Security of Candidates, MPs and Elections
Debate between Lord Wallace of Saltaire and Lord Lemos
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, can we be assured that the police are now fully supportive of preventing intimidation? I do my politics in Bradford where there has been quite active intimidation of candidates. I recall a conversation with the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, in a previous election campaign precisely about the reluctance of the Bradford police to intervene. Have we now had absolute assurance that the police will regard this as one of their important functions during election campaigns?
Lord Lemos (Lab)
There are two important responses to that question. We are taking forward legislation to extend disqualification orders to protect electoral staff and ensure that those who abuse them can be disqualified from standing for or holding elected office, and we are empowering courts to hand out tougher sentences to people who abuse. As I have said, the Government have also introduced legislation to restrict protests outside the homes of public officeholders. So we are strengthening the law in this regard. With regard to the police, the concern that emerged from the Speaker’s Conference, which we will address in our response, is the consistency of responses between different police forces, and that will be a very important priority as this work unfolds.