Cheryl Gillan
Main Page: Cheryl Gillan (Conservative - Chesham and Amersham)Department Debates - View all Cheryl Gillan's debates with the Home Office
(7 years, 5 months ago)
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Amber Rudd
I thank the right hon. Lady for her question. I share her concern: we must ensure that we do not see an increase in Islamophobia. We must be a country that can deal fairly with all communities. My hon. Friend the Minister for Policing and the Fire Service is meeting the Met commissioner, and he will raise that matter with her, thinking particularly of the right hon. Lady’s constituency of Barking.
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and through her the people in the police and security services, who put their lives on the line to keep us all safe. Following on from the question from the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge), I think that the Home Secretary acknowledges that all our communities, and particularly our Muslim communities, including the Muslim community in my constituency, need to have confidence in the protections afforded by those services. Will she therefore ensure that all our police forces have the resources to provide the continuous training that is required for the officers who are needed to provide those assurances throughout our communities?
Amber Rudd
My right hon. Friend builds on the question from the right hon. Member for Barking (Dame Margaret Hodge) about hate crime and what more we can do in our communities. I agree with my right hon. Friend that we must ensure that our police have the best training, so that they are aware of the best way to approach what could be sensitive issues. We have the College of Policing, a national body that provides such training to ensure that police officers have the information and that they can learn the best way to approach sensitive situations. Last year, we published the hate crime action plan to ensure that people have the confidence to report such incidents and that we have the procedures to follow them up. We are in no way complacent about the need always to be on the front foot to reassure communities that we will take seriously any incidents of hate crime.