Policing in the Metropolis

Part of Prayers – in the House of Commons at 11:35 am on 11 May 1984.

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Photo of Simon Hughes Simon Hughes Shadow Spokesperson (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) 11:35, 11 May 1984

I shall briefly repeat the Liberal party's general view of policing in London, although I want then to deal with more specific matters. For a long time our view has been that the most effective policing can be achieved by involving the police with the community. We all accept that the police on their own cannot do the job as well as they can if the public are on their side. We all need the police, and the police need the public to work with them.

Thus, community policing is the right way forward as a strategy for the metropolis. As part of that, a statutory duty to consult is also necessary. We look forward to the day—although we know that it will not come under this Administration because of their declared policy—when London will join the rest of the country in having a democratically elected police authority. That is how community policing can be most effectively monitored and managed. We hope that before long the anomaly of the Home Secretary being the police authority in London will be ended.

Pending that, we welcome the fact that, since Sir Kenneth Newman has been commissioner of police, he appears to have been setting out on a policy of more community-oriented policing. Although the figures for trends in crime detection and the pattern of crime in London cover only one year, it would appear that we are beginning to move in the right direction. We welcome that, because, contrary to the policy pursued by Sir Kenneth's predecessor, Sir David McNee—which was hammer-type policing — and the Conservative party's slogans in the 1979 and 1983 elections, which demanded law and order policies, we know that such policies are least effective when they are applied in an unthinking and uncaring way. They are more effective when they follow the direction that Sir Kenneth Newman is now pursuing. As far as they go, the figures prove that.

We are particularly pleased also that Sir Kenneth intends to produce a document on aims and objectives for the police force in London—and I welcome what the Home Secretary said earlier—which will set out for the first time in more than a century the role of the police and their duties. When I had the welcome opportunity, rightly as a London Member, to meet Sir Kenneth Newman recently, he explained that in essence the document would say that the police had a double duty—to ensure that society respected the rule of law, and, complementary to that, to advocate and uphold the rights of the individual citizen, the other part of our constitutional framework. In the past, many have often thought that the police were all about upholding the law in whatever way they, as the authority, thought appropriate, and not about upholding the rights of the individual.

We hope that the document to be produced in a matter of weeks will be the subject of consultation and debate in the House before it gains a formal status. We hope that it results in the police clearly recognising that their job is on behalf of the community.

We welcome too the more intelligent approach that the commissioner has adopted towards planning the deployment of the police and their activities in London. That is in part possible because more resources have been made available. It is sad that the Government have chosen not to provide a similar increase in resources for the education service. A good education service would result in a reduced need for crime detection because the better educated and the more socially well-equipped people are when they leave school the less likely they are to be unemployed, have time on their hands and indulge in criminal activity.

We urge the commissioner and the Home Secretary, who for the time being is the police authority, to go forward in the same way, but ever mindful of the fact that the clear-up rate in London is still appallingly low. Only 17 per cent. of reported crimes are cleared up and many other crimes go unreported. The figures show that the trend may be beginning to change. I am happy to say that the statistics for my constituency also bear that out. In Southwark there has been a slight increase in the clear-up rate and a slight decrease in the number of offences. But much further improvement is needed because we are still unable to guarantee that more than one in five of reported crimes will be resolved.

I wish to deal now with two London-wide matters. First, I share the view expressed by the official Opposition spokesman, the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman), that some issues relating to behaviour and information in connection with the siege at the Libyan embassy remain to be and must be resolved. I compliment the police on the way in which they did their job. On behalf of my party I express sympathy for the woman police constable, and her family and colleagues who suffered loss by her death when she was shot by someone inside the Libyan embassy. There is a suggestion that that incident need not have happened. The only way to satisfy the public, the police force and people of good will everywhere is to hold a public inquiry. If that has to wait a little, while police inquiries continue to narrow down the suspects, we must respect that, but an inquiry there must be.

Our second general concern is about the incident last year that we remember so vividly, when Steven Waldorf was shot in a London street by armed police. We are increasingly alarmed when we hear that the police in London now have machine guns in their armoury for possible use later this summer. I know that my right hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Hillhead (Mr. Jenkins), when he was Home Secretary in the last Labour Government, authorised the use of machine guns in certain conditions, but in no circumstances should machine guns be generally available to the police. That is not what people want.

I now turn to certain specific matters relating to police organisation and personnel, which I have also raised recently with the Home Secretary and the commissioner. Last year Tower bridge police station in Southwark was closed. That was much regretted and opposed by the local community. It was symptomatic of what happens when the local community is not consulted about whether a local police station is needed. I knew what the local people wanted, as did the authorities at the time. The community wishes local police stations to remain. May we have an undertaking that in future closures will not occur without public consultation? Closures take policing away from the community.

Tower bridge still has a police office. People can report incidents to the one person on duty in that building. But since the closure, traders in Bermondsey street, among others, have appealed to me to press for the re-opening of Tower bridge police station or the opening of another one nearby. The Southwark division operates two police stations—one at each end of the area—but that is not regarded as a sufficient presence.

The inquiry which reported last November and was commissioned by the commissioner's predecessor is certainly welcome. It deals with a wide-ranging list of topics, and, on personnel, came to two important conclusions. One of its recommendations should be considered urgently. I refer to the suggestion that senior officers be moved less frequently.

Last year we lost our district commander to another district only a matter of years before he was due to retire. I understand that it is more convenient for him to work in that other district because it is nearer his home, but a community spends time and effort building up a relationship with its police commander. We experienced a similar disruption when a chief superintendent was moved. It is unhelpful for senior officers to be moved on after only 18 months or two years. The Policy Studies Institute recommended that there should be greater flexibility for senior officers so that officers are not moved just when they are beginning to get to grips with local problems.

We support the report's recommendations concerning home beat officers. We understand the difficulty of finding enough police officers to go on the beat, but although the home beat officer scheme is developing well, what happens when the home beat officer falls ill? That happened at the end of last year in one area in my constituency. There was no automatic replacement for that officer. I understand that it may not be possible to provide two home beat officers in each area, but please may we have at least one replacement home beat officer when the regular one is away? This could be a cadet or a junior police officer who knows the area well. That would help if the home beat officer falls ill or is unavoidably absent. The example that I gave involved an area which particularly needed its home beat officer at that time because of a rapid escalation of the drugs problem among young people.

Senior metropolitan police officers have recently confirmed that one of the problems about policing in London is that demands are continually made upon police resources from police forces outside London. For example, recently, at the request of Nottinghamshire and other constabularies, London police have had to deal with mining disputes. It is vital that we do not move towards anything that resembles a national police force. The implementation of breach of the peace laws, involving people travelling from Kent to Nottinghamshire, for instance, to take part in indsutrial action—which can be peaceful but may not always be so—removes police from the capital. We ask the Home Secretary to ensure that in normal circumstances we do not lose police to other forces unless he and the commissioner are satisfied that that is the proper and best use for Londers of the personnel recruited to police London.

Some police practices need improving. Irrespective of the unfortunate and unsatisfactory clauses in the Police and Criminal Evidence Bill—which may still be amended—I hope there will be improvement in certain areas. For example, the stop and search provisions are often abused. Youngsters are stopped and searched regularly, often for cannabis, without justification. The police do not have the resources to detect every offence, so they should concentrate on the major criminal dealers in heroin and those who use it, rather than regularly attempting to pick up small amounts of cannabis used by youngsters who will probably suffer no long-term or harmful effect from the drug. They use it in a social context, and police intervention for this reason does not help the relationship between the police and our younger citizens. I accept that cannabis is a prescribed drug, but the police cannot do everything, so looking for it should not be a priority.

I have written to the Minister about police inquiries and, no doubt, he will reply soon. An inquiry took place in Walworth in my constituency in February. I understand that the police have a computer printout form for use on all such occasions and in any circumstances. From complaints that I have received from constituents, which are now being dealt with by the Home Office, it is clear that the police sought more information than they needed. I am concerned because an initial answer from my police commander shows that it is not clear what will happen to the unnecessary information that has been accumulated.

The Liberal party has always been concerned—and as representatives of the public we must always be vigilant—about the accumulation of information by authorities. Of course, the public can decline to provide such information, but they are not always told that they have that right. We are concerned about what happens to that information. Police need a mechanism, for example, to collect information to charge someone with murder. Inquiries must be held. But we are not satisfied that information not required is later destroyed, and we would like some guarantees about that.

I wish to raise a matter that is not directly a constituency issue, and may apply more to some areas of London than to others. I and other hon. Members have brought to the attention of the Home Secretary the fact that the police appear to go beyond their powers under section 32 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956. That section deals with the offence of importuning by men. A large number of trials this year have resulted in acquittals. The prosecution evidence has consisted mainly of police officers who have effectively entrapped gay people by pretending to be ordinary members of the public and, when a relationship has been struck, have made an arrest.

My right hon. and hon. Friends have tabled an amendment to the Police and Criminal Evidence Bill, to be debated next week. I hope that the Government will accept it. The amendment provides that there could not be an arrest for such an offence unless the police officer was in uniform. The matter raises important civil liberty issues. It has been the subject of increasing correspondence with both the Home Office and London Members of Parliament during recent months. The current police practice must be changed.

Constituents' complaints about police practice make it also quite clear that some more unfortunate citizens receive a rough deal—and I use my words carefully—when they are arrested. I know that some complaints are being pursued through the Police Complaints Board. The vagrant, the drunk, those who are less capable and least able to express themselves are often handled roughly, and that cannot be justified. I ask the authorities to ensure that the police are quite clear in their own minds that they should never use more force than necessary.

When people are arrested, they are also not allowed to exercise their right under section 62 of the Criminal Law Act 1977 which allows them to contact their solicitors. That right, which appeared to be a mark of great progress when it was implemented only a few years ago, is not yet effective because many people in detention are not allowed to tell their lawyers or families where they are.

I wish now to deal with two matters particularly relevant to my constituency, the first being crime by youngsters. About 47 per cent. of crimes in London last year were committed by people under the age of 21; 22 per cent. were committed by youngsters between the ages of 10 and 16; and 25 per cent. by youngsters between the ages of 17 and 20. My police commander has made it clear in a letter, which has been made public, that there is an increasing link between crime and unemployment. The Government must accept that unless their policies are consistent with the reduction of crime, good policing will never solve the problem. Alternative activities, interests and occupations are needed if youngsters are not to take what is often the only exciting, interesting and remunerative way out. I ask the Home Office to urge other Departments that some effort must be made to reduce the phenomenal amount of unemployment among youngsters in London—at least 20 per cent.—and the phenomenal waste of the talent of youngsters, which so easily becomes misdirected.

The second specific matter has received growing publicity in recent weeks. It is the increasing use and abuse of hard drugs, especially among youngsters in south London. It does not help when the press report single estates or areas as drug cities, drug dens and so on. They are no more drug cities or drug dens than any other part of the country. They are areas occupied by decent, respectable people whose children have often become entrapped after someone has made an approach and given them the introduction to hard drugs.

I am grateful for the fact that this week additional Customs and Excise officers have been appointed. The Home Office has sent people abroad, through the Customs and Excise authority, to try to prevent the importation of heroin from Pakistan. I am aware that there is a great deal of concern about the matter and an increasing effort is being made by senior officers to deal with the villains of the piece. This is not enough. I ask that that problem become a particular priority for both manpower and resources — otherwise, we shall ensure that our youngsters in increasing numbers have their lives ruined at an early stage.

A friend of mine is a science teacher in east London, and he sets examinations each year for the CSE. One question that is regularly asked is, "Describe any drug and its effect on the individual." In past years, the sort of drug described has been either alcohol, or drugs that have been discussed in the classroom, such as LSD. This year, for the first time—and I am referring to a respectable part of the outer London borough of Havering—the 15-year-old girls and boys described vividly what could only have come from their direct experience of drugs such as cocaine and heroin. One 15-year-old girl described the effects as, "Sight blurred, your brain doesn't know what to do, hearing goes funny and your words are slurred." A 15-year-old boy wrote about heroin, "You lose speech, do not have very good hearing and are slow speaking." Another 15-year-old boy wrote about heroin, "Lose sense of co-ordination, also hallucinate."

A survey in Bermondsey and Rotherhithe last year by community, youth and social workers and those involved in the local drugs project showed clearly that the cheapness of heroin has led to hundreds of youngsters experimenting with it. They are not best dealt with by being sent to drug clinics along with traditional addicts because they are not addicts in the same sense; they are not physically addicted after only a few months of use. It is surprising to learn that about 40 per cent. of them are girls.

Unless the Home Office co-ordinates its efforts with other Government Departments to ensure that there is immediately—by which I mean this year—in London a network of advice and information, linked with police activity to deal with the villains who are exploiting our young people, with provision being made for clinics and the back-up necessary to counsel and assist youngsters to break the habit, we shall be committing a whole generation of our nation to an appalling waste of their lives, to suffering, pain and isolation from the community.

Young heroin users and addicts are some of the new victims of crime in society. One of society's jobs should be victim support. The police have a role to play in that. We welcome what they do, but we are not yet anything like satisfied, and I hope that that is also the attitude of the Home Office. There must be no more complacency, but a renewed determination to make policing in London far more effective.