Mike Wood
Main Page: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)Department Debates - View all Mike Wood's debates with the Home Office
(1 day, 4 hours ago)
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Sarah Jones
I am not going to make a slightly political point about the right hon. Lady’s decision to attack the police and crime commissioner; I think that he does a good job and has served well for many years. As for the wider point that she made, as a west midlands MP, about what has happened and what it means, I absolutely share her concern.
Mike Wood (Kingswinford and South Staffordshire) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that the information that came to light over the weekend seems to suggest that a very worrying bias has entered the decision-making process, and that this has cast a stain on Birmingham’s reputation as a welcoming city as well as raising serious questions about the senior leadership of West Midlands police ?
Sarah Jones
I am not going to draw that conclusion today, but the hon. Gentleman can be assured that I am going to ensure that we get to the bottom of yesterday’s reporting and what happened. We often ask the police to make decisions that are almost impossible, and—here I am setting aside this particular case—we ask them to police protests in such a way that we are almost asking them to make political decisions on a day-to-day basis, which is very difficult for them. I should pay tribute to the many excellent public order police officers, who are very well trained and who work in such difficult circumstances. We ask a great deal of them, and I am grateful for the work that they do.