Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Chakrabarti

Committee stage
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 438C in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Cash, on the recording of ethnicity in police data. I do not profess to have the noble Baroness’s expertise in this area in terms of her work at the Equality and Human Rights Commission or as a distinguished lawyer, but her aspiration to have clear, consistent and transparent data is increasingly important for politics and with the public, which is why I wanted to speak.

Following on from the Casey review, the then Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper, announced that collecting ethnicity and nationality data in child sexual abuse and exploitation cases would become a mandatory requirement. This recommendation to collect targeted information was made after the review had found that there was a paucity of data nationally concerning the ethnicity of perpetrators who were part of the rape grooming gangs. The noble Baroness, Lady Casey, had found that, as we have already heard, only three local policing areas, Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire and South Yorkshire, had such data.

The noble Baroness, Lady Casey, concluded that while this was sufficient evidence to show that there were “disproportionate numbers” of men from Asian and specifically Pakistani heritage among the suspects, as well as those convicted, that conclusion had been avoided for too long. She criticised official “obfuscation” that misled the public.

Yvette Cooper concluded:

“While much more robust national data is needed, we cannot and must not shy away from these findings”.


I think that sums up a very positive development. It recognises that we need to collect more data on ethnicity if we are not to get ourselves into a political scandal, which the grooming gangs question was, and not to obscure the detail. Local residents, members of the public and, of course, victims felt very frustrated that these things were not allowed to come out.

With much more acceptance of the positive role of acknowledging ethnicity and data in the wind, we should look at expanding that. This much more open approach now needs to be applied to crime statistics more generally. In fact, in this new atmosphere, the issue has also affected policing. In the wake of the Southport murders of those three little girls, the police slowness in releasing the details of the suspected perpetrator, Axel Rudakubana, when he was arrested, caused immense political tensions, as we know. The almost wilfully misleading description of the suspect as a 17 year-old from Lancashire who was originally from Cardiff led to a sort of pseudo form of misinformation, creating an information vacuum that led to false rumours. Misinformation started online that the killer was a Muslim asylum seeker, which was completely incorrect.

Accurate data and accurate descriptions play a valuable role. The Met Police chief, Sir Mark Rowley, declared that it was right to release the ethnicity of suspects, pointing out the importance of being

“more transparent in terms of the data”

that the police release. This amendment is trying to make sure that the data collected is accurate. It is not just a debate about it being released.

The Southport incidents led to guidance being developed by the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the College of Policing, recognising public concerns, to ensure that police processes are fit for purpose in an age of rapid information spread. But I do not think that this response should just be about combating misinformation—that should not be the main driver. In order for us to have accurate information, the main driver should be that the public have a right to know and understand offender and victim profiles accurately. The police, very specifically, need to understand the data to aid in the prevention and detection of crimes. It is arguable whether decisions to release information should be left up to police forces—that is not what we are concerned with here—but data collection certainly needs to be mandated, and a failure to act on this can lead to tensions.

I want to counter one thing. In some of this debate, campaigners have tried to suggest that such data collection may overly encourage focusing on racial backgrounds, fuelling right-wing conspiracy theories or pandering to racism. I do not think that is fair. Not a week goes by without the public asking questions about incidents because they are concerned for the safety of their communities. Sometimes that involves ethnicity. The noble Baroness, Lady Cash, made it clear that this is much broader than the issues that I have raised. This is also about the ethnicity of victims and ensuring that people from different ethnic backgrounds are not discriminated against or unfairly treated by the police. We have to be much more open and not shy away from or be frightened by this kind of data—it is essential for good policing and for reassuring the public that we are not trying to hide behind not revealing or not collecting ethnicity data for political or ideological ends, as we did with the grooming gangs.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Fox, said, this amendment focuses on the recording of ethnicity in police data—not the sensitive, balanced issue of when to publish. I rather agree with what I understood her remarks to be about that: it is probably best left in operational police hands, because there are sensitivities about it. The recording of ethnicity has been a controversial subject in different jurisdictions over the years. Parts of continental Europe—Germany, for example, for obvious historical reasons—take a very different view to recording ethnic data. But I think there is value in having some recording of ethnicity in police data, not least as a means of attempting to grapple with race discrimination, for example, in stop and search.

My question is about subsection (2) of the new clause proposed by Amendment 438C. Again, it is this issue of police observation rather than self-identification. The amendment focuses on the 18 categories in the census. We are all familiar with that census and often fill out questionnaires that look at those 18 subcategories. That is one thing when you are self-identifying—it is very easy for me, for example, to use the census categories, because I know my story and I know my history. But I challenge even noble Lords and noble friends in this Committee, without the benefit of Wikipedia or smartphones, or stuff written about me and my history, to determine which of those 18 categories I would best fit into.

I worry about how this would work if an officer must record the police-observed ethnicity of the individual using the 18-category classification employed in the most recent census for England and Wales, including determining whether somebody is British Asian, British Pakistani, mixed race, et cetera—

Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Chakrabarti

Committee stage
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

As a woman, I have often been called emotional in debate, but that is the nature of the patriarchy. I did not mean to be emotional; I am just trying to ask about the practicality of this proposed obligation on the police to be the determiners of the biological sex of a person they arrest, not for sex offences but for any offence. I heard in some of the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Cash, for example on the importance of knowing as much about a prisoner as possible, an argument for making a clear determination in a prison setting, because one needs to determine who should be imprisoned with whom. I understand that. I can certainly envisage this being highly proportionate and relevant for arrest and investigation for sex offences, but that is not the breadth of this proposal. This is for any arrest, charge, caution or suspect, which would be overbroad and a complete administrative and practical nightmare for police officers.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

Can the noble Baroness clarify a couple of things? First, does she recognise any problems at all about the data as it is presently collected—in different forms by different police forces, and then used as national crime data as though it is reliable and consistent? Does she have any qualms? I am sure the noble Baroness, Lady Cash, would be happy to work with the noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, as great legal minds working together, emotionally or non-emotionally, on better wording. I can understand that, but the import of this is the data.

Secondly, the noble Baroness rightly points out that many of us are committed to campaigning against violence against women and girls. How can we reliably know how many women and girls are victims of such violence or who the perpetrators of that violence are? We cannot just assert it unless we have reliable statistical data. That is the point of the Sullivan review, which I hope she would show some respect towards even if she is not quite clear that she supports this amendment.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

To be clear, a perpetrator is someone who is convicted, not anyone who is arrested. As I tried to suggest in response to the comments about incarceration, it is much easier to justify greater intrusion at the point of conviction, particularly if someone is going to prison. I do not think this is about drafting; it is about the practical policy the amendments are proposing. How on earth is it viable to put this obligation to be the determiner and decision-maker over somebody’s biological sex? Is it reasonable to put that on every constable? I look forward to hearing from the noble Lord on the Opposition Front Bench, because he served as a police officer for many years and with some distinction. He may know better than I whether this will be welcome for police officers in their everyday duties, for every arrest and every offence.

Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Chakrabarti

Committee stage
Thursday 27th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lady Brown of Silvertown, but she may not need much support, having received the much-coveted gold star from the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, who, I am very proud to say, supports a later amendment of mine on raising the age of criminal responsibility—which, I am ashamed to say, is barbarically only 10 in England and Wales. The UN recommends that it be 14. In Scotland it is 12 and the heavens do not seem to have fallen.

I have a couple of specific points to make in support of my noble friend’s amendment. If I may, I will be as bold as to predict what my noble friend the Minister and his advisers might be about to say in response. If they are about to say that my noble friend’s definition is unnecessary because the definition can be taken from the offence itself in Clause 40, I would like to get in first with two points to counter that. If I am pessimistic and wrong, so be it. Noble Lords know that I do not mind looking a fool.

The first point, which has already been made clearly by my noble friend Lady Brown, is that we need a definition that is about not just a specific criminal offence but interagency working and interventions across services, well in advance of any investigation or prosecution for a criminal offence.

I do not think the second point has been made yet. If the Committee compares the elements of my noble friend’s definition with the definition of the criminal offence in the Bill, it will see that the Government’s approach misses something very important that is to be found in my noble friend’s definition: enabling the child, not just causing the child, to engage in criminal conduct. That addition is important because “causing” is a harder thing to prove and a greater step in grooming. Currently, the Government’s definition is

“causing the child to commit an offence”,

or, indeed, “facilitating” somebody else to cause the child to commit the offence.

To prove causation in law is a serious matter. Enabling—making it easy, making the tools of the trade available, providing the opportunity—is a lower threshold, which is appropriate in the context of children. My noble friend made the point that currently in law they are treated as victims but also as perpetrators, and sometimes it is a matter of luck as to whether you will find the adult and the public service who will take the proper approach, in my view, of always treating the child as a child and as a victim, and not criminalising them. This is the point about “enabling”.

My noble friend the Minister is very experienced in these matters. Whatever he comes back with, I would like him and his advisers to consider the question of the lower threshold of enabling, not just causing. If there is to be a further compromise that includes some element of my noble friend Lady Brown’s amendment, I hope that that is taken on board.

The most formative time in my professional life was as a Home Office lawyer. I know what it is like to work on big Bills and to defend them as originally crafted and drafted. But it is wise, especially in this House, to take good advice and to bend a little when it might improve legislation for the benefit of victims.

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, first, I absolutely congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Brown of Silvertown, on her excellently motivated amendment. It is very thought provoking. In particular, this sentence caught my attention:

“The victim may have been criminally exploited even if the activity appears consensual”.


That is one of the most difficult challenges. For some years I have been involved in the grooming gangs scandal, and one of the most horrible parts of that was when the police took the decision that the young 14 or 15 year-old, precocious though she—a general “she”—may have been, was somehow actively consenting to her own rape or sexual exploitation. It was about the notion of this being a child, because the young girl may have looked more adult—it was literally as superficial as that—and about the type, if we are honest, in class terms. Therefore, it was said that she could not be a victim and she was accused of being a prostitute, and so on. We are familiar with that. That is the reason why that sentence stood out to me.

However, I have some qualms, and I want to ask genuinely what we do about those qualms, because I do not know where to go. I am slightly worried, because county lines gangs, as the noble Baroness will know, are a young men’s game. Some of the gang leaders are younger than one would ever want to imagine in your worst nightmare. That is a problem with this, in a way, and with how you work it out. If you have a general rule that this is always a child, how do you deal with the culpability and responsibility of a 17 year-old thug, not to put too fine a point on it, who is exploiting younger people or even his—and it is generally “his”—peers? I am not sure how to square that with what I have just said. It also seems that there is a major clash with the age of criminal responsibility. I am very sympathetic with that not being 10, but how do you deal with the belief that someone aged under 18 is a child, yet we say that a child has criminal responsibility? Perhaps I am just misunderstanding something.

My final reservation is that if we say that everybody under 18 has to be a victim all the time, would that be a legal loophole that would get people off when there was some guilt for them to be held to account for? I generally support this amendment, but I want some clarification on how to muddle my way through those moral thickets, if possible.

Employment Rights Bill

Debate between Baroness Fox of Buckley and Baroness Chakrabarti

Committee stage
Monday 19th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I, too, have my name on Amendment 97, which would introduce yet another impact assessment. I know that so many impact assessments have been proposed in relation to the Bill that it has become a bit of a cliché, but I am especially concerned that this one is taken seriously because the third-party harassment sections of the Bill are ill thought out in a way that could lead to unintended consequences.

One noble Lord a few moments ago asked why there was a desire for an impact assessment rather than thinking of the potential positives of the Bill. The response of the Government in relation to concerns about Clause 20, for example, which is to say that there is nothing to see here—no problem at all—is an insufficient way of responding to some quite detailed scrutiny that has been put forward. If there is any exaggeration of the potential problems, an impact assessment should be able to resolve that for us.

I will focus largely on Clause 20, looking first at its potential cost to employers. That is especially important given that the Minister’s counter to my remarks earlier was that Clause 20 will be good for business. The Government’s own assessment advises that the total economic impact of complying with Clause 20 will be under £10 million and will have negligible economic impact on businesses. That is irresponsible; some might go so far as to call it misinformation. For example, that assessment says that the cost of familiarisation with the Bill and its ramifications will be £30 per medium business and only £19 per small microbusiness. I am not sure where these woeful underestimates come from or what they are based on, but if noble Lords have never met an employment lawyer, I can assure them that that is an unlikely figure.

We need a serious cost-benefit analysis. Let us consider what this section of the Bill requires businesses to do. Employers must show that they have taken all reasonable steps; that sets a high threshold for preventive action, as we heard earlier. Let us think what that means. There are direct costs for the initial implementation of anti-harassment policies, including familiarisation with the new regulations and checking exactly what their legal liabilities will mean. As we have seen during this debate, it is not necessarily as clear as day what the Bill requires.

As we have been arguing, if you are a small microbusiness trying to concentrate on being a business and trying to grow bigger, having to study the Bill and work out what your liability will be could be quite time consuming, nerve-wracking and so on. They will have to seek out third-party and legal advice—no doubt, there will be lots of consultants queuing up—because, as responsible businesses, they will want to safeguard themselves from the financial risks of not complying. One of the main risks they will be trying to ensure they do not have to deal with is the possibility of employment tribunals.

In what seems like an entirely arbitrary figure, the Government predict that only 30 employment tribunals a year will come from these clauses. There is no explanation as to how the Government reached that figure, and it is certainly completely at odds with industry experts who expect that Clause 20 alone will see an increase in employment tribunals of 15%—in other words, an additional 14,750 cases a year. As we heard earlier in a different context, already in 2023-24, employment tribunal courts received 97,000 cases, up from 86,000 the year before. That is an increase of nearly 13%. More and more people are forced into employment tribunals for a variety of reasons.

This Bill threatens to create even more cases—an unknown figure because it is a new provision. The Government are saying that it will be only 30 a year, but that is just making it up. There is, at least, an attempt in this amendment to try to work it out. According to the chambers of commerce, the cost of one employment tribunal is, on average, about £8,500, and if a claimant is successful, there is no financial limit to the compensation in a harassment case. Imagine you are a business worried about what is going to happen: this clause will lead to risk-averse and overcautious behaviour, not detailed in the Bill, to try to avoid being held liable. Some of us fear that this is what this kind of over-regulatory, precautionary approach will lead to.

Businesses will not be able to be slipshod about their potential liability. Smaller SMEs and microbusinesses —often with no dedicated HR or EDI offices—will need to think about employing new staff dedicated to protecting them from claims and giving them advice. The idea of a whole new generation of HR and EDI staff roles in every business in the country is frightening enough, but, anyway, it has nothing to do with their core businesses. Let us also note that the average salary of an EDI officer in the UK is £42,084.

I want also to stress why an impact assessment must include which occupations might be at particular risk of third-party harassment claims through no fault of the employer and the impact, specifically, on free speech. These parts of the amendment are very important because we were asked earlier in a different group why there had been a focus on hospitality, sport and universities. There may be other sectors but, in a way, this is an assessment to see which sectors would be affected. It also asks for an impact assessment on free speech. As we have heard, the Government simply deny that there will be any impact in relation to free speech. I disagree, but let us scrutinise it.

The noble Baroness, Lady Chakrabarti, made the point that we should not worry about free speech because it is protected by the convention on human rights. She cited a number of clauses. It is true that, on paper, none of us should be worried about free speech; our free speech in this country is fully protected. And yet, daily—I stress, daily—there are more and more instances, as the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, who is not in her place, indicated earlier, in which free speech is under stress in this country. More and more people are walking on eggshells and are, in many instances, getting sacked or disciplined for speaking their minds in workplaces, so I am not convinced by “Nothing to see here, don’t worry about it, all is well”.

Earlier, the noble Baroness—

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness; I will be brief. I want just to respond to her point, because she referred to what I said earlier. I am not trying to suggest that there are not challenges and there is not, on occasion, over-policing of people’s freedom of expression. Believe it or not, I probably read the same newspapers as the noble Baroness. I was trying, perhaps inadequately, to make the point to the noble Lord earlier that we have overarching legislation in the Human Rights Act which guarantees free speech and does so in a way that is legally and constitutionally stronger than any amendment noble Lords could pass to the current Employment Rights Bill. If that is not working, then we need to enforce it better. I am just suggesting that, as a matter of law, we have the protection for free speech; we just need to enforce it.