Peter Bone
Main Page: Peter Bone (Independent - Wellingborough)City of Westminster Bill [Lords]
Peter Bone Excerpts
Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mr Field) on taking the matter before us seriously. The reason why I and other colleagues shouted “Object” to prevent the revival motion from going through on the nod was so that we could hear from the Bill’s sponsor exactly why it was held up for so long in the House of Lords between Second Reading and the completion of its Committee stage, which, as he said, has not yet happened. We now understand from the promoter’s statement that a date for the resumption of that Committee has been fixed for later this month. That will mean that the Bill and the petition against it will be considered in the Lords. As he said, if passed in the other place, the Bill will come to this place in due course, when hon. Members can give it proper scrutiny. I am all in favour of that.
I heard what my hon. Friend said, but it is worth emphasising that a revival of a private Bill is not a right but a privilege, and it is right that Members of the House ensure that a motion to revive a Bill is made on good grounds and that the case is made. We will have a chance in due course to consider aspects of the detail of the Bill, but one point my hon. Friend did not deal with is the interaction between the City of Westminster Bill and the possibility of more general legislation applying to pedlars. The Bill consolidates much of the private legislation relating to pedlars in the city of Westminster.
In the previous Parliament, the Government initially asked Durham university to carry out research, which was subsequently conducted and consulted upon. Proposals were then introduced and subjected to further consultation. I hope that during the course of the evening, in response either to the debate on this Bill or to the debate on the Canterbury City Council and the Nottingham City Council Bills, the Under-Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr Davey) will say what the Government’s initial thinking is on their approach to pedlar legislation. What impact would national pedlar legislation have on the provisions in private Acts in relation to Westminster city council? Obviously, it might be a waste of time if the House or the other place spend a lot of time discussing the consolidation measures in the City of Westminster Bill if the Government subsequently introduced national legislation on pedlar activity.
At the moment, traditional pedlars cannot operate within the city of Westminster boundary. They can go from door to door, but they cannot act as pedlars on the street, which means that they are severely disadvantaged, notwithstanding their national licences to peddle. I hope for national legislation and a national approach to the matter, and that the Minister tells us what the Government’s thinking is on the prospect of such legislation, so that we do not have piecemeal proposals from councils up and down the country.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
Is that not the crux of the matter? The previous Government talked about introducing national legislation. It costs local councils an enormous amount of money to promote private Bills, so would not such legislation solve that problem?
Mr Chope
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We are told that had there not been so much resistance from him and others to private Bills in the previous Session and the one before that, there would have been many more. That it was difficult for such Bills to make progress through the House acted as an effective deterrent for the very good reason he articulates. Such legislation is expensive and will often be seen by local taxpayers as a disproportionate response to a local niggle. That is why a large number of councils did not go down the private Bill route. Obviously, the City of Westminster has a very well-resourced council—it also delivers one of the lowest council taxes in the country—and has decided that it will go down that route, but it is important to point out that many of the private Bills promoted by local councils to deal with street trading and peddling were encouraged by the City of Westminster Bill, which has acted as a sort of precedent. That is why my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) and others will be interested to see what the City of Westminster council thinks of touting. I notice that its Bill includes a lot more information on seizure powers and what to do with the receptacles that are used for street trading, and that it includes some of the powers that were eventually excluded from the Bournemouth Borough Council Act 2010 and the Manchester City Council Act 2010, which were passed following a gentlemanly compromise prompted by the opponents of those provisions.
Some of the developing law is contained in the City of Westminster Bill, which is why Members who are alert to the concerns of individuals who try to eke out a living as street traders or pedlars should be vigilant on their behalf. We want to ensure that oppressive, disproportionate legislation is not introduced under the radar. That is why this evening’s debate is important, but I can tell my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster that it is not my intention to press the motion to a Division.
Mike Freer (Finchley and Golders Green) (Con)
First, may I declare an interest as a former leader of a London borough council that had to deal with street trading on a day-to-day basis? My postbag on street trading was far bigger than my postbags on many other areas of council activity.
I should like to address a few of the issues raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies). I understand the law of supply and demand and the effect of regulation, and that if people are selling things that people want to buy, we should not get in the way. That is fine, but if it were true, we ought to allow drug trading and prostitution to be completely unregulated. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope) is quite right that a revival of the City of Westminster Bill does not stop subsequent detailed scrutiny.
I have risen to support a revival of the Bill because I feel strongly about localism, which is not an à la carte concept. We cannot say that local councils should have the rights and powers to do what they think is right for their areas only as long as we agree with them.
Mr Bone
My hon. Friend makes a powerful point, but the crux of the argument is that we want national legislation to allow local authorities to introduce the right pedlar laws for their areas, and not for councils to have to spend tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds on private Bills. We may be on the same side in that respect.
Mike Freer
That is quite right. It would be helpful if we could get the Department for Communities and Local Government or whichever is the correct Department to regulate on a national framework. However, in the absence of that, I shall support the city of Westminster in its promotion of the Bill. Those who have to deal with the scourge of street trading know that it is not simply a matter of the touting and the pedlars. The high streets of many major cities—especially the London boroughs—are virtually obstacle courses. One has to dodge not only the normal street furniture, but the goods and services being peddled on the pavements.
I am pleased to see that clause 18(e) deals with disabled access, because many people in wheelchairs or who use zimmer frames—or even families with pushchairs—find it difficult to manoeuvre around the variety of plastic tubs or greengrocery in the high streets. It may sound trivial, but it is not when we are trying to maintain our high streets as vibrant economies. They have to encourage trade while also retaining their attractiveness for local people. If families or disabled people feel that they cannot manoeuvre along their high street, they will go to the major shopping centres, which are regulated. On that basis alone, I support the Bill.
Importantly, the Bill also deals with the detritus of smoking. Many councils spend tens of thousands of pounds cleaning up after smokers. I expect that hon. Members were keen to ban smoking in public places, but they may not have realised the cost that was pushed on to local councils.
The fundamental issue is that if we support localism, we must allow the democratically elected councillors of Westminster to bring forward what they believe is right for their people.
Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer) who has experience in his borough of the problem. However, he does not have the experience of listening to the hours of debate in this Chamber. The problem really revolves around the previous Government refusing to bring in national legislation. If that had been done, each of the local authorities could have decided whether they wanted to take powers over pedlars and introduce their own legislation—exactly the localism that we are looking for. What might be right for the City of Westminster might not be right for Wellingborough. We almost teased the last Government into such legislation, so I am looking forward to hearing what my hon. Friend the Minister has to say.
The one aspect that is new to the debate—we did not know about it when we discussed it last year—is the amount of human trafficking of children into London to be pedlars, although it is false peddling as they do not have the licence from 1871. This is such a serious problem that we have seen people imprisoned. A national newspaper recently reported the case of a Romanian father who had sold his daughter to traffickers in this country to go on to the streets and, in theory, to peddle old issues of The Big Issue. In fact, that was completely false and bogus. He got four years in prison and served two, and now he is back home in Romania. Similar cases apparently involve thousands of children.
While I welcome the legislation for local councils to make their own decisions on peddling and how the law should be enforced in different areas—although I regret the thousands of pounds it has cost local councils to get to this stage—all the councils seem to have missed the question of what we do with these false pedlars, many of them young children, when it is discovered that they have been trafficked. We have to get to grips with that issue, because the children who have been trafficked over here are not criminals; they are victims of crime. It is a frightening problem and I hope that this Parliament will get to grips with it. That is why I would welcome national legislation.
I shall not oppose the revival of this Bill tonight, but the issue of the children trafficked into this country—especially into London—is one that we need to note.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills (Mr Edward Davey)
We have had a good debate this evening, helped by the experience from previous debates. We have heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mr Field), who opened the debate, and my hon. Friends the Members for Christchurch (Mr Chope) and for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), who are veterans of discussion on this legislation. However, we have also benefited from new experience, on the part of my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer), who spoke of his local authority days. I also welcome the hon. Member for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods) to her place and thank her for her contribution.
It is right that I should begin by restating an important procedural point. Traditionally, the Government do not take any view on the content or progress of private Bills, unless they are exceptionally moved to do so. From the speeches that we have heard this evening, I would note—as I am sure other hon. Members would—that there seems to be no real opposition to reviving the Bill. Although I hope to catch your eye and speak in the related debate, Mr Deputy Speaker, at this stage it is right that I should set out a little of the new Government’s thinking in this area.
Let me start by saying that, overall, having looked into the issue in some detail in recent days, I personally believe that we need to protect the rights of the genuine pedlar as we look at legislation across the piece—I say that to hon. Members from across the House and to local authorities looking at the issue. The rights of pedlars are traditional rights, going back to the Pedlars Act 1871. Although there might be people engaged in illegal street trading under the protection of a pedlar’s certificate, that should be dealt with separately. We should not use a sledgehammer to crack a nut by cracking down on genuine pedlars. They have rights that should be recognised.
The previous Government consulted on the issue, and I hope to be able to publish the Government’s response to that consultation within the next two or three months. I can tell the House that about 80 people and groups responded to the consultation, although they had differing views. The Government will reflect on those differing views and provide the House with our thoughts. Therefore, I cannot commit this evening to any particular timing for future legislation, although I can confirm something on which I believe there has been a cross-party consensus: that there is a need for a national framework, as the hon. Member for City of Durham set out and as other hon. Members stated.
Of course we need a national framework, and we need one for two reasons. We do not want local authorities across the country to have to spend tens of thousands of pounds on bringing forward private legislation. It is sensible that the Government should provide a national framework that in no way undermines localism or local responses to local situations. Therefore, although I cannot commit to any particular timing for that, that is certainly the intention, and we will be exploring those opportunities in the time ahead.
Mr Bone
The Minister is making a splendid speech and a splendid announcement. It seems strange that every time a Liberal Minister stands at the Dispatch Box, I find myself agreeing and saying what a wonderful job he is doing. [Interruption.] If I reflect on where I am sitting, I get a bit worried. Will the Minister endeavour to let councils know that that is the intention, so that those thinking of introducing legislation can hold back from so doing?
Mr Davey
I note that I am wearing a blue tie and the hon. Gentleman is wearing a yellow tie, which might suggest that this coalition is founded on many things. More seriously, I think he can be reassured that the interested local authorities will be reading Hansard; we do not need to spend money on stamps to tell them, as they are quite capable of clicking on the internet to read our deliberations.
Philip Davies
That may well be true.
I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr Chope), without whose dogged pursuit of the issue we probably would not have reached this stage this evening. We all owe him a great debt of gratitude—certainly, genuine pedlars do, because without his persistence, many bad bits of legislation would have been passed to their detriment. I am sure that we are all grateful that he is here keeping people’s feet to the fire to ensure that unworthy legislation is not sneaked through the House.
The Minister’s contribution to the debate was especially helpful, although, inadvertently I suspect, it questioned whether the Bill and related Bills are worth reviving. He seems much more determined than the previous Government to see progress on national legislation in this field. If we are to move quickly towards such legislation, it is utterly pointless for local authorities to pursue their own private legislation, which, as he seemed to indicate, may shortly be trumped by a national framework.
Philip Davies
My hon. Friend might be right, on this as he is on most issues. The Minister was at pains to stress that he would not prejudge what the national framework and legislation would be. The question is whether the Bills are worth reviving in light of the fact that the Government will push on with some kind of national legislation. The matter would have been more clear cut if the Government had said that they have no intention of pursuing national legislation, and that it was for local people to make up their own minds through local authorities. The Minister has slightly muddied the waters.
We all believe in the principle of localism. No one argues with that. My hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer) made a forceful defence of localism, and I would tend to share his enthusiasm. However, it is difficult to expect people to know the different legislation relating to peddling as they move from one local authority to another. Certainly, when I am in London, I find it difficult to know which local authority I am in, because there is no obvious boundary between one London local authority and another. It might be clear if one is a resident and can benefit from the low council tax that Westminster city council provides, but otherwise it is difficult to know which part of London one is in.