Coronation: Policing of Protests

Debate between Hilary Benn and Chris Philp

Tuesday 9th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

As I have said two or three times already, the new Public Order Act contains a section—the hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter) suggested a moment ago that it was section 17—specifically to protect journalistic freedom. Of course, that came after the incident in Hertfordshire. If there are particular individual cases where the new law, and indeed the wider ECHR and common law right for journalists, is not being applied, there are complaints mechanisms. But this House, supported by the Government, has legislated specifically to protect journalistic freedoms.

[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

Given what happened to the six individuals on Saturday who were clearly not involved in any plot to use rape alarms or paint to disrupt the coronation—otherwise, why would the police have apologised to them—what confidence can the organisers of any future protest have that what they are told in advance planning meetings with the police can be relied upon on the day?

[Chris Philp]

Without wanting to go into too many specifics, I believe that the police assessment at the time did not relate in this particular case to rape alarms or paint but to locking-on equipment. The right hon. Gentleman says that it is clear, but of course, many things are clear with hindsight; they are sometimes less clear in the heat of a live operation. In terms of assurance on the right to protest, the Public Order Act does not in any way infringe or undermine the right to protest. Indeed, we saw on Saturday quite a reasonably sized group—a few hundred people—protesting at the coronation event without any impediment, and these days we see Just Stop Oil protesters protesting almost daily, so there is evidence in front of us showing us how the right to protest unfolds on a near daily basis.

Machetes: Consultation

Debate between Hilary Benn and Chris Philp

Tuesday 18th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

My hon. Friend speaks words of great wisdom and I agree with every single one of them.

[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

This is urgent. Last Sunday a 15-year-old boy was attacked with a machete in Leeds—he is being treated for a serious head injury—and the previous month a group of men had a fight with machetes in broad daylight on the streets of our city. I welcome these proposals and echo the call from my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) for them to be brought in as quickly as possible and the call from the hon. Member for Southend West (Anna Firth) for them to be made as comprehensive and loophole-free as possible, because there is no place for these weapons anywhere in our cities and towns.

[Chris Philp]

I agree completely with the right hon. Gentleman’s sentiments and those expressed previously by the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden). Speed is important: we want to do this as quickly as we can, and that is one reason it is a seven-week consultation rather than longer. As I said earlier, we will take forward measures in secondary legislation as quickly as we can, and will also handle as quickly as possible those that need primary legislation.

I agree with the point about the need to avoid loopholes, and in that spirit I strongly encourage Members of this House and people outside it with an interest in this topic—whether charities or anyone else—to reply to the consultation on those points of detail. The shadow policing Minister, the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones) raised some questions about the length of particular knives; that is the kind of detail we need to get right and the consultation is the vehicle through which we can make sure the details are comprehensively captured exactly as the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) suggests.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Hilary Benn and Chris Philp

Monday 14th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

I also met the chief constable, Mark Webster, just a week ago. The hon. Gentleman mentions resources, and of course Cleveland this year is receiving an extra £7.8 million compared with what it received last year and it has been allocated 239 extra officers as part of the police uplift programme, 197 of whom are already in post.

[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

In September, I asked a then Home Office Minister why it is still legal for anyone aged 18 and over to walk into a shop and buy a machete. I was told, because the incidence of the use of machetes on our streets is increasing, that the serious weapons review is looking at this matter. Will this Minister tell us when that will be concluded and when the Government will act to ban the sale of machetes in this country?

[Chris Philp]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question and I have a lot of sympathy for the point he is making. In the two or three weeks since I have been in this position, I have met the Met’s Deputy Assistant Commissioner McNulty, who has particular expertise in this area and is the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead on this topic. He has made a number of interesting proposals that are consistent with what the right hon. Gentleman just suggested. I am studying those carefully and sympathetically, and hope to have more to say on this topic in the near future.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Hilary Benn and Chris Philp

Thursday 7th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)]

First, I just say to the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith) that this is not about defying the will of the British people; it is about how sensibly we are going to give effect to it. The referendum campaign seems a long time ago now, but during it we heard endless assertions that the process of leaving the European Union would be easy, straightforward and all those things. Anyone who looks at the Bill will see with their own eyes just how wrong the people who said that were. Despite the brave face that the Secretary of State habitually puts on things, it must now be dawning on Ministers that their assertion that they would be able to negotiate the whole thing—a comprehensive agreement covering all the things we need and all the benefits we want—by the end of the article 50 process is not now going to be possible. The reason why both those assertions have failed to survive contact with reality is not for want of effort, but because of fundamental disagreements in the Government about what the policy should be, which has resulted in delay, and because the task is Byzantine in its complexity. I do not envy civil servants, who are working hard, or indeed Ministers, and I do not envy the House the task that confronts us, but we have a duty to be honest with each other and with the British people about the choices that we face, their consequences and the fact that we have to do all this against the ticking clock.

Apart from the repeal of the European Communities Act 1972, the Bill is not about whether we leave the European Union—a point the Secretary of State made in his opening speech—because that decision was taken in the referendum and given effect by the triggering of article 50, and we will leave at the end of March 2019. The Bill is about trying to ensure that our law is in shape when we leave. We all accept that there is a need to do that, and we all therefore accept that a Bill is necessary. But that does not mean that Parliament should accept this Bill, which is the 2017 equivalent of the Statute of Proclamations of 1539. I gently remind the Secretary of State that the Exiting the European Union Committee did urge him to publish the Bill in draft. Had he done so, he would be having fewer difficulties now, because its flaws and weaknesses are fundamental—they were brilliantly exposed in the speech by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer). The Bill is not about taking back control. If Ministers continue to fail to take Parliament’s role seriously, we will have to continue to prod, push and persuade or, in the case of the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr Clarke), to gently threaten, so that Ministers understand that in this Parliament—this is a new Parliament; it has been christened the Back Benchers’ Parliament, and rightly so—they are going to have no choice but to listen to what Parliament has to say.

On the detail of the Bill, if they remain unamended, clauses 7, 8 and 9 would grant Ministers new and unprecedented powers. Ministers are asking us to give them a legislative blank cheque; we should not do so. How can we accept a Bill if on the one hand Ministers get up and say, “Look at the safeguards; they are in the legislation,” and on the other they propose in another part of the Bill to give themselves the power to remove every one of those safeguards, if they are so inclined? How does that build a sense of confidence and reassurance? I accept that there is a balance to be struck between giving Ministers the latitude and flexibility to do what needs to be done and Parliament having control to scrutinise and decide, but as they stand, the delegated powers do not achieve that balance, which is why the Secretary of State is going to have a very long queue of Members outside his office wanting to have a conversation. If he wants to save himself some time, he should come forward with his own amendments.

[Chris Philp]

It sounds as though the right hon. Gentleman agrees with the principle and thrust of what is being attempted here but has some comments on the detail and the mechanics. Will he therefore vote for the Bill on Second Reading and seek to address some of his concerns by amending it in Committee?

[Hilary Benn]

No, I will not—unless the Government move on this—because the flaws are so fundamental that they should go away and do their homework again. Not a single person in this Chamber does not accept that legislation is required to undertake the task; we are just saying that it is not the legislation before us.

There is a huge difference between a statutory instrument that proposes in some regulation to delete the words “the Commission” and insert the words “the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs” and a statutory instrument that will, for example, give responsibility for the oversight and enforcement air-quality legislation, which derives from an EU directive, to an existing public body. What assurance can Ministers give us that whichever body is given that responsibility will have the same effective enforcement powers as the Commission has had, including ultimately taking case to the European Court of Justice, and will give the public the same power to hold that body and the Government to account if there is a continuing lack of progress in making sure that our air is pure enough to breathe? If that is not provided for, Government cannot argue that the Bill’s aim is to produce exactly the same situation the day after we leave as existed the day before. Therefore, as many people have said, the Bill will have to produce a mechanism for sifting. We need to sift the proposals that come forward, so that we can distinguish the absolutely straightforward and non-controversial and those that raise really quite important issues of policy, so that we as Parliament can do our job.