Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill

Paul Waugh Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 14th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for making that intervention, and yes, of course I join the hon. Member in that. I am sure that all Members will want to pay tribute to the late Ian Gow.

The shadow Home Secretary asked about implement-ation. Following Royal Assent, there will be time to understand and, where necessary, act upon the new requirements before they come into force. We expect the implementation period to be at least 24 months to allow for the set-up of the regulator, and we will continue to engage and communicate with industry and other stakeholders during this period, including in the live music sector, to ensure that there is sufficient time for those responsible for premises and events in scope to understand their new obligations, and to plan and prepare. A robust monitoring and evaluation plan is also in place to measure the Bill’s effectiveness following implementation, and the Government will keep the Bill’s measures under review and have the powers needed to adjust the regime if necessary.

Several Members asked about the proportionality of the standard tier. The Government are extremely mindful that many premises and events continue to face the challenge of rising costs. The Bill seeks to achieve public protection outcomes while avoiding an undue burden on businesses and other organisations. In the standard tier, the focus is on having procedures that are intended to be simple and low cost. There will be no requirement to put in place any physical measures.

[Paul Waugh (Rochdale) (Lab/Co-op)]

Many of my constituents in Rochdale will warmly welcome this Bill, particularly given that many of them were in the Manchester Arena on that dark day in 2017. I would like to suggest, though, that many small music venues worry about the proportionality of this Bill. Does the Minister want to give them reassurance that the voluntary scheme in Manchester has worked well so far, and that this revised version of the Bill will reduce the costs that were anticipated before?

[Dan Jarvis]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, a Greater Manchester MP, for making that important point. It is worth saying in response that the feedback from businesses in the Greater Manchester area has been incredibly positive. While we are mindful of the potential burdens on business, we have consulted and worked closely with the sector and we will continue to listen carefully to the concerns it may wish to raise.

Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill (First sitting)

Paul Waugh Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 29th October 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Chris Murray]

Q I would like to ask about the impact that you think the legislation will have on events. My constituency is in Edinburgh. We have the Edinburgh festival in August, where suddenly we have 5,000 events taking place in one month and 50,000 tickets being sold in venues across the city. How do you think this legislation will help cities like Edinburgh, where we have large-scale events—especially when they are distributed? I should also say that Edinburgh city council is very supportive of this legislation. It recognises its power.

Andy Burnham: Thank you, Mr Murray. We are really grateful for its support. A lot of collaboration is going on between Edinburgh and Greater Manchester at the moment; the director of the festival was with us just last week.

I have visited Edinburgh festival for the last three years, and I am left in awe at the arrangements in place there because of the depth of experience in Edinburgh of running major events with many facets and many venues, and because of the number of visitors who come into the city. There is a lot to learn from Edinburgh city council and how it manages things. The fact that it supports the Bill should say something. Those who have been to the festival know that a whole range of venues are used—all kinds of sizes. That is the point I made a moment ago in response to Mr Roca: if the smaller venues were not covered by the Bill, they would potentially become the ones more at risk and more targeted.

The point is about the whole ecosystem of venues, from the smallest to the biggest. Measures should not be disproportionate, sure, but if the Bill went through in its current form that would cause me anxiety, given my position. I would have to look at the venues that were not covered. To go back to the question that Linsey Farnsworth raised, that would not make the job of Edinburgh city council, Manchester city council or any other local authority easier. Having clarity in terms of the arrangements is not going to make the job of local authorities harder—the more arrangements are standardised, the better.

[Paul Waugh (Rochdale) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q Thank you, Andy, and thanks also to Figen and Brendan. You all make a really powerful case for why strengthening security actually helps business—it is not just helping the public, but helping businesses to thrive because then they can attract people in a secure, safe environment. However, at the same time, some smaller, independent, live concert promoters, very small-scale people, are worried about the impact on them.

The reason Martyn went to this gig was the reason a lot of people go to gigs—they love music. You love music. Greater Manchester, and Manchester itself, is fantastic for music. Could you explain what is happening in Manchester locally to reassure some of those small-scale live music people, who are saying that this could put them out of business—“We’re not the big boys, we’re not the arena, how can we cope with this and make everyone feel safe without changing our way of life?” As Brendan said, not changing our way of life is ultimately the purpose of this legislation.

Andy Burnham: It is a good question, Paul, and it goes back to the guidance for local authorities. The way we work—when I say “we”, I am thinking of the leader of Manchester city council, Bev Craig, and deputy Mayor of Greater Manchester, Paul Dennett; people you will know—is that we get close to the venues because we all love music and we are a music city region. You will know that there has been a threat to one of our venues night and day in recent times; at different points, we have had similar issues with other venues.

We cherish the infrastructure, and we work hard to keep it. We work hard to understand the issues that venues have, and how we can work in a practical way to help them. That is what I mean by getting close to the night-time economy—that is critical, and it is one of the things we do really well in this country. It is a big reason why people come and visit Britain: not just for the big arenas, but for the grassroots music scene as well. We had WOMEX, the Worldwide Music Expo, in the city last week; Councillor Besford has been very much at the heart of that, and he runs the English folk festival. We, like Edinburgh, often have events that involve the smallest and the biggest.

My point is: do not just impose things on venues. You have to sit down and talk with them and ask what we can do to help. This is my point about Greater Manchester Fire Rescue Service—if you have a capable fire service, they can go in and help. The blue-light services can help provide the training and help people comply with the measures in the Bill. This is not just about leaving venues on their own, saying, “Here is Martyn’s law, so get on with it even if it puts you out of business.” That is not how it is done. We are doing it a different way: get down there and listen to them all. They will all have different issues, so support what they do because they are important in bringing visitors to the city.

I am just giving you the Manchester perspective. That is the way we go about things. The music infrastructure in the city, and the broader entertainment infrastructure, is highly valued. There was an era when a certain nightclub was just left to close and there are flats there now. We do not think like that these days; we protect the infrastructure and that means supporting the venues. It is tough for them, so get close to them and support them. I appreciate that times are hard, but there are blue-light services everywhere that can help them raise their game from a security point of view.

I just think that we cannot talk ourselves into a sort of thing where it is all too big a burden. I can tell you from experience: a terrorist attack is a massive burden on a city and what it does challenges everybody at every level—and that is ongoing. Like Figen said, Manchester will never be the same again after what happened. It has changed us but it has strengthened us and made us more united, and as I say, I do not want any other city to go through that. The Bill is designed to prevent people going through that and part of what I would say is that the way we and Edinburgh do it is a good model for others to look at.

[The Chair]

If there are no further questions, I thank Mayor Burnham for his evidence. We move on to the next panel.

Examination of Witnesses

Councillor Keith Stevens and Helen Ball gave evidence.

Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill (Third sitting)

Paul Waugh Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 31st October 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Dan Jarvis]

Well, as it sounds as though it will be our final exchange, I take this opportunity to thank the right hon. Gentleman for his service and wish him well for the future.

The purpose of clause 1 is to aid the reader of the Bill to understand its content and structure, which I am sure will be a great relief to members of the Committee as we debate the Bill. As the clause provides an overview of the Bill, this seems an appropriate moment to set out a reminder of why we have sought to legislate.

The first responsibility of any Government is to keep the public safe; that is, and will always be, our No. 1 priority. Since the start of 2017, agencies and law enforcement have disrupted 43 late-stage plots, and there have been 15 domestic terror attacks. As the MI5 director general, Ken McCallum, set out last month, this country is today subject to

“the most complex and interconnected threat environment we’ve ever seen.”

As can sadly be seen from recent terrorism incidents, the public may be targeted at a wide range of public venues and spaces. We know, too, that the terror threat has become less predictable and potential attacks harder to detect and investigate. That is why those who run premises and events need to know what they can do, and what they should be doing, to keep the public safe. That view is supported by inquests and inquiries into terror attacks, which have recommended the introduction of legislation to improve the safety and security of public venues. That includes, but is not limited to, monitored recommendation 4 in volume 1 of the Manchester Arena inquiry.

The purpose of the Bill is to ensure that appropriate procedures are in place, or appropriate measures taken, to keep us safe. Wherever people are and whatever they are doing, they deserve to both be and feel safe, ensuring protection of life and of our way of life.

While we recognise that the risks posed by terrorism are already proactively considered for some premises and events, there is a lack of consistency, which needs addressing. The Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Bill—Martyn’s law—will remedy that inconsistency. The Bill’s proposals have been subject to extensive development, and a draft version of this legislation was subjected to pre-legislative scrutiny under the previous Government. Indeed, the shadow Minister gave evidence to the Home Affairs Committee on that matter.

The Bill that we have brought forward has been adjusted to strike an appropriate balance between protecting the public and avoiding an undue burden on premises. We recognise that a one-size-fits-all approach would not be suitable for all premises and events, which is why, for example, we have adapted the Bill’s requirements to include the “reasonably practicable” test. That will enable those responsible for qualifying premises or events to take into consideration what is within their control and the resources they have available to them, as well as what is suitable and appropriate for their venue.

I take this opportunity to pay tribute once again to Figen Murray, from whom we heard so movingly on Tuesday. She has without doubt been the driving force behind this Bill. I am sure that all Committee members will agree that Figen is an inspiration to us all. With that, I look forward to the exchanges to come in the course of proceedings in this Committee.

[Paul Waugh (Rochdale) (Lab/Co-op)]

I would like to start with something that Figen Murray said this week in her evidence to us, which, as my hon. Friend the Minister said, was incredibly powerful:

“Martyn’s law will save lives.”––[Official Report, Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Public Bill Committee, 29 October 2024; c. 7, Q1.]

That is what she said, and that is what will happen.

As the Minister has pointed out and as Ken McCallum of MI5 has put so powerfully, the number of foiled plots shows that, sadly, the terror threat is not going away but getting more intense. That puts even more of an onus on all of us to keep the public as safe as possible, especially when they are at their most vulnerable —simply going on a night out to enjoy themselves. I think I speak for all members of the Committee when I say how moving it was to hear Figen read out the names of all the individuals who lost their lives in the Manchester Arena bombing.

Like many Greater Manchester MPs, I know that many of my constituents in Rochdale will welcome the Bill, not least because many of them regularly go to the Manchester Arena—indeed, many were present on that awful night in 2017. Brendan Cox put it perfectly when he said that

“nobody wants to have a law named after their child.” ––[Official Report, Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Public Bill Committee, 29 October 2024; c. 8, Q1.]

It is a tribute to both him and Figen that they have turned their own losses into campaigning to make sure that no other families suffer at the hands of terrorists.

We as a Government are also bringing in Awaab’s law, named after two-year-old Awaab Ishak, who died when he was exposed to mould at his family’s home in Rochdale. We are creating new duties on private landlords to make sure that no other child dies in the same way. And, of course, there is the Hillsborough law: a duty of candour on all public bodies to ensure that the state can never again fail to comply with public inquiries or deny bereaved families the right to fair legal funding. What links each of those pieces of legislation is that they have been driven by the sheer determination of individuals—of those who have suffered a loss but are determined to turn that into something positive for others.

As the inquiry into the Manchester Arena bombing found, both the state and the private sector have more to do to make our public venues safer. This Bill at least makes a real start on delivering that change. Andy Burnham was right when he said that Manchester and Greater Manchester have shown resilience since the 2017 bombing. I would add that the city showed similar resilience after the 1996 IRA bombing, turning that awful event into a catalyst for the regeneration that we have all seen since.

With Martyn’s law, we can make our public spaces across the country more resilient. We expect public premises to have a fire safety plan, so it seems obvious to expect them to have plans in place to mitigate the threat of a terror attack. This version of the Bill recognises the need to balance safety with proportionality, while retaining flexibility to amend that proportionality at a later stage if that is needed.

Manchester’s experience of a voluntary version of this Bill has shown that if smaller venues are engaged with and supported in the right way, these changes can help our thriving night-time economy and do not hinder it. But it is simply unacceptable that, for bigger venues in particular, there has been inconsistency on whether they have strong enough security checks. The terrorists will win if they restrict our freedoms to do simple things such as going out to enjoy a concert or show. We can reduce that fear—the fear that all those terrorists feed off—if we make our public venues safer in the way the Bill intends.

[Ben Maguire (North Cornwall) (LD)]

I really welcome the bipartisan work that the Minister has done on this legislation and also welcome the Conservative party support. I would like to add the Liberal Democrats’ wholehearted support for this important legislation. However, I would like to flag with the Minister my concerns about training, or the lack thereof, under the Bill at the moment. I would like to work with him to explore that area in a bit more detail. That issue has certainly been raised a lot by constituents when it comes to smaller venues just over the 200-people threshold. I would like to clarify that in more detail before we reach Report. The hon. Member for Rochdale rightly raised the comparison with other safety procedures, such as fire. That is a powerful point, but I add that often those fire safety procedures come with training programmes for the staff responsible. I sound that note of caution.

I pay tribute to Figen Murray, Brendan Cox and everyone the Committee has heard from. I again give my wholehearted support for the legislation.