UK Border Agency

David Nuttall Excerpts

Monday 20th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend, given his constituency, takes a particular interest in border matters. He is assiduous in dealing with these issues, in liaising with those at Dover port responsible for such matters and in taking up any issues with Ministers. He raised several matters. I am happy to say that despite this weekend being the busiest weekend for returning school coach parties—the thoughts of the House must be with those affected by the terrible school coach accident in France—the UKBA, by working with the French authorities and putting in place mitigating measures, achieved a greater throughput than was achieved previously. There were also fewer problems with coaches on the motorway.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I welcome the Home Secretary’s announcement of the separation of the UK Border Force as a separate entity, but it is clear that the organisation urgently requires a period of stability. In order to provide it, will she say when she envisages a permanent head being appointed?

[Mrs May]

We will, of course, be holding an open competition for people to apply for that post. I hesitate to give my hon. Friend a date, because we have to be cognisant of the fact that, with the Olympics and Paralympics coming up, we need to ensure minimum disruption to the Border Force. It is with that in mind that an appointment will be made, at an appropriate time.

Abu Qatada

David Nuttall Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I have made my views on the Human Rights Act clear, but I also point out that even before that Act we were signatories to the European convention and subject to the European Court of Human Rights. On the process of reforms towards a possible Bill of Rights, a commission is examining a possible UK Bill of Rights. It was set up by my right hon. and learned Friend the Justice Secretary and the Deputy Prime Minister, and I believe that it is due to report before the end of this year.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

How are the bail conditions going to be enforced? How much will their enforcement, and any benefits that this individual will be entitled to, cost the British taxpayer?

[Mrs May]

The precise details of how the bail conditions are enforced will be a matter for the police. Abu Qatada does not have immigration status and therefore he is not entitled to claim benefits.

Parliamentary Representation

David Nuttall Excerpts

Thursday 12th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Dame Anne Begg]

I am aware of the work my right hon. Friend has been doing in encouraging people from lower socio-economic groups to put themselves forward, which does, of course, take money. I would like to see how the access to public life fund works for disabled people. Perhaps the Minister will tell us a little more about how it will work in practice. All these routes should be open, but that is not a responsibility of Government alone; political parties might also look at how they finance candidates, and they might be funded in order to do that work. We suggested that in the Speaker’s Conference report.

There is some good news to report, but there is still a long way to go in achieving a fully representative Parliament in this country. It will not happen by accident or because large numbers of people from disadvantaged groups suddenly have a burning desire to be an MP and will be able to leap over all the economic and practical barriers to get selected as a candidate for one of the political parties, which to many remain secret societies, and then arrive here in Parliament in a blaze of glory.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Does the hon. Lady agree that one of the biggest disadvantages a man from a working-class background in one of our large inner cities might face is the existence of all-women shortlists, as they may well feel that their route to joining us in this place is closed before they even start?

[Dame Anne Begg]

I would accept the hon. Gentleman’s argument if every seat had an all-women shortlist, but only 50% of Labour seats has an all-women shortlist, so the man to whom he refers has access to 50% of the seats. This issue is not just about women or people from ethnic minorities; it is also about people with different backgrounds and life experiences. The political parties should therefore be encouraging that man and helping him, and perhaps providing some funding to allow him to get selected in the seats that are available. That is not happening at present, but it should happen.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I believe that when political parties are selecting candidates, what most people want to see is that they are selected purely on merit and not according to a given particular characteristic, be it gender, faith, disability or what sort of relationship they may be involved in. Everyone should have an equal opportunity to apply to become a candidate, and by all means, we should be encouraging as many people as possible to come forward for selection. However, personally, I do not want to see the imposition of quotas, which in reality mean fixing the result of the selection process before it has even begun. By their very nature, the use of all-women shortlists, for example, discriminates not just against men as a whole, but, by extension, against men belonging to a group under-represented in the House, such as those from a working-class background.

It is entirely wrong that those who seek to remedy what they perceive as discrimination against women should adopt as their solution the practice of all-women shortlists, which discriminate against men. We should oppose all forms of discrimination and not seek to legitimise it, as happened with the passing of the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002.

Good candidates will always rise to the top. As has been mentioned, Margaret Thatcher became leader of our party, and Prime Minister, without the need for any special help. As she said in her book “Statecraft”,

“the use of quotas applying to the appointment or promotion of individuals because of their collective identity or background is an unacceptable incursion on freedom, however well-intentioned the motives. Nor does it help those who are its intended beneficiaries. Individuals from these groups may well feel patronised; their professional reputations in posts which they would anyway have attained on merit are diminished, because they are thought to occupy them by special privilege; and they are likely to become the targets of resentment and possibly even ill-treatment.”

The report of the Speaker’s Conference stated:

“at present few people think that members of Parliament understand, or share the life experience of the people they represent (their constituents). Building and restoring public faith in Parliament is of crucial importance to the future of our democracy.”

One certain way to alienate voters up and down the country is to put forward as candidates to be their potential representatives people chosen on the basis not of merit but of their gender.

Equality and Diversity (Reform) Bill

David Nuttall Excerpts

Friday 21st October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

I think that I was given the position on merit, and I certainly was not given the job because I am a man. I do not think that I was given it because I am white. I would like to think that I was given the position on merit. Most Members know my views on political correctness.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

As my hon. Friend will be aware, many new Members may not know those views, so perhaps he would like to enlighten them.

[Philip Davies]

It is unlike my hon. Friend to be so off the ball as not to know my views on political correctness, but for his benefit, I make it perfectly clear that I abhor all forms of political correctness, the restriction of free speech, and the way in which we try to rig jobs to get a particular outcome. I believe in merit, and that merit alone is the best form of action. Political correctness annoys the vast majority of the public, but it is not only the silly things. People concentrate on them, but it is the sinister side of political correctness that I do not like, including the erosion of free speech and people being made to feel that they are some kind of bigot or are xenophobic simply because they express opinions that other people do not hold. That is why it is time for the silent majority to stop being silent and stand up against the scourge of political correctness.

--- Later in debate ---

[Philip Davies]

The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely good point. I will deal with it later. One of the things that my Bill tries to repeal is the legislation providing for all-women shortlists. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman might like to ask himself the same question when it comes to the number of women MPs—how many of those people put themselves forward to become MPs, against the number who are selected. He may find the answer to his own question in that conundrum.

Apart from those whom one would expect to oppose equality and diversity measures, there are many others whom those who push political correctness would rather sweep under the carpet, as their views are inconvenient to the argument.

[Mr Nuttall]

On a couple of occasions my hon. Friend has referred to political correctness. Will he provide the House with a definition of the term?

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Political correctness is one of those things that is very difficult to define, but people know it when they see it. I will have a go for my hon. Friend. I would say that political correctness is the promotion of positive discrimination and the restriction of free speech carried out in the name of minorities, but usually initiated by white male middle-class lentil-eating sandal-wearing Guardian-reading do-gooders with too much time on their hands and a misguided guilt complex. My hon. Friend may have a better definition and I am happy for him to offer one. That is my initial stab at a definition of political correctness.

[Mr Nuttall]

Is it true to say, then, that the political correctness agenda is not set by those whom the white middle-class males seek to “protect”?

[Philip Davies]

That is my experience. Most of these measures are not perpetrated by the people whom they are supposed to help. On many occasions the people in whose name it is supposedly done are the ones who feel most patronised by it and find it most unhelpful. I encourage my hon. Friend to go to the website www.capc.co.uk which gives some examples. There is a section there called “Not In My Name” where many people say how unhelpful such measures are for those in their situation, whether they are people who are gay, women, disabled or from an ethnic minority. There are countless such examples.

--- Later in debate ---

[Philip Davies]

That is a separate issue, but the hon. Gentleman has made his point.

The point my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) made about how the people political correctness is supposed to benefit do not actually feel the benefit has also been made by Anjana Ahuja. Writing in The Times, she explains how her opinion was once sought by the newspaper’s executives on how to attract non-white writers. The paper planned to offer internships to ethnic minority candidates who had graduated in media studies. She says:

“It was well intentioned but misguided, I ventured, because I knew of no colleague whose passport to these venerable corridors had been secured by such questionable means. There were historians, linguists, lawyers, classicists, philosophers, biologists, physicists, even an Egyptologist—but no media studies graduates. My view was this: if a brown writer sails in on an easier ticket than a white wordsmith, The Times would be construed as patronising rather than progressive and the intern would struggle against whispers of lowered standards…which is why, in the miserable tale of Ali Dizaei, the Scotland Yard commander convicted of corruption, the fact that sticks out most is the continued, seemingly pointless and possibly harmful existence of the National Black Police Association. Substitute ‘black’ with ‘white’ and an outdated collective becomes an illegal organisation that is morally impossible to defend. Why partition members of the same profession along the lines of skin colour? I would not join an organisation for black journalists (or female ones) because its identity lies wholly in the exclusion of white hacks (or male ones).”

Batook Pandya, director of Bristol-based charity Support Against Racist Incidents, has said of a positive action scheme that meant that fire service open days were limited to ethnic minority recruits only:

“None of these open days should have been closed to white communities. I couldn’t give two hoots if they are white, black, Asian, male or female—they should simply be the best person for the job.”

Roshan Doug, writing in the Birmingham Post, has stated:

“I don’t want people promoted purely on the basis of the colour of their skin—call it ‘positive discrimination’ or something else. To me that’s rather patronising—as if Asians and blacks are a little more than token staff to appease the CRE… I would like to see the best men and women for the job.”

I believe that people are appalled, and rightly so, when they hear that a white person has been turned down for a job because of the colour of their skin. The same people would be appalled if anyone, whatever their ethnicity, was turned down for a job simply because of the colour of their skin. When that happens, it inevitably leads some people wrongly to conclude that the benefiting group in question has asked for this special treatment. As I made clear earlier, that is not the case at all. Some politically correct do-gooder has tried to do the right thing or, as is increasingly the case and perhaps more worryingly, someone is trying to comply with equality law.

Speaking for the Liberal democrats on the Second Reading of the Equality Bill, the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Lynne Featherstone), now the Minister for Equalities, said:

“I turn to positive action. It seems completely illogical that we should be allowed to fast-track the training of ethnic minority and women police, but not be allowed to fast-track their employment. The rebalancing of the workplace is hugely important, and I do not disagree with the Leader of the House’s vision of the bank boardrooms of the future. When both the genders make a decision, it is likely to be more balanced.”—[Official Report, 11 May 2009; Vol. 492, c. 581.]

That is just the sort of thing that winds people up. If people want real equality, it must be just that, not some groups being more equal than others. What has a young, white male ever done to deserve being turned away from a dream career in the police force simply because he is the wrong colour and the wrong gender?

[Mr Nuttall]

That is a very important point, because it seems to me that, where positive discrimination is being exercised, young, white males are today paying a price for the fact that their forefathers were not subject to those measures in years gone by. Why should that be so?

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. Perhaps we also ought to reflect on the fact that in many parts of the country the people who are finding it most difficult to get a job are young, white males from very poor and deprived backgrounds. They are among those who are finding it hardest to find employment. It must be a double kick in the teeth for them to find that they are denied the opportunity to attend a fire service open day simply because they happen to be white. I really do not know why on earth should have a Government who are prepared to sit and tolerate that kind of thing.

[Mr Nuttall]

Does my hon. Friend think that those feelings may have played a part in the riots that took place this summer?

[Philip Davies]

I am not sure about that, to be honest, because it is very difficult to know. As far as I am concerned, the riots were largely born out of opportunism and criminality. I would not like to provide any kind of excuse for the behaviour we saw, but I do not doubt that many people feel a resentment and frustration that would otherwise not exist. I do not know whether the riots had anything to do with it, but I certainly think that the worrying increase in support for the British National party in recent years was born out of such frustration. It is no good Members complaining about the rise of such wholly unacceptable parties and then pursuing policies that are meat and drink to those parties. If we are to stop people voting for the BNP, we must remove the frustrations that led them to do so in the first place.

The cost of all these equality and diversity plans, action points, schemes and training courses is immeasurable, but one thing we can be sure about is that they cost an awful lot of money. I would always oppose such needless expenditure, but at a time when people are losing their jobs, having to tighten their belts massively and fearing what the future holds, it is even more inconceivable that so much money is thrown down the drain each year in the public sector on the equality and diversity agenda. The Government Equalities Office spent a whopping £62 million in the year to March 2011, and other Government Departments have their own equality budgets on top of that. That is before we get on to local police forces, hospitals, fire brigades and schools, which all have to spend their money on equality and diversity measures, taking it away from front-line services.

To give one example, the North East Ambulance Service NHS Trust is looking for an equality and diversity manager, with a salary of between £30,460 and £40,157 pro rata. The job description is “to act as a lead within the trust on the implementation of our equality strategy and action plan. The successful applicant will have a key role in developing the trust’s approach to the new NHS equality and delivery system.” Who in their right mind could think that an equality and diversity manager in an NHS ambulance service is a priority at this time, compared with a nurse or another ambulance driver? When someone dials 999, they want an ambulance, not an equality and diversity officer. What on earth is there to consider for the ambulance service? Surely if someone is injured they are looked after irrespective of their gender and race. It is all a load of nonsense.

There is another such vacancy, at the University of Greenwich, which is selecting someone to be its Equality and Diversity Champion, salary approximately £40,000—well, at least students now know where their tuition fees are going. The job description states:

“You will be responsible for promoting an integrated approach to equality and diversity issues across the university, and provide Schools and Offices with a point of expert reference and guidance on equality and diversity issues. You will work with other university offices to continue to improve our performance as an employer and further develop disability access for staff. You will be an experienced equality professional with an ability to develop and implement policy.”

[Mr Nuttall]

Would my hon. Friend like to venture how anybody could become qualified as an “experienced equality professional”? It rather suggests that there must be a whole career path for equality officers.

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend is right, and that is part of the problem we now face, because the equality and diversity industry—that is what it now is: an industry—is incredibly powerful. There is now a huge lobby, and so many people’s jobs depend on the industry, that it is difficult to tackle, because as soon as anybody tries to argue against the point of such things, those people descend on them. My hon. Friend may well find that, and I am sure I will at some point.

Those people descend on others like a ton of bricks, because, although they believe in equality and diversity, they do not believe in the equality or diversity of other people’s opinions; everyone has to agree with them on being against such things; otherwise, they are not entitled to that opinion at all. It always amazes me how such people, who always preach tolerance and diversity, are so intolerant of other people when they have an opinion that differs from theirs.

I prefer the person who drafted the advert for the Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University NHS Trust, who at the end of it wrote:

“Usual rubbish about equality, equal opportunities employer etc.”

That just about sums it up perfectly.

[Mr Nuttall]

I appreciate that my hon. Friend, for reasons that I know not, opposed last week’s motion to allow electronic hand-held devices in the Chamber, but one great advantage of now being allowed such devices is that I was able immediately to follow his advice, go to www.capc.co.uk and access the website of the Campaign Against Political Correctness. On it, there can be found the “Not in my name” section, where Bolaji Alajija, a 42-year-old student nurse from north London, says:

“I don’t see why there is all the fuss. What’s the harm in having a black doll? It’s exactly the same as a white doll. People shouldn’t be so sensitive.”

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I remind Members that, although they are allowed to use iPads, they have to make a speech without continuously reading from them. I am sure Mr Nuttall will take that on board.

[Philip Davies]

I am very grateful for your guidance, Mr Deputy Speaker, particularly as someone who voted against allowing these wretched things to be used in debates. If anyone was ever going to convince me that I made the wrong decision in that vote, however, it is my hon. Friend, who has gone to an excellent website, and I certainly commend him for doing so.

The second part of my Bill tackles the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002. I was not a Member when the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Bill was debated, but it will come as no surprise to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, to know that had I been I would have definitely opposed it. I have a great deal of time for many of my female Conservative colleagues, we have some extremely able MPs and, for the record, I have excellent female staff. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that the greatest Prime Minister this country has ever had was, indeed, a woman, but I do not particularly care if the House is made up of 10% women or 90%. For me, that will never be an issue, so the fundamental premise of the 2002 Act will always be totally flawed.

The most important thing for me is not how many men or women are in Parliament, but how many Conservatives there are in Parliament, and I challenge anybody who is obsessed with the idea that the most important end in itself is that we have more women in Parliament. If, for example, a Conservative male fought a marginal seat against a Labour female, would any of my hon. Friends campaign for her on the basis that it was so important to get more women into Parliament, or would they campaign for him? I venture that they would campaign for him, because I am sure that for all Government Members, apart from of course the Liberal Democrats, it is far more important to have more Conservatives in Parliament than to be worried about how many MPs there are of a particular gender.

During the Bill’s Second Reading on 24 October 2001, almost 10 years ago to the day, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), now the Home Secretary, said:

“I shall be honest with the House. There was a time when I never thought that I would stand up in the Chamber and support such a Bill.”—[Official Report, 24 October 2001; Vol. 373, c. 334.]

I wish she had stuck to her earlier opinion, as it would have been the more Conservative thing to do.

While my right hon. Friend supported the Bill, the former Member for Maidstone and the Weald, Ann Widdecombe, did not. In the debate, she said:

“The Bill is fundamentally wrong. I must ask this question; are all the men in this place sound asleep? Do they realise what the Bill means for them? Have they thought that positive discrimination for women can entail negative discrimination for men?”

The irony is that, as those in the House at the time were already Members, they did not need to worry about candidates, so the Bill was effectively about kicking away the ladder of opportunity from men who had not yet reached the House. I wonder how those Members would have felt if they had been told, “Sorry, I know you would make an excellent MP, but we’re going to stop you applying for the seat that you’ve lived in all your life, because you happen to be a man.” How would any men present today have felt if such a rule had applied to them?

Ann Widdecombe also hit the nail on the head, when during the debate she asked:

“What would that mean for a man in that constituency who had given to his local council the same lifelong service that the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Helen Jackson)—

at the time—

gave to hers”?

[Mr Nuttall]

I had the honour of standing against the then Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough in 1997. Does my hon. Friend agree that she was able to succeed in a northern, working-class city without any positive discrimination whatever?

[Philip Davies]

Absolutely. My hon. Friend is entirely right. People such as Helen Jackson made their way to Parliament on merit alone, and they should be commended for that. I am sure that they would not have wanted it any other way.

Ann Widdecombe went on to say:

“Let us say that the man had worked there and escaped from there, and that he wanted to apply for the seat when it fell vacant. He would not be able to represent the constituency if all-women shortlists were in operation.

“That would be the reality for men under this pernicious Bill, yet hon. Gentlemen welcome it as a great step forward. It is a massive step towards inequality for men, and the poor souls just let the women walk all over them. They do not appear to care what will happen to them.”

And Miss Widdecombe also said:

“I can tell the hon. Gentleman that when I entered a constituency selection committee and saw that most of the people there were women, my heart used to sink. We should not get the idea that discrimination against women is performed solely by men. It is not… If I had been in a selection committee anteroom with two men who had got there by beating off all the competition yet I was only there because a place had been reserved for a woman on the shortlist, I would not feel helped. I would feel humiliated, insulted and patronised. I am glad to say that my party never did that to me. —[Official Report, 24 October 2001; Vol. 373, c. 352-53.]

The fact of fewer women MPs is always blamed on discrimination, but in reality—certainly in the Conservative party—at the time of the Bill’s discussion roughly the same proportion of women who applied for seats were selected. The lack of women MPs is, therefore, much more to do with the fact that they do not put themselves forward.

As India Knight put it so well:

“I’ll tell you what the issue is with women in business or women and work”—

and this deals with the point that the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr David) made earlier—

“It is extremely simple. It is not to do with sexist dinosaur male bosses or with male-dominated industries crushing our genius. It is not to do with glass ceilings. It is to do, very straightforwardly, with the number of hours we are prepared to put in. If you’re happy to work a 16-hour day and never see your children, you too can become a master of the universe…. Few women are prepared to make that kind of sacrifice. This is entirely their right and good on them. However, it is surely both dishonest and intensely stupid to apportion blame—in the form of so-called corporate discrimination—to what is essentially a completely personal choice: power versus being there at bath time, conferences versus the park, business trips versus getting home in time for homework, giving ‘110%’ versus sleeping more than five hours a night.”

The words of India Knight address the point made by the shadow Minister.

The 2002 Act was supposed to be temporary, and apparently was supported on that basis. I do not know many “temporary” things that have run for more than a decade. As things stand, the Act has a further two decades to go, it having been granted a massive “temporary” extension in the recent Equality Act.

Some people will say that we need more women MPs so that we can be more representative and so that women’s issues can be addressed better. That is utter rubbish. It is ridiculous to suggest that women are more likely to be better represented by women and that men are better represented by men. I am very proud of the fact that I represent all my constituents—men or women—equally and to the best of my ability. I suspect—although I do not know for sure—that just as many women voted for me at the general election in Shipley as did men.

[Mr Nuttall]

Can my hon. Friend confirm that he also represents constituents of all races equally, despite being a white man himself?

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and that applies to all hon. Members. We treat all of our constituents equally and we represent all of them to the best of our ability, irrespective.

It is interesting that we keep hearing about “women’s issues” as this seems rather sexist and patronising. What are “women’s issues”? Many issues that are tagged as so-called women’s issues are also important to men. I have often heard that education is a women’s issue, but I would have thought that education was a family issue and was of just as much interest to men and fathers as to women and mothers.

I venture that the issues that a Conservative woman is concerned about are more closely aligned with the issues that a Conservative man is concerned about than they are with the issues that concern a Labour woman. The idea that certain issues are women’s issues is patronising and wrong.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)]

I have been following the speech by the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) very closely and taking a considerable number of notes. Unfortunately, I had to deal with something in my office but, alas, I could repeat almost word for word what he has said; however, I will not.

In my 17 years in the Commons, this is the most reactionary, right-wing, regressive Bill ever put to this House in a serious speech. The hon. Gentleman will probably take that as a compliment. However, there is something more profoundly serious at stake, because he represents a growing view within his party that the minor progress that we have made on equality in recent years has gone too far and should be reversed. The whole history of British legislation is precisely to use the power of Government and state to redress imbalances and unfairnesses, first, between those who did and did not have the vote—between the aristocracy and the non-noblemen in our communities—and, over time, through other positive action to ensure that there was full equality for all.

Some of the hon. Gentleman’s proposals are ridiculous. He suggests that there can be no “affirmative or positive action” in order to help people depending on their “sex”—I think he means gender. Presumably, that would outlaw the recruitment of women into convents because they were nuns and not men, or perhaps rugby players should now be hired not on the basis that they are trained, fit, male athletes, but that they are women.

The very first pamphlet I ever wrote as a political activist—

[Mr Nuttall]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr MacShane]

May I just make my points, and then I will give way? I do not mean to be discourteous, but I want to be brief because I am conscious that other people want to speak on other issues.

The very first political pamphlet I wrote in 1978 was an appeal to the BBC and other media organisations to hire journalists who were not white—at the time, we would say they were from the Asian or Afro-Caribbean community—because there was not a single byline reporter or presenter of that description on TV, despite the fact that by then we had hundreds of thousands, if not more, among our fellow British citizens and journalists I worked with, but in subordinate roles for which they had been able to offer themselves. I am glad, 30 years later, that that is not the case. We do not have a mono-coloured BBC or ITV or bylines in all our great newspapers evidently comprising only sturdy British citizens.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr MacShane]

The hon. Gentleman is quite wrong. I did fall on my sword, in the sense that the BBC made me do so by liberating me from its employment at the time. Whether I was replaced by a journalist from the black and minority ethnic community, I do not know. The point is that we expanded journalism, and yes, we went in for positive discrimination in the sphere of broadcasting, and I am very glad about that. Certainly, when the time comes for me to leave my position as MP for Rotherham, I will be delighted if there is an all-women shortlist. The real question that the hon. Gentleman’s party has to ask is why, even with the all the people put on to the A-list, there are still so few women sitting on the Conservative Benches.

[Mr Nuttall]

rose—

[Mr MacShane]

I will take just one more intervention, because I want to make my contribution very short.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Nuttall]

Going back to the question of rugby players, does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that women’s rugby is a very popular sport?

[Mr MacShane]

Women’s rugby and football, and other sports, are very popular. On the strict reading of the Bill, it would be illegal for Rotherham, Wasps or Harlequins not to entertain the notion of a woman rugby player, but I do not want to go too far down that road.

The notion that I find exceptionally offensive is that we make no efforts to help people with disabilities. We are facing thousands of people being fired from Remploy because of the wicked actions of the governing party. These are people who will find it incredibly difficult to get jobs elsewhere in the normal labour market. Quite rightly, in the 1940s, after the war, we honoured our war veterans by saying that those who came out of the war with particular disabilities could work in normal jobs and have the dignity of labour rather than living on handouts and the dole—but according to this wretched Bill, that, too, would be illegal.

On religion, we had an interesting discussion this week in Education questions about whether Cardinal Vaughan school in London can maintain its Catholic identity or, as some might wish, should no longer do so. I think that my many Jewish friends would find it very offensive, but oh so typical of the chauvinist, nationalist spirit that now reigns in the Conservative party, that they cannot define who comes into their schools on the basis of religion.

The whole balance of legislation, going back to the abolition of the slave trade and Lord Shaftesbury stopping children going up chimneys, was precisely to alter law to give particular protection to people who would otherwise be unfairly exploited on the grounds of their socio-economic status. I find it profoundly distressing that in October 2011 we are seriously being asked to rip up every decent parliamentary value that we and our predecessors have fought for over the years.

This is a Friday morning debate, and we all know that these Bills never go anywhere, but this Bill is symptomatic of the entire approach of the Conservative party. The Conservatives are refusing to support the International Labour Organisation convention on domestic workers because that, too, is aimed at giving a little bit of protection to people of a particular socio-economic and sex, or gender, status who are facing the most appalling exploitation in this and in other countries. Conservative Front Benchers have nothing to do with this Bill, of course, but the hon. Gentleman speaks for much of today’s Conservative party. That is why the quicker it is replaced in government by a party or parties that support the standards and best values of Britain, the better.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I have listened carefully to what has been said in the debate, because I knew that it would be enlightening. I will make a few short points.

Of course I agree that people should secure employment and be promoted on merit. Unfortunately, often that is not enough to secure equal opportunity. Some people, such as Baroness Thatcher, may be exceptions to the rule, but very few people are exceptions to rules.

On positive action, I think it is entirely appropriate that, over a number of years, the Metropolitan police have taken measures to try to ensure that the police force in London is representative of London’s communities. I think that that makes them more effective and more acceptable to the public as a whole.

On the point about midwives, the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) needs to consider whether there is a significant number of men who apply to be midwives and are refused on the basis of their gender, or whether men simply do not apply for those positions because they prefer to apply for others.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the Liberal Democrat party. Clearly, it is a source of some embarrassment to my party that we have failed to secure the election of any members of black and ethnic minority communities to Parliament.

[Mr Nuttall]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Tom Brake]

In a minute; I will just finish my point.

It is also a source of embarrassment that the Liberal Democrat Benches do not have a more representative balance of men and women.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am most grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. He is making some important points. I urge him and his colleagues not to feel embarrassed if they have arrived at this place on merit. There is no reason to feel embarrassed for that.

[Tom Brake]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. I would like to think that we have all arrived here on merit. The issue is that there are obstacles that often prevent others from arriving here on merit. He will know that, in politics, it is often helpful to have a network of people within a political party whom one knows and who are supportive. Often, women candidates or those from BME communities do not have the networks to help them progress in a political career. As he knows, there are other issues, such as financial issues. Anyone who wants to be a parliamentary candidate requires a certain amount of funding to support their political campaigning. That is not available to all.

I welcome the fact that the Liberal Democrat party has a leadership programme that aims to support women candidates and those from BME communities, to ensure that they are better prepared and better supported—financially, if necessary—so that they can compete on merit with other candidates.

[Mr Nuttall]

Would those funds be available to a young, aspiring, white, male politician from a working-class background or who is on benefits?

[Tom Brake]

I am grateful for that intervention, because the hon. Gentleman has given me the opportunity to confirm that that support is available to the sort of person he describes. That is because we recognise that people from poorer socio-economic backgrounds struggle to get elected as Members of Parliament.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Bryant]

Indeed, many of us who represent valley seats in south Wales, such as my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr David), who is in his place, know the long history of people fighting for better education precisely as a means of trying to rebalance and recalibrate that inequality in society. People do not need to have seen the play or film “The Corn Is Green” to know the educational ambition that often exists in many valley constituencies or other areas in the country with very high levels of multiple deprivation. All too often, however, it does not seem that the same educational opportunity is afforded to somebody in the Rhondda as it is to somebody in Chelsea.

I see the hon. Member for Chelsea and Fulham (Greg Hands) in his place—as a Whip, he is now unable to speak, so I can tease him remorselessly. Since he dispatched his close friend the former Defence Secretary from his post specifically so that he could become a Whip, I shall now enjoy teasing his silence. My point is simply that those in Chelsea, who have much greater financial resources, can ensure that they live in a good catchment area so that their child can go to a better school, or can afford to send their child to a private school. I was very fortunate that members of my family paid for me to go to a private school, but that is not available to the vast majority of my constituents or, I suspect, to any of them. That is why ensuring that the educational system genuinely provides equality of opportunity is vital.

The most distressing thing that I have come across in my time as an MP was early on. I bumped into a girl of 17 in Tonypandy and asked her what she wanted to do when she left school. She said she wanted to be a barrister, and I said, “Brilliant, how’s all that going? What are you going to study at university?” She said, “Well, I want to be a barrister, but I’ve been told by the careers service that girls from the Rhondda don’t get to be barristers.” All too often such depression of ambition can be self-perpetuating in communities, and that is why many of us believe in an aspirational form of socialism so that everybody has a chance to prosper.

[Mr Nuttall]

Does that not actually reinforce the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) that the education system is at fault? The careers adviser should not have said that to someone who had that ambition. He should have encouraged her and provided her with the help and support she needed.

[Chris Bryant]

Absolutely—I agree with the second part of that intervention, although not with the bit where the hon. Gentleman encouraged me to agree with the hon. Member for Shipley. Incidentally, I prefer the former Member for Shipley, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie), and I very much hope that he will have an opportunity to present his rather ludicrous Bill later.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his typically helpful intervention. Of course sons of peers should be represented, and they are a minority too. Perhaps as a son of a peer I should be given special help and intervention to help me to get through all the prejudice there is against sons of peers—not that I would ask for it or that I have ever noticed a particular prejudice against sons of peers. Mr Deputy Speaker, I hope that such prejudices never fall upon so distinguished a figure as yourself either.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend may have seen the press reports today regarding possible new legislation to allow females to take hereditary titles in the House of Lords. Does he agree that this is the way forward?

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

Well, I do not really like change as a general rule, and I would be very nervous about intervening in the line of succession to the throne. I think that the line of succession to the throne works very well and changing the Canadian constitution is a particularly difficult thing to do. With Her Majesty’s fantastically successful visit to Australia, we want everything to have a settled continuity of that succession. However, I think that the world has changed and that it may not be unreasonable to allow hereditary titles to pass through the female line, particularly if they are in danger of becoming extinct, because it would be a great sadness for titles to die out over succeeding generations with no new hereditary peerages being awarded. I must briefly declare an interest, because my mother-in-law would be able to resurrect a title if this law were to be changed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

It is always a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg), who spoke with such authority on the matter. I am a sponsor of the Bill and am obviously rising to support it.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) for bringing us the Bill. Millions of people across the country will be saying, “Hooray” this morning because at last somebody has started to roll back the tide of political correctness. I am pleased to be joined in support for the Bill by my right hon. Friends the Members for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis), for Hitchin and Harpenden (Mr Lilley) and for East Yorkshire (Mr Knight), and my hon. Friends the Members for Altrincham and Sale West (Mr Brady), for Christchurch (Mr Chope) and for Kettering (Mr Hollobone).

I want to follow up one or two of the points made by earlier speakers. The first is about racist jokes. Over the years, the nature of comedy in this country has changed, but we must not think that because we have changed it means that racist jokes were restricted only to this country. I understand that in Canada jokes were often told about the Newfoundlanders—the Newfies. No one took offence. It was part and parcel of their way of life—their culture—just as we have Irish jokes. It is not demeaning in any way.

Like the Bill’s promoter, I am a Yorkshireman and we also have jokes about Yorkshiremen. Jokes about sections of the community are common. I have often heard my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs tell jokes about Lancashire, and, indeed, I have heard him telling jokes about people from Sheffield and Rotherham. Nobody took offence at that.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

They may not have taken offence, but as we both know, there is nothing about jokes on the face of the Bill. I know that an argument is being built, but I think we can move on from the jokes now—much as I am tempted by the mention of Yorkshire.

[Mr Nuttall]

Earlier in the debate the question was asked: can we take equality too far? Does it mean changing the nature of our society? Can we take free speech too far? In the same way, when I was young—

[Philip Davies]

You still are.

[Mr Nuttall]

Thank you. We always used to talk of lollipop ladies. Nobody ever suggested that there ought to be a recruitment drive for lollipop men and nobody thought it was demeaning in any way that there were lollipop ladies and not—as far as I was aware at that time—any lollipop men.

The Bill has only two main parts. The first two clauses relate to the prohibition of positive action by public authorities and the third clause repeals the legislation allowing for all-women shortlists, which I shall come to later. Clause 1 sets out the details of the prohibition of positive action and clause 2 contains the definition of the action that would be outlawed. Positive action, as it is often called, differs from positive discrimination in that it is actively intended to increase the representation in a work force where monitoring has shown a particular group to be under-represented in proportion to the profile of either the total work force or the local or national population.

Positive action permitted by the present anti-discrimination legislation allows a person to provide facilities to meet the special needs of people from particular groups in society in relation to their training, education or welfare and to target job training at people from certain groups that are under-represented in a particular area of work or to encourage such groups to apply for such work. That raises some interesting and difficult questions. What is the area in question that should be considered? If a business or a public authority is situated in the south of England in a predominantly ethnically white area, should they be exempt from the legislation? Well, of course they are not exempt, and it must be difficult for some public authorities in certain areas to meet the quota because it is impossible for them to decide what area they cover. Does one look at the town in question, or the county, or the country, and if so, which country? Does one look at the United Kingdom as a whole or just the make-up of England? Of course, many areas covered by the present legislation are not easy to determine.

An example is sex or gender, to which the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) referred. Very often, it might not be possible to know whether one has a certain number of gay or heterosexual people in one’s work force. Indeed, I would submit that the information is of absolutely no consequence or relevance whatever.

I should perhaps declare that before I entered this House, I was for many years an employer, so I know all about the rules and regulations that were imposed on my practice as a result of equality legislation. Before any of the legislation was in place, just off our own bat, I had a work force who were 95% female, so in fact, in my work force, men were not equally represented. No one suggested to me that when I came to employ another secretary, legal assistant or solicitor, I should start to select men; I always selected the best person for the job.

[Chris Bryant]

Whether a large proportion of the people the hon. Gentleman employed were men or women is neither here nor there. If, in putting together his pension package, he made provision for people to inherit only the pension of a spouse, rather than the pension of a civil partner or a person of the same gender, he would have been advancing a prejudice.

[Mr Nuttall]

The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point. I believe that it should be up to the pension-holder to determine to whom their pension should go; it should not be anyone else’s decision. No question of prejudice should arise, as it should be up to the individual to determine. I do not see that there is anything wrong with that. It is perfectly all right, and it does not need any legislation to allow that to happen.

[Chris Bryant]

But it has needed legislation to make sure that the vast majority of company pensions operate in that way. Of course the hon. Gentleman is right to say that it should be for the individual to decide to whom their pension goes, but in the vast majority of cases, the old assumption was that it went only to a spouse, and not to anyone else. It required legislation to change that.

[Mr Nuttall]

That is a slightly different point. The hon. Gentleman’s point about pensions could easily have been dealt with by the individuals concerned dealing with the trustees of the pension scheme, and explaining to them that they wanted to change the rules of the scheme to allow their pension to go to a certain other individual. Of course, very often, there was no one forcing people to join the pension scheme; if they chose to join it, so be it. We now have a free market in pension schemes, so in the situation that the hon. Gentleman describes, there would have been a gap in the market and, in a free market, someone would have sprung up to provide pensions for people in exactly that position.

[Chris Bryant]

They did not.

[Mr Nuttall]

It could have happened.

My previous comments related to positive action. Positive discrimination, affirmative action or discrimination generally means choosing someone solely on the grounds of their gender or racial group, or for any other factor, and not for their ability. We are now at the crux of the matter. I believe that, by definition, as soon as one positively discriminates in respect of any given group in society, one is automatically discriminating against another group. That cannot be right. The Bill makes a good start in tackling the problem, but it is just the first step on the long road to ridding this country of the culture of political correctness and dismantling the whole industry of diversity and equality.

There could be no better time, given the economic situation, for that to gather pace. I know from my experience as a practising solicitor that many small and medium-sized enterprises struggle under the burden of the legislation. We are not there yet—there is a long way to go—but if we could begin to remove the legislation that applies to public authorities, that would be a step in the right direction. All our public services are looking for savings but, because of the way in which the law is framed, the one area in which they are not allowed to look for them is diversity and equality legislation. They have to keep their army of officers to comply with the law and the tick-box legislation.

Under the Disability Discrimination Acts, positive discrimination in favour of disabled people is not unlawful, and if disabled people meet the minimum criteria for a job, they are guaranteed an interview. The only other exemption relates to the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002, which the Bill seeks to abolish. The Equality Act 2010 includes a provision giving employers the option, when faced with two or more candidates of equal merit, of choosing one from a group that is under-represented in the work force. There is a whole Government Department—the Government Equalities Office—that exists solely for the purpose of issuing and enforcing guidance, red tape and regulations on that legislation. It has published guidance for employers on how to make those changes and use them in everyday life. The provisions on positive action in recruitment are, I am pleased to say, entirely voluntary but, as we all know, the public sector has seized on them with great glee. There is no requirement for an employer to use either the general provisions or those relating to recruitment and promotion.

Positive action in that regard will be used in cases in which an employer reasonably thinks that people with a protected characteristic are under-represented in the work force or suffer a disadvantage connected to that protected characteristic. As my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley made clear, the problem is where we draw the line. Why not, for example, protect and give help to those who are particularly tall?

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

What an excellent idea—there should be special benefits for everyone over 6 feet.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am pleased that my hon. Friend is interested in this matter. If someone, for the sake of argument, is 7 feet tall—there are people of that stature in society—an employer might secretly think that they had better not take on such an employee, because they might complain about the size of the company’s doorways and it would have to spend a fortune going round the building and enlarging all the doors. One can easily see how an argument could be made for heightist, stoutist or shortist legislation to be introduced—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. I am sure doors matter to people who are over 2 metres—usually it is 6 feet 6 inches—but I cannot see the connection between the Bill and where we are being led, so I am sure the hon. Gentleman would like to bring us back now to the Bill.

[Mr Nuttall]

I will indeed, Mr Deputy Speaker. The point I make is where do we draw the line? I will leave—

[Mr Deputy Speaker]

Order. To help the hon. Gentleman, I have drawn the line at doors.

[Mr Nuttall]

I entirely accept that, Mr Deputy Speaker, and I will leave that point there.

The new positive action provisions make it clear that employers must not adopt policies or practices designed routinely to favour candidates with a certain protected characteristic of whatever nature, even where there is evidence of under-representation or disadvantage. All suitably qualified candidates must be considered on their individual merits for the post in question. Current positive action provisions in employment relate only to training or encouragement—for example, mentoring schemes for ethnic minority staff where they are under-represented in senior roles, or open days to encourage women applicants in male-dominated sectors. This merely serves to upset and discriminate against all those who are not allowed to take part in such training. Why should they not receive the same training just because of their racial background, sex or particular individual characteristics?

The Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002 was originally presented on 17 October 2001. The key objective of the Act was to enable a political party, should it wish to do so, to adopt measures that regulate the selection of candidates for certain elections in order to reduce inequality in the numbers of men and women as candidates in that party. In south Yorkshire in the 1980s I was regularly involved in the selection of parliamentary candidates. Of, say, 50 applications that we would typically receive for a seat, there would be on average 45 from men, three from women and two from ethnic minority candidates. It follows, therefore, that with 90% of the applications being from white males, very often a male was selected, but we were selecting purely on merit.

There were many examples, and there continue to be many examples in the Conservative party, of women who have succeeded on their merits. I know from Mrs Nuttall that she feels extremely patronised whenever there is any talk of special treatment being given to women.

[Chris Bryant]

By you?

[Mr Nuttall]

Mrs Nuttall does not mind special treatment of her from me—I think she expects it—but as a general rule that reflects the view of many women. If they are given special treatment, they feel that they are being patronised and that they can make it on their own merit without it. That applies equally to those from ethnic minority backgrounds. Many Members of this House have made it on their own strength without special treatment.

[Mr Alan Campbell (Tynemouth) (Lab)]

I am listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman. Given the changes that his leader has instituted in his party, is he saying that there are Members on the Conservative Benches—women or members of ethnic minorities—who have not got here purely on merit?

[Mr Nuttall]

I am not saying that at all. There is a risk that others might regard the winner from an all-women shortlist as not having succeeded against the whole field of candidates, which is self-evidently true.

[Mr Campbell]

Is that the hon. Gentleman’s view? If so, would he care to name any of them?

[Mr Nuttall]

As far as I am concerned, all Members on the Government side of the House have got here on merit, but there are plenty of Members who succeeded in their applications as a direct result of the all-women shortlists that the Labour party introduced.

[Mr Campbell]

Is the hon. Gentleman saying that the changes instituted by his leader to try to make his party more representative have been a waste of time?

[Mr Nuttall]

I believe that all selections should be open to all candidates, regardless of their race, sexual gender or any other merits, that political parties, wherever they are in the country, should be free to choose who they want on merit and that the 2002 Act should be repealed, which the Bill seeks to do. The key objective of that Act was to enable a political party, if it so wished, to adopt measures to regulate the selection of candidates, but I do not believe that that is the right way forward. According to the explanatory notes that accompanied the Act, in the 1996 case of Jepson v. the Labour party an employment tribunal held that section 13 of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 covered the selection of candidates by political parties, which therefore constrained their ability to take positive action to increase the number of women elected to this House.

[Damian Green]

For the avoidance of doubt, given the interventions from the Opposition, I am happy to confirm that the Conservative party has never used all-women shortlists and that they fell into disrepair in the Labour party after an all-women shortlist produced a male candidate who happened to be the leader of a trade union.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am most grateful to the Minister for that intervention. The Opposition say that they support all-women shortlists, but as Members on both sides of the House will be aware, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) was selected as a candidate despite his gender. It is perhaps one of the biggest ironies that he was selected even though his wife, the right hon. and learned Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), seems so keen to have all-women shortlists in all constituencies.

[Philip Davies]

Is it not also ironic that the Labour party has brought in all these massively talented women, apparently, through the use of all-women shortlists, but when it wanted to select a new leader it seemed to bypass all that talent that had been brought into the House and plumped for a man?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a good point, and perhaps the Labour party will consider selecting its leader on a rotational basis, with a male leader being followed by a female. As far as I am aware, the Labour party, unlike our party, has never had a female leader; perhaps it is time for half a dozen consecutive female leaders.

[Chris Bryant]

We have actually had two women leaders: my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby South (Margaret Beckett) was briefly leader after John Smith died; and we had an interim leader in the form of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman), the current deputy leader. More to the point, however, considering the trump card to which the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) referred—Baroness Thatcher—is it not surprising that not a single other woman has chosen to stand for the leadership of the Conservative party since?

[Mr Nuttall]

That is not surprising; it is just a matter of fact. The two examples to which the hon. Gentleman refers from the Labour party were of course simply temporary leaders, who held the post until they could be replaced by a man. We should read nothing into the fact that, since the great lady ceased to be leader of our party, we have not produced a further female applicant for the leadership. I am sure that in years to come females will apply and be candidates in such elections.

[Chris Bryant]

I do apologise; I misled the House. Ann Widdecombe stood, but she was voted off quite fast—as she was off “Strictly”.

[Mr Nuttall]

I will leave that there. We do not want to go into “Strictly Come Dancing”. I will not be tempted down that road.

It has been suggested that the most effective way to attract female parliamentary candidates is to introduce a new system of flexible parental leave, so that aspiring female politicians do not have to choose between a career and family life. But, as we know from experience, Margaret Thatcher entered Parliament when her two children, Carol and Mark, were just six years old. That did not put off Margaret Thatcher, and there is no reason why it should put off anyone else some 50 years later.

Those who consider putting themselves forward to become a Member of Parliament have to make a choice, as we all do, men or women, and it would be sexist if that choice did not apply to men, too. Hon. Members, surely on both sides of the House, recognise that participating in running our country is no ordinary job.

What started in the 2002 Act as a temporary measure that would last only until 2015 has been extended by an enormous 15 years, so the use of all-women shortlists will be permitted right up to 2030. It has been suggested that this debate provides a suitable opportunity for the House to consider whether all-women shortlists have been effective, and perhaps it is time for us to do so. They have produced women MPs, but that is quite obvious. What we do not know is how many good male candidates have been prevented from getting to this House as a result of the application of the Act.

The Leader of the Opposition, on the subject of all-women shortlists, recently said:

“People were sceptical about all-women shortlists but I think they have actually made an enormous difference to the numbers of women in Parliament.”

If that is not a statement of the blindingly obvious, I do not know what is. If all-women shortlists are employed, by definition that can have no other effect than to produce more women candidates and, if applied across the board, that would inevitably lead to an increase in the number of women MPs. That is hardly a great achievement to cite.

It has also been suggested that we need to take action to increase female representation on boards of companies, but it should be up to companies themselves to determine whom they have on their boards. I have no reason to believe that they do not choose the best person for the job. I read the other day that there has been an enormous increase in the number of women directors in the City of London. However, the percentage of the total has hardly increased at all, because what tends to happen is that companies appoint female directors to tick a box. We have almost reached “token woman syndrome” again.

The positive action in recruitment provisions in the Equality Act 2010 are entirely voluntary. There is no requirement for an employer to use either the general provisions or those relating to recruitment and promotion. I may not want to see any legislation to ban discrimination, but equally I would not wish to legislate to encourage discrimination. The Bill would even things up. It is not clear that we have seen any improvement in how companies operate, but at a time of increased difficulty for public spending we have to look at ways of cutting back, and pruning the whole area of equality and diversity legislation would be a good starting point.

Mention was made earlier of the “Not In My Name” section of the Campaign Against Political Correctness website, and I have one or two other quotes from people who do not feel that the whole equality industry has helped them. Mark Grohen said:

“As a gay man I’ve always thought myself rather lucky...I do not need to be told by politicians and do-gooders that I’m either vulnerable or incapable of looking after myself. I really dislike people’s obsession with what I do in the bedroom: I prefer it not to be the reason why I’m hired for a job.”

[Chris Bryant]

But unfortunately people are still murdered for their sexuality, as happened in public only a couple of years ago in Trafalgar square. That is why we need to ensure that the police services ensure that everyone is protected, not just the mainstream and the majority.

[Mr Nuttall]

The shadow Minister makes a perfectly valid point. I entirely agree that the police have to protect everyone equally, regardless of the colour of their skin, whether they are gay or straight, wherever they come from in the world, male or female. However, the existence of all the equality and diversity legislation runs the risk of upsetting those sections of society who feel alienated and discriminated against by that legislation. It does not help—in fact, it is counter-productive—for the Act to remain in place.

A lady—a female—who is half Chinese, said:

“For those of us who have pursued equality for so many years, it is disheartening to see how little has been achieved. Equality is not political correctness. In a truly equal country, the best candidate gets the job even if it is the Anglo-Saxon chap. There is a still long way to go.”

Paolo Fragale, who is a gay man of mixed race, said:

“As a gay man of mixed race I vehemently oppose positive discrimination and quotas. Apart from the fact that I find them patronising, I feel they are counter productive and only serve to further segregate people.”

Rachel Watts summed up the feeling of many women when she said:

“The majority of women in favour of ‘helping hands’ and special treatment are the ones who will gain the most from them.”

Perhaps the most difficult and sensitive area is those who are disabled. Frederick Bird said:

“As someone registered disabled, I would not object to not being given a job that I was not able to do due to my disability. Being realistic there are things that I cannot do and no p.c. rubbish can alter the fact.”

Mention was made earlier of the help that disabled people need. I am pleased to say that the Government, under the Work programme, are dealing with this as it should be dealt with—on an individual basis. It is simply not right to write off great sections of the community, whether they are blind or disabled in any other way, and say, “I’m sorry—you’re not able to work because of your disability.” We should do all we can for those who have a disability to give them tailored, specialised, individual help to get them back into the workplace, but that cause will not be helped by some artificial means of employing quotas.

My final quote comes from Denise O’Brien, a disabled female person who is also a lesbian. She said:

“Political correctness is making artificial differences between people unnecessarily. Special treatment for minority groups in a lot of cases breeds resentment from those not included who have genuine need of help.”

The Bill is a good start on a very long road that we have to go down. It perhaps says something about where we are with the equality and diversity agenda that in the recently published new edition of “The Solicitor’s Handbook”, chapter 2 is on equality and diversity, and it comes before the chapters on client confidentiality and conflicts of interest. I am sure that when someone goes to consult their solicitor they are more interested to know that their business is being dealt with confidentially and that there is no conflict of interest than whether the company in question has the right sort of tick-box approach to equality and diversity. This is a burden on small and medium-sized enterprises. It is no business of the Government to interfere in this way in how businesses are run. It provides an unnecessary burden in terms of the training that they have to do on a yearly basis in order to be able to demonstrate that they are complying with the diversity agenda.

In conclusion, this matter is perhaps best summed up by the quotation from George Orwell’s “Animal Farm”:

“All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.”

It cannot be right that we need this legislation in the 21st century. Everybody should be treated with respect and tolerance. I have no objection to using the word tolerance. If it is used in its normal, everyday meaning, everybody knows that it means tolerating people and treating people from different backgrounds with respect. By starting along the road of removing some of the politically correct nonsense legislation, we would be doing our constituents a great service. I warmly commend the Bill to the House. I trust that it will receive resounding support on Second Reading, have a smooth passage through this House and the other place, and reach the statute book, much to the delight of my constituents.

Tribunals (Maximum Compensation Awards) Bill

David Nuttall Excerpts

Friday 17th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

May I help my hon. Friend on that point? I suspect that no accurate figures are available because many of these claims are resolved before the application is put to the industrial tribunal. Although figures will be available for those withdrawn or settled after the industrial tribunal proceedings began, I suspect there will be many thousands of other cases that the public do not know about.

[Mr Chope]

To put the issue in context, I will quote briefly from some newspapers. On 24 October 2008, the MailOnline had the headline “Asian bank worker gets record £2.8m race discrimination payout”. On 10 September 2009, another headline read: “Sacked council manager wins £1 million age discrimination payout”,

and a report has come out in the past few days saying:

“Discrimination compensation payouts hit an all time high.

A recent annual survey of compensation awards in the Equal Opportunities Review has revealed that the amount being paid out by employers in discrimination cases has more than doubled in two years.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Diana Johnson]

Obviously, I cannot comment on the circumstances of that case. The tribunal or court that dealt with it would have considered all the issues that arose. Some dreadful discrimination cases are brought before the tribunals and courts, and tribunals do their best to make just and equitable awards that fit the circumstances that are brought before them. I dispute the idea that everybody who goes before a tribunal is awarded a huge amount of money. When people are awarded very high compensation payments, there may well be very good reasons.

May I also say to the hon. Member for Christchurch that I believe he has got the law wrong in a number of ways, particularly on wrongful dismissal? He wants to limit payments that can be made for that, but often people’s contracts of employment contain clear rights to notice. If he wants to limit those rights, he may find that he is in breach of contract. That may apply to some high earners.

I want the Minister to have an opportunity to contribute, so I will cut my comments short, but I wish to point out that at the moment there is a limit of about £68,000 on unfair dismissal compensation payments. My hon. Friend the Member for Manchester Central (Tony Lloyd) made that point. When awarding compensation for unfair dismissal, the tribunal has to make clear judgments about the immediate loss of earnings that the person has experienced, their future loss of earnings, the expenses that they have incurred, the loss of statutory rights and the loss of pension rights. At the moment, tribunals consider the range of losses to an individual and make a judgment based on that, but there is a cap of about £68,000 on the compensation.

I am interested to hear what the Minister has to say about the particular issues of sex, race and disability discrimination claims. We know from the Marshall case that European law states that it is not possible to have an upper limit for those claims, because damages should be awarded for the losses sustained.

[Mr Nuttall]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Diana Johnson]

I am very keen to hear from the Minister, but I will give way.

[Mr Nuttall]

Is it not the case that since the decision to which the hon. Lady refers, EU directive 2006/54/EC has recast the legal position so that there is a prohibition on the fixing of a prior upper limit to restrict compensation, and a provision that the “effective, proportionate and dissuasive” remedy should be given? I believe that a cap of £50,000 would be dissuasive.

[Diana Johnson]

That is obviously where the hon. Gentleman and the Labour party disagree. We do not think it is right to have such a cap. I would be interested to hear the Minister’s view about the European dimension to imposing a cap on sex, race and disability discrimination compensation. On the basis of what I have said this afternoon, the Opposition oppose the Bill.

Drugs (Roadside Testing) Bill

David Nuttall Excerpts

Friday 10th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

Before I speak to my Bill, may I, on behalf of the whole House and my constituents, congratulate His Royal Highness Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, on his 90th birthday today?

My Bill, which I hope will receive a Second Reading today, is part of an iterative process to try to maintain pressure on the Government to take seriously the issue of drug-driving. They talk the talk—I refer to both the present and the previous Government—but they have not delivered on the action. Since I was a Minister with responsibility for road safety and then a shadow Transport Minister, I have taken a deep interest in the subject of trying to get evidence to ensure that people are deterred, detected and punished if they are guilty of driving with drugs in their body.

There have been some horrific fatal accidents and accidents causing serious injury. I remember one on the A31 in my constituency, in which a young student was killed in a head-on crash because a lorry driver was on the wrong side of the road, having gone to sleep after taking a lot of amphetamines. There is a real problem here, as the Government accept. As recently as last Sunday, the Minister with responsibility for roads, the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), produced an article saying that it was essential to get to grips with the issue. My concern is that unless or until the Government enable roadside drug testing to take place, we will never get to grips with the issue.

Back in 2003 I served on the Standing Committee on the Railways and Transport Safety Bill, which was enacted that year. That Bill included provisions to alter the road traffic legislation to allow a roadside drug test of people suspected of having drugs in their system. The test was to show not whether they were impaired by drugs, but whether they had drugs in their system. We were told then that the technology existed and that in due course the test would be available. It was spelled out in the Bill, however, that Home Office type approval was necessary.

That was back in 2003, and not only do we still not have Home Office type approval for a roadside drug- testing device, but the Home Office has not yet even been able to draw up a specification against which type approval might be given. Until a specification is drawn up, it is not possible for the experts in the field to submit their ideas. The best the Government can do is say that they have agreed a specification and type approval for a testing device which could be retained in police stations. That is something, but it is not the answer to the problem. It means that the police will have to have grounds for arresting somebody at the roadside before taking them to the police station. One can assume that relatively few people will be taken to the police station because of the difficulty of establishing at the roadside a reasonable suspicion that a driver has drugs in his system.

Why can we not have a system of roadside drug-testing devices? The irony—it is so sad—is that in this country we are trying to achieve an export-led manufacturing recovery for our economy. It is British experts and British manufacturers who are the key players in the technology. A firm called Concateno is already exporting devices to enable roadside drug testing to take place. It is exporting them all over the world. Various countries, including Finland, Croatia, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, have introduced legislation to enable roadside testing for drugs to take place, often utilising the very same devices produced by Concateno. Even more ironically, these drug-screening devices are used by the police forces themselves to screen police recruits to see whether they have drugs in their system. They are also used by the Ministry of Justice in the Prison Service and by quite a lot of schools, where pupils who have been caught with cannabis or other drugs are put on a drug abstinence regime which is then reinforced by these screening devices. These devices are therefore widely used.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is rather strange that the police, and by implication the Home Office, should have sufficient confidence in these devices to use them to test members of the police force, and yet they apparently do not have enough confidence in them to test drivers at the roadside?

[Mr Chope]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. When presented with such evidence, one has to question the motives. Why has the Home Office been so slow in coming forward with a specification against which it might be able to give type approval for these devices? It may be because it knows that were there to be such roadside testing, there would be a lot more work for the police to do, because many drivers have drugs in their system and if they were detected by such screening devices at the roadside following an accident, the whole process of law would come into play and many of them would end up with a conviction. We know that there is a cost associated with that, and I suspect that behind all this delay is a reluctance by the Home Office to open up a Pandora’s box of increased detection of offences and increased burden on the court system, and ultimately, perhaps, increased numbers of people in prison.

What could be happening? Funnily enough, on Wednesday of this week there was a short post from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation from the Limestone Coast police in South Australia, which said:

“Statistics released by Limestone Coast police have shown significantly more people are being caught driving under the influence of drugs, than under the influence of alcohol. Superintendent Trevor Twilley says 6 per cent of people tested for drug driving are coming back with positive results, while less than half a per cent are returning positive results for alcohol.”

That is a direct consequence of the state of South Australia equipping its police with the technology and the means to do roadside drug tests. It is relatively new in South Australia but it is already having a major impact. If it can be done in South Australia, why can we not do it here, and now?

My Bill, like previous Bills along the same lines, says that a type approval for this drug-testing device must be in place within 12 months. My original Bill, introduced under the ten-minute procedure in April 2007, had the exclusive support of those who were at that time Opposition Members. Among those who supported that and subsequent Bills are a number of distinguished Members of the House. The Bill that I introduced in December 2007, which was identical to my ten-minute rule Bill, was supported by none other than my right hon. Friend the Leader of House, who I am delighted to see in his place today, and also by four colleagues who are now Select Committee Chairmen, and one colleague who is now a Deputy Speaker of this House, as well as, of course, what might be described as the more usual suspects, my hon. Friends the Members for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) and for Shipley (Philip Davies). The legislation thus had a wide range of support, and that was back in 2007. The Bill then said that the type approval should be produced within one year. My right hon. Friend was obviously keen that that should happen. He is now in a very powerful position in the Government—arguably even more powerful than the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), who will reply to the debate.

Why cannot the Government, with the support of the Leader of House and that of the Minister with responsibility for roads, who was also a signatory to one of my Bills in identical terms on this subject, deliver on this reasonable proposition that we should have type approval for a roadside drug-testing piece of equipment? I am sure that it would result in far fewer people driving on our roads under the influence of drugs or with drugs in their system. Far too few people are being brought to justice at the moment, so people think they can drive with drugs in their system with impunity. It is relatively rare that the courts are asked to deal with people who are guilty of drug-driving, because it is quite hard to detect at the moment.

One of the most famous recent cases was reported on 14 September 2010 when somebody called George Michael was jailed for eight weeks for drug-driving. He crashed his car while under the influence of cannabis and was given a five-year driving ban. He had also been guilty of driving under the influence of drugs on a previous occasion. I am not sure what Members of the House will think about the sentence that was imposed, but it shows that this illegal activity of drug-driving is taking place in this country, and the police themselves suggest that it is much more widespread than has so far been recognised by the Government.

We have had any number of Government initiatives promising to clamp down on drug-driving and have a publicity campaign about it. Even this week, in the Mail Online, there is an article similar to that in The Sunday Times to which I have already referred, saying that the Minister is determined to do something about it. All he has to do, if he really has the will, is to go to Concateno and ask what type approval would be needed to ensure that we can have a roadside testing device. Concateno would be able to give him that information relatively easily and the specification could be drawn up and the testing device given type approval sooner rather than later.

In the Government’s most recent road safety programme, they refer to this issue but only in the most general terms. Even the target that was set as recently as March, that the type approval for the device that would be used in police stations would be completed, has not yet been met. It was said that it would done by the end of April, but we are now in June and it still has not been completed. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will be candid in explaining the reasons. For one reason or another, we have still not got the type approval that we need for both the roadside testing device and the testing device to be used in police stations. Until we get that we will not have an effective regime for dealing with the scourge of drug-driving.

The principle that Ministers should apply is this: where there is a will, there is a way. If the ministerial team has the will to do something about this and is prepared to override the block in the Home Office, particularly in its scientific branch, they will be able to deal with this. I think that it is an indictment of the Home Office’s scientific branch that, despite all its expertise, it is still unable to come up with the type approval specification.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) for showing such determination and persistence in bringing the Bill before the House. I think he has been hiding his light under a bushel to some degree, as he has attempted no fewer than four times to get his Bill a Second Reading. Today is very much a red letter day in the life of the Bill. It was first brought to the attention of the House in April 2007 under the ten-minute rule. A similar, if not identical, Bill was presented to the House on 10 December 2007. Sadly, as the time-honoured phrase “due to lack of parliamentary time” so aptly describes, it befell the fate of so many private Members’ Bills and proceeded no further than that first hurdle.

Unperturbed by this and remaining convinced of the merits of the case, my hon. Friend presented the Bill for a second time in the following Session and it had its First Reading on 26 January 2009. Sadly, the legislative gods again did not smile kindly on the Bill. Despite being on the Order Paper so many times, it failed to make any further progress. Until I looked at the list of sponsors of those previous Bills, I was unaware that I, as a sponsor of this Bill, was replacing one of the Deputy Speakers or the Leader of the House. Had I known that, I certainly would not have changed my decision to support it.

We have already heard my hon. Friend explain the thinking behind the Bill and what it seeks to achieve. I think it makes good parliamentary sense, because essentially it seeks to amend what is effectively a dormant provision in an Act of Parliament.

It breathes life into the provisions of section 6C of the Road Traffic Act 1988, so that rather than being just words they can be used in practice, which is no doubt what was intended so many years ago when they were introduced as an amendment to the 1988 Act. The whole purpose of the Bill is to make it easier for the police to detect those who drive under the influence of drugs.

My hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) quite rightly raised concern that if machines are not accurate innocent drivers might be convicted and receive a criminal record. I acknowledge that risk, but, as I will outline later in more detail, medical evidence shows that even an infinitesimally small amount of drugs can impair one’s driving ability. The reading from the machine will not represent proof beyond all doubt, because it will be for the courts to assess its strength and validity, but it surely must be better than what happens at the moment.

There are penalties for people who drive under the influence of drugs, and the police are advised about the steps to take if they think that someone is doing so. Five exercises are designed to assess their abilities: a pupil dilation test, designed to test for the presence of drugs; counting out 30 seconds; walking in a straight line, nine paces forward and then back—the classic test to check co-ordination and balance; raising a foot in the air 6 to 8 inches off the ground, which is designed to test the balance; and touching one’s finger to one’s nose with the eyes closed.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

It occurs to me that those tests are rather unfair on people who are not necessarily particularly numerate or athletic, and that standing on one leg with one’s foot 6 to 8 inches off the ground might be rather difficult for a lot of people on a normal day.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point. The police are concerned that many completely sound people, who had never been within a mile of a drug or been involved in any drug taking whatever, would fail such a test. I would doubt my ability to perform all those functions without some error, and I have to concede that it would be difficult for even a sober person to pass all those tests easily.

In the Romberg test, for example, motorists are asked to stand up straight, tilt their head back, close their eyes and count to 30. If they sway and lose count those are regarded as an impaired ability to drive. It is like a scene from a Hollywood movie, seeing a suspect have to walk nine paces in a straight line and then nine paces back, and the idea of somebody having to stand alternately on their left and right legs without falling over is really rather ridiculous, so anything that moves away from those subjective tests and puts things on a more scientific basis can only be a step in the right direction.

The evidence obtained by the police must be of sufficient quality to enable them or the Crown Prosecution Service to secure a conviction in court, and it is important to determine what is meant by “drugs”. We all might think that we know what is meant, but what does the legislation state? Fortunately for us, and for the purposes of the 1988 Act, we are enormously assisted by section 11, entitled “Interpretations of sections 4 to 10”. Section 11(2) states that

“‘drug’ includes any intoxicant other than alcohol”.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

That is an enormously important point. I do not know whether my hon. Friend reads the Daily Mail regularly, but it pointed out earlier this week that if one had five cups of coffee in a day one could hallucinate, so under the Bill will we roadside-test people who have had just one extra cup of coffee?

[Mr Nuttall]

That is indeed a problem, because caffeine can be regarded as an intoxicant, as indeed—I was very surprised to find out—can water. Those apparently harmless substances, if consumed to excess, can result in intoxication, so the definition in section 11 captures not just the obvious drugs that we think of when we hear “drugs”.

[Chris Heaton-Harris (Daventry) (Con)]

The road haulage industry is in a quandary, because a number of lorry drivers drink high-caffeine drinks, such as Red Bull and Relentless. Is there not a danger that such hauliers, who are just trying to ensure that they are very aware of what they are doing as they drive down the road, and just trying to do the best that they possibly can in maintaining control of their vehicle, could be subject to the Bill and find themselves breaking the law?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend raises an interesting issue. I appreciate that he says such drivers are not doing anything wrong, and are just trying to do their best in their job, but medical evidence may well show that, although they think they are doing the best they can, by ingesting so many intoxicants, which is what they are doing according to the definition, they are putting themselves in a state of well-being whereby they are prepared to take chances that they might not take if they were completely sober.

It would be for a court to weigh up the evidence of whether a person was driving under the influence of drugs, which, under an earlier section of the 1988 Act, is the offence in question, and one can easily see how a bench of magistrates or a jury might decide that a lorry driver who had drunk several cans of highly concentrated caffeine-based drinks had subjected their body to such external influences as to result in their having driven under the influence of drugs.

The fact that the definition in the Road Traffic Act is so widely drawn is one of the reasons it is necessary to bring this Bill before the House. I suspect that it is also one of the reasons there has been such a delay in having a device approved by the Secretary of State for the carrying out of a preliminary drug test within the scope of section 6C. Perhaps when that that legislation, and the amendment to it, was drafted, section 6C should have used the word “devices” instead of “device”, because that might have made it easier for scientists and developers to devise and manufacture one device to deal with one set of drugs and another to deal with another set of drugs. The use of the word “device” has meant that the manufacturers, the scientists and the Home Office Scientific Development Branch have had to work towards coming up with a catch-all machine that is capable of detecting any number of substances. The Act is drawn so widely that a large number of substances could be termed a drug.

Apart from all the obvious drugs, which I will, for ease of reference, call illicit drugs, it is arguable that, as we have heard in my hon. Friends’ interventions, the definition will cover other substances—not only substances that we take in every day, such as coffee and water, but prescribed medical drugs. Intoxication is one of a number of conditions that come under the umbrella term “substance-related disorders”. Of course, the drugs most likely to cause impairment are those whose use is prohibited by law. I want briefly to explain the different ways in which such drugs can affect people. Different drugs affect different people in different ways, and the effects can last for several days, sometimes without people even realising it.

Cannabis slows the actions, affects concentration and often has a sedative-like effect resulting in fatigue and affected co-ordination. I would not be surprised if somebody suggested that cannabis was rather like one of my speeches on a Friday. The parliamentary correspondent from the BBC might put that in one of his reports.

[Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con)]

Cannabis is often the drug of choice for younger members of society. Is my hon. Friend aware that RAC surveys of young drivers show that they are more likely to have been driven by somebody who has used illegal drugs than by somebody who has used alcohol?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Although the statistics show that thousands more people have been convicted of driving under the influence of alcohol than of drugs, whenever a survey is carried out we find that people, especially if they have been to a club, will admit that they are more likely to have been driven in a vehicle by somebody who has had drugs than by somebody who has had alcohol.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

This is a very interesting discussion of the effects on people’s behaviour. One of the most dangerous ages for driving is 18 to 25 for young men. If they are having accidents because they are going too fast, and cannabis slows them down, are you saying that they ought to be using cannabis when they drive?

[Mr Speaker]

I am not saying anything, but I think that the hon. Gentleman might be.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point. As my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris) said, people may think that by taking certain substances they are doing themselves great benefit and putting themselves in a state where it will be easier for them to drive. If they are feeling all pumped up and hyped up after being in a nightclub, they think that taking cannabis might slow them down and get them back on the right track. I would submit that it is very dangerous for anyone to go down that road.

That is cannabis. Secondly, there is cocaine.

[Mr Chope]

I am glad that my hon. Friend has dealt with cannabis.

It is thought that one of the reasons prison officers are so relaxed about the widespread use of cannabis in prison is that it keeps the prisoners—or inmates, as the politically correct would describe them—in a relaxed state.

[Mr Nuttall]

That might be so, but the fact is that the use of such drugs is illegal. I hope that one of these devices will be authorised for roadside drug testing in the near future, because it would then be a small step for them to be used in prisons, making it easier to ascertain which of the inmates has had access to illicit drugs.

[Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that there is some concern about the fact that if these devices are to be used purely to detect whether drugs are present in a person’s system, that creates the possibility of a greater move towards a police state, because the current legislation states that the authorities must prove that the individual was impaired by the use of drugs in driving the vehicle, as opposed to having drugs in their system?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Ultimately, however, it will be for the courts to decide, not the police, so I do not think it could be said that we would be living in a police state. The police will put the evidence before the magistrates court or, in appropriate cases, the Crown court, where the jury will weigh up the evidence and decide whether the person is guilty of the offence. Let us stick to what we are talking about, which is driving under the influence of drugs.

Cocaine causes over-confidence and can cause erratic behaviour. After a night out using cocaine, people often report that they feel as though they have flu. Some people, however—I said that different drugs can affect people in different ways—feel sleepy and lack concentration.

My hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) commented that drug taking among young people, particularly in nightclubs, is still very prevalent. One of the principal drugs used in those circumstances is ecstasy. Ecstasy makes the heart beat faster, which can cause a surge of adrenalin and result in a driver feeling over-confident and therefore taking additional risks that could, and do, cause accidents.

LSD can, depending on the individual concerned, appear to speed up or slow down time and movement, making the speed of other vehicles difficult to judge. It can distort colour, sound and objects, and users often see objects that are not there. LSD can cause people to feel panicky and confused—obviously a dangerous state to be in while driving.

Speed makes people feel wide awake and excited. Of course, I refer to speed, the drug, rather than vehicle speed. People who have taken speed find it difficult to sit still and have difficulty sleeping. Someone who has taken speed and has not been able to sleep at the weekend would probably be tired and dangerous on the road. Speed can also make people feel very panicky.

The problem is complicated by the fact that medicinal drugs that are legally prescribed by a qualified medical practitioner can also adversely affect a person’s ability to drive. It is, of course, the responsibility of the driver to ensure that he does not commit an offence when driving under the influence of drugs. Doctors do, however, advise patients of the dangers of the side effects of medication. The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency issues advice to general practitioners on the possible effects of a variety of drugs. GPs are advised to assume that the majority of adult patients are actual or potential drivers.

The Medical Commission on Accident Prevention has published a booklet, which is available to all GPs, setting out its views on the commoner conditions that affect one’s fitness to drive safely. The booklet, entitled “The Medical Aspects of Fitness to Drive”, contains chapters on prescribed and illicit medicines and driving. Various suggestions are offered to GPs on the advice that should be given to patients, such as not driving at all until any side effects are known, not driving if feeling unwell, and not combining alcohol with drugs. As will be seen from the cases I refer to later, the combination of alcohol and drugs is sadly all too common in cases of death by dangerous driving. GPs are also advised to warn that stimulants and euphoria-producing drugs may lead to unnecessary risks being taken.

In addition to that advice, the DVLA issues the “At a glance guide to the current medical standards of fitness to drive”, which contains sections on driving while taking medication for psychiatric and cardiovascular disorders. Specific illnesses such as epilepsy and diabetes are also covered. A review of the effects of over-the-counter medicines and the associated potential for unwanted sleepiness was published in 2004.

We should not forget the impact of the internet in this area. The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency noted in its evidence to the North review, to which I will refer later, that

“there is an increasing trend of buying prescription only medicines over the Internet.”

Clearly there are dangers that medicines purchased in that way may be misused, because there is no opportunity for an individual to be given advice about the possible dangers and side effects.

Publicity was first given to the problems of driving under the influence of drugs, particularly lawful drugs, by a report published as long ago as April 1995 by the Institute for Human Psychopharmacology, entitled “Drugs other than alcohol and driving in the European Union”. Compared with the research into drink-driving, there was little real understanding of the effects of drugs on one’s ability to drive.

[Mr Chope]

My hon. Friend is making some interesting points, but I do not want him to think that my Bill would cover roadside testing for non-illegal or medicinal drugs. I am trying to deal with people who have illegal drugs and substances in their body while driving.

[Mr Nuttall]

That might be so, but, as I have pointed out, drugs are defined as anything that is an intoxicant, and that includes not just illicit drugs but medicinally approved and prescribed drugs and common drinks such as those containing caffeine and, in extremis, water. Although the focus will be on illegal drugs when the device is eventually brought into use, the producers of the device ought to look at the definition of the word “drug” and produce a device that covers both illicit and medically prescribed drugs, because both are dangerous.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way again; he is being enormously generous. Are not the same drugs sometimes illegal and sometimes legal? Drugs that are banned for use in the wrong circumstances, such as opiates, may be prescribed by physicians to treat pain. Such drugs would be illegal if you bought them—sorry, Mr Speaker, I mean if my hon. Friend bought them, because I think it inconceivable that you would buy them—in a corner shop in Cheam.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes the valid point that a drug that for all other intents and purposes is illegal becomes legal if it is prescribed by a GP. As Members on both sides of the House will be aware, we are often lobbied by those who feel that cannabis should be more widely available to make it easier for those with certain medical conditions to bear the symptoms. I understand that cannabis can make it easier for people to bear certain symptoms that are otherwise unbearable.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

To return to a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope), is the problem not that the Road Traffic Act deals with whether a drug impairs someone’s ability to drive and does not prescribe a limit for how much can be contained in the blood or urine?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend raises a good point. With alcohol, the law sets a specific limit of 80 mg of alcohol per 100 ml of blood. It is relatively easy to test whether someone has more or less than the proscribed amount of alcohol in their blood, whereas a subjective decision has to be taken on whether someone is driving a vehicle under the influence of drugs. The 1988 Act is specific about that. That is indeed part of the difficulty that the Home Office has faced in proposing an appropriate device, because, as my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch said, no standard for device specification has been set. As I will say later, some studies show that as little as 1 nanogram can adversely affect one’s ability to drive.

Fortunately, those who have to draw up the specification will be aided by the fact that some research has been carried out on the appropriate level to be set. A research programme was initiated by the Department for Transport, the Home Office, the Coroners Society and the Association of Chief Police Officers, aimed at establishing systematically the incidence of drug use among fatal road casualties—not just illicit drugs but those that are prescribed or sold over the counter. The interim results were released in February 1998 and included in the road safety White Paper entitled “Tomorrow’s roads: safer for everyone”, published in March 2003. That White Paper stated:

“Studies have shown that compared with ten years ago, five times as many people killed in road accidents had a trace of an illegal drug in their body. Cannabis was by far the most common illegal substance found. However, whilst it is likely that shortly after use the active ingredient of cannabis impairs driving, traces of the drug can remain in the body for up to four weeks, long after it has ceased to have any effect. This can present difficulties for enforcement until we have further research findings.

Class A drugs are most likely to have an adverse effect on driving. According to interim survey results, they were found in 6% of cases (compared with 12% for cannabis). This was a small increase compared with 10 years ago.

In the studies of road accident fatalities referred to above, it was found that there had been no change in the incidence of medicinal drugs over the period. There is scope, nevertheless, to improve enforcement and to make people more aware of the risks of driving while their ability is affected by drugs.”

The RAC has also surveyed a group of young drivers and found that young people are twice as likely to have been driven by someone who has taken illegal drugs than by someone over the drink-drive limit. A Transport Research Laboratory report on the effects of cannabis on driving was published in December 2000, and found that there were measurable effects on driver performance and that drivers could be impaired. A report on the effects of cannabis and alcohol was published in 2002, which confirmed the earlier observations and judged that the general medical examination and standardised impairment testing applied by police surgeons were generally effective in determining impairment.

It may well be that those reports led the Home Office to think that the testing that was already being done was generally satisfactory, and that the matter was therefore not as urgent as supporters of the Bill feel it is. However, there have been several other small-scale qualitative and quantitative studies that have examined patterns of recreational drug use and driving. I wish to refer in particular to one, undertaken by the Scottish Executive. It was published in 2001 and examined aspects of driving while under the influence of recreational drugs. It identified general patterns of personal drug use. When stopped on a toll bridge, some 3% of survey respondents aged 40 and over, and 13% of those aged 17 to 39, had taken an illegal drug in the previous twelve months. Among those attending dance clubs, 76%—three out of every four—had taken illegal drugs in the previous month. Drug-driving was particularly evident among those attending nightclubs.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

My hon. Friend says that 76% of those who have been to dance clubs have been taking drugs before driving. Ought we therefore to have a test for people who have been to dance clubs, since it seems so many of them will be unfit to drive when they leave?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point indeed. The statistics that I mentioned show the importance of the police monitoring closely those who seek to drive a car after leaving a dance club where drugs must clearly have been available.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I would hate the public listening to this debate to think that everyone here believes that anyone who goes to a club for a good night out is much more likely than others to take illicit drugs and then drive illegally when impaired by them. Most people go there for a damn good time, and they manage to do that. They might well have a drink or two, and they might well have a good boogie in what my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) might refer to as a discotheque, but most of them are law-abiding citizens just enjoying themselves on a night out.

[Mr Nuttall]

I could not agree more. I am merely drawing the House’s attention to the findings of a particular survey. I do not seek in any way to draw any further conclusion from it, but there is clearly a problem if that survey—and it is only a single survey—is to be believed.

[Mr Chope]

Is there not an even more important survey, which is the one that shows that half of the young people who admit to driving with drugs in their system say that they would not do so if they thought that there was a possibility of their being subject to roadside testing for the presence of those drugs?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point, and I shall touch later on the fact that the lack of roadside testing, and the knowledge of that fact among young people, may well lead to widespread use of illegal drugs.

I mentioned that 76% of respondents to a survey who had attended dance clubs had taken illegal drugs in the previous month. Drug-driving was much more prevalent among those attending nightclubs than among the general population. The study showed that 85% of those who had attended a nightclub had driven after taking illegal drugs on at least one occasion. Some 37% per cent reported that they drove after taking illegal drugs on at least a weekly basis, most of whom—89%—were cannabis users. However, whereas drug-driving appeared to be widespread among the sample of those interviewed who attended clubs, it was not identified as being widespread among the general population.

In a separate survey in 2001, the Transport Research Laboratory measured the incidence of drugs among fatal road accident casualties. An earlier study published in 1989 had found that the incidence of medicinal drugs, at 5.5%, and illegal drugs, at just 3%, was relatively low in comparison to alcohol, which was at 35%. However, the 2001 study, based on results collected between 1996 and 2000, found that the incidence of medicinal and illegal drugs in the blood samples of road traffic fatalities was three times higher than in the previous study, at 24%, while the incidence of alcohol had fallen slightly to 31%.

It is a matter of conjecture whether those changes arose as a result of the legislative framework that existed—my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch made the point that it is well known that there is no device for roadside drug testing—or whether they were merely a result of social changes. I venture to submit that it was probably a combination of both those factors.

The findings of further research, which was sponsored by the Economic and Social Research Council and led by Dr Philip Terry, were set out in January 2004 in a paper entitled, “Indirect harm from regular cannabis use”. It was found that 52% of those surveyed had driven while under the influence of cannabis and of those, 70% believed that that had impaired their driving.

In December 2005, no less a publication than the British Medical Journal published an extract of a paper by—I apologise in advance for my pronunciation—Bernard Laumon, Blandine Gadegbeku, Jean-Louis Martin, and Marie-Berthe Biecheler on cannabis intoxication and fatal road crashes in France. The research was based on a sample of 10,748 drivers, with known drug and alcohol concentrations who were involved in fatal crashes in France. The paper found that of the drivers studied, 7% tested positive for drugs and 21.4% for alcohol, including 2.9% for both drugs and alcohol. Men were more often involved in crashes than women, and were also more often positive for both cannabis and alcohol, as were the youngest drivers and users of mopeds and motorcycles. Positive detection was more commonly associated with crashes that happened during the hours of darkness.

In the light of that growing body of academic evidence, it is perhaps no surprise that Parliament legislated against driving while under the influence of drugs. Under section 3A of the Road Traffic Act 1988, as amended by the Road Traffic Act 1991, the offence of causing death by careless driving while under the influence of drink or drugs requires the prosecution to show that the driving caused the death of another person and fell below the standard expected of a reasonable, prudent and competent driver in the circumstances; and that the driver was unfit through drink or drugs, or that the level of alcohol was over the prescribed limit, or that there was a failure to provide a specimen. Such a charge can be heard only in Crown court. The maximum penalty is an unlimited fine and/or 14 years imprisonment; an obligatory disqualification for at least two years, or a disqualification for three years if there is a relevant previous conviction; and the obligatory endorsement of the driver’s licence with between three and 11 penalty points. The maximum penalty was originally five years imprisonment and/or an unlimited fine, but that was doubled to 10 years imprisonment from August 1993 as a result of the Criminal Justice Act 1993, and it was increased again to 14 years in February 2004 under the Criminal Justice Act 2003.

Under section 4 of the 1988 Act, it is also an offence to drive or to be in charge of a vehicle, as we have heard, while unfit to drive through drink or drugs. The maximum penalty for driving or attempting to drive while unfit is six months in prison, a £5,000 fine and disqualification. The maximum penalty for being in charge while unfit is three months in prison, a £2,500 fine and a disqualification, or 10 points on a licence.

In January 2007, the Sentencing Advisory Panel announced a consultation on advice about “causing death by driving” offences. In January 2008, the panel published its new advice to the Sentencing Advisory Council on those offences. In total, the panel made 18 recommendations. Among them, the panel recommended that when there is sufficient evidence of driving impairment, the consumption of alcohol or drugs prior to driving will make an offence more serious. It said that consuming alcohol or drugs unwittingly before driving can be regarded as a mitigating factor, but that consideration should be given to the circumstances in which the offender decided to drive or continued to drive while their driving ability was impaired.

In November 2008, the Department for Transport published a consultation document on road safety compliance and asked for views of the public on the proposed creation of a new offence for driving with drugs in one’s system. The consultation paper explained:

“We could explore the viability of creating a new offence to target those who drive after taking illegal drugs—those that are controlled by the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971—which can impair a user’s ability to drive. The public rightly perceive users of these drugs who drive as a danger to road safety.”

[Tracey Crouch]

I have always thought that the insurance industry has a role to play. Currently, when somebody’s driving is impaired by drugs or alcohol and they are involved in an accident, if they have comprehensive cover, they can get their car repaired, regardless of the offence that they committed of why they committed it. There is a great deal of benefit in the argument that someone driving under the influence of alcohol should have their third-party liabilities covered, but that damage to their car or their injuries should not be covered, because that damage occurred as a consequence of their taking drugs or alcohol before driving.

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[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point indeed. I am not an expert on insurance policy contracts, but I suspect that it is possible for an insurance company to write such a provision into a contract—[Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) wants to contribute, he can do so.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

indicated dissent.

[Mr Nuttall]

It is possible that such provisions are already written into contracts—I would be unsurprised if they are. If they are, perhaps they should be more widely advertised. People might know about driving while unfit from alcohol, but they may be unaware that driving under the influence of drugs risks invalidating insurance policies.

[Andrew Bingham]

Does my hon. Friend agree that if a measure such as the one outlined by my hon. Friend the Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tracey Crouch) were implemented, insurance premiums for a great many law-abiding motorists would be reduced, which I am sure would be welcomed by one and all?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point indeed. That is one beneficial and happy side effect of the Bill. As a result of fewer people driving under the influence of drugs, there will hopefully be fewer accidents. Therefore, insurance premiums for everyone else would be much lower.

If I may, I shall continue my brief explanation of the contents of the Department for Transport consultation document, which states:

“The public rightly perceive users of these drugs”—

drugs that are controlled by the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971—

“as a danger to road safety. As this paper has shown, it is difficult for the police to deal with these offenders. The nature of the effects of the drugs they take mean it is inappropriate to regulate the use of impairing illegal drugs using a prescribed limit based on the same principles as the limit for alcohol, even if it was acceptable to do so…Such an offence could be framed in such a way that a driver could be convicted of a new offence if an appropriate test showed such an illegal drug in their body. The effects of particular drugs on different individuals are complex, and, as set out below, there would be a lot of further work to do to develop this possibility, but our ultimate aim would be to treat in this way any illegal drug that is capable of impairing driving…The penalties for drivers exceeding the prescribed limit for alcohol are the same as for those convicted of the alternative offence of driving while unfit through drink or drugs. We therefore envisage that penalties for the possible new offence should be the same as for the existing offence of driving while unfit through drugs, which is a mandatory minimum disqualification of 12 months; offenders may also be fined up to £5,000 and sent to prison for up to 6 months.”

That consultation closed in February 2009, and in December 2009 the then Labour Government announced that they would seek further advice on the matter from Sir Peter North—it was his review that I referred to earlier as the North review. Although Sir Peter North provided initial advice to the then Minister, Lord Adonis, before last year’s general election, his final report was not published until 16 June last year, which of course was after the change of Government. The main recommendations of the North review relating to drug-driving were that police procedures enforcing current drug-driving laws should be improved, and that there should be early approval for saliva testing. The press notice accompanying the review stated:

“The Review also assesses Great Britain’s less well-understood drug driving problem, challenging the lack of reliable statistics, out-dated research and police emphasis on drink driving detection. In the short term, Sir Peter recommends that police procedures enforcing current drug driving laws are improved, making it more straightforward for police to identify and prosecute drug drivers by allowing nurses, as well as doctors, to authorise blood tests of suspects. Medium-term, he recommends early approval of saliva testing of drug driving suspects in police stations, which will largely overcome the environmental problems in roadside use that had previously slowed technological development of so-called ‘drugalysers’.”

On the question of a new law setting banned drug levels, Sir Peter was keen to say:

“The focus should be on public safety. Any new offence should therefore focus on establishing levels of drugs in the blood at which significant impairment – and therefore, risk to public safety – can be reasonably assumed, as is the case now for drink-driving”.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way for what must be the dozenth time. Has the issue of cannabis remaining in the body for up to a month been settled in terms of this type of testing? If limits of this kind are to be set and people have not taken an illegal substance for a month, would it be reasonable to penalise them? Is the testing yet sophisticated enough?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. It is one of the difficulties arising in this area. It might well be that the body retains chemical traces of an intoxicant drug—if I may use that term, as we have now learned that it is perhaps the correct way to describe these drugs. The question would be whether that trace was having any effect on the ability of that person to drive, and that would be a matter for the court to determine. The court might well decide that a person was guilty of the offence—if it were to be an offence—of driving while having drugs in the body. Were that to be made an absolute offence, of course they would be guilty of it.

I made the point that the focus should be on public safety, and that any new offence should therefore focus on establishing levels of drugs in the blood at which significant impairment—and therefore the risk to public safety—can be reasonably assumed, as is the case now for drink-driving. Responding to concerns from patients and health care professionals that people taking medicines would be banned from driving, Sir Peter stresses that this is not his intention. Instead, he highlights that although medicines can be as impairing to driving as illegal drugs, there is an important opportunity for the relevant parties to work together to improve public awareness and the driving patient’s safety.

The power that the police have to conduct roadside drug testing was introduced under schedule 7 to the Railways and Transport Safety Act 2003. However, in the absence of any approved device, testing was of a rather more subjective nature. Guidance was issued in December 2004 on the conduct of the preliminary impairment tests. As I mentioned earlier, the police may ask drivers whom they suspect are under the influence of drugs to perform a series of physical tests, usually at the roadside, such as walking along a straight line, touching the tip of their nose with their finger, and standing on one leg. The police also examine drivers’ pupils to see if they are dilated while checking for slurred speech and poor co-ordination. If the police officer is not satisfied, the suspect is taken to a police station and a blood test is undertaken.

The problem with these tests is that they are subjective and not scientific compared with breathalyser tests. However, the police still feel that they are successful in identifying those who have been taking drugs. Moreover, the law does not make a distinction between illegal or misused drugs and over-the-counter prescription drugs taken as directed by a medical practitioner. For these reasons, there were often problems associated with prosecuting those who drove under the influence of drugs. In practice, the police have preferred to use the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, as amended, if they stop a person whom they suspect of taking drugs. Section 5(1) of the Act makes it unlawful to possess a controlled drug unless authorised by regulations under section 7. It may more often be the case that drivers thought to be unfit to drive and found with drugs in the vehicle would be prosecuted for possession of drugs and not for driving while unfit. However, problems may arise with the prosecution of a driver found in possession on the basis of a positive blood or urine sample, because once drugs have been consumed their character is altered and the person consuming the drugs is no longer considered to be in possession.

The same problem was highlighted in the submission by the Department for Transport to the North review team last June:

“The complex nature of drug pharmacodynamics and pharmacokinetics makes it difficult to establish values that would represent impairment in the general population. The main challenges in determining suitable cut-offs include: individual variations, drug tolerance, interactions with other drugs, and the variable effects of the same blood concentrations of drugs depending on whether the concentration is rising or falling. One review of the evidence for levels of cannabis related to impairment has suggested a cut-off for THC in whole blood of between 3.5–5 ng/ml, although a population-based study in France suggests that impairment is evident at lower levels (above 1 ng/ml). Attempts to develop comparable levels for amphetamines, however, have found greater variation in the association between blood concentrations and tests of impairment and thus recommend that per se cut-offs are inappropriate for this drug group. Tolerance issues and interactions with other drugs suggest that identifying suitable cut-off values for other drugs may also be inappropriate. Within Europe, a variety of drug driving policies has been adopted by the different countries, ranging from zero tolerance per se limits (e.g. Sweden) to proof of impairment (e.g. current UK laws), each with subtle variations. A zero tolerance approach overcomes the difficulties associated with: a) proving impairment; and b) deciding on scientifically valid cut-offs from conflicting sources of data. However, zero limit per se laws also have the potential to penalise drivers who are not impaired and pose no risk to safety. Studies of the effectiveness of Sweden’s zero tolerance laws have found them to have been unsuccessful in deterring DUID”—

driving under the influence of drugs—

“re-offenders. Further research into the correlations between blood concentrations of certain drugs and impairment may help to move toward developing suitable cut-offs (like those developed over time for alcohol). However, ‘before’ and ‘after’ studies of newly introduced laws to evaluate the performance of these various approaches in practice may be more useful.”

Perhaps I should add by way of explanation that pharmacodynamics explores what a drug does to the body, whereas pharmacokinetics explores what the body does to a drug. It is also worth bearing in mind the infinitesimally small amounts of a substance that have to be detected. The review of evidence that I have just quoted stated that some studies had found impairment at levels as low as 1 nanogram per millilitre, and a nanogram is one billionth of a gram.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

I know that we are tied up heavily with the European Union, but I wonder whether my hon. Friend could translate that into ounces.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am sure that there is a method of doing so, but I could not do it now. However, my hon. Friend will be pleased to know that I will briefly touch on the European Union later. In all seriousness, however, 1 nanogram is one billionth of a gram, which may account for why it has taken the Home Office so long to produce a realistic specification for such a device, given the extremely small—indeed, unbelievably small—levels that it is expected to detect.

With all that in mind, it is perhaps worth considering some of the tragic cases of people losing their lives as a result of drivers taking the wheel while under the influence of drugs. It is perhaps all too easy to get bogged down in the technicalities and the dry scientific details of the drugs that we have been considering, and to forget the human tragedies that lie behind the problem. The road safety charity Brake has briefly and helpfully summarised some of those cases on its website. For example, it cites the case of a 20-year-old young woman, Katharine Davis, who was killed by a banned driver, Lee Fitzgerald. The case was reported in The Northern Echo, which stated that Fitzgerald was not only almost two times over the legal drink-driving limit, but had taken a cocktail of drugs, including cocaine and ecstasy. He then got behind the wheel of a friend’s car and gave a lift to Katharine and a work colleague. As he was being followed by the police, he crashed the car and Katharine lost her life. Fitzgerald was jailed for five years.

In another case, a young girl, Lucy Bellamy, aged only nine, was hit and killed while on a pelican crossing by one Andrew Wilkinson, who at the time was just 20. Wilkinson admitted to police that he had been smoking cannabis through a makeshift pipe. He apparently had not even tried to brake, even though he was approaching a pelican crossing. He was jailed for four and a half years. Further such cases arise all the time.

[Dan Byles (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is generous in giving way. I apologise for not having been here for the start of the debate and I do not know a great deal about this area, but is there any scope in such circumstances for using legislation on driving dangerously? There is no specific law on the use of illegal substances, but could the offence of driving dangerously or of causing death by dangerous driving be used instead against someone who had taken an illegal substance that prevented them from driving safely?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. It is perhaps one that those with greater knowledge of the workings of the criminal law—particularly as it relates to road traffic offences—would be more able to deal with.

There are two more recent cases that I would like briefly to raise, because I do not want people to think that everyone convicted of driving while under the influence of drugs is sent to jail. There was a case reported in the Dudley News of a Dudley man who was handed a suspended jail term for driving while unfit to do so through drugs. He was given a six-week jail sentence, suspended for 18 months, and banned from driving for 18 months. To run consecutively, the defendant was also jailed for six months, suspended for 18 months, for possession of a class A drug, heroin. He was ordered to pay £600 compensation and court costs at Dudley magistrates court.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

My hon. Friend has been generous in giving way to me throughout this debate, which I very much appreciate. He has listed a whole bunch of terrible tragedies that no one in this place would wish had happened, although the criminal justice system has then caught up with the characters involved and punished them—perhaps not accordingly, but it has at least punished them. Surely the art in this case is in stopping people taking drugs and getting in a car in the first place. Even the devices that he was talking about earlier do not do that. Perhaps we need a much stronger education campaign about the effects of drugs on drivers.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. Such education starts at school, with teachers and parents explaining the dangers of drug taking and the terrible damage that it can cause to the individual and, if they get behind the wheel of a car, to others. We would do well to send that message out loud and clear this morning.

Let me turn to the very heart of the Bill: the drug-testing device. For about a decade now, the Home Office has been developing a type approval specification for a drug- screening device—known as the “drugalyser”—that will help police at the roadside to detect the presence of drugs. A Metropolitan police trial took place between January 2001 and 2002. It had some success, but was hampered by the fact that testing had to be voluntary. In their February 2007 review of road safety, the then Labour Government stated that the first devices developed to specification could be available by the end of 2007, and that the Home Office was developing a prototype device that could both screen and analyse samples, and which was likely to be ready in two to three years. In February 2008, the then Minister told the House of Commons that the Home Office scientific development branch,

“in consultation with the Department for Transport, continues to discuss possible improvements to the field impairment test currently used by the police…HOSDB continues to investigate a possible impairment measuring device through established contacts working in this area. Opportunities for partnership with a suitable university or other outside agency continue to be sought.”—[Official Report, 19 February 2008; Vol. 472, c. 582W.]

This is rather like a mirage of an oasis in the desert—the nearer we get to it, the further away it appears to be. The Times subsequently reported that the Home Office was “preparing to approve” hand-held drug-screening devices, and that

“Philips…announced that it will start deliveries to police next year”—

that is, 2009—

“of a machine that detects five different drug groups, including cocaine, heroin and cannabis, in just 90 seconds from a single saliva sample”.

However, no type approval has yet been given. There is the rub: the Home Office might have thought that it was about to approve such a device, but, as we know, that never happened.

I have seen a picture of the machine, and it is a very simple device. A person is asked to provide a sample of saliva, which is placed into a small tube that is inserted into the machine. The sample goes into the measurement chamber, which contains magnetic nanoparticles coated with ligands that bind to one of the five different drug groups. This delivers test results in one and a half minutes. Philips had apparently been busy developing that device since 2001. It was built as an optical device that would be easy to mass-produce for law enforcement purposes.

Sir Peter North’s review reported on the problems as follows:

“To date a type-approval specification for such a device has not been produced. Consequently, while a range of commercial drug screening devices is available, none is suitable for enforcement purposes in the UK.

Home Office Scientific Development Branch has been working on the development of a roadside screening device based on surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) over the last 10 years, both in house and externally. A SERS based device would be a considerable advance over existing commercially available devices in that it would be capable of identifying any drug.

Following an expert peer review in 2008, the in-house development by HOSDB of the SERS substrates required for such a device was halted and the emphasis placed on developing external technologies, including those based on SERS. Following two calls for research initiated at the start of 2009, two external research contracts were placed, with the aim of developing prototype devices within the next three years.

With regard to drug screening devices for use at the roadside, the preferred matrix for analysis is oral fluid, which is easy and convenient to collect, and any drugs detected in this medium are indicative of recent use.

Early trials of roadside drug screening devices based on oral fluid…concluded that none of the devices tested at that time was suitable for use in enforcement at the roadside. However, recent evaluations of drug screening devices have highlighted continued improvements in sensitivity and the general performance of oral fluid drug testing devices, but also that the reliable detection of cannabinoid use and benzodiazepines still remains problematic.”

Mr Deputy Speaker, you can imagine my delight when I discovered that the long tentacles of the European Union had found their way into this subject. I promised my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset that I would touch on this matter. It appears that there is a project funded by the European Commission—using some of the billions of pounds that we contribute to the EU each year—and I hope that you will not think that I am straying from the subject if I mention the word “DRUID”. It is actually an acronym for the project funded by the European Commission, and it stands for “driving under the influence of drugs, alcohol and medicines”—[Laughter.]

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

That reveals another criticism of the European Union. They cannot even spell.

[Mr Nuttall]

It is a kind of organised acronym. We have the D and R from “driving”, and the U from “under”. Then we miss out the “the”, adopt the I from “influence”, miss out the “of”, adopt the D from “drugs” and miss out the “alcohol and medicines” bit. That is how we get to DRUID.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I think the correct acronym should be IAMADRUID.

[Mr Nuttall]

But I am not a druid! I am a practising member of the Church of England. I am not sure whether the Archbishop of Canterbury has commented on this matter yet, but no doubt he will later.

The DRUID report includes an analytical evaluation of several on-site oral fluid screeners. The final report is still in production but early results suggest that police evaluations of the devices tested were broadly positive. Eight of the 13 evaluated devices were rated as “promising” and were subsequently included in a scientific evaluation focusing on sensitivity and specificity.

[Stephen McPartland]

Were these devices tested in the UK or in the European Union?

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend asks a good question, but I do not know the answer. I suspect that they might have been tested throughout the European Union, although I would like to think that at least some of them were tested in the United Kingdom.

Early drafts of the report go on to state that research papers in the press have reported on the evaluation of four of the devices. While one device was considered unsuitable, three demonstrated excellent sensitivity for amphetamines and moderate sensitivity for the detection of cocaine and cannabis. A newer version of one of the devices using new generation oral fluid screening tests demonstrated improved sensitivity—as high as 93%—for tetrahydrocannabinol.

A recent evaluation of the zero tolerance approach adopted in parts of Australia is particularly informative. A report on the first 12 months of the new law in Western Australia reveals that 9,716 roadside tests were conducted during that period. Of those, 517 tested positive for one or more proscribed drugs, which equates to 5.3% of the total.The results suggest that a zero tolerance policy utilising roadside screening devices has distinct advantages over the UK’s impairment-based approach. Specifically, the process is simple, straightforward, quick to administer and unambiguous.

Drug-impaired driving legislation, which is akin to our own impairment-based approach, was introduced in conjunction with the roadside oral fluid testing procedures. However, drug-impaired driving appears to have been largely ignored as an anti-drug-drive measure, in favour of the roadside oral fluid testing approach. During the study period, only five drivers were charged with drug-impaired driving. Police officers appeared to be more comfortable with administering the roadside oral fluid tests than with trying to demonstrate impairment in order to secure a conviction for drug-impaired driving. The Australian experience suggests that, were the UK to move to a zero tolerance system, one effect would be that police officers would be less likely to pursue a case for driving under the influence of drugs under section 4 of the Road Traffic Act 1988.

Since the Bill had its First Reading last year, there have been significant developments in this area by the Government. First, in written evidence to the Transport Committee submitted in September 2010, the Department for Transport set out the Government’s views on how they intended to proceed in the area of drug-driving. In March this year, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport set out how the Government would proceed. Subsequently, on 11 May this year, the Department for Transport published its strategic framework for road safety. This stated:

“On drink and drug driving our priority is to deter driving when unfit through drugs or alcohol, and to ensure that those who persist in this dangerous behaviour are detected and punished effectively. Considerable progress has been made in the abatement of drink-driving, but we now aim to achieve similar results with drivers who are impaired through the use of drugs. The prospect of an effective means of detecting and deterring drug-driving will—for the first time—allow a serious enforcement effort against this dangerous behaviour. That is our first priority, which we believe is shared by the police.

It can be just as dangerous for people to drive impaired by alcohol or drugs, and it is currently unbalanced that it is easier to get away with one than the other. We want to give the police the means to identify drug-drivers and allow them to request evidential samples for testing. There needs to be a clear message that drug-drivers are as likely to be caught and punished as drink-drivers.

Our strategy is to focus resources and any legislative changes on measures which will have the most impact in reducing dangerous behaviours. There are therefore two main priorities to continue the successful abatement of drink-driving and achieve similar success against drug-driving;

To give the police effective tools to identify and proceed against drug-drivers;

To streamline the enforcement process for drink and drug driving to relieve pressure on police and other enforcement resources, and enable these to be targeted better.

We have issued a specification to manufacturers for drug testing technology that will be able to be used in police stations. It is for manufacturers to supply, and police forces to obtain, approved devices and put them to use. We are also finalising the additional requirements for type approving such devices for use at the roadside.”

At that point, one might add, “About time, too”. It continues:

“We will explore the case for introducing an offence of having a specified drug in the body while driving in addition to the current offence of driving while impaired by drugs. An objective measure of whether a drug driving offence has been committed should deliver a significant improvement in the enforcement of drug driving.

This is a complex issue and so we will continue the research and other work that is necessary before any decisions can be made. We cannot at this stage pre-empt that work by describing any additional offence, or give a firm date for its potential introduction. Any proposals will be subject to further consultation, regulatory clearance and other impact assessments in the usual way.”

I look forward to hearing from the Minister what further progress the Government have been able to make in this area since that report was issued. Finally, I join my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch in commending the Bill to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I am sure that my hon. Friend is completely correct—[Interruption.] Let us not go back down that route; I will stick to where I was going.

It is impairment of an individual’s ability to drive that we are seeking to identify—there is a line that one might cross, and different individuals’ bodies will metabolise drugs, as they do food, in different ways. We have already accepted that with regard to alcohol, so let us make a bold leap. Why not introduce tests for the five main types of recreational drugs—those listed by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North—that tend to be found in individuals who have caused an accident to which the police are called? This hinges on getting approval for a device, and that is the bureaucratic nonsense behind it all. Having accepted the principle of introducing a level—I would push for a zero level, as in Sweden, because that is much easier for everybody to come to terms with—why should we not bring forward such devices?

In his review, Sir Peter North said:

“The focus should be on public safety”.

The protection of our constituents from those who take drugs and then decide it is fine to jump in a car is one reason why we are all interested in this debate. Such drivers might not feel that their ability is impaired, and even if they do, they probably do not care too much for the other individuals concerned. Sir Peter continued:

“Any new offence should therefore focus on establishing levels of drugs in the blood at which significant impairment—and therefore, risk to public safety—can reasonably be assumed, as is the case now for drink-driving.”

That is a fairly simple statement. We have accepted levels for alcohol, so let us accept them for some of the more commonly used recreational drugs, and get the type review device approved by the Home Office and out on the streets, adding to the deterrents that we have.

Under schedule 7 of the Railways and Transport Safety Act 2003, the police have the power to conduct roadside drug tests, so there is no problem with that side of the argument. Guidance was issued back in December 2004 on the conduct of the preliminary impairment tests detailed by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North. There is a host of reasons why we should put more pressure on the Government to get on with this job.

Having had private conversations with the Minister, I think he understands that there is a great deal of anxiety about how long the process has taken. The crime is relatively new, but it is also one of the crimes most on the increase. As my hon. Friends have detailed, the problem is the scientific ability of drug-screening devices to detect what we would like them to identify.

For about a decade, the Home Office has been developing a type approval specification for a “drugalyser” that would help police at the roadside to detect the presence of drugs. The Metropolitan police took part in a trial between January 2001 and January 2002 which, although reasonably successful, was—according to the official phraseology—“hampered” by the fact that testing had to be voluntary at that time.

In their February 2007 review of road safety, the Labour Government stated that the first devices developed to specification could be available at the end of that year, and that the Home Office was already developing a prototype device which could both screen and analyse samples and was likely to be ready in two to three years. In February 2008, the hon. Member for Gedling (Vernon Coaker), then a Minister, told the House that the Home Office’s

“Scientific Development Branch… in consultation with the Department for Transport, continues to discuss possible improvements to the field impairment test currently used by the police… continues to investigate a possible impairment measuring device through established contacts working in this area. Opportunities for partnership with a suitable university or other outside agency continue to be sought.”—[Official Report, 19 February 2008; Vol. 472, c. 582W.]

Clearly there has been no lack of work, and that work has been carried out for a host of years. However, someone sitting in the beautiful village of Flore in my constituency as traffic rattles along a road that desperately needs to be bypassed, and fearing that one night, on one of the bad bends, a person who has had far too much of a good time and used illegal drugs will pile into the side of their house, may feel that, given the length of time for which this deterrent had been talked about, a Government of any colour should have acted much earlier.

As we know, The Times reported in 2008 that the Home Office was “preparing to approve” hand-held drug-screening devices, and that

“Philips…announced yesterday that it will start deliveries to police”

early in 2009. I wonder where those deliveries have got to. There is a problem somewhere, and I hope that, in his considered reply, the Minister will tell us how he is trying to unblock the channels that seem to be blocked.

[Mr Nuttall]

Is my hon. Friend aware of a report that has appeared in the Daily Mail in the last few days? Apparently police in Australia are launching trials of a testing system this week, and similar equipment is already in use in Finland and is being tested in Italy.

[Chris Heaton-Harris]

I was aware of that. It was in one of the press releases that I chose not to read out earlier. It adds to the frustration that people feel, which I hope I have been able to convey to the Minister.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bury North mentioned the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning), the road safety Minister. Not long ago, he said:

“Drink and drug driving are serious offences and drivers should be in no doubt that if they are caught behind the wheel under the influence this summer they risk losing their licence as well as facing a fine and even a prison sentence.

We are taking forward measures to make it easier for the police to tackle drink and drug driving and protect law abiding road users including plans for drug testing kits to help detect drug drivers and tightening the law on drink driving.”

We would all welcome that, but I have a sneaking suspicion, based on the press reports that I read out earlier, that Ministers have been heard to utter those exact words before. If there is a drug-testing kit that we are happy to put on the streets in the summer, let us arrange for it to be type-approved by the Home Office and supplied throughout the country.

Back in December, the Minister—this Minister, the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire)—said:

“Any equipment for use by the police in this country must be of a type approved by the Secretary of State. Type approval is granted on the basis of compliance with a specification which sets out the detailed requirements a device has to meet and the testing regime which it has to pass to be suitable for use in British operational conditions and within the British legal framework. We hope to issue very shortly the specification for a device for use in a police station and are continuing work towards the specification for a roadside device. It will be for manufacturers to submit for testing and approval any devices which they think meet the specification.”—[Official Report, 2 December 2010; Vol. 520, c. 1098W.]

Given that we have been waiting for specifications for so many years, can we please get them out quickly? The question of when the devices will be available is of concern to our constituents throughout the country.

I do not wish to condemn a certain section of society too much, but it is possible to see examples of it daily on the Jeremy Kyle show. There is a type of person who is much more at risk of taking drugs and getting into a car without realising what he or she has the potential to do as a result of lack of education, awareness or care. Such people tend to be young, and they tend to be uninsured and untaxed. They tend to be breaking the law simply by getting into their cars, let alone having taken drugs beforehand. They are probably either going to or coming from a location that is known to the police. Obviously such locations do not exist in North East Somerset, and I should of course be stunned and surprised were there any in Northamptonshire. Indeed, such people tend to be known to the police themselves. I am afraid that there are not too many surprises when the police stop them and subsequently find that they have been driving under the influence of drugs, and when their names flash up on the system in connection with an earlier drug-related offence.

I suggest to the Minister that there is a certain group of individuals out there who need to be targeted—not as in police targeting but for education purposes, so that they can come to terms with the fact that in taking an illegal drug and then getting into a car, they are not just already committing a crime but are about to drive a lethal weapon that could potentially kill someone’s child. Although this debate is about roadside testing, surely the whole point of it is the need to stop people even being tempted to take drugs before getting into a vehicle, so that none of us have to experience a tragedy in our constituencies or among our friends, as I have in the past and as so many other Members have.

[Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) on securing this important debate and moving the topic of drug-driving higher up the agenda. It is a great pleasure to follow the brief remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall), and to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris).

Although I agree with many of the principles associated with the Bill, I am unable, for a number of reasons, to agree with the Bill as it is currently worded. Before I go on to detail those reasons, I stress that I am a trustee of a charity in Stevenage called The Living Room, which tries to break the cycle of addiction, specifically drug and alcohol addiction, and the devastating impact that that has on the lives of those who are addicted and, more often than not, their families. In many cases, the involvement of those individuals in criminal activities has a devastating impact on the victims and their families.

Drugs are a huge problem in our society and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry suggested, we must focus more on education, on ensuring that people who enter a world of drugs to escape their current reality recognise that that is not the right path, and on identifying why they take that line.

One of the issues that I have with the Bill is the nature of the offences as detailed. Primary legislation would probably be required for its provisions to be introduced. At present the offence is driving while impaired by drugs or causing death by careless driving while under the influence of drink or drugs. Although a roadside screening device can identify whether someone has drugs in their system, that will not necessarily be a criminal offence. The police need to have reason to believe that the person’s driving was impaired by having the drugs in their system.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bury North mentioned some tragic cases that were the result of an individual causing death by careless driving because of drugs. Under the Criminal Justice Act 2003, the penalty was increased to 14 years, so the five years that such an individual would receive under the present law would be increased to 14 years. Section 4 of the 1988 Act stresses the need to show that the person was unfit to drive while under the influence of drugs. My hon. Friend detailed well the Department for Transport’s consultation in 2008, which asked for views on the creation of a possible new offence—driving with drugs in one’s system. That consultation closed in February 2009 and in December 2010 the Government announced that they would seek further advice from Sir Peter North.

My hon. Friend the Member for Daventry referred to Sir Peter North’s response. On the question of a new law setting banned drug levels, Sir Peter stated that the focus should be on public safety. Any new offence should therefore focus on establishing levels of drugs in the blood at which significant impairment and therefore risk to public safety can be reasonably assumed, as is the case now for drink-driving. That brings me back to my concern about the Bill. It would require primary legislation to introduce a new offence of driving while having drugs in the system.

[Mr Nuttall]

I am not entirely convinced that the Bill seeks to establish a new offence. It calls on the Secretary of State to approve a device for administering the preliminary drug test, which was envisaged in section 6A(1) of the 1988 Act. Will my hon. Friend expand a little on his objections to that?

[Stephen McPartland]

Indeed. As my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) said, the device used to establish drink-driving, the breathalyser, provides the evidential basis. My concern is that if a drug-screening device is produced in the next 12 months, it will identify whether people have drugs in their system, as opposed to the police stopping someone because they thought his driving was impaired by having drugs in his system. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch cited a case in which an individual was prosecuted for crashing his car and received eight weeks in prison for being under the influence of drugs.

As the law stands, if the police stop a driver because they feel that he is driving the vehicle irrationally and is impaired in some way, they have the power to take him back to the police station and test whether he has drugs in his system. Increasing the powers of the police would move us closer towards a police state, as they could stop anybody and test them for drugs, because the drug- screening device would have evidential power, whereas at present only a blood sample is allowed to be used in court.

Hon. Members have given a number of examples—discotheques in North East Somerset, dance clubs where one boogies in Daventry, or dance clubs in Bury North. Statistics show that 76% of young people surveyed admitted to having drugs in their system. That brings me to my second objection to the Bill, which is the social aspect. We would not want the police to use a drug-screening device to target younger people leaving such premises to identify whether they had drugs in their system. My concern is the practical one of the device being used in a slightly different way.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen McPartland]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. I agree with much of what he says, but the key point is that the police can already tell such individuals that they believe they are under the influence of drugs and will test them at the police station. I am not sure many police officers in Hertfordshire would be keen to allow an individual to get back into a vehicle and continue driving if they felt that the individual was sufficiently impaired to stop and question them in the first place. In nine cases out of 10 they would no doubt take them back to the police station and test them.

There is also the issue of costs and road safety. The previous Government and this Government have done a lot to highlight road safety. A number of excellent charities such as Brake are doing everything they can to ensure that people are educated in improving road safety and, for example, are made more aware of the fact that if people drive at 20 mph in a residential area instead of 30 mph, small children will be less likely to be killed. A lot of work has gone into that and I would refute the suggestion that the reason for the delay by parties on both side of the House was cost. The real reason, as the previous Government concluded, is that none of the previous devices have been considered sufficiently reliable to be used for roadside testing.

My hon. Friend the Member for Daventry spoke about specifications, and the Bill seeks to introduce the specification in the next 12 months. If the previous Government concluded that none of the specific kit out there is sufficiently reliable, I am not sure that we should simply say that one of those pieces of equipment should be taken on board within the next 12 months. My fear is that, as my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) mentioned on more than one occasion, that would endanger innocent people, and delay may not be the result of bureaucracy but of ensuring—

[Mr Nuttall]

All that the courts have to go on at the moment are roadside tests that make people walk back and forth and stand on one leg. Does my hon. Friend agree that they might welcome being able to look at scientific evidence produced by one of these devices?

[Stephen McPartland]

I hope that the Minister will respond to that point, and that the scientific evidence for the devices is being considered. Some of the statistics and evidence we have heard today do not provide any reliable comparisons, and we need to look at this further. I agree with the concept and know that we are all frustrated that we are not moving fast enough, but I am concerned that if people felt they were being wrongly prosecuted it would be open to judicial review and would drag on an awful lot longer. If we get the specification right to begin with, the process will move on much faster and further, and in practice rather than in theory.

It has taken such an unreasonably long time for the specification for a device to be approved because it has to be very detailed and precise, and no doubt one problem will be that the Government will want it to adhere to a specific rationale and the manufacturers will want it to be commercially viable, so there is that tension. Will the Minister invite manufacturers to propose specifications so that devices can be tested scientifically, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North has suggested? Is the specification unrealistically demanding? I do not think that any specification is unrealistically demanding if it prevents innocent people from being prosecuted unnecessarily, which is a key issue. We have to do what is right to ensure that innocent people are allowed to carry on with their lives and are not caught up in this process.

That brings me to a point about medication. I am not a scientist and so am unaware of how much theory, evidence and scientific support there is for the device. I can only identify the number of drugs that might be tested for—I cannot repeat their names, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North did so eloquently, no doubt challenging the Hansard reporters to spell them correctly. I am not sure whether medication would be picked up by the devices in the same way as some illegal drugs would be. Some people who take medicine prescribed by their doctor for health reasons could be accused of taking illegal drugs and, as a result, taken down to the police station and prosecuted. All that rigmarole will have a huge impact on their lives simply because they are taking medication. It is really important that the drug-screening device, which I fully support, does the right job at the right time and that we ensure that we stop people who are under the influence of illegal drugs.

Finally, I feel that the delay is of paramount importance to protect innocent people who are taking medication. We do not want the drug-screening device to be used to stop and search people. It is very important that those who are considered to be driving under the influence of drugs are prosecuted in exactly the same way as they are at present. Although I fully support the actual intention of the Bill, I cannot support it at the moment because of its current wording and its instruction to the Government to agree on a device within the next 12 months.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

I almost entirely agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Stevenage (Stephen McPartland), who put absolutely clearly and rightly his point that most people want this desperately serious issue to be dealt with fairly and forcefully. There is undoubtedly a scourge in the country of people taking illegal substances and then doing unwise things, which include driving cars, but, although we are talking about cars, we need also to talk about carts and horses, because with this Bill the cart is being put in front of the horse, for one very obvious and clear reason: we have the test, but we have not set the limits that apply.

We have heard learnedly from my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) about nanograms, a term that I had not previously been particularly familiar with, but if we are dealing with nanograms of substances in people’s blood we need to say whether a nanogram is a legal or illegal nanogram when we test it, because if we have not established that, we will not know what the benchmark is; hence the cart is in front of the horse.

In that context, a great deal more work needs to be done, because, as has been widely discussed, there are varying views on what level of substance in somebody’s blood could impair their driving and, indeed, what combination of substances could impair or unimpair their driving. Earlier, we discussed the person—the youth perhaps, or the dangerous driver—who was calmed by taking cannabis. But then he might have had a cup of coffee to pep him up, so how are we going to balance those substances in one little drop of spittle, which I must say is not an ideal way for the police to go around collecting samples?

I feel rather sorry for the officer on duty at the roadside who stops somebody driving in zig-zags and not absolutely on the straight and narrow and then has to get him to spit. I feel sympathy for the enforcers of law and order, given that we cannot find a better roadside test than one based on spittle. We need to be clear, as we are with alcohol, however, about the amount that is allowed before we can make the test effective.

If I have misunderstood this point, I hope that somebody will intervene on me to explain it more clearly, but the current law states that one has to be shown to be impaired, hence the roadside tests, the standing on one leg and all that, because the police can turn up in court and say, “Mr Bloggins couldn’t stand with one leg 8 inches from the ground for more than 30 seconds while counting up to 100,” or whatever the test is. That is evidence either that he is a poor unbalanced man anyway, or that he has taken illegal substances and that conclusion might be backed up by a blood test taken at the station, showing that an offence of operating a motor car when under the influence of drugs has been committed.

First, let us be absolutely clear: we have not set the benchmarks, so the test does not test anything particularly evidential. Secondly, however, there is the point, which my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North again made so wisely and rightly, about drugs themselves and what is legal and illegal. [Interruption.] Does my hon. Friend want to intervene? He looks as if he is about to spring from his perch, coiled as he is.

[Mr Nuttall]

I wish merely to comment on my hon. Friend’s previous point about what the offence is. He is quite right that it is not an offence merely to have drugs in one’s body, because that is not what the 1988 Act states. It states:

“A person who, when driving or attempting to drive a mechanically propelled vehicle on a road or other public place, is unfit to drive through drink or drugs is guilty of an offence.”

The difficulty facing the court is in determining, first, whether the person was unfit to drive and, secondly, whether it was as a result of drink or, in this case, drugs.

[Jacob Rees-Mogg]

My hon. Friend, in his opening remarks, put it extremely clearly that the courts should determine these matters, but I do not agree. The courts should not determine the levels. They can determine the individual case. They can say, “Yes, we accept what the police are saying, yes we accept that that person was unable to hold his leg 6½ inches off the ground for two hours”—or whatever it is—“and that therefore he was affected by drugs.” However, it would not be right for the courts to establish the broad principle that 1 nanogram of some substance was the limit, or 2 nanograms. I could keep counting up to one full gram; on another occasion, Mr Deputy Speaker, I may find it advisable to do so, but not today. This should be decided by Parliament, because that is what we are here for—to determine the principles that are then applied by the courts.

I worry when we give either too little or too much discretion to the courts, because it depends so much on the area that is covered. When it comes to the appropriate sentence, we should set the maximum, and possibly the minimum, but we do not want to set the finer details. With quantities of drugs, likewise, we want to set the minimum and the maximum for legality, but we do not want the judges to develop their own precedent that gives them a power that rightly belongs to Parliament. That is why the Government are right to consider this. I have not suddenly decided that I am in favour of bureaucratic dithering, because it is not bureaucratic dithering; it is a right understanding of the very difficult issues that exist.

I move on to the question of what is legal and what is illegal. I thought of quoting Coleridge:

“In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree”.

That was written under the influence of what would now be an illegal substance. Coleridge had been taking opium for some time beforehand, and he wrote out his poem until interrupted by a gentleman from Porlock, which is notably in the county of Somerset. Taking opium was perfectly legal at the time. He was not committing any offence by doing so, nor are some people today who are prescribed opiates for the relief of pain. If somebody is prescribed an opiate for the relief of pain and is driving perfectly well, is it conceivably reasonable to say to them, “We’ve found a nanogram of this substance in you and therefore you’ve committed an offence and must be banned from driving for a year”? It is not the same with alcohol, because very few people absolutely need to take alcohol. That is not entirely true, as I knew a man who was prescribed gin and tonic by his doctor towards the end of his life, but that was for more complex reasons than as a curative—I think it was more of a palliative. Some people need these serious and otherwise illegal drugs for good and proper medical reasons, and therefore a blanket test could be a very unfair and unjust way with dealing with them. That is why the Government are right to consider this thoroughly and properly so that ultimately we can not only set the limits but differentiate as regards where the limits ought to be set and what we are trying to include and to exclude.

Beyond the drugs that are illegal in certain circumstances and legal in others, there are the drugs that are always legal but can, in certain quantities, create an impairment. That leads to a balance of advantages. Lots of people suffer from hay fever, for example. If someone is driving along and has a fit of the sneezes, that is quite dangerous, as they could drive into a ditch, or something worse. If they take a more old-fashioned type of antihistamine, they may find that it makes them feel a little sleepy if they have that type of reaction to antihistamines. Are we suddenly going to say that someone who takes an antihistamine cannot drive because it is better that people should have a fit of the sneezes? Would it show up in the test anyway?

The broad problem that, I am afraid, often comes up on Friday mornings is that the laws that we look to pass are about motherhood and apple pie. They are saying, for example, “The world is simple and it’s all very straightforward—we’ll have a nice test, and bingo, we’ve got the drug dealers and the drug users off the roads.” But it is not quite like that; the situation is much more complex and nuanced, regarding not only the levels but the legality and the illegality, and then some of the broader general principles.

I want to return to the piece in the Daily Mail on coffee earlier this week. I was astonished to read that anybody who has five cups of coffee a day is likely to hallucinate. I should think that I have had at least five cups of coffee every day since I was a young teenager, and I have never, to my knowledge, hallucinated; it may be that one does not notice these effects. I would be very reluctant to see the Government introduce some hand-held device to test Members of Parliament as they drive out of New Palace Yard to see whether they have too much caffeine in their system. After some of our sittings that last until 4 in the morning, quite a lot of Members have a lot of caffeine in their system, not to mention some who might have other things in their system. I would not think it right for the police officers on duty to ask us to spit at them, as I mentioned earlier, which would be most unpleasant and improper. There are real issues and difficulties in how we deal with legal and illegal drugs, and the measuring of them.

There is also the general principle. I have a certain sympathy with the US constitution, and the fifth amendment in particular, which allows people not to incriminate themselves. We have made an exception for drink-driving. The motorist, oddly, is the one person in British life who is not protected from the general principle of non-self-incrimination. The motorist who does not reply to a speeding ticket is guilty of an offence and therefore incriminates himself, and occasionally members of his family. There are obvious questions over the breathalyser, because a failure to provide a sample without good reason is an offence and one incriminates oneself by failing to give one. Already with drug-driving, as I have said, it is an offence to refuse to stand on one leg for the specified time with the other leg a specified number of inches from the ground. That ought to worry us constitutionally.

Criminal Records (Public Access) Bill

David Nuttall Excerpts

Friday 13th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be read a Second Time.

This Bill is similar to my previous Bill in that it comprises just one substantive clause, but it also has a financial provision and it would need to have a money resolution. The Bill arises from what has been accepted for a long time as a big anomaly in public access to court records, particularly magistrates court records. It is most effectively summarised in the Information Tribunal decision EA/2009/0037 in the case of John Carleton and the Information Commissioner on 24 August 2009.

The tribunal looked at the issue of somebody who wished to get access to the record of a conviction in a magistrates court. Because that person was not present at the court hearing, and because the press did not cover the matter and report it, it was not possible for that person to get information from the magistrates court without getting specific permission from the court. In order to do that, they needed to write to the court manager detailing the request and asking for an appointment at court to make a formal request to a justice of the peace. They were able to get that application granted only if they could show that it was in the public interest for them to be able to access that information. The court decided that, although the conviction was on the public record, it was not publicly accessible because of data protection legislation. The relevant paragraphs of the decision read as follows:

“34. The Tribunal notes that there are apparently anomalies created by the current Freedom of Information and Data Protection legislation in this area and which are mentioned briefly below.

35. If the Appellant, as a member of the public, had attended the court on the relevant date there is no reason to suppose that he would not have been able to hear all the information that he was requesting because it would have been part of the normal, public court proceedings.

36. If the Appellant had found out that the press or the media had covered the case and was able to get a copy of the newspaper report or media broadcast then – although the personal data in question would have been processed by becoming part of those reports – the Appellant would have had legitimate access to the information and the personal data he was seeking.

37. If the local newspaper or media outlet put the court report within a webpage on the internet or as a ‘podcast’ to be downloaded by the Appellant – whether there was a ‘search’ facility on the site allowing specific names or topics to be highlighted and retrieved or not - and then viewed, printed out, played or stored, then all of that is legitimate processing of personal data within the current statutory legislation.

38. However he did not attend the Magistrates Court on the day in question and he was seeking the personal data in relation to the individual – from the court itself - after the event.

39. That situation is not permitted in the Magistrates’ Court by the current Statutory regimes save through the filtering situation incorporating permission to inspect the Court Register made in person on application to a Justice of the Peace.

40. It may well be that the Ministry of Justice wish to draw this appeal, the Good Practice highlighted by the Information Commissioner – and these remarks – to the attention of HMCS’s Justices’ Clerks and Legal Managers because it is unlikely that this Appellant’s request is the only one of its kind received by the Magistrates’ Courts throughout England and Wales.”

Only yesterday, Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions, was reported in the newspapers as saying:

“I believe that transparency and visibility help the public understand how the criminal justice system works, and shining a light on the workings of the courtroom can only serve to boost its efficiency and effectiveness.”

He was actually speaking in support of a proposal to allow cameras into courts across the country, which is far beyond what I am talking about in this Bill.

This Bill would mean that if somebody was convicted in a magistrates court and that conviction was recorded by that court, as it has to be under a statutory duty, it should be possible for anybody to get access to that information because it is public information and it should be publicly available. At the moment, the only way somebody can get access to that information is by carrying out a criminal records office check. They can do that only if they know a police officer who is prepared to carry out the check, unofficially, on their behalf, with or without a fee, or if they belong to an organisation that can get access to the criminal records office’s information.

The trouble is that the criminal records office’s information goes far beyond just the details of convictions. It includes a lot of prejudicial information, such as details of who has been arrested and not charged, who has been charged and then acquitted in court, and even who has been the subject of suspicion. Such information is all included in the records of the criminal records office. I am not suggesting that people should be able to get easy access to that information, but I am suggesting that they should be able to find out much more easily whether somebody has been convicted in a magistrates court of drinking and driving.

I give that example because if the Government insist on reversing the House of Lords amendment to the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill, it will not be long before this House is enabling people to be elected as police and crime commissioners and that Bill says that it will not be possible for anyone to stand for election to that post if they have a previous conviction, which could include a conviction for a drink-drive offence. Why, therefore, should this information in the magistrates courts not be available? It is already available, but it is not available to everyone and it is not available easily. That is why this Bill is described as a means to facilitate public access to court registers.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Can my hon. Friend confirm that it would be very easy and, indeed, desirable to ensure that this information contained the record of convictions in not only magistrates courts but the Crown courts?

[Mr Chope]

Yes, it would. Of course there are far fewer Crown court convictions and far fewer Crown courts, so it is much easier to get access to that information. As my hon. Friend will have noticed, the Bill states that

“‘a criminal records office’ means the Criminal Records Bureau or any successor body with similar statutory functions to the Criminal Records Bureau”.

It also states:

“A criminal records office must keep, in electronic form, copies of all Magistrates’ Courts Registers, and any other registers produced by a court listing convictions”.

Obviously, that could include Crown court registers.

In drafting this Bill, I have tried to make the regulation and the demands placed on the criminal records office as light as possible. I have done so by, among other things, saying that none of this would have to be retrospective, and so only after the Bill was enacted would the magistrates courts’ registers have to be communicated in electronic form to the criminal records office. There would be no burden on the criminal records office to collate the information on all those records. All that would happen would be that the records would be available in electronic form and could be investigated on the internet by members of the public.

I expect what would happen—this has already been happening in the US—is that people who were interested in providing a public service would start to collate the records themselves, thereby producing a combined database that would be accessible, perhaps for a fee, by members of the public. It would set up almost a private sector alternative to the Criminal Records Bureau.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford). It is always a pleasure to follow him in debate. His principal objection seemed to be the possibility that the register might be inaccurate. It seems to me that the first thing that any hon. Member or member of the public would do is to check the accuracy of their record, and anyone should be able to do so. In the vast majority of cases, the information would be accurate. It is difficult to understand how a mistake could be made, although they are always possible.

[Stephen Phillips]

As someone who sits routinely in the Crown court as a recorder, I can assure my hon. Friend that there are often mistakes in the antecedents sheets that are forthcoming from magistrates courts, that that causes an enormous problem for those who sit in the Crown court, and that that is perhaps one of the flaws of the Bill. Given that potential inaccuracy and the potential for blackening people’s names, does he not therefore think that the Bill needs looking at again before receiving its Second Reading?

[Mr Nuttall]

I hear what my hon. and learned Friend says, but I am not convinced that he gives a reason for looking again at the Bill. It might be a good reason to look again at how magistrates courts record and deal with information that they give out. The problem seems to lie with magistrates courts, not with the Bill. We ought to ensure that magistrates courts accurately record their convictions. It is not rocket science. Good grief, all they have to do is write down what sentence has been given against someone’s name. It is difficult to understand how so many mistakes can occur.

I accept what my hon. and learned Friend says from his personal experience: mistakes have occurred, which is highly regrettable, but the problem does not lie in the Bill. In fact, the Bill is a major step forward in providing openness and transparency in the field of justice. Justice must not only be done; it must be seen to be done. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) referred in his opening remarks to a case where someone was not in court when the judgment was read out. I dare say that often nowadays, especially since the reduction in the number of local newspaper court reporters, a judgment is read out but no one else is in court. Whoever gets to hear about it?

I am pleased to be named as a sponsor of the Bill, along with my right hon. Friend the Member for East Yorkshire (Mr Knight) and my hon. Friends the Members for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), for Shipley (Philip Davies), for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) and for Witham (Priti Patel), because it has many benefits that will enable members of the public easily to ascertain whether another person has been convicted of a criminal offence. There are many reasons why someone might wish to do so.

Of course, in some professions, CRB checks are required by law. In many cases, enhanced CRB checks are required. A lot of employers, particularly small ones, might want to check whether prospective employees who say that they have no criminal convictions are telling the truth. The Bill is a simple, straightforward way to enable that to take place. It is necessary to check the criminal background not just of those who work with children, teachers, social workers and those who deal with vulnerable adults, but of those who deal with money in the financial—

[The Minister for Equalities (Lynne Featherstone)]

Does not the hon. Gentleman see some conflict between the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and the ability to check on everybody?

[Mr Nuttall]

I will come to the contents of the register later, but briefly, with modern technology it would be easy for records that are spent under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act to be so marked on the register. That could be done quite easily. I do not see why that could not take place.

Material that is secret would not suddenly be put in the public domain. The Bill would make available information that is already in the public domain. I see no argument why it should not be more widely available in an easily accessible format. I can see many benefits to a register on which members of the public could see not just the date and nature of the offence and the sentence that was handed down, but whether, for example, an offender had been ordered to wear an electronic tag. If a fine had been imposed, the public would be keen to see whether it had been paid, or whether only some of it had been paid. If an order had been made for someone to serve a certain number of hours of community work—a community sentence order—had they worked those hours? Had the whole of the sentence been completed? Had a criminal who had been sentenced to a term of imprisonment served the entire length of the term or, more likely, been released early? The public would want to see how much of the sentence the criminal had served. That would enable them to determine for themselves whether sentences were lenient or not.

[Lynne Featherstone]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the things that he is raising which the public might want to see on the register would not be recorded on the register? They are not matters for the register. A sentence would be registered as imposed, but not as served.

[Mr Nuttall]

I agree with the Minister. I made the point at the outset that in due course I would like to see the legislation go further. It would be widely welcomed by the public if further information could be made available in the future. It would add to the transparency agenda, which I know the Government are keen on pursuing.

One side effect of such a Bill, which is not intended to be a crime reduction measure, is that if people knew that their neighbours could easily turn on their computer and check whether someone had been convicted of a criminal offence, that might have the effect of reducing crime in this country.

[Mr Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)]

Might not the Bill have the opposite effect? If the residents of a street discovered that one resident had a criminal record, they might decide to try to hound him out of the area by threatening and abusive behaviour.

[Mr Nuttall]

That information is already public. We are all aware from our own communities that people will often know whether someone living in their area is constantly visited by the police or has had spells in prison. I hear what my right hon. Friend says, but the provisions would be no more likely to cause an increase in attacks on individuals than is the case at present as a result of the information being in the public domain.

[Mr Knight]

I was only pontificating that it might lead in some circumstances to an incident or incidents, but it is clear from the Bill that public knowledge of those who have convictions is likely to increase. Indeed, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that if the Bill became law, someone might develop an iPhone app, for example, that would show how many people in the neighbourhood had convictions.

[Mr Nuttall]

My right hon. Friend raises an interesting point, which fits neatly with my point about available technology and the sort of database that could be created. It is quite likely that a private sector organisation could put such information into a searchable database on the internet, which, as my right hon. Friend rightly says, could easily be accessed on a mobile phone. That is the way in which the internet is going. It is more and more likely that people will carry their own personal computers around with them—tablets are already available —and if a search can be made on a desktop computer in an office, it can be made as one walks down the street. I see no reason why that should not be the case. I cannot see the problems with that.

The main point is that the information must be accurate. We already have the technology to make that happen; of that there can be no doubt. We have already seen the excellent Home Office website that enables individual householders to search right down to street level to find the number and category of crimes committed in their area. Having seen how complicated that website is, covering every road and street in the entire country, I think that the proposed database would be much easier to construct. Provided that measures were in place to ensure that the information on the register was accurate, which could be done easily by ensuring that people could check their own record free of charge, I see no reason why—

[Henry Smith]

Does the Bill not merely extend information that is increasingly becoming publicly available, as my hon. Friend is setting out? In the Sussex police force area, the recently passed Sarah’s law allows people to check whether anyone in their neighbourhood has been convicted of a child sex offence. That has empowered people, and certainly has not led to any vigilantism.

[Mr Nuttall]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Generally speaking, people can be relied on to treat this information, which is publicly available, with common sense and reasonableness.

One area where problems are likely to occur is when people change their name. I know that what we can do to prevent people from giving false names is of particular concern to the Home Office, because there is no law that prevents someone from changing their name. A name can be changed simply by statutory declaration, rather than by going through the complexity of doing so by deed poll. No one has to give a reason for wanting to change their name. In fact, many people do so for the slightest of reasons, perhaps because they do not like their name. I am not normally the first to suggest further regulation, but I wonder whether the need to monitor sex offenders, in particular, might result in some further control, to ensure that those convicted of sex offences are not free simply to change their name and walk away from their past.

This short Bill would be warmly and widely welcomed outside this House. I wish it well on Second Reading and look forward to seeing it on the statute book before too long.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Phillips]

My hon. Friend is right, but access to a spent conviction can be gained only where Parliament believes that there should continue to be access to spent convictions to prevent harm that might arise were the convictions not to be apparent to those making criminal records checks. The Bill would go much further and make generally available to the public the entire criminal record of those who might well have mended their ways many years before. That is the first problem with the Bill.

[Mr Nuttall]

Does my hon. and learned Friend accept that, with existing technology, it would be easy, under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act, to tag an entry on the register with a conviction’s expiry date?

[Stephen Phillips]

The hon. Gentleman might be right, but his difficulty is that the Bill does not propound the technological solution that, he advises the House, might be applied. He is therefore saying that the Bill, which he supports, is defective and should not receive a Second Reading.

The Bill’s second problem, to which I have already adverted, is the scope for inaccuracy in antecedent conviction records from magistrates courts. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch was kind enough to say that this is a matter on which I know something, and I flatter myself that that is indeed the case. The simple position is that not all magistrates court records are of the quality that one would wish, either because they lack information or because they refer to the wrong individual.

The keeping of magistrates court records is an undoubted problem. The Minister might need to look at properly funding courts to ensure that records are accurate, but until the problem is properly grappled with, the Bill will continue to suffer from the defect that records that were inaccurate in part or in whole could follow individuals around for their entire life. Nothing would be worse than a member of the public, unbeknown to them, having associated with them a criminal conviction for an offence they had not committed.

The third major problem with the Bill is that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch said in moving its Second Reading, it is intended to be only prospective; if enacted, it would apply only to offences committed in the future. His principal aim is to ensure that the burden on magistrates courts does not become too great, but the difficulty is that if the Bill was enacted those already convicted of offences in magistrates courts would form one class of person whose criminal records were not following them around—notwithstanding the mischief that my hon. Friend seeks to address, because the information or data were at one stage in the public domain —whereas the criminal convictions of those who committed offences in future could follow them around.

For all those reasons, although my hon. Friend and the sponsors of the Bill have a very fair point and have quite properly alluded to an anomaly—the public’s inability to secure access to the records—it seems that the Bill is defective in any number of respects.

Student Visas

David Nuttall Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I referred in my statement to students who stay on and move from course to course but I had not got as far as those who deliberately, as my hon. Friend suggests, fail their exams. There will be a time limit on how long someone can stay in the UK—three years for a below degree-level course. The limit will be extended for postgraduate studies and to accommodate those who are doing medicine and longer courses, but there will be a limit on the number of times that someone can try that ruse.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

One in five of the students granted a student visa in 2004 was still here in 2009. Will my right hon. Friend please confirm whether the measures in her statement will end that type of abuse of the system?

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely valid point. I am happy to tell him that the time limit on how long a student can stay in the UK will address precisely the point he raises.

Sex Offenders Register

David Nuttall Excerpts

Wednesday 16th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

I welcome the Home Secretary’s desire to tighten the loopholes in the sex offenders register, and particularly her proposal to prevent sex offenders from avoiding registering by changing their name by deed poll. I am sure she will be aware that deed poll is only one way in which a person can change their name. It is the most formal way, but not the most usual. Changing name by statutory declaration is quicker and easier. Perhaps she will consider that as another loophole that should be closed.

[Mrs May]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that point. It is important that we examine the process of changing a name by deed poll and tighten the rules so that sex offenders cannot use them as a means of avoiding the need to register. He makes a valid point about statutory declaration, and we will certainly take it into consideration.

Policing in the 21st Century

David Nuttall Excerpts

Monday 26th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I of course commend the work that is being done on the ground by individual police officers, such as those whom the right hon. Gentleman mentioned. This Government want to strengthen the fight against crime. He returns—as did the shadow Home Secretary—to the issue of cuts. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary reported last week that it thinks that it will be possible to find 12% budget cuts in the police force without affecting front-line policing. The reason that we are having to look at the sort of spending cuts across Government that we are—[Interruption.] Labour Front Benchers may groan, but they know that it is their fault: it is the legacy of the last Labour Government.

[Mr David Nuttall (Bury North) (Con)]

Does the Home Secretary agree that having directly elected police commissioners will help to improve the public’s trust and confidence in our police force by ensuring that the police listen to local people?

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend makes an important and valid point. We need to restore that confidence and the link between the police and the public—the link that has sadly been damaged over the years by the increased bureaucracy and imposition from the centre under the last Labour Government. He is right that our proposals will increase the public’s confidence.