Community Policing: Government Support

Debate between Jess Brown-Fuller and Chris Coghlan

Wednesday 21st October 2026 Westminster Hall

[Jess Brown-Fuller]

My hon. Friend pre-empts one of the things that I will call for later in my speech.

Antisocial behaviour is happening in all corners of the country. In Chichester, I am seeing it in the balaclava-clad young men riding e-bikes at terrifying speeds along pedestrian streets or pavements, the people feeling intimidated and threatened when they are out in the evening, the growing use of catapults to harm wildlife or the shoplifting epidemic that plagues our local businesses. It is seen across my constituency, whether in the city centre, the town of Selsey, Westhampnett or the Witterings. Charity venues have told me about young men forcing entry and threatening their volunteers or elderly members of the public who have gone along to watch a film. Another constituent told me that the local bowls club is struggling to retain members after some were hit with ball bearings that were being shot at pigeons.

Today’s debate is on community policing. Much of that antisocial behaviour is driven by a lack of visible policing in areas like mine.

[Chris Coghlan (Dorking and Horley) (LD)]

I thank my hon. Friend for calling this important debate. In my constituency, we have a serious problem with antisocial motorbike noise from modified exhausts. Does she agree that we should have more public spaces protection orders to help the police enforce against antisocial behaviour, and funding for trials of acoustic cameras to try to stop this?

[Jess Brown-Fuller]

I thank my hon. Friend for his important intervention. I agree that we need more access to things like PSPOs, but there is an acute challenge in actually policing the PSPOs that we manage to get in place. That was a suggestion that we had to cull the wildlife crime that we were seeing locally, but the police rightly said that a PSPO is effective only if there are police to manage it.

This is not the fault of local police officers—they are diligent, well trained and dedicated to keeping our communities safe, but they are also asked to achieve the impossible. The Government’s neighbourhood policing guarantee makes all the right noises about ensuring that policing is local, but in coastal and rural areas such as mine, it is near impossible to have a meaningful presence in the huge areas they are asked to cover. Selsey has nearly 11,000 residents, and the number nearly doubles in the summer months thanks to tourism, but the area does not magically get any additional policing during that time.

SEND Provision and Reform

Debate between Jess Brown-Fuller and Chris Coghlan

Monday 13th April 2026 Commons Chamber

[Chris Coghlan (Dorking and Horley) (LD)]

I first want to address the comments from the right hon. Member for Salisbury (John Glen). I have enormous respect for him, but his underlying argument is flawed, because there is the same number of SEND children now as there was in 2010 and in 1978. The question is why the number fell so much up to 2016 and then rose, and I would suggest that the answer probably has something to do with the scrapping of Sure Start by my party and his, but that is for another day.

One month ago a SEN dad messaged me on Facebook about his autistic son, who has been out of school for seven years, with his tribunal delayed three times. He said that his son will now be out of education and employment for the rest of his life. He said that his son had been “left to rot” by his local authority and the NHS. I wrote to him to say how sorry I was. I suggested how he could get help and put him in touch with his MP, but then two weeks ago he wrote to me again. He said:

“My son is very unwell, and I can no longer carry on. I am mentally and physically exhausted, and I am electing to end my life. I intend to find peace. I simply cannot continue, and I refuse to see my son deteriorate further. There will be no one to care for him, so now the NHS will have to care for my son.”

We called 999 immediately, and the emergency services sent an ambulance.

We have seen too many families like this. I presented to the Government and published in The Times evidence that hundreds of SEND children are avoidably killing themselves due to public authority negligence. ITV has published evidence of misconduct and law breaking on SEND by 117 local authorities. I believe that the Government are serious about SEND reform, and I am grateful to the Minister for coming to Dorking tomorrow to meet Surrey SEND families, but family after family has testified to me that the legal rights that the Government are seeking to reduce can be the difference between life and death.

When a council officer determines that a child does not need an EHCP when they know that that child does in fact need an EHCP, that is serious misconduct. We know that this is happening on a massive scale because families win the resulting tribunals 98% of the time. Councils are betting that they can save money because the families are too exhausted to take them to tribunal. Children are killing themselves as a result.

Under-resourcing is no excuse.

[Jess Brown-Fuller (Chichester) (LD)]

My hon. Friend mentions under-resourcing. At West Sussex county council, the department just put an answerphone message on its system saying, “We are overwhelmed. We cannot take any calls today.” Does he agree that the parents who are navigating the system and often describe it as a “fight” do not have the opportunity just to put their answerphone on or not show up for their kids that day because they are overwhelmed, and that we need to do far more for them?

[Chris Coghlan]

I entirely agree. An under-resourced officer can still determine need, still issue an EHCP and still be transparent about what cannot yet be delivered. That, at least, is honest.

I know that many council officers do the right thing, but when a council officer commits misconduct that results in an avoidable death, why are they not criminally prosecuted? Here we are, with pervasive local authority law breaking, hundreds of children avoidably killing themselves, and a Government who plan to cut the rights that can save their lives.