Spiking Incidents: Prevention

Diana Johnson Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2023 Westminster Hall

[Esther McVey (in the Chair)]

The debate may continue until 12 minutes past 4.

[Dame Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I start by congratulating the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) on his determination and perseverance on this issue. The fact that this debate has been so well attended shows the strength of feeling on spiking. It is important to note that the former Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel), and the former safeguarding Minister, the hon. Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), have taken part in this debate and made their views very clear, which is helpful.

The Home Affairs Committee carried out an inquiry on spiking last year, which reported in April 2022. Some 2,000 victims and 1,400 witnesses of spiking responded to our call for evidence. It is interesting to note that 75% of the victims had not reported the spiking incident to the police. We made a number of recommendations; I want to go through them quickly, and then refer to the letter from the Government dated 20 December. The first recommendation was on education, training and awareness—to aid prevention, detection and reporting of spiking. We also talked about action by local authorities and reviewing the guidance under section 182 of the Licensing Act 2003. I am pleased that we have heard reference today to door staff, because they are very important in how spiking incidents are dealt with.

We talked about a national strategy on prevention. There is much good work done locally, but nationally we do not have an overarching strategy. We talked about a duty on all police forces, so that when incidents of spiking are reported, there is access to rapid testing. We also asked the Government to consider whether a new offence around spiking was required. From the letter from the Government dated 20 December, published by the Home Affairs Committee this morning, I was very pleased to learn that the Government plan to have a review of section 182 of the Licensing Act, but I ask the Minister to set out the timetable for that consultation, and to say when we are likely to know the results.

I am disappointed that the Government do not accept the arguments for a new specific offence. They say that there is sufficient legislation on the statute books, but it is clearly not working; it is not being used, reporting is low and prosecutions are very rare indeed. The hon. Member for Gloucester has made a very clear and compelling case for a way forward on a specific spiking offence. Can the Minister tell the House what the Government target is for increasing the use of existing legislation to hold perpetrators of spiking to account? Also, what increase would show that the Government were successfully dealing with spiking offences?

We are told that data can be collected centrally, and that there is a development of central procedures. Can the Minister explain to the House what the process will be, how it will work and what the timetable is for this data to be captured?

In the letter from the Minister, the Government say that their public awareness campaign on violence against women and girls, which is known as Enough, and to which I pay great tribute, covers spiking, but anyone looking online at the information about that campaign would have to search very hard to find any reference to spiking. I ask the Minister to go away and have a look at it for himself, to assess how clear it is that the Government take spiking very seriously in their fight against violence against women and girls.

Some work has been done, which we welcome, but there is much more to do. This is an ongoing issue. It needs to be properly resourced, and Government and statutory responses to the problem need to be embedded, so that the Government uphold their commitment to combatting violence against women and girls.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Security (Tom Tugendhat)]

I am entirely mindful of that, Ms McVey. As my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) quite rightly stated at the beginning of the debate, this is not normally an area I have taken the active interest in that I have today. The reason is that it has been covered by many other brilliant Ministers, and I am delighted to see several of them in the Chamber, notably my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel), who has done so much for the protection of women and girls in her role in the Home Office. She has spoken out in many other ways and at many other times for the protection of women and girls, not just in the United Kingdom but around the world. If I may, I pay personal tribute to her on the record and thank her for the protection she offered Afghan women and girls, when she was instrumental in helping so many escape that terrible moment in 2021 when the Taliban were doing more than anyone has done in decades to reverse the rights of women and girls.

Many powerful voices have spoken out. She did not speak today, but I speak in particular praise of the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Mims Davies), who has spoken out on the record publicly about her own experience of spiking and the reason it matters so much to her and many others. She has exposed a very important truth, which is that, although we have spoken a lot about women and girls today, this crime is not about women and girls, but about our whole society. It affects many young men as well, and it affects many more people in our community than just those who are spiked. It affects families and loved ones. It affects partners and friends, who deal with the pain of seeing a victim suffer and with the trauma that affects a community afterwards.

I place on the record the importance I attach to this crime, as I know the Safeguarding Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire Dales (Miss Dines), also does, as does the Home Secretary, who has been very clear in her defence of not just women and girls, but all people in our society over the months in which she has been in post. This is an enormously important issue, and I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester and to all other Members who have spoken out today. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Ruth Edwards) put it, this is a crime of violence, and violence should be punished.

There is an awful lot that is already being done. We should be especially grateful to people such as Deputy Chief Constable Maggie Blyth, who is the national policing lead in this area. She has done huge amounts of work to make sure that, in cities across England and Wales, uniformed police officers visit venues and work closely with those who are guarding them. The SIA has also made it part of the conditions for licensing in the industry, including for bouncers, to consider the importance of standing up for women and girls and knowing how to act in certain circumstances. That change was brought in by my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham—that was another moment when she was active in defending people who require assistance in moments of emergency and trauma. I am extremely grateful for the work that has been done.

I am also grateful for the work done with groups such as Eurofins, which has developed a rapid testing capability. Forgive me for going on about it, but my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham was again instrumental in that development. I am also grateful for the work of police forces around the country, in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, in making sure that police officers are properly trained and ready to respond.

It is absolutely right that we now look at where the law is. Last year, we reclassified the so-called date rape drug GHB and two related substances from class C to class B, under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, which made those drugs harder to access and increased the maximum jail sentence from two to five years. Spiking is one of the crimes that is affected by those drugs, and that change was an important step in addressing the use of those drugs and their availability.

Since 2021, £30 million has been invested in projects with a particular focus on protecting women in communities. This Government have also been absolutely adamant about setting up a tackling violence against women and girls strategy, to ensure that women and girls are safe on our streets and in our night-time economy. It is worth saying that action taken to protect women and girls protects all people in our night-time economy, which is absolutely essential.

It is also important that the Enough communications campaign has been having an impact. It is good to see so many different groups supporting it and pushing out the different ways in which it can been helpful.

Another aspect is the additional £50 million invested into the 111 projects through the safer streets fund, which has focused on tackling violence against women and girls in public places, as well as neighbourhood crime and antisocial behaviour. I am very grateful that so much of that funding has gone through and has now been seen in a range of interventions, including bystander training programmes, taxi marshals, CCTV and street lighting, drink protectors and educational training for night-time economy staff.

Public safety is of course paramount, which is why we worked so closely with festivals and festival organisers and the outdoor events sector last summer to ensure that the necessary protocols, training, communications and guidance were in place ahead of events, and why so much work has been done with universities ahead of freshers week. Sadly, it is a time when events can lead to offences, and we need to ensure that everyone is aware of the challenges that we face and the dangers that some people bring. I am extremely grateful for all the work that my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester has done to highlight the issue, not least through introducing a private Member’s Bill last year.

The Home Office, and the Home Secretary in particular, is committed to examining whether, in addition to the existing range of offences that can be used to cover spiking, there is need for a further criminal offence. The Home Office has told me that it has carefully considered the case for further legislation, and the Minister for Safeguarding has written to the Home Affairs Committee. There is clearly more that has come out today. There is clearly a strength of feeling in the House and a voice that is coming from so many parts of this Chamber that needs to be listened to. I am sure that the Minister for Safeguarding will listen to this debate and hear exactly what has been said.

I am interested to note that my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester has mentioned that, given the strength of existing legislation, he is not of the opinion that a new offence is required. I will listen carefully to his point and his suggestion that a so-called umbrella amendment may be possible. This is not an area on which I have spoken to officials, so I hope he will forgive me, but my understanding is that this would come under the Offences against the Person Act 1861 and would require—I see that my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham is nodding, as she is more aware of this than I am—conversation and discussion with the Ministry of Justice. I will take that away and come back to him, or ask the Minister for Safeguarding to come back to him to look at where different aspects could be investigated, because no one wants a gap in the law. No one wants to see crimes going unpunished and no one wants to see victims unable to achieve the level of protection that is absolutely essential.

Having heard the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson), and the Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), make such powerful points in the debate, I think there certainly are areas in which we could investigate further opportunities for co-operation and ensuring that spiking is not only reported but counted in the data, so that we can target responses in exactly the way we should for the protection of others.

[Dame Diana Johnson]

This morning, the Home Affairs Committee published the letter from the Minister for Safeguarding, which is dated 20 December—sent just before Parliament rose for the Christmas recess. Is the Minister now saying that he is moving away from the unequivocal position set out in that letter, which said that there was going to be no change to the law because existing legislation stands and is sufficient? From what the Minister is now saying, it sounds that way to me. If he is, can he please write to the Committee and to the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham), because we were under the impression that that was not the Government’s case at all?

[Tom Tugendhat]

My position and the Government’s position on this is that the Minister for Safeguarding has written clearly to the right hon. Lady, but I was merely identifying the fact that the whole point of this Chamber is to debate and explore ideas, and ideas have been explored this afternoon. As new ideas come forward and new issues are raised, it is appropriate that we respond to them. I am sure the Minister for Safeguarding will be delighted to respond to them, and my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester has raised other issues that could offer a different way of looking at things. There are always areas where we can engage in debate and discussion. After all, that is the point of this Chamber.

I am going to leave it there, because my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester will want to wrap up, but I will very briefly go through the facts that have been laid out so clearly. First, this is a crime that sadly affects far too many people in this country and seems to be growing. Secondly, this is a crime that disproportionately affects women and girls, but does also affect many others. Thirdly, the Government take this extremely seriously. In many ways, over many years, they have sought to tighten up the defence of women and girls, of those enjoying the night-time economy and of individuals who may find themselves vulnerable. In that light, I pay huge tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for Mid Sussex, for Derby North (Amanda Solloway), for Redditch (Rachel Maclean) and for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins), and my right hon. Friend the Member for Witham, for the work that they have done in this area in safeguarding others, because it is hugely important not just to the Government, but to all Members of this House.