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6.55 pm

Mr. Bill Walker (North Tayside): The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace) attacked the Government's record on crime. If the increase in crime was confined to Scotland and the United Kingdom alone, his comments would be justified. But crime has risen and continues to rise throughout the industrial democracies. In particular, the rate of crime in Europe has risen dramatically. That is not surprising, given the easy and rapid movement of large numbers of people. It would be astonishing if patterns were not repeated.

The challenge is to deal with that situation and to deter mobile criminals. It is no good simply saying that crime in Scotland is rising. We must consider the world in which we live and how to address the problem. The Bill, which I welcome, will go a long way towards restoring the Scottish people's confidence in the rule of law.

Whatever our learned judges and others may say, people look to Parliament to respond to their concerns and to introduce laws to address those concerns. They expect Parliament to listen to those with an axe to grind because they are directly involved. That is what lobbying is all about. They expect Parliament to make the judgments and decisions.

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Given the Bill's long title, it is astonishing that hon. Members should suggest that it will not be possible in Committee to table reasoned amendments. Most of the points that I have heard could have been addressed by means of reasoned amendments.

What we have seen today is the reality of new Labour. It has one policy for England and Wales, where it supports minimum sentencing, and another policy for Scotland, where it is against minimum sentencing. The question that we should be asking is which is the real Labour. The Islington-Hamilton divide is endemic. It wrecked Labour's policy on devolution, causing the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. McAllion) to take a principled stand and resign. I understand his position, because I too have taken a principled stand and resigned on a constitutional matter about which I felt deeply. It wrecked Labour's devolution policy, and it will wreck its law and order policy as well.

Disraeli once described political parties as organised hypocrisy. New Labour must be the textbook example for students of modern politics. For us politicians, it may just be hypocrisy, but for the British people, especially Scottish people, new Labour means chaos or catastrophe, or it would if ever a Labour Government were forced on us.

The only consistent theme in new Labour policy is the white flag. Labour will wave the white flag at the unions. Labour Members will surrender the constitution, they will surrender to Brussels, and would surrender to the criminals in our society if they had their way on this Bill. They talk about law and order. I have a long memory and I have served on every law and order reform Bill Committee in the past 17 years.

Mr. Connarty: As the hon. Member has been on the Government side for 17 years, can he tell us why they have made such a mess of it?

Mr. Walker: The hon. Gentleman obviously did not listen to my opening remarks. If he had, he would have heard me explain that the Bill deals with the problems created by a modern, mobile society, especially in Europe and the rest of the western world.

We must put in place a combination of measures. The Bill is only one part of that combination. It is not the solution; it is the road towards a better way of dealing with crime. No Bill, in isolation, will address all the problems. We must amend the law in the light of experience. Criminals are much more mobile now. We must produce Bills that will deter, and this Bill is part of that approach. Its purpose is to create deterrence. I have always believed in deterrence, which is why I have always supported the nuclear deterrent and capital and corporal punishment. I am not saying that they are answers in themselves, because they are not. But they are part of a package.

What is wrong with modern society is that we seek simple, single-issue solutions when the problems are always much more complex. The Church has responded recently. I agree with the cardinal: he was right to address the issue. He and the Leader of the Opposition may have words, but one cannot deny that the cardinal is right to speak out on behalf of his Church. That is his job, and I support him. In fact, I think that he is a splendid cardinal, and I am not a Roman Catholic. He tries to address some of the fundamental problems.

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We live in a world that has substantially abandoned old standards and values. That worries Tom Winning, because he sees standards being eroded and not being replaced with other standards and values. In schools, in the workplace and on the football fields people no longer have a code of conduct that is acceptable to the majority. The Bill, in part, tries to address that problem, and I welcome it.

I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, West (Lord James Douglas-Hamilton) and the Government for funding the DNA laboratory in Dundee. I am sure that the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. McAllion) also supports that. The Tayside force led the way in this field, and now that it has extra funding, its laboratory is being extensively used by other Scottish forces. I welcome that. Modern policing and modern detection is about having the right equipment and the right people.

I shall deal briefly with another comment of the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland. The use of aircraft for coastline surveillance is much more important than having people on the ground. With the size and length of our coastline, we could never have enough people on the ground to ensure that every part of the coast was covered. That cannot be done: it is not realistic. Using modern equipment makes it a more viable proposition, so the use of aircraft is much more important.

We must introduce measures that will give people confidence. The courts must be reminded that Parliament's job is to tell them what to do: it is not their job to tell Parliament. They can advise Parliament and they can lobby--everyone has that right in a democracy--but Parliament must ultimately decide. I shall not go into detail on the Bill tonight, because I will have ample opportunity to do so in Committee. As my right hon. Friend knows, I never sit silent in Committee. I look forward to considering amendments, introducing amendments and listening to the reasoned amendments of hon. Members who have been so critical tonight.

7.4 pm

Mr. Michael Connarty (Falkirk, East): I do not often agree with the hon. Member for North Tayside (Mr. Walker), except at a social level, but he used a short phrase that I agree with when he said that this Bill "is not the solution". Unfortunately, because of soundbite politics, the Secretary of State tried to sell it as a solution. That is the frightening thing about the context of the Bill. It was embarrassing to hear the fumbled and mumbled expressions used by the Secretary of State to try to tie this Bill in with the Bill that we debated in 1992, when we helped the Government to pass the Prisoners and Criminal Proceedings (Scotland) Act 1993. I hope that he was embarrassed by that: I certainly was.

The Minister of State always reads a good brief, and he will no doubt read his brief well at the end of the debate. I hope that he will admit that he was embarrassed. He also served on the Committee on that legislation, and he argued the case for the 1993 Act very well. To have to contradict it will be a further embarrassment, although he will cover it well as he is trained to do so. I will return to the Chamber to listen to his response.

Law and order is a key demand of the citizens of Scotland in my constituency and in every constituency. When we consider Bills, we must take account of the key

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demand of our citizens for security and peace of mind, free from threat to themselves, their families and their communities. That is what people want in every constituency of Scotland, and no doubt throughout the rest of the United Kingdom. The Bill will not necessarily give them that. The terrible thing is that it may hold up a banner that will hide from them the reality of what may happen as a consequence, and that will make them think that it is a solution. If we go too far, we shall fail to make the progress that we want to make.

I am wearing the "Scotland Against Drugs" badge, as most Ministers are: if it is not on their lapels, I am sure that it is in their pockets or on another suit.

Mr. Wallace: It is difficult with a poppy as well.

Mr. Connarty: I made a point of not covering it with my poppy for the debate.

There is a discussion in Scotland about the type of advertisements that the "Scotland Against Drugs" campaign intends to use. They have all the flaws of those used in the campaign against AIDS and HIV in the early 1990s. Their portrayal of every drug user as a victim who will end up a vegetable or even dead was extreme and ridiculous. Everyone trafficking in drugs or selling a tab of E looked like the devil without his tail. That is so ridiculous that the vast majority of young people will reject the advertisements, and that will not help our fight against drugs. I hope that that organisation gets that message.

When I learned about the constitutional history of the United Kingdom, I was taught about Hanging Judge Jeffries, who hanged people for stealing sheep. Even though people were caught with the sheep in their hands, they were acquitted of sheep stealing. The ridiculousness of the sentence compared with the crime was apparent, so it led to less rather than more justice. That is what is worrying about the Bill.

The Secretary of State, for whom I have a great respect intellectually, has not had time to take on board the fact that the population in Scotland needs a toughening up on crime and on the way in which we act against criminals. Because we are rushing towards an election, we have what the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace) called the Dostoevsky Bill. It may be nearer "The Possessed" than "Crime and Punishment".

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