Oral Answers to Questions

Nick Clegg Excerpts

Monday 5th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Newton]

My hon. Friend is right to raise this serious situation. I commend him and the Metropolitan police which, along with other police forces, has been working on Operation Sceptre, which includes knife sweeps. I recommend that he speaks to the head of Sutton Borough Council to see if they are interested in working with the Institute of Community Safety to undertake an area review and make sure that everything is being done to stop this dreadful crime.

[Mr Nick Clegg (Sheffield, Hallam) (LD)]

T4. Last Thursday, I met Jenny Hockey, a 70-year-old retired sociology lecturer who was, extraordinarily, arrested on 17 November as part of a council-directed dawn raid to chop down six trees on her street, with the assistance of 12 officers from South Yorkshire police against—it now turns out—the views of the local police and crime commissioner. What assurances can the Home Secretary give the House that in future councils do not drag police officers into such absurd, draconian initiatives?

[Amber Rudd]

The right hon. Gentleman is right to raise this issue. It is a local matter, of course, but it sounds like that important balance we tread between peaceful protest and responding to the law might have been handled in a rather tricky way in his constituency. I would always urge that peaceful protest is allowed, but I wonder sometimes whether police forces strike the right balance, as in the example he has given.