| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
Mr. Parmjit Dhanda (Gloucester) (Lab): First, I reiterate my earlier intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham, South (Alan Simpson). Understandably, many hon. Members mentioned the tragic case of Danielle Beccan, but it is also important to get across the fact that Nottingham is a vibrant, exciting, diverse and sought-after place in which to live. As I said earlier, I spent five of the happiest years of my life in Nottingham as a student at Nottingham university.
When I first became an MP in 2001, I held a surgery in one of the slightly more leafy areas of my constituency, Quedgeley. A mother who came to visit me told me that she had to spend time in local car parks in the city centre trying to get hold of heroin for her teenage son because of the 16-week wait for methadone. Earlier this year, I opened a drug rehabilitation centre in the heart of my constituency, and that 16-week wait for methadone is now a five-week wait. That is real progress, so we must keep things in context.
Statistics represent another element of the debate. People always talk about lies, damn lies and statistics, so which set of statistics can we really trust? The Conservatives certainly believed in the British crime survey when they came up with it in 1982, and I dare say they believed in it when it suggested that crime figures were going up, but they need to believe in it now, as do we all. We should not lose trust in it because it shows that vehicle crime is down by half, house burglary is down by 47 per cent., assault is down by 43 per cent., wounding is down by 28 per cent., and vandalism is down by 27 per cent. But who are we to be trusted? We are just politicians. It is anybody's guess whether people in the Public Gallery or viewing this debate at home trust the Home Secretary, Home Office Ministers or, indeed, the Opposition, but I would say to them, "If you are not going to trust us with regard to these statistics, who should you trust?"
In my constituency and in almost every other, people should trust their local police. I know what my local police are saying loud and clear, because they said it last month in a local newspaper, the "Gloucester Citizen". On 14 September, they commented on local crime statistics and gave two reasons for them: first, their innovation at a local level; and secondly, the resourcing that they are receiving from Government. Not one, two or three but four of the most senior police officers in the Gloucestershire constabulary were quoted in the article. The assistant chief constable, Craig Mackey, said:
"This has been a truly remarkable start to the 2004/5 operational year."
The chief constable, Dr. Tim Brian, said:
"It demonstrates the success of the investment and changes we made in 2003".
There is slightly more explanation in the remarks of a man whom I know very well, the chief superintendent of the Forest and Gloucester division, Chris Merrick, who says:
"Our efforts around controlling the supply of controlled drugs on the streets of Gloucester have also had an impact on crime generally".
Perhaps the person who goes furthest—my neighbour, the hon. Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown), will know him better than I do—is Chief Inspector Jim McCarthy of the Cotswolds and Stroud division, who said of the statistics:
"They prove that our intelligence-led approach to reducing the opportunities for committing crime is paying off."
So what are the key innovations and what difference are they making at a local level in my community, as in communities all over the country? There has been a release of 17 additional police officer posts for general policing duties—that means more bobbies on the beat—through the civilianisation of custody detention officers, and there have been 61 additional community support officers, 31 of whom have been funded above and beyond the Government match funding figure. I hope that police forces that have stuck their necks out by trying to innovate in the same way as the Gloucestershire constabulary will be rewarded when their settlements come up later in the year. That innovation has made a significant difference locally. Overall crime is down by 19.2 per cent., domestic burglary is down by 27.2 per cent., and vehicle crime is down by 31.8 per cent. Perhaps most significantly, the level of crime fell by one third—33 per cent.—between last August and this August.
The other key element is resourcing. Several hon. Members spoke about resourcing, and not least the hon. Member for Newark (Patrick Mercer), who made an eloquent plea for an extra 1,000 police officers. This debate comes up year after year, and usually in May in areas such as mine, when there is an election around the corner, so a couple of years ago I decided to request a study by the House of Commons Library to consider the pattern of policing in Gloucestershire and the number of civilian support staff and police officers down the ages, all the way back to 1979.
It is an interesting pattern. Back in 1979, Gloucestershire constabulary had 1,096 police officers. In fairness to the Thatcher Government, police numbers then went up, peaking in 1984 at 1,149. The figure then stayed largely the same, varying up and down a bit, and peaking in 1992 at 1,174. That was the highest number of police officers that we ever had under the Tories—back in 1992—and from then on the number kept dropping, right the way through until 1999, when the Government had changed and had put in the resources. However, one cannot turn the battleship around in a couple of years. In 1999, there were only 1,104 officers, less than there had been in 1992.
Since then, the rural policing fund, which has brought us about £750,000, and the crimefighting fund, which is over and above our annual settlement and has been
18 Oct 2004 : Column 712
worth about £4 million to my constituency in the past four years, have made a huge difference. When the work was done for me back in 2002, we had 1,183 officers—far more than ever before—and 545 civilian support staff, compared with only 367 in 1992. I know that hon. Members may argue that civilian support staff are not that important or that we could get rid of them and have more officers on the beat, but one cannot say that, because some of these people do jobs that make it easier for officers to get out on the beat. For example, there are civilian statement takers.
Those figures were for 2002. This morning, I decided to get in touch with the Library again. I was told that on 31 December 2003 the constabulary had 1,269 officers—far more than it had even in 2002—and the number of support staff had grown from the 1992 figure of 367 to 738. We have had innovation and resources, making a difference and reducing crime in my constituency by a third between August last year and August this year.
Mr. Wiggin: Would not it have been even better for Gloucester if the hon. Gentleman had been able to cite an increase not only in civilian back-up but in jobs for real police officers?
Mr. Dhanda: I like the hon. Gentleman immensely and he makes some very good points in the House, but he was not listening to what I was saying. I said that we had 1,269 police officers—more than we have ever had before; and for the first time in the history of Gloucestershire, we have more than 1,000 constables. Compare the figures with those of years gone by, and they reveal a huge difference. On top of that, we have additional civilian staff and 61 community support officers, 31 of whom are funded—this is a message for my own Front Benchers—over and above the match funding figure. It is a right to take such decisions at local level, and police authorities and constabularies can do so. Innovating in that way demonstrates that they can reduce crime statistically.
I say not just to Members of this House but to members of the public listening to this debate in the Chamber, on television or on the radio that if they if they are not prepared to trust the statistics of the British crime survey and other organisations, and if they are unwilling to trust what Ministers or Back Benchers such as I say—if so, they are unlikely to trust Opposition Front Benchers, either—they should listen to and trust local police officers, who are saying that crime is going down and that they are better resourced than ever, and in areas such as mine, they are also innovating like never before.
8.55 pm
Mr. Bill Wiggin (Leominster) (Con): I reciprocate by pointing out that I am fond of the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mr. Dhanda), who is doing his very best to defend a difficult position. He will remember that "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime" was one of the promises that, sadly for the people of Britain, simply has not proven true. People feel less safe than they did seven years ago, and not without good cause.
The facts on Labour's crime record speak for themselves. Well over 1 million violent crimes are committed every year in the UK, and crime is rising year
18 Oct 2004 : Column 713
after year. Some 800,000 more offences are committed each year compared with 1998–99; that equals an extra 90 crimes every hour, compared with five years ago.
Of course, the Government try to hide behind selective statistics and changes in the recording of crime. So why, then, do adjusted records since the method of recording was changed still show an increase in crime? Violence against the person went up by 14 per cent. between 2002–03 and 2003–04. The number of serious assaults has increased by more than 1,000, and there were 30,000 of the less serious, injury-causing crimes in the past year. The number of sexual offences is up; criminal damage is up; and total violent crime is up by more than 100,000 offences since 2002.
In my constituency, the number of thefts of motor vehicles has risen by 5 per cent. in the past year. It is a telling sign of the state of crime in Britain that this seems to be a relatively lucky situation. We should consider some of the crime rate figures for Wales. In the last year, robbery offences were up by 30 per cent., and sexual offences in Dyfed-Powys increased by 90 per cent. Robbery offences in south Wales went up by 71 per cent. Violent crime has risen almost twice as fast in Wales as in Manchester or London. No matter what we do with these figures, it is impossible to conceal what everyone in Britain already knows—that crime is soaring.
Yet this is not all that we have to worry about. Detection rates are falling. More crimes are being committed, yet fewer criminals are being punished for them. In fact, detection rates have sunk to just 23 per cent. For every 100 crimes, 77 are left unsolved. Nearly four out of every five criminals are left unpunished, and for all the unpunished criminals, there are the many victims of crime who are left knowing that justice has not been done. No wonder people feel disappointed. We are living in a country in which the law-abiding majority are losing out. People do not feel safe going about their everyday life because the system is leaving criminals to roam our streets.
According to a survey carried out last year, nearly a quarter of adult females admitted to feeling "very unsafe" when they were out at night. People are unable to go out and enjoy themselves because they do not feel safe in their own towns. Crimes are left unreported because people have no hope of the criminals being caught, or because they know that if they are caught, the punishment will probably not fit the crime. Not only have crime rates grown and detection rates fallen in the past seven years, we have also witnessed the introduction of schemes that impose on criminals punishments that simply do not bring justice, so even when offenders are caught, there is no guarantee that they will be punished fairly.
We know that Labour's early release scheme has led to 3,600 crimes being committed by people who were let out of prison early. Earlier this year, the Home Office confirmed plans to hire a public relations firm to launch a £1 million pound publicity drive. What for? Its purpose is to increase public confidence in alternatives to sending convicted criminals to jail. People do not want alternatives to sending criminals to jail; they want their money to be spent on more effective policing to stop crime. They want it to be spent on safe prisons to hold dangerous criminals. They want prisons to hold the 100,000 prisoners predicted by 2010, not 20,000 fewer prisons, as the Home Office is planning.
18 Oct 2004 : Column 714
The Home Secretary has rejected pressures for a major prison-building programme. Instead, he wants to refurbish prisons and use weekend jail sentences for convicted criminals. Perhaps he has been listening to the Liberal Democrats—not sending burglars to prison, abolishing mandatory life sentences for serial rapists and cutting prison sentences for people who deal in ecstasy and cannabis. The fact remains that the soft approach to crime will not work.
No one is suggesting that all criminals should be sent to prison and that there should be no alternative. Of course rehabilitation and help should be available as well. We need to combine effective support with effective punishments. We need better, more rehabilitative sentences for persistent offenders. Two issues perhaps stand out more than any others here—young offenders and those affected by drug misuse.
Young offenders are being failed by the present system. The Government introduced an intensive surveillance and supervision programme for young offenders, a community sentence involving curfews and 25 hours a week of education and therapy. Yet that was completed by fewer than half those sent on it over the past year. The way in which jail sentences are being managed is not working either. Just 7 per cent. of young offenders were given custodial sentences last year, yet providing prison places for young offenders cost the Youth Justice Board £283 million of its £394 million budget. Of those, 80 per cent re-offended on their release, so nearly 70 per cent. of the Youth Justice Board's budget was spent on successfully punishing and rehabilitating just 1.4 per cent. of young offenders. Once again, something is clearly not working here. Tackling young offenders properly would prevent those youths from going on to a lifetime of crime and destruction. It is one of the most important aspects of bringing crime down. It is more than just punishment; it is prevention. Prevention is one of the keys to fighting crime in Britain, as is tackling the drug problem.
It does not take much to realise that the current system is failing criminals with drug problems as well. Britain now has a million or so hard drug addicts. [Interruption.] We all know that drug addiction often leads to other crimes, such as violence, theft, robbery and organised crime—
| Next Section | Index | Home Page |