The Riots

Virendra Sharma Excerpts

Thursday 13th October 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Virendra Sharma (Ealing, Southall) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell) on securing such an important debate.

As has been widely reported, Ealing was subjected to violent rioting on the Monday night of 8 August and in the early hours of Tuesday 9 August. Ealing Broadway town centre, in the constituency of the hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Angie Bray), was very badly hit. What is less known and less reported is the fact that West Ealing town centre, shared between the hon. Lady and myself in Ealing, Southall, was also hit very hard by these terrible acts of wanton lawlessness. Related criminal actions also took place in Hanwell and Southall, but to a lesser extent.

Let me place on record my total condemnation of the mindless criminals who ran amok on the normally peaceful streets of Ealing, terrorising innocent bystanders, attacking residents enjoying an evening meal in our many restaurants, threatening shop keepers and their staff, and even threatening residents in their own homes. Their brazen criminality left one man dead, and others are homeless after their homes were burnt down. Dozens of shops and businesses have been seriously damaged, and scores of cars were burned or smashed. It is difficult to find words to condemn strongly enough the actions of this feral minority who literally brought anarchy to the streets of my constituency and those of other hon. Members.

I place on record my thanks to the Ealing borough commander, Andy Rowell, and to his police officers who heroically tried to stem this tide of evil on our streets. Unfortunately, they were overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of mainly young adults intent on inflicting this sickening violence on our community. The police were responding to numerous roaming gangs who were clearly using mobile phones and social networking sites to communicate with each other and were thus very mobile, co-ordinated and difficult to pin down and stop.

We have to address the lack of sufficient available public order police as back-up in this situation, and the question of police numbers and resources. In Ealing, 44 officers with riot training and equipment were deployed earlier in the evening to other parts of London. Only a similar number of officers, without training or equipment, were left to try and deal with a mob of more than 200 rioters until reinforcements finally came hours into the riot. In the days that followed, police from all over the country—Cleveland, Sheffield, Berkshire and many other places—patrolled the streets of Ealing to prevent a repeat of the rioting and to provide reassurance to my constituents. It is a sobering thought that the number of 16,000 police officers who were deployed on the streets of London after the riots is the same number of police officers due to be cut. God forbid that we have a reoccurrence of the riots after police numbers have been cut. I urge the Government to halt the current cuts to the Met police in the capital and to the police across the country.

I pay tribute to the emergency services and to Ealing council, which worked throughout the night to provide CCTV pictures for the police to try and track these criminals, and to prepare an emergency response and clean up in the morning. The council, having picked up via Twitter during the night that local residents wanted to take part in the clean-up in the morning, arranged for them to be provided with materials to do so. Hundreds of local residents turned up in the morning to take part and very quickly had both Ealing and West Ealing cleared up. The council had extra street sweepers and refuse collection vehicles on the streets from 5 am and also repaired the roads, which had been damaged by burnt out vehicles, in very quick time. It was a tremendous effort, especially by local residents, who showed the real spirit of community and pulled together in difficult times.

I would like to address a number of issues relating to the aftermath. Obviously, the work to bring the perpetrators to justice is ongoing and I urge my constituents who have any information that would help in this regard to contact the police. Local businesses have provided the police with their CCTV footage and any other evidence that will help to bring about convictions. Ealing council is working closely with the police to use its extensive CCTV footage to bring the full force of the law down on these criminals. It is imperative that all those who committed these outrageous acts are brought to justice and not given the impression that they can get away with wanton law breaking.

On the Tuesday night, all was quiet across Ealing, but there had been warnings that Southall, in my constituency, might come under attack. Having met the police, the local faith, business and community leaders arranged to have volunteers outside places of worship and businesses to protect them. This was a powerful and united community response that received praise from the Prime Minister. However, we all have to make sure that such actions, or other responses by citizens seeking to defend themselves, do not lead to vigilantism. Given the tragic death of the three men in Birmingham who were trying to protect their business, we also need to guard against any inter-racial community tensions. In Southall, all law-abiding religions, races and creeds stood together against the lawless.

Finally, it is vital that as much help as possible is given to local businesses and communities to recover from the impact of these terrible events. In Ealing, the council used a £250 million fund from reserves to provide each affected local independent business with a £1,200 civic disturbance payment, interest-free repayable grants of up to £20,000 for more affected businesses, free weekend parking during September in Ealing and West Ealing, and individual advice to affected businesses through an assigned regeneration officer. One month’s business rates relief has also been given to those affected businesses and one week’s relief to businesses in the affected areas. There are still issues around claims for loss of business and ongoing levels of insurance premiums that the Government need to help with.

Everything needs to be done to stop a repeat of these disturbing events. I call on the Government to consider the impact of making such large cuts to local council budgets, and the effect that this has had on youth services provision at a time when young people so clearly need support and guidance from the community around them. We must be confident that we can protect our streets should such events occur again. I call on the Government to halt and review the cuts to police numbers and resources. There can be no question that the cuts, as they stand, decimate police numbers and have a significant effect on their ability to deal with events like those we saw in August.