Windrush Lessons Learned Review

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

I thank my hon. Friend for his comment and his point. He will know, through the work we are undertaking in the Home Office itself with reforms to the immigration system, including the points-based system, that we are looking at the Law Commission’s recommendations on simplifying the immigration system. It has become far too complicated, and this is the moment that we need to streamline the system and make it much more open, more transparent, much more flexible and much more agile—but, actually, much fairer.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I welcome the Home Secretary’s statement, but if we are learning lessons why will she not act now on looked-after children and care leavers eligible under the EU settlement scheme to ensure that they are all urgently processed? Otherwise, they are destined to end up in exactly the same position as the Windrush victims.

[Priti Patel]

With respect, I disagree with the hon. Gentleman’s last comment. When it comes to carers and children in particular—who he rightly highlights, if I may say so—there is a great deal of effort taking place, not just in the Department but with local authorities, specifically on the groups he speaks about. It is right that we do that and, of course, we are committed to doing that, but obviously as he will know there are some complexities right now throughout the covid period that we, others and local authorities themselves have come up against. If he has particular cases that he wants me to look up, I am more than happy to do so.

Windrush Compensation Scheme

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I appreciate what the Home Secretary has said about the complexities of the scheme, but what assessment has she made of how much, on average, a victim can expect to have to spend on obtaining medical records, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs records, Home Office records and other documentation in order to support a compensation claim?

[Priti Patel]

That is a legitimate point about the documentation and evidence that has to be provided, but every claim is different and so there is no one-size-fits-all or simple figure for this. Of course if we can find ways in which we can simplify the process, we will do that. This is an iterative process and if we have to make changes, we will look at that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Monday 8th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Priti Patel]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. She will know from the discussions that we had as recently as Friday the extent of the criminality, exposure and abuse undertaken by people traffickers, who are forcing mothers and children on to unseaworthy vessels, and the horrendous circumstances that they are put in. My hon. Friend the Immigration Minister earlier outlined the approach that the Government are taking to tackle these abuses, and to go after the criminals and the facilitators of this crime. We will not stop pursuing this policy until we absolutely break the pathway that these criminal gangs are using.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

The Home Office says that 9,000 looked-after children and care leavers are eligible for EU settled status. To date, 11% of these children have had such status. Why does the Home Office not consider a blanket approval for these vulnerable children, and spare us all an administrative nightmare and a second Windrush?

[Priti Patel]

When it comes to EU settled status, we are working with local authorities to give them the support that they need. I hope that the hon. Gentleman, and all hon. and right hon. Members across the House, will continue to work in a constructive manner in their constituencies to ensure that children are granted the settled status that they are due.

Policing (England and Wales)

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Monday 24th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

I listened with interest to the Minister’s presentation. In particular, I listened when he described the Conservative party as the natural party of law and order. Not all of our constituents would agree with that, having seen the relative cuts in funding and the spike in violent crime. I shall return to that later.

I wish to say at the outset that the Opposition will not be opposing the police funding settlement, but we remind the Minister that it is not just about the total settlement but about the police funding formula. For five years Ministers have been promising to revise the police funding formula, and I argue that that is a concern not just for Opposition Members but for Members of all parties. Ministers have had five years. Perhaps they can make greater haste in something that is so key to the effective fighting of crime in all parts of our country.

Although we are far from satisfied with the Government’s plans for policing overall, the Opposition believe that this is the first time since the Labour Government that there has been a funding settlement for the police that does not in real terms undermine them further, so in the circumstances it would be wrong to oppose this particular funding settlement. Let me be equally clear, though: I do not want to be cruel, but the Opposition have no confidence in this Government to restore policing to its proper strength or to tackle serious crime. I strongly doubt—I shall explain why—that the Government will even meet their own pledge to recruit an extra 20,000 police officers. I see Government Members who are new to the House looking shocked, but I remind them of this Prime Minister’s track record on policing and police recruitment.

When the current Prime Minister was Mayor of London in 2012—those of us who are London MPs remember that well—he sent a list of nine promises to every household in London. His political marketing claimed that it was his “nine-point plan for Greater London”. No. 4 on the list was:

“Making our streets and homes safer with 1,000 more police on the beat”.

I have to tell the House that this pledge was never met, even though it was signed by the current Prime Minister himself, so I do not think that his record on policing provides much confidence that he will meet his manifesto commitment to recruit 20,000 extra police.

Secondly, I want to turn to an issue with the funding settlement, which is inadequate even in its own terms. When the Minister announced the funding settlement, the Home Office claimed that it was the biggest for a decade, but that was a decade of cuts in police funding—cuts made by Ministers now on the Government Front Bench. It is not much of a boast when the settlement represents an uplift only when compared with the cuts made in previous years.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that what the settlement actually means for West Midlands Police—the second largest police force in the country—is a funding gap of about £10 million, so it will have to make savings despite the settlement?

[Ms Abbott]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing some reality to the discussion.

The Opposition have learnt that police chiefs have also recently been told to find another £165 million in 2019-20 and up to £417 million in 2020-21 as a result of the overhaul of pension schemes recently announced by the Treasury. We of course support better police pensions, and indeed better public sector pensions in general, but we do so by arguing that they should be properly funded, whereas Ministers want the money to support them to come out of the extra moneys that they are announcing today. The amount provided in the funding settlement to cover the pension changes is nowhere near the amount it will cost the police. There is a real risk that, with this poor beginning, the Government will fail to meet their total recruitment target. I hope that Government Members are taking due note.

Thirdly, I want to question the Government’s entire approach to this matter, because although police numbers are a key factor, they are only one aspect of combating serious and violent crime. The Government’s goal must be to keep our citizens safe, but their track record is abysmal. I know that this set of Ministers like to pretend that the record of the past 10 years has nothing to do with them, but most of the Ministers now in office voted for the police cuts that have been made. This is continuity Toryism, and they are continuity Tories.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Newbury (Laura Farris) on her excellent maiden speech, which was thoughtful and thought-provoking. I lived and worked in Thatcham in the early ’80s. We may not agree on everything in our time here, but what she says about the area is absolutely true, and listening to her description of it brought back many happy memories. I think we have all seen that she is a truly worthy successor to Richard Benyon.

I welcome the Government’s commitment to beginning the process of restoring police numbers, although it is only fair to remind the House—including the hon. Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax)—that it was the Tory party, aided and abetted by their then friends the Lib Dems, who in 2010 embarked on the disastrous course of cutting police resources by 20% and ignored the warnings that it would lead to a rise in crime and undermine the police’s ability to cope. Those warnings have been repeated by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services, the Public Accounts Committee, the Home Affairs Committee and the chief constables of Greater Manchester and the West Midlands, who all acknowledge that the cuts have undermined the police in the battle against crime.

When confronted with that, the Government often cite—as the Minister did today—the need for the police to change because of the changing nature of crime. I accept the need to change as crime changes, but it is easier to manage such change if there is not a constant preoccupation with managing cuts, which is the problem that most police forces are living with. The cuts have made it harder to recruit new people with the skills and talents needed to tackle modern crime. They have made it harder to acquire new equipment and technology and, as we have heard from a number of people, they have led to collateral demand or cost shunting for the police, whereby reductions in other services because of austerity place extra demands on the police; mental health is a particularly good example.

I acknowledge that the police have tried to deal with these resource shortages. They have tried to redefine the issue of visibility with new initiatives such as online reporting and telephone interviews, but that approach falls down because of staff shortages. The chief constable of my force in the West Midlands said last April that what is “cheesing off” the public is the police’s inability to get to grips with “the routine stuff” and the failure to return calls and follow up reports from the public. He simply does not have enough resources to do the routine stuff. That is seriously undermining public trust in the police, which is exacerbated by the switch to reactive policing because of the reduction in neighbourhood policing.

I want to raise two areas of particular concern: fraud and retail crime. Only last April, HMICFRS reported concerns about the lack of a national fraud strategy, which I am sure the Minister is aware of. It said that the disjointed approach to fraud was leaving

“fraudsters feeling they can act with impunity”.

Last week, I was alerted to a fraud affecting a 68-year-old retired teacher who has been robbed of £157,000—money he built up in his pension pot—in a scam where the fraudster hacks and mimics the email of solicitors engaged in house conveyancing. The response he received from the City of London fraud review team seems to be more concerned with how quickly they can close the case than tracking the fraudster and recovering this poor gentleman’s hard-earned cash. That is not right, Minister—something has to be done.

With retail crime, we see a problem that is reaching epidemic proportions. Traders have lost faith in the police. The value of goods stolen must exceed £200 before most forces will take the matter to court. Meanwhile, more than 100 shop workers are being attacked daily while simply trying to do their job. Retail crime is costing us around £2 billion per year. It is serious, and it ought to be policed.

I welcome any extra resources, but the problem of relying so heavily on the council tax precept to increase police resources is that it results in areas such as the West Midlands, which has the second largest force in the country and a complex range of crime, only being able to raise an extra £8.2 million through the precept because of the council tax base. I urge the Minister to review the demands made of forces such as the West Midlands and to help us find a better way of funding some of that demand. I hope he will be willing to meet a cross-party delegation from the West Midlands to consider some of the pressures the force faces. As I pointed out to the shadow Home Secretary, even after an increase in funding, the West Midlands will still experience a funding gap of £9.8 million this year, so further savings—further cuts—will be required. As the Minister knows, there will be significant pressures in the coming year in terms of pay and price inflation, and the force is wondering how that will be managed.

I genuinely welcome the Minister’s efforts, and I hope he is right that this is a down payment. I hope we are about to embark on a sustained period of increasing police resources, as well as a constructive review of how policing needs to change. I hope the Minister will consider how we fund the extra demands being made of forces such as the West Midlands. I hope he will take on board the impact that the decline in neighbourhood policing is having on the public. I hope he will look again at neglected areas—what Chief Constable Thompson of the West Midlands calls “the routine stuff”—and respond to the growing problems of fraud and retail crime.

Retail Workers: Protection

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Tuesday 11th February 2020 Westminster Hall

[Mike Amesbury]

I agree, and I will come on to the progressive work that some of the hon. Gentleman’s Scottish comrades are doing elsewhere.

Working every day in a situation where they were attacked or threatened, and facing a constant stream of strangers, is more than enough to cause retail workers panic attacks and anxiety after an assault. Retail workers, especially those working at night—as touched on by my hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds)—or tasked with selling alcohol, simply do not have the option of avoiding the anti-social behaviour of others. Dr Emmeline Taylor, in collaboration with the Co-operative Group, traced the psychological impact of the epidemic of violence. She highlighted the incidence of post-traumatic stress disorder in employees after their assaults. In the most severe cases, they were too traumatised to return to work—assaults literally cost them their livelihood.

In preparation for this debate, the House of Commons digital engagement team last week put out a survey online. Some of the responses received were absolutely shocking: stories of employees being racially abused, watching colleagues being stabbed and punched, and even being held at gunpoint. Andrea from Sheffield told us that:

“we are threatened...daily...with…needles, flick knives...colleagues have been headbutted and punched. Shoplifters feel it is their right to assault us”.

The psychological impact described by Dr Taylor is all too clear in many responses. One worker from Bristol said that he developed severe PTSD and panic attacks after he was assaulted at work—another victim of these callous criminals, who affected his livelihood, and who affect that of major retailers.

Looking at the responses, it is obvious that some retailers can do more to support their staff, as many do not feel protected or defended by employers. It is also clear that staff want legally set and enforced standards of behaviour from the public. One respondent, Fiona, stated:

“Customers see retail workers as ‘fair game’, things they wouldn't say to a stranger in the street, they are quite happy to say it to us...I believe for our protection, it should be made clear that verbal or physical abuse would result in prosecution”.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. I wanted to raise the point he just made, because the authorities are giving the wrong signal. The setting of the figure of £200, which has almost become an acceptable figure for shoplifting, is signalling that the police do not need to intervene at that level. Provided the shoplifter keeps it under £200, they will get away with it—the worst that will happen is they will get a fine by post, a bit like a parking offence.

[Mike Amesbury]

I concur wholeheartedly. Anyone who is assaulted deserves to be protected by the law, but it is clear that retail workers face a particular threat. What is more, despite ample evidence, some cases are not being prosecuted, as rightly pointed out by USDAW, even when there is clear video footage of an assault. A lack of sentencing leads to a lack of reporting, which leads to even fewer prosecutions. USDAW found that 17% of attacks are never even reported to the police.

There is another reason why we need urgently to review how we handle assaults on retail employees. We put a statutory responsibility on retail workers to uphold the law and to protect the public from dangerous items getting into the wrong hands.