Police: Stop and Search

Lord Davies of Gower Excerpts

Tuesday 6th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The noble Lord is absolutely right that intelligence-led policing is critical to making the best use of stop and search. That includes methods where individuals who have information can pass it in confidence to the police. The suggestions the noble Lord has made are important ones. It will also be helpful that we will have over this Parliament an extra 13,000 neighbourhood police officers, with neighbourhood police officers allocated to each community area. It will build confidence and trust to report those matters.

The noble Lord mentioned technology. It is no secret that the Government have been looking at the question of facial recognition and other technologies along those lines, which can spot and analyse the use and carrying of knives. That is something we are working on, although I cannot give him definitive answers today.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, as has been said many times, stop and search is a vital part of the police toolbox to tackle crime. The 2023 review by the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, highlighted several areas of concern in how these powers were used. In my years of policing, I always maintained that it is vital that all officers are properly trained in how to use these powers and that they know their limitations within the law. Could the Minister update the House on how the Government are working with the College of Policing to deliver the updated national policing curriculum to ensure that guidance for stop and search is properly understood and implemented on the ground?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The noble Lord is absolutely right; it is important there is training in the use of stop and search by police officers and that it is updated. It is important that the outcomes of stop and searches are monitored for both the impacts, which the noble Lord mentioned earlier, and to see whether racial disparities are taking place. Those should be fed back to both the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council. This is why the National Police Chiefs’ Council is issuing and regularly updating information on the race action plan, both monitoring it and examining its impact.