Planning System: Gypsies and Travellers

Debate between Kate Green and Philip Hollobone

Wednesday 29th January 2020 Westminster Hall

[Mr Hollobone]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. I will do so straight away: I put it to the Minister that this legislation needs to be brought forward as soon as possible, so that we can address this problem head on. Of course, this has been done in the Republic of Ireland, which in 2002 changed trespass from a civil offence to a criminal offence. That is actually inflaming the problem in this country, because many Irish Travellers are not in Ireland any more; they are here.

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

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. He will know that in the Republic of Ireland, the criminalisation of trespass is part of a much wider, holistic package of equalities, rights and social programmes for Gypsies and Travellers that do not exist in this country. When pressing the Minister on the progress of this legislation, will he join me in pressing him on the flawed nature of the Home Office consultation, which was conducted during Dissolution and with questions that were, at the very least, loaded?

[Mr Hollobone]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. Like her, I do not regard the Government’s consultation as satisfactory. I do not regard it as ambitious enough, and she is right to identify that there are issues with the Gypsy and Traveller community that we need to address outside the planning system. My hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire, in one of his excellent debates on this issue, highlighted the fact that Gypsies and Travellers have the lowest level of work of any ethnicity, at 47%. Some 60% of Gypsies and Travellers have no qualifications at all, whereas the figure for the rest of the population is just under 23%. He has said quite rightly that a compassionate case can be made for integrating Gypsies and Travellers into one whole assessment of their housing needs within a local area, rather than treating them as a separate group.

Prisoners (Voting Rights)

Debate between Kate Green and Philip Hollobone

Tuesday 11th January 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

May I wish you a very happy new year, Mr Benton, and offer my grateful thanks to Mr Speaker for giving me permission to lead today’s debate?

May I also wish the Minister and his shadow a very happy new year? The Minister is a personal friend, and I have always had high regard for him, both before he was elected to this place and since he took up his present position in the Government. I know, therefore, that we will not fall out on a personal level over this issue, but it is my job as a humble Back Bencher to stand up and to speak up for my constituents, whose view is that this country should not give prisoners the right to vote, and it is my job to hold the Government to account on that.

Here is a question for hon. Members. Who said

“Frankly, when people commit a crime and go to prison, they should lose their rights, including the right to vote”?

He also said:

“It makes me physically ill even to contemplate having to give the vote to anyone who is in prison”—[Official Report, 3 November 2010; Vol. 517, c. 921.]

The answer is my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, and I could not agree more with him. The vast majority of people in this country would also back him in those sentiments. One difference between the Prime Minister and myself, however, is that he is actually in a position to do something about this issue. We need some backbone—we need a hardened spine—if we are to take on the European Court of Human Rights and resist its judgment.

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

In making that statement about public attitudes, is the hon. Gentleman aware that research carried out for the previous Government in 2009 showed that only a quarter of respondents favoured a total ban on prisoners having the right to vote?

[Mr Hollobone]

The previous Government’s two consultations, which they did, by the way, to avoid having to make a decision—they kicked the issue into the long grass for five years—involved a pathetically small number of respondents. Given that there were fewer than 100 respondents, the statistical relevance of those consultations is almost meaningless. If I asked my constituents whether prisoners should be given the right to vote, the vast majority would say that they should not. I strongly suspect that if the hon. Lady spoke to her constituents, she would get a very similar reaction.

I also want to pray in aid the words of the now Attorney-General when he was in opposition:

“The principle that those who are in custody after conviction should not have the opportunity to vote is a perfectly rational one. Civic rights go with civic responsibility, but these rights have been flagrantly violated by those who have committed imprisonable offences. The government must allow a parliamentary debate which gives MPs the opportunity to insist on retaining our existing practise that convicted prisoners can’t vote.”

I absolutely, 100%, agree, and I hope that this morning’s limited debate will be a warm-up act for a proper debate on the Floor of the House.