I have allowed my right hon. Friend to make his point, but the simple truth was that the reason for the Home Secretary of the day curbing stop and search was concern about its impact on ethnic minorities. He is also right that the biggest number of victims of knife crime came from ethnic minorities, so I take his point. My answer to him—and the general concern here—is that bad policing is not improved by bad law, which is what I think this is.
That brings me to the Casey report. The hon. Member for Croydon Central was right to cite the criticism of the Metropolitan police. The report said that there were numerous examples of stop and search being carried out badly. There were examples where officers
“justified carrying out a search based on a person’s ethnicity alone”.
That should not apply under any circumstance. There were examples where officers
“Had been rude or uncivil while carrying out a search”
and
“had used excessive force, leaving people (often young people) humiliated, distressed, and this damaged trust in the Met”.
Those are all bad things from our point of view.
We all want—I include the Opposition—the disgraceful trend in modern demonstrations brought to an end. It is designed not to demonstrate but to inconvenience—there is a distinction. But the Bill is a heavy-handed way of doing that. The Minister tried to say that the Lords had accepted the principle. They had not. What they have sought to do with these amendments is leave the tool in the hands of the police but constrain it in such a way that it is used more responsibility.
The Lords amendments will change the level of seniority required to designate an area for suspicionless search from inspector to chief superintendent or above. Whatever Lord Hogan-Howe says, that is not a crippling amendment. Changing the maximum amount of time for which an area can be designated from 24 hours to 12 hours is not crippling but practical. While my right hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire was doing his job in London, I was on the Opposition Benches as shadow Home Secretary, dealing with a number of Metropolitan Police Commissioners. That is a perfectly practical change. Changing the level of seniority required to extend the authorisation by a further 24 hours to chief superintendent is, again, a practical change.
We talk about suspicionless stop and search. What does that mean? It means the right to stop and search innocent people who have no reason to be stopped and searched whatsoever. We are handing the discretion to a police force that has been called upon to reset its approach to stop and search. The Government are doing almost precisely the opposite of what Casey is calling for. The final amendment states:
“The chief superintendent must take reasonable steps to inform the public when the powers conferred by this section are in active use.”
Those are all practical changes. The smart action of the Government is to accept them, carry on and try to improve on the Metropolitan police that we have today.