Public Disorder

Malcolm Wicks Excerpts

Thursday 11th August 2011 Commons Chamber

[Malcolm Wicks (Croydon North) (Lab)]

As soon as I heard that there were riots—and they were riots—in my constituency and in the borough of Croydon, I left my family holiday, and I have spent the last two days talking to many hundreds of victims. I think it is best, in the brief time available to me, to report to the House on what I have heard. There were hundreds of people on the rampage in Croydon, ranging, I am told, from those aged eight or 10 to those in their 50s, but obviously most were teenagers and people in their 20s. As the House knows, major buildings were torched; there were absolutely devastating fires. Those buildings, many of which housed businesses and accommodation, have now been demolished. When I looked at the area on Tuesday morning, I realised that it could be London during the blitz, or Berlin in 1945. It is no soundbite to say that it was a war zone. Many were lucky to escape with their lives, and not to be burned to death. A woman jumped from a burning building.

Many dozens of small businesses—offices and shops—were trashed or robbed. There was theft on a gigantic scale. Those small businesses were mainly owned by people from our ethnic communities—hard-working, enterprising people who put their life savings into their businesses. They worked to build them up, and now they have seen them devastated.

Of course there were brave police officers, firefighters and ambulance staff, but the thin blue line was very thin indeed; frankly, in my constituency of Croydon North it was virtually invisible, in the minds of the victims. It is interesting that the centre of Croydon, with big national offices such as those of Nestlé, major superstores such as Marks & Spencer and national brands, was protected by the police, so the mobs descended towards west Croydon, and came into my constituency—the poorer part of the borough, where enterprises are small and tend to be owned by hard-working families. I heard dozens of reports, as I ducked into shops to look at the devastation, that the police had effectively been nowhere to be seen; 999 calls were sometimes unanswered. When people got through they were told that no officers were available. If they dared to call again out of fear about what was happening, they were told they were being a nuisance and, “Please do not call again.”

The thugs ruled the roost. Looking at it objectively, the thugs were more mobile, certainly more numerous and made more effective use of technology than the police. That is the reality as I see it. The looters in Croydon North did not have just an hour or two; they had all night to loot and loot again. The shopkeepers told me that people were returning hour after hour to take everything away. None of this was helped by the absurd decision of Metropolitan police commanders to withdraw our very able and experienced police commander from Croydon to look after strategy at Scotland Yard, meaning that when the riots kicked off that experience was not available.

I have to say to the House on behalf of my constituents that there was no law in Croydon North that night. There was just lawlessness. There was no order, but there was grave disorder. There were virtually no police; the vandals were in command. People are angry and upset and we have got to do better in future.