Oral Answers to Questions

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Monday 29th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Dame Diana Johnson]

It was a great pleasure to be on that visit with the local constituency MP. We will consider funding around the police settlement in the weeks and months ahead.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

A few days ago, the Home Office published a notice about the use of the Northeye detention centre in my constituency, telling residents very little except that no decision had been made. As a matter of urgency, will the Home Office publish what options it is considering for the centre’s use and commit to a timetable for telling residents when it will come to at least a provisional decision that I and my constituents can feed into?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

The site was purchased by the former Government. I understand the uncertainty that has been caused by this, especially in the local community, and they will want to know the Home Office plans for the site. A decision will be made on the use of the Northeye site at the earliest opportunity and I will keep the hon. Member informed.

Immigration and Home Affairs

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

I begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Ashford (Sojan Joseph) on his maiden speech, in which he spoke about his constituency with passion. Having NHS experience myself, I welcome any Member with frontline experience of our public services, which I am sure he will put to very good use during his time in the House.

I welcome the opportunity to speak in today’s debate on immigration and home affairs, which are two areas that are important to me. I believe that how we tackle illegal migration will be a totemic political issue in the coming decades, not just because of its probable global scale but because it will test whether Governments in the UK and elsewhere are willing to face down often well-meaning but misplaced ideas about how best to protect the rights and welfare of individuals while preserving community cohesion and overall fairness in society. Criminal justice was one of my primary reasons for wanting to come to this place because, despite recent good progress under the previous Government, I feel that our criminal justice system does not do enough to secure justice for the victims of serious crime.

At the end of 2023, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the number of people who had been forced to flee their home stood at 117 million. Irregular migration to Europe is rising. According to the European Union’s border agency, Frontex, there was a significant increase in irregular border crossings last year, estimated at approximately 380,000 people, driven, it says, by economic, social and security instability in parts of Africa. Over the last 15 years, Frontex has detected 1.4 million irregular border crossings into the EU. The United States has seen even bigger increases of migrant flows from South America. The question is what to do about it.

First, I do not demonise people who make the journey—that is something we should avoid. People naturally want to improve their lives and their family’s lives. For those arriving from conflict zones, their original motivation for leaving was, of course, to protect themselves, but Governments and politicians cannot afford the luxury of blind sympathy for people in difficult circumstances. We have to act rationally. What is sustainable? What are voters in democratic countries, who have to pay to provide refuge for people, willing to accept?

I supported the Rwanda plan because I believed it was both fair and rational. Right now, who gets asylum in this country and who the British taxpayers pay to support is determined by the ability of people to make the journey into Europe and the UK. That is not fair. I believe that the agencies that placed people in Rwanda for re-homing were against the plan, because they failed to move with the times in understanding the changing nature of the issue.

This is no longer the same problem that the European Convention on Human Rights, the European Court of Human Rights and the refugee agencies were set up to address. The scale of the problem has, and will, continue to grow. There is a fear that if the UK implements such a policy, as Australia did, it will become more and more difficult for anyone to apply successfully for asylum in a western country. I understand that concern, but these agencies and well-meaning human rights advocates need to wake up to what will happen if we do not control these movements of people. We will see a surge in far right support and risk even more unpalatable solutions.

Providing safe and legal routes is, by no means, an answer. Whatever safe and legal routes we set up will have criteria and, inevitably, not all people will be able to make it here on that basis. The fit and young will continue to make small boat crossings to overcome that barrier, so we will be right back to where we started.

Labour may have some short-term successes, for example on some obvious thing we may not have done when it comes to tackling gangs, but let us look at Labour’s track record. Labour Members opposed all of our measures to increase sentences for people trafficking and the Prime Minister himself opposed the deportation of foreign criminals. That is not an encouraging track record. I wish them luck in the proposals they have put forward, but none represents a sustainable solution. As a number of EU countries have recognised, moving people and offshore processing are the way forward.

I pay tribute to the good progress we made on crime and justice in the previous Government. We introduced a whole-life tariff for premediated child murder. We introduced Harper’s law, a mandatory life sentence for the manslaughter of emergency service workers. Importantly, we reformed Labour’s halfway release, bringing it up to two thirds for the most serious offenders.

There is no doubt that the pandemic, the associated court backlog and the increase of thousands of prisoners being kept on remand have made other difficult decisions necessary. I take the Justice Secretary at her word when she says these are “temporary” solutions, although if she had sunsetted them she might have had more credibility. However, I send her my goodwill.

More generally, there is an intellectual snobbery towards people who think the punishment of offenders is a public good, a positive thing that is necessary for the functioning of our society. In my experience, the Ministry of Justice is happy to focus on the experience of victims but not so much on whether they actually get justice. I will continue to campaign and push this Government, as I did the last Government, to move the whole-life sentence for child murder away from just significant premeditated child murder to all child murder. We will all have been horrified by stories of parents murdering their own children, very often not in premeditated circumstances. I think people like that deserve to face justice with a whole-life order.

I will also campaign on the use of life sentences. The term is misleading, often reported as jail for life, when it almost never is, which is an insult to victims. Those are my priorities. I will welcome the new Government’s progress in those areas, but I will be there as a sceptical champion for victims of crime along the way.

Border Security and Asylum

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Monday 22nd July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend raises an important question. As well as a failure to tackle the criminal gangs taking hold along the channel, there has also been too much of a focus on gimmicks and a failure to have practical planning in place. For example, there was a failure to ensure that there were proper long-term contracts on asylum accommodation, so that instead the chaos at Manston a couple of years ago led to last-minute hotel procurement, which was completely inappropriate accommodation and cost a fortune as well.

We have to tackle that. That is why we have set out plans and we are determined to make sure that we can get that backlog down and end asylum hotel use. As a result of the chaos with the Illegal Migration Act 2023 and the fact that the Home Office had stopped taking decisions, that will now take time and it will be difficult to sort out, but that is why the statutory instrument we are laying before the House today is so important. That alone should save the taxpayer £7 billion.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

I know the Labour party managed to go an entire election campaign without answering this question, and the Home Secretary failed to answer it again when asked by the shadow Home Secretary, but I will give it one more try. Where does the Home Secretary intend to send failed asylum seekers from Afghanistan, Syria and Iran?

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Gentleman obviously does not understand the system that his party and his Government put in place. All the people who are in the asylum system are staying there. Under his policies for those individuals, they are now being sent all around the country into asylum hotels. That is the system the Conservatives have left us with. We do not think that is the right thing to do. We think that asylum decisions should be taken on a case-by-case basis. That is the right thing to do. We also think we should have proper returns agreements and do what his party should have been doing, under his own policies, for the 60% of people who continued to be entitled to asylum decisions but were not getting them under his Illegal Migration Act. What we will do is run the asylum system effectively, which his system should have been doing.

Migration and Economic Development Partnership

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Suella Braverman]

Last year, 30% of those arriving on the boats came from Albania, a safe country—a country from which they are not feasibly fleeing persecution or torture—so it is, again, a fallacy to suggest that everyone coming on the boats is somehow vulnerable or is coming here for humanitarian reasons. The vast majority are young, healthy men. The vast majority are paying willingly for those journeys. They are procuring them from people-smuggling gangs—criminal gangs—and they are coming here, knowingly and willingly breaking our laws, to seek a better life. That is not what humanitarian protection is all about. That is not what refugee status is all about. That is why we need to stop the boats.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I agree with the Lord Chief Justice. Despite what we have heard from Opposition Members, one of the three judges thought we were right; these are finely balanced issues. Of course, the court was preoccupied not so much with the ability of Rwanda to host asylum seekers but with its ability to process their claims. We might find that other countries are willing to work with us but are also not able to evidence their ability to process claims as well as they can evidence their ability to look after people. Will my right hon. Friend update the House on plans to allow us to process the claims ourselves while people are in a third country, so that we can overcome some of these barriers?

[Suella Braverman]

We have in recent months put in a huge amount of extra resource focused on the processing of asylum claims. We have increased the number of caseworkers, and we are on track to have over 2,000 case- workers by September. We have improved and streamlined the process, and we have simplified the guidance, so that we can make decisions and process cases more quickly.

Public Order

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Monday 12th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

The main point I want to emphasise today is that these issues are of course to do with balance. Opposition Members want to make it black and white, but we know that these things are not black and white. I am also interested in the fact that some of the same Members who have been so opposed to these regulations made complete counter-arguments when they proposed legislation, which I supported, to say that people should not be able to protest within a certain distance of an abortion clinic. These are common arguments and it is about the individual interpretation of them.

In a free society, we have responsibilities as well as rights. Our right to protest does not offer absolute relief from our responsibility to allow other citizens to go about their lives freely. Of course they have a right to do that. Much attention is paid to the rights of the protesters, but what about the rights of everyone else? We must view the impact in the context of the cost of resources to taxpayers, because they have a right to see their resources used sensibly. If we are going to say that something is acceptable—disruptive protest, disrupting sporting events, going on the road—let us imagine what would happen if we were not spending millions of pounds to minimise that behaviour. That behaviour would run rife. We would not be able to have a public event in this country without one or two people running into it and disrupting it. We would be unable to have any kind of major event without spending millions of pounds to stop people from protesting en masse, so it is quite right that we should look at making sure that we can do that more efficiently.

I would encourage the Home Secretary to consider going further. We are talking today about serious disruption and people perhaps not being able to go to hospital, but what about just being able to go to work, to catch up with a friend that they have not seen for a few months or to go out for dinner in a restaurant? Why do we say that one individual person can block a road and prevent all sorts of people going about their daily lives because they care deeply about an issue?

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a very strong point. Does he agree that part of the disconnect on this between the Labour party and the rest of the country is that with these protests, the disruption is the objective, not the message? That is what makes the British people feel so aggrieved. Here in Westminster, more than anywhere, we understand that disruption can be a by-product of protest, but that is a by-product, not the primary objective.

[Dr Mullan]

Indeed, and the protesters brazenly admit it. It is not about protesting with a by-product of disruption; they brazenly admit that they want to do ever-escalating things to get into the news. They should go on a hunger protest and disrupt their own lives. Do not eat—that will get in the news. Why do they think they can go around disrupting everybody else’s lives just to make their point? Importantly, they can still protest. I was flabbergasted by the reporting of the apparent crackdown on protest at the coronation. I was on the parliamentary estate, and I saw loads of people holding up signs saying, “Not my King”. It was all over the news and I saw lots of people who were not arrested and who were not moved on. They were within feet of the procession and were perfectly able to go about their protesting.

I urge the Home Secretary to think about this. In my view, people should not be able to disrupt a road. They should not be able to stop traffic because they care particularly about an issue.

[Sammy Wilson]

Does the hon. Gentleman not find it even more amazing that the Labour party opposes this legislation when many of the protests impact on the poorest in society? I remember being in Canning Town tube station when two idiots jumped on top of the roof of the tube, and the guy beside me said, “If I don’t get to work today, I get my wages docked. I am not earning a great deal of money but I will lose money because of those two guys.” Thankfully, they pulled them off, which was a good idea, but this is the impact. Ordinary people who cannot afford the disruption are the victims of it.

[Dr Mullan]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely correct. We have all seen the footage online of people saying that they are just trying to get to work. Opposition Members say that that is not serious disruption, but they should tell that to the individual who is trying to go about their daily life. It is disruption, it is not acceptable and people have other ways to make their point. I would also say to Opposition Members and members of the other place that they cannot have it both ways. They cannot say that this is unnecessary and a waste of time and then block it in the Lords. If it does not make any difference and will not impact on anything, why are they blocking it? They should just let it pass.

[Sir Edward Leigh]

Are there not double standards on the left? They believe that in their cause they can disrupt people’s daily lives, but when some old lady is praying outside an abortion clinic, that is absolutely outrageous and must be banned by law.

[Dr Mullan]

Indeed. As I said earlier I supported the proposals for protection zones for abortion clinics, but that makes the exact point. When it suits them, they are perfectly happy to sign up to these arguments, but they take a different view when it does not suit them. As the Home Secretary mentioned, they are very happy to get into bed financially with the people supporting these protests, so I think we all know where their loyalties lie.

[Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)]

If the laws are already there, what difference are these regulations going to make? How are they going to strengthen things?

[Dr Mullan]

The other point that I think the shadow Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper), completely ignores is that we have a common law legal system in this country. It is perfectly normal for Parliament to pass legislation and attempt to apply that law via the police. That is another reason why I think the hysterical reaction to the police beginning a process of using new law and not getting it right every single time totally betrays the normal way in which law is developed in this country. We legislate, we use certain terminology and we try to be clear, but it is for the courts and the police to operationalise it and feed back if they think we need to go further. It is all very normal, and again, this is just histrionics from the other side, because it suits them to put their clips on social media standing up against us over these “draconian” protest laws that are not in the least bit draconian.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

My hon. Friend made a point about social media. One of the main intentions of this disruption is to get publicity for the protesters’ cause, so they make maximum effort to try to get maximum publicity, which is cheap.

[Dr Mullan]

Indeed. I am going to finish by making a point to the protesters. If they want to change opinions, they should do what we all have to do most weekends, on both sides of the Chamber: put leaflets through doors, knock on doors, persuade people and run for election. If they do not believe in that, they do not believe in democracy, and whether it is for Extinction Rebellion or any other cause, that is not how we get things done in this country.

When people hark back to the suffragettes, let us remember that they did not have the vote. They were campaigning for the vote in order to be participants in the process. We have a universal franchise: everyone has a say. Everyone can run for election and can campaign, so why do these protesters not put their energies into that? I am sorry that the British public are not open to their arguments, but that is not my fault. I agree with the public, because those arguments are so extreme. The answer is not to stop the public going about their daily business, and I suggest to Opposition Members that they should be in keeping with what the British public want, not with what the people who are funding them millions of pounds want.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison Thewliss]

No, the right hon. Member has been extremely obnoxious to me many times in the past, so I will not take his intervention.

Groups, including Liberty, have pointed out that these are not insignificant changes. Liberty says that the Government’s attempt to redefine serious disruption from “significant and prolonged” to “more than minor” is

“effectively an attempt to divorce words from their ordinary meaning in ways that will have significant implications for our civil liberties.”

The statutory instrument refers to

“the prevention of, or a hindrance that is more than minor to, the carrying out of day-to-day activities (including in particular the making of a journey)”,

but what is “minor”? We do not know. Is a couple of minutes late “minor”? What is “more than minor”? Is that 10 minutes late rather than five minutes late? There is nothing in these regulations to say. They will give significant discretion to the police to figure out exactly what is “minor” and what is “more than minor”, because nobody can really tell us.

[Dr Mullan]

There is an offence called “drunk and disorderly”. Disorderly can have any number of meanings. The common law legal system over time has sought to define it more narrowly and the police operationalise that. Why does the hon. Lady not think that that could be done in exactly the same way with this offence?

[Alison Thewliss]

Because the regulations are extremely unclear and extremely discretionary. [Interruption.] It is not clear at all in the regulations what is “minor” and what is “more than minor”, and neither of those things seem to me to be serious disruption. “More than minor” is not the same as serious disruption.

The regulations also refer to a “community”, which

“in relation to a public procession in England and Wales, means any group of persons that may be affected by the procession, whether or not all or any of those persons live or work in the vicinity of the procession.”

What does “affected” mean? Does that mean people saw it on the TV and they were upset by it? How are they “affected”? Again, that is unclear in the regulations, which will give police officers a huge amount of discretion to carry out the enforcement of this pretty lousy legislation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Apsana Begum (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)]

It is appallingly apt that this widely recognised repressive and authoritarian Government are using a widely recognised repressive and authoritarian power to implement a widely recognised repressive and authoritarian measure to give the police almost complete discretion over which protests they want to ban. It is not as though the police are not already equipped with excessive and unaccountable powers.

Indeed, such powers were on display in my constituency recently when up to 100 police officers evicted 29 homeless people, including some thought to be subject to no recourse to public funds, from 88 Hardinge Street—a building understood locally to be an unofficial homeless shelter. The operation included a large number of territorial support level 2 public order officers with riot shields to deal with residents who had gathered in shock to protest against the action. A dispersal order was issued that stretched almost a full kilometre around my constituency. A constituent said:

“as a local resident, if I could file a complaint against the actions of the police today, I would.”

[Dr Mullan]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Apsana Begum]

I will not—the hon. Member has had his say.

It is chilling that these measures are being forced through when trust in the Metropolitan police is at an all-time low, not least following the killing of Chris Kaba, who was fatally shot by a Metropolitan police firearms officer in September last year; the treatment of Child Q; the kidnap and killing of Sarah Everard by a serving police officer; the evidence of institutional racism and misogyny, and so on. Even more unaccountable power is being handed to the police when so many are concerned about long-standing failures on the part of the police to be accountable for their actions.

The truth is that the Government’s actions today would never be right. This attack on democracy and civil liberties is akin to that of many repressive regimes that the UK has been right to criticise, but now it seems to be seeking to emulate or perhaps compete with them. Does the Home Secretary agree that Dr Martin Luther King, with his non-violent civil disobedience, is one of the most widely celebrated activists worldwide? Does she acknowledge that many recognise, and some even celebrate, the suffragettes and the role they played in advancing the democratic rights of women? She referred to harmful protests and repeated protests that will be outlawed through the powers to be given to the police. So harmful were the protests that the suffragettes engaged in that they won women the right to vote. She and I both enjoy the privileges of that today as parliamentarians in this House.

We cannot allow the Government to get away with this repressive change to the laws of protest. I will vote against the regulations, and I urge colleagues across the House to consider doing the same. This is so much more important than all of us individually and more important than political parties; it is about the future of democracy itself.

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I concur with everything said by my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum), the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) and others.

I want to bring this down to a parochial level for my constituents. When we sit here and see legislation going through, we can sometimes spot the legislation that we realise will never work, and we know that we will be back here shortly to try to put it right. I think that is the case now, so I want to take up the point made by the right hon. Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) —he is not in his place at the moment—and followed up by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Dr Mullan).

I fully agree that, in a democracy, what should happen is that constituents and members of our communities should be able to raise issues and argue a case, put their views to their relevant elected representatives and vote as constituents in elections for Governments who will fulfil their wishes. That is what happened with my constituents in west London on the third runway issue, which we have been campaigning on since the late-1970s. David Cameron assured people that there would be no third runway, “no ifs, no buts”. Some of my constituents—I forgive them now—even voted for the Conservative party on that basis. However, what happens if the governing party, after its election, puts in a caveat saying, “Actually, that commitment was only for the life of this Parliament and no further”? All the insecurities come out about the continuation of blight on communities.

People felt, “Where do we go from here?” They had tried to use the democratic process—all that they could—and secured a political commitment, but that was reneged upon. People felt betrayed, so naturally they came out in the streets. They were joined by Conservative MPs, including Justine Greening. In fact, one Conservative MP got so excited that he said he would lie down in front of the bulldozers. Is this an anti-Boris Johnson piece of legislation as well?

[Dr Mullan]

The right hon. Member is postulating an argument that if a particular group of people are not successful in their protests because the Government do not follow through, that means that the system is not working. We have had people protesting against vaccines. They could say, “The fact that we protested vociferously against vaccines being rolled out and did not get our way means that it is perfectly legitimate for us to go on and disrupt everyone,” but that is not an argument for protest.

[John McDonnell]

I think that the hon. Gentleman was not listening. What my constituents and the constituents of Uxbridge did was follow the process, exactly as he advised them.

[Dr Mullan]

They lost.

Protection from Sex-based Harassment in Public Bill

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Report stage
Friday 24th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I will also speak briefly and begin by paying tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Greg Clark) for securing the passage of this Bill. It has been great to hear it being warmly supported in the House today.

I rise primarily to pay tribute to a group of girls who really helped me understand this issue. Sandbach High School is not in my constituency—it is in that of my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce)— but she kindly agreed for me to visit, because so many of my constituents go to school there. It is a girls school, and I had a session with a group of girls who put across to me how frequently this was an issue for them, even at this point in their lives, and how commonplace it was for them to experience harassment.

I also pay tribute to a charity in Crewe called Motherwell, founded by Kate Blakemore. What we have discussed today is recognising that this issue sits within a bigger picture of how we think about and treat women and girls in society. Motherwell is a women and girls charity dedicated to empowering women in all sorts of different ways, including looking at issues of their own safety. That organisation and that group of girls helped me understand this issue. I am pleased to be here today to pay tribute to them, and to my right hon. Friend, in supporting the Bill.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I call the shadow Secretary of State.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Monday 20th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

Forensic science is critically important, as the hon. Gentleman says. The Home Office is continually discussing forensic science provision with our colleagues in the policing family to make sure there is adequate provision. We are always looking at the funding arrangements and the range of providers, so I can assure him that this topic is the subject of continual scrutiny.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

7. What steps her Department is taking to reduce antisocial behaviour.

[Jack Brereton (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Con)]

10. What steps her Department is taking to reduce antisocial behaviour.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Suella Braverman)]

We are committed to tackling antisocial behaviour and to recruiting 20,000 additional police officers, which will take us to our highest number ever. We expanded the safer streets fund to include the tackling of antisocial behaviour as one of its primary aims, and last year we published the ASB principles to establish a strong and effective partnership response to antisocial behaviour.

[Dr Mullan]

One challenge we have in Crewe and Nantwich on antisocial behaviour is groups of people at bus stops, on high streets and in other public spaces drinking alcohol all day long. That puts off families and elderly people, in particular, from making use of those public spaces. In theory, public spaces protection orders should work, but they can be burdensome to get into place. May we meet to discuss how we might make it easier for them to be enacted, in order to reduce that kind of behaviour in towns and cities?

[Suella Braverman]

My hon. Friend is right to focus on the blight that antisocial behaviour causes to communities. He mentions existing powers that the police have. We are keen to ensure that those are streamlined and improved so that they are more effective. I am pleased that his local force of Cheshire has more police officers on the beat—316 in the force. Following my visit, I was pleased to meet his outstanding local chief constable last month.

Illegal Migration Bill

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 13th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I rise to support this policy because I believe it is fair, sensible and in keeping with the UK remaining a compassionate country. An asylum system should not be based on people’s ability to make the journey to a foreign country—that is what is not fair.

Those who oppose this policy say that people would not need to make the journey if there were more safe and legal routes. Let us follow through that line of thought and say we set up application centres in France. Although the journey would be less strenuous, a grandmother in a wheelchair or a double amputee would still be less able than a fit adult to make the journey, so it would remain unfair. So let us say we set up application centres in a more accessible country such as Turkey. What would happen next?

Even if there is disagreement on the exact figure, no one can deny that many millions of people around the world would be eligible for asylum in the UK. If tens of thousands of people are willing to make such a long and arduous journey to the UK to seek asylum, it is obvious to me that many, many more would make an easier journey to somewhere like Turkey. I cannot imagine the number being less than double, and there is no reason to think it would not be even higher. For anyone who understands British public opinion, it would be completely untenable to continue with that position. We would then need to introduce a cap, and then what? Of course, we would have to turn some people away. A humane policy would prioritise granting the elderly, the disabled and ill people asylum, which would leave fit, younger people as the ones we turned away. There is no reason why they would not make the crossing by boat in any case and we would be right back where we started.

That is why more safe and legal routes will not solve this problem—because at the heart of the issue is the fact that many more people could legitimately claim asylum than the British public would or should reasonably take in. If someone’s test of an asylum policy’s humaneness is whether a particular deserving individual—we have heard many such examples this evening—can obtain asylum, no policy will ever pass it, because unless we agree to take in everyone, there will always be people who would like and deserve to come here who will not be able to do so.

What the British public expect is that we take our fair share. Even if someone personally wants the UK to take many more refugees than we do, we have to remember that we are talking about taxpayers’ money. Compassion paid for by someone else is compassion that must be offered carefully, because if we do not do that, we find that we grow the resentment and hostility that we seek to avoid in the first place. The British people are fair and compassionate, and they ask me and they ask each other, “If people are coming from France and they are young men, are they really the people we have in mind when we want to say that we give a safe haven to the most vulnerable? Does a preference to come to an English-speaking country give someone a right to be here?” Those are fair questions and if we do not answer them, someone else will.

That might seem harsh, but I am a Conservative because I believe we should act with our heads as well as our hearts, and that we should care less about how something looks on social media and in the Chamber, and more about what it actually does. There is no problem-free panacea to this issue; it is about doing what helps best overall, which is why I am supportive of this policy and I am confident that the British public will be too.

Police Training: Entry Routes

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Tuesday 28th February 2023 Westminster Hall

[Sir George Howarth (in the Chair)]

I will call Dr Kieran Mullan to move the motion, and I will call the Minister to respond. As is the convention for 30-minute debates, there will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered police training entry routes.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir George. I am grateful for the opportunity to discuss an area of policing that is important to all our constituents: the question of how we recruit people into the police.

Why is how we recruit people into the police so important? It is because our model of policing—policing by consent—has at its core the idea that our police forces are not separate from us; they are us, drawn from our communities and all parts of our society. I am proud to have grown up as a policeman’s son, and the fulfilment I know that job gave my dad was based on serving the public. It is a job that requires resilience, courage and a strong belief that injustice should be stood up to. It is not enough just to think that criminality is wrong; police officers need to feel a calling to stand against people who undertake it. When other people look the other way, police officers have to be willing to run headlong into conflict and confrontation. I was honoured to follow my dad’s footsteps and volunteer as a special constable, and that experience, along with speaking to people across the policing family, helps to inform my views.

Policing has no doubt changed. We ask our police forces to think more about prevention, to engage with young people and to try to get them onside, rather than just to keep them in line. Although others and I would argue that good beat police officers have always built good relations with their communities—it was not necessarily called stakeholder engagement before, but it happened none the less—this is a much more distinct formal part of the role.

There is no doubt that the crime we have been fighting is changing. Often the person stealing now is not stealing from a shop, mugging people or burgling homes, although these things still go on, and they are not from the local community. They are stealing from behind a computer, often in another country. However, we should not overstate the change and forget the fundamental need for the police to be active in communities and neighbourhoods, and to be among people. They need to be on the high street at 1 pm and 1 am, on housing estates, outside pubs and outside football matches, and vital to doing that effectively is ensuring that police officers reflect their local communities.

However we change the structure of policing going forward, there will always be times when the police need to turn up in numbers and with force, with people happy to step out of the office and on to the frontline. That is why I and more than 100 Back-Bench colleagues were concerned about plans to end the recruitment of men and women to our police forces unless they had or wanted to get a degree. I thank the Cheshire police and crime commissioner, John Dwyer, and other police and crime commissioners who are similarly concerned about this issue. I am absolutely delighted that the Home Secretary responded to those concerns positively and stopped that happening, but that is just the first step in what needs to be a concerted effort to ensure that policing always remains open to as wide a range of people as possible, while looking to ensure that policing and its people move forward with changing demands as patterns of criminality change.

Cheshire Chief Constable Mark Roberts, Northampton-shire Chief Constable Nick Adderley and Stephen Mold, the police, fire and crime commissioner for Northampton-shire, were among those who feared the demise of the traditional non-degree entry route, and they expressed their views clearly in a piece they wrote for The Times earlier this month. They accepted that

“recent events have reinforced that change is necessary and that a more robust approach to recruitment, development, vetting…is needed.”

However, they argued in the article that

“it is crucial that the non-degree route remains”,

adding that

“the public want to see the most effective, trained and competent police service possible”.

I agree: we need the best possible people from all walks of life and different backgrounds. Everyone should feel that they have an opportunity to join the police and succeed. As I said, police forces need to reflect the populations they service.

The reality is stark: tens of millions of people do not have degrees. A blanket decision that the entire future police population should have them would create a force potentially divorced from the experiences and lives of the people they seek to police. A degree-only police force would, by definition, not reflect the population. Those who advocated that introducing degrees would attract a different sort of recruit were right, but there are two sides to the coin. No matter the actual content of a degree and whether it is more or less academic than people expect it to be, calling for one will inevitably put off people as well as attract them.

At a time when we are prioritising concerns around representation, identity and the trust between police and communities, it is crucial that we remain receptive to individuals from diverse backgrounds and walks of life joining our police forces. Speaking to those involved in police recruitment across different parts of the country, I have heard how the degree route has certainly attracted new and different interest, but there has been a lack of interest from existing groups, too. The impact may be different in each area—there is no one size fits all—and that is why a mandated national approach would have been wrong.

In my time, I met many special constables who had years of experience on the beat as effective police officers. It would be misguided to insist that they need a full degree to transition to being regular officers. Similarly, there will be people from other walks of life who could more readily be transitioned into the job than through the degree-only routes: former members of our armed services stand out, and police community support officers are another example.

It is essential that training and education remain integral components of the profession. In fact, I join others in urging the college to consider awarding professional educational credits for various type of training that officers undertake throughout their careers, which include, but are not limited to, law exams, public order training, firearms training, supervisory roles, child protection, cyber specialisms and other unique skills. By providing educational credits that lead to a level 6 qualification—that is, a degree—over time, we can motivate and incentivise new recruits to strive for recognition and reach their full potential, if that is how they want their career to progress, and they can do it in a manner and at a pace of their choosing. That can be important for some people—for example, those who have childcare responsibilities and want to flex the way in which they progress their qualifications.

It is misguided to attribute the recent differences in training experience and diversity statistics solely to the use of newer models of entry. It is likely that there are a wide variety of factors at play, because all sorts of elements of police recruitment focus and approach have changed at the same time. There is no reason to think that similar improvements could not have been achieved through the traditional entry route. I understand that forces that made the transition to degree-only have seen recruitment success in the short term, but I would caution against concluding that it works as well in the long run. Are we confident about the long-term retention of those recruits? I have heard from existing officers that some of those recruits are perhaps keen to get a degree in policing as a stepping-stone, or that the job in the long run turns out not to be what they expected. The need for many officers to be focused on the frontline means that policing will always be a relatively flat organisation, without room for high-flying promotions for everyone. Are we confident that all our new recruits understand that?

I must add that I have taken into account the concerns that alternative entry routes can lead to police officers being away from the frontline for extended periods. By upholding traditional entry routes, chief constables can adapt a more balanced approach to recruitment, which can allow them to mitigate that short-term impact at the same time as increasing police numbers.

There are some concerns about creating a two-tier system, but I do not think that that view holds water. In my experience, police officers are comfortable with the job being one that presents different opportunities for different people. Many officers never take their sergeants exam or think about being a detective, and they are just as valued as those who take the exams and seek to progress their careers in different ways. That is the nature of policing—it always requires many people who are happy to step up and deliver on the frontline. That is why I and others were so concerned, and why I welcome the steps that have been taken.

I encourage chief constables who may have felt that the change was inevitable, and that they did not have a choice, to take the opportunity to make their views known. I encourage the college to revisit the issue, with a fresh perspective and in listening mode. Flexibility is often a positive thing. I hope that we can use this opportunity to continue to help policing move forward in a way that allows our police forces to be drawn from and within the communities that they seek to serve. I look forward to seeing how the proposals develop, and I know that my Back-Bench colleagues will follow developments closely.

[Sir George Howarth (in the Chair)]

Before I call Darren Henry, I remind him that the Minister needs to be left with enough time to respond to the debate.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Crime, Policing and Fire (Chris Philp)]

As always, Sir George, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I thank and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Dr Mullan) on securing this important debate. Essentially, I have little to add to his comments. I agree with everything that he said about the importance of policing reflecting the communities that it serves, and the importance of making sure that people from all backgrounds can access policing, serve the public and keep us safe.

This is a good time to pay tribute to the police officers who serve our communities up and down the country with bravery and dedication. I am sure that the Members here will want to join me in thanking police officers for their service, which often involves them putting themselves in the line of danger, as we saw with the tragic incident of the Police Service of Northern Ireland officer who was shot just a short time ago.

Turning to more positive news, I am pleased to say that our programme to recruit additional police officers is going well. By 31 December last year, we had recruited 84% of our target of 20,000 extra police officers to be recruited by March. As I have said to the House previously, we are on track to have a record number of police officers in England and Wales by next month—more police officers than we have ever had at any point in our country’s history. I am sure that our constituents will be very happy to hear that.

Of course, it is important to make sure that police officers represent the community more broadly. Of the new officers recruited by December 2022, 43% were female, which is a substantial increase from the previous figure of 36%, and 11% were from ethnic minority backgrounds, which is an increase on the 8.3% of the current workforce who are from ethnic minority backgrounds. The diversity of the police workforce is improving.

Regarding entry routes, I completely agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich. He acted as a very passionate and powerful advocate on this issue a few months ago, expressing his concern that we would lose the initial police learning and development programme or IPLDP—the so-called “ippledip” entry route—whereby people could join the police without a degree, and without having to obtain a degree. My hon. Friend and others expressed concern that the change would limit the accessibility of policing, and that we would lose people who had the potential to become very effective and capable police officers. The Home Secretary and I listened to those concerns, which is why the Home Secretary announced just two or three months ago that the IPLDP entry route would remain open, alongside, of course, degree-based entry routes, until such time as the College of Policing has developed a new and improved replacement non-degree entry route. It is doing that work at the moment. We are doing that because we completely agree with the points that my hon. Friend made in his excellent speech.

Both my hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Darren Henry) referred to the armed forces. I strongly agree that drawing from the armed services for policing is a good idea. As my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe said in his excellent speech, the values of both services are very similar. I pay particular tribute to the police and crime commissioner for Nottinghamshire, Caroline Henry, who worked with my hon. Friend, my predecessors and the previous Minister for the Armed Forces—my right hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Anne-Marie Trevelyan)—to establish the pilot scheme that is now running. I believe that work is under way with the College of Policing to expand that scheme and take it nationwide. I will certainly do everything I can to ensure that happens as quickly as possible. It is an excellent route, and we should do everything we can to facilitate and encourage it.

Questions were raised around whether the officers being recruited are likely to be retained. I am pleased to say that survey data from the new officers is generally positive. Between 70% and 80% of newly recruited officers have had a positive experience and, critically, intend to make policing their long-term career. We cannot be complacent—we have to ensure that they have a good experience—but that survey data encourages us to believe that the people we are recruiting view policing as a long-term career, and have had a positive experience of it so far.

[Dr Mullan]

I recognise those statistics; they paint an initially positive picture, and I do not want to take away from that. For me, the question is whether those officers will still be there in five years’ time. It is not so much about whether they are setting themselves a goal, and want to stick around in the short term. Will they be there five or 10 years from now? That is my concern.

[Chris Philp]

It is certainly our intention for those recruits to commit to long-term careers in policing. We do not want a fast turnover; we want them to build their skills. Policing offers a number of opportunities. People tend to start in emergency response or on neighbourhood policing teams, but there are a huge number of interesting specialisms that can be developed thereafter, whether they become a detective in the criminal investigation department or a specialist in investigating a particular type of crime, or undertake firearms training. That is besides the regular career progression that comes through promotion.

We are keen to ensure that all police officers are valued and looked after. That is why I chair the Police Covenant Oversight Board. The police covenant is rather like the armed forces covenant; it ensures that serving and retired officers are properly looked after, for all the reasons my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich referred to in his speech and question. I completely share his views.

This is an important issue. We will have a record number of police officers in the near future. I am pleased that both the entry routes that we have discussed are open; that is right. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for assiduously, energetically and persistently lobbying and campaigning on this topic. His personal intervention made a real difference in securing a change of policy and keeping the non-degree entry route open, when it had been previously decided that it would be closed down. He can take that away as a personal accomplishment.

I look forward to working with hon. Members from all parties to ensure that the police force, having reached record numbers, maintains them, and continues to serve and protect our constituents the length and breadth of the country.

Question put and agreed to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kieran Mullan Excerpts

Monday 14th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Chris Philp]

The hon. Lady makes an important and valid point. I had a similar conversation with Sir Mark a couple of weeks ago and I was out with officers in my borough of Croydon the week before last where the emergency response team told a similar story. Sir Stephen House is looking at this topic as part of his review into police productivity, but I also plan to have discussions with colleagues across Government, including in the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England, to find out what more we can do. The issue that she raises is certainly real.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

It is vital that our police forces draw on the best talent in our communities, including people who excel outside the classroom. Following our discussions, can the Home Secretary update the House on future plans for entry routes into policing?

[Suella Braverman]

I thank my hon. Friend and other honourable colleagues for their important campaigning to ventilate this issue. He speaks not only with passion, but with a deep understanding of the issue. I very much agree with him. I think that there are people from all walks of life who do not necessarily have a degree or want one who can be very good police officers. That is why I have asked the College of Policing to consider options for a new non-degree entry route to complement the existing framework. The current transitional arrangements will be extended in the meantime, and I am very clear that the police force must be open to those who neither have or want a degree.