Crime and Policing

David Lammy Excerpts

Wednesday 8th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

We obviously look forward to the results of the further work that Jan Berry has been doing in this area. The right hon. Gentleman started his intervention by commenting that the last Government intended to reduce bureaucracy, but the problem was that they did not. We have come in and within a matter of months we have shown specific examples of where we can reduce that bureaucracy.

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

On that point, my recollection is—I think that the shadow Home Secretary said this in his contribution—that the previous Government did make some progress on bureaucracy. My concern, particularly on stop and search and stop and account, is that we have a long history in this country of recognising that they can have particular effects on particular communities. I hope that the right hon. Lady will be sensitive, particularly in relation to my constituency, to the fact that we have a long past during which this issue has been at the absolute apex of concern about crime. I do not want to see the sort of problems that we had in the 1980s again. When she says that bureaucracy is being reduced as regards stop and account, will she say whether there will still be accountability for stopping ethnic minorities, in particular?

[Mrs May]

I recognise the right hon. Gentleman’s concerns. He makes particular reference to his constituency, and there will be others who will share his concern. That is why, as I said, we are reducing the reporting requirements for stop and search. We fully recognise that we need to do that in a sensitive way that notes and deals with the issue that he has raised.

In addition to dealing with bureaucracy, we will introduce directly elected police and crime commissioners—single, named individuals who will be democratically accountable to their communities. That accountability will be real and will be provided not by invisible police authorities—surveys show that only 7% of people know that there is a police authority they can go to if they have a problem with the police—and not by Ministers hundreds of miles away in London, but by people themselves. The police commissioner will be somebody whom people have heard of, whom they have voted for, whom they can hold to account and whom they can get rid of if they do not cut crime. So we will leave local crime fighting to local crime fighters, but we will not forget cross-border, national and international crime. It is an irony that for years the Home Office has tried to micro-manage local policing from the centre while it has neglected policing at the national level. That is why we will establish a national crime agency with a proper command structure to fight serious organised crime and to control our borders.

I understand that it was only yesterday that the Opposition added antisocial behaviour to their motion. The shadow Home Secretary spent quite a bit of time on it in his speech, but he forgot to mention his own quote about the last Government’s record on antisocial behaviour, when he said:

“We became a bit complacent…we…dragged our feet by not making it a priority.”

He claimed that the police have the powers they need to deal with antisocial behaviour and that there is a range of 15 options that they can use, but the fact that there are so many options is precisely the problem. We have individual support orders, acceptable behaviour contracts, antisocial behaviour injunctions, antisocial behaviour orders and criminal antisocial behaviour orders. There is a whole list of options that increases the bureaucracy and complexity and means that in many areas, the police, councils and local people find it very difficult to decide what is appropriate, and that all too often things are not applied.

The shadow Home Secretary should also know that three quarters of incidents of antisocial behaviour are not reported and that more than half of ASBOs are breached. Again, that is not a record of which to be proud or on which to be complacent. That is why we need to look at the whole toolkit that is available to the police in dealing with antisocial behaviour. No number of sanctions is a match for local policing that is responsive to local needs. That is what this Government’s police reform agenda will deliver—simpler, smarter sanctions that are faster to obtain, easier to enforce and that provide a strong deterrent and a real punishment.

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[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

I want to concentrate on those constituencies that have suffered from high crime rates over different periods of time. Those high crime rates not only affect the constituents in those areas but have big implications for the rest of the country. Without doubt, my constituency has been one such area. It is good to see in her place the Minister for Equalities, the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Lynne Featherstone), who also represents the borough of Haringey. She will be familiar with these issues.

Tottenham has a history of riots, and there has been deep concern recently about knife and gun crime. We have recently had some big debates about security, and many hon. Members will be familiar with the significant problems at the Finsbury Park mosque, which is on the edge of my constituency, four or five years ago. Because of the nature of multi-cultural Tottenham, the most significant criminal justice issue in the lead-up to the election of the Labour Government in 1997 was the murder of Stephen Lawrence.

I have come to the conclusion that crime largely comes from one thing and one thing alone: poverty. I am talking about poverty of ambition and aspiration; poverty relating to education; poverty of employment; poverty where communities break down; and, sometimes, poverty relating to parenting. The nature of today’s debate is hugely significant for people outside this place, and the resources allocated to deal with the problems, not just within the Home Office but across government, will be hugely significant over the next few years.

I am very proud that, when we look back over the past 10 years, we can see the huge progress that has been made, despite the challenges, in my constituency and in similar constituencies across the country. Many people in constituencies such as Tottenham were acutely concerned—even suspicious, frankly—of the Metropolitan police in previous decades, but they now say that, although their experience of policing is not perfect, they have moved from seeing a police force to seeing a police service.

At the forefront of that police service has been neighbourhood policing and the police community support officers. My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) is absolutely right to say that neighbourhood policing has made a huge difference to people’s confidence in reporting crime and their ability to relate to police officers, and to our attempts to get officers on to the beat.

Alongside that sense of having a police service must be the presence of the police in the community, and that is why we have all welcomed the extra police numbers. They have been particularly manifest in the London borough of Haringey. The borough had suffered historically because it was an outer-London borough, and inner-London boroughs always had more police officers than we did. Under successive Mayors and Labour Home Secretaries, however, the outer-London boroughs benefited from more police officers. We should be very concerned indeed—and the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green should also be very concerned—that the Mayor proposes to cut police numbers in London by 455 over the forthcoming period. What effect will that have on the significant issues that exist in a constituency such as mine?

When we relate this problem to the poverty of aspiration and ambition and to the issue of how we lift communities up, we must also recognise the huge amount of work done by communities, particularly on knife and gun crime. I am thinking of someone like Nims Obunge, chair of the Peace Alliance, which started in the London borough of Haringey and grew to affect much of London and now has influence in different inner-city areas across the country. It is an alliance of civil society, with people coming together to stand up and say no to violent crime—and it is having an effect. I know it is having an effect because the figures are clear. Gun crime was down by 28% in my constituency last year and knife crime down by just under 20%.

That shows the sort of effect it can have when local people take ownership and work alongside the police. What will happen to the funding for projects like that and others such as the “Value Life” project, led by young people in my constituency at the Gladesmore school? They rely on funding, which will be needed for the years ahead if the level of cuts weighed up and suggested by the Home Office come about. What will happen to the statutory services that all local authorities will have to review in this period?

We know what sort of budgets will get cut. I am particularly worried about the funding available to young people beyond school. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears) for the work she did when she was responsible for policing. The provision of positive activities for young people, particularly during the summer period, is important, so the money we put in to support young people and ensure that they have things to do is crucial. What will happen to those funds over the coming period?

Some really significant issues of security are at stake. We should think back to those images of the Finsbury Park mosque four or five years ago. What is going to happen to the Prevent fund and to all the work that has gone into turning a mosque like that around and to support the young people and communities within it? What will it all mean for the crime statistics and for ordinary people in this country?

The Government are taking a backward step. The decision to cut the state is ideological and it will have huge consequences. The decision—failing to ensure that Home Office front-line services are protected in difficult economic times—is the wrong one, and we will all suffer as a consequence of it.

[Guy Opperman (Hexham) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Lammy]

No, I will not.

I ask the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice to think very carefully over the coming months about these issues, which are critical for constituencies like mine. Such constituencies rely on Home Office funding. They rely on supporting, not cutting, police numbers. They rely on community policing, not the diminution of such policing. They rely particularly on supporting young people who, in the absence of proper and effective community policing, are vulnerable to being seduced by various threats.

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[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) and if I may return a compliment that she was good enough to pay to me before the recess, I hope that it is not too long before she makes the journey down from where she sits today on to the Front Bench. It would be stupid for me to stand here as a criminal barrister of 16 years standing and say that nothing was achieved by the last Administration in 13 years. Many of the things that were done were different, new and effective. But between the two sides of the House, there are some fundamental differences of approach that stem from a difference in the philosophies that drive us to our political parties.

Those differences were exemplified for me by the speech by the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy). He said, with some pride, that under the last Government we had established a police service as opposed to a police force. I could not disagree more with that policy and all that was done to achieve it. It has been hugely harmful not only to the police, but to our society, that we now have police officers who are confused about their role. They should be a police force—a presence on our streets—and not part of social services. In some instances, yes, some officers work beautifully and properly with, for example, youth offending teams, and add something to the process. However, as any parent knows, what stops children from doing something that they should not do is not the fear of what might happen to them if they are caught out, but the fear of being caught out. If people do not think that they will ever be caught, they will carry on doing what they should not do. That is why I want to see some fundamental changes in our police force.

I want the police force to be a police force and a presence. They are public servants, paid for by the public and accountable to the public, but I want them to be on the streets making their presence and their force known.

[Mr Lammy]

I respect the manner in which the hon. Lady makes her remarks, but will she acknowledge that my remarks were particular to certain communities and incidents? She will be well aware of the various inquiries and reports that established that the black community in particular was some way from experiencing a police service.

[Anna Soubry]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman and, in due course, I will touch on my hopes for a much improved police force.

As a criminal barrister, I could speak for ever about this subject, but the clock is against me. I am pleased that one of the first things that the coalition did, to enable our police officers to get on and do the job that they want to do, was to allow our custody sergeants to charge some minor offences. I would like custody sergeants to revert to having the decision about charge on all matters, working in co-operation with the Crown Prosecution Service. They should take the responsibility that they always used to have for the charges that the accused should face. Changes can always be made as more evidence is gathered and leading counsel and other counsel can also play their part.

We all want to see less form filling and bureaucracy. Opposition Members have to accept that for ordinary police officers—whom many of us have dealt with on almost a daily basis in our working lives—that is a true and real frustration. It holds them back from doing the job that they want to do. We have to restore and build confidence, not just in some of the communities to which the right hon. Member for Tottenham referred, but across Britain. We have to restore the confidence of the public in our police. How many times have Members gone along to a residents’ meeting, or knocked on a door while canvassing, and someone says, “You know what, there’s a real problem with kids hanging around outside the Co-op”? It is called antisocial behaviour, but it is actually often low-level criminality. One hears that complaint and asks, “Well, have you rung up and complained about it?”, but then one hears the riposte, “Well, what’s the point? The police never come out, and if they do come out, they won’t do anything about it, and if they do do anything about, it won’t get to court.” And so it goes on. We have to break that cycle, and that sort of work has to start now. By reducing the form-filling and bureaucracy, we will begin at least to make our police more efficient. However, we have to stop this idea that there is no point in contacting our police because they do not have the time or will to do the job.

When it comes to the police and what they give back, I want to see some big changes in how they think and operate. When police officers commit offences, whether like the assault on Ian Tomlinson that lead to his death or like the case in which a police officer recently received a custodial sentence of six months, I want police officers prosecuted fairly, vigorously and swiftly, just like anybody else. There should be no bounds, and the police must be prosecuted properly.

I also want police officers to be prosecuted when they give perjured evidence in court—[Interruption.] I see hon. Members nodding. I know of the work of the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner). Like many in the criminal justice system, we have sat in court and heard officers on oath tell lies. That has happened, and we know of it. We also know that they have never been brought to book. That has to change. There is a duty on the Crown Prosecution Service, judges, counsels and solicitors to make those complaints and for them to be taken up, if we are to restore confidence in our police service.

When police officers fail to do their job—I suspect there might be a few more nods of agreement from hon. Members—when they fail to disclose material, as they are statutorily obliged to do, when they fail to seize the CCTV or, if they have seized it, to view it rather than destroy it, or when they fail to disclose it to the defence or put it on to the schedule of material to be disclosed to the defence, those are important matters that should not be left to rest, but must be taken up by the police and acted on in order to restore confidence in our police.

I do not want to sound overly critical of the police, because I have real sympathy for many police officers. In my previous work, I dealt with them on almost a daily basis.