European Union Referendum Bill
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(9 years, 3 months ago)
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Tom Brake
May I say what a pleasure it is to take part in this debate? Certainly, for some Members on the Government Benches it is as though two Christmases have come at once—the BBC and the European Union. Had we also been able to debate political correctness, traffic wardens and road humps, their ecstasy would have been complete.
Tom Brake
And wiping out the Lib Dems would be the final segment.
I want to make a few points about amendments 8, 19, 17, 20, 21 and 23. With regard to votes at 16 and 17, I will not repeat the arguments that have already been set out on Second Reading and in this debate, but clearly it is something we support. One of the fundamental reasons why we support votes at 16 and 17 in the EU referendum is that young people could be deprived of the benefits of our EU membership, such as the ability to live and work abroad. That would be extremely regrettable, because it would close down their options.
Amendments 20 and 21 were tabled by the hon. Member for Ilford South (Mike Gapes), who is no longer in his place. I assume that he did so—I support him in this—to try to initiate some sort of debate, because one thing that is sorely lacking in debates on our membership of the EU is the impact that pulling out would have on UK citizens who live elsewhere in the EU and on other EU citizens who live in UK. I think that he was trying to trigger that debate, because those who support leaving the European Union have to start talking about that. It is only fair that they set out what they think the impact would be on the millions of EU citizens who live in the UK, and on the millions of UK citizens who live elsewhere in the European Union.
When the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) referred to precedent, I hope that he was not saying that the Labour party could not move on the issue of votes for EU citizens in the UK simply because there was no precedent for that anywhere else in the EU. If we always waited for a precedent to be set, we would never do anything. I hope that there are other reasons why the Labour party cannot support that, although it was not entirely clear what they were. All he referred to was the fact that precedents elsewhere in the EU were against that happening.
Government amendment 23 relates to the wording of the referendum question. Like the official Opposition, we accept the wording put forward by the Electoral Commission, but we are disappointed that it is more complicated than the original question. Indeed, the Electoral Commission has suggested in its own findings that the change was not necessary because there was no evidence to suggest that the original question resulted in participants changing their voting preferences. I am slightly confused about why the Electoral Commission then felt that it was necessary to put forward an alternative and more complicated question, but that is where we are and that is what it has set out.
Deregulation Bill
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(9 years, 9 months ago)
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Tom Brake
It seems a long time since I was sitting opposite the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) debating the Deregulation Bill, but we are back here today. The Government support Lords amendments 1 to 37 and 39 to 123. I will also be speaking to amendments tabled by hon. Members to Lords amendments 19, 21, 26 and 27, which the Government will not be supporting for reasons that I will set out shortly.
Lords amendments 1 and 2 relate to health and safety and the self-employed. Lords amendment 1 addresses concerns raised during the public consultation on draft regulations conducted by the Health and Safety Executive during July and August 2014. Concerns were expressed that the regulations as drafted could lead to some self-employed persons who do pose a risk to the health and safety of others falling exempt from the law. Amendment 1 sets out the ways in which undertakings may be described in regulations made under section 3(2) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 to retain duties on self-employed persons. Subsection (2A)(a) provided for regulations to include descriptions of activities carried out by an undertaking where the duty on the self-employed would remain in place, essentially providing for a list of high-risk activities. Importantly, subsection (2A)(b) ensures that the regulations can also include a general description covering any undertaking the conduct of which may expose others to risks to their health and safety. The amendment means that the provision in the Bill aligns more with Professor Ragnar Löfstedt’s recommendation. The HSE will produce guidance targeted at self-employed persons and others to assist with their understanding of the amendment.
Lords amendment 2 takes into account a recommendation of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee to change the parliamentary procedure for these regulations from negative to affirmative. This will allow Parliament fully to scrutinise the regulations.
Lords amendment 3 removes a measure that would have had the effect of allowing private hire vehicles to be used for leisure purposes when they were not being used for private hire purposes. After listening to concerns about this proposal during the Bill’s passage, the Government have decided that the best course of action is for this measure to be considered as part of the package of measures recommended by the Law Commission to reform taxi and private hire vehicle licensing.
Lords amendments 5 to 17 seek to provide clarification and certainty in relation to the tenancy deposit protection legislation in response to recent court cases. The amendments address two issues. First, they make it clear that, where appropriate, a letting agent’s contact details, instead of the landlord’s, may be provided to a tenant. That was always the intention of the original framework, and thus the measure has been made to apply retrospectively. However, to ensure fairness, provision is also being made to prevent the reopening of out-of-court settlements or court cases that had been finally determined on this basis.
The second issue, which was raised by the recent Court of Appeal judgment in Charalambous v. Ng 2014, concerns tenancy deposits. The Court ruled that the tenancy deposit legislation should apply to landlords who received a tenancy deposit before the coming into force of the tenancy deposit legislation in 2007, and that they would therefore need to protect deposits if they wished to rely on the “no fault” ground for eviction, known as section 21. This was never the Government’s intention. Our amendments therefore make it absolutely clear that, although landlords affected by the judgment will need to protect deposits if they wish to rely on section 21, they will not be at risk of financial penalty should they fail to do so.
Lords amendments 18 to 26 protect tenants in the private rented sector from being evicted where they have raised a legitimate complaint about the condition of their home, and make the eviction process more straightforward in appropriate cases. They also ensure that tenants are aware of their rights and responsibilities and those of the landlord. The hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) has tabled amendments to these amendments, and I will come to those shortly. The effect of the Government’s amendments is that landlords in the private rented sector will not be able to evict a tenant merely because the tenant has asked them to carry out a repair, provided that the local authority has confirmed that such a repair is necessary to prevent a potential risk to the tenant’s health and safety. They ensure that tenants are always given at least two months’ notice before they have to move out of their home and make the eviction process more straightforward for landlords in situations where the tenant should be evicted.
The amendments enable the Secretary of State to make regulations specifying the information to be contained in any eviction notice served under section 21 of the Housing Act 1988, and provide that an eviction notice cannot be served where a landlord has failed to comply with their existing legal obligations relating to the condition of the property, the health and safety of their tenants, or the energy performance of the property. They also require landlords to provide information to their tenants about their rights and responsibilities.
As many Members will know, these amendments started as a private Member’s Bill in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Brent Central (Sarah Teather), whom I thank for all her work in bringing this to the attention of the House. I also thank the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills; the Minister for Employment; and the Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol West (Stephen Williams). Shelter and Citizens Advice have also been heavily involved in this process.
Retaliatory eviction is wrong, and its continued practice is unacceptable. No tenant should face eviction because they have made a legitimate complaint to the landlord about the condition of their home, and no decent landlord would engage in the practice. However, a small number of rogue and unscrupulous landlords think it is perfectly acceptable to evict a tenant for requesting a repair. These important amendments introduce protection for tenants against rogue and unscrupulous landlords, but they also contain provisions that will benefit landlords and make it more straightforward to evict tenants in legitimate circumstances.
On the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Shipley, I understand the intention behind some of them. However, I assure him that Lords amendments 18 to 26 ensure that all landlords are still entitled to their rights under section 8 of the Housing Act 1988, which enables them to evict a tenant who does not pay rent, goes to prison, or uses the house for illegal purposes. Our fundamental aim is to prevent a very small minority of rogue landlords from evicting tenants in retaliation for raising a legitimate complaint. Part of his proposals would undermine this effort.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
Will the Minister answer two questions? First, is the opposition to my amendments unanimous across the coalition, or is it just the Liberal Democrats who oppose them? Secondly, what estimate have the Government made of the number of revenge evictions that take place each year, because there is great discrepancy in the numbers?
Tom Brake
On the number of revenge evictions, I will have to get back to the hon. Gentleman; I may get inspiration in the next few minutes. On whether there was coalition agreement on this issue, when the Department for Communities and Local Government looked at the impact of his amendments, it was clear that, in some cases, they would allow a landlord to make a retaliatory eviction on the day after the landlord had completed a repair. That would go completely against the intent of the provisions in terms of protecting tenants. It would permit a landlord to evict a tenant as soon as repairs had been completed using a section 21 eviction notice. That is not in the spirit of preventing retaliatory evictions, but merely delays them until after repairs are completed.
On the number of revenge evictions, as the hon. Gentleman will probably know, the figure is estimated to be some 80,000 per year. The source of that figure was a YouGov survey of 4,500 renters.
Philip Davies
Why are the Government basing their figures on an opinion poll commissioned by a campaigning charity on this issue and ignoring their own figures from the English housing survey, which estimates that the number is about 6,000 a year?
Tom Brake
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that helpful intervention. He thinks that the figure is lower, at 6,000 evictions. I said 80,000, and then generously halved it for him to 40,000. If it is indeed 6,000, then that is 6,000 retaliatory evictions too many. His amendments would facilitate the process of retaliatory evictions, which the Government are, instead, seeking to avoid.
The amendments would extend the time within which a landlord must respond to a request for a repair from 14 days to 20 working days. This Government believe that renting out a property is a business and that tenants should be able to expect a much swifter response to a complaint than 20 working days—in other words, a month—particularly where the problem is serious. To clarify, this time frame is only for responding to the concern raised, not fixing the problem. There is a further amendment to the effect that any complaint must be within the scope of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985. However, that legislation is not the framework under which local authorities operate for the purposes of inspecting a property and deciding whether there is a health and safety risk to the tenant. Inspections are carried out under the Housing Act 2004 and involve checking for the presence of 29 potential hazards in the home.
Amendment 5 would remove protection against retaliatory eviction where a landlord intends to sell the property within six months. However, the proposed legislation already provides that it does not apply where, at the time when the section 21 eviction was served, the property was generally on the market for sale.
The next amendment would provide that protection against retaliatory eviction does not apply where a landlord wants to move into or redevelop the dwelling, or the dwelling is subject to a compulsory purchase order, or the landlord needs vacant possession to comply with a legal duty to carry out works in the building. Compulsory purchase orders are rarely used, but even where they are, the acquiring authority would become the landlord and could terminate the lease under separate powers.
The final amendment would introduce a five-year time limit on the life of the legislation or require that a review shall be commissioned within three years of the legislation coming into force. As the hon. Gentleman will be aware, it is standard practice to evaluate legislation after a certain period, and we will of course do this. However, we do not necessarily believe that the issue of retaliatory evictions will be resolved in five years, so we do not want to limit the powers as they stand.
Where a landlord wants to move back into a property that they are renting out, the legislation will not prevent them from doing so, provided that they follow the normal process and deal with any repairs before a local authority becomes involved. The legislation contains safeguards to ensure that a tenant cannot benefit from making spurious or unfounded complaints. A complaint in itself will not be enough to trigger protection against retaliatory eviction. In all cases, the local authority will have to confirm that a repair needs to be carried out and that failure to do so would probably involve a serious health and safety risk to the tenant. In addition, the legislation makes it clear that a tenant cannot claim protection against retaliatory eviction where they have failed to treat the property in a tenant-like manner—in other words, to take care of it, rather than to damage it wilfully and negligently—including by carrying out small jobs around the property.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
On 6 December 2010, the Home Secretary replied to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk Coastal (Dr Coffey), stating:
“We are also taking steps to ensure that the database will, for the first time, hold the profiles of all serving prisoners and all those previously convicted of serious crimes”—[Official Report, 6 December 2010; Vol. 520, c. 99W.]
A few weeks ago I asked
“how many DNA profiles of current prisoners have not been added to the DNA database”
but was told:
“The information requested is not held.”—[Official Report, 2 July 2014; Vol. 583, c. 645W.]
How on earth can Ministers say that something will definitely happen and then, at a later date, say that they have no mechanism for judging whether or not it is taking place?
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(10 years, 7 months ago)
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Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
6. If he will ensure that Ministers place documents in the Library in accordance with their answers to parliamentary questions.
The Deputy Leader of the House of Commons (Tom Brake)
This is a matter for individual Departments. However, I can reassure the hon. Gentleman that the Office of the Leader of the House provides best practice guidance on answering parliamentary questions to all Departments, which states that if reference is made to documents in response to a parliamentary question, copies of the documents must be placed in the Library.
Philip Davies
On a number of occasions, I have received answers to parliamentary questions that say that information has been placed in the Library, only to find that it has not been placed there and that it does not arrive until quite a while later. Before we get into naming and shaming Ministers and Departments, will the Deputy Leader of the House take steps to ensure that that poor practice does not happen again?
Tom Brake
I agree that if an answer to a parliamentary question refers to information being deposited in the Library, that should happen in a timely manner. I would be happy to remind Departments of the requirements and to take up any cases on behalf of the hon. Gentleman, should he wish to give me the details. We tried to identify the question to which he was referring. If he provides that information, we will follow it up.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(11 years, 1 month ago)
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Tom Brake
I congratulate my hon. Friend on pursuing these matters as vigorously as he does in relation to private Members’ Bills. I am afraid that I am not in a position today to tell him that the Government have responded, but I can tell him that we will respond very shortly to the Procedure Committee’s report, and indeed it contains some sound and strong recommendations that I am sure we will want to consider carefully.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
Is it not the case that if 100 MPs turn up for a closure motion on a Friday they can ensure the progress of any Bill, which is not a great number out of 650 if it has such widespread support? Hon. Members should not expect to turn up with some well-meaning claptrap and expect it to be nodded through just because it is a Friday.
Tom Brake
Yes, my hon. Friend is right that the use of a closure motion and, indeed, timetabling is possible for private Members’ Bills, but it is also worth pointing out that the Procedure Committee has said in its report that it is not its intention to facilitate the passage of Bills into law, and that it should not be easy to see a private Member’s Bill become law.
Business of the House
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(11 years, 2 months ago)
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Tom Brake
The hon. Gentleman will be aware that in response to concerns expressed by local authorities the Government made additional moneys available for the discretionary housing payment. I am sorry that on his patch the funds are, he says, exhausted, but I am aware that a number of other local authorities did not fully access the money made available to them. He will understand the reasons why the Government have proceeded with the changes to the spare room subsidy, and if he has concerns about the policy, we need to hear whether the Labour party would provide additional funding or simply deliver the same as the Government’s programme.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
We recently had the intolerable situation where a triple killer, who murdered his last victim while he was on the run from prison, was not given a whole-life tariff by the judge, because the judge said that that would breach a European Court of Human Rights ruling. I know the Deputy Leader of the House is on the wishy-washy wing of the coalition Government—quite a crowded wing—but will he arrange for a debate and a vote in this House, so that the House can make it clear that we expect judges to impose whole-life tariffs where they see fit, and ignore the views of the pseudo-sham judges at the European Court of Human Rights?
Tom Brake
I thank my hon. Friend for that, but I do not think I would describe myself as wishy-washy in any shape or form. I hope he will acknowledge that there is separation on this issue, and that Members of Parliament and the Government generally should be a little reluctant to interfere in decisions taken by judges.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(11 years, 9 months ago)
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Tom Brake
Whether to change the Standing Orders would, of course, be a matter for the House, but I point out to the hon. Gentleman that my right hon. Friend the Member for East Yorkshire (Mr Knight) and his predecessor have both been successful in securing private Members’ Bills while in opposition. Indeed, in the previous Session four private Members’ Bills made it to the statute book, and they were not hand-out Bills, and in this Session three private Members’ Bills have been secured in legislation, and we expect a further three to do so.
Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)
Does the Deputy Leader of the House agree that it is essential that all legislation, whether it stems from the Government or private Members, should be properly scrutinised and that we should not go down the route, as some people would have us do, of simply nodding through well-meaning legislation without proper or effective scrutiny?
London Local Authorities Bill [Lords]
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(12 years, 10 months ago)
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Philip Davies
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Again, I bow to her superior knowledge from her time on the Select Committee. She has heard more evidence about this matter than I have. I am merely reading the report and giving a flavour of the recommendations.
When I worked for Asda, for a number of years I had the privilege and pleasure of being responsible for the facilities and services that we provided to our customers with disabilities. After car parking and the abuse of disabled car parking bays, the biggest issue that was raised by our customers with disabilities was the accessibility of the toilets. I say to my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green that we ignore at our peril the difficulties that people with different disabilities experience in accessing toilets. There is no one category of disability whereby we can have one kind of turnstile and people think, “Well, that’s fine, everybody can get through that.” We should appreciate that lots of people have different types of disability that make different types of equipment difficult for them. Instead of having turnstiles that will no doubt catch out people with one or another type of disability, we should be making toilets as accessible as possible for everybody so that their disability is not affected.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
Because the disability discrimination laws would apply, the problems of access that the hon. Gentleman is highlighting should not apply to turnstiles. Furthermore, the fact that these turnstiles allow for the mechanical collection of charges should mean that there will be more, not fewer, public toilets.
Philip Davies
We absolutely do not know that, and neither does the right hon. Gentleman. I will come to that later.
Equality and Diversity (Reform) Bill
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Philip Davies
If the hon. Gentleman will allow me, I will come to that later. He raises an important issue and I will tackle it directly. If he feels that I have not done so, I invite him to come back to me later and I will have another stab at it for him.
The idea of businesses and organisations reflecting the community they serve is nonsense. A certain proportion of our local communities are criminals. A certain proportion of people are sent to prison. Are we really saying that, because it is so important that all organisations and all businesses reflect the community they serve, a certain proportion of every organisation should be made up of criminals because they make up a certain proportion of the population? That is nonsense. Nobody seriously believes that every organisation should reflect the community it serves. That is just trite.
Nobody—and I mean nobody—who I know is remotely concerned when white men are under-represented, so the issue is not really one of equality and diversity at all. The aim is to make some people more equal than others. To illustrate the point, I note that there seem to be very few male midwives about, yet nobody, to my knowledge, has seriously suggested in the House that there should be positive action to try and ensure that 50% of midwives are male. Similarly, the number of white men, or indeed women, who work in Indian restaurants up and down the country is not an issue, nor should it be. The first thing that crosses my mind when I go into a south Asian restaurant is how good the chicken madras is and how well it has been cooked, not what sex or ethnicity the waiters and chef are. That is the way it should be.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
Has the hon. Gentleman looked at what percentage of people who apply to be midwives are men, and what percentage of men subsequently get a post?
Philip Davies
The hon. Gentleman makes an extremely good point. I will deal with it later. One of the things that my Bill tries to repeal is the legislation providing for all-women shortlists. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman might like to ask himself the same question when it comes to the number of women MPs—how many of those people put themselves forward to become MPs, against the number who are selected. He may find the answer to his own question in that conundrum.
Apart from those whom one would expect to oppose equality and diversity measures, there are many others whom those who push political correctness would rather sweep under the carpet, as their views are inconvenient to the argument.
Philip Davies
The point is that women can—although not in his party or in the Labour party. In our party, almost 40 years ago, a woman was quite capable of getting to the top on merit alone. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman thinks that the women in his party have not been good enough to lead his party—
Philip Davies
If the hon. Gentleman thinks that the women in his party are more than capable of being leader, why have they not become leader? Is he saying that his party is sexist and does not allow women to become leader even though they are good enough to be leader? If he is saying that, he should not tarnish the Conservatives’ reputation by trying to impose ridiculous laws. He should tackle the sexism in his own party instead, if that is why he supports this nonsense.
Margaret Thatcher was leader of the Conservative party—the very party that is constantly accused of sexism and appears to want to beat itself up about it—more than a third of a century ago. It gets even better, because she was clear, years after leaving office, that all-women shortlists should be avoided. In her book on statecraft she says that
“the use of quotas applying to the appointment or promotion of individuals because of their collective identity or background is an unacceptable incursion on freedom, however well-intentioned the motives. Nor does it help those who are its intended beneficiaries. Individuals from these groups may well feel patronised; their professional reputations in posts which they would anyway have attained on merit are diminished, because they are thought to occupy them by special privilege; and they are likely to become targets of resentment and possibly even ill-treatment.”
If any male Members are still in favour of all-women shortlists I say what I have always said to them—“Come on. Do the honourable thing and, instead of shafting other men who are trying hard to get into this place, put your money where your mouth is. If it is so important to you that you want to support legalised discrimination, go ahead, resign your seat so a woman can be selected in your place.” That is the best thing that proponents of this approach could do, but it is amazing how few of them are prepared to do it. They are not so keen that there should be more women in Parliament that they are prepared to make space themselves to allow a woman in—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) says that I am talking drivel, but I look forward to him resigning his seat the moment the House rises so that a woman can take his place. Or is it that women should represent only other constituencies, not his? Until hon. Gentlemen are prepared to take that step, I am afraid that people will see through it as gesture politics of the worst possible kind.
People can say I am misguided, that I am missing something, that I need to be educated on the benefits of positive action and positive discrimination—but what would they say to all the people I quoted, who are from the very groups that equality and diversity moves are supposed to help? Would they say that those people were wrong and that they just do not get it, either, whatever “it” is?
This is a case of the emperor having no clothes. Most Members want to be seen to be in favour of nice-sounding ideals, and many confuse political correctness with doing the right thing. They do not want to be the ones to say that they do not get the whole equality and diversity agenda or, worse still, that it is having a negative effect on race relations and good community cohesion. I, however, am prepared to say that the emperor has no clothes. The whole concept of equality and diversity is, at best, a mistaken attempt to pursue a fantastical idea of equality, but, at worst, a dangerous piece of social engineering that encourages and praises discrimination against certain groups of people based on things they cannot change.
I do not believe that this is the right thing, and I certainly do not believe that it is a fair thing—and I am not alone. There are many, many people who agree with me. In an ICM poll, a massive 80% of people in Britain said that they were fed up with political correctness. Members will be delighted to hear that the poll was completely representative and covered a very diverse range of people. The vast majority of people in all categories said they were fed up with political correctness, including women and people from all ethnic origins.
Britain can truly hold its head up and say that it is not racist or sexist only when people are given jobs on merit, and merit alone. People should be given jobs regardless of their sex, age, race or sexual orientation, not because of any of these factors. This Bill gives the House a chance to vote for something that can undo one of the biggest inequalities around. It can vote to reintroduce fairness, to remove the clear injustice of equality of outcome in the name of equality and diversity, and to promote real equal opportunities for all. I commend the Bill to the House.
Tom Brake
I am grateful for that intervention, because the hon. Gentleman has given me the opportunity to confirm that that support is available to the sort of person he describes. That is because we recognise that people from poorer socio-economic backgrounds struggle to get elected as Members of Parliament.
Philip Davies
The right hon. Gentleman is hitting the nub of the issue. Does he think that the Conservative party, for example, would be much more diverse if it replaced Rupert from Kensington and Chelsea with Jessica from Kensington and Chelsea, which is what the legislation he is defending seeks to do? Does he not think that it would make the party more diverse to replace Rupert from Kensington and Chelsea with George from Newcastle? That point is not addressed by the legislation that he is defending.
Tom Brake
If the hon. Gentleman will excuse me, I will allow him to push for the particular balance that he would like to see in the Conservative party.
The hon. Gentleman gave a description of people who worry about equality and diversity issues, which I thought was quite an accurate description in some respects of those who are obsessed with political correctness. He said that they tend to be white, male and have too much time on their hands. I would add that they mourn the loss of empire, are bitter at the loss of their undeserved supremacy and are stuck in the last century but one. That would be an accurate description of those who are obsessed with political correctness.
The Bill has one merit, in that it allows us to debate these issues. We should acknowledge that although merit is a fine thing, in practice there are many fields of life in which merit is not sufficient to ensure that people make the progress that they should be allowed to make. I therefore hope that the Bill will make no further progress.
Anonymity (Arrested Persons) Bill
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry), who made a measured and thoughtful contribution. I have not had an opportunity to have any dealings with her before, so I made some discreet soundings about her among my Liberal Democrat colleagues, and there was broad agreement that she is a very sound, responsible and dignified Member of Parliament. I am therefore pleased to have the opportunity to support some of her comments.
Like the hon. Lady, I will try to avoid mentioning any names. She did such a good job in disguising the details of one of the earlier cases that she mentioned, which related to a TV personality, that I am not sure whether she was talking about the person to whom I am going to refer, in very vague terms, who was also a TV personality and who, several years ago, received press coverage indicating that he had committed some very serious offences. Only yesterday, my researcher, who had been looking at the Bill, pointed out to me that that person was in fact found not guilty of anything at the end of the process. It was lodged in my mind, and I suspect the minds of millions of other people around the country, that this person was guilty of something, and that is what remained from that coverage. The hon. Lady’s point is therefore a very good one. The press leave people with the clear implication that people who have been arrested are guilty of a crime, and although that subsequently proves not be the case, the thought is lodged in people’s minds that they are guilty.
The hon. Lady’s Bill, as she has clearly stated, would prohibit the publication or broadcast of the name, address or image of a person arrested for an offence if such information would lead members of the public to identify him or her as the person suspected of committing the offence in question. She has set out the necessary safeguards to provide that a Crown court judge would have the power to direct that reporting restrictions should not apply in a particular case—for instance, where identifying a suspect in the press might lead to the coming forward of additional complaints or information that would assist the police investigation of the suspect. I wonder whether she thinks that that would have allowed the Crown court judge in the most recent case that she mentioned to have lifted reporting restrictions. Perhaps in a case such as that, as in many others, the lifting of reporting restrictions could lead to the coming forward of additional complaints or additional information of assistance to the police. It is therefore hard to see where the line would be drawn between assisting the police and protecting the individual who has been arrested but has not been charged. The Bill rightly makes it clear that existing constraints on reporting, such as those relating to people under the age of 18, would still apply. It proposes no changes to those constraints.
Some counter-arguments to the Bill have been expressed in interventions. One relates to the degree of protection for people who are arrested under the current arrangements and then have their name publicised. As I understand it, the Bill is flexible enough to allow an arrested person to seek to have their own name put into the public domain if they feel that it would help them to prove their innocence or to protect them by making people aware of their arrest, for example in cases where there are concerns about what might happen in police custody.
I promised to keep my remarks short, and I will keep that promise. To conclude, I think that the hon. Lady’s Bill has merit. She has explained succinctly, using much supporting information, what she is seeking to achieve. She has identified an area in law that requires greater clarity. We need to improve the protection for innocent people who are wrongly implicated by the press as potentially having committed a serious crime. It is clear from the comments of press editors that even they think the law is unclear in this respect. Perhaps they are using that as a protection or justification for some of the things that they do. However, if the law was clearer, they would not be able to fall back on that as a defence for the fact that they often put information into the public domain that should not be there.
Philip Davies
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that in many high-profile cases there would be no end to the speculation, rumour and gossip in the local community? In many cases, the media printing a factual piece of information giving the name of a person who has been arrested prevents gossip and rumours that would vilify other people in the local community who are not in any shape or form involved.
Tom Brake
The hon. Gentleman highlights why this is not a straightforward issue. Although the hon. Lady’s short Bill makes an important contribution and moves the debate on, I suspect that it does not cover all the hon. Gentleman’s concerns, or, indeed, mine. There are other issues with the Bill, such as its non-applicability to Scotland. There is therefore the potential for matters to be raised in the Scottish press and thereby get some coverage here. Clarification is also required on how the internet and websites would be addressed.
The hon. Lady referred to the Press Complaints Commission. In responding, perhaps the Minister will update us on the PCC’s progress in relation to the most recent case to which the hon. Lady referred. We want to hear that it is taking the matter seriously.
I would be happy to see the Bill make further progress. However, if its fate has been sealed by a shadowy cabal of conspirators behind closed doors, I hope that the Attorney-General will consider its merits and take on board the hon. Lady’s legitimate concerns.
Prisoners (Voting Rights)
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) on securing this debate. It has generated more interest in Westminster Hall than other debates that I have attended. I congratulate also the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green). She said that she felt rather vulnerable taking part in the debate, but at least she positioned herself strategically with no one sitting behind her.
Some Members will acknowledge that an announcement was unavoidable because the Minister had been put in a position in which he had no alternative. Others, however, will argue that he could have disregarded the ruling. I should be interested to know whether a majority of Members present think that we should abide by the law and the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights, which clearly stated that the Government had to address the question.
The Government have known about the problem for a long time. Since 2004, we knew that the Government—any Government—would have to deal with it sooner or later. The previous Government found some imaginative ways to postpone taking a decision or responding to something that they knew was coming down the track, given the consultations that they launched and their unwillingness to take action.
During his speech, the hon. Member for Kettering was asked to confirm when the blanket ban came into place. As he said, it came about under the Forfeiture Act 1870. He deployed the argument that the Government and Members of Parliament clearly debated the matter in 1870. I do not know whether he thinks that once in every 140 years is appropriate, or whether those 140 years have brought about a change in the way in which Parliament and society should operate.
Philip Davies
Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that in those 140 years, there has been ample opportunity for Governments to change the status quo? The fact that change has not been debated is a fair indication that the will of the House—and of the public—in those intervening years was not to change it. It has been within Parliament’s gift to change over for the past 140 years if it had so wished, but it did not so wish.
London Local Authorities Bill [Lords] (By Order)
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(14 years, 2 months ago)
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Philip Davies
My hon. Friend is much bigger than I am, so I would not want to get into an argument with him.
I accept absolutely the points that my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset made about selling cars on the street and via the internet. I came into politics because I wanted to try to encourage people to be entrepreneurs, to believe in the free market, to sell their goods and to be buyers and sellers. I do not want the Government or local government sticking their noses into every aspect of people’s lives. If people want to sell a car and somebody wants to buy it, and they are both happy with the price, why not let them get on with it? Why do we need government, either local or central, interfering in every aspect of people’s lives? Surely we should try to encourage people to do things themselves, so that they do not have to go to big car dealerships. Why do we not just let them get on with it and stop interfering?
Philip Davies
If somebody is legally able to park their vehicle on a particular part of the street, it does not matter to me whether it is my next-door neighbour’s car, a car somebody is selling, or an ice cream van. My suggested solution to the hon. Gentleman, to which he may not have given any consideration, is that if he does not think that cars should be parked in a particular location, his local authority should put down double yellow lines so that people are not allowed to park there. If people are allowed to park at a particular point, what on earth does it matter whether it is my next-door neighbour’s car or somebody else’s car with a small sticker saying, “For sale: £500”. It seems to make a big difference to the hon. Gentleman, but I cannot see why. I ask him to reflect on why he decides that he is a Liberal when he has such an illiberal approach towards people selling their property.
I wish to concentrate on the licensing aspects of the Bill. My hon. Friend the Minister made a perfectly good point about clause 23, which is wholly unnecessary. A couple of years ago, the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, on which I serve, undertook a report on the Licensing Act 2003. We took evidence about certain clubs, including lap-dancing clubs, and we made recommendations about how best they might be licensed. As my hon. Friend made clear, the previous Government, in the last throes of the last Parliament, created new legislation enabling lap-dancing clubs to be licensed as sex encounter establishments—something that people may or may not agree with. As he said, the job has been done. The last thing anybody needs is a London Local Authorities Bill to start trampling all over the licensing regime dealt with by the previous Government and which does much of what the Bill seeks to do. I seek confirmation from him that he will strike out clause 23, which even the biggest supporters of the Bill would concede is completely and utterly unnecessary.
My main point concerns the seizure of goods. I cannot emphasise enough how absolutely outrageous the Bill’s provisions are in this regard. The only fair way to do this is to quote a small section of the explanatory notes. I would be astonished if people who read it were not completely outraged by what is proposed. It says:
“Westminster City Council officers already have power to seize items used in unlawful street trading where the items are required for evidential purposes, or where the items are subject to forfeiture by the courts. On a street trading prosecution, if there is a conviction, the magistrates’ court can order the forfeiture of any goods seized in relation to the offence.”
So the provision is already in statute. It continues:
“Authorised officers cannot exercise their powers of seizure unless they suspect that a street trading offence has been committed.”
The London local authorities are complaining that they cannot exercise their powers of seizure unless they suspect that a street trading offence has been committed. That is not good enough for them: they want to be able to seize these goods even when they do not suspect that an offence has been committed. They say that Westminster city council officers already
“use the powers regularly in the West End”
to deal with
“unlawful sales of hotdogs and other hot food from portable stands.”
But they complain:
“City council officers are unable to seize hotdog trolleys until the vending begins.”
That is not good enough for the poor local authorities—they cannot seize these things until an offence has been committed and somebody actually trades. So they want, through the Bill, to
“enable City Council officers”—
pettifogging bureaucrats in the local authority with, no doubt, as my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset said, their peaked caps—
“to seize receptacles which are in a street and which the officers have reasonable cause to suspect are intended to be used in connection with a street trading offence.”
Can Members imagine where we would be if the police started arresting everybody who was walking down the street because they might go into the nearest shop and start shoplifting? We are giving such a power to council officers, which is totally unacceptable. Any hon. Member who supports a Bill that provides such powers should be ashamed of themselves if they believe that they support freedoms in this country.
DNA and CCTV (Crime Prevention)
Debate between Tom Brake and Philip Davies(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Philip Davies
The hon. Lady is absolutely right and has pre-empted what I was about to say. In this age of austerity, we should be trying to find ways of reducing the cost of the criminal justice system, and as she rightly noted, CCTV is a key way of doing that.
Unless millions of police officers are stationed on every street corner, in every park and on every road, without CCTV those crimes would go unreported and often undetected. A prime example is that of the so-called “crossbow cannibal”, who was arrested on suspicion of murdering three prostitutes in my home city of Bradford, but only because he was caught on CCTV. Without CCTV, that arrest would never have been made. We would never have been able to identify the 7 July bombers without the CCTV footage from the tube because the police would have been unable to track their movements on that day.
Let us look at the cost-effectiveness of CCTV. The average running cost of a CCTV system with 150 cameras is about £320,000 a year, and on average 3,000 events are monitored every year by each system, giving an average cost of about £100 per incident. It seems to me that that is good value for money in this age of austerity. It seems even better value when we consider that a 12-month experimental study in Burnley showed a 28% reduction in crime in an area with CCTV, compared to a 10% increase in crime in an area that relied solely on policing. Therefore, CCTV is not only cost-effective, but effective in reducing crime in the real world. An initiative in my constituency in west Yorkshire set up a CCTV camera, which cost only a few thousand pounds, and Crimestoppers has stated that the number of arrests and charges has increased by 40% as a result, so its cost-effectiveness has been proved beyond doubt.
As the hon. Lady pointed out, CCTV is a valuable tool not only for the police, but for the courts. It is an invaluable tool on two levels: for convicting the perpetrators of crimes; and for acquitting those who have not committed a crime. CCTV footage provides conclusive and unbiased evidence, void of anyone’s spin or mistaken recollection. When viewed by defendants and their solicitors, footage often leads to a change of plea, from not guilty to guilty. That invariably happens in cases in which defendants were drunk or on drugs when they committed an offence and could not recall it. That not only saves the courts time and money, as the hon. Lady suggested, but prevents witnesses having to give evidence in court, which is often a stressful and unpleasant experience. CCTV prevented Richard Whelan’s girlfriend from having to testify against his murderer, Anthony Joseph, who brutally stabbed Richard on a bus when he was attempting to defend her. That attack was caught on camera and Joseph, a paranoid schizophrenic, was jailed.
Equally, CCTV can prove that someone has been wrongly accused of committing a crime, as was the case with Edmund Taylor, who was convicted of dangerous driving. His conviction was quashed on appeal, when CCTV footage showed that a white man had committed the offence—Mr Taylor was black. Similarly, Garry Wood was cleared of raping Natalie Jefferson after police studied CCTV footage of his movements on the night of the rape and realised that he had not committed the crime.
I want to touch on the automatic number plate recognition scheme because it was through its use, and that alone, that the murderers of PC Sharon Beshenivsky were caught. Without an ANPR system around Bradford, those people would never have been brought to justice. On 18 November 2005, PC Beshenivsky was shot and killed during a robbery in Bradford. The CCTV network was linked in to an ANPR system and was able to identify the getaway car and track its movements. Because of that system, the police realised that the people responsible were in London, virtually before those people knew it themselves, and six suspects were arrested. At the system’s launch in May, Chief Superintendent Geoff Dodd of West Yorkshire police called it
“a revolutionary tool in detecting crime”.
Many of my constituents are sick to the back teeth of drivers who do not have insurance, and who not only put other people at risk, but cause them unnecessary expense. Many of my constituents think that it is absolutely fantastic that the police can use ANPR to stop people who drive without insurance, and can confiscate the cars. I would not want anybody to try to stop the police doing that.
I am obviously interested to know what the Minister thinks of CCTV. In 2007, he was calling for more CCTV cameras in his then constituency of Hornchurch. On his website he stated:
“I think CCTV would help to make an important difference in supporting the local police. It will also make clear to those intent on causing crime in Elm Park that their images will be recorded, increasing the likelihood that they will be identified, prosecuted and punished for their offences.”
I could not agree more. I absolutely endorse everything that the Minister said then, and hope that he still feels the same.
Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD)
I do not think that in this debate any Member is likely to say that they are not in favour of CCTV, but I do want to see where the boundaries of the hon. Gentleman’s enthusiasm for these systems stop. The ANPR system in Birmingham was installed in a predominantly Muslim area, with a view to tracking vehicles coming in to and going out of the area. Does the hon. Gentleman support that? Does his enthusiasm go that far?
Philip Davies
One purpose of this debate was to flush out the fact that people do support CCTV, even though they are always reluctant to say so, and I am therefore grateful to the hon. Gentleman for saying that he now supports it. On his point, surely the solution is to have more CCTV, because if there is more CCTV and more ANPR systems no community can feel that they are being unduly picked on, or picked on to the exclusion of others. If everybody has the systems, nobody can feel that they are treated unfairly. I think that the hon. Gentleman’s argument is, therefore, for more rather than fewer of these systems, and I wholly support him in that.
Philip Davies
I agree with the right hon. Lady; she is absolutely right.
There is always the risk that, the day after any cut-off point, someone could, for example, go out and commit a murder. In that instance, such a person’s previous DNA would not be available to the police so that they could detect the crime and prevent further murders, because it would have been destroyed in the name of civil liberties. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will consider that carefully before coming up with any reduced time scales for the retention of data, as it is Ministers who will have to live with the consequences of their actions further down the line.
In the fight against crime, effective technology such as DNA and CCTV should be encouraged, not discouraged. Those methods can hugely speed up police detection of crime, which could mean the difference between life and death for someone else. It really is that serious, which is why I am so determined to fight any proposals to restrict the use of those technologies in the name of so-called civil liberties.
Philip Davies
I think I dealt with that in an earlier intervention. If my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North was proposing taking people’s DNA at birth, I would agree. However, that is a battle for further down the line. What I am worried about at the moment is that we are removing from the database a limited number of people’s DNA. We have not yet reached the issue of whether to extend the database—I wish we were and that that was the nature of the debate we are having today.
I am trying to stop the Government from making the stupid mistake of removing people from the DNA database. That is why I am so determined to fight the proposals to restrict the use of such technologies in the name of so-called civil liberties. Organisations such as Liberty are not really arguing for civil liberties but for anarchy, which cannot be right. I am sure that they would prefer it if no one was arrested for anything, but I am afraid that in the real world that is not what we are here to do.
All our liberties are at stake—our liberty to walk down the street safely is at stake. Again quoting the Minister of State, Ministry of Justice, my right hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs, I totally agree with what he said in a speech last week:
“crime can never be too low; our streets can never be too safe and there can never be excuses for inaction.”
Unfortunately, the Government give the impression that they do not believe in CCTV or DNA. They may not go as far as I would, but I hope that this debate will at least give the Minister the opportunity to make it clear to the House and to the police that he supports the use of CCTV, DNA and automatic number plate recognition as essential tools in fighting crime that keep us safe, enhancing our freedoms, not diminishing them.