Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jeremy Browne and Meg Hillier

Monday 7th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

14. What steps the Government are taking to tackle antisocial behaviour.

[The Minister of State, Home Department (Mr Jeremy Browne)]

We have just published a draft Bill setting out measures to put victims at the heart of the response to antisocial behaviour. They include the community trigger, which will ensure agencies take persistent problems seriously; the community remedy, giving victims a say in the punishment of offenders out of court; and, overall, faster, more effective powers so that front-line professionals can better protect the public.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Browne]

Let me make two brief points. First, we take antisocial behaviour extremely seriously. I think that MPs of all parties see the terrible effect that antisocial behaviour has on decent, law-abiding citizens and we want to help them. Secondly, the measures are designed to be quicker and more effective than those previously in place. If they were not going to achieve that objective, we would not be bringing them forward.

[Meg Hillier]

The Minister has given warm words about his desire to tackle antisocial behaviour, but why is it that my constituents and people up and down the country who suffer antisocial behaviour will now get no action unless they complain three times, not just once?

[Mr Browne]

The hon. Lady misunderstands the intention of the policy. Our hope is that the police and other authorities will respond instantly when concerns are raised about antisocial behaviour. The problem in the past has been when the same concern has been raised repeatedly and no response has been forthcoming. What we are putting in place is a defined measure to make sure that that no longer happens.

Gangs and Youth Violence (2011 Riots)

Debate between Jeremy Browne and Meg Hillier

Tuesday 4th December 2012 Westminster Hall

[The Minister of State, Home Department (Mr Jeremy Browne)]

Thank you very much, Mr Streeter, for giving me the opportunity to conclude this afternoon’s debate. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) on securing this debate. I remember that about five or six years ago, when she was a Minister and I was a relatively new MP, she was very nice to me—well, she said that I was surprisingly sensible for a Liberal Democrat, which was qualified niceness but nevertheless nicer than I had expected. I will try to reciprocate that positive attitude during my concluding remarks.

I just want to give a little bit of context. I do not say this in any way because I take any of the issues that have been raised lightly, but listening to the debate, one might be forgiven for thinking that we are having it against a backdrop of escalating crime in London or across the country. I will respond in a moment to the substantive points that Members have made, but it is worth briefly putting the statistical context in front of the House.

That context is that recorded crime figures show a 14% reduction in homicides in the last year. That is very substantial. Offences involving knives and sharp instruments are down by 9% over the same period. Also, NHS data on hospital admissions for assault, which are a very good indicator of the level of violent crime, including unreported violent crime, show a 6% reduction in the 12 months to the end of March 2012. Members have been good enough to pay tribute to the work that has taken place with the Metropolitan Police Service and other agencies here in London.

Of course there are appalling incidents and we are not complacent. As a Government, we want to try to do everything that we can to reduce gang membership and gang violence, but it is worth noting that there have been successes. There are volunteers and charitable organisations across London and across the country as a whole who should feel proud of what they have achieved; we should recognise that their efforts are reaping some dividends; and we would like even more to happen in the future.

I will divide my comments into three sections: the first is about how we try to prevent gang membership and violence; the second is about how we try to intervene at the crucial point if we fail to prevent gang violence; and the third is about the sanctions that are used afterwards.

I obviously have only a few minutes left to speak, so let me split up the first section on how we try to prevent gang violence. In a way, prevention easily splits into a sort of adolescent stage and a pre-adolescent stage. Regarding the pre-adolescent stage, I hope that Members will join me in Westminster Hall tomorrow when we have a debate about early intervention. That is a very important area and Members will know about the troubled families initiative, in which the Prime Minister takes a personal interest. That initiative is trying to help the 120,000 most troubled families in the country. There is a very high statistical correlation between children being born in troubled circumstances and their going on to experience underachievement, as shown in their employment history, their crime record and their gang membership. There is a certain level of activity through which the Government can intervene in that area.

Members will also know about the Government’s commitment to the family-nurse partnership programme, in which we will double the number of places to at least 13,000 by 2015. So there is a body of early work, and the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) again mentioned today the importance of even wider social initiatives, such as having more male teachers in primary schools and more role models for boys, and I agree with him on that.

We then get into the adolescent and predominantly male stage; we are talking mainly, although not exclusively, about young men. Members have referred to the Government’s initiative to reprioritise £10 million worth of funding to 29 areas, including areas here in London—every Member who has spoken in the debate, apart from me, represents a London constituency. At least half of that money, so at least £5 million, has been spent on grants that have been given to voluntary groups, and that is not the only funding that has been made available.

However, I should say that I do not think the Government’s commitment to tackling this issue is just measured by how much public spending is devoted to it. There are huge numbers of very good voluntary groups, such as cadets, scouts, sports clubs, church groups and others, that are run by people right across the country and that have a very big role to play in engaging young people and giving them meaningful activity that does not involve gang membership and violence. I therefore reject the notion that the Government’s commitment to the agenda is measured entirely by the amount of public money we spend.

Having said that, we are spending £3.75 million over two years on the communities against guns, gangs and knives programme, £4 million has been made available to voluntary and community organisations working directly in local communities, and—I was asked about this by the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field)—we are also providing £1.2 million over three years, starting this year, to improve services to girls at risk of being victims of gangs and sexual exploitation.

[Meg Hillier]

I have been in the Minister’s shoes, and I am a constituency MP with a strong interest in this matter. He has talked a lot about voluntary projects, but what the Home Office can do apart from providing some funds is rigorously to evaluate what works and to ensure that funding goes only to the projects that work. It should not be sprinkled so thinly that it has less impact than it ought to.

[Mr Browne]

We are keen to spend the money where it works most effectively. As has been pointed out, it is not just the Home Office that spends it; the Department for Work and Pensions has an innovation fund of £30 million, some of which is spent in this area, and there is another DWP project that helps prisoners on their release from prison. That matter was raised by a number of Members, including the right hon. Member for Tottenham.

The Ministry of Justice is leading some interesting pilot studies on payment by results, looking at how we can incentivise prisons more effectively to reduce the terrible reoffending rates, which the right hon. Gentleman mentioned. He also talked about work in young offenders institutions and adult prisons, and he specifically mentioned Feltham young offenders institution, which has joined together with the Islington youth offending team to deliver a specialist programme for gang members in custody. There is a lot of excellent work such as that, large parts of it directly supported, and in some cases funded, by central Government.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jeremy Browne and Meg Hillier

Monday 15th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Browne]

The House will not be surprised to learn that I strongly agree with my hon. Friend. Scrap metal theft is a serious crime that can have serious and expensive consequences, but Members in all parties will feel that when it involves the desecration of war memorials, particularly those relating to the two great wars of the past century, in which so many British and Commonwealth soldiers died, that is particularly offensive to our sensibilities. I very much hope that his private Member’s Bill, and other measures being taken by the Government, will help to address that appalling behaviour.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The theft of war memorials is a real problem, so what conversations is the Minister having with the taskforce chaired by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport on how the Departments can work together to tackle this problem further? I say that notwithstanding the excellent work being done by the hon. Member for Croydon South (Richard Ottaway).

[Mr Browne]

I am happy to have discussions with any parties that are interested in trying to ensure that we can make improvements, but I can tell the House that new measures will be introduced as early as 3 December to create a new criminal offence that prohibits cash payments in the purchase of scrap metal. We are putting a series of measures in place; we are not merely waiting for my hon. Friend’s private Member’s Bill to come into effect, which we hope will happen. We are acting more swiftly than that and I am keen to draw on support from all parties and none to try to ensure that we tackle this serious crime as effectively as possible.