Amanda Martin
Main Page: Amanda Martin (Labour - Portsmouth North)Department Debates - View all Amanda Martin's debates with the Home Office
(1 day, 21 hours ago)
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Amanda Martin (Portsmouth North) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Lewell. I want to spend my time talking about those individuals who make up our police force. Community policing is one of the foundations of effective policing in this country. It is about far more than preventing crime; it is about building trust, strengthening relationships and ensuring that every resident feels safe, supported and connected to those who serve.
Community policing works because it is rooted in local knowledge, and I should know—my dad was once a policeman. However, for too long that connection has been weakened. We need to restore the vital link between police forces and local people, ensuring that officers are visible and present in their neighbourhoods. We need to see police desks on our high streets, so that residents can report crime.
The coalition Government woefully underfunded the police, but Hampshire police has seen an extension to its funding that has meant we have increased our police tally to 114 officers from the 99 that we had. That investment has provided my constituency with named officers for all communities, and I have personally met all of our neighbourhood police. I have been on the beat, and I have worked with them in the community, hand in hand. PCs Smith, Joyce, Middleton, Wetherill, Treend and Goldfinch are the very best of what Portsmouth has, and I want to put on record my sincere thanks for the work they do every day to keep my city safe.
Yesterday, I was delighted to meet the Hampshire Police Federation in Parliament. The pressures that come with the job—the long hours, the difficult incidents and the emotional toll that policing can take—are some of the main things that we need to talk about. Suicide is a huge health issue in the police. We are rightly shocked and appalled when an officer is killed in the line of duty, but many more take their own lives and that is not treated with the same importance. We must ensure that mental health support is available, accessible and embedded throughout a police officer’s career.
Another thing I would like to draw attention to, which has seen a rise in my city, is the doxxing of police officers. It is not okay, and we need to stamp it out.
Emma Lewell (in the Chair)
I remind Members that I need to call the Front Benchers at 5.10 pm; if Members are kind to one another, they may all get in.
The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Lewell. I congratulate the hon. Member for Chichester (Jess Brown-Fuller) on securing what is a very important debate on a very important topic.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd North (Gill German) said, community policing is about whether people feel safe. It is our first duty as parliamentarians to make sure that our constituents feel, and are, safe. Community policing is the frontline of that work, so I appreciate the opportunity to debate this topic.
I, too, express my sorrow at the homophobic, racist and xenophobic abuse described by the hon. Member for Chichester. Obviously, we are all very sorry for that and hope that justice will be done in those cases. I also join many Members who have thanked the police and police staff, who are often forgotten. We should talk about them more often. I want to add my thanks to all the police officers and staff who I have met and worked with.
We had some really good contributions. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas) asked whether the local council should pay for policing. The council in Harrow should do exactly what my hon. Friend tells them to do. That would be a very good starting point, and I definitely always recommend that.
The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) spoke about Northern Ireland, and as he knows I met the Chief Constable a couple of weeks ago. I was pleased to talk to him and he is obviously doing a very good job in very difficult circumstances.
To my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Juliet Campbell), I say that I spoke to the deputy chief constable following the incident in Nottingham and the awful shooting of a police officer. I will keep in touch with them about what has happened and how that officer, as well how his team, are doing. They were all very affected by what has happened and I know that has been deeply worrying for people.
My hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North (Amanda Martin) talked about doxxing of police, which we talked about earlier in the week and which is very worrying. We are very keen to hear from the Fed, or others, about what more we can do as the Government to help in that space.
My hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Luke Myer) was right to talk about the things that he did. The Fed rep that he spoke to has done some really good work to make that case. He is right that, on lots of measures, the force is judged as being really good. I know the frustration and we have talked about it before. We are working on the funding imbalance that follows from that.
My hon. Friend the Member for Reading West and Mid Berkshire (Olivia Bailey) talked about e-bikes. They are a scourge. As she says, we have passed a law that means that the police have more powers to seize, which is good, but I am having conversations with hon. Members about what more we can do in that space. It is becoming very problematic. I was talking to my hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Dr Sandher) today, who has been campaigning on that issue quite a lot, and we were talking about some of the struggles and some of the potential solutions.
Amanda Martin
There was a Westminster Hall debate this morning on e-scooters and e-bikes, and there were over 20 contributions from constituency MPs. The Minister is right to say that it is everywhere across the country.
Sarah Jones
Yes, it is a problem everywhere.
This week I have been to Hemel Hempstead, Southall and Newcastle-under-Lyme in a bit of an antisocial behaviour tour in advance of our respect orders coming into force on Monday. Everybody in those three areas, and everybody I speak to, is concerned. There are things that the Department for Transport needs to do and there are things that the Home Office needs to do. I am in the space of looking at what we can do from a policing point of view. I was interested to hear from my hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough that their public spaces protection order has rules about the wearing of balaclavas as well. That is another debate that crosses into the e-bike one, as well as into other areas. That is an interesting innovation that they have introduced.