Police and Justice Bill

Let us get back to the Bill. I should like to make a brief contribution, and I am pleased to be able to participate in what has been a very important debate today. Of course, the Bill’s aims of building safer, stronger communities and instilling a culture of respect are highly commendable and would be welcomed by all hon. Members. Whether legislation can ever achieve such aims remains an open question. I commend the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert), who gave a powerful presentation of the case against some aspects of the Bill and highlighted some of our concerns. We all agree that the Bill has some good points, but Conservative Members have great concern about the centralising influences that the Government seem to show in all their measures, and the Bill is no exception. Yes, real issues to do with antisocial behaviour and police restructuring have come across in the debate today, but some of us are rather concerned that the Home Secretary did not answer the point that was made in interventions on him that the real reason for the Bill is perhaps police authority restructuring. That is behind the Bill, which is being wrapped up under the guise of an antisocial behaviour measure, when something a little more sinister is, in fact, behind it. Phrases such as ““technical””, ““bureaucratic”” and ““too much central control”” seem to be the hallmarks of large parts of the Bill. In my constituency, however, the most important issues are those associated with the antisocial behaviour that our constituents face every day of their lives, and I want to centre my limited contribution in today’s debate on those issues. In particular, police community support officers have been mentioned in general, but I want to highlight how important they have been in improving community safety in my constituency. I was one of the sceptics when the proposal for CSOs first came into being. I was sceptical because I wondered how they could do the job and what contribution they could make to improve antisocial behaviour and reduce criminal activity in our borough. I was sceptical, too, about their training and about their role—their powers and their responsibilities—but I welcome what CSOs have achieved so far and what will happen under the Bill to standardise their powers and responsibilities. I still have some doubts about their training and wonder whether it could be better and more extensive, but I am sure that that will be debated at length in Committee. It is true to say that when we go around any Conservative Member’s constituency we see that the police are very much respected and their work is much appreciated. However, the tide of antisocial behaviour, vandalism and graffiti that has occurred during the past decade is still growing worse and worse—in fact, it has become an epidemic in some areas—and residents, shopkeepers, business people and visitors are all appalled by the situation in which we find ourselves in a society where people do not have a great deal of respect for one another. Of course, that is the reason why we are debating the Bill. I met some of the residents of the Hurst Place estate in the northern part of my constituency. They came to see me because they felt that the vandalism, graffiti and bad behaviour of the youths in our society was out of control. That is the key issue that most people find: they are worried about where things are going and how they will end up. Anything that can be done to improve those aspects of antisocial behaviour will be welcomed. Part 3 is welcome, because local authorities will have a new role with oversight committees to scrutinise crime and disorder reduction partnerships, which is very positive. As always, the worry with this Government is the vagueness of the call for community action. They use wonderful phrases in their approach, but what does it actually mean in reality? Of course, the Government say that they will allow communities to request action on the community safety issues that they consider the police or other organisations and crime reduction partners have failed to address adequately, but I am not sure what that means in reality. What does it mean for the people who are already suffering? In Committee, we look forward to taxing out more from the Government.