Offensive Weapons Bill (Ninth sitting)

Debate between Stephen Timms and Stuart C McDonald

Tuesday 11th September 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Stephen Timms]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

The new clause arises from my discussions with the office of the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan. I pay tribute to the work of the Mayor on the topic of acid attacks, and also to that of my colleague, Unmesh Desai, who represents east London and the City on the London Assembly and is deputy chair of the London Assembly’s police and crime committee. He has highlighted the problem of acid attacks as one of his priorities.

There is a problem with people pretending to have acid when they just have water or something innocuous, and using that pretence to threaten and frighten people. I have a couple of examples. There was a headline in The Independent on 19 July 2017: “Water thrown at terrified Muslim women in ‘fake acid attack hate crime’ outside Southampton mosque”.

On 8 December last year, The Times quoted Assistant Chief Constable Rachel Kearton, who the Committee has met and to whom we have already referred this morning. That report stated:

“Thieves have taken to faking acid attacks to steal mobile phones, police said as they admitted that officers lack the tools and powers to defend the public from the growing menace. The emerging trend of throwing liquid, which victims presume is acid, to cause fear during robberies or for the purpose of intimidation was highlighted by the National Police Chiefs’ Council yesterday.”

The police should have the tools to deal with such incidents and the new clause provides those powers.

There is precedent for a measure along those lines. Section 16A of the Firearms Act 1968 makes it an offence for a person to possess an imitation firearm with the intent to cause another to believe that unlawful violence will be used against them. We are all are familiar with and have heard examples of offences involving imitation firearms and the law rightly makes them an offence. That measure was inserted into the 1968 Act by the Firearms (Amendment) Act 1994—a very simple, one-clause Act—when Michael Howard was Home Secretary. He was right to put that measure into legislation and I believe it has been effective in the case of imitation firearms. We now need a comparable measure for fake acid, so that if people are intimidated and frightened by people pretending to have acid, they will know that those people who are conducting the pretence are committing an offence. I very much hope that the Minister will accept new clause 2.

[Stuart C. McDonald (Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East) (SNP)]

New clause 2 is the first of a number of official Opposition amendments that would create new criminal offences. This may be a good point to repeat what I said when we started line-by-line consideration of the Bill. So far as Scotland is concerned, the Bill is a complex mix of devolved and reserved competencies. The UK and Scottish Governments have agreed that it would be better to combine them in one Bill rather than have parallel Bills going through the Scottish Parliament and here.

Criminal law is a devolved matter and there are some criminal law provisions in the Bill that would generally have been a matter for the Scottish Parliament. They have been carefully considered by both Governments and there has been agreement that they should be included and a legislative consent motion will be sought. Some of the Opposition amendments that we are about to consider would usually be matters for the Scottish Parliament. Some of the amendments make absolutely clear the territorial extent does not include Scotland. Some are a bit unclear about that and some clearly do include Scotland. My support or otherwise for the amendments will not necessarily be a reflection of the spirit behind the amendments, but their impact on devolved matters, and whether they should properly be left to the Scottish Parliament.

New clause 2 is an example of that. It relates to the offence of threatening behaviour. The Scottish Parliament last legislated in that area in 2010 and I believe that the police have the required tools to deal with some of the situations that the right hon. Member for East Ham was referring to. In the absence of a clear argument about why we should be altering the spirit behind the 2010 legislation, I would not be able to support this particular new clause. There may be a similar consideration for some of the other Opposition amendments.

[Victoria Atkins]

First, may I express my sympathy—and, I am sure, the sympathy of the Committee—for those whom the right. Hon. Member for East Ham described as victims of these fake corrosive attacks, if I may put it that way. I very much hope that they received the support they needed in dealing with those awful and frightening situations.

Cases where a person threatens another with what purports to be a weapon are already criminal offences. The law already provides sufficient powers to the police and CPS to prosecute that type of offending and we would suggest that there is no gap in the law. I am now going to read the detail.

There are various offences that would cover this type of threat—for example, the offence of common assault and the offences available under the Public Order Act 1986. Common assault is any conduct by which a person causes another to apprehend immediate and unlawful personal violence. This offence could be charged where a person threatens another with a substance that that person claims or implies is corrosive.

Section 4 of the Public Order Act 1986 makes it an offence to use threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour towards another person with the intent of causing that person to believe that immediate, unlawful violence will be used against him or her. We would argue therefore that these offences would already apply to the scenarios that the right hon. Gentleman has described. Section 5 of the Public Order Act also makes it an offence for a person to use threatening or abusive words or behaviour or disorderly behaviour that is likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress. Again, we would say that such incidents could fall within the definition of section 5.

Finally, I would like to draw attention to the fact that police officers and others can also consider the facts of the case and, if relevant, consider whether the crimes committed fall under the category of hate crime. If the crimes have a racially or religiously motivated intent, courts can impose strong sentences.

I hope that I have answered the very proper points raised by the right hon. Gentleman and alleviated any concerns he may have about a potential gap in the law. I therefore invite him to withdraw his proposed new clause.

Offensive Weapons Bill (Eighth sitting)

Debate between Stephen Timms and Stuart C McDonald

Committee Debate: 8th sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 6th September 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Stephen Timms]

My hon. Friend makes a very interesting point. I rather hoped that being in the EU would mean that we could regulate what those sellers are doing, but I gathered from the debate this morning that we cannot. The fact that Germany is in the European Union does not seem to give us any more purchase over what German sellers do than we have over Chinese sellers, and my hon. Friend is right that the impact of leaving the EU will need to be considered.

In clause 18, we are trying to ensure that knives bought from sellers outside the UK are not delivered to under-18s. I reiterate my view that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley argued persuasively on Tuesday, that age is too low; it should be higher. It should be set at 21, rather than 18.

It is clear—the Minister gave us a good example this morning—that a lot of knives are reaching under-18s in the UK. Reducing under-18s’ access to knives from sellers outside the UK will help to reduce the number of young people being injured and, indeed, killed.

We should go further than clause 18. We need something a bit more robust. The Minister rightly pointed out that sellers outside the UK are beyond the reach of UK law, so clause 18 instead places the responsibility on the delivery company. I accept that that is a perfectly reasonable way of doing this, but I worry that sellers outside the UK that are determined to increase their profits by selling knives to under-18s in the UK will fairly easily be able to get around the restrictions that clause 18 imposes. The delivery company in the UK is absolved of blame under subsection (1)(d) if it did not know when it entered into the arrangement that it covered the delivery of bladed articles. I would prefer that companies delivering parcels from overseas to households in the UK be required to carry out some degree of checking what is in those parcels. I am not suggesting that every parcel should be opened and scrutinised, but there must be some degree of checking what is being delivered. A sample should be checked.

If it turns out that the seller outside the UK with whom the company has a contract is delivering a significant number of knives, even though the seller did not tell the delivery company that they were knives, in practice the delivery company would eventually probably realise that. Someone would open a parcel on the doorstep, or perhaps a parcel would fall open en route. I think the delivery company probably would in due course pick up that it was delivering knives. Were that to happen, the delivery company should be required to end its contract with that supplier, because the supplier had obviously been dishonest and not told the delivery company that the contract involved the delivery of knives. It would be entirely appropriate for the contract to be ended.

As clause 18 is worded, however, the delivery company does not have to end its contract if it becomes aware that it is in fact delivering knives. Subsection (1)(d) requires only that it should be

“aware when they entered into the arrangement”

that it related to knives. At the very least, that should be extended so that if the delivery company becomes aware in the course of the arrangement that it is in fact carrying knives, the clause takes effect. The fact that it did not know at the moment it entered into the arrangement imposes a very limited restriction. I have not tabled an amendment to address the issue, but I wonder whether the Minister could reflect on it. I am not expecting her to give an answer today. Will she reflect on whether it would be appropriate to tighten the wording?

Say a delivery company has a contract to deliver products from a supplier that is outside the UK to purchasers in the UK. It is not aware when it enters into the contract that some of the products are knives, but discovers in the course of its deliveries that some or perhaps all of them are knives. Surely the delivery company should then be required to terminate the contract. I would go further and argue that companies delivering goods from outside the UK should be required to carry out at least some checks to find out whether they are delivering bladed articles. If they do find out, one way or another, that they are delivering bladed articles and the seller has not told them, they should surely at least be required to end the contract.

I have another question to ask the Minister. Presumably when these parcels are imported to the UK, they will have to go through customs of some sort, where some level of checking of what is in them will be carried out. Perhaps it will emerge in one of those checks that a parcel contains a knife. What would happen at that point? Would customs inform the delivery company to whom the parcel was being shipped that it contains a knife and should not be delivered to somebody under 18? I appreciate that it is not only the delivery company that is involved in checking what is in parcels. I am sure there will be some element of checking in customs. When such a check reveals that there is a knife, what is the response of customs?

My concern is that clause 18 as framed does not go far enough to restrict the ability of overseas sellers—we have established that they account for a significant part of the problem we are facing in constituencies such as mine—to deliver dangerous weapons to young people under 18.

[Stuart C. McDonald]

I will be brief. There was a lot of sense in what the right hon. Member for East Ham said, particularly about the wording:

“when they entered into the arrangement”.

I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say about that. It brings to mind the amendment I tabled on the equivalent provision on corrosive substances, where the test in the Bill is that the delivery company is “aware”. I queried whether that should be “ought to have been aware”. As the Bill is drafted, there is a danger that delivery companies will take an approach of “see no evil, hear no evil” and will not make active inquiries about what products they will actually be asked to deliver. If, at the very least, we put in a test of “ought to be aware”, that will mean other companies actively trying to work out what a company will generally be requiring them to deliver. That might also be something for the Minister to think about.

Offensive Weapons Bill (Sixth sitting)

Debate between Stephen Timms and Stuart C McDonald

Committee Debate: 6th sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 4th September 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Stuart C. McDonald]

Clause 4 concerns the delivery of corrosive products to under-18s. Amendments 43 and 44 are probing amendments, tabled in my name, and they seek to test the Government’s thinking in this area. Amendment 43 merely queries why a delivery company commits an offence in delivering a corrosive substance to a person under 18 only if the seller is outside the United Kingdom. Why is it okay for that delivery to take place on behalf of a seller based within the UK? That is a straightforward question.

Amendment 44 queries the test that the prosecution will have to meet. As I understand, under the Bill’s current drafting, the prosecution would have to prove actual knowledge on behalf of the delivery company, and that it was aware that a corrosive substance could be involved in the contract to deliver products. From recollection, I think that some offences permit prosecution if it can be shown that the delivery company ought to have been aware of that—for example, if the client who was sold the product remotely is a well-known manufacturer of corrosive substances, and that is the main part of its business. Perhaps that should be enough in itself for the prosecution to make its case, but, again, I simply seek the Government’s view on those issues and wish to test their opinion.

[Stephen Timms]

I rise to speak to new clause 9. It arises from a number of conversations that I had with a man called Mr Raheel Butt, whom I would briefly like to tell the Committee about. He grew up in West Ham, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown), rather than in East Ham, and as he would freely acknowledge, he went wrong for several years and served a term in prison. I think he left prison in 2012, and since then he has made it his mission to try to ensure that other young people do not make the same mistakes he made. He set up a community interest company called Community & Rehabilitation Solutions, which works with the Metropolitan police in a number of ways, and he is very concerned about the ease with which people can get hold of very unpleasant weapons and corrosive substances—the new clause covers both corrosive substances and bladed weapons.

I arranged to meet Mr Butt a couple of weeks ago, and he came to Portcullis House to have a conversation with me about this issue. About five minutes after he was due to turn up, I realised that he had not arrived, so I gave him a call on his mobile. He said, “Well, the problem is I don’t know how to get past security with my offensive weapons.” I had not realised that he was planning to bring his offensive weapons with him, but that was indeed his intention. It caused a significant security alert; I actually never got to see the offensive weapons, because they were taken off him before he managed to get through Portcullis House security. I suppose that was reassuring.

The point he wanted to make, however, was that it is extremely easy to buy the most dreadful weapons online extremely cheaply. For example, I am just looking at a product that he pointed out to me—the ones he showed me are all readily available on eBay, and I know there are other websites where they are available as well. “Ultralight Self Defense Tactical Defense Pen Outdoor Glass Breaker Writing Pen” is the name of a product that costs £2.84 on eBay. It is designed to look like a pen, and it does look like a pen, but it is actually a lethal weapon. My worry, which I am sure is also the Minister’s worry, is how to stop these things getting into the hands of people who want to do harm with them, of whom there are sadly far too many at the moment.

Clause 4 covers the delivery of corrosive products to people under 18, and clause 15 covers the delivery of bladed products to residential premises. In both cases, the Bill places requirements on the suppliers. My worry is what happens in a case such as one Mr Butt drew my attention to. That ultra-light product on ebay.co.uk is supplied by a Chinese company called vastfire-luz. My worry is whether this legislation will cover companies such as that one in China, or companies elsewhere, that are sending these very damaging and unpleasant items to people in the UK.

I know that clause 15, on the delivery of bladed products to residential premises, puts in place arrangements to cover the situation where the supplier is outside the UK. An onus is placed on the delivery company; we will no doubt come to that in due course, but it is not clear to me how effective that will be. If a Chinese company posts an item, which could be in a perfectly innocuous small package, to somebody in the UK, will the arrangements in the Bill help us pick up that it is, in fact, a lethal weapon that is being delivered? It might be delivered by the Royal Mail through the post or by a delivery company of some kind. It is difficult to see how the measures in the Bill, although clearly intended to stop that kind of delivery being made, will in practice have that effect for suppliers determined to get around the impediments being put in their way.

That is the reason I have tabled new clause 9, which I accept looks like a rather odd proposition on the face of it, to move that a person

“commits an offence if they knowingly purchase an offensive weapon from a seller located in a country that is not a member of the European Union.”

The Bill is intended to manage sellers and delivery agencies, but I am sceptical whether that will work in practice. Through my new clause, I instead place an onus on the purchaser and, indeed, on people such as eBay who are facilitating these sales, and say to them: “If you are an individual purchasing an offensive weapon from a seller outside the EU, that is an offence.” That would be one way of shifting the onus on to the purchaser. Clearly, it would still be possible for businesses to import items into the UK in the ordinary way. What I am worried about is individuals buying the dreadful implements that are freely on sale at the moment, on eBay and elsewhere and that, as far as I can see, the well-intentioned measures in the Bill will not capture. This proposal would be another way of trying to stop those very damaging things getting into the country.

Offensive Weapons Bill (Fifth sitting)

Debate between Stephen Timms and Stuart C McDonald

Tuesday 4th September 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Stuart C. McDonald]

It is with some reluctance that I must explain why I cannot support this group of amendments. Amendment 53 relates to clause 12, which sets out defences applicable in England and Wales only; there are equivalent provisions in clauses 13 and 14 for Scotland and Northern Ireland. We are talking about a devolved matter, and I understand that the Scottish Government, who have obviously agreed this legislation with the United Kingdom Government, are not unsympathetic or closed to the idea of changing the age limit for buying these products from 18 to 21, but would not do so without full consultation and further consideration of some of the issues that the Minister has spoken about. I will therefore not vote for amendments relating to England and Wales when the Scottish Government are not prepared to enact the same measures in Scotland.

I am also sympathetic to amendments 1 to 9, but similar reasons apply, albeit that they are not devolved matters this time. I am not yet utterly convinced that the benefits that could accrue from these amendments cannot be largely achieved by other provisions already in the Bill, without the unintended consequences that the amendments might bring. I do not think that the evidence for fixing the age limit at 21 is quite there yet. I am open to persuasion, and could perhaps be persuaded by Report, but I am not there yet, so I cannot support the amendments today.

[Stephen Timms]

I am grateful to the Minister for her thoughtful response to the amendments, although I am of course disappointed by the conclusion that she reached. I accept that it might be difficult to raise the age limits—it would not be completely straightforward—but that does not mean that it should not be done.

Indeed, the Minister’s evidence seemed to set out a stronger case than mine. If the most recent data suggest that the average age of the people carrying out these attacks is 23, the case for limiting the ban on sales to 18-year-olds is even weaker, and the case for raising the threshold to a higher level is stronger still. The Minister is absolutely right to make the point that the average age of perpetrators varies between years, but it is clearly the case—as shown by the Metropolitan police figures given in answer to my freedom of information request, which I think go back to 2002—that setting the restriction at the age of 18 is too low.

The Minister makes the point that a change will cause inconvenience for some. However, the question is how seriously the Committee is willing to take this problem. Do we recognise the appalling harm being done by acid attacks? Some of them are carried out by under-18s, but the majority are carried out by people who are young but who are over 18. If we raise the age limit to 21, we would be able—I think—to reduce the scale of the problem among a significant cohort of those who carry out such attacks at the moment.

I am puzzled by the Minister’s suggestion that the Government might lose a challenge over this on age discrimination grounds. One would be able to, and would certainly have to, defend the decision on clear public interest grounds. If an age limit of 18 can be defended, I see no reason at all why an age limit of 21 could not be, given that we know that so many of those carrying out acid attacks are between the ages of 18 and 21. There is a clear public safety ground for seeking to reduce the availability of acid to people aged 18 to 21.

On the question of inconvenience, I accept that there will be some difficulties for some of those who are required to implement such changes. However, given that Challenge 21 is in place, shopkeepers are already getting into the habit of challenging people up to the age of 21. The basics for implementing this change in shops are in place. I accept that there would be some difficulties and that this is not completely straightforward. However, I impress upon the Minister that the scale of the harm of acid attacks carried out by people aged 18, 19 or 20 is too great for us simply to allow people to carry on getting hold of this stuff and doing harm, so I will press the amendment to a vote.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

Offensive Weapons Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Stephen Timms and Stuart C McDonald

Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 17th July 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Stuart C. McDonald]

Q Are there any other comments on any of those questions?

Trish Burls: I would certainly like to come in on the residential premises one. The definition of residential premises could cause a problem for businesses and enforcers alike, in that residential premises have been defined in the Bill as places purely for residential use—no business use at all. These days, increasingly, many people work from home or have businesses registered at home and so on, so businesses might find that difficult to comply with and enforcers might find it difficult to enforce against.

[Stephen Timms]

Q The Bill makes it an offence to sell corrosive substances to people under 18. As I understand it, the evidence is that when checks are made of retailers’ compliance with not selling things that they are already prohibited from selling to under-18s, there is a high level of failure. Can you tell us a little about what trading standards’ experience is of the degree of compliance with bans on sales to under-18s, what you think that tells us about how effective the ban will be in this case, and what we can do to make it more effective?

Trish Burls: In terms of age-restricted products in general, do you mean?