Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lisa Cameron and Robert Buckland

Tuesday 3rd November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland]

My hon. Friend has worked tirelessly on this very sensitive and sad case, and I pay tribute to him for his hard work on behalf of his constituents. I am sure that this delay is causing them additional distress, and of course I will be happy to meet him. He knows that, sadly, the Government cannot compel the production of documents for a coroner investigation from the Egyptian authorities, but my officials have indeed contacted the senior coroner in the local area for more details and an update, and I understand that the senior coroner has now written to the Egyptian prosecutor general.

[Dr Lisa Cameron (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (SNP)]

The YPeople project in Lindsay House in East Kilbride in my constituency has had the police called out 700 times in two years in respect of antisocial behaviour, crime, weapons and drug misuse, and this has continued at a high rate even during lockdown. Local residents now tell me they are terrified and parents are saying that children are being offered drugs during their school lunch breaks. What more can be done to provide intensive offender and substance abuse rehabilitation prior to relocation to local communities so that residents are not put at such pervasive risk?

[Robert Buckland]

The hon. Lady raises a very serious case in her constituency, and I am sure that her colleagues in the Scottish Government, who of course have always had responsibility for these matters, Scotland being a separate criminal jurisdiction, will consider this very carefully. I am concerned to hear that in that local instance, despite best intentions, there does not seem to be that reach into the community to give people the speedy comfort and the confidence that they deserve. May I say that south of the border we are working very hard to enhance and improve community treatment requirements to deal with drug addiction and alcohol abuse and, indeed, to try and get to the root cause of some of this reoffending that causes misery to communities such as the one the hon. Lady serves?