Police and Justice Bill

I thank my noble friend Lady Henig for the compliment she paid the Home Office. It is a rare moment and I will savour it for a long time. May I say with all humility that on this occasion it is perhaps justified only because of what has been said by other Members of the Committee, not all of whom were as enthusiastic when CSOs were originally introduced but who have now become stalwart converts to their benefits. I had the great pleasure last week of speaking to a head teacher who had been extremely antipathetic to the thought of working with police officers or indeed with CSOs, and is now extolling their virtues and benefits. We have converts it appears not only all over the Committee but all over the country, which we must of course celebrate. It is right that people are jealous of that success, because PCSOs have added colour, flavour and intimacy to the way in which the community can respond, which we value. I wish to reassure the Committee that our seeking to standardise some of the powers under which CSOs will operate is only to bring clarity. It is not to bring rigidity or to try to undermine the efficacy of the way in which they work. It would therefore be right to make it plain, in response to the question of the noble Viscount, Lord Bridgeman, that the list of the powers that the Government propose to confer are set out as standard in annexe B of the Explanatory Notes. None of the proposed powers is inappropriate to CSOs. They are already in legislation, which is what the noble Baroness, Lady Harris of Richmond, indicated, so we should not see PCSOs abstracted from the community as was feared. I understand what the noble Viscount says about their visibility, accessibility and importance. An approach that took them away from that front-line role would be extremely regrettable. I am not sure whether I misheard, but I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, referred to powers of arrest. I remind the House that CSOs do not have a power to arrest, although they have a power to detain. I thought that he did not intend that. The power to detain is worded as a requirement to wait with the community support officer for up to 30 minutes. The use of force is therefore not inevitable. It has been piloted successfully. The power to use reasonable force is separate and will not be a standard power. I particularly endorse the views expressed by my noble friend Lady Henig that the way in which it can be delivered has been found successful in many situations, and on other occasions not so. The power to use reasonable force is a separate power that needs to be judiciously used. I turn to the truancy sweeps that the noble Viscount raised. They are only one element of the strategy that we intend to use: there are issues on how we respond to truancy in terms of educational welfare, the assessments made at school, parenting orders, the attempts to engage the parents in relation to it, and the now greater connection between the wraparound services and the agencies working together in partnership to identify need and interventions which will encourage children to remain in school. Special programmes for children are being developed. Some of the groups teach them in a slightly different way, which is more interesting and likely to retain their presence at school, one hopes. All those matters have to be undertaken. This is but one extra step, which cannot ever be a panacea but can be an additional support. Children who are truanting are disproportionately likely to be engaged in anti-social behaviour and disproportionately often at risk. The training for PCSOs is not minuscule; it is often around four weeks and the chief officer has a statutory obligation in that regard to ensure that they have proper training. Training is an issue to which we will return on a number of occasions. It is also right to say that the reason why we are not persuaded that Amendment No. 82 adds value to Clause 5 is that there is, as I have already indicated, provision in the clause that requires the Secretary of State to consult police authorities and chief officers prior to exercising the order-making power. In putting our proposals for consultation, the Secretary of State will in any event need to strike a balance between the benefits of a standardised set of powers for community support officers and the advantages of according chief constables a degree of local flexibility, which has already been echoing around the House as one of the benefits that we have been able to derive to date. The Home Secretary will then have to consider carefully the comments made in response to that consultation. We have been candid about the whole process since last summer. The proposed set of standard powers for community support officers has been formulated following a formal public consultation in which the Association of Chief Police Officers was specifically invited to comment. Our intentions, which will be subject to debate in this House, are set out in annexe B of the Explanatory Notes. The Bill recognises that it is desirable for some powers to be standard and for some to remain available at the discretion of individual chief officers. In deciding which powers should be standardised, the Secretary of State will take into account the relevant factors and views. We believe that the duty to consult achieves the ends sought by Amendment No. 82, and I hope for that reason the noble Baroness, Lady Harris—at whom I am looking, but my remarks are also intended for the noble Viscount, Lord Bridgeman—will be content not to press the amendment, as it is not necessary. As I said, we understand why it was tabled. Amendment No. 84, which was tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, who has spoken to it, and the noble Baroness, Lady Harris, singles out one particular power that will for ever be excluded from the standard set of powers. That is at odds with the approach taken in Clause 5. All powers remain at the discretion of chief officers of police, save those designated as standard powers. We see no reason to single out the power to detain for special attention. If, as Parliament accepted in 2002, CSOs should be capable of exercising a power of detention, that power should be one that could be included in a standard suite of powers. We have already indicated that we will omit the power to use reasonable force to detain an individual from proposed standard lists of powers for community support officers. That power should remain in the discretion of chief officers of police, but detention is a key enforcement power that can contribute to the effectiveness of community support officers. The clause as it stands provides flexibility while ensuring that any order is subject to full consultation and parliamentary scrutiny through the draft affirmative procedure, which provides sufficient safeguards. Accordingly, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, and the noble Baroness, Lady Harris, will be content not to move their amendment.