Mohammad Yasin
Main Page: Mohammad Yasin (Labour - Bedford)
Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)
My hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) made an important point about the lack of police funding, which is affecting not only his constituency, but Bedford, too. The chief constable of Bedfordshire police warned a year ago that he did not have enough officers to keep people safe, and Bedford has seen three murders in the last month. Two people—one a teenager—died from stab wounds, and this weekend saw the shooting of a man in his 20s. Chief Constable Jon Boutcher was right. Despite a rise in serious violent crime, we heard from the Chancellor today that he is not going to give Bedfordshire police the funding that successive chief constables have asked for, that the previous police and crime commissioner Olly Martins asked for and that the current PCC Kathryn Holloway is now asking for.
I attended a Home Office roadshow in Luton last week, which I think was intended to bring community leaders together to discuss the serious problem of rising violent crime. It was difficult to know the purpose of the meeting, because we know what the problems are. Action is what is needed. I had not been invited to the event, and I found out about it by chance only the evening before, but I thought it important for my constituents, who are very worried about the recent spate of murders and obvious antisocial behaviour on our streets, that I should be there.
Only the PCC and the Policing Minister were invited. We were told that the event was non-political, which is why no politicians had been invited. I do not accept that argument. The crisis in policing and the chronic underfunding of Bedfordshire police are about as political as it gets. The results are being seen today on the streets of my constituency—in the towns and suburbs—where violent crime, drug dealing, county lines crime, theft from vehicles and burglary are everyday occurrences.
Channel 4 “Dispatches” reported recently that 57% of burglaries in Bedfordshire are “screened out”—the highest proportion of any police force in the country. If a person is burgled in Bedfordshire, more often than not the police will take little or no action and that person is left to battle it out with their insurance company. With no resources to investigate, the force is relying on algorithms to predict the likelihood of conviction, and the victims of crime are left with no hope of redress or even of the reassurance offered by having a police officer attend the incident.
Our small county force was reported as the second worst in the country for screening out calls—second only to West Yorkshire, and then only by a small margin. We do not need a series of roadshows to tell us what the problem is. If the Home Office insists on continuing with this initiative, it should get out there and make sure that all the relevant people are in the room, not just the ones from the blue side.
The Home Affairs Committee was right last week when it said that police forces across the country are in danger of “becoming irrelevant”, and I can tell the House that my constituents are noticing. It is all because of the Government’s austerity agenda, and we have seen today that austerity has not ended at all. This is what we get when the Government: starve the police of funding; strip local authorities down to the bone; force people into poverty and food bank use with their cruel welfare change agenda; slash public health funding, allowing drug and alcohol addiction to take hold; leave a town devoid of in-patient mental health beds for years; and turn our prison into a Victorian dungeon. This is the result. Criminal gangs are taking hold with no resources to challenge them, and young people are dying on the streets in small towns like Bedford.
It is a real shame that this Government are not looking to fund the police properly. The Chancellor needs to look at his figures again and come up with a better deal. He needs to wake up, because there is a terrible human cost when we make the wrong choices about public spending, and we are seeing the effects of that now.
Ordered, That the debate be now adjourned.—(Michelle Donelan.)
Debate to be resumed tomorrow.