Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Lord Hanson of Flint and Lord Cromwell

Committee stage
Thursday 5th February 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, not just for his amendment today but for his patience in sitting through the Committee debates prior to introducing his amendment this evening. I am also grateful for the meeting we had with him and Phil Brickell, MP for Bolton West, in October and the meeting we had on 18 November.

It is important that Amendment 482 is considered. It would require the Government to consult on the viability of a ring-fenced economic crime fighting fund, and the intention of the amendment is to examine whether such a fund could provide multi-year resourcing for tackling economic crime. I am grateful for the comments from the noble Baronesses, Lady Doocey and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, in support of the amendment. The amendment recognises the significant harm that economic crime causes—reflected in the contributions made—to individuals, businesses, the economy and wider society.

The Government remain committed to tackling economic crime. That is evidenced not just by words in this Chamber but by our continued investment through the asset recovery incentivisation scheme and the economic crime levy, which has allocated £125 million to tackling economic crime in recent months. These schemes are delivering state-of-the-art technology to provide law enforcement agencies with the tools they need to stay ahead of criminals. It also includes an important factor, which is the recruitment of 475 new officers across the threat leadership, intelligence, investigative and prosecution capacity. We are putting people on the ground to deal with this issue as part of the, we hope, tangible benefits that we can get in the fight against economic crime. As a Government, we want to continue to work with our partners to ensure that we are most effectively investing the funding available.

I understand and accept—and did so in the face-to-face discussions we had with the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, and the Member of Parliament Phil Brickell—that the call for sustaining funding is an important one that needs to be investigated. I want to confirm to the noble Lord what I hope is of help to him: the Government are committed to exploring the funding landscape with the aim of strengthening economic crime enforcement. This is witnessed by the statements we have made in the recently published economic anti-corruption strategy, which was published last December —particularly paragraph 42, on page 23, which I quote for the noble Lord:

“In the context of Spending Review 2025”,


we will

“explore the funding landscape with the aim of strengthening economic crime enforcement”

as a joint Treasury and Home Office priority commitment in that anti-corruption strategy.

This strategy is fixed and there was a timescale for it when published. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, will accept our intentions in identifying the issues that he has raised and not just doing what we have done to date, which is to ensure that we have put resources in already. I hope that that review commitment in the strategy from December is of help to the noble Lord regarding the objectives of his amendments here today.

With that commitment, I would be grateful if he would at least welcome it and hold us to account on it and, in doing so, withdraw his amendment today.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

First of all, I can certainly promise to hold the Minister accountable for it, so I hope that pleases him. I thank the speakers—the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones and Lady Doocey, and the noble Lord, Lord Davies—who have kindly commented on this amendment. I thank the Minister in particular for engaging with me before and for his comments tonight. I am still not quite sure what I am looking at. I think he used the phrase “exploring the funding landscape” a couple of times. When does that exploration reach its destination and come up with a report?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

We have the strategy, which was published in December. It is a fixed-term strategy, which includes the commitment to examine the points that the noble Lord has mentioned. My time is quite stretched at the moment but, if the noble Lord would find it helpful, I am very happy for him to meet officials dealing with that aspect particularly. We can potentially explore from there whether his input is helpful in stretching that strategy and making some positive outcomes from it.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

I thank the Minister for that answer. I was described in a previous debate as a legislative terrier, so I can assure him that I would like very much to meet his officials and, if necessary, nip their heels, because I am after a date when we are going to find the result of this viability study. Let us leave it at that. I am very grateful for his positive response. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Lord Hanson of Flint and Lord Cromwell

2nd reading
Thursday 16th October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Cuckooing, not cuckolding. Sorry, it has been a long day in the Chamber today—apart from a very quick 20-second call of nature, I have been in for the whole day. I am grateful for the noble Lord’s support for that measure as a whole.

We have also had a range of new ideas for the Bill, and I look forward—honestly—to developing and arguing and having a discussion around the amendments during the passage of the Bill.

I am happy to meet any Members, if I can, who are going to raise those issues. I have firearms and cycling from the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe. Historical weapons were raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, and I know that the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, takes an interest in that. I have had measures on child abuse from the noble Baroness, Lady Hazarika, and the noble Lord, Lord Faulks. I have transport issues from the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, deceased children from the noble Baroness, Lady Kidron, and the chatbot issues. I have new proposals on cyber-digital from the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, The noble Lord, Lord Walney, raised a number of issues to do with the terrorism review.

I have universal jurisdiction from my noble friend Lady Kennedy of The Shaws. I have the cumulative impact issues from the noble Lord, Lord Walney. I have facial recognition from the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger. I have vehicle non-compliance from the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. I have fraud from the noble Lords, Lord Cromwell and Lord Birt, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Doocey and Lady Coffey. On all those things, I am happy to meet and discuss. Let us look at what is tabled, let us look at what is put down, and the Government will reflect on it. We may disagree at the end, but let us have that discussion as a whole.

On the fraud issue, from the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, in particular, I am the Government’s first Fraud Minister—Anti-Fraud Minister, really, but is called Fraud Minister for the purposes of the discussion here today. I have a challenge from the Government to produce a new fraud strategy. We are in the process of working on that. By January or February of next year, there will be a three-year fraud strategy, which will cover some of the points that the noble Lords, Lord Cromwell and Lord Birt, and others mentioned.

I know that facial recognition issues are important to the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Doocey, and the noble Lord, Lord Strasburger, and I want to ensure that we examine those.

The noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, the noble Baroness, Lady Royall of Blaisdon, and others made representations about the stalking measures in the Bill. I hope they will welcome those, but we will have a debate around that in due course.

My noble friend Lady Whitaker argued for the repeal of the provisions on encampments in Part 4 of the Police Act. We are aware of the High Court ruling and of the points made there. We will consider how best to respond in due course and will do so.

The noble Lord, Lord Farmer, again mentioned the recording of offences of intimate images. I am not sure we are going to agree on some of these issues, but at least I look forward to the amendments in due course if they are brought forward.

I also note the points from the noble Baroness, Lady Featherstone, which I will reflect on and look at in due course.

This is indeed a very large Bill. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, mentioned the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Act and the implementation of that for farmers. We are looking now at when we can implement that and trying to bring the necessary regulations later this year—so I can give him the answer and support on that.

Although it is very rushed, I think I have covered every point raised by every Member who has spoken in the debate today. I may not have satisfied every Member, but I hope I have recognised that—

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

Can I make the briefest of interruptions? That is a terrific to-do list and I congratulate the Minister on a spectacular summation. The one thing that has not really been touched on, which I think almost all of us spoke about, is resources. How are we going to pay for it?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Again, the Bill covers a range of legislative options on a range of matters. In parallel to that, there are two other aspects of work. We will produce a policing White Paper very shortly, which will look at some of the issues in policing and how we can improve efficiencies. With the National Police Chiefs’ Council and colleagues and police and crime commissioners, we will look at how we can get better value and better focus on the key policing issues that Members have talked about today.

The very point that the noble Viscount, Lord Goschen, and others have mentioned—about delivery, about use of resources, about focus and about asking what the police do on particular issues—is extremely important. It is absolutely vital that we focus the police on government priorities. Aside from the police White Paper, we have issues with police funding and budgets. We have given £1.2 billion extra this year to policing. There is a challenging settlement, but our job is to get better value out of that. But I think there is commonality between all of us in the Chamber today that the issues that matter to people are anti-social behaviour, shop theft, violence against women and girls and child sexual abuse. Although there are many policing priorities, those are things that this legislation is dealing with. Therefore, we are hoping that the resources and focus will follow the legislation. The work we have done already—putting an extra 3,000 neighbourhood police on the ground and focusing on neighbourhood policing—means that over the next two to three years we try to increase the number of forward-facing neighbourhood police officers on the ground.

Nobody expects that there will be no challenge in all this, but the purpose of this Bill is to give legislative framework to government manifesto commitments. I think it meets a number of important objectives. There will be debate between Members; there will be differences; there will be votes; there may not be a meeting of minds on certain issues. But I am hopeful that, when this process is over, this Bill will pass, that it will be put into effect and that Members of this House and the House of Commons will hold the Home Office to account for making sure that we reduce crime, increase confidence in policing and make sure that there are fewer victims in the future. I commend the Bill to the House.

Respect Orders and Anti-social Behaviour

Debate between Lord Hanson of Flint and Lord Cromwell

Tuesday 3rd December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Government will have plans to deal with those issues, but they are the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice. If my noble friend will allow me, I will draw his comments to the attention of my noble friend Lord Timpson, who represents the Ministry of Justice in this House.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

My Lords, crime and anti-social behaviour in rural areas has been mentioned. I draw two things to the Minister’s attention—can he tell me how to classify them? I recently spoke to a rural family who kill all the hares on their land because, if they do not, people come in four-wheel-drive vehicles, smash through the vehicles and hedges, and course on their land. The second thing—which I have direct experience of—is people sitting in lay-bys, launching drones and flying them around rural buildings to see what is worth coming back to steal at night. How are the police expected to deal with those people?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I reassure the noble Lord that, if the proposed legislation is passed—that is a matter for both Houses—the ability to seize off-road bikes used to commit anti-social behaviour will be in it, and that will be done without warning. If individuals break through and undertake criminal damage, without the legislation being in place, the police can take action now—if they can track and identify the alleged offenders. So I hope that there will be future powers, but there are also existing powers to do that.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

The people who are flying these drones are not coming on to land illegally; they are whizzing them around the buildings, photographing and going away.

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

Having finished with off-road biking, I was moving on to the point about drones. The noble Lord makes an extremely valid point, and we will examine that issue and the use of drones as part of the legislation. It is not in the Statement today, but the point about the illegal use of drones and their use for criminality is certainly valid. I will take that away as part of the discussions prior to the introduction of legislation in this House.