Crime and Antisocial Behaviour: Small Towns
Debate between Tracy Brabin and Ruth George(5 years, 6 months ago)
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Tracy Brabin
I absolutely agree. In comparison with cities, the quality of life in some towns is being diminished because services are going out to cities—infrastructure and so on. We should not have to put up with the increase in violent crime and antisocial behaviour in nice backwaters; we should have a proper quality of life and choose to live in communities such as ours because they are safer, the quality of life is better and they are great places to bring up children.
We have to be frank: the rise in crime is not just about a couple of bad apples, a family or a gang of kids. The Conservatives used to be the party of law and order—they used to pride themselves on it—but they have done their absolute best since 2010 to destroy that reputation. Police-recorded violent crime has more than doubled since 2010. Knife crime is at its highest on record. Arrests—the currency of deterrence—have halved in a decade, and the number of unsolved crimes stands at an unthinkable 2 million cases. Nine years of austerity has led to 20,000 fewer officers on our streets. The National Audit Office estimates that police funding fell by 19% between 2010-11 and 2018-19, and direct Government funding fell by a staggering 30% over the same period.
Police are not the only force for resolving, and preferably deterring, crime—no hon. Members present would argue that they are. However, they provide a vital service. When the police are seen on the streets less or take longer to respond, or when a crime goes unsolved, trust is diminished and fear creeps in.
Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent case about her constituency, which is very similar to mine—a rural area with lots of towns and where crime is rising. Our police have almost halved in number. Our police stations have been shutting, our magistrates court has shut, and now our custody suite is shutting as well. Police officers will have to travel almost an hour to take people who have been arrested into custody. Does she agree that those cuts, and austerity more widely, lead directly to the rise in crime?
Tracy Brabin
I absolutely agree. My hon. Friend makes a powerful point about the reduction of police officers on the streets. If an officer has to travel further with a prisoner, they will be tied up for longer and less available to respond to emergency 999 calls. It is a powerful point.
I said at the beginning that there is a crime epidemic in Batley and Spen. I know that that is strong language, but I think my speech has proved that it is justified. I very much look forward to hearing the contributions from other hon. Members and the Minister, so I will not take up too much more time but finish with this. The challenge is that cities, towns and rural areas are often very different, but the ambition should be the same. Crime ruins lives, and citizens should not be blighted by it or live in fear of it. The purpose of this debate is not to say that towns and smaller communities are more important than other places; it is simply to get a better understanding of the issues and to kick-start the debate about the solutions.
Does the Minister have plans to undertake an audit of crime in towns? My office staff and I tried hard to find data about crime in towns compared with cities, and it is not available. Will she and her Government produce a report that shows the difference in the levels of reported crime and crime that has been resolved in towns, compared with cities? We also need a greater understanding of where money is spent. Most police force areas include towns, cities and rural areas. Perhaps the Minister can work with police forces on that and update the House at a later date.
Town of Culture Award
Debate between Tracy Brabin and Ruth George(5 years, 11 months ago)
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Tracy Brabin (Batley and Spen) (Lab/Co-op)
It is an honour to speak under your chairmanship, Mr McCabe. I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (David Hanson) for securing the debate.
Why do we need a national town of culture award? It is really simple: it is about pride and confidence in where we live, bringing our communities together, enhancing social cohesion and growing economic and social investment in our towns. According to the 2011 census, more than 38 million people live in towns—about 59% of our population. Yet despite being the majority of the population, people in towns frustratingly feel that they are competing with cities for jobs, infrastructure and wider arts and cultural investment, so it is about fairness, too.
Obviously, I will speak about Batley and Spen, which includes the wonderful towns of Birstall, Cleckheaton, Heckmondwike and Batley. We have amazing organisations, such as the Batley festival, the Bagshaw Museum, the Cleckheaton folk festival and the Batley and Spen Youth Theatre Company. I would love to celebrate all those things, but I also need to say to the Minister that we know that the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport understands the impact that winning the city of culture award has. Impacts derived from that award were referenced in the recent cultural development fund announcements, in which funds were awarded to Wakefield, Grimsby, Plymouth, Kent, the Thames estuary and Worcester. Of course I congratulate those communities, but we want to take the impacts of that award much further; we want to bring them to our towns and communities.
Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)
Buxton, in my constituency, has world-class arts; it has the Buxton festival and the Buxton opera house. It also has fantastic community arts, in which people can get involved to boost their health and wellbeing; that is an amazing treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder. Given that we have less mental health treatment in our towns and rural areas, does my hon. Friend agree that the Government should look at the ongoing benefits of supporting the arts in our towns?
Tracy Brabin
I thank my hon. Friend for that powerful statement about how creativity can affect mental health. Certainly Creative Minds in my constituency works with social prescribing to support mental health.
Other Members want to speak, so I will conclude. I am co-chairing a parliamentary inquiry on social mobility in the performing arts. My personal commitment, in supporting the call for a town of culture award, is to work to ensure that we have diverse participation in both the bidding and the implementation process.
Being a town of culture is a key opportunity to drive better access and social mobility in the arts sector. We cannot continue to see statistics such as 12% to 13% working-class participation in the arts. We must do better, and we can. As they say, “If you don’t see it, you can’t be it.” I ask the Minister to please let us make this happen. Let us celebrate what makes towns great.