It is a pleasure to serve under you this morning, Sir Jeremy. I thank Saqib Bhatti for securing this important debate, and for an eloquent speech setting out his concerns about the issues of knife crime and stop and search. I want to remember, as the hon. Gentleman did, the young people who he referred to—the victims of knife crime in the West Midlands. Jack Donoghue, Reuben Higgins, James Brindley and Leo Ross were all victims of knife crime, and all our thoughts and prayers will be with their friends and family.

I also acknowledge, just as the hon. Gentleman did, the work of the police. They work tirelessly, day in and day out, to keep us all safe. And I pay tribute to West Midlands police, Chief Constable Craig Guildford and the police and crime commissioner, Simon Foster. I was also just reflecting on the fact that in the West Midlands, the figures for knife-enabled robbery are declining, so the data is going the right way in the West Midlands on that particular issue, which is worth flagging.

I am very grateful to all hon. Members who have contributed to this wide- ranging and very thoughtful debate on this important topic. Of course it is always helpful to hear from Jim Shannon about the experience in Northern Ireland. He is absolutely right that, as the Policing Minister, I am very keen that we learn from the different nations and countries and regions about what is working. We all want to see a reduction in the crime that blights parts of our communities, so I welcome his insights from Northern Ireland.

As ever, my hon. Friend Bell Ribeiro-Addy spoke thoughtfully and with great eloquence about the knotty problems around stop and search, its disproportionate use on certain communities and the lived experience of individuals. I will make some comments about that in a moment, but first I note the interventions by my hon. Friend Jonathan Hinder. Again, it was very helpful to hear his perspective as a former police officer; his experience adds to the richness of the debate that we can have in this place.

As I said, I will talk about stop and search, but I will also make some comments about knife crime in a moment. Stop and search is a complex issue and, as we have heard, often a divisive issue as well. It is a vital tool for tackling crime, but it must be used fairly and effectively. Getting that balance right is key to this Government’s mission to make our streets safer and restore confidence in the police.

I will just refer to two points made by the hon. Member for Meriden and Solihull East. The first one was about officer confidence. It is absolutely essential that the police have the confidence of the communities they serve, but of course it is also essential that officers have the confidence they need to do the vital and often extremely difficult job of keeping us all safe. Every police officer should have the confidence to use stop-and-search powers where they have reasonable grounds to suspect that someone is carrying weapons, drugs or other illicit items.

Chief constables and other police leaders play a critical role in ensuring that officers have that confidence. We have been discussing how important it is that police officers understand PACE code A and use it properly. Of course the College of Policing also provides detailed and authorised professional practice on stop and search, to ensure that police officers have both knowledge and confidence.

In the Majority of forces across England and Wales, the total number of searches conducted has risen for the last two years in a row; that is not the case in the Metropolitan police area, but in the majority of areas the number is going up. The Shadow Minister, Matt Vickers, asked me about knife detection technology, as did the hon. Member for Meriden and Solihull East. I agree with the shadow Minister that technology has an important part to play; I know that the former Policing Minister, Chris Philp, is very passionate about this issue and talks about it a lot.

As I said on Second Reading of the Crime and Policing Bill, the Home Office is working with industry partners to develop systems that are specifically designed to detect knives concealed on a person at a distance. Phase one of that work is expected to be delivered by the end of May, resulting in the first prototype systems, so I hope I will be able to talk more about that technology after May.

I will just say again why we think stop and search is so important. In the year to March 2024, stop and search led to over 16,000 offensive weapons being taken off our streets. There were more than 75,000 arrests following a stop and search for a range of offences, including weapons possession and intent to supply drugs. In short, stop and search helps police to save lives and tackle crime. When officers have reasonable grounds, they should, as I have said, feel confident using these powers.

Policing sector leaders, including Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley, His Majesty’s chief inspector of constabulary Sir Andy Cooke and the Independent Office for Police Conduct, are all clear that stop and search is an important part of the police toolkit. Public opinion agrees: recent research shows that a majority of people, across all ethnic groups, support the use of stop and search, and a majority of young people also agree that the police should have stop-and-search powers. However, policing sector leaders stress that, if done badly, stop and search undermines trust in the police and can damage their relationships with the communities they serve, which in turn can lead to less co-operation and compliance and ultimately make it harder for the police to keep people safe.

Turning to the issue of fairness, stop-and-search powers have long been seen to affect some communities disproportionately, with stark ethnic disparities in their use, as my hon. Friend the Member for Clapham and Brixton Hill mentioned. This Government cautiously welcome the fact that disparities in the use of stop and search have fallen in recent years. Five years ago, black people were over nine times more likely to be stopped and searched than white people, but that has fallen to 3.7 times more likely in the most recent data. That number is still far too high, which is why the Government backs the National Police Chiefs’ Council’s police race action plan. Earlier this month, I met the NPCC team leading the work on that action plan, along with the independent scrutiny and chair of the oversight board.

The plan aims to foster anti-racist culture, values and behaviours in policing that will inform all operational policing practices, improving experiences and outcomes for black people. On stop and search in particular, the plan commits chief constables to identifying and addressing stop-and-search disparities, particularly on drug searches and the searches of children. I will work with police leaders to ensure that the aims of the plan are adopted and embedded in all forces. The Government are also introducing a requirement for police forces to collect data on the ethnicity of people stopped by police under section 163 of the Road Traffic Act 1998, which will help to address concerns about potential disparities in the use of traffic stops.

I turn now to section 60 “without suspicion” searches. Where serious violence has occurred, or where intelligence suggests that it may occur, a senior police officer may authorise police to use stop and search without reasonable suspicion. These authorisations, known as section 60 authorisations, are limited to a particular area for a particular period of time, usually no longer than 24 hours. The powers are used exceptionally and are rightly subject to strict constraints, but these searches are contentious within communities, and it is concerning that rates of ethnic disproportionality for section 60 searches are particularly high. The Home Office is introducing new data collection on section 60 that will come into effect from April, including on the authorisation decisions and the locations authorised. That will help improve transparency and accountability for the use of this power.

His Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services has made a range of recommendations on section 60 for police forces and agencies, and the public will expect to see the policing sector respond comprehensively to those recommendations. Looking at the effectiveness of stop and search, we know that it works best when it is used in a targeted and intelligence-led way against active offenders and when officers have strong grounds for suspicion. This point is supported in recent work by the highly respected Youth Endowment Fund.

I will move on to knife crime. We should not lose sight of the fact that, while stop and search is one part of how we address the problems around knife crime, enforcement is only one part of the overall approach. We need to tackle knife crime in many different ways and prevention remains the most effective mechanism for tackling crime, which is why this Government have made a commitment to halving knife crime. Within that effort, investing in vulnerable young people is a key priority. The Young Futures programme aims to intervene earlier, ensuring that vulnerable children are identified and offered support in a much more systematic way. It will also create more opportunities for young people in their communities through the provision, for example, of open access mental health support, mentoring and careers support.

We are also bringing in new and stronger Laws to crack down on the sale of dangerous knives. These measures will help to deter potential perpetrators—young people—and make our streets safer. It is also worth referring back to a manifesto commitment that this Government made to ensure that every young person found in possession of a knife is referred to a youth offending team and given a mandatory plan to prevent reoffending.

To the questions raised about neighbourhood policing, part of making our streets safer is seeing that visible police presence, which, sadly, has reduced over recent years in our neighbourhoods, town centres and villages. That is why we are putting 13,000 uniformed officers back on to our streets. A question was asked about the allocation of that 13,000. The 13,000 is over the course of this Parliament. The Government have doubled the amount of money going into neighbourhood policing from next month to £200 million. We initially identified £100 million in the provisional police settlement, but we have doubled that to £200 million. We are in discussions with police forces to make sure that the allocations work for the individual police forces; they are coming forward with the workforce mix that they believe will work best for them in the communities that they serve. That announcement will be made shortly.