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Mr. Hattersley : In one moment. I will let the Home Secretary know when I have finished.
I congratulate the Home Secretary on initiating and pursuing the idea of a common European safety standard
Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman (Lancaster) : What sort of paragraph is that?
Mr. Hattersley : As this is the first day of the Maastricht summit, I cannot resist asking the Home Secretary why he believes that car locks are a suitable subject for Community competence when unfair dismissal procedures and minimum working conditions are not. By any standard, car locks and safety devices are intruding into what the Foreign Secretary calls the "nooks and crannies" of our normal life. I am in favour of that, but I thought that the Government were not. Mr. Baker rose --
Mr. Hattersley : If the Home Secretary would like me to give way, I am happy to do so.
Mr. Baker : A paragraph from the right hon. Gentleman borders upon eternity, but before he started that long, long paragraph, he made a careless, damaging and harmful comment about a tragic accident which took place a few weeks ago when a young boy was killed in his own garden, alas, by three dogs. It is typical of how the right hon. Gentleman argues in his ill-informed way, grabbing at a few facts, imperfectly understood, that he should try to say that the Dangerous Dogs Act was imperfect because it allowed that tragic accident to occur. It had no effect on that tragic accident because, as the right hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well, to do away with the possibility of such accidents, one would have to forbid the ownership of all dogs in almost all circumstances. The right hon. Gentleman should try not to make such cheap points, but I am afraid that that is typical of the way in which he seeks, time and again, to argue his case.
Mr. Hattersley : The Home Secretary simply makes the point that I made, at rather less length. The fact that we pass legislation to prevent tragedies of one sort or another does not mean that those tragedies will be avoided, although I trust and hope that that will be so. The contention of the hon. Member for Uxbridge (Mr. Shersby), with which I entirely agree, is that the House has a special duty to move swiftly when it is sure that to do so will avoid a national ill, but I am not prepared to accept the assumption underlying his contention that by passing the Bill we shall solve the problem. I welcome the one positive initiative that the Home Secretary has taken, to which he referred during his speech--the attempt to make British cars more secure--but that positive action should have been reinforced by a swathe of other positive proposals. Chief among them should have been a co-ordinated attempt to deflect young men at the first opportunity from a practice which turns into an obsession. The problem with such young men is the numbers in which they commit their crime.
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The Criminal Justice Act 1988 was intended to overcome the difficulty of Crown courts being inundated with young men who had taken cars and been apprehended before they had done any damage to themselves or anyone else. That Act amended section 12 of the Theft Act 1968, which virtually created the offence of taking and driving away. The offence carried a maximum penalty on summary conviction of six months' imprisonment and a £2,000 fine.Although the offence was intended to be a low-grade offence with a low- grade punishment, police authorities throughout the country complained of difficulties of getting prosecutions into court. The Crown prosecution service often insists that the cost of prosecution, which is estimated at £190 per hour, is not justified, and proposes a caution instead of prosecution. That is especially the case when the crime is committed by juveniles.
I have no doubt that action should be taken to prevent young men--some of whom, as the hon. Member for Stockton, South (Mr. Devlin) said, have been cautioned up to a dozen times--from developing an ingrained course of conduct. We know how that can be achieved. The Home Office working group which reported as long ago as 1988 showed that of 4,500 youngsters who, having been held responsible for motoring offences, attended special motor projects, only 100 committed car-related offences in the weeks and months that immediately followed.
There are examples from throughout Britain of the success of such schemes. One notable example is in south London, where, according to the probation officers who run the scheme, the reoffending rate is 9 per cent., compared with 80 per cent. in adjacent areas. There is no doubt that widespread development of such schemes would cut the number of car thefts.
However, the schemes that I have described suffer from one disadvantage. They seem to the unthinking to provide pleasure rather than punishment. I take a wholly pragmatic view. If schemes result in a reduction in car crime, I am in favour of them. That seems to be the sensible approach, and one which the sufferers from this epidemic would welcome.
I admit that many young men who are required to attend such schemes might have to go through the courts to obtain a probation order, but that would be a price well worth paying for an extension of sentencing in the community where it is a proven success. That is why the Opposition regret that, alongside the proposals that the Home Secretary has made today, he has not already instituted a massive programme of the nature which his own research demonstrates to be the most effective way of tackling car theft.
Such a programme would have tackled the causes of the crime and prevented thousands of young men from developing an obsession which can lead to destruction of property, injury and even death. It would not have sounded spectacular, as the Bill does, and it would not have appealed to the people who believe that the only response to crime is more severe punishment, but it would have been effective. As the only virtue of such schemes is practicality, however, they do not appeal to the Home Secretary.
I ask the Home Secretary specifically what is happening to the proposed scheme in Oxford, where the Blackbird
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Leys incident last summer caused so much damage and distress. I understand that the police and the probation service are anxious to develop motor projects and are waiting for Home Office approval and the promise of a Home Office grant.There is one immensely important objection to the Bill as it is currently drafted. I shall deal with it briefly, not to minimise the strength of our objection, but because it is the subject of the first group of amendments with which we hope to deal in the Committee stage. In effect, the Bill creates two levels of car crime. The basic act of stealing a car is defined in section 12(1) of the Theft Act 1968. Clause 1(2) stipulates the ways in which offences can be aggravated, or made more serious, and attract additional penalties. I understand--and, within the limited value of the Bill, accept--the advantages of warning a young man who steals a car that if, by his reckless behaviour, a pedestrian is killed or injured or damage is done to property, he will be subject to more severe penalties. Within the limitations of the Bill, I understand the purpose and advantage of that proposal, although it is worth repeating that the young man is probably already liable to penalties of similar severity even before the Bill is passed.
Surely it cannot be right that the man who commits the basic offence--and is liable to prosecution under the 1968 Act--may become liable under the Bill, even though his actions, or those which he is accused of taking, are not actions which he takes knowingly or wilfully or which are likely to exaggerate the offence in the way the Bill stipulates. That is in defiance of the principle of English law which requires the prosecution to demonstrate the wilful commission of an unlawful act. [Interruption.] As I see some scepticism on the Treasury Bench, I shall give an example of what I mean, which I hope will demonstrate the unacceptable point.
A young man steals a car and is indictable under the original Act. Let us assume that the young man loses his nerve, or retains his senses, and pulls up in a lay-by with the intention of leaving the car and walking home. If he succeeds in that endeavour and leaves the car and walks home, he can still rightfully be prosecuted under the Theft Act 1968. Clearly, no one would object to that. But if he climbs out of the car to walk home and another driver, legally in charge of his vehicle, swerves off the road and hits the stolen stationary car, the man who stole the car is guilty of the aggravated offence and liable to the additional penalties.
Sir Anthony Grant (Cambridgeshire South-West) : Quite right.
Mr. Hattersley : I hear the hon. Member for Cambridgeshire, South- West (Sir A. Grant) say that that is right. How can it be right to say that someone is guilty of an offence if he gets out of the car and walks away, but guilty of a worse offence if he gets out of the car and walks away and someone hits the car?
Mr. Alex Carlile : Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the problem goes a stage further? Courts will not sentence people for those things which they have not done. Whenever a case comes before a court, there will be a prosecution version and a defence version of the facts. The label given to the offence is often misleading, because if the defence disputes the prosecution's version of the facts--even if there is a guilty plea--there will be what is called a
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Newton hearing to determine exactly what the defendant did. Therefore, if the facts are as the right hon. Gentleman suggested, the young man will receive the sentence that he would have had for the lesser offence in any event. So the distinction is wholly artificial.Mr. Hattersley : That is my view.
Sir Anthony Grant rose --
Mr. Hattersley : I think that we are about to hear why the courts will sentence a man for something that he has not done, did not wish to do and, indeed, attempted not to do.
Sir Anthony Grant : There is a much simpler explanation of the point that the right hon. Gentleman made. The fact is that, if the offence of stealing and taking away the car had not been committed, the other car would not have run into the first one.
Mr. Hattersley : While that is patently true, the man in my hypothesis has created exactly the same circumstances and committed exactly the same offence whether or not something wholly fortuitous happens to him. I agree with the hon. Member for Montgomery (Mr. Carlile). The distinction may be clear to Conservative Members, but it will not be obvious to the courts. In consequence, the courts will not share the Home Secretary's judgment.
The Home Secretary's judgment is that the Bill makes individuals responsible for the consequences of their actions. We are all in favour of that, but it can be seen from examples which anyone can make up that the Bill makes people responsible for actions which are not their own but the actions of others. I do not believe that that will be acceptable to the courts, not least because the issue is much complicated by the defence set out in clause 4, which reverses the burden of proof in a way which extends the innovation which first came into English law in the legislation prohibiting the carrying of knives in public places.
According to clause 1(3)(b), a conviction is not possible if a driver proves that
"he was neither in nor on nor in the immediate vicinity of the vehicle"
when the aggravated offence took place. That vitiates the defence of the Bill by the hon. Member for Cambridgeshire, South-West, who said that because the person stole the car he was responsible even if he was
"neither in nor on nor in the immediate vicinity of the vehicle" when the aggraved offence took place. The hon. Gentleman's argument is totally invalidated by the Bill. More importantly in terms of that argument, however, the defence of clause 1(3)(b) requires the defendant to prove his innocence, and thus contradicts a basic principle of English law.
I draw the Home Secretary's attention to another area of legitimate doubt-- automatic disqualification from driving as set out in clause 3.
Mr. John Patten : On that basic point of principle, the right hon. Gentleman surely recalls that, under the Prevention of Corruption Act 1916, a person convicted of corruption has to prove that moneys in his possession were gained from activities which were other than corrupt activities, or that under the Sexual Offences Act 1956 a convicted pimp has to prove that his moneys were not gained from immoral activity? Also, under the 1971 drug legislation, a person with a cannabis plant in their garden
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has to prove that they did not know what it was. There is no great principle adduced in British law, and the right hon. Gentleman cannot refer to one because it does not exist, as I have just demonstrated.Mr. Hattersley : I confess my ignorance of the three laws that the Minister has brought to my attention, but I recall vividly the first Act of this Parliament, which concerned carrying offensive weapons in public places. I read the speech of the then Home Secretary--now the Foreign Secretary--this morning, in which he dealt at great length with what he described as a new principle of English law, in which a man found to be carrying such weapons was required to demonstrate that he was not doing so for an unlawful purpose. He described that as a reversal of our normal rules of evidence. His speech four and a half years ago was explicit in saying that that was unique to that sort of offence. If it was unique, this is the first extension of it that I know of.
Mr. Anderson : Surely the new principle of law to which my right hon. Friend takes exception is that a penalty can be aggravated as a result of circumstances over which the person has no control. That was the case in the example that my right hon. Friend gave about a lay-by. That penalty would be even more aggravated in the case of a passenger, whose mens rea may extend to riding in a vehicle which he knows to be stolen, but it does not follow that he has any control over the manner of driving.
Mr. Hattersley : That was my first objection. My second concerns the reversal of the burden of proof, and my third concerns the automatic disqualification from driving, as set out in clause 3. However, that may not be an objection if the Minister of State can give a cogent explanation. There is some doubt about whether a 14 or 15-year-old offender will be influenced by the discovery that he will be denied a licence two or three years later. More important is the effect that automatic disqualification would have on proper rehabilitation, which in some ways would be made impossible by such a requirement.
When the Minister of State winds up the debate, will he tell us if he can imagine circumstances in which a sentence--perhaps a custodial sentence-- has been served and it would be sensible to direct the offender into some activity which requires a driving licence? I can imagine that that might be part of the corrective training, or even part of the punishment. Will he think about that and tell us whether he still believes that mandatory disqualification is the right course to follow?
I admit that all those considerations are practical, and the Government are far less concerned with practical consequences than with public impact. In our way, we shall persist in examining each Bill brought before us in terms of its real and relevant issues, and that is how we intend to continue to behave when we get into Government.
Mr. Baker : Before the right hon. Gentleman sits down, I have listened to his speech carefully--
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Paul Dean) : Order. Has the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) completed his speech?
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5.4 pmDame Elaine Kellett-Bowman (Lancaster) : There can be few more mindless crimes than that which used to be known as "joyriding", but is now correctly described as death riding, because that is what, sadly, it so often becomes, as far too many families in the land now know.
Under the present law, the penalty for taking and driving away a car is a derisory six months, yet those thugs--usually young thugs--wreck people's lives, destroy property and terrify innocent pedestrians of all ages.
I was delighted when I heard the Home Secretary say in October that he proposed to introduce a new offence to tackle the problem. At that time, he proposed to provide for automatic disqualification, a maximum penalty of two years in imprisonment and an unlimited fine--good, but not quite good enough.
I was glad that, when the Bill was drafted, the proposed penalty was increased from two to five years. However, even that is not a sufficient penalty for those who mindlessly destroy other people's lives--and not only the lives of the people they kill. To lose a much-loved child or partner-- often the parent of a young family--can cruelly affect many more lives than the person who was killed. We must bring home to these scatterbrained young hooligans the seriousness of what, to them, is a light-hearted prank or blatant exhibitionism.
The thought of spending a few dull years in gaol although the Opposition appear to discount it--should help to dampen even the most foolhardy. Under the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988, there is a power to disqualify youngsters who are under the legal driving age. It is used far too rarely. All too often those youths are legally able to drive when they become 17. It is to be hoped devoutly that, whatever the Opposition may say--they do not seem to like this provision at all--that power will now be more widely used. Moreover, since the offences covered by the Bill are usually committed by the young, more youngsters will be caught in the net and will be liable to a term of disqualification, which can be unlimited and applies --as do the other penalties--to passengers as well as to the driver. That is important and fair, since egging-on by passengers is all too often the cause of the disaster, as a recent case has shown only too clearly. It will no longer be necessary to prove who was driving, which is sometimes difficult, since all those involved will now be liable. Thus another loophole is usefully closed by the Bill. Apart from the penalties under the Bill, penalties of life imprisonment for murder or manslaughter are still available under other legislation. However, the Bill tackles not merely injury to persons, but the damage to other people's property which criminals can cause.
As with much criminal law, it is essential for people who have knowledge of the offenders to speak out. It is no kindness to a son or daughter--however much loved--to shield them from the consequences of their criminal behaviour. It must be agonisingly hard to shop someone whom one loves, but we must create a climate of opinion in which that can and will be done.
Anyone taking a vehicle without the owner's consent, or driving or being a passenger in such a vehicle, will be liable under the Bill for tougher sentences if any of the aggravating circumstances--injury, death or damage- -
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takes place between the taking and the recovery of the vehicle. I am bound to say that the shadow Home Secretary's example was ludicrous in the extreme.Mr. Kenneth Baker : Absolutely, and the right hon. Gentleman would not give way to me.
Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman : The right hon. Gentleman would not give way to the Home Secretary.
It will be no excuse to plead that the consequences were not intended or foreseen or directly caused by that person. All too often, especially on motorways, a relatively small initial error can cause an horrendous chain of consequences. In the right hon. Gentleman's example, that was exactly what happened : the man got out of the car and another driver swerved to avoid him. If the young man did not cause that to occur, I should like to know who did, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridgeshire, South-West (Sir A. Grant) asked. Under the Bill, the person taking and driving away the vehicle will be liable for the chaos and mayhem that can follow the initial act of folly.
All in all, I welcome the Bill and wish it a speedy passage. The only matter that puzzles me is why those on the Liberal and Labour Benches do not see the urgent need for the legislation. Those in Oxford, Liverpool, Newcastle and many other cities undoubtedly do. 5.10 pm
Mr. David Young (Bolton, South-East) : It is not for me to analyse in the House today the reasons for the escalation in car theft. Part of it may be due to boredom caused by unemployment and some of it may well be due to our acquisitive society. Where material gain is everything, the law suffers as a result.
It is clear that, in many of these cases, there is complete contempt for the law as it stands, not unlike that shown by certain store owners who, when faced with a vacillating and weak Government, use their commercial power to bring the entire law into disrepute. I see little difference between the contempt in which a car thief holds the law and that of those who continue to open their stores because the Government are not prepared to uphold the law. I will not comment on who those store owners support financially, but many are the financial friends of the Tory party.
Car theft is not simply an offence against property : it is potentially a lethal offence. Between 1 September and 30 October 1991, about 12 youngsters died. Some died as a result of their own actions, but others were innocent people who were mown down by cars being driven at least recklessly or by cars certainly out of control. This is a serious problem in Bolton. In the first 10 months of 1991, 4,589 vehicles were taken and there were 4,903 thefts from vehicles and 2,533 charges of criminal damage involving vehicles. In total, about 11,000 innocent Boltonians suffered in one way or another from the crime. When these crimes continue to occur, it is the innocent who pay. It is the nurse who comes late off her shift to find her car stolen. It is the young man trying to hold down a job who finds his means of transport taken from him. Worst of all, it is those who are killed by the stolen cars. If we believe in a law-abiding society, this must be a matter of concern to us all.
What saddens me most is that we do not have as much will as we should have to get rid of the crime. With a small
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amount of the dedication that the Tory party showed in the way it attacked miners and trade unions, we would live in a law-abiding society. What we have is not a society of law and order, but a society of law and disorder.I do not condemn the police for that. The clear-up rate in Bolton increased from 27 per cent. last to 41 per cent. this year. That is a creditable performance, but there remains a tremendous backlog from which criminals benefit.
Sir Nicholas Fairbairn (Perth and Kinross) : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Young : I will not give way now, because other Members wish to speak.
There is little point in passing legislation if the police do not have the means to apprehend the criminals.They cannot deal with people they do not catch. The problem in Bolton is that it is often the same people who repeat crimes. The crimes are not simply committed by people on bail. They are also committed by the same people time and again. This morning, the chief superintendent in charge told me of an individual who had stolen 30 vehicles. Clearly, if we wish to rid our streets of this danger, it is not enough to pass legislation. We must also provide the resources to enable the police to carry out the legislation.
Sir Nicholas Fairbairn : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Young : I am not giving way.
Equally important is the requisite facility of communication between police forces in different areas because, obviously, car crimes are not exclusive to one town or county. They spread across the length and breadth of the country.
What is apparently lacking is a meaningful deterrent. I am not talking simply about custodial sentences, although I do not rule them out. The Government must take in hand by every means in their power any scheme that will stop this crime. As I have emphasised time and again, we are not talking simply about the loss of property, bad as that may be ; we are talking about the loss of life.
The people involved are often between the ages of 13 and 19. Often they have no worry about losing a licence, because a person who applies for a licence in the first place has some respect for the law. For the person with no respect for the law, why should the removal of a licence be any deterrent when that person has never had a licence anyway? Many of those involved are without funds. The Bill has been cobbled together as a hopeful public relations exercise, but it will result in only a small reduction in the crime. When such crimes are committed, it is the innocent in our society who pay. It is no good passing new legislation unless it reduces the incidence of the crime. We are seeking not simply to introduce punitive measures for use against the criminal, but to stop the crime of car theft and sweep it from our streets.
A few months ago, our television screens showed entire communities that were terrified. Men and women were afraid to walk on the streets of their own town or city because someone was racing around in a high-powered car that he could not control.
The preservation of the law is a matter for all parties. It is no good simply to claim in words, without actions,
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that one supports law and order, because, as the saying goes, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. So far, the taste of the proposed legislation has been nasty.5.20 pm
Mr. Michael Shersby (Uxbridge) : I declare that I am, as the House knows, parliamentary adviser to the Police Federation of England and Wales.
The federation and I support the Bill. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary should be in no doubt that he has the full support of the federated ranks in trying to deal with this difficult problem. The increased penalties are necessary. The penalty for the aggravated taking away of a vehicle, causing the death of innocent members of the public, must be introduced because the recent events in Oxford, Elswick and other towns and cities have shown that we cannot sit idly by and watch them repeated.
Until the passage of the Criminal Justice Act 1988, persons convicted of taking away vehicles without consent could be given a custodial sentence of up to three years. My right hon. Friend told us today that, of those sentenced, only about 3 per cent. each year received custodial sentences of more than six months. It is one thing to say that only 3 per cent. of those convicted receive custodial sentences, but it is interesting to consider the number of offences involved.
Those figures, which were given in answer to a parliamentary question that I tabled on 15 November, reveal that, in 1988, more than 20,000 persons were convicted, of whom 3,658 received immediate custodial sentences. Of those, 491 received a sentence of more than six months ; 103 received a sentence of between a year and 18 months ; 36 received a sentence of between 18 months and two years, and six received a sentence of between two years and three years. Those figures show that substantial custodial sentences were imposed which cannot be considered light or as encouraging young people to take a risk in the belief that nothing serious will happen to them. The figure of 3 per cent. is a little misleading. The custodial sentences and the number of individuals who receive them are significant.
Mr. Anderson : Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is not just the actual number of those who are sentenced to immediate imprisonment or to terms of imprisonment of six months or more that is significant? What is crucial is the signal given about the importance the Government attach to this offence. In 1988, the Government sent a clear signal that that offence was no longer so high in their scale of priorities. Does the hon. Gentleman agree, however, that that scale of priorities provides a deterrent in itself?
Mr. Shersby : I entirely agree. However, in 1988, the Government, and indeed the House, decided to reduce the penalty for the offence to a maximum of six months. The House agreed to the proposition that we should rely more on cautions and community service punishment. That decision was part of the policy, which had received support from all sections of the House, of reducing the number of people, particularly juveniles, sent to prison. It was also part of the policy of reducing the cost of criminal proceedings. I agree with what the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) said about that.
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To some extent, the decision in 1988 has resulted--it is difficult to judge to how great an extent--in a massive increase in auto crime--the taking away of cars without the consent of their owners and, in some cases, racing them on the public highway. I cannot believe that there is no connection between the abolition of the custodial sentence of up to three years and the subsequent increase in auto crime.Sir Nicholas Fairbairn : Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Shersby : I shall give way to my hon. and learned Friend a little later.
The number of vehicles that have been used to ram-raid shops and other premises to steal goods of every kind from hard-working shopkeepers has also increased. That crime has not been referred to today, but it is a worrying and major part of the auto-crime scene. Why do such things happen in our country? Some people will say that such crime is caused by unemployment and the recession, but that is not necessarily so. On the Blackbird Leys estate, it was clear to the police that the damage to cars and shops was done merely for pleasure, not for gain. Many of the youths involved in that crime were in full-time work or full-time education. It is true that some were unemployed, but there did not appear to the police to be any common denominator among them except that they lived on the estate or had relatives living there.
Mr. Andrew Smith (Oxford, East) : I live on the Blackbird Leys estate, and I can tell the hon. Gentleman that by no means all those who were caught up in the events were residents of the estate. It is an unfortunate feature of such confrontations that, once they start, every psychopath for miles around who wants to have a go at the police is pulled in. The people of Blackbird Leys and other parts of Oxford who are plagued with this problem are decent, law-abiding citizens. They are more anxious than anyone in the House to see this business brought to an end.
Mr. Shersby : I am glad that the hon. Gentleman intervened, because I know that he has a unique knowledge of precisely what happened. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will agree that a number of youths who were in full -time education or in full-time work were responsible for what happened. Many of those in full-time education did not attend school, and some visited Oxford and committed shoplifting offences or car crimes around the city.
During September, the people of our nation sat watching a unique spectacle on their television sets. They watched as young people drove stolen cars at high speed on several estates, to the great danger of residents. "Hotting" was the term used by many of those youngsters to describe their activity. Stealing cars and driving them to destruction had become a dangerous craze, almost to the point of addiction.
Sir Nicholas Fairbairn : Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Shersby : I will do so in a moment.
The House will recall that a computer scientist, Mr. Melvyn Davies, was clubbed and slashed in Oxford while going to the help of his girl friend, who had herself been stabbed in the body and in the face. He gave a succinct judgment about what happened when he said :
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"We have got to stamp out this sort of thing or it will spread like wildfire and become a new craze for the yobs. We cannot let them ruin our lives."That is one powerful reason why the House is considering the Bill. I believe that we owe it to Mr. Davies and to many others to pass it quickly.
We owe it not only to the people of Oxford but to those of Birmingham, Cardiff, Elswick, and even of rural Shropshire who have suffered. We owe it to the people of my own borough of Hillingdon, where only a week or so ago a teenager who had just stolen a car killed himself when he drove it into a tree at nearly 100 mph. There is no joy in those dangerous rides to death.
It is only as a result of sensitive and skilful policing in towns and cities that the problem will be kept under control. That kind of policing requires good police intelligence and first-class training. Fortunately for us all, those skills are possessed to a considerable degree by police officers of every rank.
The police have also demonstrated considerable success in building good relationships with the community, but they need the backing of the law and a powerful deterrent to prevent the craze of "hotting" from becoming a permanent feature of life in British towns and on estates.
Sir Nicholas Fairbairn : My hon. Friend spoke of "our nation", which includes a place called Scotland. Those new crimes are not occurring in Scotland--but if they were, there would be no difficulty in charging a person with reckless driving under the Road Traffic Act 1988, or, under common law, with assault to the danger of life, which should, if necessary, carry a penalty of life imprisonment. Am I being told that the law of England is so deficient that, if one assaults a person by driving a car at them to the danger of that person's life or property--whether or not one damages either--that is not a crime known to the common law of England, and would it not attract the most condign penalties?
Mr. Shersby : My hon. and learned Friend makes an extremely valuable point. I am glad that he has drawn the attention of the House to the situation in Scotland and to the law of Scotland, which in so many ways is superior to that of England.
Although the Police Federation welcomes the Bill, it would prefer the basic offence of taking away without consent possibly to incur the same penalty as was available until 1988, of up to three years' custodial sentence. The Bill does not propose that : it proposes only that those who cause injury or damage shall be liable to imprisonment for up to two years--or, if it is proved that an accident caused death, of up to five years.
Over the past few days, police officers have asked me why a community has to wait until someone is injured or killed before an offender is sent to prison for a lengthy period. For most juveniles who steal cars and engage in "hotting", the maximum penalty will remain a six-month custodial sentence--although, as my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said this afternoon, the fine will increase next year to £5,000.
I doubt whether many young people will be deterred by a fine of £1, 000 or £5,000, because they do not have that kind of money available. However, it will be interesting to see whether, under the Criminal Justice Act 1991, their parents will have some liability, and perhaps exercise more supervision over their youngsters than they have in the past.
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