Electronic Tagging

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Thursday 11th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

This is a shocking statement and I believe that the Lord Chancellor has acted swiftly and decisively in dealing with the issue. G4S should never have got another Government contract after the shambles of the Olympics. G4S and Serco hold 17 contracts worth £118 million with the Home Office, and although I accept what the Lord Chancellor has done in referring G4S to the Serious Fraud Office and the police, I think he should have done the same to Serco. When its chief executive appeared before the Home Affairs Committee on 25 June, he said that he did not believe that Serco had overcharged. The right hon. Gentleman is right to have acted as he did, but he should not take a different approach to Serco. We need the high-risk register that the Home Affairs Committee recommended after the Olympics. That register should be held by the Cabinet Office, and any company that has failed the taxpayer should be on it and should not get another contract.

[Chris Grayling]

Let me be clear about the different treatment of G4S and Serco. I have followed the legal advice I received very closely, and the right hon. Gentleman and all Members of the House would expect me to follow such advice in the interests of the taxpayer and the Government. I have done that, and the approach I have chosen follows closely the legal advice I received. I would not expect any Member of this House to expect me to do otherwise.

As for how the Cabinet Office approaches contracting, my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office, who is sitting next to me, will have heard what the right hon. Gentleman said. The Cabinet Office is taking both this issue and the broader issue of contracting very seriously, and my right hon. Friend will be saying more in due course.

Oral Answers to Questions

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Indeed.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

4. If he will introduce mandatory drug testing for prisoners on entry to and exit from prison.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Jeremy Wright)]

The right hon. Gentleman knows that we already have a system of random and intelligence-led drug testing in prisons. He knows, too, that we are not persuaded of the merits of adding further testing for all prisoners at the fixed points of arrival and departure from custody. However, we are working with the Department of Health to test an end-to-end approach to tackling addiction from custody into the community, which includes looking at which prisoners should be tested and when.

[Keith Vaz]

The Minister is right: I do, in fact, know all that. However, it does not deal with the problem. The problem is that 35% of those in prison have a drug addiction and 6% acquire that addiction once they are in prison, so more come out with an addiction than went in with one. Why do the Government not feel that mandatory testing on entry and exit will help break the cycle of drug dependency?

[Jeremy Wright]

We are in agreement, because I knew all that, too, but it is worth saying to the right hon. Gentleman that we have one or two issues with the suggestion he and his Select Committee make in what is, I concede, an excellent report that makes a substantial contribution to this debate. The concerns we have are that if tests are done at a fixed point of exit, particularly from custody, the offender knows that is coming and can do things to try to mitigate the effect of the test. We think it is important to test on a random, and perhaps frequent, basis. We entirely agree with him and his Committee, however, about the importance of extending our testing to include prescription drugs as well as illegal drugs, because of the widespread abuse of those drugs, and I hope he will support the private Member’s Bill of my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Margot James), which will achieve exactly that.

Legal Aid Reform

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Thursday 27th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Teather]

I understand that the family of Jean Charles de Menezes would not have qualified under the new test. As the hon. Gentleman says, that was an incredibly important case which had huge implications for policing policy, and it is for precisely that reason that we need to be careful about identifying categories of this kind.

A number of Members have said that the changes will not save money. That, I think, is the point. The Government are apparently not seeking to save money with the changes in the residence test; they say that their purpose is to shore up public confidence in the legal aid system. However, I do not think that the public will continue to have confidence in a system that denies access in certain cases, including the one that was referred to by the hon. Gentleman.

Particularly unjust, in my view, is the position of those who, having gained refugee status, will be forced to wait 12 months before becoming eligible for legal aid. I think it extremely unlikely that we would be complying with article 16 of the Geneva convention if we proceeded with that proposal. Many of the people involved are very vulnerable, and there is frequently a gap in communication between the Home Office and those who should be seeking care for them in the form of housing or benefits. Many would face a period of homelessness if lawyers did not intervene to ensure that local authorities do their duty.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Sarah Teather]

I will, but I am conscious that I am taking up the time of others who wish to speak.

[Keith Vaz]

I am most grateful to the hon. Lady, who has been extremely generous in giving way. She is right about immigration, which has become more complex. One of the reasons for opposing these proposals is that the few remaining specialist legal aid immigration lawyers will disappear if they are accepted.

[Sarah Teather]

I fear losing specialists in immigration law. I already see constituents who are consulting lawyers who are, I am afraid to say, less than qualified to do the job, and that is what creates many of the delays and bad decisions in the first place.

Police and Crime Commissioners

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Monday 24th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

I had no idea you were keeping count so very carefully, Mr Speaker, but thank you for reminding me.

I am delighted to be able to raise the issue of police and crime commissioner accountability on the Floor of the House tonight. I am pleased to see the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice here to answer the debate, having appeared before the Select Committee on Home Affairs only last week.

On 15 November 2012, 41 police and crime commissioners were elected, representing a total population of 48 million and covering individual populations of up to 2.6 million people, earning salaries of between £65,000 and £117,000 a year, and between them controlling billions of pounds of spending on police in England and Wales. Since 2010, the Home Secretary has embarked on what can only be described as a revolution in policing: whole organisations have been changed, some have been abolished, some merged, and others are at this moment in a state of limbo. Names that we have become used to, such as the Serious Organised Crime Agency, the National Policing Improvement Agency and police authorities, have been or will be replaced by the College of Policing, the National Crime Agency and 41 elected police and crime commissioners. The police commissioners were introduced to bring a democratic element into the new landscape of policing. I fully support the vision behind them, which is one of the democratic accountability of our police service.

Allegations today that undercover officers spied on the Lawrence family are just one of a number of recent events in policing that have shown why this new element of democratic accountability is vital to the landscape of policing. In creating the commissioners, the Home Secretary was seeking to construct a new and better, more accountable policing edifice. However, it has become clear that there may be a number of structural faults, and if these are not addressed quickly, this gleaming new building will collapse.

The birth of the commissioners was a long and difficult one. The original election date had to be changed, voters did not receive a formal election mailing—they were asked to look at websites—and there was a record low turnout. In Devon and Cornwall, Commissioner Tony Hogg was elected by only 5% of the electorate. In Wales, at a Newport polling station, not a single vote was cast. The commissioners are a new breed, although some of them are known to us. Six commissioners are former Members of Parliament, including Alun Michael from South Wales, Jane Kennedy from Merseyside, Paddy Tipping from Nottinghamshire, Vera Baird from Northumbria, Sir Graham Bright from Cambridgeshire, and Tony Lloyd from Greater Manchester.

Subsequent to their election, the first actions of some commissioners were to make appointments to their offices, which vary hugely in size, from 40 staff in Tony Lloyd’s Greater Manchester office to just four in Vera Baird’s office in Northumbria. There are 16 Conservative, 13 Labour and 12 independent police commissioners. The House will know that there has been much controversy over political appointments. The Committee heard from the West Yorkshire commissioner, Mark Burns-Williamson, for example, who appointed the wife of his party’s regional director in Yorkshire and Humberside, who oversaw his selection, to become his deputy on a salary of £53,000. Both the Labour West Midlands commissioner, Bob Jones, and the Conservative Northamptonshire commissioner, Adam Simmonds, made political appointments to the post of assistant commissioner.

Not a week has passed without articles in newspapers about the activities of some commissioners, and I shall give just four examples. Newspapers reported that three police officers were arrested after allegedly leaking details of Cumbrian Commissioner Richard Rhodes’s undeclared expenses to the press. Richard Rhodes has written to my Committee to clarify the position, and we have published his letter on our website. The Mail on Sunday ran a splash raising questions about the office of the Thames Valley commissioner, Anthony Stansfeld, who is the Prime Minister’s local commissioner. Last week, the Watford Observer said that in April alone, in his capacity as Hertfordshire commissioner, David Lloyd accepted hospitality with outsourcing companies Serco and Capgemini. It was also revealed by the newspapers that the Surrey commissioner, Kevin Hurley, ran a private security firm, and it was claimed that that was a conflict of interest. Mr Hurley denies that. The House and the public need to decide if that is just press speculation or something more serious reflecting general unease about the activities of some commissioners.

So much is not known about the commissioners that the Select Committee decided to produce a report to set out all the issues and to provide an easy way to refer to what the commissioners were doing, effectively creating a central register of interests. I want to thank Richard Benwell for his hard work on the Committee’s register. Our report was prompted by a lack of transparency: the fact that the Government refused to collate such a register themselves led to our decision to produce one.

In May 2013, four commissioners had still not published the required budget data online: Humberside’s Matthew Grove; Norfolk’s Stephen Bett; North Wales’s Winston Roddick; and Suffolk’s Tim Passmore. Twenty-three commissioners have yet to publish the full statutory information required.

Despite the permanent secretary telling the Committee on Tuesday that he had e-mailed his own staff saying that the Home Office needs to be much more transparent, the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice has refused to disclose details of meetings that have taken place between the Home Office and commissioners. His excuse was that it was on the website, yet he answered in full a similar question from my right hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson) on 12 December. Ministers need to be open and transparent with Members of the House when they ask questions about police and crime commissioners, rather than referring them to Home Office websites.

Transparency is vital to allow a full and fair analysis of the momentous decisions that some of the commissioners have to make. The biggest power they wield is the ability to hire and fire chief constables. This month Gwent’s commissioner, Ian Johnston, apparently forced the chief constable of Gwent, Carmel Napier, to retire. The reason he cited was that she was hostile to the idea of commissioners and their relationship was “never going to work.” We hope to hear from both the Gwent Commissioner and the former chief constable at the Committee in the near future. In Lincolnshire Commissioner Alan Hardwick’s suspension of Chief Constable Rhodes was later reversed by a High Court judge, who called it “irrational and perverse.” Ten chief constables have resigned or retired since November 2012.

The police and crime panels are meant to hold commissioners to account on all these issues. They are the only groups standing between commissioners and a four-year period in which they can, in effect, do whatever they like. However, as soon as the cold light of scrutiny was shone on them by the Committee, we found that these panels were often compromised by political allegiances, and some lacked the guidance, legal advice and legal powers that they required. The Kent police and crime panel never scrutinised Commissioner Anne Barnes’s decision to appoint a youth and crime commissioner on a salary of £15,000. Gwent’s commissioner, Ian Johnston, admitted to a group of Labour Gwent MPs that until the details of his meeting with Chief Constable Napier were leaked, he had had no intention of informing the panel of the full details of her departure.

The Lincolnshire police and crime panel did not meet for two months to discuss the suspension of Chief Constable Rhodes. The panel chairman told the Committee that it received poor and confused legal advice and in the end the chairman had to write to the Minister asking what to do. Just a few days after appearing before the Committee, Lincolnshire’s panel chair, Councillor Ray Wootten, resigned after “inadvertently misleading” the Committee. Apparently it was he who was confused, not the legal advice that he had been given. He and the other panel chairs we heard from, Councillor Patricia O’Brien in Suffolk and Councillor Peter Box, issued a plea that the Home Secretary had left them alone in their mammoth scrutiny task and they needed more help and support to achieve proper scrutiny.

The situation is so serious that Sir Hugh Orde, one of the country’s most distinguished police officers and the president of the Association of Chief Police Officers, has branded the system for holding commissioners to account

“the worst system you can possibly have”

and demanded a meeting between chief constables and the Home Secretary—an astonishing statement from someone as senior as Sir Hugh, and a statement that I hope the Government will listen to. I hope that when the Minister replies, he will tell the House when and where this meeting between Sir Hugh and the Home Secretary will take place. I hope he will not refer me to a website.

London’s own police and crime commissioner, Mayor Boris Johnson, and his relationship with Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, the Metropolitan commissioner, is proof that with proper scrutiny, the system can work. We can also look to Leicestershire, where Commissioner Sir Clive Loader and Chief Constable Simon Cole get on very well indeed. We want to see relationships like this replicated across the country.

Her Majesty’s chief inspector of constabulary, Tom Winsor, recently told the Committee that he thought there was scope for the inspectorate to have a greater role in the new landscape. HMIC should take over publication of the central register of interests started by the Committee, as well as the register of chief constables’ interests, which still does not have a home. The chief executive of the College of Policing, Alex Marshall, should ensure that police and crime panels have a representative on the college’s board, and indeed the college should provide them with training, guidance and legal advice.

As the level 2 transfer deadline approaches, some commissioners will choose to take over important matters such as procurement. The Home Secretary has said that she is looking at commissioners taking over 999 contracts, including for ambulance and fire services, which is a most interesting idea.

A number of these issues would never have arisen in the first place if the Government had done as the Select Committee recommended in our report on the new landscape of policing published earlier this year, in which we suggested the introduction of a “Magna Carta”. This would be an agreed document, signed by police and crime commissioners and chief constables, setting out the rights and responsibilities of the various parties.

There is unquestionably a very important role for commissioners in the new landscape. I want to pay tribute to the work that many of them do; it is no easy task to take the first steps in a completely new and important area of policy. The police need to be accountable to the taxpayer for the money they spend, the priorities they choose and, indeed, the mistakes they make. However, we must ensure that there is a sound process in place for making commissioners accountable. After all, we will have to wait another three and a half years until the next election, and nothing can be done until then. That is why my colleagues on the Home Affairs Committee have agreed to conduct a major inquiry into commissioners on the anniversary of their elections. We want the public to have their say on this important issue. If the police commissioners are to assume their place as the bedrock of more transparent and accountable policing in the Home Secretary’s new landscape, we must get the process right, and we must get it right now.

[The Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice (Damian Green)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) on securing the debate and am grateful for his support for the Government’s vision of a more accountable police service. He made the standard disobliging remarks about turnout at the elections, but I should point out that 5 million people voted, which is approximately 5 million more than the number who elected anyone who sat on a police authority.

The police and crime commissioners have been in office for six and a half months, and in that relatively short time they have made a significant impact. Crime has fallen by more than 10% under this Government and has continued to fall since the PCCs were elected, against the challenging economic climate. PCCs not only represent the most significant democratic reform of policing we have seen; they are also proving to be central figures in helping to cut crime. In the past six months all the PCCs have published their police and crime plans and engaged with the public in a way that police authorities did not, and indeed could not. PCCs have made pledges and put in place measures to improve services offered to victims and to protect the vulnerable from those who would prey on them.

The right hon. Gentleman listed a series of newspaper articles criticising PCCs and said that they were appearing almost weekly. I merely observe that articles that are critical of Members of this House appear almost daily, but that does not mean that parliamentary democracy is a bad thing. Newspapers are there to criticise, and elected representatives are there to defend their position.

I am genuinely puzzled by the right hon. Gentleman’s objection to looking up information on websites. The internet is common these days and many can access it; it is the easiest way for the public to access information. He is as capable as anyone in the country of accessing information on a website.

[Keith Vaz]

When a Member of Parliament asks a question of a Minister about when they have a meeting with a police and crime commissioner, the Minister should answer the question rather than saying, “Wait until it is published in three months’ time”. That is my point. I have no problem in accessing the internet.

[Damian Green]

I am delighted to hear it. As I pointed out to the right hon. Gentleman at the Select Committee last week, this Government are the most transparent ever. Previous Governments, including the Government of whom he was a leading and distinguished member, did not routinely publish the meetings their Ministers had in the way that my ministerial colleagues and I do.

I do not accept at all the right hon. Gentleman’s implication or accusation that the Government are in any way trying to hide information about meetings. Indeed, as he pointed out, I replied in some detail to the shadow Policing Minister about a meeting I had with police commissioners. Any imputation that such meetings are covered up is factually inaccurate.

As a result of the arrival of police and crime commissioners, we are seeing the development of innovative and challenging thinking that cuts to the heart of crime reduction and prevention in our communities. That thinking is the work of a disparate group of individuals who are nevertheless united in their commitment to a single goal that cuts across party politics or ideological leanings—that of cutting crime, reducing the harm that comes to our citizens from those who would wish to do them harm, and making our streets and communities safer places to live.

Those innovations, brought about by the police and crime commissioners, can be split into three broad groups: challenging the criminal justice system to deliver for victims and the vulnerable; challenging local partners to play their part in cutting crime; and challenging forces to drive the changes needed to ensure that front-line services are maintained and improved.

Let me illustrate some of the ideas being brought to life. In the first group, we see examples such as Martyn Underhill, the independent PCC for Dorset, who is developing a victims bureau where victims are supported throughout their journey through the criminal justice system by a single point of contact. Another example is Shaun Wright, Labour PCC for South Yorkshire, who is allocating extra funding to assist the work to prevent child sexual exploitation.

In the second group, Matthew Ellis, the Conservative PCC from Staffordshire, has focused on the interaction between the police and those with mental health issues. He is looking at how officers can reduce the time spent with such individuals, without compromising the service to those who need it. Sue Mountstevens, the independent PCC from Avon and Somerset, is establishing a business crime forum for business leaders to provide input into policing best practice on such areas as CCTV security, security staff and joint initiatives. That will be coupled with prevention work with communities and schools.

In the third group, we are seeing PCCs challenge forces to drive essential changes. PCCs of all kinds are looking at how the police can work more closely with the fire service. Sir Graham Bright, the Conservative PCC from Cambridgeshire, has begun work to exploit better the existing IT systems to provide the opportunity to automate and improve the flow of information across the force. That work is designed to get key information to the officers on the beat when they need it and provides the opportunity for the public to access the police quickly through digital means.

Such innovations have not come about by accident, but by design on the part of the individual PCCs. That is a direct result of the Government achieving what they set out to do all along with the introduction of PCCs—to shift accountability away from Whitehall into the hands of locally elected representatives, who understand the needs and the priorities of the people in their areas far better than policy makers in Whitehall ever could.

The right hon. Gentleman implied that some kind of accountability gap is developing between Whitehall and PCCs. That is not the case. This Government have given serious thought to how we can improve the accountability of the entirety of policing, not just the leadership, and that is why we are seeing improvements in the information that is available to the public. In the case of PCCs, the Home Secretary rightly retains backstop powers that we do not envisage using, but the day-to-day management, governance and oversight of the forces have transferred into the hands of PCCs. The legislation that underpins PCCs is enabling legislation, not preventive legislation. The supposed accountability gap is a fiction created by people who cannot bear to see the transference of accountability away from Whitehall, where it was held for so long—indeed, for too long. The truth of the matter is that what we have seen demonstrates that we were right all along. The challenges and, indeed, controversies that we are seeing are the product of PCCs doing the job they have been elected to do.

The right hon. Gentleman rightly made a point about the availability of information. I share his desire for increasing transparency. We are working towards ensuring that key elements of the information required by legislation are published on the national police.uk website. We are confident that this will enable the public to access even more easily the information they need to hold their PCC to account. Under the specified information order, PCCs have to publish a register of interests, including every pecuniary interest or other paid interest, budgets, contracts and tenders, senior salaries, expenses, and key decisions. We have been clear that it is not the role of central Government to establish and maintain a national register of interests. This is not co-ordinated because the public want to hold their own local PCC, and not all 41 PCCs, to account.

Significant structures and safeguards are in place to ensure that PCCs are able to fulfil the role that the Government intended for them. PCCs already benefit from appropriate checks and balances, as befits their status as democratically elected individuals, through locally elected councillors with strong powers to question the PCC, through the statutory framework that underpins the office of PCC, and ultimately, of course, at the ballot box. As the right hon. Gentleman rightly said, PCCs work every day in the full gaze and scrutiny of the media.

Specific safeguards include the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011, which brought PCCs into being. That is enhanced by the Policing Protocol Order 2011, a document that has been commended in the House of Lords for its ease of comprehension. These documents clearly set out the powers that police and crime panels have to provide supportive scrutiny to their relevant PCCs. Those powers include, but are not limited to, the power to ensure that the appointment of a chief constable is subject to the scrutiny and the potential veto of the panel; the power to ensure that the dismissal of a chief constable is open to proper scrutiny and follows clear procedure; and the power to require that information held by the PCC is made available to the panel and therefore to the public.

If there have been failings in the system—the failings that the right hon. Gentleman mentioned—they may be the result of chairs of panels, and panels themselves, having a lack of understanding of the powers they hold and the role they fulfil. We are confident that panels have the powers they need to fulfil their scrutiny roles. He mentioned the incidents in Lincolnshire. As he knows, the chairman of the panel there wrote to the Home Office asking for advice about whether he could hold a scrutiny meeting. I wrote back to him saying that he could, and he chose to ignore that advice. With the best will in the world, there is not a lot more that the Policing Minister can do when asked for advice than to give it, and if the chair of the panel—former chair; he has subsequently left the job—chooses to ignore it, that is a matter for him.

The protocol is explicit:

“At all times the Chief Constable, their constables and staff, remain operationally independent in the service of the communities that they serve.”

That could not be clearer. Regardless of which PCC is in office, the police have the discretion to use their judgment when deciding who to investigate or arrest, and must by law be wholly without influence of the PCC.

There have been several high-profile cases where the performance of the chief constable has been challenged by the PCC. That is a positive symptom of the shift in accountability from Whitehall to PCCs. It is right that the role of chief constable and the post-holder are open to challenge, and that PCCs have the mandate to challenge them on behalf of the people they represent. It would be a disservice to PCCs and chief constables, who are professionals, to suggest that they would be unable to maintain a professional and productive working relationship having come through any such challenge.

There has been criticism of the size and structure of the offices of PCCs. Indeed, we have heard some tonight from the right hon. Gentleman. There are significant variations. In the examples that he gave, that is partly because of the difference in size between Greater Manchester and Northumbria. However, PCCs have the mandate and the knowledge to determine what is needed to carry out their remit. Who else is better placed to judge that? Equally importantly, all information regarding the offices of PCCs is available to the public, so people will be able to take into account the value for money that their PCC has delivered when they next cast their vote. That is also true of the appointment of deputies and other figures who support the PCC in their duties. Whether those appointments are appropriate or necessary is not for me to say; it is for the public to judge at the ballot box.

PCCs have been complying with the requirements that we made on them to be transparent. The Elected Local Policing Bodies (Specified Information) Order 2011 requires PCCs to publish key information. That includes a register of interests that must include all other pecuniary or paid interests, expenses, budgets, contracts and tenders, senior salaries, and key decisions. The intention is for the public to use that information to hold PCCs to account. I would contrast that with the situation that used to obtain with police authorities.

Police and crime commissioners are doing much that all Members of every party can be proud of. Those actions are a function of the shift in accountability from Whitehall to PCCs. The innovation and ambition in PCCs’ plans for their areas are testimony to their dedication to the role, their commitment to the people of their areas and their desire to make a real change, which is precisely what is happening. It is evident to me that PCCs are doing exactly what Parliament had intended and many of them are doing it extremely well.

Question put and agreed to.

Protecting Children Online

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Wednesday 12th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones). I declare myself a dinosaur where online issues are concerned. I was going to say the same thing about my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott), but she is much more modern than I am. Although she, I and you, Madam Deputy Speaker, were elected 26 years ago yesterday, she is thoroughly modern in her approach. She was able to name the Pokémons as one of the groups that children look at online, though Pokémons are perfectly fine as creatures and they probably need protection from the children.

In the short time available to us to speak, let me say that I normally go to the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert), who is a member of the Home Affairs Committee, for advice on these matters, and I listened carefully to what he said about filters. However, I think the real responsibility is on the internet companies and the service providers. They have got away with murder—literally, in some cases—because people have been able to use the internet to groom young girls and children and to behave in an irresponsible way. The internet companies throw up their hands and say that is freedom of speech.

We recently had some of those companies before the Home Affairs Committee during our last inquiry and also during a previous inquiry, so we have questioned them about both the roots of radicalism and e-crime. We will invite them again when we look at this matter again. They are very reluctant to intervene, and a tiny proportion of their profits—a tiny proportion—goes to the Internet Watch Foundation. It is not enough. They cannot sit back complacently and allow these things to go on without intervening and cleaning up the internet.

The Home Secretary has made positive statements, after what happened in Woolwich, about her desire to get things done. I am glad that there is a summit next week. I hope that she will be invited and that this is not just being seen as an issue for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, because when dealing with crime it is important to ensure that the police are fully involved.

[Tim Loughton]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Keith Vaz]

I will get into trouble with you, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I will give way briefly.

[Tim Loughton]

The right hon. Gentleman makes a good point about the search engines, most of which are based in America, pleading freedom of speech. Does he agree that every search engine could have a simple sign on its home page alerting users to how they can report material they are concerned about, which would cost nothing? That way, there would be no excuse for not knowing what to do. They could also put money into having moderators to ensure a rapid response to unacceptable material.

[Keith Vaz]

Yes, and I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for all the work he did in that area as Children’s Minister and since then. The internet companies must be proactive. They have to go in and clean up the internet. They cannot just sit back and allow others to do it for them. It is so difficult to get internet companies to appear before Select Committees. It takes an age to find them, and then they always respond by saying that they are based in California or New York and therefore do not come over to the UK. They send us their public relations officers, but they, very nice people though they are, are not the decision makers.

I am full of praise for the work CEOP does. I have visited it, along with members of the Home Affairs Committee, and encourage other right hon. and hon. Members to go—it is just across the Vauxhall Bridge road—and see the fantastic work being done. I pay tribute to Jim Gamble for his work in setting it up in the first place and to Peter Davies, who leads it ably. I say to the Policing Minister—he is now in conversation with the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, the hon. Member for Wantage (Mr Vaizey), who has done a great deal of work in these matters, for which we are grateful—that it is very important that we protect CEOP’s budget. The Home Affairs Committee expressed concern that CEOP was being put into the National Crime Agency. We accept what the Government have done and understand the need to rationalise the policing landscape, but it is important to maintain CEOP’s budget and focus. I understand that its budget will be cut by 10% over the next four years. Perhaps the Minister can reassure me that that is not the case and that CEOP, even though it is in the NCA—the Committee thinks that is fine for the moment, but we will revisit the subject—will still retain its focus. Ultimately, it provides terrific expertise that could benefit police forces across the country.

Finally, I recently visited Europol and Interpol. I urge the Policing Minister to visit those organisations, because I gather that no Home Office Minister has visited Europol in recent years. They are doing some fantastic work internationally. I know that the Cabinet Office has funded a project in Interpol specifically dealing with online child exploitation. I think that we can take credit for the work we are doing internationally. To return to my first point, the internet is a marvellous invention and a power for good, but as we have seen, and as we have heard today, it can be used in a different, darker way to exploit children. I hope that internet service providers and others involved in this whole area will understand their responsibilities and act accordingly.

2011 Public Disorder (Compensation)

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Wednesday 5th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Reed]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that helpful intervention. I hope that the Government will look at other parts of the United Kingdom that have more experience of disorder and that therefore have more agile and nimble ways of responding to it. It would be foolish not to consider such experience and I hope that the Minister will take the hon. Gentleman up on his generous offer and speak to him about experiences in Northern Ireland.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

May I compliment my hon. Friend on the way in which he has brought his communities together? I and the Home Affairs Committee visited Croydon just after the riots and I visited it again just before his election. Local people tell me that he has played an important leadership role in ensuring that their cause is brought to Parliament and is prosecuted properly.

[Mr Reed]

I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend for that intervention, which, typically, was extremely generous and kind.

In many cases, compensation under the Riot (Damages) Act cannot kick in until the insurance process has been completed. Too many insurers have taken too long to complete the process, leaving businesses unable to claim under the Government schemes. As a result of all the factors I have mentioned, the compensation is falling desperately short of the claims.

In the light of the two examples I have given of people from Croydon who have suffered, I want to give a further quotation from the Prime Minister. He was asked by the hon. Member for South Basildon and East Thurrock (Stephen Metcalfe):

“Will the Prime Minister assure me that no business will be lost and no livelihood subsequently lost because of the actions of those thugs and hooligans, and that the £20 million support fund, if deemed not big enough, will be increased to make sure that those things do not happen?”

The Prime Minister replied:

“Of course we will keep the issue under review, and there is the Riot (Damages) Act as well as the £20 million scheme. I believe that should be enough, but my hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills will be on the case.”—[Official Report, 11 August 2011; Vol. 531, c. 1083.]

Those were the warm words, but where are the help, the compensation and the action that were promised? These people are victims, not perpetrators. The riots are still creating new victims, but the Government are not doing enough to help them. I am afraid that the Government’s promises have been shown to be hollow. By failing to act, the Government are complicit in the suffering that people continue to endure in my constituency and elsewhere.

I ask the Minister to look at three things. First, please will he look again at the claims that are disputed? He may consider them to be settled, but too many people whose lives face ruin do not. Secondly, he must consider allowing old business equipment that was destroyed during the riots to be replaced by new equipment where there is no reasonable possibility of the business owner acquiring like-for-like replacements at the value of the property that was lost. Thirdly, please will he consider funding the businesses and individuals who are still being forced to pay mortgages on property that was destroyed? If the property does not exist, it is impossible for the business person to make an income to pay the mortgage. If they are forced to dip into their own finite resources, they will end up being bankrupted and will again be victimised, having already suffered loss during the riots.

Frankly, it is scandalous that people in Croydon who lost so much are still waiting for compensation nearly two years later. People in Croydon, across London and in all affected areas of the country looked to the Prime Minister and believed that the failure of the police to protect them, their homes and their livelihoods during the riots would be made good. That has not happened and it must be put right.

Rehabilitation of Offenders

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Thursday 9th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I can give assurance on both those points. The national probation service will continue to have local delivery units operating at a local authority level with local agencies, which is essential, and multi-agency supervision will and should continue for the most serious offenders.

On charitable groups, I am clear that quality and the likelihood of delivering success in reducing reoffending will be crucial in the contracting process. This is not simply a money-saving exercise; it is about easing pressure on the system by reducing reoffending. That is what it is all about and the bidding process will ensure that quality rises to the top.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

Breaking the cycle of crime means breaking the dependency on drugs. I welcome the Government’s decision for mandatory drug testing. Will the Secretary of State confirm that it extends to those who go in and out of prison as well as to those under 12-month supervision, and will he be very careful when choosing drug rehabilitation providers? A group such as G4S has expertise in tagging—it is obviously good at that—but it does not have expertise in drug rehabilitation.

[Chris Grayling]

The right hon. Gentleman makes an important point. It is always good to hear him make a thoughtful and measured contribution, which is not always true of the rest of his party. We have to be absolutely certain that the organisations we recruit to do the work have the expertise we need, particularly in the field of drug rehabilitation. I reassure him that I have no intention whatever to contract with organisations that cannot demonstrate that they have genuine expertise in delivering the solutions we need.

Oral Answers to Questions

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Tuesday 19th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Chris Grayling]

I agree with my hon. Friend. Within the voluntary sector, we find very many of the mentoring skills that I am so keen to harness in preventing reoffending. That is why we have a team in the Cabinet Office working with the voluntary sector to ensure that they are as well prepared as possible for this exercise, and why I am making it absolutely clear that I do not believe that winning contracts can take place without a contribution from the mentoring skills to be found in the sector.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

How does he intend to deal with the issue of payment by results in drugs rehabilitation? He will know that the Home Affairs Committee recommended the mandatory testing of prisoners on entry and exit from prisons. Will he look at that proposal, because it is the best way of ensuring that we break the devastating cycle of drug dependency?

[Chris Grayling]

I do not underestimate the drug challenge that we face. The right hon. Gentleman is well aware, from the work he has done on his Select Committee, how big a part drug addiction plays in the crime and disorder problems we face in this country. We are working closely with the Department of Health. He will be aware that we have many localised drug treatment pilots using payment by results. It is my clear objective to ensure that what we deliver in the Ministry of Justice synchronises carefully with the work that is being done with the Department of Health.

Metropolitan Police Service

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Wednesday 6th February 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Thomas]

I welcome any increase in police numbers, given the significant cuts that have been made and, in truth, will continue to be made up to 2015. The figures that I cited are from a freedom of information request about the cuts between March 2010 and April 2012, and the hon. Gentleman has said nothing about whether he supports the Mayor’s decision to axe 175 posts in Croydon during that period. The figures that I gave for the numbers of police officers in 2015 and in 2010 are from evidence given to the London assembly’s police and crime committee.

As I have said, the Mayor and his staff deliberately chose 2011, because it was the lowest point for police recruitment, with a freeze on recruitment that no one was told about. With respect, the hon. Gentleman will be judged by his constituents on what has happened since March 2010, when the general election campaign started, and what the position will be by 2015, and I am afraid that they will see a reduction in the number of police officers and PCSOs in Croydon, unless there is a dramatic change before then.

Local police teams are essentially being squashed under the Mayor’s plan. Instead of each community in Harrow having at least a sergeant, three police constables and three PCSOs, there will be only one PC and one PCSO dedicated to policing each community. In my constituency, the areas of west Harrow, Rayners Lane and north Harrow, which cover four wards, will go from having 28 uniformed police officers dedicated to those communities to just eight. Perhaps we should not be surprised. After all, in July last year, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary, commenting on the Metropolitan police, noted the plans to cut police officers and PCSOs, as well as police staff, by 2015.

The inspectorate’s survey of whether police officers were available when they were most likely to be needed showed a decrease in the proportion of police officers and PCSOs in visible roles at key times. In an FOI request, I asked for the proportion of safer neighbourhood team staff on duty at 9 pm on a Friday at the end of November, and the answer was just 20%. Response teams were, of course, available, but I was surprised by how low the figure was. We need to be cautious with such figures because they offer a one-off snapshot, but that underlines the concern that many constituents and many Members of Parliament have about whether enough police are now available on our streets at key times.

Although the Mayor’s plans are at pains to appear committed to safer neighbourhood policing—they retain that language—in practice, it is clear that that model of policing is as good as over. There is talk in Boris’s plans of one borough-wide safer neighbourhood panel, but local ward-based panels, which enable local people to develop a relationship with the local police teams and talk through the challenges faced in their communities, are not mentioned at all. Will the Minister explain whether such forums are to be abolished?

Victim satisfaction rates in London are poor, compared to those in the rest of the country. The ambition to lift the rates is laudable, but having fewer senior and experienced police officers and lots of new inexperienced ones, along with less of a visible deterrent in the form of vital reassurance policing hardly suggests that a convincing plan to increase victim satisfaction is at the heart of the Mayor’s thinking on the future of the Met. The plan that is being touted around London boroughs is being aired for just one hour, and the Mayor of London himself cannot even be bothered to go and hear ordinary Londoners’ concerns around the capital. The Metropolitan police service is one of our city’s greatest assets and deserves inspired political leadership, but instead it is being asset-stripped, and our constituents will lose out.

No debate about the future of the Metropolitan police can take place without a reflection on the story of Stephen Lawrence’s murder and the failure of the investigation, because it still resonates all these years later, in part because of the continuing failure to ensure that the senior ranks of London’s police reflect the communities they aspire to serve. If recent media reports are to be believed, there is not one black or ethnic minority participant on the strategic command course, which is

“the conveyor belt for middle-ranking officers being groomed for senior-officer rank.”

I find it difficult to believe that, in the 21st century, there is not one ethnic minority candidate with the talent to be groomed for a senior command position in the Metropolitan police—not one.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. Will he join me in commending the local commander in Harrow, Borough Commander Dal Babu, on all his work, and does he share my concern about the commander being one of the people not chosen to go on the strategic command course? He would have been admirably suited for the course.

[Mr Thomas]

I agree with my right hon. Friend, and I will come on to that point in a second.

The Metropolitan Police Commissioner has pledged to act on the issue. That pledge is extremely welcome, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister that he is encouraging the commissioner to be ambitious in his thinking.

My right hon. Friend just mentioned my own excellent borough commander. He was one of the Met’s few senior Muslim officers before he retired this week. Chief Superintendent Dal Babu’s story reminds the House of the ongoing need for, in his words, “radical measures” to boost ethnic minority recruitment into the Met, into its specialist units—for example, firearms and the criminal investigation department—and, crucially, into its senior ranks. During his time in the Metropolitan police, Dal Babu helped repeatedly to challenge discrimination and bias. Just one example of his work is a pilot mentoring scheme for talented senior officers. Surprisingly, however, ACPO rejected the idea of rolling the programme out more widely, to encourage more black and ethnic minority officers in middle and senior-ranking posts to be ready for higher commands. As Chief Superintendent Babu points out, there is a significant gap between our collective ambitions for a representative police force in our city and the reality. It would be useful to hear the Minister underline publicly what I believe is a cross-party view, that the senior ranks of the Met need to be much more representative of the communities of London.

More recently, the Mayor of London announced plans to close some 65 police stations and sell them off. In my borough, Pinner police station and the front counter at the civic centre are set for closure, although I understand that there is now a question whether Pinner will be closed after all. Given that the civic centre front counter has long been manned by volunteers, I would be surprised if much in the way of revenue savings would be generated. What is striking, though, is the scale of the cuts to police stations in some parts of London. Croydon will lose five of its six stations. Barking and Dagenham will lose three of its four. Havering will lose four of its five, and Waltham Forest is set to lose four of its five. I understand that the police station in Tottenham—a visible signal of reassurance to a community devastated by the riots—is set for closure, too. What is far from clear are the rationale and criteria for each closure, particularly when the deputy Mayor has promised that, where a face-to-face service closes, it will be replaced with another such service. I ask gently, as the Minister can perhaps throw some light on this: how much money will be saved by that scale of closure, given that promise of replacement face-to-face services?

The Mayor’s plans create uncertainty about not just police stations; there has been a sharp reduction in the number of police cars available to the Metropolitan police. The car is a fairly fundamental bit of equipment for police work. According to information obtained through freedom of information requests, almost 200 police response vehicles were axed across London in the first two years of this Government—a 16% drop. I am not sure why the Mayor thought that it would be a good idea to cut by almost a third the number of unmarked and marked police cars in Haringey, which was a flashpoint of the 2011 riots.

Gang crime remains one of the most modern challenges that the Metropolitan police face. It is a huge issue in much of inner London, but it is becoming a problem in the suburbs as well. In a debate in this Chamber on 4 December, a series of Members—in particular, my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck), but also my hon. Friends the Members for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) and for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) and the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field)—pressed the Minister on the future funding of the anti-gang initiatives that are in place. My hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North noted that funding had been cut already and was likely to face further significant reductions.

The police and crime committee of the Greater London assembly has noted that community safety funding often pays for independent domestic violence advisers, who are crucial in supporting domestic violence victims to come forward. Such funding also pays for restorative justice projects, substance and alcohol misuse programmes and, crucially, programmes to divert young people from gang and youth violence. Concern about whether such funding will continue threatens to destabilise projects that have made a difference in addressing gang crime, supporting the victims of domestic violence and preventing antisocial behaviour.

I ask the Minister, as my hon. Friends did in the debate on 4 December, to clarify whether Home Office grants to London for community safety, youth crime and substance misuse will again be substantially cut back next year. Does the Home Office still plan to end funding to London through its ending gang and youth violence funding pot in March?

Championing the safety of constituents is surely a Member of Parliament’s most significant responsibility. The cuts in police funding, coupled with the Mayor’s half-baked crime and policing plan and further cuts to programmes that address some of the causes of crime, leave my constituents and Londoners in general less safe and more vulnerable. I urge the Government to think again.

--- Later in debate ---

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Streeter. Like you, I recognise that the Home Affairs Committee, of which you were a distinguished member, constantly has inquiries involving the Metropolitan police.

I want to raise three issues, but I want first to congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas) on not only securing the debate, but becoming the deputy shadow Minister for London.

The first issue I want to raise is diversity. My hon. Friend was right to highlight the fact that the Metropolitan police, especially at senior levels, does not look like London, and that is not acceptable. Peter Fahy, the chief constable of Manchester, suggested that the police service adopt positive action to get a broader range of officers into the ranks of chief constable. Whatever method is adopted, the situation must change. For the six years I have been Chairman of the Select Committee, senior officers have said they must do more, but that is not enough. Given the population in London, it is vital that the police should change at the highest levels.

Secondly, I support what the Government are doing to restructure the landscape of policing, although they must carry the work force with them. That is not happening at the moment, and it is certainly not happening in the Met. I would like to hear very clearly where the counter-terrorism command will rest. Will it go to the National Crime Agency or will it stay with the Met? Judging from the speeches we have heard so far, there are a lot of bread-and-butter issues the Met should be concentrating on. I would like to hear from the Minister whether that decision has been made.

Finally, we are all concerned by the number of historical investigations—Yewtree, Alice, Elveden and Tuleta—occurring at the moment. Yesterday, we heard that Operation Hearn, which has cost £1.2 million and which has 20 or so officers working on it, has still not concluded. At this time, it is important that the Met is given the resources it needs—not from its agreed budget, but additional resources—to deal with some of these cases. In that way, we can deal with issues such as the one that was raised with the Committee only yesterday: undercover agents’ use of the identities of dead children in performing their activities. That is quite wrong, and it is important that the families are notified immediately. When Pat Gallan gave evidence to us, she said the issue had to be investigated thoroughly. I urge the Minister to give the Metropolitan police the resources it needs to conclude these inquiries.

Oral Answers to Questions

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Tuesday 5th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Grant]

As I said, we do not have the figures on the number of prisoners leaving prison with an addiction to a class A drug, but this Government are absolutely committed to stopping drugs entering prisons and getting prisoners off drugs for good.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

We cannot break the devastating cycle of drugs unless we deal with the issue of drugs in prisons. Why does not the Government adopt the recommendations of the Home Affairs Committee, which are simple: mandatory testing of prisoners when they enter the prisons, and mandatory testing when they come out of prisons? That will give her all the figures she needs in order to deal with this serious problem.

[Mrs Grant]

We feel that investing in comprehensive testing may not be the best way to tackle the problem, but the Government welcome the Home Affairs Committee report, “Drugs: Breaking the Cycle”, and we will of course give careful consideration to all the findings and recommendations.