Hate Crime

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement made earlier in the House of Commons and for the words about Jo Cox MP. Will he assure us that the reason this important Statement, on a matter of real concern, was not made by the Home Secretary in the Commons was definitely due to unavoidable reasons unrelated to internal politics within the Conservative Party?

Since last Thursday’s referendum, there are reports of a fivefold increase in race hate comments on social media channels and a more than 50% increase in hate crimes reported to the police online hate crime reporting channel. That increase is on top of an already rising tide of hate crimes in England and Wales. Last year the police recorded over 52,000 hate crimes—an increase of 18% on the year before—and more than four-fifths of these were racially motivated.

There are also reports, in the aftermath of the referendum campaign and result, of attacks on individuals and incidents of racial hatred against specific communities: a Muslim schoolgirl cornered by a group of people who told her, “Get out, we voted leave”, a Polish community centre daubed with racist graffiti, a halal butcher’s shop petrol-bombed, and a US Army veteran and university lecturer told to “get back to Africa” by three youths on a tram. There are even cases of people who were born in this country, have lived in this country all their lives, and are as British as I am, being told to go back to their own country.

All this was unleashed by the campaigning during, and outcome of, a referendum that was called not in the national interest but because of splits in the Conservative Party. There would have been no referendum if the Conservative Party had not been so divided on the issue of Europe. The result of the referendum has emboldened those with feelings of such hatred, because in the light of the tenor of much of the campaign and its concentration on migration, such people now feel that the result has been an indication of support for their abhorrent views, and has given those abhorrent views a level of respectability that they did not have before.

It is a small minority of people who seek to use a time like this to peddle hatred and violence—but if you are on the receiving end of such hatred and violence, it does not feel like a small minority. I do not know what is happening in our country—or to our country—today. We seem to be becoming an increasingly intolerant society. The question now is: how do we get the evil genie back in the bottle? That will not be easy, particularly in the new world of social media. If the Government take the view that we just have to ride out the next few weeks and months and everything will rectify itself, that will be complacency in the extreme—and a damaging and dangerous complacency at that. It all depends what the measures referred to in today’s Statement mean in practice, as opposed to in words. We all have a responsibility to respect the decision that has been made by the people in the referendum, to work to heal the divisions that it has magnified and to take on directly, and defeat, those filled with feelings of hatred and violence towards others.

The Government have announced an action plan to tackle hate crime, and said that it will be published shortly. This will not be the first plan this Government have had. What is needed are results—positive results. Perhaps the Minister can say when the plan will be published, and why he thinks it is going to deliver. Can he tell us whether it will have specific objectives that can be measured, and what will be included in those objectives which can be measured? Since the Government have said that the action plan is to tackle hate crime, presumably one aspect will be apprehending those engaged in such crime. What more resources, financial and human, will be provided to our police forces, which have been cut and cut again since 2010? From which budget will the extra funding referred to in the Statement be taken, and how much will it amount to?

Hate crime of any kind is abhorrent and has no place in society. It is in itself, and by its very nature, a rejection of the British values that have always bound us together. Non-British nationals living in Britain will today feel worried about their safety and that of their children and families, and will be in need of reassurance. I hope the Minister and the Government will be able to provide it. People need reassurance that action will be taken now. Can the Minister tell us what extra steps are being taken to monitor reports of hate crime, and what immediate advice the Home Office is giving to the police on tackling such incidents? Will decisions on the extra resources that should now be used from police budgets to address rising hate crime and violence be for police and crime commissioners or for chief constables?

Confidence to report such hate crimes will increase if people believe that reports will be followed up. What specific action will be taken to address this point? To provide further reassurance at this difficult time, can the Government say more to provide reassurance to EU nationals in this country about their future status in this country? Frankly, the response by the Government in Oral Questions today about the position of EU nationals who live in this country will not have helped the situation. The referendum is over but its scars remain. We now need to work to make sure that our country remains the open and welcoming place we know and love.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, I too thank the Minister for repeating the Statement. We on these Benches condemn all hate crime, whatever the target, and deplore the appalling murder of Jo Cox MP—our thoughts are with her family. We need to stand together to have a united, strong, liberal voice against those who try to stir up hatred in our communities. We as Liberal Democrats are prepared to do that. We beg both of the other major parties in this House to stand together to try to fight this issue.

It is difficult to judge what the longer-term impact of the EU referendum will be on hate crime, but far more worrying to us on these Benches is the impact the immigration debate and increasing xenophobia had on the EU referendum rather than the other way round. In addition to the increase in Islamophobia mentioned in the Statement, and as the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, just said, in 2014-15 there was an 18% increase in reported hate crime compared with the year before, and anecdotally, those who have rarely experienced hate crime in the past now report becoming victims, including members of minority groups on these Benches.

To what extent does the Minister share my concern that these developments are a worrying reflection of a change in the culture of this country—a shift, of whatever magnitude, away from being an open and tolerant society that welcomes diversity? What will the Government do about it? It is not just about reporting investigations into hate crimes, treating the symptoms, but about treating the causes. What will they do to try to address this shift in culture towards xenophobia and racism? As the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, and other noble Lords, have asked this afternoon, what does the Minister think the impact on xenophobia will be of the Government’s apparent position—that the status of 2 million EU citizens currently resident in the UK will be the subject of negotiation with the EU? Surely the Minister realises that this will increase hate crime, not decrease it. What will the Government do about it?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

My Lords, first, I thank both noble Lords for their contributions. Various questions have been asked; I will take some of them head-on.

Questions were raised, particularly by the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, with regard to recent events. As the Statement alluded to today, my noble friend Lady Williams and I went to the cultural centre in Hammersmith to reassure people there, and we were accompanied by the Polish ambassador. The positive element we heard from both the Polish community and the ambassador about reporting such hate crimes since the vote last week was that, while they have been reported, they are pockets and certainly not an emerging trend. That said, we cannot show any degree of complacency. I talked about the True Vision online police reporting stats, and there are two elements to that. It is of course concerning that if you look at some of the statistics, from Thursday to Saturday there was about a 27% increase compared to the same period in the previous month, but if you include Sunday’s figures, it went up to a 57% increase in reported crimes. This is just a snapshot but, nevertheless, it is indicative of how certain mindsets, and indeed criminals, will use opportunities such as the vote last week to demonstrate their criminal intent against minority communities.

Let me assure the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, that during the coming weeks and months—both in my personal work and in my work as a government Minister—I shall leave no stone unturned in ensuring that we eradicate all levels of hate crime. But in doing so, we must work in partnership with all communities. We must also emphasise—coming back to a point noble Lords made about how we tackle embedded culture issues—that part of this is down to education. We must ensure a level of integration in which, not only can someone from any culture, community or faith feel that their identity is protected, but they are also protected through mutual respect of one another’s right to belong to whichever faith or community they choose.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, asked how the Government are addressing the levels of intolerance in society, as did the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, who also asked about the national action plan. We have consulted very extensively on this and we are in the process of getting cross-government sign-off for it. The noble Lord also asked about certain measures that will be in place. We need to ensure we can measure hate crime effectively in all its ugly guises.

In terms of specific measures, asked about by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, we have taken serious steps to address various issues, as I am sure he is aware. Previously, only anti-Semitism was recorded as a specific religious hate crime but, from 1 April this year, any hate crime against any religious community—including anti-Muslim hatred—is now specifically recorded by the police.

We have also seen a much higher take-up in the reporting of hate crime, particularly within the Muslim community, and that is a positive development. People know that they can report hate crime; the fear of reporting it is often forgotten. People increasingly have the confidence to come forward at a local level to report hate crime, but more needs to be done.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, talked about the general immigration debate. There were certain elements of the referendum campaign—there is no better example than when a particular poster was revealed—that all of us across this Chamber felt were best described as vile. They played on fears, division and the history and legacy of a path that we all not only deplore but do not wish to see arising again in our country. Anyone who supports such campaigning needs to reflect very deeply on their own intent, as to what kind of atmosphere and environment they are creating.

The Government have further recently announced that we are in the midst of finalising the governance of how funding will work. As noble Lords will be aware, we work very closely with the Community Security Trust to protect of places of worship—synagogues—and schools within the Jewish community. The Government have now announced funding to protect other places of worship that are coming under attack or are being targeted by extreme right-wing groups, particularly mosques. We have seen instances of gurdwaras being attacked, sometimes due to the sheer ignorance of attackers thinking they are mosques. As I have previously commented to Members of your Lordships’ House, we have to overcome the kind of prejudices whereby, for example, if the noble Lord, Lord Singh, and I were walking down the street, he may be perceived, because of his attire, by an ignorant person as a Muslim while I may not. Those are the kind of ignorant attitudes we must address. They are partly driven by fear, but also partly by hate. We must address these attitudes full-on.

I would be happy to talk to noble Lords across the Chamber to see how we tackle all forms of hate crime. Any form of hate, be it based on religion, culture, community, sexual orientation, race or gender is, frankly, unacceptable.