European Convention on Human Rights

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart]

The hon. Gentleman might be right—I do not know. We need to hear from the Government exactly what we are voting on. The Home Secretary made three different attempts to tell the House what we will be voting on tonight, but we are no clearer. At some point, we will need to hear from the Government exactly what they are asking us to support. If they want us to support the full rules, I cannot do that. It is a Conservative assault on article 8 and I will not be able to support it this evening.

We need a considered debate on immigration. Hon. Members who have spoken are absolutely right that the matter concerns our constituents, but in Scotland we do not share the Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail, right-wing Tory view of immigration. Scotland consistently sees these issues differently. Scotland’s population is at an all-time high, but only a few years ago we had great concerns that it was going to fall below the iconic 5 million mark for the first time since the 20th century. That was a real and absolute concern that has been addressed by immigration. We see immigration as something that is valuable to our communities and that is there to be cherished, grown and developed. The minute people set foot in our nation, they are new Scots. They are integrated from day one and that is why we do not have such problems.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman therefore confirm whether, were Scotland to become independent, it would have its own independent border service?

[Pete Wishart]

You betcha. We have been observing what has been happening in the UK Border Agency and it is a textbook guide of how not to do to it. It is a nonsensical agency; it is dysfunctional and gets things absolutely wrong. I look forward to the day when we exercise control over our own immigration policies, so that we can have policies that are designed for and suited to our demography, our economy and our population. Right now, our population is at an all-time high because of immigration and we see that as good and positive.

[Mark Reckless]

Just to clarify, is the hon. Gentleman presuming that an independent Scotland would be part of a common travel area in the way that the Republic of Ireland is? If so, can he be certain of that—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. We are straying way off the matter under consideration.

Proceeds of Crime

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Tuesday 12th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hanson]

I have said to the Minister that we believe that the directive is a positive development, as the Minister in the other place also said, only two weeks ago, and we should look at it in a positive way. I will take at face value the concerns that the Minister has raised this evening about operability and the advice that he has received from the agencies, but if the hon. Gentleman thinks that we should not opt in because of a wave of anti-European sentiment, that is a very different matter indeed. I will certainly be a positive European. We should have co-operation. I want to see co-operation between states. I also want the European Union to take powers to take the assets of criminals abroad who are operating and making profits in this country. That would not be a bad thing. I would very much welcome further discussions with the Minister about the points that he has raised, but in principle I have no objection to a Europe-wide document helping to support this approach and enshrine improvements on what we currently have in British law.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Was that a yes?

[Mr Hanson]

For the anti-Europeans on the Government Benches, let me say that it is certainly a yes. I certainly wish to see co-operation on a Europe-wide basis to freeze terrorist and criminal assets and to repatriate them to this country. The hon. Gentleman can certainly take it as a yes. This evening I have listened to what the Minister has said, which indicates that he has had advice—which I have not seen—that says that there are difficulties with this measure. What I am saying to the Minister—and to his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, who is in her place—is that my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary and I would wish to have sight of that advice and to have further briefing on it, so that we can scrutinise the operation of the process by the Minister and how he intends to take forward discussions on the document as a whole. However, I sense that Government Members have objections to the very principle of such co-operation, rather than to the practice that the Minister has set out.

I would like to have some idea from the Minister—either now or after contributions from right hon. and hon. Members—of how he will take this matter forward. He has indicated that he has concerns about certain issues, but he has not yet shared with the House the details of what they are. What is his timetable for discussion with his European Union colleagues on these matters? Does he have a timetable to try to resolve the issues? Does he intend to return to the House at some point to sign up to the document, or has it been kicked into the long grass because he knows that, ultimately, Members such as, I suspect—with due respect—the hon. Member for Rochester and Strood (Mark Reckless) and others would vote against the measure, no matter what was brought forward, as a matter of principle? If that is the case, the Minister should be honest with the House, because we will certainly return to this matter in due course, when we have seen the advice that he has received, as far as he can share it with us. I sense that this is not just about the operation and practice of the measure; rather, I sense that there are certain elements on the Government Back Benches with a fundamental objection to the principle of such co-operation.

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[Keith Vaz]

I am sure that the Government are most grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s thanks.

Last night I was present at the launch of a document produced by the hon. Member for Bournemouth West (Conor Burns) about the operation of the European arrest warrant and what it has delivered over the last few years. I know that the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) is a frequent commentator on its justice and home affairs implications for our country.

I think that we should be cautious in dealing with these matters. The EU document needs to be considered with great care. I am not one of those who believe that we need a directive in order to secure co-operation between EU partners, but I think that my right hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson) deserves the explanation that he seeks. I think that he deserves to be told why the Minister in the other place was so enthusiastic about the directive, and why the Government have apparently changed their mind. Of course, if there is a valid explanation, and if the various agencies—the Serious Organised Crime Agency being one of them—make representations to the Government pointing out that this is going to create problems for our legislation, it is important that that advice is shared not only with the Minister, but with the House.

The hon. Member for South Ribble (Lorraine Fullbrook) and I recently returned from an official visit to Colombia as part of a Home Affairs Committee delegation, where we were looking at the drugs trade. We noted a very important fact: only 2.6% of the profits from the trade in cocaine remain in Colombia. Some 97% of cocaine profits are administered and laundered within the European Union—in our country and other countries of the EU. That means that our existing structures are not used appropriately enough to catch the people who are responsible for drugs having become the biggest illicit activity in the world.

Even though a directive would help, it will not provide the answer. The Government are right not to opt in unless and until there are further negotiations, therefore. We need to make sure that the structures that are in place in the various countries of the EU can work together to catch those responsible for laundering the profits from drugs. I hope that the Government will use the time that will be available to them as a result of their decision not to opt in constructively and productively, and that they look at the institutions and organisations and make sure that that co-operation is improved. There are, of course, organisations—such as Europol and Interpol—which can be used effectively. I do not think Europol is used enough. We have a very good British director of Europol, Rob Wainwright, who was trained at SOCA. We must co-operate much more closely, without legislation from Brussels being needed.

Drugs is one example. The other is human trafficking, which is the third biggest illicit activity in the world, with profits of £32 billion a year. Through our co-operation with the Romanian authorities in Operation Golf, we showed that it is possible to have mutual co-operation with other EU countries without having a further directive, if there is willingness on the part of our European partners to work with us to deal with illegal activity.

[Mark Reckless]

The right hon. Gentleman mentions Europol and the issue of trafficking. Does he recall that when the Home Affairs Committee visited the Greek-Turkish border, one of the issues we found was that the structures of Europol were not well designed to secure co-operation with Turkey? Very often, the European basis of Europol and the insistence on doing everything through that framework was getting in the way of practical co-operation.

[Keith Vaz]

I am happy to agree with the hon. Gentleman, who is also a fellow member of the Home Affairs Committee; he is absolutely right. The EU looks at these issues only within the confines of the EU. Because Turkey is not a member, it is not included in any aspects of co-operation. An example of that is the way the RABITs were deployed in Greece to deal with illegal immigration. Because the UK was not part of Schengen, we were not allowed to be a formal part of the activity of the RABITs. As a result, we were left marginalised.

Mr Speaker, I can see that you are about to tell me that I am out of order. [Interruption.] Oh, you are not. You were frowning, Mr Speaker, and I have known you long enough to know that a frown may have indicated that you were about to stop my flow. Let me go back to the original reason behind this debate. I was tempted along the other path by the hon. Member for Rochester and Strood (Mark Reckless).

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[Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)]

I support the motion, and I commend the Minister and the Home Secretary for taking a wise decision. I wish to speak briefly because after years of our sleepwalking into many mindless EU regulations, we are at last getting some substantive scrutiny of and rigour in how we take these decisions under this Government and in this Parliament. I also wish to commend the European Scrutiny Committee and, in particular, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg). That Committee has become the nightwatchman for Parliament on these matters, and on this directive in particular.

This draft EU directive is flawed. The Minister has explained one of the specific law enforcement problems with it, but beyond that there are six reasons why Britain should not opt in. The first of those is the basic issue of principle: the directive empowers the state to freeze assets without a court order being obtained first, and that extraordinary proposal is contrary to the fundamental tenets of justice in this country. Given the exponential increase in security legislation in this country since 9/11 and the many examples of broad powers being expansively interpreted by law enforcement agencies, whether inadvertently or otherwise, under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 and elsewhere, the retention of judicial oversight before making such an order is vital.

Those who want to make a practical rather than ideological argument in favour of opting in should note that in the UK a court can be asked to issue a property freezing order at any time and, if necessary, without notice to the affected party. The risk that assets might be moved if a court order was first sought are not a good reason for us to legislate along these lines. The decision to deprive an individual of their property should always require a judge’s consent.

[Mark Reckless]

Although the Labour Chair of the Home Affairs Committee took a different view, how does my hon. Friend react to Her Majesty’s Opposition apparently, in principle, supporting opting into this directive, despite the issue of principle, to which he refers, of the state taking away a private citizen’s assets—freezing them—without any reference to a court?

[Mr Raab]

I thank my hon. Friend for that. I think we saw a classic piece of fence-sitting. There is a clear contradiction in the position set out by the shadow Minister, which I shall refer to briefly in due course.

The second argument against opting in is, as the explanatory memorandum explains, that there has been no formal domestic consultation yet, so the House does not have the official and formal views, based on operational law enforcement experience, of the police, SOCA, the intelligence agencies and other departments, let alone external experts and groups, on the need for and the practicability of what is being proposed. The Government are therefore right to be cautious and not to be bounced into signing up to a broad new law with far-reaching implications that have not been properly thought through. I noted that the shadow Minister has explicitly requested some gist, explanation or consultation in respect of the nature, character and substance of those submissions, yet without having seen them, he would be happy to opt in anyway. I respectfully suggest to him that the ideological view in this debate and in this House is his, in favour of more JHA integration, irrespective of the scrutiny of the merits and the substance.

The third argument against opting in relates to the costs associated with this directive. Those remain unquantified, but they could well be substantial. The directive will require changes to UK primary legislation. It would introduce new data collection requirements, specifically for evaluation purposes at the EU level. Those would create a pointless administrative burden for UK authorities and lead to an additional bureaucratic tier of EU monitoring of our practices. In addition, as has been said and as the explanatory memorandum explains, the directive’s insistence on effective remedies could add to the legal aid bill, just as we are taking difficult decisions to reduce it which require uncomfortable sacrifices at home.

The fourth objection is that the UK already has ample powers in the area of asset confiscation and freezing. The Government’s explanatory memorandum states:

“We believe that the UK exceeds many of the minimum requirements and so we do not foresee that it would have an impact on the number of cases.”

If anything, those powers have become too broad in the post-9/11 era. The amount of money confiscated by the UK authorities rose by more than 500% between 2003 and 2009, which is scarcely the symptom of a weak regime. The reality is that the directive is neither necessary nor desirable.

Under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, the UK framework for dealing with the confiscation and freezing of assets is perfectly robust. Let us be honest about this—I think that the shadow Minister should be honest about it: by legislating on this matter in Brussels, we would be legislating for the failings of other EU member states whose regimes are criticised by the Commission as “underdeveloped and underutilised”. In other words, we are expected to sign up to this blunt EU directive to try to encourage other EU states to pull their socks up. That is not a satisfactory basis for legislation in this country. For one thing, most of the failings in other member states arise less from legislative defects and more from deficiencies in operational law enforcement capabilities. The statement from the Commission suggests that the problem is less one of legislation and more one of law enforcement.

The Home Office recognised that point in its explanatory memorandum, which states:

“The UK does not consider that non-legislative options have been fully considered”.

That is the fifth objection to opting in. If there are alternatives to legislation, why have they not been thoroughly and properly examined by the Commission before it rushed to churn out yet another intrusive and in certain respects draconian directive?

The final objection is the impact on the UK’s 2014 opt-out decision on crime and policing, which has already been mentioned. Every time the UK opts in to one of the 130 or so measures that are subject to our block opt-out, that measure is removed from the list of laws that the UK will have the chance to repatriate by 2014. In other words, if we opt in we will automatically become subject to the jurisdiction and interpretation of the Commission and European Court of Justice. Given that Brussels will be assuming competence over broad and, for the UK, unprecedented security powers, that is not an ideological issue but a major constitutional one.

The directive is in part draconian, but it is in whole costly and unnecessary. It conflicts with basic principles of British justice and would undermine Britain’s opportunity to wrest back democratic control of justice and home affairs legislation. There is no good reason why Britain should opt in—the Opposition have not advanced one—and for principled and practical reasons, we should remain out. I commend the Home Secretary and the Minister for their rigour in reaching this decision based on the substance and merits of the matter.

Family Migration

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Monday 11th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. I remind the House that in order to ask a question about the statement, a Member must have been in the Chamber to listen to it.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

I welcome the series of impressive and, dare I say, Conservative measures that the Home Secretary has announced. Given that thresholds are higher when children are involved, is there not a risk that people entering the country in order to marry will quickly have a number of children, and may therefore need state support although they are above the original threshold?

[Mrs May]

I understand my hon. Friend’s point, but I think that it would be highly unreasonable for the Government to tell people that they could enter the country but could not have any children. When people first enter the country, they will be able to stay for a limited period, and will then have to undergo a renewal process to establish whether they meet the requirements at all stages before they achieve settlement.

Abu Qatada

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Tuesday 17th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

Yes, we are confident in the level of protection given by TPIMs—otherwise we not have introduced them. On the right hon. Gentleman’s first point about the timing, I am tempted to say that if SIAC had sat before I had made my statement, I would have received complaints from Labour Members that I should have come before the House before it had taken any decision.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

The European convention is incorporated in law by the Human Rights Act. On that basis, our supreme court has already ruled that it would be lawful to deport Abu Qatada. Why, therefore, does the Home Secretary say that it would unlawful?

[Mrs May]

Obviously, for the past three months, a rule 39 injunction against the deportation of Abu Qatada has come from the European Court. As I outlined in my statement, if any move were made to deport him immediately—we have a memorandum of understanding with Jordan about how a deportation would take place, including a timetable that we should abide by; it was a part of our arrangements supported by the European Court and was supported in the UK courts—it would be open to Abu Qatada to issue an injunction. If he were to be deported contrary to that injunction, it would of course be unlawful.

Abu Qatada

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

Of course everybody in this country—everybody who wants to ensure that we can deport those who are a danger to us here in the United Kingdom—will be appalled by the decision that was taken by the Strasbourg Court. As I have said, we are doing everything we can to examine the legal options available to us. I continue to say that I believe it is right that we should be working to reform the European Court of Human Rights, and to do that we need to get the support of all of the other 46 countries involved.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

We cannot currently repeal the Human Rights Act because the Liberal Democrats will not let us. However, so many Labour Members are running in the police elections that, come November—if they all win—it is possible that we may have a Conservative-Democratic Unionist party majority. Will we use it?

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend is well aware of the position set out in our manifestos at the last election, but he is also well aware that the coalition Government have agreed that we will look at a British Bill of Rights. That work is being done by the commission and, as I said in response to an earlier question from another hon. Friend, I expect it to report by the end of the year.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Monday 7th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Nick Herbert]

I have explained that we are not in a position to reconsider the four-year funding allocation that has been made, because we have to deal with the deficit. Opposition Members simply do not seem to understand that. The police can make savings in ways that protect front-line services, as we heard earlier, and we are committed to ensuring that that continues to be the case.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

In its White Paper, the Home Office said that from 2012-13, the police and crime panels would have the power to trigger a referendum on a policing precept recommended by the police and crime commissioner. When did the Secretary of State decide that that power would be better exercised by herself?

[Nick Herbert]

I do not accept the premise of my hon. Friend’s question. I have committed to meeting him to discuss the issue, but we believe it important both that the panel has the power of veto over an excessive precept set by a police and crime commissioner, which has now been legislated for, and that the public have the ability to reject an excessive precept through the referendum lock. That is the subject of separate measures that are before the House in the Localism Bill.

UK Border Force

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Monday 7th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

Yes, we were looking at the operation of the pilot, as a full evaluation, at the end of the pilot taking place. Opposition Members have asked on several occasions whether during the course of the pilot it became clear to Ministers that it was being operated not just as requested and authorised, but in another way, and the answer to that is no.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Brodie Clark was governor of Whitemoor prison when five IRA men escaped, yet he was promoted to be the Prison Service head of security and then to head the UK border force. The Home Secretary explains that things will improve under the NCA, but does she agree that confidence in the agency would be bolstered if its head were subject to a parliamentary confirmation hearing?

Metropolitan Police Service

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

Of course we have reviewed the requirements for Olympic security, and we did an audit of it when we came into government. In the run-up to the Olympics we will continue to ensure that the resources that are available and the measures that are taken will provide a secure and safe games.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

Is the Home Secretary aware of the statement that Sir Paul made at the conference of the Association of Chief Police Officers in July 2009, which suggests that it was not John Yates who limited the review then to less than a day but the commissioner himself?

[Mrs May]

I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. As he will know as a member of the Home Affairs Committee, the Committee will have a chance to question both Sir Paul Stephenson and John Yates tomorrow at its further meeting.

Police (Detention and Bail) Bill

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Thursday 7th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

The hon. Gentleman asked me the same question earlier this week when I appeared before the Home Affairs Committee. The issue has also been raised by a number of other Opposition Members, who are doing their best to suggest that there was a delay. There was no delay. It was necessary for all the parties concerned to examine in detail the judgment that had been made available on 17 June. Professor Michael Zander is well respected in this field, in which he has considerable expertise, but I think that if I had come to the House and proposed to the Opposition that the Government introduce emergency legislation on the basis of an article that had appeared in a journal, the Opposition would have rightly told the Government that they should take a rather more professional approach.

The Supreme Court’s decision on Tuesday not to grant a stay in the case has made the legislation all the more vital and all the more urgent. I welcome the support for it that has been promised by Opposition Front Benchers, as well as the support given by the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz).

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

It is clear to me, at least, that the Government acted with alacrity, but perhaps the Home Secretary can help me by explaining earlier events involving Greater Manchester police. Why, despite the discussion following the judgment, did they not apply for a certificate for an appeal on 19 May, and why did it then take so long for that to happen? In particular, why was no reliable written note taken of the oral judgment?

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[Yvette Cooper]

My right hon. Friend is right. He makes his points diplomatically, but the complacency of Home Office Ministers is worrying. They seem to think that they have done everything right in this case, that there have been no delays and that everything has moved as rapidly as possible, but that clearly is not the case. I hope that they will learn lessons for the future from this incident because there clearly has not been rapid movement every step along the way. Whether that applies to what Home Office officials should have done when they received the note on this case, what work they should have done, or what further information they should have sought either from the judge in question or through legal advice at that point, it is their responsibility to prepare options for Ministers, so that Ministers can take rapid judgments, know what their options are and move very fast. That is especially true given the significant risks from this case to the operation of police work and to justice.

My right hon. Friend’s point about the role of the Treasury Solicitor’s Department is important. The point of having the Attorney-General and those solicitors is to be able to seek additional legal advice from them. The Home Secretary said that it is not normal practice for the Government to confirm whether and when they have sought legal advice, but in fact it is very common for Ministers to say that they have had legal advice from the Attorney-General or others. They might not reveal the detailed content of that advice but in this case the Home Secretary is not even confirming whether she has had or sought separate legal advice or whether the Attorney-General provided any such advice to set out options, so that the Government could move fast and deal with this matter considerably faster than has been the case.

[Mark Reckless]

Will the shadow Home Secretary accept that the Government and the Home Office were not parties in the proceedings? We can see from the judgment that counsel for Greater Manchester police were asked at the end of the oral judgment whether they would like to apply for a certificate in relation to an appeal. To the extent that questions have to be asked, surely they should be addressed to Greater Manchester police about why they did not apply to the judge for a stay or for a certificate despite having been specifically asked about doing so. We should be addressing those questions to Greater Manchester police, who are party to the case, rather than trying to twist this in relation to the Home Office.

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Gentleman is right that there are issues for Greater Manchester police in terms of how fast they respond and react and whether they apply for appeals and stays, but the issue for the Home Office is that, in the end, it matters to the Home Office if policing practice and the protection of victims right across the country are jeopardised. His point goes to the heart of my concerns about the way in which the Home Office and Home Office Ministers have responded. There seems to be an attitude that “We’ll let Greater Manchester police and ACPO do their bit; we’ll just sit back and wait until it all comes to us.” Ministers finally acted only when ACPO said that emergency legislation was needed, rather than Ministers and the Attorney-General recognising that they would have to take responsibility for the consequences. Even if Greater Manchester police did not take the first steps, there was still a responsibility on the Home Office and the Attorney-General to go and talk to Greater Manchester police about whether they had applied for a stay of judgment or appeal. That is where there have been delays and, frankly, incompetence in the way the Home Office has responded.

Government Reductions in Policing

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Monday 4th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

We have always said that efficiency savings can be made. That is why we set out 12% reductions, but HMIC said that

“a cut beyond 12 per cent would almost certainly reduce police availability”.

The hon. Gentleman also cited the HMIC figure on visibility, but he is misusing the figures. In fact, HMIC said in its most recent report that it is right that forces should try to increase visibility, but pointed out that policing is a 24/7 service. The report stated:

“HMIC estimate that between five and six officers are needed in order to provide one on duty 24/7…This suggests that, overall, the police are operating at the upper end of the efficiency range.”

That is not my conclusion, but that of the independent HMIC.

Chief constables are being put in an impossible position. They are doing their best within their budgets to deliver strong policing and to reassure the public, but the rug is being pulled out from underneath them. Whichever way we look at it, the evidence from the police and the expert witnesses is clear. The sheer scale and pace of the cuts mean that front-line services, and not just front-line numbers, are being hit. The Home Secretary and her co-defendants can change their story as much as they like, but every claim collapses under interrogation. The evidence from the police and the expert witnesses is damning, and the mood among the jury, as Lord Ashcroft’s polling proves, is already hostile, even though the cuts have barely started to bite. It is little wonder that the Ministers are backing softer sentencing; they know that they are going to be found guilty as charged.

Whatever Ministers say at the Dispatch Box, in their offices and in the TV studios, they are a long way from the reality in the police stations and out on the beat. They are out of touch. They think that if they talk fast enough and loudly enough in management-speak about efficiency, bureaucracy, visibility, availability, back office, middle office and even Middle Earth, it will somehow make the real cuts go away, but it will not. This is all a far cry from their pre-election promises. The Prime Minister promised that the front line would be protected. The Lib Dems wanted 3,000 more officers, not 12,000 fewer. Even the Policing Minister told his local paper, just a year before the election:

“I will continue to press for more PCSOs and police officers”.

So much for that, then.

As for Ministers’ claims that there would be no link between the cuts in police numbers and crime, influential members of their own coalition see things rather differently. Before the election, the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg) said that

“putting 2,700 more police on the beat in England and Wales will lead to 27,500 more arrests and an extra 24,500 crimes being solved.”

I am not sure that I would sign up to his level of precision, but he made his point. And one prominent Tory Front Bencher said the following:

“The case can certainly be made that the increase in police officers in the last few years has had a positive effect both on providing reassurance to the public and on reducing some crimes…I am making an argument in favour of an increase in police numbers”.—[Official Report, 3 May 2007; Vol. 459, c. 1671-73.]

Who said that, in this House? The current Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice.

Let us listen to the concerns from the top police. The South Yorkshire chief constable has warned of the impact of higher unemployment, shorter sentences, cuts in probation and cuts in police on increasing crime. The Kent chief constable has said that a 20% cut was

“quite a significant drawback into police numbers, both civilian staff and police numbers, and clearly there’s a potential impact that crime will rise.”

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

I am a member of the Kent police authority, and the chief constable of Kent has also said that he sees this as an opportunity to deliver a more efficient and effective force. He is increasing the number of neighbourhood officers by more than 75%.

[Yvette Cooper]

I welcome anything that the Kent chief constable is able to do to support neighbourhood policing, but the hon. Gentleman will know that Kent police are having to lose more than 500 officers and about 1,000 support staff. That means that they will be under pressure in a number of different areas.

What on earth has happened to the Conservative party? The traditional party of policing and crime is throwing it all away. They have left the Liberal Democrats in charge of policing powers and sentencing policy, and they have left the management consultants in charge of the police. They are taking serious risks with crime and communities as a result. Over the 13 years of a Labour Government, crime fell by more than 40%, but most of us think that it is still too high. We want it to come down further. But instead of building on our progress, the Government are putting it at risk.

The Government’s amendment today

“welcomes the Government’s comprehensive proposals to cut crime”,

but what are those proposals? In 13 years of falling crime, Labour increased the number of police officers and got more of them on to the front line, increased the powers of the police through ASBOs and other measures, increased the use of CCTV and DNA, increased crime prevention through youth services and intensive family support, strengthened sentencing and, yes, sent more people to prison. What are this Government doing? They are making cuts in the number of police officers and cuts in the number on the front line. They are cutting the powers of the police and ending ASBOs. They are cutting the use of CCTV and DNA. They are cutting prevention, youth services and specialist family support. They are cutting sentencing, cutting prison places and cutting probation, all at the same time. They are increasing unemployment and child poverty, too. Those do not sound like crime-cutting proposals to me.

The Government are whipping up a perfect storm. None of us knows when it will blow, but they should think again before it is too late. Let me say this to them: they used to be the party of law and order once. Not now.

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[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

First, I should declare an interest as a member of the Kent police authority. In that capacity, I get very frustrated about some of the numbers that the Opposition throw around. The shadow Home Secretary said that Kent’s police force had said that it was going to cut more than 500 officers, but it has not said that. The projection, once made, of 500 was on the basis of an assumption that the cut in grant was going to be significantly worse than it actually turned out to be.

The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) set up this great contrast between the 12% cut that Labour is very happy about and the 20% cut that we are supposedly imposing, but he does not draw attention to two key differences between those figures. First, the 20% reduction is a real reduction rather than a cash reduction, so a two-year pay freeze accounts for a significant portion of it and helps to explain totally appropriate front-loading, because that is the period in which the pay freeze will take place. In addition, the 20% does not allow for a precept, and assumes that the precept falls as much as the central grant. If we take those two factors into account, the reduction in central Government grant represents a more generous settlement than the one that HMIC said it would be possible to deliver. That reflects the importance that we place on policing and on police numbers.

The motion is predicated on the assumption that there will be a cut of 12,000 in the number of police officers because that is the number that ACPO has put out. However, that number was put out before Tom Winsor’s report was published. It is a very long report, and I look forward to reaching its conclusion over the recess, but I have read quite a lot of it already. Tom Winsor is saying that, even for 2012-13, on the basis of his recommendations, there will be a further £200 million of savings, over and above those that police authorities and chief constables have already been pushing towards. If we generously assume that there will be add-on costs of about £50,000 per police officer, that would give us enough money for 4,000 officers. If we implement what Tom Winsor suggests in his interim report, we would get the number down from 12,000 to 8,000.

That number will have to go through the national Police Negotiating Board, and there will doubtless be some pushback from the Police Federation and others, but in some areas Tom Winsor is actually being quite generous to the police in recognising the unique contribution that they make. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), who is no longer in his place, has suggested that 40% of officers would lose £4,000 on the basis of what Winsor has said, but that is quite wrong. Tom Winsor’s point was that, back in 1978, under Lord Edmund-Davies, a 9% shift allowance for unsocial hours was incorporated into the standard police pay. Tom Winsor went on to say that, logically, we should therefore reduce by 9% the pay for the 43% of officers whose role did not require them to work unsocial hours. Rather than recommending that, however, he has now left them as they are and proposed an additional 10% shift allowance for hours worked between 8 pm and 6 am.

Another area in which Tom Winsor has been very generous to the police is that of the new expertise and professional accreditation allowance. Most police have been operating on the assumption that the special priority payments, which were introduced in 2003 and which have been quite divisive, would not be continued. If we take into account the additional allowance, which will be more costly than the special priority payments, we shall see a net increase in pay, even though most officers probably assumed that they would not get a special priority payment. Perhaps there will be a bit of give and take in the negotiations but, in those two areas in particular, Tom Winsor’s proposals are more generous than many officers would have expected.

I should also like to touch on the ability of police forces to make savings. We also heard about this from my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart). Most organisations try to find savings and do things more efficiently year by year. In policing, however, there was an increase in grant every year from central Government. Police forces were able to increase their numbers, deal with particular issues and have more police tackling problem areas without having to find savings in other areas to fund those activities.

In Kent, we found a deputy chief constable who had been delivering a fantastic programme in Norfolk and finding very significant savings, all of which were able to be invested in the front line. Now, in tougher times, Kent is looking to strip out some of the inefficiencies. There might be too many people in central teams, or the intelligence area might be top heavy, so we will make savings in those areas. We are also going to work with Essex to form a single major and organised crime division, which will bring together a lot of the specialist areas. That will enable us to iron out the peaks and troughs in demand and deliver at least as good a service using fewer officers.

When I first joined Kent police authority, I was concerned that we were not going out to find the savings and ask the difficult questions. Partly that is because police authorities are not elected, so there is no direct connection with the electorate that requires delivering the best possible policing while minimising the precepts. If one finds savings, asks difficult questions and tries to get the police to do things in a different way from the one they are used to, and which they perhaps prefer, that will always be quite difficult and with no direct electoral accountability, there is not necessarily the motivation to do that.

In my police authority, in the past year or two at least, people have worked very hard to find savings and it has one of the lowest precepts in the country. I believe that in many police authorities across the country that have had consistent grant increases year on year, there is scope to find savings and to work together much more. There is no justification for having 43 different IT systems. A large amount of the police budget is police pay, but that is partly because the police deliver almost everything themselves with a direct labour force. In many areas of the public sector, we have found significant savings through outsourcing. Cleveland police has a control centre run by the private sector—it is outsourced—but it is quite rare in policing to make those more radical changes to deliver things as cheaply and efficiently as one can by going outside the police service. A direct electoral mandate would press people to deliver policing as well as they could for as little as they could. There is significant scope for savings and I believe that reductions can be made while protecting the front line and delivering the police service that the country deserves.