I shall try to rattle through my contribution. I shall speak to my new clause 1, but first let me mention new clause 17. I welcome the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) and pay tribute to his work as deputy mayor on championing alcohol abstinence and monitoring requirements. I did my bit in the Commons and in the Lords to ensure that the new clause eventually got on to the statute book and we need to make it have meaningful effect.
The evidence from what is happening in London, which is spreading, and the impact on the offender, not least as a result of the inconvenience of having to pay, is significant and supports the South Dakota model. That needs to be taken into account when the measure goes to the other place. There are those in the other place—Baroness Finlay and others—who champion the cause and who will look carefully at the evidence and give further impetus to cost-effective efforts to help those caught up in the cycle of alcohol-related offending.
I welcome the cross-party support for new clause 1 and the support from my hon. Friends the Members for St Ives (Derek Thomas), for Colchester (Will Quince), for South Thanet (Craig Mackinlay), for North West Hampshire, for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith), for Romford (Andrew Rosindell), for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) and for Altrincham and Sale West (Mr Brady). Some more recent supporters such as my hon. Friends the Members for Gower (Byron Davies), for Eastbourne (Caroline Ansell) and for Windsor (Adam Afriyie) did not quite make the cut last night to get their names on the amendment paper.
Over a number of years there has been support to ensure that knife crime legislation was fit for purpose and that it dealt properly with the issues of enforcement, recognising as do all of us who represent constituencies that have, sadly, been affected by knife crime, that much work is needed on prevention. I welcome the Government’s work over a number of years to ensure that we tackle knife crime both at its source and when it comes to court. I and a former Member, Nick de Bois, championed mandatory sentencing for repeat knife offending and I welcome the fact that that has now reached the statute book and is being implemented. We will continue to monitor that to ensure that it is implemented properly.
More needs to be done. No one can be complacent about the need to review legislation and to use the opportunities presented by the Bill to deal with knife crime. At 11 pm last night there was another incident of stabbing in the borough of Enfield, where a 28-year-old was stabbed twice in the abdomen and twice in the head in what was probably a gang-related incident. An off-duty police officer found the victim opposite Edmonton police station. The case reminds us of the impact of knife crime.
New clause 1 focuses on the sale of knives, particularly online sales, to those who are under age. I recognise that in some ways that is of marginal relevance. When I talk with police officers about gang crime, they explain that the easiest way for a youngster to obtain a knife is by getting one from the kitchen, or from someone else, or an adult might purchase it for them, so we have to recognise that there are other areas where we can tackle the prevalence of knives that would not be tackled by new clause 1.
6 pm
Nevertheless, the Government have been on this case as well, in relation to how we deal with appalling cases such as that of Bailey Gwynne, which was mentioned by the shadow Minister. During the trial we got a reminder of what we are talking about when knives get into the hands of young people and are used, tragically and fatally, on other young people. When the police asked the offender how he bought the knife, he said, “I ordered it over the internet, because they don’t check your age.” I appreciate that the Scottish legislation relating to such cases is very different from ours and not totally applicable, but we want to ensure that our legislation on the sale of knives is fit for modern-day purposes, not least in relation to online sales.
I want to pay tribute to others who have campaigned on this issue, not least my hon. Friend the Member for Richmond Park, who has helped lead the charge to tackle knife crime, particularly in relation to zombie killer knives. He and others have worked hard, in London and elsewhere, to encourage the Government, who have effectively indicated that they will be banning the sale of those knives and that secondary legislation will give effect to that. That is very welcome.
I also welcome the fact that in March the Home Secretary announced the agreement of principles between major retailers and the Government to tackle knife crime. That voluntary agreement is very welcome. It has been signed by the British Retail Consortium and others. It is important to recognise that commitment by retailers to raise public awareness of age restrictions and robust age verification checks for knife sales.
However, in this legislation I am looking not so much at the prevention end, but at the prosecution end, because when these cases get to court there is a concern that we need to cement and support the Government’s action and the voluntary agreement by seeing what read-over there is through to the time when it reaches the courts. Under this legislation—section 141A of the Criminal Justice Act 1998—since 2009 there has been a drop in in the number of prosecutions. Back in 2009 there were 232 prosecutions, and 190 convictions were secured, but the number of prosecutions and convictions has reduced to a handful, despite the increased access to knives online. I admit that the evidence base is thin, because the police do not know the exact prevalence of online sales, and there is not much evidence for tracking those sales. Particular attention is quite properly given to guns and other illicit material that is obtained on the internet. I appreciate the comment made by my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) about knives also being obtained on the dark web. We need to see what we can do.
I have looked at the Chartered Trading Standards Institute website to see what it says. The situation we are
facing is this: when a matter goes to court and someone is quite properly prosecuted for selling a knife to someone underage, they then need to provide the defence of due diligence, which is that they have taken all reasonable precautions to avoid the conviction for the offence. The Chartered Trading Standards Institute says that what would certainly not reach the threshold of due diligence is simply relying on the purchaser to confirm that they are over the minimum age, for example by asking them to provide their date of birth, or using tick-boxes to ask purchasers their age, or using a general disclaimer, such as, “Anyone ordering this product will be deemed to be at least 18.” That is not sufficient.
The Chartered Trading Standards Institute also says that using an accept statement for the purchaser to confirm that they have read the terms and conditions and that they are over the minimum age is not due diligence, and neither is using e-payment services, such as PayPal, Nochex or Worldpay. Those services might require customers to be over 18, but they might not verify a user’s age. The issue is the verification of age that may not be properly adhered to. There is a suggestion on the Chartered Trading Standards Institute website that not all retailers are following basic trading standard requirements.
We need what has now been agreed voluntarily by the major retailers to be applied by other online retailers and places where knives are available, such as small fishing shops. We need to ensure that this legislation has bite. We need to do that because young people can sadly evade the more stringent proof of age checks that are required for face-to-face purchases on the high street. That is why new clause 1 seeks effectively to tighten the defence that a seller took all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence to avoid the commission of the offence. The triple-lock check in the new clause uses three minimum requirements recommended by the Chartered Trading Standards Institute for online sales of age-restricted products.
The first check is age verification on delivery. Retailers would be required to carry out age verification checks at the point of delivery by ensuring that their delivery drivers request valid proof of age to confirm the purchaser is over the minimum age necessary to buy the knife. The reality is that third-party couriers do not accept responsibility for age verification, and that could be a loophole. Furthermore, although the voluntary agreement the Home Secretary got the major retailers to sign up to means there is a commitment on their delivery drivers, we are looking at all other online retailers.
The second check is online age verification. Obviously, the credit card could provide that, but easily obtainable software could also ensure that a person’s age and identity are verified during the ordering process. Checks could use a register or a credit reference agency, and that could help to provide a proper due diligence check.
The third check—a follow-up offline check—goes a step further than the voluntary agreement. In some circumstances, it may not be possible to verify a potential purchaser’s age to conclude an online order. Further checks would then be required, such as requiring the customer to provide valid proof of age, which could then be appropriately checked.
Those checks put more flesh on the bones of the due diligence check. I understand that the specificity of due diligence is not usually included in statute, and the
Government may well respond that they do not want the new clause to cut across the voluntary agreement, but it does not seek to do that. In many ways, it is about cases that get to court, whereas the Government’s voluntary agreement is about trying to prevent online sales to under-18s and encouraging responsible retailers.
We want the prosecution and the court to be properly appraised of what is the very least in terms of reasonable precautions. New clause 1 would give them a clear understanding of the minimum requirement and of what is not a good trading standard, going beyond just the good voluntary agreement the Government helped to agree. It would make clear where the read-across is when cases reach court, so that the court has a clear understanding of due diligence.
I have tried to find other legislation where due diligence is specified, and it is hard to find. Nevertheless, there is an example of guidance relating to money laundering. Following a meeting that gave rise to something not dissimilar to the voluntary agreement with online retailers, the Government published guidance on customer due diligence on their website on 5 August 2013, and that guidance can be read across into court.
The new clause has cross-party support, and the Government will have seen how many Members—not least Conservatives—have signed up to it, and others no doubt support it as well. It is therefore important that the Government respond constructively and look at how we ensure that publication of their voluntary agreement leads to guidance so that the courts recognise what a due diligence defence to such crimes is.
In conclusion, it is important that the offence we are talking about is fit for the modern-day purposes of online sales. Often, we are talking about not just the sale of a knife but the supply of a knife. I would therefore welcome the Government considering whether a tweak needs to happen so that the sale of knives also encompasses the supply of knives. A wider understanding of sale and supply would ensure that we allow for the purchase of a knife by an adult who then passes it on to a youngster. We would then have full coverage. We should make the most of the opportunity provided by the Bill, whether that is today or later, when we come back to it here or in another place.