Catapults and Antisocial Behaviour

Sarah Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd December 2025 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. I congratulate the hon. and gallant Member for Spelthorne (Lincoln Jopp) on securing the debate.

There is clearly a problem. It is not my job to defend the status quo; it is my job to consider what we can do about the problem. This debate has brought forward that problem in a good-natured way, setting out a number of ideas, which we can talk through today but need more thought. The Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam), referred to existing laws, and the need to look at how they are implemented. Other suggestions, from this place and beyond, may also help. The starting point is that there is clearly a problem. Although the national data is not great on this subject, it appears to be a rising problem, as borne out by the Kent statistics.

I will say a couple of things about the broad approach to governing. Most of the public want police in their neighbourhoods, with the time and space to tackle physical crimes. The Government are working on a White Paper on police reform, which we hope will do exactly that. We are not only putting in more money—already bearing fruit in funding neighbourhood police in local communities—but looking at the time police spend on bureaucracy. Artificial intelligence can help to free up time, with new technology such as live facial recognition or drones playing a role, to enable the police to do what we want them to do.

We are also spending a lot of time on outlining plans for a national centre for policing, which could do what the hon. Member for Chichester (Jess Brown-Fuller) suggested: bring together national aspects of policing, so that local police can deal with the problems that face them. The hon. and gallant Member for Spelthorne also talked at some length about the good youth engagement activities in his constituency, and pointed out the cuts to youth work. I think we would all agree that policing is one thing, but activities are very much another. We have a brilliant ambition for a 30% increase in the number of cadets by 2030, which would ensure that people are gaining skills, learning about being a good citizen and occupying their free time. Hon. Members will have examples of great youth clubs and sports groups, which we want to support where we can. Those are the two principles that I would start with.

The hon. and gallant Member described very vividly some of the injuries to wildlife, which are very upsetting. Concerns were also expressed about where that violence would escalate to over time. Something that is increasingly taking up Government time is thinking about people who are obsessed with violence. Where does it come from? How do we stem it? I suspect that people who are attacking wildlife are on some path that we would want to stop. Interventions at that point are necessary, too.

The hon. and gallant Member set out his arguments and made a very compelling case that we need to take this issue seriously. I was in a meeting just before the debate, and I said to those I was meeting that I was coming to this debate, and they said, “Oh, Dennis the Menace!” The hon. and gallant Member made exactly the same point. This is how people perceive catapults; that is not the nature of what is happening here. The letter he read out paints that picture very clearly.

My hon. Friends the Members for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Kevin McKenna) and for Dartford (Jim Dickson), who I was pleased to meet recently, made very good points about the challenges in their communities. My hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey talked about the urban nature of this problem, and the churches and high streets that have been damaged. This is clearly a problem that is affecting a number of areas. We heard that from Northern Ireland as well. My hon. Friend the Member for Dartford talked about TikTok and the role of social media, and this strange new habit that seems to be to commit these violent offences and put them on social media, which is obviously also very worrying.

In terms of what the Government want to do in response, as I set out, reforming our police so that our police can do what we want them to do and they can implement the legislation that is already there because they have more time is a major priority. That is, in part, about funding neighbourhood police and making sure that we tilt resources in that direction. It is also about freeing up people’s time, so they can get on and do what they need to do.

The Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for Weald of Kent, made the sensible point that there is no point in having legislation just for the sake of it, but there are some changes that we do want to see. As we heard, Spelthorne borough council has a PSPO that includes catapults. That is a really good thing. The Crime and Policing Bill will increase the upper limit on fixed penalty notices for breaches of PSPOs to £500, which gives some more power to that function. People have mixed views about PSPOs—some work; some do not—but making sure that they have teeth is important.

Tackling antisocial behaviour generally is a big priority for this Government, and we are doing that in a number of ways, one of which is being much more savvy when it comes to data—looking at hotspot policing and targeting policing in the areas where crime occurs the most. For that to work, we have to have people reporting crime. So please can the message to all our constituents be: “Do report any crime you see; report it online if that is easier.” We are being increasingly sophisticated in the way that we are responding to crime, and data drives that. If we do not have the data, it makes it harder.

[Jess Brown-Fuller]

The Minister raises a really important point about data. I say the same whenever I am out in my constituency doing Q&As—report, report, report—but there is always a reticence from my constituents, who say that they feel like they are reporting all the time, then they never hear back from the police and they are not sure where the information goes. Also, when they are talking about antisocial behaviour, there is always a concern that it is going to come back on them and they will be identified as the people who are actively reporting these crimes. Can the Minister provide any advice for those constituents who feel anxious about consistently reporting and feel like they are being a burden or a nuisance?

[Sarah Jones]

They are very much not a burden or a nuisance; they are doing their civic duty, for which we are very grateful, and we encourage them to continue to do so. Reporting is absolutely key. I have had similar conversations to the ones that she and, I suspect, all of us have had, particularly when things have gone on for a very long time and people feel there is no point in reporting any more. We now have in each neighbourhood a named officer, who is your person, and you can contact that person. That will hopefully make it a bit easier for people to get in touch.

Crime can be reported online. We would not always want people to ring 999; there are lots of different ways to report crime. As we go on, there need to be better ways to do it. We need to have apps and technology that help people to do things simply when they are reporting, for example, repeat behaviour. Even though it is difficult, and I understand the case made by the hon. Lady in terms of people feeling nervous, the best result is for the people who are committing the crime to be stopped, and they will not be stopped unless the police are there to intervene.

[Lincoln Jopp]

I am grateful to the Minister and conscious of time. Does she agree that, when people are concerned about intimidation and identification, they can ring Crimestoppers anonymously and report in that way?

[Sarah Jones]

The hon. and gallant Member is absolutely right; people can, and I would encourage them to do that.

Respect orders are part of the legislation that we are bringing in. We do not have time to get into this because I want to let the hon. and gallant Member wind up at the end, but respect orders will have a place in terms of repeat antisocial behaviour offenders. We will introduce them in the Bill, pilot them and roll them out. It will be a tougher measure in terms of tackling antisocial behaviour more widely.

On the hon. and gallant Member’s point about whether we should expand the age group eligible for community protection notices, he said that it was a way of intervening without criminalising children, but he also said that, if they breach it, they are then criminalised. The question is: what is the most effective way to get people out of that kind of behaviour? Is it to criminalise them at that point, or is it to intervene in ways that might be more effective, as he said in other parts of his speech?

Of course there need to be consequences, and there is the issue of whether we should list this as a banned weapon. We looked in our meeting at the list of weapons that are banned, and there is a strange mix of slightly peculiar weapons that clearly have been an issue at some points in time. It is an interesting list for people to look at. That is one aspect, but as a Minister who has been in post for less than 100 days, I want to look at this issue more. There is clearly a problem, and we need to consider how we tackle it.

Thames Valley police were mentioned by name. I was with Thames Valley police recently, and they have massively reduced hare coursing through the use of really effective policing. They are using gators—these vehicles that zoom around the country—and drones to see where the hare coursing happens and get there, so I can reassure people that, when the police put their mind to it, they can do incredible things, despite the challenges. I am therefore optimistic that we can tackle this problem together.