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8 Apr 2003 : Column 188—continued
3.54 pm
Mr. David Atkinson (Bournemouth, East): I welcome much of what the Bill proposes, as will my constituents.
Bournemouth, as an urban conurbation that includes Poole, as we have heard from the hon. Member for Mid-Dorset and North Poole (Mrs. Brooke), includes residential areas that experience many of the problems that the Bill is designed to tackle. Those areas include
housing estates where it takes only a few unruly ringleaders of gangs of young people to make the lives of everyone else a misery. They cock a snook at the entire neighbourhood, as the Home Secretary rightly pointed out in his opening speech.Such behaviour can be discouraged by regular police patrols. The appointment of a community beat officer represents a valuable contribution in any such neighbourhood. However, the police cannot be everywhere. The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 established community safety executives, under local authorities, which allowed elected members to highlight local experiences of antisocial behaviour and to respond by agreeing a strategy with the police and the local authority.
Under local government reorganisation, that procedure was replaced by local partnerships that have no direct accountability to the council. I look forward to assurances from the Minister who winds up the debate that the effectiveness of the Bill's new provisions to deliver safer communities will not be undermined by the new and remote partnerships that have replaced the local community safety executives.
I welcome the measures to tackle the misuse of air weapons. They include some of the proposals in the 10-minute rule Bill that I introduced last year—the Firearms (Replica Weapons) Bill—which would have banned the acquisition and use of airsoft weapons by anyone under the age of 17 unless supervised by an adult. I was extremely grateful to the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, the hon. Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Ainsworth), for meeting me to discuss my Bill.
I introduced the Bill after the traumatic experience of two of my young constituents—sisters—who were targeted in a public place by a ball bearing gun. Such incidents involving BB guns occur regularly throughout the country, but that will no longer be the case if the Bill is effective. We must all welcome that.
My local Dorset police—like all forces—will welcome measures to tackle the availability of replica weapons. All too frequently, we read reports about the police reacting to the brandishing of guns in public, only to find that they are replicas. Apart from that being a costly waste of police resources, it can lead to tragic consequences. However, the Bill does not appear to respond to police requests for tougher controls on the sale of toy guns.
Last week, the Bournemouth Daily Echo reported that the cab window of a passenger train passing through Poole town centre had been fired at by a paintball gun, which could have obliterated the view of the driver. One can imagine the consequences for a car driver if his windscreen was sprayed with paint in that way. Like the use of airsoft guns, the use of paint guns without supervision should also be banned.
Finally, I am disappointed that the Bill does not strengthen police powers to deal with the antisocial behaviour of large groups of travellers who occupy public parks and open spaces with unauthorised encampments. When I introduced my Traveller Law Reform Bill on 10 July last year, I described the horrific experience in Bournemouth in Christmas 2001 and in
the new year of 2002, when 300 caravans and vehicles and 800 people occupied Kings park in my constituency. My Bill would define the rights and responsibilities of travellers.As the Anti-Social Behaviour Bill does not refer to the antisocial problems posed by travellers, I look forward to proposing my own constructive solutions when I reintroduce my private Member's Bill on Wednesday 7 May. I look forward to the support of the Government for that measure.
3.58 pm
Alan Howarth (Newport, East): For me, too, it would be an unusual constituency surgery if no one came to me with a story about the distress that their household was experiencing due to antisocial behaviour. It is to the Government's credit that they have fully recognised the problem and have already responded in a range of ways, notably in the 1998 legislation that set up crime and disorder reduction partnerships. That was enthusiastically welcomed by the police and the local authority in Newport, who have themselves addressed the challenges to increasingly good effect.
The new White Paper and the Bill will add valuably to the panoply of interventions available to public authorities. In Newport, we especially welcome the powers to disperse intimidating groups in designated areas and to close down premises used for drug dealing; the powers on air guns, replicas and graffiti; and the scope to accredit neighbourhood wardens. Newport's estate rangers, now renamed the community safety warden service, have won the respect and confidence of local people.
Of course, there will be differences of view. I have found different reactions to fixed penalty notices for 16 and 17-year-olds and to the provision for faster eviction as between the police in Newport and the youth offending team. There are greater doubts still about the appropriateness of the proposals concerning housing benefit. However, the important point is that the added powers will be provided for use at the discretion of local agencies and partnerships. It is positively valuable that the merits and demerits of using them should be debated thoughtfully at local level. I shall make three points.
My first point is that prevention is better than cure. Indeed, that is the title of an excellent document on policy for young people produced by the Welsh Assembly Government.
Risk factors for children and young people are more likely to occur in low-income households where unemployment is endemic, where there are housing problems and where there is a culture of substance misuse. So, to resurrect a phrase, we must be tough on the causes of antisocial behaviour. The Government's commitment against poverty and in support of good public services is central to that strategy.
In 1997 and 1998, in the Department for Education and Employment, I had the privilege of working with my right hon. Friend who is now the Home Secretary on the new deal, the national child care strategy and sure start, all of which were early and essential building blocks in the strategy.
My observation of children and young people is that they need two things: love and success. Where they have both, they will thrive. Where one is missing, they may
get by. Where there is neither, they will almost certainly be in real difficulty. Love is not for the state to provide, but it can help. The Government are right to focus on parenting through Parenting Plus and support for home start, which does a wonderful job in Newport, as well as to introduce the new powers on parenting contracts and parenting orders. That so many parents who have been subject to parenting orders express enthusiasm and recommend them to others shows us, if we are in doubt, that inadequate parents do not want to be inadequate. Intensive fostering and intensive support schemes will enable children to receive care and attention that may make all the difference to them emotionally.Without compromising standards, schools can find opportunities for all their pupils to achieve success in some area and the respect of their peers.
Andrew Selous (South-West Bedfordshire): Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that where the love and support of parents is not available to children, the constant attention of a mentor throughout a child's development can be a crucial factor in developing that life in a positive direction?
Mr. Howarth: I very much agree with the hon. Gentleman. It is difficult to find mentors and mentoring is a difficult role to play, but I do not doubt that he is right that where they can be brought into play, they will play a valuable part.
We are doing much more to provide sufficient sporting facilities, but we must do still more to ensure that there are enough recreational facilities that are affordable and available for people in deprived communities. Those who are working on the ground in the more disadvantaged wards of Newport, East tell me that, while more funding is available for intervening when things have already gone wrong, not enough funding is available for preventive work. It is a struggle even to obtain a few thousand pounds to refurbish a youth club or to fund young people to make a video. Early intervention and preventive investment should have consistently higher priority.
That takes me to my next main point, which is about prioritisation and integration of effort. Antisocial behaviour covers a multitude of sins, from unkempt gardens to systematic persecution. Holistic approaches are needed, but vaporous terms such as "holistic" and "partnership" do not get us very far.
The partner agencies have other pressing duties. The police must deal with serious crime. The health service must deal with cancer and heart disease. On what basis are they and other partners to commit resources to antisocial behaviour? How then are they to prioritise between different varieties of antisocial behaviour?
My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, in the White Paper and the Bill, is giving a clear lead. Government, whether in Whitehall or Cardiff, needs consistently across all Departments to follow that lead. The police now know, with the national policing strategy that was published in November, that antisocial behaviour is to be a higher priority than in the past. I trust that the resources and the performance indicators emanating from across government will reflect that. However, if everything is a priority, nothing is a priority. The Government need to make it clear where in the plethora of priorities antisocial behaviour ranks.
We need consistent approaches between levels of government, between Departments, between different areas and over time. To ensure delivery, we need more than just identification of where lead responsibility lies among Departments and individuals, important though that has been. We need to overcome the problem of agencies and Departments operating as separate fiefdoms. All must be equally committed, because if we fail to deal with one part of a complex pathology, we will undermine the rest of what we do. Hitherto, in Newport, we have not, for example, had the commitment that we needed from the health service to our crime and disorder reduction partnership. Too little effort and resource have gone into the child and adolescent mental health service. Public service agreements, business plans, targets and performance indicators must all reiterate the same story. We need to pool budgets for antisocial behaviour to a greater extent. Multi-agency training must be developed further. Partnership must become integration.
We also need to improve our base of evidence. We need systematic recording of antisocial behaviour, the number and severity of instances, the profile of perpetrators, and the damage that is done, as well as progress on objectives. Cost-benefit analysis in this complex inter-agency arena is not easy, as the Newport community safety partnership has noted in a thoughtful and candid strategy document. We must disseminate what has been found to work to good effect—perhaps that will be a role for the Government's new antisocial behaviour unit.
My final point is about community confidence and resilience. Antisocial behaviour damages vulnerable communities the most, and hurts the most vulnerable people in them the worst. There are things, however, that can be done quickly to help to build confidence.
Neighbourhood agreements, as recommended in the social exclusion unit report of 2000, can establish ground rules whereby communities agree standards of acceptable behaviour and service providers set out the service that the community can expect. If people who have been frightened, confused and disillusioned know what they have a right to expect and what behaviour is within the pale and what is beyond, they will be better able to regroup and stand up for themselves.
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