I welcome this opportunity to discuss crime prevention in Norwich, and I am grateful to the Minister of State, Home Office, my right hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, West and Abingdon (Mr. Patten), for being present at this late hour to reply to the Adjournment debate.

I was in touch recently with the crime prevention panel in Norwich and with the chief constable of Norfolk to ensure that my remarks are completely up to date.

The fight against crime in any part of the country is an on-going struggle. It involves the public just as much as it involves the Government, Parliament, the police and the courts. We all agree on the need to deter potential criminals, on the duty of catching those responsible for crime and on the need for appropriate punishment. There is a continuing debate in Norwich about how to achieve those objectives.

The 1989–90 crime statistics for the county of Norfolk reveal a worrying upward trend. There are particularly marked increases in the figures for burglaries from dwellings which are up 29·5 per cent. Thefts from motor vehicles are up 45 per cent. and criminal damage is up 41 per cent. By contrast, crimes of violence are stabilising and were up only 3 per cent. over that period. Crime statistics in Norfolk show a deterioration in the record. In 1980, the figure was only 35·3 recorded crimes per 1,000 population, but in 1990 it was 71·7. The average national annual increase in the crime rate in the 1980s was 5·2 per cent., but in Norfolk it was higher than that average at 8 per cent.

Norfolk is steadily falling down in the league table of crime. I am informed that Norfolk is the second lowest funded of all the 31 non-metropolitan forces in terms of gross revenue expenditure and lowest of all in terms of capital expenditure per 1,000 population. My right hon. Friend may wish to comment on those facts later.

There is great pressure on uniformed police officers and on the CID in Norfolk. My attention was drawn yesterday to an article in the Eastern Daily Press by Canon David Sharpe of St. Peter Mancroft church in the centre of Norwich. He referred to the increasing problem of vandalism. Almost two dozen insurance claims have been made by his church in the past two years, and in the past fortnight his stained glass windows have been damaged on three occasions at a cost of more than £1,000. It is no wonder that he is worried.

I am aware that the Government have responded positively to calls from Norfolk for extra resources to fight crime. An additional 155 police posts have been authorised since 1979 and 67 police officers have been released through civilianisation since then. An extra 12 police posts were authorised last December, with effect from 1 October 1991. However, the rise in police manpower is significantly less than that sought by the police authority in Norfolk. Only 102 of 188 posts sought since 1988 have been granted and I gather that the decision on 25 additional officers requested for 1992–93 may still be some way off.

I ask my right hon. Friend whether his Department realises that the special needs for policing of the rural areas are greater than is recognised when compared with the metropolitan areas. From my studies, it seems that the metropolitan areas are treated more generously in terms of the number of police officers. That case is put to me regularly and I should be grateful if my right hon. Friend could respond to that point.

There has been a concerted effort to win the support of the Norwich public through the establishment of the Norwich Crime Stoppers in 1987. Crime Stoppers began in 1983 in Great Yarmouth and since then it has been a great success. It offers direct telephone access to Norwich CID for members of the public with information on serious crimes. Callers are able to remain anonymous and they are given a code number. If a criminal is convicted by the courts on their information, they become eligible for a reward. The success of the Crime Stoppers scheme is clear from the figures. In 1987–89, 145 serious crimes were publicised in local newspapers. Some 191 calls from informants were received by Norwich CID and 35 arrests were made. Attacks on six elderly ladies, a bank robbery, cases of robberies from business premises and arson and burglary at a Norwich school, advertised through Crime Stoppers, have all recently ended in arrests.

The value of the scheme is clear but, unfortunately, the flow of donations from local businesses is drying up. I am not sure whether more direct Home Office support is available to Crime Stoppers campaigns. Again, I am thinking of the metropolitan areas and of London, where such support is forthcoming. Does my right hon. Friend agree that this excellent scheme needs support not only from the local community, but perhaps from the Government? There is no doubt of the success of the Crime Stoppers campaign in crime prevention and detection in Norwich.

Better intelligence on crime and detection are only part of the struggle. There is considerable concern in Norwich about the lack of secure facilities for young offenders, about the policies of the courts on bailing accused persons and the apparently lax punishment of those convicted.

My right hon. Friend may know of criticisms of the social services department of Norfolk county council expressed by the senior Crown prosecutor, Mr. Nicholas Methold, at Yarmouth magistrates court last August about the department's failure to provide secure accommodation for two juveniles remanded to the council's care. The county's social services department had to telephone other authorities across the country to find places for the boys, but that problem is likely to end when the secure accommodation unit at Kerrison school in Eye, Suffolk, opens next October. But that unit has only 10 beds to serve the whole of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, so I hope to hear soon from the authorities that an expansion to a total of 30 beds will follow rapidly.

I realise that the absence of suitable secure accommodation is a partial explanation for the bailing practices of the courts. I appreciate that, under the provisions of the Bail Act 1976, a decision on the release of accused persons is a matter for the courts alone. Presumption in favour of bail, unless there are reasons to fear absconding, interference with witnesses or further crimes, is right. However, my doubts are raised by the current position in Norfolk where four people accused of murder, two of attempted murder and one of armed robbery of a bank are currently on bail. By any standards, those are serious and violent crimes, and there need to be good reasons to justify bail in those cases.

There is also concern about some of the courts' sentencing policies. It is sensible for those guilty of minor crimes against property and, in some cases, against persons to be kept out of gaol. I welcome the Government's recent initiatives ensuring that mentally ill people are not unnecessarily kept in prison. I think that it is true—my right hon. Friend can correct me if I am wrong—that one fifth of sentenced prisoners are, at present, mentally ill. I am sure that it it right to try to reduce the numbers of some categories of prisoners. But in more serious cases, criminals should go to prison, where they can be contained and the public protected.

Without the intervention of the Court of Appeal in January, brothers who lured pizza delivery boys into traps for the purpose of robbing them would have escaped with a suspended prison sentence of 21 months and community service of 180 hours but now, as a result of the appeal, they are doing three years in gaol and 18 months in a young offenders institution.

Serious questions are being asked about these matters, and serious questions have to be asked about the supervision that probation officers can give to offenders under community service orders. Doubts about the value of community service were expressed by a former senior probation officer, Peter Coad, in the February edition of the police magazine. Those doubts are shared by some police officers in Norwich and by the crime prevention panel chairman, Mr. Norman Potter.

It is all too easy for persistent minor offenders to regard community service as an easy alternative to prison and to fund payment of fines through further criminal activities. Therefore, I hope that my right hon. Friend will in the near future be willing to meet representatives of the organisations interested in crime prevention and detection in Norwich to discuss the issues further.

For the reasons I have explained, there is a need in Norwich to enlarge support for the Crime Stoppers scheme, increase the numbers of police in Norwich and the more vulnerable rural districts, ensure that courts are more careful in their operation of bailing procedures and send those convicted of serious crimes to prison to protect the public. I support the general Home Office policy of reducing the overall number of prisoners. But I have made clear where the problems are arising, and I have outlined the points raised by my constituents and others in Norwich.

I have drawn my right hon. Friend's attention to some of the issues of concern among responsible people in Norwich. I hope that he will respond positively, bearing in mind the commitment of all those involved in the local community and the police force.