The Riots

Jonathan Evans Excerpts

Thursday 13th October 2011 Westminster Hall

[Gavin Barwell]

I will come on to sentencing in a second, but anyone under the illusion that those crimes were victimless should consider the experience in Croydon. As I am sure the right hon. Member for Croydon North will say, the devastated shops were not those of the major multinational businesses but of small businesses—family businesses on one premises—often owned by members of the black and minority ethnic community. The crimes were absolutely not victimless.

As of 10 October, 2,819 arrests had been made throughout London and 1,700 people charged. The cost of that operation so far to the police in Croydon is £1.4 million. Clearly, the police face a difficult time on budgets, so who will pay for that? On 11 August, the Prime Minister said on the Floor of the House:

“the bill for the Metropolitan police force for the past few days will be large and, if they continue to deploy in those numbers, it will get larger and the Treasury will stand behind that.”—[Official Report, 11 August 2011; Vol. 531, c. 1065.]

There is still uncertainty in the Metropolitan police about where the money is coming from, and I hope that the Minister will provide reassurance.

[Jonathan Evans (Cardiff North) (Con)]

As well as the policing costs, under the Riot (Damages) Act 1886 responsibility for uninsured losses falls on police authorities. Even if insurance claims are paid, the insurers who have paid may recover their loss from the police authorities. Two days ago, in the House, that figure was estimated to be £330 million. Does that not add some force to my hon. Friend’s point?

[Gavin Barwell]

My hon. Friend has real expertise in the area and he makes a powerful point. We need reassurance on both those issues. I will now make some progress, if hon. Members will permit me, because I want to allow time for everyone present to speak in the debate.

The Metropolitan police estimates that in London alone there are more than 20,000 hours of closed-circuit TV to view. That gives rise to a lesson and to a question. The lesson is the importance of CCTV. There are legitimate civil liberties concerns—no Member would want our country covered in surveillance cameras—but CCTV has played a crucial role in bringing people guilty of offences to justice. I was much encouraged that on 11 August the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary made more positive noises about the contribution that CCTV can make. I understand why the Government wish to ensure that, when a system is introduced, the proper checks are made, but I will be grateful to hear from the Minister that the Government recognise the important contribution that CCTV can make to deterring crime and catching criminals.

My question concerns the police estimate that it will take nearly 12 months to review the remaining evidence. The Government must ask whether it is reasonable for such a review to take that long. If not, the Met police will need assistance from outside London, not to patrol the streets as they did in the immediate aftermath of the riots, but to get through all the evidence.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)]

It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Ms Clark. This has been a very interesting and important debate, and I warmly congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell) on securing it and on the very thoughtful, measured and constructive tone he adopted, as did the other hon. Members who spoke. I recognise that not every hon. Member has had the chance to say all that they would wish to, but I will do my best to do justice to the comments that have been made. If I run out of time and do not manage to do so, I will write to hon. Members to deal with any outstanding matters.

As hon. Members said, we are some two months on from the riots and it has rightly been observed that they were on an unprecedented scale. Some 4,700 people had been arrested by the end of September. That compares with 82 arrests after the 1981 riots in Brixton. All of us will have seen shocking scenes, the details of which were relayed by hon. Members today. The whole country has rightly expressed its abhorrence of what happened, and hon. Members are right to do so today.

Some 1,800 businesses were affected during the four or five days of the riots, and 174 residential properties were affected, resulting in 167 households being displaced. Some 16,000 police officers were deployed on the streets of London alone from 9 August. That demonstrates the ability to surge the numbers—an increase of 10,000 officers from the day before.

My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister gave a commitment in his statement to the House of Commons that the Government would

“help you repair the damage, get your businesses back up and running and support your communities.”—[Official Report, 11 August 2011; Vol. 531, c. 1053.]

I shall tell hon. Members how we are seeking to do that. By working with our partners, we want to help communities and businesses to get back to normal, restore footfall, restore pride in high streets as shopping and leisure areas, and help those most seriously affected.

The day after the Prime Minister’s statement, Ministers from the Home Office, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, the Ministry of Justice and I updated hon. Members on the Government’s multi-million pound support package to overcome the immediate recovery issues that those affected were facing. That was followed up with a “one month on” update sent to all English MPs, which was placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

Ministers visited hard-hit areas. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government spoke by telephone to the mayor of Hackney. I have had one subsequent meeting with him, and our chief executive has met theirs and they will continue to meet. I was in the constituency of the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford), seeing the businesses affected there. I went to see the 38 affected in my own constituency, in the town centre of Bromley, and like many other hon. Members, I viewed the CCTV footage. An inter-ministerial recovery group, chaired by the Secretary of State, has been set up to support business and community recovery on the ground.

[Jonathan Evans]

The Minister knows that I mentioned that I chaired the all-party group meeting with leading figures from the insurance industry two days ago. They were concerned that the insurance industry should be involved in the regeneration efforts. That was successfully achieved in Cockermouth, where communities ended up with something better than they started with. That would go some way towards meeting the objective to which the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) referred.

[Robert Neill]

Yes, the involvement of the business community, including the insurance sector, has been discussed. We are in contact with them, and I am sure that we will be able to take that forward. For example, the quality of shutters that are put up by way of replacement can be an enhancement. That is one thing that has already been very much on the agenda.

Hon. Members have talked about how the riots occurred. I hope that they will forgive me if I do not go into too much detail about that but concentrate on the response. Whatever the circumstances surrounding the death of Mark Duggan, to which the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) referred, and whatever the circumstances that led to that, I think we all agree that what happened later had little to do with it and was fuelled overwhelmingly by greed, deliberate thuggery and opportunistic or sometimes—I have to say, having seen the videos from my area—planned criminality. There is no excuse for that. Sadly, lives were destroyed, along with homes and livelihoods. We have heard about instances of businesses that had been going for years being put out of business. The loss of life—five lives in all—can be fairly connected with that.

It is good to be able to say that a response is already taking place. The fancy dress shop in Battersea that was ruined in the riots is now trading next door to its original building. Duncan Mundell, the proprietor, is opening an additional outlet in the Debenhams store opposite. He is building up his Hallowe’en trade.