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Such intelligence-led policing depends on the knowledge of NCIS and local police officers of who the troublemakers are. The new clause is designed to build on that operation and allow us, rather than merely detaining the hooligans in a cell overnight or questioning them for a few hours so that they miss the match, to go one step further and present information to a court, perhaps with video evidence.
I am conscious that presenting video evidence to a court could compromise intelligence, so it must be left to the police and NCIS to decide how much evidence to give, taking into account the risk that if they do not give the court sufficient information--if all they have are rumours, gut reaction or a bobby's instinct--they will not get the banning order. We do not need to prescribe too much detail in legislation.
I do not see too great a risk of intelligence being compromised. I would leave it to the good sense of the police to keep their intelligence sources intact, as there are much more valuable gains to be had in the long run with convictions of some of the nastiest hooligans, which must be a more pressing concern than gaining a banning order against one individual.
The new clause has aroused some concerns about the scope for civil actions against the police on the grounds of their presenting uncorroborated information to the court. Certainly, that is a risk. It is possible that people may claim to have been defamed by the police. If the police have laid information before the court about an innocent
member of the public--innocent in the sense both of the person being unconvicted and of the information being wrong--there would of course be scope for action, but it would not be any greater than the present scope for action against the police on a whole range of, in my opinion, bogus issues. The number of law suits against the police is rocketing. It has become the newest and juiciest racket for getting money from the state. A group of lawyers has no doubt moved on from medical negligence cases to action against the police.
Probably the greatest concern is about civil liberties, and some of my more sensitive colleagues may want to speak about that. I have not had unanimous, wholehearted supported from them for the new clause, although I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford will want to support me this morning.
Some of my hon. Friends may say that the new clause is a sledgehammer to crack a nut. They may think that it is disproportionate to the mischief being created, and that we would be passing draconian measures in providing that some people who have not been convicted of an offence may be banned from travelling overseas, or may be subject to a whole host of sanctions imposed by the courts.
Subsection (3) would allow those sanctions. It states:
I appreciate the civil liberties concerns about such a provision, but we should remember that--thank goodness--we are not dealing with hundreds of thousands of people. Although I am not arguing that it is acceptable to remove the civil liberties of even one person, the fact is that we are dealing with a few hundred or--at the very most--a few thousand dangerous hooligans, whose civil liberties will not be removed on the whim of a police officer or a chief police officer. Their civil liberties would simply be restricted on the basis of evidence presented to the court that they would be a danger and might cause violence if they were to go to a football match. The courts would be able to decide whether to grant an order, and what conditions to impose. I do not think that such restrictions are extremely draconian.
Restricting someone's freedom of movement and travel is, of course, a potentially severe measure. I should therefore be very keen to hear the Minister's views on whether my proposals--or an amended version of them--would satisfy the requirements of the European convention on human rights. I realise that--as the Government have not seriously contemplated including my new clause in the Bill today--the Minister may not have taken legal advice on its compliance with the ECHR. However, if she has a view on whether we may be on dangerous ground in relation to the ECHR, the House would be interested to hear it. Nevertheless, I think that it should be possible for a court to restrict someone's freedom of movement and travel within the European Union without falling foul of the ECHR.
My proposals are not totally new or off the wall, as there are some precedents for imposing an order in cases in which an offence has not been committed. Anti-social
behaviour orders, for example--which were introduced in the Crime and Disorder Act 1998--allow a court to impose any prohibitions considered necessary to protect persons in the local area.
Incidentally, during that Act's passage, the official Opposition tabled an amendment to introduce football behaviour orders in cases in which a person had acted in such a way as reasonably to give cause to believe that an order was necessary to prevent him from disturbing good order at any designated football match outside the United Kingdom, or during the period before or after any designated football match. The amendment was not pressed to a Division--as some of my colleagues were merely testing the water--and was withdrawn.
I am, therefore, not on entirely new ground in suggesting that it is appropriate to go to a court to obtain an order restricting the freedom of movement of an individual who has not been convicted of an offence in cases in which there is evidence suggesting that the person is a troublemaker or likely to commit violence.
As other hon. Members wish to speak, I shall not go on for too much longer. I merely wish to draw attention to some of the NCIS statistics on football violence and disorder, some of which were quoted on Second Reading. The NCIS view on the matter is very important. In its December 1998 press release, NCIS said:
Bryan Drew went on to say:
On Second Reading, when I stated that statistics showed about 1,000 arrests for football-related violence, Labour Members made the point that that number could be only the tip of the iceberg. I accept that, usually, the majority of those committing a crime are not arrested and convicted. So it is quite possible that many hardcore football hooligans have not been arrested by police, or that, if they have been, the evidence was not sufficient to obtain a conviction or--under clauses 1 or 6 of the Bill--a banning order.
My new clause would permit police, in limited circumstances, to take action against those other well -known offenders--whom every Opposition Member
talks about; they know who they are--who regularly follow football matches and foment violence, but manage to be on the back line when police move in to make arrests. The police have information and video evidence on those people. In many cases, police may have sufficient evidence to convince a court--in the terms of my new clause, although they may not have enough evidence to obtain a conviction--that the liberty of those people should be restricted.
New clause 1 is worthy of an airing, and I should be interested to hear what my hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford has to say about it. I was very interested in his comments, some time ago, on the potential for such a new clause. I should also be interested to hear why he has resiled from the tough stance that he proposed taking on such a provision. I am sure that he wants as many of these hooligans locked up--or at least prevented from causing trouble overseas, ruining the good name of Chelmsford and other parts of the United Kingdom--as I do.
As my hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford says:
"Where an order is made under this section, the court may, if it thinks fit, impose such conditions in the order as may be imposed where an order is made in respect of a person who has been convicted of a relevant offence."
My new clause would give the courts the right to impose the same range of penalties and restrictions--including passport removal--on those who have not been convicted as they may already impose on those who have been convicted.
"The National Criminal Intelligence Service today warned that they were becoming increasingly concerned about the number of incidents of football hooliganism being reported by their football section and by the network of FIOs"--
football intelligence officers.
"Although it is too early to say that the overall downward trend for football-related arrest figures over the past five years is being reversed, the signs are not encouraging."
He was referring to the fact that, although the overall figures for football-related offences and convictions had been dropping, he had noticed that there were more arrests for the more violent football-related offences of affray, violent disorder and missile throwing. He said that those had
"shown a marked increase over the previous season."
Bryan Drew continued:
"This season, the ugly face of football hooliganism has continued to make its unwelcome presence felt. The numbers of people involved remain comparatively small, but it is hard core, well organised and hellbent on causing mayhem. It is using football matches as a cover for its criminal activities."
Mr. Drew went on to talk about the fact that, although incidents of violence were declining inside the grounds, they were increasing outside or away from them.
"For far too long, a small minority of mindless, moronic football hooligans have besmirched the reputation of football in this country and dragged the game into the gutter by their anti-social behaviour."
My hon. Friend knows the rest of his press release. He was suggesting taking tough action to deal with those people.
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