Terrorist Incident at Liverpool Women’s Hospital

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Wednesday 17th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for his questions, and I join him in paying tribute to our emergency services, who acted so quickly to try to preserve life at the scene of the attack, and to the taxi driver, who really was a hero in what must have been an extremely frightening situation. We wish him and his family well. With regard to the first question about lone actors, clearly we get information from all sorts of sources. The noble Lord is absolutely right to point out that the nature of terrorism is changing, and we have seen a number of lone-actor attacks in the past few years. I cannot comment on this attack further because clearly it is a live and very new investigation. The facts of the case will come out as the investigation continues, but I know that the police made a statement today. I will get back to him on the report he referred to if I can. I am not sure what more I can say about it today.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I understand the caution that the noble Baroness has expressed about the incident itself; it did not seem to stop the Home Secretary reportedly saying that

“The case in Liverpool was a complete reflection of how dysfunctional, how broken, the system has been in the past”.


Despite that, I also express my thanks to the police, the security services and the taxi driver. Does the Minister agree that so-called lone-wolf or lone-actor attacks are some of the most difficult to prevent, whatever motivates them; and that, while the police and the security services do an outstanding job, they cannot be successful without the help and support of people from every community? What are the Government doing to build trust and confidence with communities where this is lacking?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I totally agree with the noble Lord that these things are hard to predict and hard to deal with when they happen. I have seen a couple of comments, particularly from BAME communities in Liverpool, saying that they have faced hate incidences in the last couple of days, and we have seen before that, when an attack happens, quite often it is women who bear the brunt of the hatred and the name-calling. When I was Minister for Counterextremism, I remember going to many different communities, such as Muslim communities and Polish communities after Brexit, trying to provide reassurance. The police have been fantastic on the back of some of the attacks in reassuring local communities.