Stop-and-Search

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Wednesday 30th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I thank the Home Secretary for early sight of the statement.

It is four years since the Equality and Human Rights Commission report described serious problems with the way stop-and-search was being used, describing disproportionate and inefficient use of stop-and-search and raising concerns about racial discrimination, because we know that, as the Home Secretary herself said, young people from ethnic minorities are six times more likely to be stopped. Since then there has been strong support across the House for reform, and it is welcome that the Home Secretary has finally come forward with proposals, but these proposals are extremely limited. They do not match up to her previous promises and they do not go far enough.

We all agree that the police need to have powers to stop and search individuals suspected of crime or to prevent a serious threat. Officers have to deal with serious problems such as teenagers in gangs carrying knives and organised criminals carrying guns or stolen goods or dealing deadly drugs, and intelligence-led targeting of suspected criminals helps to cut knife crime and youth murders. The right hon. Lady and I agree that too many searches, however, have not been targeted at all. Last year there were a million stop-and-searches; of those, only 10% led to an arrest. That means hundreds of thousands of stops and searches led only to resentment.

The Home Secretary and I agree that resentment creates barriers between communities and the police, particularly in ethnic minority communities that are most affected. That is bad for the innocent people who are regularly and unfairly stopped, bad for the police because it is an expensive waste of time, and bad for community safety because it undermines the very relationships we rely on for policing by consent.

The Home Secretary has powerfully described the problem, but four years on her proposals are very limited. They are welcome but they do not match the scale of the problem that she herself has described. A new assessment for police officers using stop-and-search is sensible and welcome. Revising the code of practice is fine, but it is not clear why she could not have done that straight after the EHRC report four years ago. Commissioning the College of Policing to review training is sensible, but she could have done that last July. A new “best use of stop-and-search” scheme that sounds very sensible will be only voluntary.

What about the things that we called for? Why is the Home Secretary not banning the use of targets given to police officers to stop and search a certain number of people? Why will she not put the guidance on race discrimination on a statutory basis? Why will she not insist that all forces abide by case law, rather than some? That is what she called for five months ago. She wrote to the Prime Minister in December saying that she wanted to change the law on section 60 stop-and-search

“so that the test for the power’s use is ‘necessary’ and ‘expedient’”.

We agreed, but instead all she is introducing is a voluntary scheme. She said then that she would raise the authorisation to a senior officer and strengthen the test for using the powers. We agreed. Instead, she has a voluntary scheme that forces do not even have to sign up to. Her plans have been frisked of serious substance and we need to know why the Home Secretary has backed down.

The right hon. Lady’s advisers have blamed regressive attitudes in No. 10, but why has she listened to them? She was right and they were wrong. These proposals are too weak and the Home Secretary has given in. Why is the Prime Minister ignoring the voice of ethnic minority communities? Why is the Prime Minister ignoring the impact on good policing, and why is he blocking sensible reform? Why is the Prime Minister not listening to his Home Secretary?

[Mrs May]

That was a disappointing response from the shadow Home Secretary, but it was characteristic of her. She complains that we are not going far enough and seems to imply that Labour would like to go further on stop-and-search, but perhaps I could remind her of some of the facts.

When Labour was in power, overall stop-and-search powers were not curbed; they were extended. Perhaps she has forgotten the stop-and-search powers introduced by the Terrorism Act 2000—powers extended by her Government and limited by this Government. When Labour was in power, section 60 powers were not curbed; they were extended. Has she forgotten the decision to extend the reasons for the police to be able to use section 60, the extension of the time limits for section 60, or the decision to reduce the rank of the authorising officer from superintendent to inspector for authorising section 60—powers extended by her Government and now limited by this Government?

When Labour was in power the PACE codes of practice were not strengthened; they were weakened. Has the right hon. Lady forgotten the date when breaching the PACE codes ceased to be a disciplinary offence? That date was April 1999, when her party was in power. Checks and balances were weakened by her Government and strengthened by this Government. When Labour was in power, no-suspicion stop-and-search did not go down; it went up. Section 60 stops went from fewer than 8,000 in 1997-98 to 150,000 in 2008-09, but down to 5,000 last year. [Interruption.] Stops under the Terrorism Act went from 32,000 in 2002-03 to 210,000 in 2008-09, but down to zero last year. No-suspicion stop-and-search was up under her Government but down under this Government.

When Labour was in power the overall use of stop-and-search did not fall; it went up from just over 1 million in 1997-98 to more than 1.5 million in 2008-09 and down to 1 million last year, so overall stop-and-search under the right hon. Lady’s Government went up and it has gone down under this Government. The right hon. Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson), a former policing Minister, was commenting from a sedentary position earlier. Speaking in 2008, he boasted: “We have increased stop and search powers”.

In 2007, when the Home Affairs Committee recommended:

“Alternatives to stop and search that might help the police engage better with young people should be considered”,

Labour’s Home Office replied, “We disagree.” Let us not rewrite Labour’s history when it comes to stop-and-search.

This is a serious subject. It is about the relationship between the public and the police, and it is about police time. The right hon. Lady mentioned a few issues to which I will turn. She mentioned the EHRC report from four years ago and seemed to imply that there had been no Government action since then. In fact, I have been working with HMIC, the Association of Chief Police Officers, chief constables and, in particular, the Metropolitan police since I became Home Secretary. I refer to my earlier point that the powers were extended under the right hon. Lady’s Government and have been reduced and limited under ours.

The right hon. Lady asked about the issue of officers having targets to stop and search people. I am clear that that is entirely unacceptable, and in my letter to chief constables I have told them that any such targets should be abolished.

The right hon. Lady asked about section 60 and why I was not introducing legislation now. She commented on the need to change the law so that stops can be used only when they are necessary to prevent incidents involving serious violence, rather than expedient. She obviously did not hear what I said in my statement and she obviously does not appear to know that the case law established in Roberts effectively does precisely that. There is no longer any need to legislate in that respect. The right hon. Lady commented on legislation to bring in action, but what we are doing will bring in action this summer, whereas legislation, as she well knows, would take a considerable amount of time.

The right hon. Lady talked about some of this just being voluntary. The Metropolitan police has signed up to it. I say to her that if she wants to see these changes and the “best use of stop-and-search” scheme extended, she should be encouraging the Labour police and crime commissioners in metropolitan areas to adopt these exact proposals, and I hope she will do just that.

I am afraid the right hon. Lady has just shown a complete lack of credibility on this issue as she carries on complaining and playing party politics. Whenever I have raised this subject in the past, she has said nothing about it. She only got interested in it when it appeared in the newspapers and she thought she could play party politics with it. She can play party politics, but I am interested in the national interest. I am clear that stop-and-search should be used less. It should be targeted and it needs to be used fairly. If that does not happen, we will bring back primary legislation. The difference between her party’s record and that of mine and this coalition Government is clear: we are serious about stop-and-search reform and she is not.