Leader of the Opposition for her response to the statement. I see that the shadow Home Secretary has been subbed out after his performance at Home Office oral questions, but whether it is the shadow Home Secretary or the Leader of the Opposition herself, I am very happy to take on the Conservative party any day of the week.

Let me start by saying that we will not take any lessons from the Opposition on how to run an effective migration or asylum system. As the Leader of the Opposition knows, when the Conservatives were in Government, they gave up on governing altogether. They gave up on making asylum decisions, creating the huge backlog that this Government were left to start to deal with. In our first 18 months in office, removals are up 23% compared with the last 18 months that the Conservatives were in office, so I will take no lessons from anyone on the Conservative Benches on anything to do with our asylum system. They simply gave up and went for an expensive gimmick that cost £700 million to return four volunteers and was doomed to failure from the start.

The Leader of the Opposition had a lot to say about the European convention on human rights, but I do not recall the Conservatives ever bringing forward any legislation to deal with the application of article 8, the qualified right to a private life. A Bill that sought to clarify the way that article 8 should apply in our domestic legislation or in our immigration rules was never introduced, so I am not going to take any lessons from the people who never bothered to do that in the first place. This Government are rolling up our sleeves, dealing with the detailed, substantive issues that we face, and thinking of proper, workable solutions to those matters.

The position on article 3 has changed across Europe. In my previous role as Lord Chancellor, I was at the Council of Europe just before the summer recess earlier this year, and I was struck by the sheer range of European partners who want to have this conversation. It is important that the British Government lean into that conversation and seek to work in collaboration with our European partners. The one thing that will not work is simply saying that we are going to come out of the European convention altogether. That is not and will never be the policy of this Government because we believe that reform can be pursued and that this is an important convention, not least because it underpins some of our own returns agreements, including the one with France. The right hon. Lady talked about how many years it would take for us to think about reform of the convention, but as she well knows, it would take just as many years to start renegotiating lots of international agreements that would be affected by us coming out of the convention, so I am afraid that, once again, her solution will not work.

I am always up for working in the national interest because nothing matters more to me than holding our country together and uniting it, but if the Conservatives really wanted to work together in the national interest, they could have started by voting for the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, currently going through the House, that they have voted against at every opportunity. Forgive me if I do not take this newfound conversion to working together in the national interest with much seriousness, but the Conservative party’s track record suggests that it should not be taken seriously.

To not be taken seriously sums up the position of the Conservatives: these are the people that left this Government an abject mess to clear up. They gave up on governing, they gave up on running an effective asylum system, and now they turn up without so much as an apology to the British public, thinking that they have got anything to say that anyone wants to hear.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Before I call the first Back-Bench contribution, may I remind Members that in order to expect to be called to speak in response to a statement, they should have been here from the start of the Home Secretary’s statement? There may be Members bobbing quite unnecessarily.

[Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall and Camberwell Green) (Lab/Co-op)]

The reality is that we need an asylum and immigration system based on fairness and consistency. My constituency of Vauxhall and Camberwell Green is a testament to that, as it is a place that has been made richer because of the people who have come there from all over the world. Some of them have fled persecution and have made a home in my constituency over many years. I meet these people every week in the community, including in schools, where I see those children excited about their future. When this Government came into office last year, they were right to say that their priority was to tackle the huge backlog of unprocessed asylum claims left by their predecessor. Clearing that backlog is a big task, but it is right that we identify who has the right to be here, although introducing more assessments of those who have been here for many years and making new judgments about the safety of a country, will take considerable resources. Is the Home Secretary confident that these changes will not have the unintentional consequence of making it harder to achieve her goal?

[Shabana Mahmood]

I assure my hon. Friend that there will be both the administrative system and the resources needed to underpin the asylum changes that we are making. At the end of the five-year leave to remain period, there is already meant to be an assessment about whether the country of origin remains a safe country or not, but in practice there has ended up being an almost automatic pathway to permanent settlement, and that it what we are changing. I would ask her to look carefully at our protection work and study route, because we will be encouraging those who have sought asylum here and been granted refugee status to go into work or to study. That supports their integration and means that they are making a contribution that will retain public support for the system overall.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Max Wilkinson (Cheltenham) (LD)]

It is right that the Government are looking for ways to bring order to the asylum system, which was left in total disarray by the Conservatives. Sadly, the Government have been too slow to act.

Britain has a long and proud history of responding with compassion to people fleeing unimaginable horrors. That should continue in a way that is fair and sustainable, so we welcome some of what the Home Secretary has said on that score. However, it is not helpful for the Home Secretary to claim that the country is being torn apart by immigration. Acknowledging the challenges facing our nation is one thing, but stoking division by using immoderate language is quite another.

I welcome the news about safe and legal routes. The Liberal Democrats have called for such routes since they were scrapped by the Conservatives, leading to more small boat crossings, but we have some concerns about the far-reaching detail behind the proposals, which seems to be missing.

The Home Secretary is revoking the legal duty to provide asylum seekers with accommodation, and says that asylum seekers should support themselves and contribute to our society, yet she is still banning them from working so that they can support themselves and contribute to our society, which makes no sense. The Home Secretary relies a lot on Denmark as an example. Denmark lets asylum seekers work after six months, so will she? Can she guarantee that the burden to house asylum seekers will not fall on already struggling local councils? Can she also guarantee that we will not see a wholesale transfer of asylum seekers from hotels to the streets?

The Minister for Border Security and Asylum has announced to the media that asylum seekers could have jewellery confiscated. Is the Home Secretary doing that to raise money or to deter people? Either way, does she acknowledge that many British people will see it as unnecessary and cruel? State-sponsored robbery will certainly not fix a system that costs taxpayers £6 million every day in hotel bills.

If the Government plan to keep their promise to end hotel use, they must process the claims of the 90,000 asylum seekers in the backlog. The Liberal Democrats have a plan to do that within six months using Nightingale-style processing centres. Does the Home Secretary seriously believe that an overstretched Home Office that is yet to clear the existing backlog can also undertake reviews of every refugee’s status every two-and-a-half years?

The UK must continue to lead international efforts to manage large migratory flows. Because the flow of people comes from Europe, the Home Secretary will need to work with the EU on a solution. The Oxford Migration Observatory has identified a clear Brexit effect. That means that people refused asylum in the EU make a second attempt here—a consequence of the Brexit delivered by the Conservatives and the hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage). The Minister for Border Security and Asylum refused earlier to answer whether Brexit has harmed our immigration and asylum system, so I will ask the Home Secretary now. Does she think that Brexit has made it easier or more difficult for this country to control its borders and asylum system? Does she think that reductions in overseas development spending will reduce or increase migratory flows?

We have already made it very clear that we think leaving the ECHR will make no difference to securing our borders and will tear hard-won rights away from British people. It is encouraging that the Home Secretary has said that that is not part of the Government’s plan. We urge the Government to tread carefully and act with fairness, efficiency and compassion for local communities in the UK who want this issue resolved, but also for asylum seekers.

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[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

The Home Secretary should know that language that is not acceptable in this House does not become acceptable if it is attributed to others. She might like to apologise for the language that she used.

[Shabana Mahmood]

I apologise, Madam Deputy Speaker. I did not mean any discourtesy; I was merely reflecting the truth of words that are used to me.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I think we all appreciate that, but I urge Members to keep their language acceptable in the House.

[Graham Stringer (Blackley and Middleton South) (Lab)]

I fully support the Home Secretary and her statement. It is a fundamental duty of Government to protect our borders and to know who is coming into this country—something that we have not known for some time. She has set herself a difficult task. Will she agree to publish targets for all the areas that she outlined in her statement, and particularly for a reduction in the number of undocumented and illegal entrants to the country, so that we can check whether the plan is working? If it is not, she may need to alter some of the policies.

[Shabana Mahmood]

What we will not do is set arbitrary targets or caps. We have learned the lessons from previous Governments, and setting a number in that way actually costs public confidence. The better thing to do is to get on with passing the necessary legislation in this House, to deliver the reforms out there in the country, and to assess them as they go. I have no doubt that there will be much debate and scrutiny in this place and others about the success of these reforms, and I look forward to answering questions over the coming months and years.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee.

[Dame Karen Bradley (Staffordshire Moorlands) (Con)]

I am sure that my Committee will want to look closely at the very significant number of announcements that the Home Secretary has made today. She referred on a number of occasions to asylum seekers contributing when they are given support. Has she given any consideration to setting up a deferred payment scheme, much akin to the student loan scheme, so that when people are granted asylum and are in work, they can start to pay back the generosity that they have received?

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[Shabana Mahmood]

We will bring forward legislation in the next Session on the specific ways that we will deal with the application of article 8 to immigration cases, and on updating our immigration rules. I am happy to discuss with her how that legislation will be developed over the coming weeks, but the intention is to do exactly as I said in my statement. In particular, we will define “family”; set out how the public interest test is to be used, and that it is to be used only in the most exceptional circumstances; and tighten the “who” and “where” of how article 8 claims can be made. Taken together, we believe that those measures will ensure that article 8 is applied exactly as was intended when the European convention on human rights was first agreed to.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Father of the House.

[Sir Edward Leigh (Gainsborough) (Con)]

We Conservative Members genuinely wish the Home Secretary well, because otherwise, in her own words, the country will start falling apart. It is a good effort—seven out of 10. She clearly has strong conservative instincts, but does she fear that the misery in many of these countries is such that asylum seekers are not really worried about how long they have to wait for their claim to be processed? Does she fear that unless we arrest, detain and deport people very quickly, this problem will just go on and on? The Home Secretary mentioned return hubs; could she say a bit more about those, and will she have an open mind about schemes such as Rwanda?

Police Reform

Caroline Nokes Excerpts

Thursday 13th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Jones]

That is of course the aim of this Government: we want to put policing in our communities, where people expect it to be, and make sure that the police are not, as they currently are, spending hours and hours of their day on bureaucratic, very outdated, very unproductive tasks. Indeed, in many cases police officers are actually doing the job of police staff, which is ludicrous. We need to work with our police chiefs to change that, ensuring that our police officers are doing the roles that we need officers to be doing, while the very important crime fighters of our police staff are doing what they need to be doing. That is not currently the case, but we are working hard to make sure that it will be.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Ben Maguire (North Cornwall) (LD)]

I thank the Minister for advance sight of her statement. The Liberal Democrats warmly welcome the news that police and crime commissioners are being scrapped. We have been calling for it for years, and I personally called for this in one of my first contributions in this House, after the PCC election turnout in Cornwall was abysmally low, at just 18%. The model was a failed Tory experiment that has cost taxpayers dearly.

The Minister is right to point out the countless flaws in the overly politicised PCC model, which has diverted much-needed funding away from frontline and community policing. PCCs cost the public millions in council tax every year, yet the impact on their local communities has been negligible. However, transferring the role to mayors is not the answer; it would give even more power to single individuals with dubious democratic mandates and little scrutiny or accountability. The Government must learn the lessons of this expensive and failed experiment.

Instead, the Government should see through their plans for these “temporary” local police and crime boards, but give them the powers on a permanent basis. They should ensure that the money saved from PCCs goes where it is needed most: getting more officers out on our streets and repairing the damage done by years of Conservative mismanagement and underfunding. That is particularly urgent in the light of the slow progress the Home Office has made on its promise to deliver 13,000 new neighbourhood officers; only 200 were added last year, while the number of officers in frontline roles went down.

Will the Minister commit to investing the money saved from these unnecessary PCCs straight into frontline policing and towards proper, effective community policing? Could she outline the safeguards that will be put in place to hold mayors to account with their new-found policing responsibilities? Finally, could she elaborate on her estimated £100 million in savings from scrapping PCCs—has that figure been independently verified, and can she confirm that the funds will be not just transferred to mayors’ budgets but spent on frontline policing?

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[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Order. Before I call the next speaker, I inform Members that I plan to run this statement until no later than 1 o’clock, so we need to have short questions and short answers.

[Rachel Hopkins (Luton South and South Bedfordshire) (Lab)]

I welcome the Minister’s announcement that she will abolish police and crime commissioners, which is the right move. That said, may I place on the record my thanks to John Tizard, our Bedfordshire PCC? He has always worked constructively with me, and I know he will continue to work constructively until 2028. May I press the Minister on the steps being taken to ensure a smooth transition from PCCs to mayor-led or council-led oversight, particularly in areas such as Luton South and South Bedfordshire, where we do not have elected mayors?