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Mr. Gordon Prentice: This is a long-standing matter which has resulted in 50 redundancies in my constituency because the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia would not pay for the bandages with which it had been supplied. I was just making a straightforward--
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. We must get back to the debate in question.
Mr. Banks: I am most grateful, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I wanted to be courteous to the hon. Gentleman, although I did not expect to mention that particular point. I think that the hon. Gentleman should write to the ambassador. That is the way in which a Member should deal with such a matter, not as the hon. Gentleman did. In doing so, he did a disservice to his constituency--
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Hon. Members should react by taking instructions from the Chair.
Mr. Banks: The Conservative approach to the fight against crime is not all about what the Government alone can do, let alone the Home Secretary. It is about a partnership between the Government, the police, the courts and the people. It is about giving the police the resources and the statutory backing to catch criminals, and it is about the courts using the powers bestowed on them by the House. That is what we expect of the criminal justice system in this country and, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary said, we should not rest until that ideal is reached.
We constantly hear from the Opposition about the 16 years that my party has been in office and about what has been achieved during that time. In law and order, we should be proud of the fact that there are 16,000 more police officers to protect us than in 1979. Recorded crime is down by 5 per cent. in the 12 months to June 1995, and includes 69,000 fewer burglaries and 130,000 fewer vehicle crimes. This is the largest 12-monthly fall for 40 years, and violent crime has decreased by 2 per cent. as well.
In the area including my constituency, 3,000 fewer offences have been committed since 1992--a decrease of about 13 per cent.--while the clear-up rate is 10 per cent. higher than the figure nationally. Indeed, offences recorded since 1979 in the metropolitan borough of Sefton have increased by 24 per cent., but that compares with 107 per cent. for the country as a whole. The statistics to which some hon. Members have referred in this debate show that the Government should take credit.
The law and order agenda is dominated by the Conservative party. A number of measures that the Government have introduced deserve special attention, and I believe that the measures introduced to prevent crime from occurring in the first place must be balanced by tough punishment for convicted criminals. In that light, the encouragement given to local people and businesses to work with the police--particularly in the "Partners Against Crime" initiative launched last year--will be instrumental in breaking down what I call the Sidney street tendency in the fight against crime. The Sidney street tendency--as the historians among us will recall-- refers to what Mr. Churchill did when he was Home Secretary in 1910. Sadly, I do not have the time to explain to non-historians what that means.
The Home Secretary and his Front-Bench colleagues simply cannot be in all places at once--as Mr. Churchill tried to be in 1910. In my constituency, much good work is done by local citizens through home watch schemes, the safer cities scheme and local drug prevention teams. The provisions in the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 to refuse bail more frequently are similarly helpful in preventing crime.
Public confidence has been shaken in recent years by the seeming inability of the police to convict the guilty in some cases. Wrong, it seems, too often wins by technicalities. Wrong must not win by technicalities. Where that has been due to the scales of justice leaning towards the defence, the Government have been careful to redress the balance. I refer in particular to the reform of the right to silence and the prospective changes to defence disclosure contained in the Criminal Procedure and Investigations Bill.
As the Government confirmed in the autumn, they are determined to punish criminals for their crimes, and imprisonment is the key to that. It is clear that the threat of prison and the confinement of criminals in prison reduces crime. During the past two and a half years, the prison population has increased by almost 10,000; during the past two years, recorded crime has fallen by 10 per cent. As the chief constable of Lancashire, Pauline Clare--who was mentioned earlier in the debate--said, there is no doubt that the fear of imprisonment is an extremely effective deterrent and certainly protects the public from habitual offenders. That is why I am firmly in favour of those who commit a second serious sexual and violent offence being sentenced to life imprisonment. That is why stiff minimum sentences should be introduced for persistent burglars and dealers in hard drugs. That is why prisoners who behave themselves should get no more than cursory time off and those who do not behave should serve their full sentences.
There is the matter of bobbies on the beat. The extra funding that has been found for 5,000 additional police officers over the next three years--including £20 million for the first 1,000 officers and a further £160 million for the rest--is to be welcomed. My constituency at the moment--until I have sorted out that little local difficulty--comes under Merseyside. It is a boost for it to receive another £6.8 million, which will enable it to take on another 28 officers. I can only hope that that money will result in a greater police presence on the streets and will not, as some recent reports have suggested, be diverted to fund more computers, civilians or radios. I hope that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary can reassure me on that point.
High-visibility policing is more than purely symbolic. If criminals see more policemen on our streets, it must provide a deterrent effect. I agree with Baroness Thatcher, who said that the only way to diminish crime is to diminish the threat of crime.
There has been a great deal of scaremongering in Merseyside recently about possible cuts. Much of it has been initiated through a leaflet produced by the Merseyside police authority. I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Minister of State for listening so carefully to my representations on behalf of literally thousands of constituents. The Government have proved their commitment to law and order by the real increase in Merseyside's funding for next year and through the
changed capping criteria. I believe that the Merseyside police force is determined to reduce crime even further and the Government are helping with that.
As I said earlier, tougher sentences for criminals must be balanced by more consideration for their victims. In that light, the Government accepted all the recommendations of the Royal Commission on criminal justice relating to victims, including improving facilities at courts and keeping victims informed of the progress of their cases. The increased provision for the criminal injuries compensation scheme and the already generous funding for Victim Support also show the current priority being given to victims by this Conservative Government.
The partnership approach towards law and order is, as I said earlier, the key to winning the fight against crime. The measures to which I have referred and others mentioned earlier are very much part of the far-reaching reforms in which the Government are engaged. The coherent policy to which my right hon. Friend the Minister referred earlier is designed to achieve a partnership to tackle crime more effectively. Yet what support have my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary and his colleagues received from the Labour party? Very little. Quite frankly, one or two of the comments made earlier in the debate bordered on the comical.
The policy of the Labour party still seems to be that all crime is the natural accompaniment to poverty; that because people are poor, they can be excused their trespasses. That ignores the issue of personal responsibility, which in my view has always seemed to be a dirty word to Labour Members.
Mr. Michael:
Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Banks:
That lack of responsibility has characterised their years in government over the past three decades.
Mr. Banks:
I would genuinely like to give way to the hon. Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth (Mr. Michael), but he spoke for 42 minutes and will be able to speak for longer in his winding-up speech than I will be able to do now.
Mr. Michael:
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Has the hon. Gentleman the right to peddle total inaccuracies and mislead the House by ignoring the facts that were put forward earlier in the debate?
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
No hon. Member has the right to mislead the House, but nothing that I have heard the hon. Member for Southport (Mr. Banks) say has misled the House, as far as I am aware.
Mr. Banks:
I am most grateful, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
The Labour party, as my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Mr. Evans) said earlier, has voted against many of the measures that the Government have introduced in recent years and, in particular, it has failed to support the prevention of terrorism legislation. It is not just the Labour party. The Liberal Democrats are just as guilty.
In the few minutes that I have left, I want to conclude by dealing not with the negative remarks of Opposition Members but with a significant point. "Responsibility prevents crimes", wrote Burke in his "Reflections on the French Revolution". That is as true now as it was then.
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