Knife Crime

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Thursday 24th January 2019 Westminster Hall

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Buck. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Leyton and Wanstead (John Cryer)—I know that I am not meant to call him that, but he is genuinely a friend—on securing this debate. He, our colleague the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) and I have discussed how to deal with knife crime, which is a problem nationally, a problem in London and a particular problem in the borough that the three of us represent. I will take each aspect of the problem in order.

I thank the Backbench Business Committee for agreeing to the debate. The issue of knife crime tends to be shovelled away because the media too often see it as a spat between members of different gangs; it only ever breaks the surface when somebody they cannot pigeonhole is abused or murdered, as in the terrible event that happened recently in the hon. Lady’s constituency. I pay tribute to the victim’s family for their behaviour and their demeanour—our hearts go out to them. Yet somehow the media’s game always seems to be, “As long as it is not people we think are important, it is acceptable.” I will cite some figures later to suggest why that is the case.

Violent crime is increasing, not just in London but across the country. It exacts a terrible toll on our most disadvantaged and impoverished communities. The London murder rate has reached the highest level for a decade, with stabbings and shootings often linked to gangs and the supply of drugs. People often say that a lot of it is not related to the gangs, but even when the gangs are not directly involved, the gang culture on our streets has a massive effect on young people’s behaviour, even if only defensively. Many who are not involved in the gangs end up being bullied or coerced for not wanting to be part of the process, and sometimes they succumb and find themselves trapped. The gang culture is sapping away at some of the best of our young people; they are exchanging their future prospects in return for short-term gain, or what appears to be gain.

In London alone, more than 25,000 incidents of serious violence were recorded across the 32 boroughs in the 12 months to the end of June 2018. Most of those incidents were completely unreported to the general public, except maybe in the local area. In my borough, Waltham Forest, the number of knife crime offences was 27.34% higher than in the previous year. This is a growing problem. Intriguingly for the three of us who represent the borough, the increase in knife crime in Waltham Forest is significantly greater than in the Metropolitan police’s service area as a whole. We have a local problem, a city-wide problem and a national problem.

Violence against the person has been on an upward trajectory in the borough for several years. Since 2010, there have been an average of 525 violent crimes per month, but there has been only one month since April 2015 with fewer than that. That is a shocking statistic that tells us what a daily event knife crime is. I saw that at first hand when I went out recently with a police patrol—I am sure many other hon. Members present have done the same. It was on a Friday afternoon, not a Friday night; everyone assumes that things are all right in the afternoon, but in the space of three and half hours we attended one shooting, two stabbings and a knife threat to a family.

The police said, “This is not prime time—it will really kick off after you’ve gone.” That tells us just about everything we need to know. We went at speed up and down the borough—from one end of my constituency to the bottom of the constituency of the hon. Member for Leyton and Wanstead. I swear to God: it was an eye-opener. I did not think my eyes needed opening, but I was wide-eyed by the time we had finished.

Commentators too often say that London is a city of 8 million, with 19 million annual visitors, so the level of violence is a problem but not a crisis. I have read articles that say, “Yes, we are awfully fussed about this, but it is contained.” That is shocking. Tell that to the families whose children have been damaged or murdered, or to the communities that have been blighted.

It all comes back to the point about culture, because the gang culture blights whole areas. Shops do not open in areas where the gangs operate significantly, because they come under threat. Kids who go there come under threat, too, so the streets become less occupied and people are more worried about going there. There are families whose children are being bullied and are frightened to go out, because they know that they will meet a gang member who will tell them that unless they get involved, something will happen to their families. People disappear from public spaces, and parts of our city end up deserted by decent people because they are frightened and worried. Even if they have not seen anything, hearsay tells them that things are going on in their area.

The point of challenging knife crime is not just that we are worried about violence and crime, but that we are worried about our communities not thriving as they could—their economies are bad, jobs are going and all the rest of it. We need to see the issue in a wider context, because it is about the health of a city.

A decade ago, the Centre for Social Justice, an independent organisation that I am part of, set up a programme to investigate what was going on in cities and look at what had gone right elsewhere. Its report, “Dying to Belong”, was about the nature of the people who end up locked into gangs. We commissioned its authors to look at cities that have had the problem, possibly for longer than London: they went to America and looked at Los Angeles, Cincinnati, Boston and even New York, and then they came back and looked at Glasgow and Liverpool. The Glasgow experience was particularly interesting, and so was the Matrix project in Liverpool; it was perhaps not as comprehensive as the Glasgow model, but it had some similar and very interesting outcomes.

What came across constantly from those visits was that the cities that have successfully controlled their levels of gang activity, and thus violence and violent crime, have all used a two-pronged process. First, policing needs to be absolutely and conclusively co-ordinated with the local area. I accept that the word “consent” is bandied around, but it is more a case of co-operation, understanding, shared intelligence and a sense of where and who to police.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the loss of neighbourhood policing has had a major impact on the situation he describes? The sense of communities working with the police has been shattered.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Yes—I will come on to that point. It is about intelligence on the streets, both for the communities and the police, and the operational matter of how to target policing.

What came across from Boston and Cincinnati was particularly interesting. Their gangs were very similar to London’s: they tended to be multi-racial in the sense that, unlike in Los Angeles, they were postcode gangs drawn from whoever lived in the community and reflecting the balance of people in the community. In Boston, Operation Ceasefire led to a 63% reduction in youth homicides. The level of violence is different in American cities, mostly because of firearms, but the overall suppression as a result of the operation is staggering. The figures have continued to reduce and have remained low because it is a permanent process. It is not about the police arriving in a borough, targeting people for nine months and then going somewhere else; it is constant, perpetual and part of the community.

The interesting point about the findings and the recommendations of that report is that, too often, we just focus on one or the other. I want to come to the comment made by the hon. Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier). Since the report was published, too little of it has been implemented around the UK. There was lots of talk. I talked at length at that time to the Labour Government—it was published under the last Labour Government. There was lots of interest in wanting to take it forward, but the issue comes down to the activity of the cities and the boroughs themselves—they have to want to take the decisions. There are issues for the Government, which are clearly to do with funding and organisation, but there are also issues to do with the local areas.

In the areas where they did pretty much next to nothing about the issue following the report, and carried on in the same way, some 700 young people have been fatally stabbed and shot. I believe those are 700 young people we could have saved, had we operated across the board, comprehensively. The level of co-operation, co-ordination and joint activity is a problem for London, with its 32 boroughs.

I had very interesting dealings with Waltham Forest Council at the time. It is a Labour-controlled council, and has been for some time, but the reality is that it was more important for us to work together to try to find a way through. At that time, to its credit, it implemented much of what the report was about: it brought the Glasgow people down, looked at the report and thought about how to act on it, and it set up an organisation and enhanced support in communities. For a time, the level of violent crime in the borough reduced. It was a good record, and I was proud of that. It was not my political party, but I was proud of the fact that we could get something done—it showed me that the report could work.

Since a while back, the pressure has come off and there have been other distractions, and this whole issue of where the Government funding went and how the boroughs reacted came to life. The point I want to make is that if the changes are not permanent, everything comes back. We see that now in Waltham Forest. I am not by any means attempting to be critical; I just simply make the point that this is not the first time.

The process in Glasgow that has been persistently and constantly maintained contains a number of things. The city was once dubbed the murder capital of Europe: someone below 22 years old in Glasgow was literally more likely to die by being stabbed than through a road traffic incident. That was unlike anywhere else. That is how terrible it was. The films of some of the gang violence going on in the city at the time were really concerning. As a result of the consistent activity in Glasgow, there has been a 46% fall in violent offences, a 73% fall in gang in-fighting and an 85% fall in weapon possession. They call it a health programme, because they talk about the community work at the same time, and co-operation with the health department and the intelligence that is necessary. It is not just about policing.

If it had just been about policing, there would have been a moment when they had reduced the level of crime, but that could not have been sustained forever, because there would have been no stoppage. As they said, they needed to get to the younger kids in the gangs and take them out of the gangs, into remedial work, through community groups and other groups that work to change educational outcomes and that get them re-stabilised—perhaps there is an unstable family, or a family who are threatened and need to be moved. All that has to happen at a community level and be led at the bottom, and it requires us to ask how we focus in on the necessary funding—not just across the board, but in the areas most greatly threatened by gang violence. It is perhaps time for us to ask whether specific areas and councils need a more targeted approach to support them.

Too often, that sort of process is effectively forgotten. I mentioned two cities in the UK that genuinely set about the process, but in all the rest, on all the visits I have been on, the work is patchy. As a result, we thought we needed to look at that report again. I say that as a member, as others are, of the Government’s violence taskforce, which is very helpful for presenting the case to the Government. I genuinely do think the Government are now seized of the need to resolve the situation.

The things that need to be done are not rocket science and they are not new. Although we talk about county lines and the way the drugs trade is changing and stretching out from London, in the end it all comes down to gang activity. If the young kids are able to be in the gangs, the gangs can operate. If the gangs do not have the young kids coming into them, then they die. The guys at the top of the gangs cannot operate without the runners and the young kids taking stuff from A to B, collecting the money and doing all the legwork, away from them. Those are the young people they need and they are the ones they threaten, so the community-level approach of stripping those young people out of the gangs is vital.

The police can target the top of the gangs, take them out and put them through the criminal justice system—throw the book at them—and police them on the streets and do their stop and search through intelligence-led processes. However, as the hon. Member for Leyton and Wanstead said earlier, the reality is about getting the young kids out. It is about them leaving the gangs and taking them out. It is not even early intervention—it is after the event. Even when they have gone into the gangs, we have to bring them out, take them away and get them through other work. Where that is done, as it has been seen and done in those cities, almost immediately the gangs begin to fold in on themselves. It does not matter who is running them—it does not matter if we are talking about the Mali Boys or whoever—the truth is that, at the end of the day, the top guys in these gangs do not operate if they do not have the young kids running and doing the work for them. If we can get to them, it strengthens the policing activity.

We cannot police our way out of this. We need organisations such as those I visited in south London, such as XLP and London Gang Exit, or Gangs Unite up in our area, Key4Life and Growing Against Violence. There are lots and lots of groups who do fantastic work in changing the nature of what goes on.

I have a very simple message. All the patterns and strands of work—from aggressive but targeted policing, through community work and the council working together, all rely on something very important. This is the last strand of what I was talking about, and it is in the book we published.

It is absolutely vital that all the Government agencies and local government agencies sign up to working closely together. Too often in the past, that has not happened with some Government Departments. I say this regretfully, but having talked to the areas that have addressed this issue, I think the most difficult Department to get involved in the giving of intelligence is the Department of Health and Social Care. It holds its intelligence very carefully and worries about it going out. In many households, the health visitor is the first person they will have in and the very last person they will eventually chuck out if they are worried about life. Health visitors hold a wealth of information about the problems of certain families. We need to find a way to use that intelligence.

We talk about early intervention. There are a wealth of signposts when it comes to kids who are excluded from school or playing truant, or families who we know are dysfunctional or already have problems or criminal activity in them. When I went to visit the programmes up in Glasgow, they pointed out to me that too often the courts are simply unaware of the kind of street that they are about to place the kids back into, or the worries about the families. More than that, they talked about why young people in certain areas will not travel to work and take jobs: if the normal map is overlaid with the gangs map, it is immediately obvious why. The young people will not cross the gang areas because they are frightened about crossing, being seen and getting caught.

Cross-party, throughout the Government and local authorities, and through community groups, we have to make a real pledge that we are not going to let this problem go on any longer—that in my borough and others, we will now work together. If money is required for funding, we must find it and make sure it is targeted. We cannot make political capital out of this issue. We have a duty to ensure that the next generation that comes through are not blighted by the times of the last.

Migrant Crossings

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Monday 7th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Sir Lindsay Hoyle)]

This is a very important statement, but can we please show some brevity? It was an important question and we wanted a very full answer, but it was much longer than I would have expected. So please, can we have brevity in both questions and answers?

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right to stress the safety and security of the people who try this most dangerous crossing. Given that, he is also right to say that people should claim asylum in the first safe country they come to—France is clearly that country—and for one very good reason: if they do not do so they will live in squalor while they seek to get across the channel, putting their own lives at risk. Has the Home Secretary checked how long the people trying to cross the channel have spent in France without declaring themselves as asylum seekers?

[Sajid Javid]

I agree very much with my right hon. Friend. It is not always possible to get a definitive answer. Many people are using France as a transit country: in many cases, they have entered through another EU country. The principle is very important. Those who encourage people not to claim asylum in the first safe country are encouraging them to take this dangerous journey and they should reflect on that.

Future Immigration

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

First, I thank the right hon. Lady for her comments and for the conversation that we had earlier in the day. We might not always agree on issues, including the approach to immigration that is set out in the White Paper, but she has always approached these issues and debate with courtesy and respect. That is great to see and, sadly, not an attitude shown by every member of the Opposition Front-Bench team, as we saw a moment ago, but certainly she has always shown that. I may not see her again across the Dispatch Box before the end of the year, so I wish her and her team a happy Christmas.

The right hon. Lady asks a number of important questions. First, she rightly emphasises that we should make it clear that, whatever happens when it comes to immigration, it is fair to say that all parties are united in trying in their way to make sure that we remain an open and welcoming country to migrants from across the world who come to the UK to work, to study or to visit, and it is great to have a Parliament that almost universally accepts that. She, like me, is the child of first-generation migrants. Her parents, like mine and countless others, have made a huge contribution to this country and making it what it is, and we should all celebrate that and try to demonstrate that more as the kind of thing that we want to see in our country. I hope that, as the right hon. Lady and her colleagues have time to digest what is in the White Paper—I appreciate that it has just been published—they have the time to look at it in a way that convinces them that it demonstrates that openness.

The right hon. Lady raised a number of other issues. She used a phrase about slaying the myths of the past. One important aspect of the White Paper is that we have listened to the evidence. There is still more listening to do, which is why I said at the end of my statement that there is work to be done over the coming year to ensure that we engage with other political parties, devolved authorities, businesses and others. The starting point for that evidence was the work done by the Migration Advisory Committee, which is completely independent of Government. The MAC undertook a detailed report. It went to every part of the UK to listen and listen hard. It presented its evidence and we published that in full in September. Much of that—not exclusively—is reflected in the White Paper.

The right hon. Lady asked specifically about targets. We are committed to the Conservative party manifesto for this Parliament, but let me be clear: this is about the future immigration system. It is about emphasising control, but bringing net migration down to more sustainable levels. There are no targets in the White Paper.

I very much welcome the right hon. Lady’s support for the principle at the heart of the new system, which is that it is about an individual’s skills and what they have to contribute, not their nationality. There will be no preference to any particular nationality. To take her example, if a doctor or an engineer is coming to the UK it should not matter to us if that doctor or engineer is from India or France. What matters is what they have to contribute. That is at the heart of the proposals and she is right to highlight that principle.

The right hon. Lady asked me about salary thresholds. This is for the high-skilled worker route. The independent Migration Advisory Committee, based on its evidence, suggests a salary threshold of £30,000. What we have said is that we have listened, but that we need to do more work and have more extensive engagement before we come to a final figure. It will not be set in stone at £30,000 at this point. We will have to have more engagement to ensure that we get it right and come up with a threshold that we believe works for all parts of the UK.

The right hon. Lady asked me about the short-term workers route. One reason we included that in the White Paper is a recognition that, as we move away from freedom of movement, which I think all colleagues see as a very easy system to use with hardly any paperwork or bureaucracy involved, to a new system where everyone requires permission, it is right that we have a transition. The short-term workers scheme is a part of that transition, having a more balanced approach and recognising the needs of businesses across the country.

Lastly, the right hon. Lady talked about being open and welcoming, and about the Home Office learning lessons and changing its approach where appropriate. She will know that earlier this year we made changes to the tier 2 system, under the current immigration system, to remove doctors and nurses from the cap. She also rightly raised the Windrush crisis. All year, there has been a process to learn lessons from what went wrong. She is right to highlight that the Windrush problems began under a previous Government and continued under this Government. They should not have happened under any Government. It is right that we learn the lessons. Wendy Williams is working on an independent report. It will be a thorough independent report and she will go wherever she needs to to get to the evidence. That will be an important moment for us to all learn lessons.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement. Obviously, I have not had a chance to read the White Paper, but much of what he said today is moving in the right direction. I hope he agrees with me that one of the problems with discussing migration over the past two decades has been that any time it is mentioned, people immediately accuse those who ask about reducing it of being racist. We have to bring an end to that level of debate, which has led to much of the frustration to which the right hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington (Ms Abbott) referred earlier, about the way the debate has been conducted. As one of those who voted leave, it was clear to me throughout that people did not want an end to migration; what they wanted was controlled migration. That is what I hope my right hon. Friend delivers today.

As far as I can see, the core bit that has caused the greatest problem has been the immediate access to social security benefits for people coming from the European Union. That has caused a big problem. Many businesses have, I am afraid, abused the process, getting them to come in and live in often quite squalid conditions, driving wages down for those who have much higher costs. Is my right hon. Friend prepared to deal with that issue to make sure that that is not a way of bringing in cheap labour? When he gets lectured by businesses and by others who say the health service cannot cope, will he remind them that for the past two decades—[Interruption.] This is a very important point.

[Mr Speaker]

The right hon. Gentleman’s point may be important, but it does need to be framed in the form of a question—briefly.

[Mr Duncan Smith]

Does my right hon. Friend accept that businesses have failed to invest in training and skilling the domestic population, with the result that only 15% of those who start life at entry level work will ever move beyond entry level work?

[Sajid Javid]

I thank my right hon. Friend for the points he raises. First, he is absolutely right to emphasise the need for control. That was clearly one of the messages of the referendum result. It is about control. Like any other major developed economy, there is no reason why Britain should not have control while also being fair in its approach to immigration. On access to benefits, the White Paper sets out—I appreciate he has not had the opportunity to look at it in any detail yet—that on the short-term workers route, for example, there will be no right to public benefits and no dependants’ rights. This is a system that many other countries have followed. It is a fair approach both to people who come to our country to work and to the domestic population.

European Union (Withdrawal) Act

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 5th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I can give my hon. Friend that assurance, and I agree with all the points he made, including the importance of control of our immigration policy.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

The Home Secretary and I both served in the Cabinet of the previous Prime Minister, and he will recall that the previous Prime Minister tried, without success, to get from the European Union a limitation on access to welfare payments for those who have just arrived here. Now we are leaving, and we say we want to take back control. The political declaration is very vague; it talks about social security co-operation. Is it our ambition to ensure that businesses cannot bring people over, pay them very cheap wages and expect them to claim benefits and live in squalid conditions? Will we now rule out access to many of those benefits, which cost a lot of money, for people who come over from the EU?

[Sajid Javid]

I agree very much with the sentiment of what my right hon. Friend said. I think it is fair to say that once we have left the EU, we will have a lot more flexibility in that area. To return to the previous question, the rules that we apply will be non-discriminatory. The broad intention is to apply the same rules to anyone, regardless of their nationality. It will be focused on an individual’s skills—what they have to offer and the contribution they have to make—and we will not want welfare or any other type of social security payment to be part of someone’s decision to come and work in this country. The White Paper will set out more detail on that.

Stop and Search

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Monday 12th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his questions. Unfortunately, this all starts from a false premise, which is newspaper speculation that is entirely wrong. I go back to my statement: this House should be clear that we have no plans to change the requirement that reasonable grounds for suspicion are needed before a routine stop and search is carried out. We are not going back to random stop and search, to use his words.

The hon. Gentleman set out eloquently the case for reform that this Government made on stop and search, which means that stop and search is now conducted in a totally transformed environment in terms of the transparency and accountability around it. We are now at record levels for the ratio between stop and arrest, so we are not going back to the bad old days when over 1.4 million people were stopped with only 8% or 9% of them arrested. That is not what this is about. This is about recognising that we now have a million fewer stops and searches than we did in 2009-10, and that we are—I think on a cross-party basis—absolutely determined to bear down on this horrendous spike in violent crime. We need to be sure that the police have the confidence to use the tools at their disposal, and stop and search is one of those tools. There is evidence that the police have lost some confidence in using it, and what the Home Secretary is setting out in his interviews and articles is his determination to restore that confidence and give the police confidence in the powers that they have. We can look at ways of reducing the bureaucracy and anything else that is getting in the way of that, but this is about trying to save lives.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I accept fully that the previous way in which stop and search was used was often too random, but there is no question but that it should play a part in the reduction of violence and the use of drugs in some areas. There has been a large increase in gang warfare and the use of guns and pistols in areas such as mine, where many of the people who are moving weapons and drugs around know that they can, for the most part, do so with impunity because they are unlikely to be stopped and searched. We therefore need to get the police to apply the process much better, so that we make it clear to those people moving guns and weapons around that there is a high likelihood of their being stopped and searched.

Offensive Weapons Bill

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons & Money resolution: House of Commons
Wednesday 27th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

According to the information that we have, weapons of this type have, sadly, been used in the troubles in Northern Ireland, and, according to intelligence provided by police and security services, have been possessed by criminals who have clearly intended to use them. That said, I know that my hon. Friend speaks with significant knowledge of this issue, and I would be happy to listen to his views and those of others.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

If we follow my right hon. Friend’s logic, we must conclude that literally every single weapon should be banned. Having served in Northern Ireland myself, I know that there is no end to saying that everything should be banned. If we accept that these weapons are not likely to be used if they are properly secured and controlled, we should think carefully about banning them. If we just go on banning weapons, we will not achieve what we want. In Waltham Forest where I live, handguns are available to any criminal who wants to use them, but those are banned as well. The right people cannot use weapons, but the wrong people certainly carry on using them.

[Sajid Javid]

My right hon. Friend makes the point that our response must be proportionate, and we must ensure that banning firearms leads to the right outcome. He has alluded to his own experience in this regard, and I hope he is reassured by my indication that I am happy to talk to colleagues about the issue. He has also mentioned the need for control and proper possession of any type of weapon that could be used in the wrong way. The Bill contains clear measures based on the evidence that has been brought to us thus far, but I am happy to listen to what others have to say.

EU Settlement Scheme

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Thursday 21st June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Nokes]

The hon. Gentleman has raised a large number of points, and alongside him I recognise that post referendum there have been anxieties for EU citizens living in the UK. That is why we are bringing forward details of the settled status scheme. We want to continue our work with—among others—the3million group, to allay those fears. It is crucial to me and the entire Government that we send the clear message that EU citizens living here are welcome. We recognise the contribution that they make to our communities, and we want them to stay. That is why we have brought forward details of the scheme, and I commend to the hon. Gentleman the statement of intent that contains many of those details.

The hon. Gentleman raised specific points about vulnerable people, and he was right to do so. We all have anxieties about the most vulnerable in our society, who may well need assistance. UK Visas and Immigration already has assisted digital schemes, and we want to roll those out to community groups and organisations that already work in local areas, so that support is there for people who may find a digital process difficult. He mentioned iPhones and the chip-checker. The digital application will be available on any computer, tablet or smartphone, but the chip-checker is currently available only on Android. I reassure the hon. Gentleman that the Home Secretary has recently raised that matter with Apple, because of course we would like the chip-checker to work on everything. There will, however, be facilities for those who wish to carry out the process on their smartphone—that process can be saved at every point, and people can then verify their documents in a contact centre or through many of the partner organisations with which we are currently working.

The hon. Gentleman rightly mentioned that 3.3 million EU citizens live in the UK. That is why we are moving to a private beta testing mode—we need assurance that the system will work, and then to have a phased roll-out. That is very important. We must also reflect that EU citizens have every right to be here, and they will continue to have those rights until the end of December 2020. For two and half years people will be able to register, and we will encourage them to do so. Importantly, this is the first publication of the scheme, and it gives the statement of intent. We then have a long period before the scheme launches next spring, so that we can be confident we have it right. I do not pretend that this is not a learning process; this is the largest exercise on this scale, and we are determined to listen to our partner organisations, and to citizens groups, to ensure that we make this a success for those EU citizens, who are so important to us.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I welcome the statement by my right hon. Friend—I think it is generous, and indeed it is. It is worth reflecting that within the criteria she laid out, we will now begin the process of ensuring that we do not have people in the UK with criminal records that could affect British citizens, which we have had to put up with for some time under European Union rules. As someone whose sister has lived and worked for pretty much all her life in Italy, can I ask whether the Minister is aware that Guy Verhofstadt at the European Parliament recently chastised other countries for failing to make the same kinds of arrangements, and with the necessary pace of change, alongside the changes that we have brought forward?

[Caroline Nokes]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point about criminal record checks, and all applicants aged 10 or over will be checked against the UK’s national police database and watch lists. Applicants over 18 will be asked about their criminal history in the UK, and indeed overseas. My right hon. Friend has raised a significant point: this is an important, clear offer to EU citizens, which sets out the process that we wish them to go through over the next few years. The Home Secretary has made the point that it is important that UK citizens who live in other EU states should have the same confidence, and we will continue to work with the EU and other member states to reinforce that message. I accept that 1 million British citizens live in the EU, compared with the 3.3 million for whom we have responsibility to see through the registration process in this country. Nevertheless, 1 million is still a significant number, and I will continue, in engagement with our European neighbours, to reinforce that point.

Medicinal Cannabis

Iain Duncan Smith Excerpts

Monday 18th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

I thank the hon. Lady for that long list of questions, and I will do my best to answer them. She asked about the recognition of the medical benefits of some cannabis-based medicine but, as I said in my response, they are already recognised by the fact that, for example, Sativex can be prescribed in the UK. Its safety and efficacy have been proven, and it has been rigorously tested. She will know the responsibility of the Government and everyone involved in the process to ensure that medicines are safe, but the system allows for medicines to be licensed once they are established and tested.

The hon. Lady mentioned the case of Alfie Dingley, with which I am familiar, and I made it clear that, however we may feel about the current rules, I undertook to try to find a solution for Alfie within the existing rules. Again, it is an unprecedented situation, because this is the first time that we are considering a personal licence, so this is new ground for everyone. I can confirm to her, as I confirmed to the family, that the process of applying for a licence to find a long-term sustainable legal solution for Alfie is well under way. It is clinically led, and I have given assurances that we will drive the process as hard as possible. Indeed, a date has been set for a compliance visit, which is a necessary part of the process. We are pushing things as hard as possible, and I want to place on the record my thanks, appreciation and respect for the dignity and patience of Alfie’s family in this difficult situation.

The hon. Lady challenges the Government to change fast, and I think I have made it clear that, as the Prime Minister said this morning, we have to look hard at our processes for handling such situations. We must ensure, as the Health Secretary made clear today, that our policy is fully up to date with the best possible understanding of the most recent and relevant evidence. As I am sure the hon. Lady will appreciate, the Government have to take a bit of time to think things through. We have to get the detail right. We do not have the luxury of opposition; we have to work through the detail to get this right. My statement recognises not only that we are taking immediate steps to improve our processes so that they become more clinically led, with the introduction of a new clinically-led panel of experts to advise Ministers, but that we are taking a wider look at policy processes and will be making a forthcoming announcement.

[Mr Iain Duncan Smith (Chingford and Woodford Green) (Con)]

I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement. I am by no means a supporter of recreational cannabis use. However, a woman I know, Amelia Powers, was given two weeks to live with a diagnosis of a tumour of the brain. There was nothing more they could do, and she took to using a form of this and, for the last seven or eight years, has not just reduced the tumour but has got rid of it. She now runs her own company, which she started.

The point I would make is somewhat wider. The biggest problem the Minister faces is that in the Department of Health and Social Care it is still not considered a good thing to investigate the medicinal properties of this particular drug. I urge him, if at all possible, to try to get a coalition on getting this investigated, because clearly there are medicinal preparations that could be used. It would be helpful if he drove that.

[Mr Hurd]

I suspect that every Member has personal knowledge, directly or indirectly, of people who swear by the benefits of cannabis-based medicine that has helped them in very difficult circumstances. I completely understand that.

My right hon. Friend talked about building a coalition across Government on updating the evidence, and I signalled in my statement that that is exactly what is happening. The Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine), is sitting alongside me, and I refer my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr Duncan Smith) to this morning’s comments by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, which make it clear that the Government are seriously looking again at our processes and how we handle these cases.