Clause 35 - Police powers for police authority employees
Police Reform Bill [Lords]
9:45 am
Mr James Paice (South East Cambridgeshire, Conservative)
I do not think that the hon. Lady's argument necessarily follows. Of course, the vast majority of the population are perfectly reasonable, law-abiding citizens and assume that everything that we do is law-abiding. Those people would not, therefore, worry about the nitty-gritty of what is or is not illegal on a particular street. She is right. However, to move on from that and say that therefore the powers of CSOs should vary is a non sequitur. There would be serious grounds for confusion.
Despite what the hon. Lady said, we envisage CSO's using their powers in marginal situations rather than in cases involving serious crimes—issues of disorder, or antisocial behaviour, for example. Whether behaviour is antisocial is sometimes a matter of subjective judgment. Therefore, we must be consistent in determining what constitutes a power of a CSO. A situation such as I described could arise—people could be apprehended by a CSO for acting anti-socially on one side of the street but not if they go into the next street. I submit to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Ms Munn), that that is not what the general public would want.
If somebody is acting antisocially, by drinking alcohol in an antisocial manner, generally behaving unpleasantly and disrupting the community, they should be apprehended by a CSO and dealt with wherever that may be—if a CSO is to have the power to do so. That is what police officers do. If people behave antisocially any police officer can deal with them. If we are going to have CSOs, the same should apply.