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12.30 pm
Mr. Peter Atkinson: I may be naive, and perhaps I am old-fashioned, but I believe in defending the right of an individual to self-expression. It is something that we should restrict only with very great reluctance. It should be restricted only if the hon. Gentleman could show, through his arguments during this debate, that some positive benefit to the public would result from passing his amendment. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary has shown without doubt that the amendment would not achieve that. Therefore, the hon. Gentleman should not try to restrict the rights of people to self-expression. I agree that they are unpleasant people, but simply because someone is unpleasant does not mean that he should not be able to express his views.
Mr. Michael: I do not regard the hon. Gentleman as old-fashioned, although I certainly regard him as naive and his views as dangerous. The expression of views can cause enormous problems in society and the House has legislated against that in certain cases. On a number of occasions we have expressed concern about the freedom
to incite violence, including racial violence. Are those freedoms that the hon. Gentleman would wish to defend? I rather think not. If he reads his words in Hansard and considers their implications, he may come to regret deeply what he has said today.
Fringe periodicals of the sort that the amendment would target reach impressionable young people, as do flyers in local newspapers. The freedom to incite violence is a freedom we can do without. The self-regulatory system is not sufficient. We need to control the advertising of offensive weapons to ensure that neither guns nor knives get into the wrong hands, thereby putting the public in danger. It is in the interests of the advertising industry--even of the ASA--that we should legislate in the way suggested in my amendment. It is certainly in the interests of the public and also of the police, who have to deal with violence on our streets.
There has been a series of cross-party debates on the Bill. I acknowledge the fact that the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam has tried to deal with the issues that I have raised. We are agreed on the need to do something about advertising. Unfortunately, the Minister has not yet accepted that. I hope that, in the atmosphere of a cross-party approach to the horrific events at Dunblane and cross-party agreement on necessary legislation, we will continue to debate the whole issue of mail order of weapons--including guns and knives and the way in which they can be advertised through channels that will encourage the interest of impressionable young people. I hope that, this year, legislation will be introduced to tackle a problem that I have been glad to be able to air during this short debate.
It is not my purpose to delay the Bill. As I said earlier, we give two cheers for it; I would have liked to be able to give a third cheer for having my amendment accepted. However, two cheers are better than none. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lady Olga Maitland:
I beg to move amendment No. 11, in line 1, leave out from 'about' to end of line 12 and insert
I tabled the amendment as a result of concern expressed about the long title of my Bill. It is a very long title and we feel that the Bill should now be given a better title and a relatively short one. I am assured by the draftsmen that the shorter version that I proposes is no different in substance from the one that it replaces
and does not affect the Bill's scope. It is therefore an uncontentious, technical amendment, about which there is not a great deal more to be said.
Amendment agreed to.
Order for Third Reading read.
Lady Olga Maitland:
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
This is an important Bill. It is a sad reflection on the times that it needs to be introduced at all. The knife culture is set to engulf us all unless we take a firm hand and curb it now. There must be tough condemnation from society for young thugs who indulge in mindless violence, and the backing of Parliament to ensure that we have legislation that will work. We want to ensure that those who carry knives do so at their peril. They are not heroes; they are common little criminals. They will be caught, they will face stiff penalties, and wherever they turn they will face a wall of obstacles preventing them from obtaining their vicious weapons. The Bill will achieve all that.
It might be helpful if I set out the context in which the Bill came about. I have personally campaigned for years against the knife culture. I know one family in particular--Bill and Valerie Dennison--who were shattered when their 17-year-old son, John, was mindlessly stabbed to death. We owe a debt to headmaster Philip Lawrence, slaughtered by a teenager: his courage and sacrifice spurred me on, and my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary and my hon. Friend the Minister helped me to put the Bill together.
Tragically, Mr. Lawrence's death is one in a long series of statistics. Knife-related offences are increasing year on year, and the victims are of all ages--children, teenagers, middle-aged people, pensioners and, above all, the police. In 1994, 1,000 police officers were seriously assaulted and injured in England and Wales. Prosecutions rise every year, and in 1993-94--the last year for which figures are available--there was a sharp jump of almost 1,000, to 3,367, in London alone. That is a good example of just how serious the problem is. Despite the appalling tragedy in Dunblane, more people die from being stabbed by a knife than from being shot by a gun. Of the 677 people murdered in this country that same year, 236 were stabbed. In London, 41 per cent. of all murders involved knives or other sharp instruments. In short, the knife is more lethal than the gun, and we have no choice but to tackle the knife culture with great urgency.
Such offences are taking place all over the country. The decent suburban areas and the peaceful rural countryside are not immune to the violence. In my constituency, a pleasant, green and seemingly tranquil part of the world, 54 people were arrested for possessing offensive weapons in just six months of last year. We have had our share of stabbing incidents. Youngsters as young as 10, 11 and 12 years old have been caught with knives.
A regular survey of the press will come up with its own catalogue of tragedy. Barely a week passes without one hearing of a terrible death. I look back, for instance, to February, when a 14-year-old boy was stabbed in the chest while playing with school friends. Last year, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Barbara Mills, reeled in horror when her husband, John, was stabbed just yards
from their front door. Just two months ago, a gang fight in west London resulted in death, and in March an amnesty produced 37,000 knives. I imagine--sadly--that that is only a tiny percentage of those still at large. And so the awful tragedy goes on. The nation may be horrified, but with determination, we should be able to prevent our country from sliding into the violent chaos that dominates major US cities such as New York, Washington and Chicago.
The Bill tackles the problem from the bottom. A week ago, the Evening Standard published a despairing article which accused Scotland Yard of being
The article suggested that the police were weak in view of the fact that although 60,000 people had been cautioned or prosecuted for having offensive weapons between 1990 and 1994, a mere 1.7 per cent. had been gaoled. The paper was right in one respect, because the law needed to be tightened up, but it was wrong to suggest that nothing was being done.
In many cases, the police were powerless to do more. The Bill will greatly help the police to make an arrest on the spot when they find a person carrying a knife without good reason. Until now, the policeman was powerless. He was empowered only to issue a caution, a warning or a summons, which could sometimes take weeks to go through the system.
In future, the thugs will have a shock when they are caught. Their swaggering arrogance will disappear when they are frog-marched down to the police station. Furthermore, on conviction, they will no longer get away with a ticking off. They will face stiff fines and, according to the circumstances, they may face gaol sentences of up to four years. There will be no hiding place for these mobsters.
Tragically, school premises have been the scene of far too many knife incidents. Until now, schools were a sanctuary, like a church, which the police could not enter to search and arrest. We have therefore taken a significant step in Committee by including in the Bill a provision permitting the police to go into schools to search and arrest. They were not able to do that before because the sanctuary aspect of schools prohibited them when they wanted to go inside. It meant that children felt that they could get away with it.
It is significant that the important step of allowing the police into schools has been welcomed by 14 different teachers' unions and associations. Regrettably, the chief education officer in my Liberal Democrat-controlled authority admitted to my researcher that he could not see any advantage in allowing the police to go into schools and that he was against the suggestion. He speaks for himself and for the Liberal Democrat attitude towards being tough on crime. The Liberal Democrats are certainly out of step.
We shall not rest there. Not only do we want the police to have permission to go into schools, but we want to forbid the sale of knives to under 16-year-olds. We have therefore taken a major step by including in the Bill a provision whereby retailers will not be able to sell knives to teenagers under 16. The truth is that these teenagers feel that buying a knife is smart. It is not; it is cheap and cowardly. The retailer is now protected by the fact that he cannot sell knives to under-16s. If he does and is caught, he will face a fine of up to £5,000.
Amendment made: No. 10, in page 5, line 39, leave out 'and 3' and insert
', 3 and 4(1), (1A) and (3)'.--[Lady Olga Maitland.]
'persons having knives, other articles which have a blade or are sharply pointed or offensive weapons; and about selling knives or such articles to persons under the age of sixteen years'.
12.34 pm
"soft over war on knife culture".
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