Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Diane Abbott and Kit Malthouse

Monday 24th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

7. Whether he is taking steps to tackle educational underachievement of black children.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Kit Malthouse)]

We are focused on raising educational standards for all pupils, irrespective of their ethnicity.

[Ms Abbott]

The Government will be aware that, although many ethnic minority groups have narrowed the gap with white pupils, and in some cases overtaken them, some groups continue to underachieve, particularly black Caribbean boys. At a time when there are so many skills shortages, what is the Secretary of State doing to ensure all our pupils achieve their potential?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am pleased to say that the right hon. Lady is right and a number of minority groups now outperform the average, not least the largest group of the black community, those who would identify themselves as black African, who outperform the average in a number of ways. She is right, however, that there is underperformance by a number of black Caribbean pupils, mainly boys, and I certainly undertake to her to try to investigate why. However, I am sure she would agree that although external factors such as disadvantage can influence educational outcomes, the standard of the school and of the teaching that those pupils receive can often overcome many of those barriers. If she has not already done so, I urge her to visit the Michaela Community School in Wembley, which I visited two weeks ago and which is seeing extraordinary results from a very mixed and diverse community, in a very challenged part of London.

Metropolitan Police Service

Debate between Diane Abbott and Kit Malthouse

Wednesday 29th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

The creation of police and crime commissioners was designed to provide a focused point of accountability for the electorate. They replaced police authorities, which were opaque organisations in which no one person could be held responsible at the ballot box. As I said, if I had been in that job—I had the privilege of holding the post of deputy mayor for policing for four years—and I had had it for six years when this situation occurred, I would consider my position.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

The Minister will be aware of the seriousness of the issues set out in the inspectorate’s report. He should also be aware that Londoners do not want to see us in this Chamber passing responsibility between ourselves like some grim game of pass the parcel. Nothing in the inspectorate’s report will come as a surprise to London MPs because, in one way or another, they have dealt with these types of issues, which have affected our constituents. The Minister can try to lay blame where he wishes, but he has not dealt, as all of us have dealt, with people whose lives have been ruined and whose children have been targeted. He has not dealt with those people; otherwise he could not be playing politics with this issue. There is no question but that the Met needs reform, and no doubt that this situation did not come about in a month or two. Will he confirm that the two short-listed candidates for commissioner are Nick Ephgrave and Mark Rowley, and does he accept that it is unlikely that the Met can be reformed by men who have spent almost their entire careers in it? Does he accept that many of us think that the selection process for the commissioner needs to be reopened?

[Kit Malthouse]

Let me be clear: I am not playing politics; I am telling the truth, and every Londoner knows it. When the Prime Minister and I were at City Hall, we stepped forward and took responsibility for what was happening in London on our watch. We fought crime. We sat with the parents of murdered children and took blame and responsibility for it in a way that the current Mayor does not. Opposition Members can spend all the time they want attempting to deflect and make this a political matter, but that is the truth. Those Members who represent Londoners, on both sides of the House, know inside themselves what Londoners think about the Mayor’s performance on crime. The reason that this situation exercises me so much is that I have been there and dealt with it. Contrary to what the right hon. Lady says, over the past couple of years in this job I have spoken to and dealt with lots of victims of crime in London. In fact, only a few months ago I met four mothers of dead children brought to me by the Met who talked about the failures of dealing with knife crime and their willingness to step forward and help us to improve. So I ask the right hon. Lady, please, not to try to teach me any lessons about dealing with victims of crime. In terms of her wider question, I cannot confirm who is in the selection process, but we can only interview those people who apply.

Metropolitan Police: Strip-search of Schoolgirl

Debate between Diane Abbott and Kit Malthouse

Monday 21st March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

We obviously take this matter extremely seriously. The hon. Lady is right that the report made recommendations to the Government, not least on strengthening and revising code C of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. We will have to consider our response to that in the light of this report, taking into account the outcomes of the IOPC review. We need to understand whether we have a specific problem or a systemic one. The report indicates that we may have systemic problems, and if we do then obviously we will seek to address them. We also need to work out from the IOPC report whether the same is true; if so, of course we will act.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

Does the Minister appreciate how angry people up and down the country are about this incident, particularly people in Hackney? We had a very big demonstration outside Hackney town hall—it was a completely peaceful one, but people were just consumed with unhappiness and anger and fear. It is not just parents of colour; all parents are thinking, “This could have been my daughter.” Is the Minister aware of how traumatised that young woman still is by the incident, and is he aware that it took the police two full years to apologise? What is he going to do? He is telling us about inquiries, but what is he going to do so that at the very least, the instructions and guidelines to the police are much clearer than they currently appear to be?

[Kit Malthouse]

Of course I understand the anger and concern across the country, and I share it. As I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price), it could have been any one of our relatives. As the right hon. Lady knows, I spent a long time in London government and I understand the impact that these events can have on trust between the police and London’s various communities. It is extremely important that people feel confident that, when such appalling incidents happen, action is taken to try to prevent them in the future. I am trying to stress to the House that, while we have the report of the safeguarding board, we want to ensure that we also have the IOPC report so that we can see the full picture in the round and act accordingly to reassure her constituents and many other Londoners.

It is worth saying, however, that it would be helpful to me if London Members such as the right hon. Lady recognised that the Mayor of London has a role to play in this, as the primary accountability body for the Metropolitan Police, and that the Government and the Mayor must work together to solve these problems with the police.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Diane Abbott and Kit Malthouse

Monday 28th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I have committed before, and I am happy to do so again, that before the end of the Parliament we will produce a new funding formula to ensure that my hon. Friend’s constituency gets exactly what he deserves, as indeed he should.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

Does the Home Secretary accept that many Members of this House are dismayed that she did not make a statement in the normal way, so that she could have been questioned in the normal way? Does she further accept that that is not just disrespectful to the House of Commons, but it shows a lack of real concern for those desperate people escaping Ukraine?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Diane Abbott and Kit Malthouse

Monday 23rd March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I wholeheartedly endorse my hon. Friend’s remarks. He is right that when we emerge from the crisis that is engulfing our country, there will be a general reassessment of who is important in this country and what a “key worker” means. He is right that those on the frontline, delivering, stacking shelves and taking money at tills, are as much part of the national effort to beat this coronavirus as a police officer or NHS worker, and we thank them for it.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

On the question of protecting shop workers and owners, as was referred to earlier, we have all seen the unfortunate recent scenes of disorder in supermarkets when persons attempt to stockpile in response to the coronavirus. We have seen shelves swept clean just hours after the shops open, the apparent shortages of very basic products such as paracetamol, and the elderly being unable to purchase their basic needs. A number of measures are being taken to deal with the situation, but we note that even when supermarkets tried to set aside hours at the beginning of the day for the frail, elderly and NHS workers, others just barged them aside. No one on the Opposition Benches wants to see police officers in supermarkets, but if the situation remains unmanageable, will the Minister consider talking to the shops, the supermarket owners and their security officers to see whether patrols by police community support officers in the vicinity of some of the larger supermarkets might play a role?

[Kit Malthouse]

The right hon. Lady is right to raise this issue. I hope to reassure her that we are in very close contact both with the police about the patterns of behaviour they are seeing, and with representatives from the food industry, particularly from the supermarkets, which I know are meeting regularly with the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to monitor the situation. We hope and believe that, over the next few days, things will settle down. Our food and supply chains in supermarkets are extremely strong, and we are reassured by those companies that they can fulfil the demand as it comes, but she is right to hold us to the challenge of monitoring the situation. If we need to take further steps, obviously we will. As the Home Secretary said, we are also talking closely with the Security Industry Association about the welfare and capability of its staff in these circumstances. We want to ensure that this is managed proportionately and calmly, but we are keeping an eye on it.

Automated Facial Recognition Surveillance

Debate between Diane Abbott and Kit Malthouse

Monday 27th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

In his usual pithy manner, my right hon. Friend puts his finger on the button. As Members will know, the police have used facial recognition since their establishment. There is an analogue version—a wanted poster. We will have seen those and they crowdsource the identification of wanted criminals. The only question here is whether a human being does it, such as a spotter at a football match, or a machine does it. We acknowledge that if a machine is doing it, more circumspection and democratic control are required, and that is what we will be providing.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

Facial recognition technology is potentially an important crime-fighting tool, but not without the correct safeguards, and the Minister has failed to persuade the House thus far that all the correct safeguards are in place. Does he accept that the random use of facial recognition technology requires not just a High Court judgment, but a specific legal framework and specific arrangements for scrutiny? After all, when blood, saliva or hair samples are provided, they are done voluntarily or under compulsory detention and charge. Facial recognition evidence is given involuntarily. He will have heard different reports about the unreliability of the evidence. Does that put people at risk of being wrongly accused of a crime? He will have heard the reports that the facial recognition technology finds it difficult to recognise black people and women, and that the technology deployed is often inaccurate. To bring in technology that might be inaccurate and mean that the guilty go unapprehended and the innocent are wrongly identified would be a spectacular own goal, leading to a breakdown of the bond of trust between the police and public.

[Kit Malthouse]

The right hon. Lady is right to say that the police must deploy technology so as to increase the trust of those they seek to protect, rather than to diminish it. We certainly believe that the use of this technology could, as she said, have enormous potential for crimefighting, if deployed in the correct way. She asked whether the random use of facial technology could undermine that confidence. It might, but of course we are not intending to use it in a random way and the police are not doing so. In effect, they will be operating it in a very specific intelligence-led way, with lots of notification in the area in which it is to be deployed against a known list of wanted suspects or criminals; a specific area will be identified where the police have intelligence that that person might be passing through. Those very specific and focused arrangements will be authorised by a very senior officer above commander rank.

As for unreliability, as technology is rolled out it obviously becomes more and more effective and reliable—[Interruption.] Well, I am the lucky owner of a telephone that allows me to make banking payments on the basis of recognising my face. That technology was not available in the last iteration of the phone—it is an iPhone—which used my thumb instead. So there are developments in technology. South Wales police found in trials that there was a 1:4,500 chance of triggering a false alert and more than an 80% chance of a correct alert. It is worth bearing in mind that even when the system does alert the police to a possible identification, the final decision as to whether to intervene with an individual is still taken by a human being.