Violent Disorder

Lord Sharpe of Epsom Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd September 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, this is the first opportunity we have had in this House to express our sorrow at the events in Southport and our sympathy to the family and friends of the victims. It was an appalling tragedy, and they all have my sincere condolences and I hope those who were injured make full and speedy recoveries. I also take this opportunity to extend similar sympathies and condolences to the family and friends of Cher Maximen and Mussie Imnetu who were killed at the Notting Hill Carnival.

I thank the Home Secretary for making the Statement yesterday. I am quite sure that the Minister had his summer seriously disrupted by the dreadful violence and disorder that we saw on our streets. By and large, I think that the police and the Government dealt with this violence well. There can never be any excuse for this type of behaviour, and I agree with the Home Secretary that this was thuggish and criminal activity. There are plenty of ways to express legitimate frustrations and points of view in this country, and many do without resorting to violence and intimidation. Acting at speed to quell the disturbances was the right thing to do, and I commend the Minister for his part in that.

However, the Home Secretary’s Statement yesterday also prompted a number of questions which deserve to be explored. First, the Home Secretary described actions taken by the NPCC and referenced that:

“the co-ordination infrastructure and systems that they had to work with were too weak”.

Can the Minister expand on that and explain which systems were too weak and why? He will be aware of a phrase that I had to repeatedly deploy when I was in his shoes—often to my regret—that our police forces retain operational independence. That phrase may be frustrating on occasions, but it also describes an important underlying principle that Ministers, while no doubt “working daily”—to quote the Home Secretary again—should not get involved in operational matters. I have no doubt the Minister will agree with that.

Following on from that, what are the terms of reference for the review that the Home Secretary has commissioned to ensure that there is

“sufficient public order policing for the future”?

What does “sufficient” mean? At this point, I will refrain from passing comment on the efforts of the noble Lord’s party to frustrate the previous Government’s public order efforts.

The Home Secretary also talked about rebuilding respect for the police. I agree, but would remind the House that this is not simply about numbers. The previous Government fulfilled our promises and ensured that there were more policemen on our streets than ever before, but numbers are not everything. Policemen have to be tasked with doing the right jobs, and that is inconsistent across the country. I obviously hope that the Government succeed in their aim to rebuild community policing, but I fear that the Minister will soon be talking about operational independence again. How many community officers do the Government expect to recruit and where will they go?

The Home Secretary talked about countering extremism, and that is of course welcome. She referenced Islamist and far-right extremism, but I note made no mention at all of far-left extremism. Why not? I am sorry to say that the far left is in large part responsible for the most enduring form of racism: that of anti-Semitism. That is worse now than in my lifetime, and it sickens and disgusts. I will be charitable and allow that those who conflate what is happening in the Middle East with the British Jewish community are just stupid, but some will not be, and they are just as manipulative as those who foment hatred of other groups and individuals. Can the Minister reassure us that the previous Government’s work supporting CREST and the Jewish community will continue, and that anti-Semitism and those stoking it will be met with the full force of the law?

My final questions relate to—I choose my words very carefully here—perceived inconsistencies in the policing of protest. I stress again that the response to this summer’s riots was appropriate and that the Government deserve praise for their commendable actions, but there is a lingering suspicion that some riots and disorder attract more robust attention than others. Referring back to my previous question, there was clear evidence of anti-Semitism on our streets in relation to Israel/Gaza, and I know that the police have now made many arrests. I understand, of course, that it can be difficult to make arrests during a demonstration; the police are usually heavily outnumbered, so that could cause more trouble. Nevertheless, the impression created was one of a degree of tolerance for the chanting of well-worn anti-Semitic tropes and the display of symbols sympathetic to proscribed terrorist organisations. Similarly, in Harehills, in Leeds the police seemingly disappeared when the Romanian Roma community rioted. Why? I note that arrests are now being made, and that is welcome, but surely the response should have been more robust at the time. If there is a good operational reason why that was not the case then I am more than happy to hear it, but I would like an answer.

Finally—I have little doubt that the Minister will agree—there can never be any room for statements from politicians that can be read as equivocation in these matters. Violence and disorder of the type that we saw across the summer is always wrong; any suspicion that this is not the case will merely fuel the keyboard warriors and stoke yet more trouble. The first step towards rebuilding trust in the police is consistency, so I hope that the noble Lord will take my questions in the constructive way that they are intended. None of us wants to see more of this and we all want the police to succeed.

[Baroness Hussein-Ece (LD)]

My Lords, the shocking deaths of three little girls in Southport, followed by the shocking disorder on our streets perpetrated by a minority of violent thugs, was truly frightening. There was racist mob violence in our towns and cities, clearly incited and organised by far-right groups and individuals —mainly online, where shockingly they shared the locations of hotels and hostels housing asylum seekers and migrants. We saw footage of thugs trying to set fire to some hotels, terrifying the people in them. The locations of immigration offices were leaked online, so they were facing attacks as well.

The bravery and professionalism of the police and emergency services are to be commended. They were dealing with what was sometimes an impossible job. However, it is disappointing that the Official Opposition has not mentioned the targeted attack on Muslim communities. They were clearly the focus of these attacks; online, we saw the most appalling Islamophobia and hate crimes. That affects not just Muslims in this country but those perceived to be Muslims, who were of course migrants and asylum seekers—and anyone perceived to be a supporter of or even associated with asylum seekers, or from an ethnic-minority community. I know of what I speak: members of my own family in some of these communities that were targeted, who wear visible headscarves, were terrified. Some of them felt that they could not stay in their homes, in an area such as Walthamstow that was targeted.

Does the Minister agree that to tackle record levels of hate crimes against Muslims we need a consistent and coherent approach to tackling Islamophobia, underpinned by a working definition to better understand what Islamophobia is and is not, in the way that we have—quite rightly—a working definition of anti-Semitism? Six years ago, the All-Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims put forward the first working definition of Islamophobia after two years of consultation with 800 community groups up and down the country, with all faiths and with victims of hate crimes. That definition was accepted by all parties, apart from the last Government. Will this Government look to revisit that, and start to come to a proper understanding and definition of what we mean by Islamophobia? Do they intend to appoint an independent adviser on Islamophobia—a post that has been vacant for two years? Discrimination, prejudice and hatred damage everyone and the fabric of our society. We must work together to challenge it.

The Statement mentions far-right extremism, which has been on the rise. We saw some people on the streets with signs depicting Nazi emblems. Make no mistake, these people are entrenched in anti-Semitism if they support Nazi symbols and that kind of behaviour. The Statement mentions a review. Can the Minister set out whether enough attention is being given to tackling far-right extremism? Can he say a bit more about how the Government intend to look into that in the review?

International Law Enforcement Alerts Platform

Lord Sharpe of Epsom Excerpts

Monday 2nd September 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I can give the noble Baroness the assurance that the Government are committed to undertaking that action. Phase 1 included 46 forces, in Scotland, Northern Ireland and England. We are looking to expand that, so that we can have real-time data—and, in future, real-time assessments of mutual sharing—to attack the real issues that matter to the people we serve: people trafficking, drug smuggling and terrorism, and a whole range of other criminal activity. That is the most important thing, and I hope that there is cross-party support in this House for the actions that the Government will take.

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

Could the Minister provide assurances to the House that August’s announcement of the withdrawal of £1.3 billion-worth of tech funding will not have any consequences for national security programmes, including the rollout of further phases of programmes such as I-LEAP?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to the honourable gentleman—or rather, with my apologies, the noble Lord; I am getting used to the House—for his comments and for the work that he undertook on these issues in the past as lead Minister in the Lords in the Home Office. He will recognise that we have a job to do, which is to make sure that we secure our borders, secure information, and tackle criminal gangs and criminal activity. That is what we intend to do. I do not anticipate that this Government will be watering down any commitments on those issues in the near future.

King’s Speech

Lord Sharpe of Epsom Excerpts

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)]

My Lords, I start by welcoming the noble Lords, Lord Timpson and Lord Hanson of Flint, to their places, and congratulate them on the excellent maiden speech already delivered and that that is no doubt yet to come. They have been garlanded with tributes this evening and I look forward to getting to know them both and working with them on home affairs matters.

I also take this opportunity to pay tribute to their shadow predecessors, the noble Lord, Lord Ponsonby—who I welcome back to his place, although I have to admit I would prefer it if it was this place—and, of course, the noble Lord, Lord Coaker. They always worked very constructively with me and when we disagreed, we disagreed well. I was slightly sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Coaker, has moved to the MoD, because he was very good at castigating me for spouting nonsense from the Dispatch Box—which obviously I did only very rarely—but I had looked forward to reciprocating, and indeed kept a Hansard scrapbook of some of his finer rhetorical highlights. On the subject of rhetorical highlights, I commend my noble friend Lord Goodman on his powerful maiden speech. He made many important points, but one struck a personal chord: that his great-grandfather lasted six months longer on the Somme than mine.

I cannot deal with the entire humble Address in the time available, and justice was dealt with very comprehensively by a number of my noble friends, including the noble and learned Lords, Lord Stewart, Lord Bellamy and Lord Garnier, and the noble Lords, Lord Sandhurst and Lord Wolfson of Tredegar. There were many other noble Lords who made very important contributions on the subject of justice as well; I cannot name all of them in the time available. I wonder, having heard all of the discussions, whether the ambitions of the noble Lords opposite will clash. There is obviously tension between what the Government are proposing with regard to so-called minor crimes and what they are saying about not imprisoning for minor crimes. I wonder how that tension will be resolved.

I say that we will work with the noble Lords opposite because that is the intention of His Majesty’s loyal Opposition. Matters of national security, public safety, border integrity and criminal justice are too important to be party-political footballs. As I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, will say, national security is the first duty of government. To that end, I was very pleased to see that the new Home Office team includes the Member for Barnsley North, Dan Jarvis, as the Security Minister. I have watched his career from afar and am reassured by the last Security Minister, my right honourable friend Tom Tugendhat, that he will do a first-class job.

While it is invidious to single anyone out, I will also say how pleased I was to see the Member for Birmingham Yardley, Jess Phillips, be given the crucial role of leading the Government’s efforts on violence against women and girls. I wish her well. I hope she will acknowledge that there was progress under the previous Government in this area, but I also acknowledge that there will always be more to do, as was also eloquently expanded on by the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes of Stretford, and my noble friends Lady Owen of Alderley Edge and Lady Newlove. I am very much looking forward to the Private Member’s Bill of my noble friend Lady Owen. I also say how personally sorry I am that abortion clinic safe access zones were not commenced when I was in post. I hope the new Government will be able to overcome the bureaucratic inertia where I failed.

I will also take this opportunity to praise the civil servants in the Home Office. The noble Lord, Lord Hanson, inherits a first-class private office. I hold them all in very high regard, but more broadly I say that it was a pleasure to work with so many very good people who really do have the country’s best interests at their core. I am pleased that my noble friend Lord Patten reminded us all of that. I will return to this theme.

The loyal Opposition will work with the Government. We will of course also scrutinise the legislative programme to the best of our abilities. In terms of the crime and policing Bill, it is to be regretted that the previous Government did not have the time to pass our Criminal Justice Bill, which contained important measures, including on anti-social behaviour, assaults on retail workers and deepfakes, among many others.

I join my noble friend Lady Bray in applauding the intention to focus on neighbourhood policing, but I also note that the previous Government delivered on our promise to recruit 20,000 more police officers. Indeed, this country has more policemen now than ever before. Unfortunately, it is not just about numbers. As I am sure the noble Lord has already found out, it is also about culture, so I welcome the Government’s intention to sort out the many cultural failings that we have seen in the police. Police leaders have a job to do in rebuilding public trust, not least because they owe that to the vast majority of good men and women who serve. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, made some important points on accountability, which were reinforced by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Manchester and, very powerfully, by the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley.

The noble Baroness, Lady Fox, the noble Lord, Lord Mann, and my noble friend Lord Godson also reminded us that there is a good deal of work to do with regard to defending democracy.

Crime is a fast-evolving landscape, so I hope the Government will continue to work with our online fraud charter, a world-first agreement with 12 of the biggest tech companies to proactively block and remove fraudulent content from their platforms, with Facebook, Instagram and Amazon among the signatories. If I may, I also suggest that the noble Lord visits the City of London Police who lead on fraud. I went earlier this year and wish I had gone sooner to get an idea of what their excellent teams are up to, particularly with regard to victim support.

The Opposition also broadly support Martyn’s Law, as my noble and learned friend Lord Stewart noted, which we intended to introduce in the previous Parliament. The previous Government also introduced the National Security Act, the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act and the Investigatory Powers Act, all of which will make the Government’s efforts on these important subjects a good deal easier. I thank the Government for their support on these subjects when they were in opposition.

I thoroughly endorse the comments of the noble Baroness, Lady Manningham-Buller, about the threat landscape and how to prepare for its evolution. She is entirely right.

I now turn to migration and borders. When in Opposition, those in the party opposite voted against the Government on this subject on more than 130 occasions, all while claiming that they shared our ambition to stop the boats and smash the gangs. So far, as my right honourable friend the shadow Home Secretary has noted, they have cancelled the Rwanda scheme without bothering to notify the Government of Rwanda, in effect announced an amnesty for illegal migrants and yesterday announced the closure of the “Bibby Stockholm” next January. On a more positive note, I join my noble friend Lord Howard of Lympne in commending the Government’s announcement of the aid—although I do not think £84 million will go anywhere near far enough.

Returning to the other matters in turn, as my right honourable friend the shadow Home Secretary noted, would the Government have treated one of our European partners as they treated the Government of Rwanda? I doubt it, but I am not entirely surprised. My noble and learned friend Lord Stewart of Dirleton and I sat through 47 hours of debate on that Bill and are well aware that noble Lords did not like it very much, but we were both shocked by some of the intemperate language that was used—not, I stress, from the Front Benches—which we often charitably described as “post-colonial”. I suggest that many noble Lords need to reflect on their contributions to those debates.

Noble Lords might not have liked the Rwanda Bill, but it was starting to work as a deterrent, which was its stated intent in the Bill. It is not just we who are saying that; the Irish Government said so too. As the noble Lord will have discovered by now, it was also of considerable interest to our European allies, who were quietly supportive and are actively exploring similar schemes. Before I am informed that arrivals were up this year, let us not forget that the people who run these gangs may be venal, but they are not stupid, and they are also evidently dedicated psephologists who predicted the new Government’s amnesty. My noble friend Lord Jackson asked some very pertinent questions on this and I hope that the Minister will be able to answer them.

As to the “Bibby Stockholm”, which, I remind noble Lords, was good enough to house oil rig workers, two specific questions spring to mind. Where are the 400 occupants going to be sent? Have conversations been had with relevant local authorities?

We want to see the gangs smashed and the borders secured, and Rwanda was one of the tools designed to achieve that. The new Government have made much of the border command that they intend to establish, but this is simply reinventing the wheel. The Small Boats Operational Command already exists and does all that it is claimed the new body will achieve. I hope that, amid all the focus on this new wheel, the men and women who serve in the Small Boats Operational Command, so ably led by General Duncan Capps, Phil Douglas at the Home Office and Chris Tilley, do not get lost in the noise. They are in the channel every day risking their lives to save others. I had the privilege of visiting them recently, and I intend to campaign to make sure they are considered for the new Wider Service Medal, which the last Government introduced in March this year and which is available to civilians

“working outside the traditional criteria of existing operational medals”.

I invite the Government to work with me on that.

On the day I visited, we rescued 67 people in the middle of the channel, 57 of whom were young men from very safe countries. They were not desperate; they were economic migrants. The few women were mostly Vietnamese and, believe me, their stories were harrowing. I remind the noble Lord, Lord Dubs, that they had all left the safety of France on an unseaworthy boat. They were treated with kindness and respect, as is quite right, but they should not have been there in the first place. The Minister will argue that the Government will quickly return all those arriving from safe countries, and of course we wish them well with that. However, the criminal gangs will merely intensify their advertising efforts in countries that are not on the safe lists, so to my regret I predict that the boats will keep on coming.

Speaking personally—this is not official opposition policy yet—I completely agree with the noble Lord, Lord Mann, about the need for ID cards. One of the principal reasons why people leave France in the first place is our, frankly, lax approach to identity.

While on the subject, I commend the efforts of the French authorities. They have done a significant amount of work that does not get reported. In many cases they are confronted with significant violence and threats from migrants who are about to board boats. That obviously necessitates a slightly more intense policing effort on their behalf and, as far as I can tell, they have discharged that with commendable responsibility.

In conclusion, there is much in the new Government’s programme to welcome, and we will do our best to be supportive. We already regret some of the missteps on borders and migration, but I have no wish to be churlish because we all want the Government to succeed. As I have said, I have doubts in some areas but no shortage of goodwill, and we will not oppose for the sake of it—certainly not 130 times. I wish the Minister the very best. To quote my noble friend Lord Goodman, we will accentuate the positive and try to eliminate the negative. We will be constructive, and I promise him that, if and when we disagree, we will disagree well.