Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 10th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

We think it is right that the power should be available, but of course we would expect it to be used proportionately. We would expect the courts to adopt such an approach.

Part 6 provides for the community remedy and community trigger, which will put victims at the heart of the response to low-level crime and antisocial behaviour. The community remedy will give victims a powerful voice in determining the appropriate punishment to be attached to an out-of-court disposal. The community trigger will ensure an effective power to compel local agencies to review their response to repeated instances of antisocial behaviour. The public have a right to expect an appropriate and proportionate response to each reported incident.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Will the Home Secretary confirm that in the areas where the community trigger was piloted there were 44,000 incidents of antisocial behaviour, but that the trigger was successfully activated only 13 times? Does she regard that as a success for the pilots?

[Mrs May]

The whole point about our approach is that we expect the police and other relevant agencies to act when an instance of antisocial behaviour is reported to them. As I am sure hon. Members across the House will have experienced, all too often several instances will be reported without any action appearing to be taken. The community trigger will ensure that a community can get a response. I would hope and expect that the community trigger was not necessary in many instances, because the police and other agencies had reacted to the first report, rather than waiting for several.

[Yvette Cooper]

If the Home Secretary is right that the trigger will guarantee a more rapid response, why does the Bill say it will happen only when there have been at least three complaints, which means that there could be five, 10 or as many as the local police and crime commissioner and council decide?

[Mrs May]

The reason is simple: the Government believe in local discretion in some areas. There is a fundamental difference between the Government and the Opposition over the ability of local areas and police and crime commissioners to be involved in determining what is right for their circumstances and local area. As the right hon. Lady says, we have put a figure in the Bill to indicate when we think a trigger would be appropriate, but it would then be down to the local area to determine. For some time, the Opposition have been saying that the fact that there have not been many instances of community triggers is somehow a failure. Actually, we want antisocial behaviour dealt with on the first report, rather than people waiting and feeling that they have to use the community trigger.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

I will need to come back to my hon. Friend on that point. I do not think that we go into quite that issue in the Bill. The Bill will give the IPCC the powers, but there will obviously be subsidiary ways of operating in relation to this. I will look into the point for her. That is me standing here at the Front Bench and being honest!

This part of the Bill will also require forces, police and crime commissioners and others to respond promptly and publicly to IPCC recommendations. Also, as recommended by Tom Winsor, we shall replace the existing cumbersome and ineffective police negotiating machinery. The new police remuneration review body will help to ensure that we can deliver pay and conditions that are fair to police officers and to the taxpayer.

We are also building on the role of police and crime commissioners as local victims’ champions by conferring on them new powers to commission victims’ services. PCCs are best placed to determine the needs of victims in their communities, and they should be empowered to provide the appropriate support. Finally in this part of the Bill, we will continue the work that we started in the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 to ensure that counter-terrorism powers protect the public, but that they do so in a fair and proportionate manner. As David Anderson, the independent reviewer of terrorist legislation, has reaffirmed, the port and border security powers in the Terrorism Act 2000 are

“an essential tool in the protection of the inhabitants of this country from terrorism”.

Reducing the maximum period of detention from nine to six hours and providing for persons detained at ports to have access to legal advice will ensure that these powers can continue to be exercised proportionately.

We have long needed to make changes to the Extradition Act 2003 in order to make it operate in a fairer and more efficient fashion. Part 11 of the Bill introduces a number of such changes. They are in line with recommendations made in Sir Scott Baker’s independent review of our extradition arrangements and build on the introduction of a forum bar to extradition, which we enacted in the last Session. Among other things, the Bill addresses the current unfairness that can arise from the strict operation of the time limits for serving an appeal against extradition.

The Baker review also confirmed that some of the concerns that have been expressed, including by a number of my hon. Friends, about the proportionality of the European arrest warrant were well founded. As the House will know, this is one of the pre-Lisbon policing and criminal justice measures that we are examining to determine whether it is in the best interests of the British people to continue to be a party to the current arrangements. I hope to make a statement to the House soon about the conclusions of that review and the 2014 decision.

[Yvette Cooper]

Will the Home Secretary confirm that about 900 suspected foreign criminals were deported under the European arrest warrant last year? Does she not think that quite a good thing?

[Mrs May]

It is important that we have the powers that we need to deal with criminality. I am on record as saying that we need to see the deportation and extradition of foreign criminals, but it is also right for the Government —and, in due course, this House—to look at whether the current arrangements are appropriate. Concerns have been raised, not only by Members of Parliament but by Sir Scott Baker, about a number of issues relating to the European arrest warrant, and it is absolutely right that the Government should look at them.

Finally, I want to draw the House’s attention to a couple of the provisions in part 12 of the Bill. One way in which we can free up resources is by increasing the number of police-led prosecutions. Having to pass low-level offences to the Crown Prosecution Service wastes police time. The police already deal with more than 500,000 cases a year in which people plead guilty. Under the provisions in this part, up to a further 50,000 prosecutions for low-level shoplifting offences will be able to be handled by the police, empowering front-line officers and bringing swifter justice for retailers.

In this part of the Bill, we have also clarified the test for determining eligibility for compensation when someone has been the victim of a miscarriage of justice. The absence of a clear statutory definition of what amounts to a miscarriage of justice for these purposes has led to repeated legal challenges and shifting case law. As well as providing greater certainty, the new statutory test will ensure that compensation is paid only to those who are clearly innocent.

Since the day I was appointed Home Secretary, I have had one simple priority for the police: to cut crime. The Bill will help to ensure that the police, working in partnership with others and focusing on the rights of victims and communities, can continue to do precisely that. I commend the Bill to the House.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

We have another parliamentary Session and another Home Office Christmas tree Bill. Last year’s Bill had a bit of crime, a bit of judicial reform, a bit of extradition and a bit of drugs. This year’s has a bit on police standards, a bit on guns and a bit on dogs, but in none of those areas does it go far enough. The Christmas tree decorations cannot hide the fact that the Bill is weak on tackling antisocial behaviour, at a time when the Office for National Statistics shows concern among the public that antisocial behaviour is going up.

There are areas of the Bill that we will support, as well as areas in which we want the Government to go further. We called for the Independent Police Complaints Commission to cover private companies, and we are glad that those provisions are in the Bill. We support the measures relating to the College of Policing, too, although we believe that the Government should go further on police standards. We agree with the Home Affairs Select Committee that new firearms offences are needed for possession of firearms with intent to supply, and we are glad that they are in the Bill.

We agree that forced marriage should never be tolerated. It is a terrible violation and can destroy people’s lives. The law should be strengthened to build on the work done to stop forced marriage, although the Government need to work with experts to get the detail right and also to ensure that cuts to refuges or to legal aid do not undermine the support that victims need in practice.

The central claim for the Bill, as we can see from its title, is that it will tackle antisocial behaviour, and here there are many false promises. Three years ago, the Home Secretary said that she was determined to take action on antisocial behaviour, yet the figures from the Office for National Statistics show that eight out of 10 people say antisocial behaviour is going up, that nearly half say it is going up a lot, and that only one in 10 say it is going down in their area.

So what have the Government done to help? They have cut the community safety funding by nearly two thirds, even though those are the funds that help communities to pay for extra police community support officers, for youth activities, for action against gangs, for extra street lighting and for CCTV. This is the crime prevention investment that helps to save money and police time later on, yet the Government have cut it severely. They have cut it not just by 20% in line with police cuts, or even by 23% in line with the Home Office budget, but by over 60%.

This is all happening at a time when the Government are cutting 15,000 police officers, including more than 7,000 from the most visible units of all. The Home Secretary claimed earlier, in Home Office questions, that a higher proportion of police officers were now on the front line. However, a slightly higher proportion of a much lower number still means fewer police officers, and the proportion who are visible has gone down from 12.3% to 11.8%. The Government are not just cutting police numbers; they are making things harder for them, too.

[Alok Sharma]

I thank the right hon. Lady for giving way, but I really wish she would not keep undermining the police force, which is doing a fantastic job. In the Thames valley, we have had crime down and detection rates up year after year. Why can she not just acknowledge that we have police forces that are doing a great job in some difficult circumstances?

--- Later in debate ---

[Yvette Cooper]

Police officers certainly are working extremely hard in very difficult circumstances. Many of them are finding themselves stretched in very different directions. Chief constables are also working immensely hard to keep their area safe and to reduce crime. However, we need to recognise that at the same time as 15,000 police officers are being cut from the force, we are seeing 30,000 fewer crimes being solved and a big increase in the use of community resolutions for serious and violent crimes. I have to tell the hon. Gentleman that I find that to be a matter of serious concern. It is important to get justice for victims, and that is being put at risk by the Government’s approach.

[Dr Huppert]

It is always very tempting to offer to spend more money to fix all sorts of problems. Is the right hon. Lady making a commitment that the Labour party would spend a huge amount more money on the police, and where would that cash come from?

[Yvette Cooper]

We have said very clearly that we would have reduced the policing budget by around 12% rather than 20% over the course of the current spending review. That would not have led to the reduction of 15,000 police officers over the course of this Parliament. I would also say to the hon. Gentleman that he promised to increase the number of police officers by 3,000—it was in his party’s manifesto. That is what he called for, and he has done the absolute opposite. Government Members have not only reduced police officers on the street; they are making it more difficult for them to fight crime.

[Robert Flello (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)]

On that point, when I talk to police officers in Stoke-on-Trent, who are doing a fine job in extremely difficult circumstances because of all the cuts, and not just to their positions—[Interruption.] I wish the Minister of State, Home Department, the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Mr Browne) would stop chuntering while I am trying to ask a question. Police officers already find themselves in difficult circumstances, yet they also tell me that the toolkit of the various powers available to them is being reduced at the same time. How can that help?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Looked at across the board—whether it be what is happening with DNA or CCTV—Government Members are making it harder for the police to do their job.

After the London riots, CCTV helped to secure huge numbers of convictions. We all know from our constituencies of communities and estates that have worked hard to get CCTV and how it has helped to provide security in those areas, cutting down on antisocial behaviour and abuse. Yet the freedom of information requests put in by my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Gloria De Piero) have shown that one in five councils is now cutting CCTV under a Home Secretary who is wrapping CCTV in a whole load of new red tape. There are already safeguards for residents’ privacy, but the Home Secretary wants a whole load of extra checks, rules and administration just to make sure. The impact assessment produced by the Home Office has found that these new regulations will cost the police and councils £14 million to comply with—and it could be as much as £30 million at a time when resources are so stretched. The Home Secretary, who has already wasted £100 million on the November police and crime commissioner elections now wants to waste up to £30 million making it harder, not easier, to get CCTV. The Home Secretary welcomed extra CCTV in her own constituency three years ago; she should stop making it harder for everyone else to get it.

[Luciana Berger]

Does my right hon. Friend share my pride in the fact that City Watch in Liverpool does such a formidable job with its extensive CCTV network, which is visited by people from not only other cities across the UK, but from across Europe because it is so advanced? It has managed to prosecute people successfully for the crimes that they have committed. Would it not be a shame if other cities and places across the UK could not benefit in the same way as the people of Liverpool have, making ours one of the safest cities in the country?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend is right. We have seen the impact in a whole series of areas—as I said, during the London riots, for example. In fact, at the time of the riots, the Prime Minister said of CCTV:

“We are making technology work for us…And as I said yesterday, no phoney human rights concerns about publishing photographs will get in the way of bringing these criminals to justice.”

It would seem, however, that the Home Secretary is tying herself up in exactly those so-called “phoney human rights concerns” that she has pledged to abolish.

This Bill will not make it easier to tackle antisocial behaviour. The Government are indeed making changes to powers: antisocial behaviour injunctions will be replaced with crime prevention injunctions; public space orders will be replaced with public space protection orders; acceptable behaviour agreements will be replaced with acceptable behaviour contracts; premises closure notices will be replaced by closure notices; and noise abatement notices will be replaced by community protection notices. No set of powers will be perfect, and everyone wants to make sure that the system is as swift and easy to use as possible. The trouble is that the Bill will not achieve that. There is a lot of changing of names and a lot of tinkering at the margins. Some changes may help and make it simpler; others may make it harder while agencies work out how the new processes are supposed to work.

Housing associations, for example, have warned that it will take five years to develop the case law for the new powers to work. The Government’s own figures admit that it will require at least 150,000 hours of police training to use these powers, even though many of them are remarkably similar to the old powers they replaced. The fact is that communities, councils, housing associations, the police and the courts need a wide range of tools to deal with very different problems. The risk for the Home Secretary is that, by trying to squeeze a wide range of problems into a narrow number of powers, she may make it harder to achieve that.

On the one hand, many organisations have written to The Times today to say that they fear this will mean too heavy-handed treatment for the lowest level of antisocial behaviour or nuisance, while on the other hand police officers have raised with me their concern that the powers will not be strong enough to deal with the worst problems. The one-size-fits-all approach has risks.

We need early intervention. We do not want to see young people unnecessarily criminalised or dragged through the courts for low-level problems when it can be sorted out on the spot. We do want to know that persistent, aggressive antisocial behaviour that can terrorise neighbours or residents will be dealt with properly, including by criminal sanctions where needed. Yes, we should have community resolutions and remedies for antisocial behaviour, but they must not be abused.

We know that community resolutions are now being used for serious and violent crimes, including for domestic violence. Last year, community resolutions were used for 33,000 serious and violent crimes, including in 2,500 domestic violence cases, where the Association of Chief Police Officers was clear that they should not be used.

[Alok Sharma]

The right hon. Lady is talking about the views of the police, so let me quote what ACPO said:

“In broad terms the proposals contained within the draft bill are practical, positive, reasonable and balanced.”

What is there not to like?

[Yvette Cooper]

I have to tell the hon. Gentleman that ACPO, like chief constables across the country, will make the best of the approach put to them, but many practitioners across the country have raised the concern that, with changing case law, it will take some time to be able to use the powers as effectively as the previous powers were used.

The Bill does nothing to make sure that community remedies and resolutions are focused on low-level crime. It does nothing to ensure that proper restorative justice, putting victims at the heart of the process, will be pursued or guaranteed. Instead, it risks creating loopholes to let offenders off because overstretched councils and police have not had the resources to sort the problem out.

[Robert Flello]

Does it not send a worrying message to the families of the, on average, two women who die every single week as a result of domestic homicide when 2,500 cases of domestic violence will be treated in this way? Does that not somehow suggest that their loved ones do not count? What sort of message does that send?

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Community resolutions and the purpose of the restorative justice approach, which can be valuable in dealing with antisocial behaviour, are about getting offenders to say sorry to the victims and make it up to them. Yet that is exactly what we do not want in domestic violence cases. We do not want a police-sanctioned process of the perpetrator somehow apologising and making it up to the victim, who will then be expected to accept and go along with the apology, as if that makes it all right. Community resolutions should not be used for domestic violence cases. It is still a serious matter of concern that they continue to be used, despite ACPO’s guidance to the contrary. This is an area where the Home Office needs to step in and make sure that stronger guidance is sent out to chief constables and police forces across the country to make it very clear that community resolutions should not be used for domestic violence.

There are many cases in which ASBOs are not appropriate, but it must also be said that in some of the most serious examples of repeated abuse, they have made a significant difference. For example, an aggressive thug who had repeatedly intimidated residents and shopkeepers in a town centre, had repeatedly ignored warnings from the police and the courts, and had breached his ASBO was taken to the criminal courts and given a custodial sentence, but under the new system he would only be served with an injunction. The council would have to pursue expensive civil action to enforce the injunction, and there would be no criminal offence.

Nor will the community trigger solve the problem. The Home Secretary has made the grand promise that

“The trigger will give victims and communities the right to demand that agencies who had ignored a problem must take action.”

However, the trigger is not strong enough to help. For a start—as I pointed out to the Home Secretary earlier—although the Bill specifies that there must have been “at least three…complaints”, the number could be far higher. Police and crime commissioners could decide on five, 10 or 20. The Home Secretary said that it would be a matter for local discretion, but that local discretion already exists. If it were simply a matter for local discretion, she would allow people to choose to set up community triggers, and she would not be legislating. Either she thinks that this is a matter for local discretion and it is up to those people to decide, or she thinks that there should be minimum standards, but something as weak and wishy-washy as “at least three…complaints” is not really a minimum standard at all. This is a con. Even if the magic threshold is passed, what are residents entitled to? A review. How reassuring.

In the five areas that have piloted the community trigger, where there have been 44,000 incidents of antisocial behaviour, the trigger has been successfully activated 13 times—in response to not just less than 1% of complaints, not just less than 0.1%, but 0.03%. This measure will not have a big impact on the antisocial behaviour problems that persist in communities throughout the country.

When the Home Secretary made her speech on antisocial behaviour three years ago, she said:

“The solution to your community’s problems will not come from officials sitting in the Home Office working on the latest national action plan.”

That is certainly true. If the Bill is the nearest that the Home Office gets to its latest national action plan, it will make it harder, not easier, to solve community problems.

There are two respects in which the Bill has missed the opportunity to deal with some serious problems, and I urge Ministers to look at those again. The first is the problem of dangerous dogs, a subject on which a series of interventions were made on the Home Secretary’s speech. We support the measures that will extend the law to private property, but that is not enough. As the Home Secretary will know, the number of attacks has been rising, and there have been tragic fatal attacks. In the last two years, we have seen killings such as those of 18-month-old Zumer Ahmed and 71-year-old Gloria Knowles, who was mauled by dogs. Last week I met the family of 14-year-old Jade Anderson, who was tragically killed in an attack by dangerous dogs. I pay tribute to Jade’s family, who are campaigning for the strengthening of the law.

The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, a number of charities, and the families of victims killed in dangerous dog attacks want dog control notices to be introduced. I listened carefully to what the Home Secretary said, but the problem is that experts have not been convinced by her argument that wider powers can be used, and that it will not take long to build up case law and make it easy for those powers to be applied. Of course dog control notices will not stop every attack, but they could make it easier for earlier preventive action to be taken. They are working in Scotland, and I urge the Home Secretary to consider the issue again during the Bill’s passage.

I hope that the Home Secretary will think again about firearms as well. As she will know, last year Susan McGoldrick, her sister Alison Turnbull and her niece Tanya were murdered by Susan’s partner, Michael Atherton, with a shotgun that he was licensed to own. Michael Atherton had a history of violence and abuse towards Susan McGoldrick, and he should never have been allowed to own a gun. Alison’s son, Bobby Tumbull, is campaigning for a change in the law.

The Home Office has rightly strengthened the guidance for gun applications, but it does not go far enough. It relies on interviews with family members who may still be living in fear of abuse. Why should anyone with a history of domestic violence be allowed to own a gun? Why should that guidance not be underpinned by legislation? We cannot legislate in Parliament to prevent every tragedy or every terrible crime, but we can seek to learn lessons when tragedies happen. We can listen to victims and their families, and we can work with them to make things safer in future.

We will not vote against the Bill’s Second Reading, but we think that it needs to be stronger. People want stronger action against antisocial behaviour, rather than the watering down of powers. They want more protection for victims, not just delayed reviews and loopholes for offenders if police resources are tight. They want more action against domestic violence, and more action against dangerous dogs. That requires more action from the Home Office, and more action from the Home Secretary. They need to do more to support communities, and they should do so in this Bill.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

Home Affairs

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Thursday 9th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

If the hon. Lady cares to look at the figures, she will see that there has been a significant increase in the number of appeals by foreign national prisoners, which is delaying their deportation. That is exactly why this Government are bringing forward measures in the immigration Bill to deal with the appeals system, and I hope that those on the Opposition Front Bench will support them.

One of the most fundamental injustices of the present system is one that many Members will be aware of from the complaints of their constituents. It is the extent to which immigrants can call on publicly funded services without having made any contribution to the system that provides them. Our system is one of universal provision, and it will remain so under this Government, but it is also one that requires some contribution to be made in order for that provision to be accessed. That is the basic principle of justice that underpins the system, but it is a principle that has been flouted. When the Bill becomes law, it will be respected.

The Bill will ensure that temporary migrants and others will not be able to have free access to the NHS until they have made at least some contribution to the Exchequer. Furthermore, the Bill will strengthen legislation that penalises businesses that employ illegal immigrants. It is obviously unfair that those who are not entitled to be in Britain should be able to take jobs that ought to be filled by people who are so entitled. The Bill will strengthen our ability to enforce penalties on employers that have used illegal workers. It will also confirm that a migrant must have lawful immigration status of more than six months to qualify for a UK driving licence.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

On the Home Secretary’s point about businesses that employ illegal migrants, will she explain why the number of businesses fined for so doing has dropped by 40% since the general election?

[Mrs May]

The rate of certain aspects of prosecutions taking place in relation to certain individuals has actually been higher under this Government than it was under the last Labour Government. That is one of the areas—[Interruption.] I have to say that I am not sure—

--- Later in debate ---

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Once again in the Queen’s Speech we have heard grand claims, from the Home Secretary and indeed from the Prime Minister yesterday, about what their plans will do on immigration, antisocial behaviour, law and order, and justice. Sadly, however, the grand claims are simply not backed up by the reality of what they are doing.

The trouble is that we have been here before. We all remember how in this Government’s first Queen’s Speech the Home Secretary brought us the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill. She said that it would give the police

“a strong democratic mandate from the ballot box”.—[Official Report, 13 December 2010; Vol. 520, c. 708.]

Instead, she spent £100 million on shambolic elections and only one in eight people turned out to vote, which was hardly a ringing endorsement.

Let us remember, too, what the Home Secretary said about her counter-terror legislation. She said:

“Public safety is enhanced, not diminished, by appropriate and proportionate powers.”—[Official Report, 7 June 2011; Vol. 529, c. 69.]

Instead, she brought terror suspects back to London and on Boxing day one of them ran off in a black cab and no one has seen him since. Let us remember how she promised that Abu Qatada would soon be on a plane, yet we are all still waiting. She promised there would be no cuts to front-line police, yet more than 5,000 officers have already gone from 999 response and neighbourhood teams. Time and again, the rhetoric does not match the reality.

The Home Secretary talked about the data communications Bill—that is, the missing data communications Bill. Here is what she said about that Bill less than six months ago:

“This law is needed and it is needed now. And I am determined to see it through.”

She also said:

“But Sun readers should know that I will not allow these vitally important laws to be delayed any longer in this Parliament.”

Instead, all that that the Queen’s Speech briefing says is that the Government are working with companies and

“It may involve legislation”—

“may”—it “may”; that is clearly the problem.

[Dr Huppert]

The shadow Home Secretary has carefully avoided saying what the Labour party policy is on the data communications Bill. Two days ago, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), the former Labour Home Secretary, said that if Labour had won the last election it would have introduced such a measure. Is that her position? Can she enlighten us?

[Yvette Cooper]

The hon. Gentleman should contain himself to squabbling within his coalition and struggling to get some answers. We have always said that action will be needed to ensure that the police can keep up with changing technology. However, the draft data communications Bill drawn up by the Home Secretary was far too wide; it gave the Home Secretary far too many powers and there were far too few safeguards for privacy. It was absolutely right that something had to be done, but that Bill was not the right approach. We must wait to see what approach the Home Secretary will now take, because Government Members are squabbling so much among themselves that the result is a shambolic approach to a serious issue. Time and again, that is what we see: there is strong rhetoric from the Home Secretary, and then the reality simply does not stack up.

It is the same when we come to the so-called “flagship” immigration Bill. We now discover that the Bill will not be published until the autumn, because the Government have obviously still not worked out what on earth to do about it. This is an area where we agree that action is needed. Yesterday, the Government told us that the Bill would have five central elements, but now it turns out that three already exist and will not require primary legislation, and two are merely proposals for consultation.

On jobseeker’s allowance, the Government are replicating the exact words in existing regulations. When the Health Secretary was asked about the NHS, all he could say was that he promised to examine the extent of the problem and do an audit. On private landlords, the Government cannot tell us how their policy will be enforced, because they do not know who the landlords are and they will not have a statutory register. Time and time again this Queen’s Speech has not set out the detailed proposals that we need. Instead of “flagship” Bills, all we have are proposals that seem to have been sketched out on the back of a fag packet—no wonder the Government wanted to get rid of the cigarette packaging legislation.

[Mrs May]

The right hon. Lady has made an attempt at two jokes during her speech, which is probably two more than we normally have. I have a simple question for her: does she agree that net migration was too high under the previous Labour Government?

[Yvette Cooper]

We have already said that the pace of migration was too fast and that the level should come down; we have supported measures in that regard. However, although the Home Secretary has made grand claims about net migration and the Immigration Minister is attempting to do the same, they will recognise that two thirds of their drop in net migration is a result of an increase in British citizens leaving the country and fewer British citizens returning home.

Let me quote the numbers to the Home Secretary; she is on the edge of her seat, itching to intervene. In fact, the drop in net migration has been 72,000. Of those, 27,000 more Brits are leaving the country and 20,000 fewer Brits are coming home. Is she proud of a set of policies that have driven British people out of the country? I will give way to her if she wants to respond to that point.

[Mrs May]

On that statistical point, I suggest the right hon. Lady looks at what the Office for National Statistics said, which was that it was not the emigration of British people that led to the drop in net migration. We have reduced net migration by a third. I think she said that she accepted that net migration was too high under the Labour Government. Will she now apologise for that?

[Yvette Cooper]

The Home Secretary is targeting net migration, which she knows is affected by British people leaving the country—by people leaving as well as people arriving. I state the figures again: a 72,000 drop, 27,000 more Brits leaving the country and 20,000 fewer coming home. People obviously do not want to come back to Britain under her Government. That is the problem that she has to face.

[Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire) (Con)]

Does the right hon. Lady accept that it is utterly astonishing that she is not apologising to the British people for creating such an enormous amount of heartache and grief for them? Rather than encouraging my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary in her attempts to put right the failings of the right hon. Lady’s Government, she is standing there and criticising. Should she not be apologising?

[Yvette Cooper]

Nice try from the hon. Lady, but the facts show that there is a series of problems in this Government’s measures on immigration. I agree that we should have had transitional controls on migration from eastern Europe. There are things that the Labour Government should have done but which did not happen. They should have happened.

We should have people working together. There are many areas on which we agree with the Government and will support the measures that they are taking, but look at what has happened, particularly on illegal immigration. The number of people refused entry dropped by 50%. The number of people absconding through Heathrow passport control trebled. The number caught afterwards halved. The backlog in finding failed asylum seekers has gone up. The number of illegal immigrants deported has gone down. This is not a catalogue of success on immigration from the right hon. Lady’s Government.

[Nick de Bois (Enfield North) (Con)]

rose—

[Yvette Cooper]

I will give way to the hon. Gentleman, then I want to make some progress.

[Nick de Bois]

The shadow Minister was bandying around figures about net migration and people leaving this country. She might do well to remember that in the 10 years of her Government, 2 million people aged 25 to 44—the most economically active—left this country, and she has the cheek to lecture us about people not wanting to come back.

[Yvette Cooper]

As the hon. Gentleman will recognise, people are travelling and trading more than ever. That is why immigration is an important issue for our future and why we must get the policies right. A policy that targets net migration means that the Government can claim to have made huge progress on the things that the British people care about when they are failing to tackle exploitation in the labour market and failing to tackle illegal immigration, which is not even measured in the net migration statistics. Illegal immigration can go on getting worse and worse, yet the Immigration Minister can make more and more claims about his target, and the result is that he is not listening to the real issues that people are concerned about, particularly on illegal immigration.

There are serious issues on immigration, crime and justice that should be addressed in this Queen’s Speech and we support action in all these areas. I shall cover each of them. We want to support many of the Government’s measures, although we will scrutinise the detail. We support action to stop the terrible crime of forced marriage and the right hon. Lady will agree that it is important to get the legislation right. We support action on dangerous dogs, though we will wait to see whether it goes far enough and to look at the detail of her proposals.

We welcome action on fire arms, but what is the Home Secretary doing to stop people with a history of domestic violence owning a gun? We need an answer for Bobby Turnbull, whose mother, aunt and sister were tragically killed by Michael Atherton, who was granted a gun licence despite his history of abuse. We agree, too, with more support and rehabilitation for offenders, but where is the evidence that these untested massive private contracts will work? When the Justice Secretary tried it for the Work programme, it proved worse than doing nothing at all, and when the Home Secretary tried it for the Olympics, she ended up calling in the troops.

Time and again the promises do not match the practice. The right hon. Lady promises action on antisocial behaviour, yet she is weakening powers, not strengthening them. There will be no criminal sanction if antisocial behaviour measures are repeatedly breached. She promises that the community trigger will make a difference in persistent cases, yet in the pilots it was hardly ever used. Out of 23,000 incidents of antisocial behaviour in Manchester, the trigger was implemented three times. In Richmond it was not used at all.

Yet still there is nothing to deal with the serious consequences for justice of the police cuts and the policies that the Government have pursued. For nearly 10 years, the proportion of crimes brought to justice went up. In 2002, 18% of crimes were solved, and that rose to more than 30% by the 2010 election. Crime fell, but a higher proportion of crimes were solved. Not any more. We all want crime to keep falling, but we need support and justice for victims too. The proportion of crimes brought to justice has fallen since the election. There are 15,000 fewer police officers, 200,000 fewer arrests and 30,000 fewer crimes solved, and some of the most serious crimes of all have not been followed up or offenders have been let off.

The Queen’s Speech proposes to expand community resolutions for things such as antisocial behaviour, and we support more action in the community to resolve low-level crimes or antisocial behaviour—people apologising to victims and making reparations. But it must not become a short cut for dealing with serious and violent crime because there are not enough police to do the job, and that is what is happening on the Home Secretary’s watch. The number of serious and violent offenders let off after they said sorry has gone up massively since the cuts started—up from 13,000 to 33,000 in just three years. Yet it goes against all the guidance from the Association of Chief Police Officers. ACPO says that it should not be used at all for domestic violence because it

“represents serious risk to the victims of such offences and is often subject to a complex and protracted investigation”.

That is too right. We know the pattern in many domestic violence cases: the offender apologises and says he will never do it again and that he really, really loves her, until the next time, when he hits her all over again. The criminal justice system must not sanction that. Yet that is exactly what happened 2,700 times last year—a fivefold increase since before the election and before the cuts started; a fivefold increase in the number of cases where a domestic violence offender was let off after they said sorry.

What was the response from Ministers? The Home Office has refused to issue new guidance, to set safeguards, to raise the matter with ACPO, and to rethink police cuts. Instead it says that it is a

“matter for Chief Constables. Through crime maps and police and crime commissioners, the public now have the means to hold them to account.”

That is reassuring. The police are overstretched, violent offenders are getting off, but at least we can Google it, and at least people get a vote in three years’ time. That is not an acceptable response to a serious problem.

On immigration, the grand claims do not match the reality either. We support action in many of the areas that the Government have talked about and we will scrutinise the legislation when it finally comes forward. Concerns about immigration are genuine and Parliament should respond. The pace of immigration has been too fast and we support measures to bring immigration down, particularly from low-skilled migration. But I hope that the Home Secretary will agree that Britain has benefited from people coming to our shores through the generations and contributing to this country. From our great scientists to the founders of our most successful businesses, from our great artists to our Olympic gold medallists, people who have worked hard for this country have boosted our society, our culture and our economy too.

As people travel and trade more than ever in future, in global markets, immigration will be important to Britain’s future as well. It is because immigration is important that it needs to be controlled and managed so that it is fair for all. We supported the proposals on article 8 when they were passed through Parliament last year. Article 8 is a qualified right and it is reasonable for Parliament to say how that should be balanced, especially when crimes have been committed, and we will work further with the Home Secretary in this area. But she should not pretend that the Government’s failure to deport foreign criminals is all because of the Human Rights Act. In fact, the number of foreign prisoners deported has fallen by 800 a year since the election, and she has herself admitted that only a minority of cases involve successful appeals under article 8. Far more often the problem is lost paperwork and administrative incompetence, problems that have been getting worse not better on her watch.

Nor has the Home Secretary set out proper plans to deal with exploitation in the labour market and illegal immigration. I hope that she will now introduce the powers that we put forward for borders enforcement staff in the Bill last year. I also hope that there will be action to close the loopholes on student visitor visas, and further action to deal with the fewer illegal migrants deported, more absconding at the border and fewer cases of illegal migrants reported to the Home Office simply not being followed up.

[Kelvin Hopkins]

I strongly agree with what my right hon. Friend is saying, but does she not accept that we must argue the case for a substantial increase in staffing to deal with all those matters?

--- Later in debate ---

[Yvette Cooper]

It is significant that the Home Office has cut around 5,000 staff from the UK Border Agency, and we have seen the consequences, for example in the growing delays for business people, who need visas rapidly, and longer delays and problems with appeals.

Crucially, we also need action to deal with the exploitation of migrant workers to undercut local staff. Where is the action to enforce the minimum wage? Where are the measures to extend gangmasters licensing? Where are the measures to stop agencies recruiting only from abroad? Where are the measures to stop employers using overcrowded housing to get around the minimum wage? Higher fines for businesses employing illegal labour are right, but they are no use if enforcement has dropped by more than 800 companies since the general election.

Let us also be clear that UK Independence party policies would make the situation worse. It wants to end statutory paid holidays, redundancy pay and maternity leave. Getting rid of those entitlements would be deeply unfair. Also, to do so would make it easier, not harder, for employers to exploit migrant workers and undercut local terms and conditions. The truth is that neither the Tories nor UKIP are willing to address the real problem of exploitation and the practical issues that trouble people because they are simply in a race to the bottom in the labour market and in the economy. If they really are concerned about deporting foreign criminals, why are they all determined to opt out of the European arrest warrant, just because it has the word Europe in the title, and even though it was responsible for the swift deportation of 900 suspected foreign criminals last year for trial back home? The reality is that those policies are not driven by facts, justice or a serious concern to get immigration policy right.

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

On the question of deporting foreign-born criminals to serve the balance of their sentence in their home countries, does my right hon. Friend agree that, given that most of the prisoner swap agreements we have with non-EU countries need the prisoner’s permission, it is difficult to see how the Government will achieve anything with that stated policy?

[Yvette Cooper]

We are still waiting to see the detail of the Government’s policy, because in so many of these areas we get strong rhetoric but the reality does not add up to it, and often it does not even emerge.

The Home Secretary might think that she is fending off the threat from UKIP, but actually she is doing the opposite. The more she ramps up the rhetoric and widens the gap between it and reality, the more she increases public concern and the more sceptical people become. This is no time for an arms race on immigration rhetoric. Instead, we need fair and sensible policies that will make things better, not worse.

Let me raise one final immigration issue with the Home Secretary. We agree with the sentiment in the Queen’s Speech that those who come here should contribute, but what about those who have already contributed to this country by risking their lives and those of their families for our troops and our nation, and many of those are still doing so? What about the Afghan interpreters who have supported our troops and face threats from the Taliban as our troops pull out? When we left Iraq, we recognised the debt we owed those interpreters. The Americans, the Australians and the New Zealanders are all recognising their obligations to the interpreters. Surely she should show a similar sense of honour and add to the Queen’s Speech a settlement scheme for the Afghan interpreters, to whom we and our troops owe so much? We will support her if she does.

This is a Queen’s Speech that fails to provide the answers on law and order. It fails to provide the answers we need on immigration. It fails to provide help for family living standards. It fails to provide the boost our flatlining economy so badly needs. Once all the pomp and ceremony has passed, the reality of the Queen’s Speech is looking pretty thin. The Home Secretary, like the Prime Minister and the Chancellor, talks tough but does not deliver. As the hon. Member for Rochester and Strood (Mark Reckless) said, she

“talks the talk but does not walk the walk.”

On the Opposition side, we could not agree more.

Abu Qatada

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Wednesday 24th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I thank the Home Secretary for advance sight of her statement.

The Home Secretary and the courts have agreed that Abu Qatada is a dangerous man who puts security in this country at risk, and the House is united in wanting him deported to stand fair trial in Jordan so that justice can be done and in wanting him to remain in prison in the meantime. I welcome the work that she continues to do to get Abu Qatada deported and the further assurances that she has sought from Jordan, although she will know that the history of Home Office problems in this area means that serious questions remain.

The Home Secretary referred to the European Court judgment of January 2012, which she has previously said she strongly disagrees with. Once that passed, she had two choices: to appeal against its conclusions about the level of proof that the British Government needed to provide before Abu Qatada could be deported or to provide enough evidence from Jordan that she could meet that level of proof. So far, the Home Office has not managed to do either. I welcome this further work with Jordan, but the question for the House and the Court will be whether it meets the specific test that the Court has set.

The Special Immigration Appeals Commission ruled six months ago:

“Until and unless a change is made to the…Code of Criminal Procedure and/or authoritative rulings are made by the Court of Cassation or Constitutional Court which establish that statements made to a public prosecutor by accomplices who are no longer subject to criminal proceedings cannot be admitted probatively against a returning fugitive and/or that it is for the prosecutor to prove to a high standard that the statements were not procured by torture, that real risk will remain.”

Will the Home Secretary tell us more about how the new mutual legal assistance agreement will meet those tests? The treaty refers to the obligation on the prosecution, but will she explain whether and how this will be an equivalent of a change to the code of criminal procedure, and whether it will supersede any ruling made by the court of cassation or the constitutional court? We wish the Home Secretary well with the mutual legal assistance treaty, and we hope that it will work. We will support it in the House, and suggest that we hold a debate and a vote in the Commons to demonstrate the strength of support that exists across the House.

Let me ask the Home Secretary more about her approach to the European Court. Everyone agrees that the European Courts have taken way too long over this, as did the British courts—that has rightly been seen as a source of frustration for Home Secretaries—but will she tell us again why she chose, in January 2012, not to appeal against the judgment that she said she disagreed with? I ask her again to show shadow Ministers and the relevant Select Committee Chairs, on Privy Council terms, the legal advice on why she did not appeal. Until she does so, doubts will remain about her legal strategy and about the credibility of her criticism of the European Court.

Will the Home Secretary also tell us whether she is planning to withdraw temporarily from the European convention on human rights, as has been suggested in briefings from No. 10 to the media, and how she would justify such a decision when she has chosen not to appeal against the European Court’s decisions?

The Home Secretary must forgive us for being cautious about her claims and assurances today when some of her previous promises on this matter have been overblown. Twelve months ago, we remember the media being invited to Abu Qatada’s arrest as she told the House that

“today Qatada has been arrested and the deportation is under way”.—[Official Report, 17 April 2012; Vol. 543, c. 173.]

However, within 24 hours, the process had stalled. We also remember her saying last year:

“The Government are clear that Qatada has no right to refer the case to the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights, since the three-month deadline to do so lapsed at midnight on Monday.”—[Official Report, 19 April 2012; Vol. 543, c. 507.]

However, the European Court said that the request had been submitted within the three-month time limit. And 12 months ago, she also told us:

“I believe that the assurances and the information that we have gathered will mean that we can soon put Qatada on a plane and get him out of our country for good.”—[Official Report, 17 April 2012; Vol. 543, c. 175.]

Today, however, we are back to a legal square one again, going through the deportation process.

We want to work with the Home Secretary to make the process work, so that Abu Qatada can be deported as soon as possible. In the past, however, she has overstated the evidence, overstated her legal position, and overstated her legal strategy, which has not worked. None of us wants that to happen again.

[Mrs May]

May I say in response to the shadow Home Secretary’s first question that she should perhaps listen to what she herself said in her statement? She said that SIAC had suggested that there should be a change to a number of aspects of Jordanian law and/or a change to the obligations on the prosecutor. It is such a change to the obligations on the prosecutor that is in the mutual legal assistance agreement that I have signed with Jordan and that has been laid before both Houses of Parliament, and that will therefore deal with that particular issue.

The right hon. Lady asked about the failure to appeal to the European Court. She has raised that issue before and I have answered her before. She seems to think that I should have appealed to the Grand Chamber of the European Court, but that would have jeopardised the Government’s wider deportation with assurances programme and risked the blockage of many other deportation cases. She should also look at what she has previously said on this issue. What she is saying today is not what she was saying last year. In this House, on 17 April last year, she said of me:

“I welcome the assurances that she has obtained from Jordan. Previous agreements were in place, but she was right to pursue further assurances.”

If she thought we should have appealed to the Grand Chamber, why did she think that we needed to pursue those assurances? If that is not clear, she should also remember what else she said:

“We understand, too, that the Home Secretary believes it is too risky to appeal to the Grand Chamber. I understand she would have had legal advice on that, and I do not want her to pursue an unwise and risky process”.

The right hon. Lady asked about the relationship with the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. The House will know that it is my clear view that we need to fix that relationship and that all options, including leaving the convention altogether, should be on the table. The Prime Minister is looking at all options, and that is the only sensible thing to do.

There are a number of questions for the right hon. Lady. She talked about why this did not happen sooner, and we have heard all sorts of claims from the shadow Home Secretary and the shadow Immigration Minister about what I have said. A year ago, I said in this House:

“hon. Members must be aware that”

what I was announcing at that time

“does not necessarily mean that he”—

Abu Qatada—

“will be on a plane to Jordan within days. There is still a potential avenue of appeal to the Special Immigration Appeals Commission court, and beyond. That appeal process could take many months”.—[Official Report, 17 April 2012; Vol. 543, c. 175-6.]

I have to tell the right hon. Lady that simply repeating something and wanting it to be true does not make it true; she should look at what was actually said here.

Finally, the right hon. Lady herself has to answer some questions. Does she support what the Government have done? [Interruption.] The right hon. Lady says she wants a vote. I am asking her very clearly whether she believes that the Government have taken the right course of action in what we have done. Beyond that, will the Opposition support what we want to do, which is to strip out appeal rights for foreign nationals, or not? Will we have a cross-party agreement that we need to deal with the issue of the length of time deportations take? We could do that by taking out layers of appeal. Perhaps even more significantly, will the Opposition agree with us that we need to sort out our human rights laws, which were passed by their Government?

This mutual legal assistance agreement with Jordan has clauses within it that, as I say, address the issue raised by the SIAC court and the European Court about Abu Qatada. I hope that the right hon. Lady will support the Government—not just on this case, but in sorting out our human rights laws and our processes of deportation.

UK Border Agency

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

Today we have had a statement made rather in haste by the Home Secretary after yesterday’s major speech from the Prime Minister barely mentioned these reforms. Only after the Prime Minister’s speech was dismissed in the media as “smoke and mirrors”, as “unravelling” and as allowing “politics to trump policy” and only after yesterday’s damning report from the Home Affairs Committee on the effectiveness of the UK Border Agency has the Home Secretary suddenly decided to rush this statement out before the Easter recess.

The Home Secretary is right that action is needed to sort out problems at UKBA, which has had a series of problems over many years. We would have some sympathy with her proposals, but the problem is that she refuses to recognise that problems with enforcement and effectiveness at UKBA have got worse, not better on her watch. Enforcement has got worse, visa delays have got worse and 50% fewer people are being refused entry at ports and borders. She says that the number of illegal immigrants removed does not keep up with the number who are here illegally, but that is because she is letting rather more of them in. The number of people absconding through Heathrow passport control has trebled and the number being caught afterwards has halved on her watch.

We have had a 16% drop in the number of foreign prisoners deported, we have had a big drop in the number of employers being fined for employing illegal workers, and what is her remedy today? She plans to split UKBA into two different organisations. We have been here before. She has already split UKBA once: just 12 months ago she split it into the Border Agency and the Border Force and made a lot of promises. The Minister for Immigration would like us to believe that it has all gone hunky dory and that things are much better since then, but what has happened since last year’s split? Queues at the borders went up and the Border Force presided over some of the longest queues our airports have seen, with people waiting more than two hours to get their passports checked.

Things got worse at the Border Agency, too. The Select Committee’s report showed a 20% increase in the backlog of asylum cases in three months, a 53% increase in number of asylum cases waiting more than six months compared with the previous year, an increase in delays for tier 1 and tier 4 in-country visa applications compared with the previous three months and 59,000 cases not even entered on the database. As the Committee said, 28,000 visa applications were not processed on time in one three-month period—that is two thirds of visa applications not processed on time. In the words of the Committee:

“The Agency must explain to Parliament what has gone wrong throughout 2012”.

The Home Secretary’s reforms and her cuts are what have gone wrong throughout 2012, so why should we believe that the latest round of reforms will do any better?

The Home Secretary has cut UKBA’s budget by 34% since the election, so little wonder it is struggling to keep up. Will she answer the following questions? When will the reforms be completed and how much they will cost? Her last reforms to split the Border Force and the Border Agency cost money rather than saving money. How many more illegal migrants will be deported as a result of the reforms? The figure has dropped by 20% since the election. How much will it increase by as a result of the reforms? How long will legitimate migrants have to wait for their visas? Will those delays be cut or will they increase? How long will the waits on asylum claims be? There was a 50% increase in long waits last year. What will she get that down to? These are the practical questions to which we want answers.

So far under this Home Secretary, the only strategy we have had for border control has been cuts and cuts, splits and splits. But performance has got worse. When she was in opposition, she said to a former Immigration Minister:

“I’m sick and tired of government ministers…who simply blame other people when things go wrong.”

So, will she recognise the things that have gone wrong since the election on her watch and give us practical information about and targets for putting them right and tell us what the improvements in performance will be?

We have had a lot of rhetoric on immigration from the Home Secretary but—this is really important—we need her to get the basics right and to do it now.

Oral Answers to Questions

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

We looked at this issue closely and what is clear is that in a significant number of cases the initial decision was not wrong on the basis of the information available at the time it was taken; in so many cases further information is put into the system between the initial decision and the appeal, and the appeal is then decided on a different basis. It is slightly cheaper, and it will take less time, for individuals to make a further application rather than going through the appeals process. As this is the only part of the visit visa system that has this appeal, we think it is right that we change the rules for this particular category.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

May I, too, give our thanks for the work that Jonathan Evans has done over many years for the security of this country? The Prime Minister has spoken today about immigration, and it is right to have conditions on benefits and public services, but will the Home Secretary confirm that she has no estimate of how many people, if any, will see any change in their jobseeker’s entitlement as a result? Will she also tell us why the number of employers fined for employing illegal workers has dropped by 42% since the election?

[Mrs May]

The Prime Minister has made a wide-ranging speech today, in which he has referred to a number of areas where the Government will be taking action to ensure that the United Kingdom is not seen as a soft touch and that people who come here are coming to contribute to our society and to our economy—that will be across the board in relation to benefits and to matters such as access to the health service.

[Yvette Cooper]

The Home Secretary did not answer my questions about whether the policies will have any impact, how many people will be affected by the new policies or why enforcement has become consistently worse since the election. Unannounced checks have fallen by more than 30%, the number of foreign criminals deported has fallen by 16% and there has been a 50% drop in the number of those refused entry to Britain since the election as well as a 50% increase in the number of long waits for asylum decisions. There is also the point I raised with her initially: the number of employers employing illegal workers being fined has dropped by some 40% since the election. What will the Home Secretary do to improve enforcement and the effectiveness of the system so that people can have confidence that it is working? It has got worse since the election, not better, so what is she doing to improve enforcement?

Alcohol: Minimum Unit Price

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Thursday 14th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the Government’s policy on alcohol pricing?

[The Minister of State, Home Department (Mr Jeremy Browne)]

I am aware that there have been a significant number of media reports and stories in recent days about the Government’s proposal to introduce a minimum unit price, and I am grateful for the opportunity to clarify the Government’s position.

The Government are determined to find the best way to diminish the misuse of alcohol. Over 44% of violent crime is alcohol-related. Fighting, antisocial behaviour and public drunkenness are familiar sights in many city centres, and there were 1.2 million alcohol-related hospital admissions in 2010-11. That is the context of our policy making and our inheritance from the previous Government. In March last year the Government published our alcohol strategy, which set out a range of measures to tackle the harms caused by excessive alcohol consumption.

The Government have already introduced a wide set of reforms to tackle binge drinking and the corrosive effect it has on individuals and our communities.  We have done the following: rebalanced the Licensing Act 2003 in favour of local communities by, for instance, removing the “vicinity test” to ensure that anyone, no matter where they live, can have input into a decision to grant or revoke a licence; introduced a late-night levy, making those businesses that sell alcohol late at night contribute to the cost of policing and wider local authority action; and introduced the early-morning alcohol restriction order, enabling local areas to restrict the sale of alcohol late at night in all or part of their area if there are problems.

The Home Office has also recently consulted on a range of new proposals set out in its alcohol strategy—this is a wide-ranging consultation—and it includes a ban on multibuy promotions in shops and off-licences to reduce excessive alcohol consumption; a review of the mandatory licensing conditions to ensure they are sufficiently targeting problems such as irresponsible promotions in pubs and clubs; health as a new alcohol licensing objective for cumulative impacts, so that licensing authorities can consider alcohol-related health harms when managing the problems relating to the number of premises in their area; cutting red tape for responsible businesses to reduce the burden of regulation, while maintaining the integrity of the licensing system; and the introduction of a minimum unit price.

The public consultation opened on 28 November— I imagine that all Members present contributed to it, given their interest in the subject—and closed on 6 February. We received a large number of responses covering a very wide range of views, including from members of the public, the police and licensing authorities, health organisations, alcohol producers and retailers, trade bodies and charities.

On minimum unit pricing, there were—and are, in my view—powerful arguments on both sides of the debate. We have to ensure that we base our decision on a careful consideration of all the representations we received. We are evaluating the data precisely and we will announce our decision when this careful evaluation is completed.

[Yvette Cooper]

I asked what the Government’s policy was on alcohol pricing and I am still none the wiser. Yesterday, the Prime Minister said,

“we must deal with the problem of 20p or 25p cans of lager…in supermarkets”—[Official Report, 13 March 2013; Vol. 560, c. 307.]

But the Home Secretary has briefed that she has blocked minimum price plans. The Health Secretary said yesterday,

“Like the Prime Minister I believe there is a case for minimum pricing”,

but we have no idea what they are doing, and it seems that the Minister does not, either. And where is the Home Secretary? I have to say that I feel sorry for the Minister, who has been sent here to waffle to the world while the Home Secretary hides. She was skulking at Prime Minister’s questions yesterday, and her office will not tell me where she is today. There is something Macavity-like about this Home Secretary.

What kind of mug is the Minister? War has clearly broken out between the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister, but while they hide in their trenches, the Liberal Democrats once again have been sent over the top. The Home Secretary was quick enough to come to this House when the policy was first announced. It was her policy; she supported it. When she set the price nine months later, she had no doubt. The Home Office document said that the Government are

“committed to introducing a minimum unit price. However, in other areas”

this consultation

“seeks views on the introduction of policies.”

So they were not consulting on the minimum price—they had made a decision.

We know that the Home Secretary has overruled the Prime Minister; it appears she has also overruled herself. It was her plan; she has announced it twice. She said she was committed to it; now, she says the opposite. It is clear that this right hon. Lady is for turning—just not for turning up.

Alcohol abuse is very serious: to public health, and to law and order. We said that the Government were right to look at minimum pricing, but they needed to make sure that supermarkets did not just get a windfall and that the pub trade would not be harmed. They needed to look at the evidence and make sure the policies were workable. Instead, we have chaos and political confusion, and I ask the Minister again: what is the Government’s policy on alcohol pricing? The Prime Minister’s authority is in tatters; the Home Secretary’s credibility is in tatters; and the rest of us, including the Minister, do not have a clue what is going on.

[Mr Browne]

I read in the papers that the right hon. Lady fancies herself as the leader of her party. That was not a particularly impressive application. I am here as the Minister responsible for alcohol policy. She said she has no idea what the policy is, but I have just spent five minutes explaining it. There was a lot of barracking from Labour MPs because they thought I was explaining it in excessive detail—that was how I understood it. I have explained the policy carefully. There is a consultation on the areas that I mentioned. The question people want answered is: what on earth is Labour’s policy on this? [Interruption.]

Oral Answers to Questions

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Browne]

My hon. Friend is quite right to draw attention to this abhorrent crime. He uses the commonly received expression, but I urge everybody to stop using it, as there is nothing honourable at all about this form of criminal activity. It is part of the overall approach that the Government are taking to try to combat violence against women and girls. He will know that the Government have ring-fenced nearly £40 million of stable funding up to 2015 for a range of tasks of this type, including for the area he has raised.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

It is “One Billion Rising” today, and the Minister’s response to the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) was simply not good enough. We have had too many warm words and too much waffle from Ministers on this subject. It is no good saying that schools are free to teach about sexual consent. All schools should be teaching our children and young people not to harm each other and to have respect for themselves. They should be teaching them that sexual violence is not normal. The Department for Education has blocked for three years any movement on legislation to introduce compulsory sex and relationship education with zero tolerance of violence in schools. It has been looking at it for three years and has done nothing. It must act. Will the Minister now support that action and our debate today on introducing compulsory sex and relationship education in schools to protect our children?

Violence against Women and Girls

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Harper]

If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will answer that intervention. I was not aware of the inquiry on which the hon. Lady worked, but I am now.

Let me come back to sex and relationships education, if I may. Sex education is a statutory responsibility. I listened very carefully to the points made in the debate. Interestingly, many Members said that sex and relationships teaching as a component of PSHE is in many cases not high quality. It is important to focus not just on teaching sex and relationships education. Schools must have regard to the Secretary of State’s guidance, but it is important that it is well taught. That was the point made by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas)—

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

If the shadow Home Secretary lets me finish my point, I will give way to her.

The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion referred to a charity in her constituency: Rise, which works in partnership with schools in her constituency. Partnership working with charities and non-governmental organisations can be important in effective delivery of high-quality education.

[Yvette Cooper]

rose—

[Mr Harper]

At the risk of trying your patience, Mr Deputy Speaker, I will give way to the shadow Home Secretary.

[Yvette Cooper]

I appreciate your tolerance, Mr Deputy Speaker.

The Minister will be aware that sex and relationship education is not compulsory in schools and that there is no requirement to teach zero tolerance of violence in relationships. The legislation available before the election, which the current Secretary of State for Education personally blocked, would have made it possible for him to require zero tolerance of violence in relationships to be taught in our schools. Can the Minister give me any reason at all why he opposes that today?

[Mr Harper]

I have just said that good teaching in schools is essential. I am not sure the route the right hon. Lady sets out is a valid one. I will take no lectures from her on the urgency of the task. She was in government for 13 years. She is now complaining about failing to legislate in the wash-up at the tail-end of 13 years of Labour government. If she meant what she said, she would have done something about it. I am afraid that her strictures are rather hollow.

This has been a very good debate. I think I am being glared at by Mr Deputy Speaker, and am being urged to bring it to a close. I am sorry that I have not been able to reference everyone who has spoken in this excellent debate. I think it will be followed by an equally excellent debate, with which Mr Deputy Speaker is keen to proceed.

Police Integrity

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I thank the Home Secretary for giving me a copy of her statement. This is an important issue, and many of the measures that she has outlined are sensible in principle. However, I shall press her for more detail on how they will work in practice, and there are a couple of areas where I believe that she has not gone far enough.

The whole House will wish to recognise and show support for the international reputation of British policing, which is respected globally for low levels of corruption, high standards of integrity and our tradition of policing by consent. As the Home Secretary said, the vast majority of police officers join the force to help the public and keep people safe from crime and harm, and they take great risks when they do so. We think of the two police officers who were shot down when answering a routine 999 call in Greater Manchester, but also of officers who go the extra mile every day to help the public—perhaps stepping in to rescue people and save their lives; perhaps sitting with bereaved parents whose teenager has been killed in a traffic accident.

Police officers themselves are deeply concerned about serious cases that undermine confidence in policing: hacking, the Hillsborough tragedy, the problems with undercover officers, and cases in which policing has failed to protect the public or to deliver justice. That is why the vast majority of police officers also want action to be taken against officers who let their force and the public down, as well as action to improve standards.

Many of the Home Secretary’s measures are sensible. We support the implementation of the Leveson recommendations, and also the introduction of greater transparency. We support the establishment of a code of ethics and higher professional standards, and we support stronger action when those are breached. We have also argued for stronger action in relation to retired officers when things go wrong. The Stevens commission on the future of policing has taken evidence on issues involving codes of ethics, national registers, the role of the College of Policing and proposals for striking police officers off, and is likely to make new proposals in that regard.

However, can the Home Secretary clarify what she means? Will there be a national professional register that all police officers must be on, will there be standards that they must meet, and will they be struck off from the register if they do not meet those standards? If so, by whom will they be struck off? Will it be the IPCC or the College of Policing, and will that be underpinned by legislation? Or does the Home Secretary simply propose to put together a list of officers who have already been sacked by their local forces?

I do not believe that the Home Secretary is going far enough on the IPCC. As she will know, I have argued for the last 12 months that it does not have enough powers and resources to deliver for the public. I welcomed the action that she took and the legislation, which we supported, to strengthen powers, but her reforms of the IPCC still seem to be incremental. Increased resources are welcome, but will she tell us how much there will be and where it will come from? Is she top-slicing the budgets of police forces across the country, and if so, by how much? How many extra police officers does she think those forces will lose as a result?

During the passage of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011, Ministers argued that more cases should be dealt with by individual forces rather than by the IPCC. In the Act the Home Secretary downgraded the IPCC’s capacity, halving the minimum number of commissioners. Now she seems to be saying that more cases should be dealt with by the IPCC rather than by individual forces. Has she changed her view since the passage of the Act, and can she clarify her proposals?

I am also not convinced that the Home Secretary is doing enough to strengthen the powers and the culture of the IPCC to restore public confidence and ensure that lessons are learned. Nothing is being done about the confused and overlapping bodies that are supposed to act when policing goes wrong. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary, the IPCC, individual police and crime commissioners, police and crime panels and, now, the College of Policing all have a role, but it is still unclear who does what, and as a result, who should act when things go wrong and ensure that lessons are learned. I therefore think that the Home Secretary has not been sufficiently radical. May I urge her to look again at the possibility of replacing the IPCC altogether with a new police standards authority, along with a new, coherent framework of standards and accountability?

Finally, I hope that the Home Secretary agrees that the best way to ensure rising police standards is to have well-motivated, professional police officers who are keen to do a good job and serve the public. She will know that there is a massive problem with low morale among police officers, who do not feel valued, and I am keen to hear how she intends to address that.

Police officers do a vital job every day on our behalf, and our duty in this House is to make sure that they get the support they need and to have a proper framework of accountability to keep standards high. The Secretary of State’s statement is welcome and responds to many of the concerns that we have raised, but I urge her to look at the proposals again as I remain concerned that they do not go far enough and will not be sufficient to deliver what the police and public need.

[Mrs May]

I welcome the shadow Home Secretary’s support on a number of the issues I have addressed today, most significantly the implementation of the Leveson report recommendations, the code of ethics and action on retired officers. She asked two key questions. First, on the national register, the College of Policing will look at how best to address the issue in terms of its general work with police officers and others on standards and development. I expect that there will at least be a list of those officers who have been struck off, and whom one would not expect other police forces, here in the UK or elsewhere, to take on. It is for the College of Policing to decide the form in which to publish that list, and it will consider that matter very shortly.

Secondly, the right hon. Lady said there were a lot of overlapping organisations, and she mentioned the HMIC and the IPCC. HMIC does not investigate individual complaints against individual officers; that is the job of the IPCC. HMIC has a different role. It looks at the efficiency and effectiveness of police forces; it looks across the force, not at individual complaints. Those two bodies do two different jobs.

The right hon. Lady referred to the changes and comments we made during the passage of the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011. We have indeed put more low-level complaints to the individual forces, but the point I am making today is that we want to ensure the IPCC can handle all the serious and sensitive allegations made against police officers. Last year, just 330 out of 2,100 such cases were independently investigated or supervised and managed by the IPCC. I think it should be able to look at all the serious and sensitive allegations against police officers, which is why we are looking to transfer resources from police standards departments in police forces to the IPCC. We will look at any manpower or funding implications and ensure that the IPCC has sufficient resources to be able to deal with all the cases we feel it should be dealing with.

The right hon. Lady asked why we do not just scrap the IPCC and set it up again with a different name. Today, I have set out the key issues of substance that will make a difference to the ability of the IPCC to do its work. The question that she has to answer is whether she is interested merely in rebranding something, or whether she is genuinely interested in agreeing with me on what the IPCC needs to be able to do its job properly.

Oral Answers to Questions

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Monday 11th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

I am happy to confirm to my hon. Friend that it is obviously in the overwhelming public interest that we have sound extradition arrangements that function properly. The public need to have confidence in those arrangements, and it is vital that decisions are not only fair, but are seen to be fair. As I indicated to the House earlier, the Government have recently tabled amendments to the Crime and Courts Bill to introduce a forum bar to extradition, which will make decisions in concurrent jurisdiction cases clear and more transparent.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I welcome the Home Secretary’s announcement on undercover policing, which we have also called for.

I know the whole House will send its sympathy to the family of Frances Andrade, who took her own life after giving evidence against her abusers in court. She was let down by the criminal justice system, whose job it was to help and protect her. It has emerged that Greater Manchester police supported Mrs Andrade getting counselling, but that Surrey police did not. The Surrey police and crime commissioner has said in the last couple of days that

“it’s the responsibility of the police to present evidence to the court with the victim in a way which is untainted. That means they will not and should not refer a victim for counselling until after they have given their evidence.”

Does the Home Secretary agree that this approach by Surrey police is completely unacceptable, and that victims of sexual abuse should never be denied the support and counselling they need? Will she tell all police forces that they need to make sure that counselling is available, and will she ensure that a proper review takes place of the handling of this entire case, so that lessons can be learned from this dreadful tragedy?

[Mrs May]

I am indeed sure that everybody across the House sends their sympathy and condolences to the family of the lady concerned. This was a terrible case and we all have sympathy with the family for what they have gone through. Improving the way in which the police deal with rape cases has been looked at by Governments over a number of years, because we all recognise the difficulty victims feel in coming forward. Sadly, when we see such incidents I fear that others may be put off, rather than encouraged, from coming forward. We need to look very carefully at what has happened in this case, and very carefully at how we can further improve the system to ensure that victims feel that they will be believed when they come forward and have the confidence to take their case through the courts.

[Yvette Cooper]

I welcome the Home Secretary’s concern, but I press her to do two specific things in response to this case, the first of which is to tell forces that they need to make sure that counselling is available in these cases. Guidance drawn up in 2002 by the Home Office, Department of Health and Attorney-General states very clearly that

“vulnerable or intimidated witnesses should not be denied the emotional support and counselling they may need both before and after the trial.”

The 2010 guidance from Association of Chief Police Officers and Crown Prosecution Service is similarly clear, yet did not apply in this case and the Surrey police and crime commissioner is saying the opposite. Will she give very clear instruction to forces across the country that they must ensure counselling is available in line with national guidance? Will she also ensure that a proper review takes place of all aspects of this case, so that we learn lessons from this terrible tragedy and ensure that vulnerable victims get the help and support that was denied to Frances Andrade?

[Mrs May]

As I indicated to the right hon. Lady, we will of course look to see what lessons should be learned from this case. She will be aware that the Home Secretary does not instruct police forces to take particular routes. They have operational independence on decisions about how they deal with particular cases. It is important for the guidance to be there, for police forces to be aware of the guidance, and for police forces to operate within the guidance. I will reflect on the right hon. Lady’s remarks on the attention being given to that guidance. I am sure that all of us across the House want a system in which rape victims feel able to come forward and that we are able to see more prosecutions taking place.