London Local Authorities Bill [Lords]

Mark Field Excerpts

Wednesday 7th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Chope]

I hope neither, but my hon. Friend is right that as sure as night follows day, what follows from this sort of power is the establishment of databases. That is very sinister.

[Mark Field (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)]

I sympathise extensively with what my hon. Friend says about the civil liberties issues, but on this specific matter I suspect that the official concerned would have computer access to the electoral register and could therefore make at least a cursory check, although that might not necessarily resolve the matter. Is his concern—it is a relatively valid one, and I would be interested to hear what the promoters think—that were clause 4 to be deleted, law-abiding citizens would find themselves subject to the penalties under clause 3, while less law-abiding citizens would get away scot-free? In other words, there would be a strong disincentive for those willing to play by the rules, while others would find a way of avoiding the consequences. Although I accept his civil liberties argument, surely there is a concern that many pedlars of no fixed abode, or of an abode many miles away, could get away with such things more easily than others.

[Mr Chope]

My hon. Friend almost answered his own point in his preamble, when he said that this was a civil liberties issue. I think that he and I agree. If there is a civil liberties issue, on the whole our instinct is to come down on the side of maintaining the civil liberty rather than giving an arbitrary power to an official to intervene—a power that might be subject to abuse or result in oppression, and which would certainly undermine the long-standing principle in this country that people are not required to give their name and address to any Tom, Dick and Harry whom they happen to meet in the street.

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[Mr Chope]

My right hon. Friend makes a good point. It certainly appears that the public’s representatives are not keen on this matter. Although I have not checked the No. 10 website to see whether there is an online petition with hundreds or thousands of signatures in support of this Bill, I suspect not, and I think we would have been told about it if there was. The Bill’s passage through this House has not yet concluded, however, so it is still open to somebody to start an online petition in support of it, and against today’s amendments.

[Mark Field]

I have some sympathy with the view that certain parts of the country should not have an entirely different regime, and I share many of my hon. Friend’s concerns about council or local authority officers having these powers—although I am a big supporter of the two London local authorities in my constituency. However, I do not think he can legitimately argue that there has not been an opportunity to scrutinise this Bill properly, as it has had far more scrutiny than any Public Bill would normally receive, not least over the past four years as it has slowly made its way through the House and the other place.

Does my hon. Friend also recognise that there are differences between London and, for instance, the leafy parts of Christchurch that he represents in sunny Dorset? There is a huge mass of humanity in London, particularly in the centre of the metropolis, and that gives rise to at least the idea that there should be a slightly different regime for some public order and health and safety matters compared with those for the wide acres of much of the rest of England. If we believe in localism, as I hope many of us do, there is a place for having somewhat different regimes of bylaws, and I suspect they would be understood by many people who visit central London even from faraway places such as Shipley, Bury North or East Yorkshire.

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[Mr Chope]

That is an important point, because most borough councils are saying that they are short of funds and will want to ensure that these accredited people at least cover their costs. In order to do that, these authorities may well give these people incentives to ensure that they get sufficient income for their activity in any tour of duty. So that is another serious problem. As far as I am aware, we have never had a system in this country where police officers are incentivised for the number of arrests they make, but it seems that people are being incentivised for the number of civil offences they can detect.

[Mark Field]

Although I very much understand the concern raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall) on incentivisation, I should put the following point on the record: Westminster city council has often been accused of incentive schemes for its parking attendants, but it is the case, and has been expressly so over past four years at least, that there is no such incentive scheme. In other words, traffic wardens do not have any sort of quota or incentive to issue tickets, and one very much hopes that a similar regime would apply to offences under this Bill.