Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Nadia Whittome Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading - Day 2
Tuesday 16th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nadia Whittome (Nottingham East) (Lab)]

There is so much wrong with the Bill that three minutes could not possibly cover it. It marks a descent into authoritarianism.

We are debating the Bill today because the Home Secretary despises Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter, having described them as hooligans, thugs and criminals. The Bill is designed to make it more difficult for working people to hold the powerful to account by expanding police powers to a level that should not be seen in any modern democracy. In fact, if this proposed legislation was being debating in another country, I am sure Members of this House would be condemning that country as an authoritarian regime. Make no mistake, this is the biggest assault on our rights and freedom to protest in recent history. It moves to criminalise Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities.

I attended the Black Lives Matter demonstrations in Nottingham East, and the protests and vigils at Scotland Yard and Parliament on Sunday and yesterday. We took to the streets because people are angry. We are hurting. We are sick of male violence, whether it is at the hands of the state, our partners, our family members or strangers. We march because some people do not survive male violence: Sarah Everard, Bibaa Henry, Christina Abbotts, Naomi Hersi and many more. The public realm belongs to women too, and women should have the right to go wherever we choose without men harassing us, assaulting us and raping us. We have a right to walk home.

This Bill does nothing to protect women. In fact, the Bill protects statues of dead men—slave owners, even—more than living women. It hands unaccountable power to the police—the same police who were forcing women to the ground at Clapham common on Saturday night. I will be voting against the Bill.