Refugee Family Reunion Routes: Sudan

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Wednesday 29th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)]

I am grateful to have the opportunity to draw the House’s attention to the catastrophic situation in Sudan and to highlight the circumstances of the people in danger there, some of whom have family members recognised as refugees here in the United Kingdom. I hope to take this time to illustrate how the UK’s family reunion rules make it incredibly difficult for those individuals—most of them children—to join their family members here. Finally, I want to ask the Government to think again about how they apply the family reunion rules, given the horrendous circumstances that those individuals face, and to urge the Minister and his colleagues to think about a new approach to facilitate and support reunion with family members here rather than hindering it, as seems to be the case in too many instances.

I turn, first, to the circumstances in Sudan. What is unfolding there has been described by the United Nations as one of the

“worst humanitarian nightmares in recent history.”

Since fighting broke out between the Sudanese armed forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, more than 9,000 have been killed. Horrific reports of rape and sexual violence continue to emerge, and clashes are increasingly along ethnic lines, particularly in Darfur. Every hour children are killed, injured or abducted. Many hospitals have had to suspend operations; others have been bombed or turned into military bases.

Last month, the Minister for Africa said that the violence there bore

“all the hallmarks of ethnic cleansing”.

The fighting that commenced in mid-April has led to more than 1 million people fleeing Sudan altogether to neighbouring Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia, South Sudan and the Central African Republic. Meanwhile, more than 5 million have been forced from their homes, internally displaced within Sudan. Among those displaced are almost 1.5 million refugees and asylum seekers from other countries, who had already had to flee persecution in their home territories to Sudan, particularly Eritrean nationals. More than 6 million people are on the edge of famine, and more than 20 million face acute food insecurity. More than 4 million women and girls face the risk of gender-based violence, with limited or no access to protection services and support.

Against that background, I have had the pleasure of working with the Refugee and Migrant Forum of Essex and London—RAMFEL—which has a number of refugee clients here in the UK with family members stuck in Sudan who want to get here. Altogether, RAMFEL represents 14 individuals—a tiny sample of that country—who have been struggling to leave Sudan to join their family here. Seven months on from the start of the most recent conflict, only two have made it here so far. Of those two, one—a child—was successful only after an appeal. Of the 12 who have not yet made it here, all are children under 18. Ten are Eritrean, and two are Sudanese. Of those 12, eight are still in Sudan itself—children in a war zone, facing extreme danger. The other four have made it to neighbouring countries but, as we will see, they are not out of danger yet.

To all reasonable observers, given the circumstances of those children, reunion with their family members in the United Kingdom must be appropriate and the right thing to do. Is it not precisely for such situations that we have family reunion policies at all? Family reunion would provide a safe legal route to the UK, allowing both the individuals here and those coming here to get on with rebuilding their lives. It would remove any temptation to seek assistance from people smugglers—breaking the business model, to borrow that expression. Most fundamentally, those children would be safe.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Member for Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East (Stuart C. McDonald) on securing this debate—that constituency is quite a mouthful, and I hope I pronounced it right. He is at the fore in addressing this issue. In Sudan, 4.3 million people have been displaced, and 1.1 million are living in five neighbouring countries. The British Red Cross has been instrumental in reuniting more than 10,000 displaced people and their families. It can offer support with visa applications if the individual is based in London, Liverpool, Preston or Plymouth, according to its website. Does he agree that it is important to have visa assistance hubs throughout the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, with at least one for the devolved institutions in Northern Ireland.

[Stuart C. McDonald]

The hon. Gentleman makes perfect sense. Organisations such as the Red Cross and RAMFEL, which I have been working with on this topic, are fantastic. The more support we can give them and people across the United Kingdom, the better.

These are precisely the circumstances in which we should have refugee family reunion rules. I regret to report that, unfortunately, the rules and processes are making it harder for these people than it should be. In particular, while UK rules are pretty generous for spouses, partners and children—I acknowledge that—they are more restrictive for other categories of relative, including siblings. Most of the children I am talking about today have lost their parents, and it is an older sibling here in the UK that they are seeking to join.

Furthermore, the rules require enrolment of biometric information before an application will even be looked at. That means the children cannot even get over the starting line, because the visa application centre in Sudan, understandably, had to close after the outbreak of the conflict. If there is no way to safely provide biometric information, surely we should stop asking for it in advance?

I will set out precisely how the application of the family reunion rules and procedures has impacted on the children. I am using pseudonyms to protect the identity of individuals. Sixteen-year-old Adila fled to Sudan to escape persecution in Eritrea, including forced conscription into the army. As a lone 16-year-old girl in a war zone, she clearly faces significant risks. She has already been displaced from Khartoum to a city in eastern Sudan and is struggling severely with her mental health. She seeks family reunion with her older brother, who is a recognised refugee here in the UK. However, hers is one of a number of cases that cannot get off the ground because the Home Office insists she attends a visa application centre to enrol biometric information. The centre in Sudan is closed, so that would mean having to make an irregular and dangerous journey to a neighbouring country to do it there.

I acknowledge that the Home Office does consider applications to defer enrolment of biometric information until the person either arrives at or is at least en route to the UK, so that the application can proceed. But even a cursory look at the relevant policy document shows that it is only in very few circumstances indeed where the Home Office allows that to happen. When 16-year-old Adila asked to defer enrolment, she was refused that application. The Home Office said she had not proved her identity with reasonable certainty and asserted that having crossed one border irregularly—fleeing Eritrea to get to Sudan—she could obviously manage to do so again.

I do not believe that that is a fair approach to take to a 16-year-old girl in Sudan. Allowance has to be made for the fact that Eritrean refugees in Sudan will almost certainly not be able to produce passports. A degree of latitude is therefore required. The idea that because someone fled over a border in fear of persecution, they can just be called on to make another dangerous and irregular journey is in itself a dangerous idea. It rides a coach and horses through the Home Office’s own policy. It would not be worth the paper it is written on. If an unaccompanied 16-year-old girl in a war zone cannot avail herself of the deferral policy, who on earth can?

Seven of the other individuals are in a similar situation. They cannot apply because they are in Sudan and there is no place to go to enrol their biometric information. Even among those who have made it out of Sudan, similar issues can arise. For example, Fatima, a 15-year-old Eritrean girl, had originally made a family application to join her brother in the UK just prior to the outbreak of the war in Sudan. She had got as far as booking an appointment at the visa application centre in Khartoum. That, of course, had to be cancelled when the centre closed after the outbreak of fighting. Fatima ended up trafficked from Khartoum to South Sudan some weeks after the outbreak of war, and was released only on the payment of a ransom. She clearly remains at severe risk of kidnapping, sexual exploitation and all other manners of harm. There is no visa application centre in South Sudan, but again the Home Office refused to defer biometric enrolment.

RAMFEL asked the Home Office if, as an alternative, mobile biometric enrolment could take place—someone would travel to South Sudan from a regional VAC to take the biometrics there. If required, RAMFEL would offer to pay, but even that reasonable offer was refused. I ask the question again: if those circumstances do not merit the deferral of biometric enrolment or other compromise action, what on earth does?

UK Citizenship Test

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd November 2023 Westminster Hall

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the Life in the UK citizenship test.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I want first to talk about my constituent, Kate Jeffery. She is an Australian by birth, and she married her husband in Banbury in 1992. They returned to Australia shortly thereafter and then came back to the UK—her husband’s home—in 2017. They have settled here, and Kate has built her life here. I am happy to say that she has now decided to make North East Fife her home; it is a lovely home.

When the time came for Kate to apply for indefinite leave to remain, she did so on 26 April, almost eight months ago. In making that application, Kate also applied for an exemption from the “Life in the UK” test due to her dyslexia, which is so severe that it means she can never study for or take the test. She did this with the formal written support of her GP, which is no mean feat, considering the waiting time to see GPs these days.

This, sadly, is where things started to go wrong. In June, her exemption was refused on the grounds that GP support did not count as evidence of a diagnosis. Kate started to worry about her right to remain, so she reached out to my office for assistance, paid out of her own pocket for a private diagnosis and sought legal advice. Evidence in support of Kate’s application was sent by my office and her solicitor to the Home Office on multiple occasions between June and August, but no acknowledgment of receipt was provided, and there was no trace of that evidence when we rang for updates. We knew that at least one set of the documents was received—it was sent by recorded delivery—but still we had no progress.

After chasing throughout September, my office finally received notification on 25 September that the documents had been uploaded to the Home Office system on 15 August, so we all had a moment of temporary relief that this ongoing situation would be over. But, unbelievably, at the start of this month Kate was contacted by yet another caseworker at the Home Office who asked again for the same supporting documents to be sent. This is a farce and an utter failure, both in ensuring that leave to remain applications are dealt with consistently and in providing a basic good customer service level.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Lady for bringing this debate forward. Many people have described the UK citizenship test as a “bad pub quiz”. The questions asked are incredible, and many people born British would not even pass the test, including you and I, Sir Christopher. Does the hon. Lady agree that for someone to understand our United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, we need to focus more questions on the inclusion of the devolved institutions, such as the operation of governmental systems and how they support integration and community in the UK? She is outlining her constituent’s case very well.

[Wendy Chamberlain]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for his intervention. I will come on to speak about the House of Lords Justice and Home Affairs Committee report last year and the Government’s commitment to review the test, but I agree: there should not be a test of history or obscure facts. It should be a test that helps people who are applying for British citizenship or indefinite leave to remain to better integrate into UK society.

As the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) said, we know that the “Life in the UK” test has serious flaws, and the Home Office knows it too, because of the inquiry I referenced by the House of Lords Committee, which concluded in June last year. Accessibility of the test for applicants with long-term physical and mental conditions, like Kate, was one of the specific issues highlighted. The Committee found that the threshold for exemption from the test is very high. That is understandable, but although the Government claim to have adaptations available to accommodate individuals, no information on those adaptations is available to applicants. Worryingly, although the purpose of the test is to promote social cohesion, all it does is test people’s ability to learn and repeat a lot of information. Many people struggle with that, and when we talk about education, we say it is a bad thing.

The Government’s response has been disappointing. In response to the House of Lords Committee’s report, they gave a letter from the former Minister with responsibility for safe and legal immigration simply stating that test applications are driven by candidate requests, rather than the other way round. In the first instance, that might sound positive: “We don’t constrain you; you tell us what you need.” But—and it is a big but—for those who are not familiar with the system, who are scared of losing their right to be here and who already face barriers to the process as a result of their disability, all that does is put up another barrier. Instead of making it easier for people with disabilities, the Government are making it harder because of that disability. It is completely subjective and dependent on a logical Home Office case handling process that, as I have outlined, does not seem to exist.

Illegal Migration

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Tuesday 24th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. It is undoubtedly true that communities with fewer hotels have fewer public services. It is harder for people to get around because public transport is weaker. It is therefore more impactful when the Home Office takes hotels in such places, and we should consider that as we proceed to exit hotels.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I welcome the Minister’s statement and his determination to deliver solutions. It is clear from what he says that solutions are coming. I welcome the news this morning of the intention to cut the costly hotel bills, but will the Minister clarify whether that is because we are sending unsuccessful applicants somewhere else, and if so, where they are going? It cannot be a case of cutting hotel bills while increasing council costs by the same amount. Will the Minister also confirm that local women and children will be prioritised in housing over any young, healthy, single illegal migrant male?

[Robert Jenrick]

I share my hon. Friend’s sentiment and conviction. Of course we should be a decent, generous and compassionate country to those coming here from places of peril, but we also have to prioritise the interests of British taxpayers. We should not be elevating the interests of illegal migrants over those of the communities we are sent here to serve. Those who are granted asylum have access to the benefits system and they can work. We should all encourage them to do so and to integrate into British society.

Hate Crime Against the LGBT+ Community

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Wednesday 18th October 2023 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the matter of hate crime against the LGBT+ community.

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Cummins. I sincerely thank all colleagues present for attending today’s debate. I draw attention to my membership of the all-party parliamentary group on global LGBT+ rights, my role as co-chair of the LGBT+ parliamentary Labour party and, sadly, my own experience as a victim of LGBT+ hate crime.

I begin by thanking Stonewall, Galop and many other national organisations that speak up on these issues. Locally, in my constituency, I think of groups such as Pride Cymru and Glitter Cymru. I also want to mention the LGBT+ Safe Spaces venues, from our clubs and pubs to inclusive religious venues, and places such as the Queer Emporium in Cardiff, not to mention their brave security staff and managers, for all they do to keep our communities safe and welcome.

The fact is that, despite all the legal progress we have made in this country and the rapidly changing and welcome debate, particularly among younger generations, this is a perilous and profoundly uncertain time for the LGBT+ community in the UK. I would never seek to downplay the even worse threats of death and violence, let alone the absence of basic legal rights in many other contexts globally, but I can genuinely say that we are not in a good place here and things are getting worse.

That view is not just anecdotal. It is borne out by clear evidence and trends that I will come on to, and is sadly borne out by the stark, horrific reality that we saw in the homophobic murder of kind, compassionate Dr Gary Jenkins in my city of Cardiff in 2021. We can all think back to the horrors of the Admiral Duncan bombing in 1999 and the Stephen Port murders in 2014 to 2015 in east London, and all the failures around how that case was handled.

We are all aware of ongoing and more recent incidents, but I am conscious of the House sub judice rule and I will, therefore, refrain from commenting on a number of them. I know that colleagues will want to take particular care on that matter.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Gentleman for bringing this matter forward. Unfortunately, I cannot stay for the debate; I have already informed the hon. Gentleman that I have a prior appointment. As someone interested in human rights issues, I want to put on the record my condemnation of those who carry out hate crimes against anybody, wherever that happens. I fully support what the hon. Gentleman is putting forward, which I want to put on the record.

[Stephen Doughty]

I thank the hon. Member for his support, which is genuinely welcome. The cross-party group that we have here today reflects the wide concern across the House at recently released statistics.

I will refer to my own experiences, which are sadly all too common for others. I have been assaulted with a homophobic element in my own constituency in broad daylight. I have been told online by somebody that he would sort me and my issues out while I was at football, while posting pictures of me dressed up at Pride. I have been called a “faggot” while walking along Queen Street in Cardiff. Like many other members of the community, I have worried whether it is safe to kiss my boyfriend or hold his hand on the bus or the tube. Even as a parliamentarian on an overseas trip, I was told to my face that people like me are detested.

In National Hate Crime Awareness Week, rather than belittling the impact of hate crime or suggesting that it is a “woke” irrelevance, it is critical that we look into the impact that attacks are having on the community, across the country, against people who just want to love who they love, live as themselves and get on with their daily lives. In the UK in 2023, the place of LGBT+ people in society, and their safety and wellbeing—is it really such a difficult thing to ask?—simply should not be contested notions, be up for debate or, worse, lead to violence, intimidation or assault; and yet here we are.

Safe Asylum Routes: Afghan Refugees

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Tuesday 17th October 2023 Westminster Hall

[Robert Jenrick]

In a moment, I will come to the specific question around the numbers and how they relate to both British Council workers and GardaWorld employees. If time allows, I will come on to my hon. Friend’s question about the limiting factor of accommodation as well. Clearly, it is a significant challenge for us. The primary responsibility rests with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and the Ministry of Defence. The Ministry of Defence in particular is responsible for bringing forward service family accommodation and ensuring that it is available and of a suitable quality, so that once families have been granted their visas, they can come to the UK safe in the knowledge that they will have somewhere to stay, rather than being housed in a hotel, which I think we all agree is an unsatisfactory way for anyone to live for a prolonged period and which we have consciously moved away from. My hon. Friend will have seen the effort to which the Government went in the first half of this year to close the hotels that were housing 8,000 Afghans who had arrived around the time of Operation Pitting.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

The Minister will be aware of the case, which I brought to his and the Secretary of State’s attention, of the gentleman who worked in the British Army alongside one of my constituents. He had to leave Afghanistan and live under threat in Pakistan with his wife and four children. We are keen to get him back to Northern Ireland—to Newtownards, to be specific. There is a job and house waiting for him; all we have to do is get him there, because he served our country. I gently remind the Minister that we still await a successful outcome for that gentleman.

[Robert Jenrick]

Let me make some progress, if I may, and I will return to those colleagues who wish to intervene. To address the hon. Member’s point, we sympathise deeply with the situation that many Afghans find themselves in, including those who are suffering because of their work in standing up for human rights and the rule of law, as well as those, such as women and girls and members of minority groups, who are facing wider persecution at the hands of the Taliban. Those are the reasons why we as a country have made the commitments that we have, and it is critical that we continue to deliver on those. The Government remain absolutely committed to the people of Afghanistan and the schemes that we established in the immediate aftermath of the fall of Kabul.

Since June 2021, around 24,600 people affected by events in Afghanistan have been brought to safety in the UK. They include British nationals and their families, Afghans who loyally served the UK and others identified as particularly at risk, such as campaigners for women’s rights, human rights defenders, journalists, judges and members of the LGBT+ community. The number includes 7,000 individuals brought to safety after Operation Pitting. Because of the various ways in which cohorts are defined, detailed international comparisons have to be made with some caution, but on most measures the figure is significantly more than the numbers brought to safety by many of our European neighbours. I stress that this is not just about the number of Afghans who have arrived in the UK, but about the manner in which we support those people in order to integrate them into the United Kingdom and ensure that they can begin to establish themselves here and lead fulfilling lives.

Dangerous Drugs

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Tuesday 12th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

I do not agree that the amendment is tinkering; it is an important measure, as I will outline in just a moment. On action against drug abuse more generally, we have a whole 10-year drug strategy that we are a year and a half into. It includes tough enforcement at the border and action to disrupt criminal gangs who deal drugs—we had a record level of drug seizures recently. In addition, we are investing record sums in drug treatment—£582 million extra over a three-year period—and increasing the number of treatment places by 54,000, so there is a comprehensive programme of work, both on enforcement to break drug importation and drug gangs, and, critically, on treatment to help people out of addiction and into a better life.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Minister for clearly outlining the Government’s intentions. The amendment deals very specifically with nitrous oxide, and I welcome it. The Government have recognised the need to make changes. I would like more stringent drug controls—as, I think, would the Minister—but, bearing in mind the Government’s intentions, and the intention of some Members to divide the House, can the Minister confirm that the amendment will not place more onerous conditions on those who need to use nitrous oxide, such as dentists? Will they be outside its scope? At the same time, the need for the law is clear.

[Chris Philp]

Yes, I can provide that assurance. I will expand on this later, but those who are using nitrous oxide for legitimate purposes, which includes the catering industry, the dental sector, research and even semiconductor manufacture, will be outside the scope of these restrictions.

The hon. Gentleman touched on the control of harmful drugs more generally. It is important to control harmful drugs, particularly where they are very addictive and cause health harms. We have seen in cities in North America that have liberalised their drug laws substantially, such as San Francisco, Portland and some Canadian cities, that it has resulted in widescale public health problems.

At-risk Academics: UK Support

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Tuesday 12th September 2023 Westminster Hall

[Sir Julian Lewis]

I entirely agree with everything the right hon. Member says, and I told a special adviser before the debate that I would be mentioning this case. I understand that there has been a statement of concern from four countries—the US, the UK, France and Germany—about this case, and I hope that those in power in Azerbaijan will take the representations seriously.

My first contact with Cara came during the fall of Kabul in 2021, when a constituent sought my help to bring her sister-in-law, an academic opposed to the Taliban, to safety in the UK and to a Cara fellowship at the University of Southampton. The task was neither quick nor easy, but it ended successfully with Cara’s help. It is a pleasure to see the executive director of Cara, Stephen Wordsworth, present at the debate today. I am grateful to him and his organisation for all they did for my constituent’s sister-in-law.

Since then, I have drawn attention to Cara’s work several times and was pleased to table early-day motion 1188 in May, with the backing of 20 more MPs on both sides of the House, to mark the anniversary of its 1933 founding statement. That success for my constituent was just one of hundreds of cases with which Cara is dealing. The charity has steadily built up its support network of UK universities and research institutes, now numbering 135. Most of them host a Cara fellow, often several, and act as their visa sponsors.

The House should note that Cara fellows come on regular visas, not as asylum seekers, and, to their great credit, the supporting universities usually cover much or all of the cost of each placement. Thanks to that support, some 170 academics from all around the world are safe with their families on Cara fellowship placements in the UK. At any given time the Cara team are working to help place dozens more, while other new applications are being carefully sifted and assessed. Many of them will soon lead to successful placements. For each one who comes, however, another will apply and will deserve help.

We talk often about attracting the best and the brightest to this country. With the generous support of the UK’s universities and research institutes, Cara plays a crucial part in this endeavour—but with the important difference that were it not for Cara, these highly talented people would in many cases be destitute, locked up, badly injured or even dead. The work is painstaking and unrelenting, and it is carried out by just 14 people. The hope is always that Cara fellows will one day be able to go home safely, and some do, with individuals recently returning to Syria, Yemen, Ukraine, Turkey, Iraq, Palestine and Azerbaijan, which we just mentioned in another context. Others, however, must continue to wait. I could provide dozens of examples but shall limit myself to just a few. For their safety and that of their relatives and friends still in their home countries, some of the names are pseudonyms.

Naila was an accomplished academic in Yemen in the field of public health. When she first contacted Cara, she was living with her husband and a young child. They were under siege and fearing for their lives. With Cara’s support, she secured a placement at Cambridge University, where she now works on a global talent visa.

Nadiya, a Ukrainian academic with vast international experience in civic education and citizenship linguistics, was forced to flee Ukraine with her 12-year-old daughter after Russia’s invasion. Cara helped her to secure a visiting research fellowship at the department of education at Oxford, where she is now continuing her research.

Wynne was a renowned environmental researcher and activist in Myanmar with over 30 years’ experience, who sought Cara’s help after the 2021 military coup. He is now a visiting fellow at Oxford, researching drought and water insecurity.

Oleksandra was a professor of economics in Kyiv. She left with her daughter after Russia’s invasion and is now a visiting researcher at the London School of Economics.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the right hon. Gentleman for bringing this issue forward. He always bring good things to Westminster Hall, but also to the main Chamber. Since 2022, over 100 Ukrainian academics have been supported to settle in the UK with British Academy and Cara at-risk fellowships. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that we, as a compassionate and generous country, should continue to ensure that those academics from Ukraine are supported in their careers, and that this approach must also extend to the likes of women in Afghanistan, who deserve the very same treatment?

Prevent: Independent Review

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Thursday 7th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Suella Braverman]

It is not right to say that Prevent is anti-Muslim. Prevent is about ensuring that Islamism, extremism, radicalisation and violent ideology about hatred, evil and values totally at odds with ours are stamped out. The vast majority of British Muslims make a valuable contribution to the UK, but we must be courageous in calling out permissive environments and tolerance for extremism among some parts of our community. That requires a fearless approach, one that is not cowed by political correctness or fear of upsetting particular groups in the name of community cohesion. If we want to save lives, we need to take a united approach, but a robust and fearless one to calling out Islamism when we see it.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Home Secretary for her statement, and for the strength of character and delivery of purpose as well. She referred to discussions about possible support for Scotland. She is right to be strong on radicalisation. Steps have been taken to combat that in Northern Ireland, where the rewriting of history is leading to the glorifying of terrorism for a new generation—that must be combatted. Will she confirm the effectiveness of Prevent in all areas of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

[Suella Braverman]

As I mentioned when we refreshed our Contest strategy, we are seeing a concerning level of terrorism related to Northern Ireland. That is a very sorry reflection of unacceptable behaviour, which must be condemned in the strongest possible terms. Our agencies work UK-wide and we are always working closely with the Police Service of Northern Ireland and other authorities at the local level, to ensure that all leads are followed in the fullest possible way and measures are put in place to mitigate risks as they emerge. However, as we saw earlier this year, that threat is a concern and we must remain vigilant to it.

Contest: UK Strategy for Countering Terrorism 2023

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Wednesday 19th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Suella Braverman]

As I said, general ideologies are set out in our Prevent approach and our Contest approach. We are actor-agnostic, but we note where these threats are emerging based on a casework analysis, as confirmed by MI5 and other agencies. The predominant threats relate to Islamist terrorism, but of course it is right that there are robust law-enforcement responses for any kind of violence or extremism that meets the criminal threshold.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I welcome very much the Secretary of State’s answers to the questions posed. Further to the question from the hon. Member for North Down (Stephen Farry), will she outline what steps have been taken to allocate additional funding to local police forces in areas with higher threat levels such as Northern Ireland, where republican terrorism is a real threat to the democratic process? Bearing in mind that the police budget in Northern Ireland has been cut in real terms in a time of crisis, will she confirm what discussions have taken place with the Chief Constable and the Policing Board to ensure that the commitment to ringfencing funding for the battle against terrorism in all of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is maintained?

[Suella Braverman]

I made some reference to the specific nature of the threat posed by Northern Ireland-related terrorism. It is clear that it is primarily concentrated and directed against targets in Northern Ireland. I regularly discuss with UK Government colleagues how we can ensure robust defences across the whole piece, but I am happy to see what more can be done through a conversation.

Retail Crime

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Wednesday 19th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Ian Paisley]

I thank the hon. Member for raising that point. The protection of workers is very important to us all—I suppose we could all recount stories where members of staff in high street shops have been verbally or physically abused. That has to be taken seriously. Of course, with crime increasing, the availability of cash has also depleted. ATMs have moved inside shops and away from banks because banks on the high street have closed, and consumers are now charged for taking their money out of those cash machines. All those knock-on effects have an impact on retail trade and crime up and down the country. Those matters will bear heavily on shops.

I want to put that statistic on record again: retail crime costs the UK economy £1.9 billion a year, and it costs businesses about £600 million a year—over half a billion pounds—to put protections in place. Retailers across the UK report that one of the biggest threats to their businesses is customer theft, which comes as no surprise. Customer theft affects the productivity and competitiveness of smaller shops, not least because if those shops make a claim against their insurance, their premiums increase. Because they are working on margins of 4% to 5%, any theft impacts the profitability of a business. So a shopkeeper or retailer is actually discouraged from claiming off their insurance, which is there to protect them from this, because it will have such an impact on their profit margin that it could ultimately put them out of business, and that matter is incredibly important.

Of course, we all know that the cost of living crisis means that more people are desperate, and despair can cause desperate measures. However, that cannot mean people have free rein. On that point, I for one will not draw a distinction in saying that, because there is a cost of living crisis, that will make people want to steal. That is not the nature of the average citizen in this kingdom. The average citizens in this kingdom are good people and they want to do good things. But there are increasing pressures that drive other people to crime and I think we have to be very clear about that. The cost of living crisis is affecting everyone and it is affecting shops. More people have less to spend and, if retail crime is left unchecked, businesses will just buckle and fold.

Retailers do take responsibility and arm themselves against this type of crime by investing in loss prevention measures, as the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier) has said. Loss prevention measures include CCTV, special mirrors, panic alarms, shutters, high-value items secured behind counters and overhead gantries. However, many independent businesses do not have the financial capability or the size of store to invest in the same way that large national chain companies are able to do and that have a physical security presence. Even if they do, the £1.9 billion cost is passed on to the consumers. Again, that highlights that this will drive the cost of living crisis even further, so it is a vicious circle. We in this House have an opportunity to challenge it and I hope the Minister, through his actions—I know that the Minister is committed to this—has the ability to help to break that vicious chain.

In addition to the financial loss, there is also the emotional impact. If the shop worker is unable to go back to work after they have been verbally abused, spat at or physically abused, that has a dire impact on the economy of that family or of those people. The fact is that 47% of retailers have reported that vulnerable customers are not visiting their shops at night due to the fear of crime, which again reduces their ability to participate in the community, because shops are about community. They are about the high street flourishing and about people within the community meeting and greeting, and engaging in business.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

First, can I congratulate my honourable colleague and good friend? He is right to outline all the things that shops can do in relation to, No. 1, safety for their workers and, No. 2, safety for their customers. I have been the representative for Strangford in this House since 2010, but I was a Member of the Legislative Assembly before that and a councillor. Over those years, I have watched the shops in my constituency and seen shop workers who have been verbally abused, who have been attacked with knives and who have had to call the police after having been beaten up in their shops. Yet, with all the precautions that are taken in a shop, and it is right to take those precautions, it only ever works if the police are accessible, and the problem for us in many cases is that the police are so busy that they are not able to attend incidents in shops at the time when the people need them to be there. CCTV can retain the evidence, but the police need to be there. Has my hon. Friend experienced that in his constituency as well?

[Ian Paisley]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. I think he has over 26 or 27 years of elected experience between these two bodies, and with that on Ards Council, over 30. I think it is telling that he has probably, like me, seen an increase in this and an increase in the threats to shops. Of course, that has been impacted by the things I mentioned earlier: the change in shopping habits with online shopping and therefore the inability sometimes to invest in some of these issues.

Everyone who works in a shop has the right to feel safe behind their counter and that their livelihood is not under threat. That is why I am pleased to be a co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on retail crime, safe and sustainable high streets and to be leading on this debate and pushing the matter forward. We want to ensure that high streets remain at the heart of our community, but unless shop theft is regarded as a serious crime, it will continue to grow. We need to flag up that this is not shoplifting and this is not petty; it is serious and at times organised and it must be addressed. We are talking here about serious and organised crime: this is a serious crime and we must deal with it.

I went through the history of parliamentary questions asked on this issue. From the response to a written question by the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) to the Ministry of Justice in 2018 we learned that a perpetrator of retail crime would, appallingly, have to be convicted 30 times before they were given a custodial sentence, up from 27 in 2017. In 2016, one offender received their first custodial sentence after—wait for it—435 previous offences; in 2017, the figure was 279 previous offences, and in 2018 it was 287 previous offences. For a prolific daily offender it took hundreds and hundreds of offences before they received a custodial sentence. What message does that send out to the kleptomaniac and the person who says, “I just need that item”? It sends the message that they will probably get away with it.

That is not good enough, and this issue is not being treated seriously enough. It is therefore no surprise that according to the British Retail Consortium only 15% of shoplifting crime is reported, and a majority of businesses—over 56%—say that they believe the police operate “poorly” or “very poorly” when dealing with retail crime. I understand that. I deal with the police regularly in my constituency, and this refers to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). Talking exclusively about Northern Ireland, when police budgets have been driven down and when the chief constable rightly puts out the message that people will notice the lack of policing because those budgets have been driven down, this sort of crime is only going to go one way—up. I know the situation in England and Wales is slightly different because the police here have been given additional support, which is very welcome. I would love for that support to be cross-applied to Northern Ireland. I have deliberately not made this debate specifically on Northern Ireland because that would let the Government take the easy path of saying that calling the Assembly back would lead to this being sorted out. That is not the resolution, however; this is about budgetary support from the Home Office for policing. We do not have that support and we require it.

So what needs to happen? All of this means that the retail industry feels largely unprotected. Unfortunately, that is the case across the entire country. From Abbott’s in Devon to Mackays of Cambridge and across to Fermanagh in Ulster, many members of the British Independent Retail Association have been campaigning on retail crime and have given evidence directly to the Home Office on this issue. They have found that, even with video evidence, there just is not the interest or imperative for some of the authorities some of the time to get involved. They feel ignored and let down. We must address that, because it is not in the interests of us as lawmakers or of those of us who want this country to flourish. We want to make sure that the law is seen to apply, is seen to apply fairly and, where it has to be, is seen to apply strictly and to punish people engaged in this crime.

Reductions in resources available to police forces are undoubtedly posing challenges, but, more pertinently, there is still a lack of consistency in responses to retail crime across the country. This has not happened by introducing the crazy £200 arbitrary figure that the Government set in the guidelines to the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, which advises police forces that they do not need to respond if the value stolen was below that figure. A written question from the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Mr Robertson), who is a fellow vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on retail crime, safe and sustainable high streets, showed that the percentage of shop thefts dealt with by the justice system stands at 13%, down from 36%. That is simply not acceptable and I hope the Minister agrees.

Prosecuting shoplifting needs to be quicker, easier and cheaper from the point of view of police forces and retailers. With the use of compelling CCTV evidence and technology, processes can and should be modernised to increase the conviction rate. At the moment, data protection often means that shoplifters are protected from identification, even though they are a danger to the public and other retail businesses. That needs to change. I am not saying that we need to put “wanted” posters up all over the country, but sometimes we feel like that when we know that a particular person in our village or high street is a menace. In the town of Ballymena, the shops have a radio connection so that when certain people are seen in the town it goes around like wildfire: “So-and-so’s in the town today. Try to prevent them coming into your shop and, more importantly, be alert and make sure they don’t do it.”

When an arrest is made, the punishment must reflect the seriousness of the crime. With that in mind, it would be much better if part of the process for reporting this type of crime was a mandatory victim impact statement so the court can hear the dilemma shop owners and shopworkers are placed in and the pain they feel. It would help to ensure that criminals are more likely to get the sentence they deserve if the real impact of their crime is laid before the courts and the judge hears the impact it has had on the community. All retail crime needs to be treated seriously. We need to expunge the words, “This is just shoplifting”. It is not. That phrase has to be removed from our lexicon. That type of terminology implies that it is somehow less of a crime and not as important.

I will leave those thoughts with the Minister. I understand that the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) wishes to make a contribution. He spoke to me earlier behind Mr Speaker’s Chair and I am more than happy to agree to that. In conclusion, this is an important issue on which we can have cross-party co-operation. Let us show retailers that that is the case and implement these simple solutions that will help our retailers live and thrive, and help the high street thrive again.