Far-right Violence and Online Extremism

Debate between Ben Wallace and Kate Green

Monday 18th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

In the last two years, we have worked with the Ministry of Justice to seek, where appropriate, segregation away from vulnerable people. We have redoubled our efforts on taking the Prevent programme into prisons, and have added a bit of compulsion around some offenders going into the Channel programme to make sure that they are challenged and hopefully diverted from that course. Like the hon. Lady, we totally recognise that that is effectively a captive audience, and that if we do not deal with the issue there, prisons will churn out new extremists.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I also associate myself with the condolences that have been expressed to the victims of the appalling atrocities over the past three days. I support my hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West) in raising the importance of schools with the Minister. Will he also discuss with his colleagues in the Department for Education the problem of some parents choosing to withdraw their children from religious education classes, particularly when they think that the classes will be about Islam and Muslims? Will he discuss what can be done to make sure that parents understand the importance of their children being educated in all things?

[Mr Wallace]

I would be very happy to raise that with both Ofsted and schools. As the hon. Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West) said, ignorance is where this starts, and we must do everything we can to ensure that our children are educated about different faiths and religions.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ben Wallace and Kate Green

Monday 16th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

I do agree with my hon. Friend. It was the Home Office that took the initiative to set up the counter-terrorism internet referral unit, which has seen 300,000 pieces of terrorist propaganda taken down—voluntarily, but taken down none the less. It was the Home Office that worked with ASI Data Science to develop an automatic model, which has a 99.9% accuracy rate. If we can do it, why can those companies not?

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I recently held a community meeting to contribute to Mayor Andy Burnham’s consultation on community integration and preventing radical hate speech. One issue that came up was the extent of online hate speech against Islam coming from around the world, and particularly from the United States. Will the Minister say what discussions he is having internationally to ensure that this kind of derogatory and offensive material is taken down as quickly as possible?

Kerslake Arena Attack Review

Debate between Ben Wallace and Kate Green

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

I would welcome any initiative that does that. This is a real challenge in the 21st century: in real time, people are eyewitnesses and people tweet, having immediately got on their phone. That is not going to go away. What is important is that the producers, the people churning out the programmes and the editors are employed, partly, to be able to sift gossip from reality, and sensationalism from impacting stories. The message is that there is a strong role for the editors and producers in this day and age of live reporting. They must be able to say, “It might be sensational, but we are not going to report it because it is not true or factual, and I would not be responsible if I did.”

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I join colleagues in once again sending condolences to all the victims of this terrible attack in our city and in paying tribute to all in our emergency services and in the wider community who served to support and care for them. In the immediate aftermath of the attack, many people and faith groups right across the faith spectrum rushed to offer help and hospitality to those who were frightened and alone that night. Shamefully, in the aftermath of the attacks attempts were also made by the far right to drive a wedge between different faith communities. Will the Minister join me in utterly condemning such shameful conduct? Will he confirm the Government’s intent always to crack down on the promotion of division and hatred?

[Mr Wallace]

The hon. Lady makes a powerful and important point. Like her, I represent Muslim communities, doing so in Preston. Let me say in response to an earlier point that there is Islamophobia and we have to deal with that. We have to stand up to Islamophobia as strongly as we stand up to anti-Semitism and all the other issues that are about dividing our communities. The terrorists, be they neo-Nazis or from Daesh, want to divide our communities; they want us to hate each other and to weaken the society we belong to. I am absolutely determined, as I know all of us in this House are, to stand up against that and to give those people no quarter. We should double our efforts, both through other programmes such as Prevent and in our counter-extremism work on getting children, certainly in school, to understand what this is about. We must also be strong enough to have a debate about extremism without shutting down freedom of speech.

Money Laundering

Debate between Ben Wallace and Kate Green

Monday 19th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

As the hon. Gentleman will have heard me say numerous times this afternoon, there are plenty of individuals who get pointed out to us and into whom we open investigations. What we cannot do is provide a running commentary on who is under investigation. As I have stated and as we have demonstrated in our legislation over the past few years, we on the Conservative Benches are determined to investigate and deal with overseas corruption and oligarchs putting money here. The best example I can give is the unexplained wealth order issued only a few weeks ago: it related to an overseas oligarch who was also a PEP and to £22 million of property in the south-east. We will continue to target such people because we think it is the right thing to do.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

Foreign nationals still come to the London financial markets to raise funds and then repatriate them to organisations that may be the subject of western sanctions. What action are the Government taking to prevent that?

[Mr Wallace]

The Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, which is coming through the House, will give us new and more tools to deal with such behaviour. When the Criminal Finance Act 2017 transited the House and people made the point about the Magnitsky amendment, I pointed out that it was against criminal assets, and when the sanctions Bill comes forward, we will take steps to address the issue. So we raised this problem long before it was an issue in the sanctions Bill—last year, during the passage of the 2017 Act. Overall, we are determined to tackle this and to send the right message. The hon. Lady will have heard the long list with which I tested your patience at the beginning, Mr Speaker, and I find it ironic that the Labour party, which came up with precisely almost nothing in government, is criticising this Government, who are actually capturing proceeds of crime and taking them away from bad people.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Ben Wallace and Kate Green

Monday 5th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Wallace]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. I met his colleagues and my hon. Friend the Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) to discuss that matter. The Department is looking at the amendment as tabled. We already have a number of powers to deal with people who have been accused in this area. However, we will look at the amendment and reflect on it. We will get back to Members on Report.

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

I am sure that Ministers will want to join me in welcoming the first Syrian family to arrive in my constituency under the community sponsorship scheme and to congratulate St Monica’s parishioners, who are providing support to the family, but will Ministers also look at the wider funding and commissioning arrangements across all Greater Manchester local authorities for the support of asylum seekers and refugees to ensure that we can look after all these people properly?