Automated Facial Recognition Surveillance

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right to raise concerns about the framework, and I will have to get back to him on whether the strategy has been updated. I do not think that it has, but I will check and make sure. He will be pleased to know that, at the recent general election, the Conservative party manifesto did contain a commitment that, while we wanted the police to use the ever-increasing capabilities that technology was presenting to them, we wanted them to do so within a strict legal framework. We will be giving consideration over the months to come about what form that will take.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend not agree that liberty also means freedom from crime and antisocial behaviour? That is why I strongly welcome these measures. Will he expand on how the technology will deal with antisocial behaviour and drug running, on which he has touched before, as we face those problems in my constituency of Harlow?

[Kit Malthouse]

At the moment, this technology is being deployed only by the South Wales police and the Metropolitan police. However, as I explained earlier, where the police do have a wanted, serious and violent criminal who they believe may be moving around in a particular location, they will deploy this camera and a wanted list and, hopefully, identify that individual. For areas that surround London, which often suffer from the movement of violent criminals mainly to deal in drugs, their identification as they move through particular areas and therefore their apprehension will no doubt pay benefits to many towns such as his and, indeed, such as the one in my constituency that exist around the capital.