Clause 29 - Dispersal of groups and removal of persons under 16 to their place of residence
Anti-social Behaviour Bill
9:45 am
Mr Matthew Green (Ludlow, Liberal Democrat)
For the first time in this part of the Bill, we support the Conservatives. The Conservative Front-Bench spokesman has done the Committee a service by tabling the amendments, because they highlight a potential problem with the Bill. The hon. Member for Cleethorpes says that the police would make the judgment anyway—they would decide whether the action was reasonable without that being explicit in the Bill. The problem is that we cannot assume that 100 per cent. of police officers act reasonably all the time. We hope that they do, but clearly there have been occasions in the past when that has not been the case.
Currently, if a measure is in place in a given area, a policeman who has acted fairly unreasonably could defend himself by saying that he had grounds because a member of the public felt intimated by the presence of a group of people. There is no test as to whether the policeman interpreted that his action was reasonable. It is a question only of his having reasonable grounds for believing that the member of the public felt intimidated.
The Conservatives have proposed an important safeguard that would ensure that the power was not abused. It would not prevent the power from being used. It would ensure that, when the power was used, the police officer could show that the intimidation or distress were reasonable grounds and that the action to move people on was not taken just because a couple of people of a different ethnic origin were standing outside someone's house and a member of the public complained. I hope that the Committee would regard that as unreasonable and unacceptable.
The proposal would provide a threshold—in fact, I will not use the word ''threshold'', because that would upset the Conservatives. The proposal would apply an objectivity test to the police constable. We will listen with much interest to what the Minister has to say, because the Government need to find a way of building that test into the Bill, whether or not the form of words in the amendment is exactly the right way to do that. As I said, there is a potential problem in the Bill, which I hope the Minister will find the means to address.