Clause 29 - Jurisdiction
Railways and Transport Safety Bill
4:15 pm
Mr Tom Brake (Carshalton and Wallington, Liberal Democrat)
I beg to move amendment No. 11, in
clause 29, page 13, line 8, at end insert—
'(h) where assistance is requested by a local police force.'.
This is a probing amendment. We welcome the measures that give the British Transport police statutory jurisdiction over the railways. Those were originally set out in the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 and the Police Reform Act 2002.
Our amendment has two purposes. First, it seeks to establish that there are clear limits to the powers that a constable would be able to exercise. I hope that the Minister will be able to confirm that a vision of British Transport police constables roaming far and wide, getting involved in things that may not directly be in their remit—although they may relate in some way to railway matters—is fanciful and not possible. I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure us on that. Secondly, the amendment seeks to make it clear that there will be cases in which it will be important to involve the British Transport police and to make use of their expertise.
The purposes of our amendment are clear. Amendment No. 11 touches on the issues of boundaries and where the BTP can and cannot operate. Therefore, I wonder whether the Minister could make it clear in his response that the Government do not support proposals, which have been mooted in the past, to transfer a number of BTP staff—those involved in the policing of the London underground—to the Metropolitan police. We could not support that.