Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Baroness Chakrabarti Excerpts

Lords Hansard - part two & Committee stage
Monday 1st November 2021 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Chakrabarti]

122: After Clause 49, insert the following new Clause—
“Arrest without warrants: safeguarding
In section 24 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (arrest without warrants: constables), after subsection (4) insert—“(4A) A constable exercising the power conferred by subsection (1), (2) or (3) may not require or ask the person under arrest to enter a vehicle or premises other than a police station unless at least one other constable is present in the vehicle or when entering the premises, as applicable.””

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, I have the duty of opening this debate on amendments tabled by noble Lords in response to Sarah Everard’s abduction, rape and murder by a man who was, at the relevant time, a serving police officer, and further to the public outpouring of revulsion and distrust arising from revelations about how the perpetrator was allowed to thrive in the police service, despite repeated concerns about his character and conduct over so many years. These emerged in particular during sentencing proceedings just over a month ago.

My Amendment 122 attempts to address the fact that as a matter of hard law—as opposed to soft guidance, practice, or anything of that kind—a lone arresting officer is currently permitted to require a person subject to arrest to enter a vehicle or premises other than a police station. This gives rise to obvious dangers of abuse of power and dangers to the majority of officers who, unlike the man in question, undertake hazardous and vital public protection duties in good faith.

I am grateful for the support of the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. I think the subsequently tabled Amendment 123, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, attempts to tackle a very similar mischief. He will forgive me, I hope, if in a moment I explain why I prefer my original proposal.

My Amendment 275 requires that the inquiry into matters arising from the Sarah Everard atrocity—for that is what it is—be put on a statutory footing under the Inquiries Act 2005. I am grateful not only for the signature of my noble friend Lord Rosser but for that of the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, and my friend the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood. I am also grateful for the support that the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and a number of other noble Lords from across your Lordships’ House have expressed for this endeavour.

Once more, I hope that my noble friend Lord Rosser —and my noble friend Lord Coaker on his behalf—will forgive me for preferring my precise formulation to his Amendment 281, not least because in this matter the ideal outcome must be for the Home Secretary to hear the legal and public confidence arguments and by her own volition launch a full statutory inquiry under the 2005 Act, long before the Bill before your Lordships’ Committee becomes law.

Finally, I will support my noble friend Lord Rosser’s Amendments 282 and 283, which seem so important given the obvious needs for better training and vetting in the police service.

Amendment 122 amends Section 24 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 governing the powers of police constables who arrest without warrant. It would prevent a police officer in or out of uniform from requiring an arrested person to

“enter a vehicle or premises other than a police station”

unless or until a second officer is in attendance. They would still be able to restrain the arrested person to prevent an escape if so required and, if necessary, to seek bystander assistance in so doing. However, there would be no question of a sole plain-clothed or uniformed officer driving off with an arrested person. This clear and simple change to our law must be better for the safety of all citizens and constables alike.

We now know that the first phase of the hideous abuse of power against Sarah Everard perpetrated by a predatory, murdering rapist was that he went hunting for a young woman under the cloak of dusk and draconian lockdown laws. He persuaded Sarah that he was arresting her under suspicion of breaching those same lockdown laws—something, by the way, that should require those laws being perhaps amended or repealed. While some senior voices in policing had the gall to suggest that she and other women are somehow too naive or compliant, and others have tried to suggest that we ought to perhaps flag down traffic, demand to speak to the control room on an officer’s radio or resort to private sector safety apps on our own mobile phones, it seems that no amount of new guidance to either citizens or constables can substitute for a clear and well-publicised change to primary legislation that everyone can understand.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

I note the noble Lord’s points and I do not disagree with him. I ask the Committee to understand the commitment of the Home Secretary. She is deadly serious about ensuring that the inquiry moves at pace and, if necessary, converting it to a statutory inquiry if it is not meeting its commitments.

I will get the date for the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, and the Committee. The announcement from Dame Cressida Dick was on 20 October, some 11 days ago, but I will get the date on which Sir Stephen House made those comments.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, I am hugely grateful to all Members of the Committee for the substance and tone of our proceedings. I am particularly grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, who dealt with our minor points of detailed difference with such grace. If I may say so, what I really took away from his comments was the sense of a loving father speaking of his daughters and the hope that we might one day return to a moment when all our daughters and granddaughters can trust the police. I was also struck by the way he worked with the young woman lawyer in trying to bring matters forward with such urgency. I thank him so much for that.

I agree with my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath that we have to get to the culture of obfuscation and denial—understandable human instincts when we want to protect our colleagues and the service that we love. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, that if it had been a scandal of equivalent proportions at the Bar, we would feel as uncomfortable as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, so we understand these things.

I say to my noble friends that my Amendment 275 also deals with culture, but this is not about precise amendments—this is too important for that—but about trying to persuade the Government on both of these issues, of trust and confidence on the one hand and effective change on the other, with which we are attempting to deal in this whole group of amendments. This is about trying to persuade the Government on the power of arrest on the one hand and the inquiry and the training and vetting on the other.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, made such an important point when she talked about that period of lockdown and the way that that has, in a sense, exacerbated every problem in the world but also problems around the fault-lines between hard law, guidance, perceptions of the law and trust in policing and what really is the right thing. It was in that lockdown that this atrocity was perpetrated.

Of course, she was also the Member of the Committee who pointed out that, just hours or days after the perpetrator was charged, someone made the insensitive decision to police that vigil in that way. Whoever did so must have known what we were yet to find out. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, spoke of the young woman who now features in all of the videos and photographs. We know that, subsequently, she has been stalked by serving police officers on her Tinder account. So we really are in trouble, and we are trying to respond to a really significant problem of culture and trust in policing in this country. We are not fabricating this. No one thinks that; I know that we are all on the same page.

My noble friend Lady Blower was also clear that guidance will not be enough. We have gone too far for that in relation to any of the really serious specific issues that the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, and I and others have been trying to address in these amendments.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, for everything that he is doing in this group and on the Bill more generally. I say to him and anyone who is now feeling very concerned about and suspicious of policing in this country that there is another side. I would like to believe that the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, still represents more of what is real and true in our policing service and in our democracy built on the rule of law. I hope that we can all listen to him and heed his practical advice. The word “gallant” is used for the military; there is no equivalent for the retired senior police officers in your Lordships’ House, but there are many retired commissioners and others here. But it is the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, who has been engaged with the Bill day after day and has spoken from the heart and from years of practical experience. We have to heed him. I was heartened by hearing him discuss, on Amendment 122, the approach where we do not want lone police officers driving off with arrestees, for the protection of either. That is best practice, but we now need to put that into hard law to reassure everyone and as a matter of good governance.

My noble friend Lord Coaker said passionately—and he is so right—that we have crossed a line in terms of public trust. Once lost, it is really hard to regain. That is why he made the point, again and again, that a full statutory and judge-led inquiry is part—just part—of trying to regain that trust. Can any of us imagine a Lawrence or Macpherson inquiry that was not judge-led and on a statutory footing, with all the iconography and symbolism of justice that comes with that?