Police, Crime, Sentencing and Court Bill — House of Commons, 2021-07-05
Topic: Law and Crime
Sarah Ann Jones (Labour, Centre-left): This Bill contains some of the most controversial restrictions of our rights for many years. It is very long, and we have only a few hours to debate it, so I agree with the hon. Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) that we should have had more time. During the pandemic, we have seen more than 400 regulations passed through statutory instruments with little or no scrutiny—necessary, but unprecedented. Now is the time to be reclaiming our rights, not restricting them further. This Bill will do little to tackle the real problems that British people face. It will not protect vulnerable children who are victims of criminal exploitation. It will not take dangerous weapons off our streets. It will not protect rape victims. It does nothing to tackle violence against women and girls Turning to part 1, we are pleased that, after almost three years of campaigning from the Police Federation, the Government have finally introduced the police covenant. I am reassured that the Government agreed with my amendment to include the whole policing family in the covenant, but why did the Government not accept amendments from my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) to support mental health when we know that suicide levels are increasing and that one in five officers has PTSD. Why did they not accept our simple suggestions for some independence and scrutiny to be included in the process? As currently drafted, the covenant could be little more than warm words—a wasted opportunity to stand with our police officers after all they have done for us. Clause 2 relates to assaults against emergency workers. My hon. Friends the Members for Halifax (Holly Lynch) and for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) have campaigned for years to introduce a separate offence, with longer sentencing, for assaulting an emergency worker. Following years of increasing assaults against our most valued public servants, we are pleased that the Government have finally listened to the call, but why on earth will they not now commit to extending similar protections to the key workers who have done for so much for us, such as shop workers On Friday, I visited a Co-op in Croydon, where I heard about the violence and abuse that shop workers suffer and that, sadly, they feel has become part of the job. I met a man in his 70s in New Addington who runs a pet shop and was punched in the face by a customer. Of our 3 million retail workers, 300,000 were assaulted last year, yet only 6% of incidents led to prosecution. Abuse must not be part of the job The public agree with us: a survey published on Saturday shows that 89% back the new law. Industry agrees with us: the Co-op, the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers and the British Retail Consortium have been campaigning on the issue for years. Yesterday, leaders of 100 brands, including Tesco, Sainsbury’s, IKEA and Aldi, all published an open letter calling for greater protection for retail workers. MPs agree with us: the Select Committee on Home Affairs published a report last week, and the hon. Member for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) has corralled a very impressive number of Conservative MPs to support his new clause 90 on the same issue Tonight, the Government have a choice: do the right thing and back our retail and public service workers, or ignore the wishes of the public and give us another excuse. I hear the Minister saying that she is actively considering it, but she could commit to it tonight and give retail workers and our public servants the protections that they deserve Chapter 1 of part 2 introduces a duty to tackle and prevent serious violence. I have campaigned for years for the Government to tackle the growing epidemic of violent crime. Yesterday, I was at a vigil for a boy, just turned 16, who was brutally murdered in my constituency last week, in his own home, in front of his mother. Nothing is more important than keeping our children safe We have called for an evidence-based approach to tackling violence, and we support the intention of the serious violence duty to get every agency locally working together to tackle violence, but we have serious concerns on three fronts. First, there is no provision in the Bill to safeguard children and the Government have rejected calls for a new definition of child criminal exploitation. Secondly, we are very concerned about the data capture elements of chapter 1; the duty risks becoming an intelligence-gathering exercise with potentially ominous consequences. Thirdly, it must be made clear in the Bill that violence against women and girls counts as serious violence—it should not be an added extra. We want the serious violence duty to work, but we fear that, as currently drafted, it will not. I ask the Government to consider our amendments to protect children, to protect data and to protect women and girls. Chapter 3 of part 2 relates to data extraction. We are asking the Government to protect victims, particularly victims of rape and sexual abuse, from painful and often necessary intrusion into their lives by the mining of their phone data. When we raised concerns in Committee, the Minister said: "I…urge caution until the rape review is published, because there may be answers in that document."––[Official Report, Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Public Bill Committee, 27 May 2021; c. 286.] With respect to the Minister, the rape review has been published and its recommendations do not address the problems that we defined. One in five rape victims withdrew their complaints, at least in part because of disclosure and privacy concerns. The Secretary of State for Justice has apologised for failing rape victims, yet he is bringing forward legislation that would legitimise over-intrusion. The Government did not support our amendments in Committee to protect victims, but tonight they have a chance to think again Part 3 relates to public order. Over the past year, the police have had to enforce necessary but draconian covid regulations after little scrutiny and short notice. I have heard many times from the police that they have struggled to be the ones interpreting the law without the leadership from the Government that they needed. It is our job to define the law in a clear way so that the police are not the ones getting the blame for our lawmaking. That must be a firm lesson for us The public order powers in part 3 threaten the fundamental balance between the police and the people. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services called for a "modest reset" of the scales on public order legislation in its recent report. On any measure, a "modest reset" is not what this is. The new measures in the Bill target protesters for being too noisy and causing "serious unease" or "serious annoyance". The vague terminology creates a very low threshold for police-imposed conditions and essentially rules out entirely—potentially—peaceful protest.