Richard Graham
Main Page: Richard Graham (Conservative - Gloucester)Department Debates - View all Richard Graham's debates with the Home Office
Tackling Spiking
Richard Graham Excerpts(5 months ago)
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Laura Farris
I thank the hon. Lady for her question and for all her work on this issue. I think we are arguing on two sides of the same coin. We agree, without reservation, that there is a need to define spiking in law and that is what we are committing to do. Effectively, it could be viewed as an offence, which will enable people to report clearly and the police to record data in the way that I have suggested. Essentially, there is no particular difference between where the NPCC is and where we are on this issue. I hope that will satisfy her. I encourage her to have a look at the report itself. The ambition is very much to work with staff at every level. We are in no doubt about who the frontline responders are. Yes, festivals are a primary location, as are student campuses. Of course bar staff come into this. The direction of travel is absolutely to further their work in recognising and—ultimately, if our research goes further—perhaps playing a role in testing and supporting the police effort on this particular crime.
Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)
This is the best early Christmas present for thousands of our constituents who have been spiked and the many tens of thousands who worry that they may be spiked. It is testimony to the new safeguarding Minister that in my hon. Friend’s first statement to the House she has announced the updating and modernising of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, which so many of us who have been campaigning on this issue believe is overdue. She has done this in the presence of both the Home Secretary and the Lord Chancellor, both of whose unwavering support on this matter I much appreciate. Will my hon. Friend tell the House when she believes it might be possible to start the process of training, when we might be able to expand the roll-out of the police reporting pilot project, and when we might expect to get an early report back on the results of the drink testing kit, which is so important to a successful implementation?