Oral Answers to Questions

Tom Brake Excerpts

Monday 7th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

I do not accept that this is some sort of weaker tool. There is going to be a more effective suite of tools with which to bear down on antisocial behaviour. Let us not forget that it was the last Labour Home Secretary who suggested that the previous Government had in some way been coasting on antisocial behaviour. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has reminded me that Thames Valley police has said that it will be protecting neighbourhood response teams. It is also worth highlighting that the Mayor of London recognises the importance of safer neighbourhood and community teams and of delivering on the antisocial behaviour agenda.

[Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)]

I do not know whether the Minister has seen “Minority Report” in which precogs predict where and when serious crimes are going to occur, but will he assess a less futuristic and more practical technique that has been advocated by Peter Neyroud, the ex-chief of the National Policing Improvement Agency, and by the Cambridge Institute of Criminology, which could cut reoffending and antisocial behaviour? The technique flags up the criminals who are most likely to reoffend, thereby allowing resources to be concentrated on them and halving prisoner numbers, saving money and improving public safety in the process.

[James Brokenshire]

I am not sure whether Philip K. Dick is bedtime reading for Peter Neyroud, but certainly the whole idea of prevention and acting earlier is very much at the heart of the consultation in which we are engaged on antisocial behaviour. I am certainly clear about the role of prevention and the need to act early in breaking patterns of offending before people become too engaged. I will certainly look at the research to which he refers.