Gareth Snell
Main Page: Gareth Snell (Labour (Co-op) - Stoke-on-Trent Central)Department Debates - View all Gareth Snell's debates with the Home Office
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Antonia Bance
My hon. Friend is correct. I so look forward to the Crime and Policing Bill coming forward in the next couple of weeks. It will give police the powers to seize those antisocial bikes.
Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)
I thank my hon. Friend for securing this timely debate. The stories she has told about her community match those I heard when I was out with Councillor Laura Carter in Sneyd Green on Repington Road only two weeks ago. We discussed with residents that this is about not just the noise and pollution, but the associated criminality that goes with those bikes—the drug running and the movement of stolen goods. Stoke and Staffordshire have the wonderful Operation Transom, which I urge all Members of this House to look at. It brings together partners to use drones and aeroplanes to chase bikes down and seize them. Although I am sure that this debate will focus on the menace, everyone should look at the solutions that we are trying to deploy in Stoke.
Antonia Bance
My hon. Friend is correct. By working together—the police, councils and local communities—we can stop this happening.
I heard more stories, including from Terri-Ann in Hateley Heath, who told me that she is just waiting for someone to get hurt because they go so fast down Jowetts Lane and Lynton Avenue. Paul contacted me one Saturday when there were seven illegal scrambler motorbikes at the top of Brunswick Park, pulling wheelies, ripping up the grass and destroying the football pitch. They were right up close to 15 kids who were trying to play football. As he said to me, it does not bear thinking about what would have happened if one of them had crashed into a kid. This is a problem across Sandwell and in Dudley, but we have particular hotspots in Friar Park in Wednesbury and in and around Tipton Green.
I want to be clear that our local police, the council and our police and crime commissioner Simon Foster all know that this is a problem. Together, we are taking action on off-road bikes. In Friar Park, our No. 1 hotspot, the council leafleted every house so that people know that their tenancy is at risk if they or their kids ride illegal bikes, and it closed off the entrances to our parks and towpaths.