Stop and Search: West Midlands

Debate between Steve McCabe and Gary Sambrook

Wednesday 17th November 2021 Westminster Hall

[Gary Sambrook (Birmingham, Northfield) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Rees, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East (Nicola Richards) for securing today’s debate.

I will start by talking about stop and search as a tool that the police are able to use to tackle crime. Just this week in the Northfield constituency, we have seen our local police force working with the National Crime Agency. They have conducted a successful operation on the Cock Hill estate, taking four criminals and weapons in the form of a gun and knives off the streets. That is an example of how these powers are used every day to bring down crime in this country and to make our streets much safer.

We have also seen the powers being used in areas such as the Three Estates in Kings Norton, in my constituency. This time last year, my inbox was full of messages from people who were worried and concerned about the safety of their children and their families on the streets of Kings Norton. However, in the course of the last year, we have seen crime coming down, thanks to our local police, including the impact team and the neighbourhood team, who have been working together hand in hand to bring down crime, using the powers that they have to make our streets safer.

I want to say thank you to Inspector Michelle Cassidy and Chief Superintendent Steve Graham, who have been an enormous support to our local teams in the area; people such as Councillor Adrian Delaney in Rubery and Rednal who have worked with the police and local communities to bring down crime in Cock Hill and ensure that we make it a safer place; and local residents such as Natalie Chambers on the Three Estates, who helped to organise an online Facebook group, sharing information with different residents, empowering them and organising them in order to ensure that the police have the correct information at the right time, so that they can decide how to execute their powers and how to bring down crime locally.

As many speakers have said so far, stop and search is a vital tool. We have seen nationally how it saves lives. Last year, more than half a million stop and searches were conducted—that equates to 11 in 1,000 people—and 11,000 weapons were taken off the streets of this country. There were 74,000 instances of people being arrested also.

We see locally how this power is being used proportionately and responsibly by our local police in the form of the GOWISELY initiative, which my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East mentioned. It is these sorts of initiatives that, as local politicians and community groups, we can help to scrutinise through the panels. I am glad that my hon. Friend brought up the panels, because they are certainly going to be picking up some of the issues that she raised. I am going to have a look at my own Birmingham panel and see how I can help and engage with it, to see what we can all do to ensure that the powers are being used wisely. It also means that local community groups feel that they are having input into the process.

I am very glad that the police are being protected in these incidents through police body cameras. I was glad that the Government listened to the calls from the Police Federation to have the images stored on a camera published, so that there are checks and balances. Unfortunately, we did see many incidents in which police were being filmed and the videos were being put online, but the police were not able to publish their own video footage to protect themselves from people making allegations against them in relation to stop and searches and other incidents. I am glad that the Government listened to the Police Federation in that respect and moved forward.

Knife crime is a real concern in Birmingham. It is something that has been around for as long as I can remember. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) knows that I was born and raised in his constituency, and lived there for 30 years. Five people I went to school with—we were in the same year group—are currently inside for murder. All those crimes were committed with a knife. People I went to school with have been slain in Finchley Park over arguments. The hon. Gentleman always gives very impassioned speeches about resources, but these incidents were pre-2010, in the times of plenty, when these sorts of things were never addressed properly. They affected people and children, and included the killing of children in local parks. We need to address these issues, and these powers are at the heart of the efforts to combat them.

It has been said that the police and crime commissioner is fully supportive of the initiative of stop and search. If that is the case, why has he thrown a cloud of doubt over stop and search recently? Why has he thrown this cloud of doubt over the entire process locally? He did not have to do so. He could have carried on with the way it is at the moment without revising his action plan. What has happened is that locally, in the media, it has thrown a cloud of doubt over the process. I can imagine that it really demoralises our local police, who go out day in, day out, and face these challenges. They need political leadership as back-up for what they are doing day in, day out, and it is incumbent on all of us to make sure that they have that political leadership behind them.

Unfortunately, with the current police and crime commissioner, as with the last, we have seen a lack of political leadership. There has always been a void between the decisions that they make and the distancing away from those decisions and trying to blame the Government all the time. There is not a single police station left in my constituency. Decisions are made in Lloyd House in Birmingham, which, coincidentally, had £30 million spent on it to do it up at a time when the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington said there were cuts. There was £30 million spent on an office in the middle of the city centre. Local police stations were taken away. My entire constituency does not even have a base that the police can call home.

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

The hon. Member makes an interesting point. I do not want to score a point, but I have listened to debates, as have lots of us, about police stations. How many police officers and staff does he think are required to resource a basic local police station? Our areas—his and mine—are served at the moment by Bournville police station. If we had another half dozen satellites, how many staff does he think would be required to staff those? How long should they be open and what would that cost?

[Gary Sambrook]

The hon. Member makes an interesting point. I do not have the figures to hand, but that £30 million would have gone a long way to providing local police stations. Even if it is not an entire police station that is open in the constituency—somewhere on the high street, in the community, in an impact area—that money could have been spent in local communities across the west midlands, particularly in my section of Birmingham, rather than being spent on a city centre office.

I have listened to the impassioned speeches of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington since I was a young man—or boy, even. However impassioned he is, that does not make his point any more right than anybody else’s. He has portrayed doom and gloom since 2010, and there is a reason why people, including me and my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East, rejected his doom and gloom argument. People do not believe the arguments that the hon. Gentleman has deployed over the last 11 years, because there is always a void between the rhetoric and the actual doing. We have had a Labour police and crime commissioner in the west midlands from day one. When the hon. Gentleman goes around knocking on doors, giving TV interviews and blaming the Government all the time, they can see the gap between the rhetoric and the actions locally. That is why they did not believe him during the elections, and that is why I and my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East are in this Chamber at the moment.

It is incumbent on all of us to make sure that our police force has the political leadership.

--- Later in debate ---

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

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Ms Rees. I congratulate the hon. Member for West Bromwich East (Nicola Richards) for securing the debate. It is nice to have a focus on the west midlands. Listening to her, there was very little difference between her positive view of stop and search as a police tool and my own view. To be perfectly honest, there is not that much difference across this Chamber in that respect.

If I have a criticism of Conservative Members, it is that that they suffer a little from selective and collective amnesia. I wonder whether I can tell you a short story, Ms Rees. I have been struck by the account given by some hon. Members—that the police and crime commissioner may be putting at risk the valuable tool of stop and search and may be undermining the confidence of the police. You will remember, Ms Rees, that in April 2014, after record falls in knife crime, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), the then Home Secretary, announced her dissatisfaction with stop and search. She demanded a much more complex recording system, with the deliberate aim of reducing the number of stop and searches. The police were instructed that they could use stop and search only when they believed that a crime would take place, rather than when they believed that a crime may take place.

I agree with Members that stop and search is essentially a preventive tool, so it follows that there will be some occasions when it is used and the people stopped will not be found to be in possession of illegal items. However, it also serves as a deterrent. That is especially important if we are talking about youth crime and particular types of street crime. It is worth while as well, and I would defend that.

I remind hon. Members that the right hon. Member for Maidenhead said that the power should be used only when the police were absolutely confident that a crime would take place. That had a dramatic effect. There were 600,000 fewer recorded stop-and-search exercises as a direct result of that intervention. It resulted in a spiralling epidemic of knife crime that we are still suffering from today. I say in all seriousness to Conservative Members that if they are worried about the risk of misplaced judgments on stop and search that could lead to a curtailment, they are seven years too late. The former Home Secretary and Prime Minister did that and created damage and a lack of confidence in police forces across the country.

I listened with interest to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Northfield, who said that the Opposition are taking up too many scares, that the public do not believe us and that that is the explanation for his and his colleagues’ election results in 2019. If people do not believe what we say about crime, I would like to hear his explanation of the election of the third Labour police and crime commissioner in the west midlands 18 months later. The assumption is that people may have some doubts about what has been said in other areas, but when it comes to police and crime, they do not trust the Tories, but they trust the Labour candidate. Is that not a logical conclusion to draw?

Let me deal with the hon. Gentleman’s selective amnesia. Let us not forget who has been in power for 11 years and takes overall collective responsibility. Let us not forget who scrapped ID cards, abandoned neighbourhood policing, and cut our police force in the West Midlands by over 2,000. Let us not forget that, even if we get the money that has now been promised, we will still be 1,000 officers short of the target. That is the overall reason why we have a crime problem in our communities these days—there simply are not enough police.

The hon. Gentleman made a reasonable claim—I hear it often—about opening more local police stations. I asked him what that would cost and to be fair, he said, “I haven’t a clue”. However, he also said, “Well, it could be paid for with that £30 million.” I want to make two points about that. First, staffing is a recurring cost, so £30 million cannot keep being spent. Once you’ve spent it, you’ve spent it. I did a quick, back-of-a-fag-packet calculation and I assume that in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, my neighbouring constituency, if we could open another four satellite stations—eight in all—at a very minimum for safety, we would need about four staff in each. That is another 32 officers, or officers and civilian staff. In addition, of course, there would be the on-costs of rent, heat and lighting.

Secondly, it is worth pointing out that the Minister for Crime and Policing’s predecessor was tackled on the question of the £30 million. He pointed out at the time that it would save money because the police headquarters could retreat into a central body and the police could refurbish some of their equipment, so that they could use high-tech policing, and create an environment where they could do their job more efficiently. I did not say that; it was the Minister’s predecessor, Mr Nick Hurd.

[Gary Sambrook]

The hon. Gentleman raises the issue of costs for rent etc. Would it not be far more logical to combine some of the services in the community, and team up with the fire brigade, ambulance services and community hubs for the local authority? Maybe, if we were really revolutionary, we could even merge some of the roles of the police and crime commissioner into that of the mayor, which would be much more sensible.

[Steve McCabe]

At a time when we are waiting six to eight hours to get an ambulance for a 90-year-old woman, I am not sure that talking about merging services is the best strategy. I am quite happy to see certain resources shared, but in my view, that does not mean concentrating them all in the hands of a single person. I would point out that the reason we have separate police and crime commissioners is that this Government forced it upon people at a time when they did not want it. They were asked whether it should be put to a public consultation, and they said, “No, we’re having it anyway”. That is why we have police and crime commissioners. It is part of the collective selective amnesia.

I am proud of the three elected Labour police and crime commissioners in the west midlands. The late Bob Jones had a reputation for decency and integrity; David Jamieson worked hard to bring communities together and showed real concern on issues such as knife crime or illegal Traveller settlements; and I hope that Simon Foster is not being attacked because he is making fair funding and equipping the police with the right resources the centrepiece of his first term.

I simply contrast that with the North Yorkshire Tory PCC who had to resign after victim blaming; the Wiltshire PCC candidate who had to resign on the eve of the count for failure to disclose a conviction; and, of course, the Tory incumbent in Cleveland who is a person of interest to the very force he is supposed to be holding to account.

I hope that demonstrates how easy it is to politicise these issues in a cheap and nasty way. It will not help any of us. We should find the common ground that is staring us in the face. We should work together on stop and search. There is an argument for asking how we get to that aspiration of a higher conviction rate. I am actually in favour of that, and the hon. Member for West Bromwich East alluded to some of the ways in which we could do that. I would not have too much trouble working with her on that.

However, there must also be a recognition of the resource deficiency in the west midlands. We are not doing our constituents any favours if we decide to play party politics and do not make the effort to work together. I will be dead straight—that goes for us as well. We have to work on behalf of our constituents because they are the people who are losing out at the moment.