Policing and Crime Bill — House of Lords, 2016-11-02
Topic: Law and Crime
Jonathan Toby Harris (Labour, Centre-left): I, of course, defer to the extensive knowledge of the noble Lord, who was born many decades before the Taser was invented. He is right that of course there are alternative methods, but pinning somebody against a wall and pushing them hard and repeatedly with a NATO shield is also a fairly violent response. We are not talking about nice situations; we are talking about a situation where something major in terms of an intervention is needed to save somebody’s life. Under those circumstances, I think a blanket proscription which says you must not use a Taser is a mistake There are also questions about why this amendment refers simply to mental health wards. There are violent incidents every night in accident and emergency departments. Are we saying that we would permit the use of a Taser in an incident in an accident and emergency department, but if exactly the same incident occurred in a mental health ward that would not be the case? The noble Baroness may actually be saying that Tasers should not be used at all. That is fine—it is a perfectly legitimate argument, and there is a debate to be had, but it seems a strange anomaly to make a distinction between one type of hospital ward and another The issue that has to be addressed is why so many incidents get out of hand in mental health wards. If that can be resolved—and I suspect it will mean staffing and may mean improved training and a lot of de-escalation—concern about the sheer number of times the police are called out to incidents of this sort would be diminished. The fact is that that is the problem, and that is the problem that must be addressed. A blanket ban on Tasers does not solve that problem; it just creates other problems, which is unsatisfactory The noble Baroness also referred to the overuse of Tasers elsewhere in the community, the probable discrimination and the fact that black people are more likely to be tasered than others. That is a real concern. I am aware that in London, at least, the mayor’s office requires that on every single occasion that a Taser is drawn, an individual is red-dotted when a Taser is pointed at them or a Taser is discharged, the circumstances are recorded and it is reported to the Mayor’s Office for Policing And Crime. I assume that the Minister has those figures to hand. It would be very interesting to know—it is quite a substantial number of cases. It is also interesting that often the mere act of red-dotting an individual—pointing the Taser at them—is enough to de-escalate the situation without discharge. It would be interesting to know whether those statistics tell us in how many instances Tasers were used in a mental health ward. I assume that the detail that is collected would enable that; I hope it does. It is certainly important that whenever a Taser or any other force is used, it should be properly recorded together with the circumstances and the ethnicity of the person against whom it was used. I understand that that is included in guidelines which are emerging from the College of Policing. I strongly welcome them because that will enable us to have a baseline to be able to see what is happening and to deal with issues where there is discrimination or overuse of force under whatever circumstances. By "overuse of force", I do not mean just Tasers; I mean all forms of force.