Border Target Operating Model: Health Certificates and SMEs

Debate between Roger Gale and Stella Creasy

Friday 19th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. One at a time, please.

[Stella Creasy]

If the Minister can tell us what the charge will be—please, do let us know.

[Stella Creasy]

So there we have it: in 12 days’ time, businesses will have to pay for these certificates, but they will not be asked to provide them, and in 100 days’ time they might have an extra cost but they do not know what it is—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. The Minister has sat down; I took it that she was giving way so I allowed the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) to come in, but the Minister has now clearly sat down, so that is the end of the debate.

Question put and agreed to.

Pet Abduction Bill

Debate between Roger Gale and Stella Creasy

2nd reading
Friday 19th January 2024 Commons Chamber

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a genuine pleasure to contribute to the debate and to follow the comprehensive report by the hon. Member for Southend West (Anna Firth), the passion of my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Ms Brown), the expertise of the right hon. and learned Member for South Swindon (Sir Robert Buckland) and, of course, Granny Meow.

should declare that I have often voted in the Westminster dog of the year competition—I have obviously voted for everybody’s beautiful dog, if anybody asks—but I have never participated. I still own a rather elderly cat, who would probably not win any awards, except from me. She is not of any particular breed, apart from loved. But we recognise that pet ownership is an intrinsic part of many people’s lives, and for good reasons. There is a lot of evidence that owning a pet can help with stress. Perhaps that is why they should be mandatory in Parliament. I always thought we should be able to have them in our offices. Maybe that would help some of our conversations. They lower blood pressure and they are good for loneliness. As a nation, half of us own a pet. In fact, the quarter of people who own a cat own more than one. We might have more people owning dogs, but we have more people being owned by multiple cats—those Six Dinner Sids.

The message the Bill sends is that this is not an insignificant matter. That answers the question from the hon. Member for Bury North (James Daly) about the need for additional legislation. One reason to legislate in this place is when we see widespread patterns of harm. There was an explosion in the number of cases of pets being stolen during the pandemic, and the response people received from the police tells us that there is something wrong with the way things are being dealt with. By legislating, we are sending a very clear message that we want that to be different.

This is a long-overdue change and I pay tribute to the pet theft taskforce—one can only imagine what its meetings were like and whether they took place in dog or cat cafés around the country. The way in which things have been slightly re-jigged for cats and dogs is also right. As Granny Meow, Six Dinner Sid and most of us know, cats are different creatures, whether they act like their owners or their owners become like them. More seriously, it is a worry to me that the experience of my constituents who have sadly experienced this challenge—one reason why I wanted to speak and support the Bill—has been so difficult with the police. The emotional impact or, frankly, the financial consequences are not being taken into account. In my short contribution, I want us to be clear that, yes absolutely, we recognise the emotional distress when somebody’s cat or dog is taken, but the trade behind that is also why legislating for this specific offence and addressing it is very worth doing.

I want to share some of the experiences of my constituents. One constituent had a Bengal cat stolen. Bengal cats can go for up to £5,000 if it is a particular type of breed. There are no other items under theft legislation of such value that we would then expect the police to say, “Well, it’s a civil matter. Sorry about the loss of your cat, but we are not going to investigate.” It is actually a very valuable item, in addition to the emotional distress. Another constituent’s son’s ex-girlfriend stole their dog. The dog was microchipped, so it was very clearly owned by the family, but the police told her that it was a civil matter and therefore they would not assist.

Again, I would just point out that there are other examples of those kinds of disputes where items have been taken and the police have clearly recognised it as theft. After all, often breaking and entering is facilitating the seizure and abduction of a pet. That is partly because some of the breeds we are talking about are incredibly valuable. A siamese cat can cost between £300 and £400 to buy. An English bulldog is £2,000 for a puppy. A dachshund is £1,500, and even a cocker spaniel is £300 to £600. It is not, therefore, a surprise that there is a trade in stealing animals and pets to re-sell. When the police response is simply to dismiss that and not even investigate, we are giving a green light for that to continue.

I fully support the Bill and the message we are sending by the clarity of having specific pet abduction legislation. It is important to have data from police forces about the scale of the crime. As we know with other crimes, data is the start of the investigation. If we do not know where these crimes are taking place, we cannot then look for the patterns that help us identify the people behind them. I also recognise the distress that this crime causes. The constituents who come to me are devastated when their pets have been stolen and they feel that nobody else cares. The message we are sending from Parliament today is that we do think somebody should care and we do think it is a serious matter.

Finally, I join others in congratulating all the brilliant voluntary organisations that help us as a nation of pet lovers. The hon. Member for Southend West talked about Tilly’s Angels. We have Waltham Forest for Cats and Waltham Forest 4 Dogs. They are two separate groups, obviously—like Sharks and Jets, never the twain shall meet. Those organisations rightly reflect that love and affection.

There is a lot going on in the world and, obviously, some very serious matters are facing us, but there is such a level of agreement across the Chamber that it is right to clarify things and have this legislation. We have had the frustration and disappointment of having done all the work, looked at the law and found a way through the challenges that people have identified, only to see the legislation dropped, I hope that Minister will recognise that there is full support in the House for the Bill. We just need to get this done, put the protection in place and help ensure that the 54% of us who have one can take our pet out to the park—we will try to shut our doors to prevent our cats from leaving the house and becoming the Six Dinner Sids. In that way, we will generally be confident that our pet welfare is one of the best things that we can look forward to.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

I call Jane Stevenson.

Victims and Prisoners Bill

Debate between Roger Gale and Stella Creasy

Report stage
Monday 4th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. I am afraid that after the next speaker there will still be 10 people waiting to speak. We have to finish this section of proceedings at 8.50 pm in order to allow for the wind-up, so, after the next speech, the limit will be three minutes.

[Stella Creasy]

I associate myself with the amendments in the names of the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Dame Maria Miller), my right hon. Friends the Members for Alyn and Deeside (Mark Tami) and for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson), my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck) and, of course, my incomparable hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion). In the time available to me, I will focus on the three amendments that I have tabled to flag issues with the Government.

Amendment 147 is about vicarious trauma. We are in a perverse situation right now—the Minister knows this—where we have to hope that a victim dies if we are to access support for our communities when traumatic things such as stabbings happen. I hope that the Minister will change that so that every child can be supported.

Amendment 148 is about overseas victims. It would simply restore the right that our constituents had when we were members of the European Union to have their rights as a victim upheld if they or a family member were a victim of crime overseas. I hope that the Minister will look at the victims’ rights directive, because so many people experience that.

New clause 32 is about a victim’s rights in relation to data. I was not sure that I would be able to table the new clause, because the court case that it refers was heard last Thursday. A year ago, a man started emailing my office with his concerns about my politics and the issues that I was working on. Like all Members when we get correspondence from non-constituents, I read the emails and filed them but did not respond. I was then called by my local social services because that man had decided that, because he disagreed with my views, I was not a fit mother for my children. He had reported me, an investigation had taken place, and while it cleared me, my children and I now have a social services record. When I went to the police about the matter, they said that he had a right to express his opinions in that way. I challenged it because, due to my work on stalking, I understood that somebody who could use a malicious report to harm someone was clearly dangerous. When I came forward, further reports came out revealing that this man had continued his campaign of harassment.

I am deeply grateful for the cross-party support for new clause 32, because although that man has now been convicted of harassment, his ability to target my family continues because the record continues. At present, there is no way of removing from someone’s record a clearly malicious and false accusation made to a third-party organisation. In tabling the new clause, I recognised that it is not just those of us in the public eye who may be targeted in this way; in many cases of stalking, we see people who fixate and use reporting mechanisms to damage their victims.

I have had no support or help from Parliament or anybody within the parliamentary process for my welfare or that of my children, but now I want to stand up for everybody who has been through this process. I ask the Minister to look at this, because victims of clearly malicious reports must have the opportunity to have the record corrected. Too often, people will say, “There is no smoke without fire.” I want to stand up for safeguarding —it is clearly a very important process—but if a court recognises that a report is malicious and a victim is being targeted but we cannot act to remove that report, the harassment will continue.

Israel and Gaza

Debate between Roger Gale and Stella Creasy

Monday 23rd October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Roger Gale)]

Order. This session must end at 5 o’clock. Patently, I am afraid, not all Members will be called. We will do the best that we can, but it would help colleagues if questions were short.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

With reports that 50 dual citizens who are hostages may be released this evening, Walthamstow is grateful to the Prime Minister for all that he has done, and for the commitment that he has made to one family to help get their kidnapped family members released. May I ask him about his commitment to other Walthamstow residents—some of the 200 UK nationals—who are stuck in Gaza? Rania and her children are terrified and confused, because they have been to the border several times following Foreign Office advice, only to find that it is closed. Can the Prime Minister update us on whether any UK nationals have yet been rescued and whether there could be a single point of contact at the border for these families if they do make such a perilous journey?