Public Order Bill

§ Mr. Speaker

Before I call the Secretary of State, I should tell the House that I have selected the amendment in the name of the Leader of the Opposition.

§ The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Douglas Hurd)

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

I must start with the principle that underlies the Bill. Public order is the fundamental social good. It is a principle of which we were reminded several times during 1985. We shall hear much today and in the debates to come about human rights and freedoms, and rightly so. But let us not forget that the right to go about one's lawful occasions in peace is the underlying human right without which all others are nugatory.

Quiet streets and a peaceful framework for our individual lives can never be taken for granted. For short periods of our history it seemed that public order was established for ever. Other periods, such as the first decade of this century, on which we may look back wistfully, included plenty of public violence. The threat to public order comes in different shapes at different times. That means that the measures needed to safeguard public order and protect the public must be re-examined from time to time. It is half a century since Parliament set itself to that task, and society and its habits have changed radically. It is not unreasonable that the Public Order Act 1936 should be followed by a Public Order Act 1986.

Change must be steadily and carefully considered, and panic and anger are bad guides to this. That is true of all legislation, but especially of Home Office legislation, and even more especially of public order legislation. I make it clear that the Bill was not cobbled together in hasty reaction to last autumn's riots. That is self-evident from its content, and everyone who has followed the proposals knows that their ancestry is older than that and different. When rioting of the sort described in the Metropolitan police report in today's newspapers breaks out, the problem confronting the police is not a shortage of legal powers, but one of enforcement. As I shall try to show, the Bill does not detract from our traditional philosophy of policing, which is based on the principles of policing by co-operation with the public and the minimum use of force. The police are anxious to maintain that tradition, and so am I.

Part I is drawn largely from the English Law Commission's report published in 1983. We agree with' he commission that public order offences should be clearly stated in modern language, and part I revises and codifies the common law offences in England and Wales. No change is made to the common law in Scotland, where the Scottish Law Commission is still considering the law on mobbing and rioting.

In England and Wales, the common law offences are replaced by new statutory offences of riot, violent disorder and affray. Clause 1 defines the new offence of riot, which will be committed when 12 or more people use or threaten violence to achieve a common purpose. Only those using 793 violence will be guilty of the offence. The White Paper suggested a maximum penalty of 10 years' imprisonment for this offence. However, it is the most serious public order offence, and we have provided a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. It does now have a maximum penalty of life for an offence drawn rather more loosely than we propose. On balance, we decided to propose the retention of the present maximum sentence of life imprisonment for the new offence, which will be more strictly defined and which will have a higher threshold.

Clause 2 creates the offence of violent disorder to replace the existing offence of unlawful assembly, with a maximum penalty on indictment of five years' imprisonment or an unlimited fine. Violent disorder will be used in the future as the normal charge for serious outbreaks of public disorder.

Clause 3 largely restates the existing common law offence of affray, with minor changes. I shall not dwell on that. However, I should dwell on clause 5, because the new offence of disorderly conduct has proved controversial in some quarters and is likely to remain so.

The proposal in clause 5 will penalise behaviour which is not itself violent but which is threatening, abusive, insulting or disorderly, and —I emphasise the word "and"—is likely to cause alarm, harassment or distress.

The right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) at one time welcomed such an offence in principle. I can understand why. Right hon. and hon. Members who represent inner cities know how many of their constituents suffer from the mischiefs of hooliganism.

The new offence is aimed at protecting those in our communities who are most vulnerable to loutish and abusive behaviour—particularly the elderly and people from the ethnic minorities. Many hon. Members will be only too familiar with the type of behaviour to which I refer. It casts a blight upon an area, whether it be a shopping precinct or a city housing estate, and makes the lives of people living there fearful and miserable. People are frightened to open their own front doors. They are kept awake by rowdy behaviour late at night. Ethnic minority families are victimised with racialist slogans and abuse. Gangs of hooligans make some pedestrian and shopping areas places where ordinary people fear to go. There cannot be many right hon. and hon. Members who do not have examples in their postbags and at their surgeries.

§ Mr. Harry Cohen (Leyton)

The Secretary of State rightly refers to ethnic minorities being the victims of racial harassment. Why have the Government not taken the opportunity of the Bill to make racial harassment a specific criminal offence?

§ Mr. Hurd

If the hon. Gentleman examines the events which constitute racial attacks he will find that they are offences anyway. It seems better to encourage the police in London and elsewhere to take the matter seriously, to issue new guidelines and to let the offence be treated as it is, seriously, with a racial connotation, but within the existing definition of offences. That is better than to single out an offence as the hon. Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen) suggests.

Clause 5 takes account of the many helpful comments that we received when we asked for suggestions on how 794 the new offence of disorderly conduct should be defined. First, we have abandoned the requirement of proof of actual alarm, harassment or distress. That would have required the victim to give evidence in court. Several bodies represented strongly to us that the more vulnerable victims were most unlikely to be prepared to face their persecutors in case things went wrong and the persecution became worse.

§ Mr. Robert Maclennan (Caithness and Sutherland)

This is the single most important departure from the White Paper. Who made the representations? How does the Secretary of State answer the argument that he set out so clearly in paragraph 3.26 of the White Paper, which makes it clear that safeguards are required?

§ Mr. Hurd

We have said throughout that the clause would be difficult to draw. My predecessor set out fairly and clearly in the White Paper the arguments for and against this offence and the considerations in drawing it. Those who commented on the reluctance of victims to go to court to give evidence included the police, the Magistrates' Association, the Association of Metropolitan Authorities, the Society of Prosecuting Solicitors and a number of individuals. When I came to office and considered the Bill, I thought that the case was strongly made out.

We have also dropped the requirement that the alarm, harassment or distress be substantial, in response to criticism that this would present the court with an impossible measurement task. We have introduced a limited power of arrest, which will apply only if a defendant fails to desist from disorderly conduct after a police warning, and we have raised the maximum fine to £400.

Those are the principal changes that we have made since the White Paper foreshadowed this offence. The offence has not been easy to draft. We know what we are aiming at and we do not intend to lose that purpose, but we are certainly open to suggestions on drafting.

§ Mr. Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton)

Paragraph 3.26 of the White paper is clear. It says: Any degree of annoyance or disturbance will not suffice. At what stage did the Home Secretary decide that Any degree of annoyance or disturbance would suffice when his predecessor had said that so categorically?

§ Mr. Hurd

I decided after studying the representations and arguments. The right hon. Member for Gorton is referring to the "substantial" argument—a different point. Setting the courts the task of measuring is unreasonable. However the right hon. Member is entitled to argue his case in Committee.

The response to the White Paper convinced us that we must act to provide the police with more effective powers to protect the public against hooligan behaviour. But we have no desire to use the criminal law to enforce a particular social standard or to worsen relations between young people and the police. This is a law against hooliganism, not against high spirits. It is carefully drafted to avoid the risks of reviving a sus law. Before the right hon. Member for Gorton shakes his head too definitively, I ask him to follow the argument. I hope that we have avoided the risk of reviving a sus law by requiring that the person committing the acts must know or have reasonable cause to believe that his behaviour is likely to cause alarm, 795 harassment or distress. It is the concept of alarm, harassment or distress which distinguishes what we now propose from the old sus law. Let us look carefully at the drafting, but I hope that before any right hon. or hon. Member opposes the clause he will reflect for a minute on the fear and unhappiness that hooliganism inflicts on so many of our fellow citizens. We believe that we have the job of finding a remedy.

§ Mr. Douglas Hogg (Grantham)

I note that the Home Secretary is anxious to avoid this part of the Bill being abused. He will appreciate that the Bill as drafted enables a constable to arrest without warrant in the event of the conduct being repeated after warning. Would it not be a good idea for the power to arrest to arise only if the constable has given warning that an arrest will follow if the offender does not desist from his conduct?

§ Mr. Hurd

I should like to consider whether that is practicable. It points in the direction in which I wanted to move when considering whether there should be a power of arrest at all. Some people believe that there should not be such a power and others say that the Bill would be pointless without it. I shall consider my hon. Friend's suggestion.

§ Mr. William Cash (Stafford)

I have corresponded with my right hon. Friend about riots. Will he consider proposing that a warning he given in advance of action by the police?

§ Mr. Hurd

My hon. Friend has put that suggestion to me and it has been considered. My hon. Friend might have the opportunity to argue his case but we do not believe that his proposal is likely to be practicable in real life. One of the difficulties is that people might be caught up in a riot but not have committed an offence. If it were an offence to be present after the equivalent of the Riot Act had been read, a person might become caught up. For the moment, we do not think that my hon. Friend's suggestion should find a place in the Bill.

Part II of the Bill deals with processions and assemblies. It establishes a new legal framework for the holding of processions, demonstrations and assemblies, building on the framework already provided by the Public Order Act 1936. We want to ensure that the right to protest, to march and to picket peacefully is regulated only to the extent necessary to preserve order and to protect the rights of others. We have therefore concentrated on trying to ensure that the law provides the police with adequate powers to prevent and deal with violence and disorder, while freedom of speech and the right to protest continue to be safeguarded.

Clause 11 deals with advance notice and sets out a new national requirement for the organisers of marches to give seven days' notice to the police. The requirement exists already in Scotland and there are advance notice requirements in local legislation in parts of England and Wales. Lord Scarman and the Select Committee both supported a requirement of advance notice, which would enable discussions between the organisers of marches and the police to take place in good time. The vast majority of march organisers already give notice to the police, and we think it absurd that the police should have to rely on chance and rumour to learn about marches that are organised by a minority of irresponsible groups, which could give rise to violence on the streets and serious disorder.

796 In March 1985, the Metropolitan police learnt about a proposed National Front march in Greenwich only as a result of leaflets left at a London railway station, yet the march and opposition to it posed a sufficient threat to public order that the police had eventually to seek consent to a ban.

§ Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North)

I take the Home Secretary's point about National Front marches, and I accept, as I am sure my hon. Friends do, that there are certain problems. However, does he recognise that his proposals will cause a great deal of concern to genuine demonstrators? We are living in a democratic country and we must bear in mind always that people have a right to demonstrate on the spur of the moment as strikes develop, for example. Another example is when residents feel strongly that something should be done immediately on their behalf. Therefore, the provisions in the Bill could undermine important and basic democratic rights.

§ Mr. Hurd

I direct the hon. Gentleman's attention to clause 11(4). We believe that we have provided there for exactly the sort of case that he has in mind. There is a specific relaxation of the requirement for marches called at short notice because of some emergency. The hon. Gentleman thought of one example, and another is when a dramatic event abroad suddenly blows up, against which some people want to protest.

Clause 12 widens the existing powers of the police that are contained in section 3 of the Public Order Act 1936 to impose conditions on marches. At present, the sole ground for imposing conditions is to prevent serious public disorder. We propose to add three new tests—the need to prevent serious damage to property, serious disruption of the life of the community, and the intimidation of others. The second test—serious disruption of the life of the community—was proposed by the Select Committee. I shall not repeat the way in which it described vividly the sort of disruption that can be caused by marches. We believe that the police should have the power to re-route a march to limit the resulting congestion of traffic, to prevent a bridge being blocked, for example, or to stop a city centre being brought to a standstill.

The third test of intimidation is a libertarian safeguard that will prevent demonstrations being used by those whose real purpose is to intimidate and coerce and not to persuade. The National Front provides examples. The provision that we propose would enable National Front marches in suitable instances to be routed away from racially sensitive areas.

I should stress that the new tests will not enable the police to ban a procession. The power to ban marches does not rest with the police. That power remains unchanged and it is re-enacted in clause 13. Nor are the new powers open-ended. The police will be able to impose conditions only if they reasonably apprehend serious disorder, damage, disruption or intimidation. As now—this is crucial—any decision by the police to impose conditions will be subject to judicial review.

§ Mr. Alex Carlile (Montgomery)

The Home Secretary has spoken about tests and referred to clause 11(4), which provides that the full period of notice will not be required when it is not "reasonably practicable" to give it. Does he not recognise that the application of the tests could be purely arbitrary and that the provisions of clause 11(4) are likely in some instances to be completely ineffective 797 unless there is some immediate and available way of testing the merits of a decision that has been made? Does he agree that judicial review is not a way of testing the merits of a decision? Does he not accept that the Government should provide that those wishing to hold a procession or assembly should be able to apply to the local county court or to a Crown court judge for a review of the decision made by the police?

§ Mr. Hurd

I think that judicial review has proved itself effective. It provides a means of dealing speedily with matters of the sort that we are discussing. That is why we inserted "reasonable" in clauses 12 and 14, especially. I shall consider what the hon. and learned Gentleman says about clause 11(4). However, if someone goes ahead and does not give clear notice, he might expect to have to argue the matter before the courts and persuade them that he was covered by clause 11(4). It would not be too late because he would not have given notice.

§ Mr. Peter Bruinvels (Leicester, East)

Is my right hon. Friend aware that nearly two years ago in Leicester there was a possibility of three different marches taking place in the city on the same day, directed mainly to getting the troops out of Northern Ireland? The council made it clear that it would not apply for the Home Secretary to grant a banning order, even though the Chief Constable appeared to want one. What is my right hon. Friend's advice to chief constables when local authorities refuse to grant such applications on political grounds?

§ Mr. Hurd

My hon. Friend is tempting me on to ground that I do not intend to cover with the Bill. As I have said, I do not think that we should change the arrangements by which it is the responsibility of councils, outside London, to take a decision on a ban. I am aware of the difficulties that arise occasionally but it should remain a matter of local persuasion.

I shall try to deal with the provisions of clause 14 in full before giving way to further interventions. The clause breaks new ground by conferring upon the police certain preventive powers in relation to open-air assemblies. These powers fall short of those in relation to marches which I have been describing. There will be no requirement of advance notice and there will be no power to ban. The clause introduces a new power to impose conditions. Assemblies and static demonstrations may just as often be the occasion of public disorder as marches and the Government believe that it is unacceptable for gatherings, such as those at Greenham common, or the mass pickets of the miners' strike, to be outside the framework of controls. The clause therefore confers on the police powers to impose conditions on open-air assemblies to prevent, on the same three tests I have mentioned, serious disorder, serious disruption or intimidation.

We stopped short of a power to ban because we believed that that would be an excessive limit on the right of assembly and freedom of speech. For this reason, clause 14 does not permit the police to impose conditions changing the date and time of an assembly. They will be able only to impose conditions limiting its size, location or duration. As with clause 12, any decision by the police to impose conditions will be subject to judicial review. Where a rally threatens serious public disorder, the police will in future be able to relocate it. Where, as in the Stop 798 the City campaign, the demonstrators set out deliberately to be obstructive, the police would have the power to take preventive action. Where pickets obstruct deliberately, or try to, the passage of those going to work, as they did at Grunwick's and Warrington and during the miners' strike, the police would be able to limit their numbers or move them further away from the workers' path.

There is an important point, which has not been grasped fully. As we know from experience during the miners' strike, the police have already substantial powers under the common law to remove people who are threatening a breach of the peace. These existing powers enable the police to take action when trouble is imminent or when it has begun. It seems sensible to us that they should have a preventive power that will enable them to negotiate reasonable ground rules that would prevent trouble happening at all. If the police were to try to impose unjustified conditions, that could be challenged by way of judicial review. As the House will see, the right of peaceful picketing will not be infringed.

§ Mr. Kaufman

It will.

§ Mr. Hurd

It will, but it depends on what the right hon. Gentleman thinks is the purpose of picketing. Pickets whose purpose is peacefully to dissuade or communicate information will not be touched by the new measure because this picketing will not be disorderly, disruptive or coercive. But where the purpose of picketing is physically to obstruct or to intimidate rather than to persuade, it is right that the police should have preventive powers.

§ Mr. David Ashby (Leicestershire, North-West)

This clause has a lot to do with the miners' picketing of last year. Is there anything in this Bill that assists with the evidential aspect of the offences that were committed at that time? The problem that arose out of the miners' picketing was the great difficulty in bringing people, who had clearly committed offences, successfully to trial due to evidential difficulties. Is there anything in this Bill that will assist?

§ Mr. Hurd

I hope when my hon. Friend studies in depth the new definitions of riot and violent disorder he will find that they have been tightened. Areas of uncertainty have been cleared up. We have made it more difficult to obtain a conviction for riot because we have tightened up the definition of that offence. I hope that when my hon. Friend looks at part I as a whole, he will see a tidier framework, which should remove some of the present uncertainties.

§ Mr. D. E. Thomas (Meirionnydd Nant Conwy)

The Secretary of State spoke earlier of the right of protest and demonstration. Does he not accept that clause 14 means that the right of assembly is now to be defined in its formal context by the police? This is a major change to existing legislation.

§ Mr. Hurd

Where the police have reasonable grounds—I am sure that the hon. Gentleman knows more about the law than I do and he will know the importance of the word "reasonable"—the court can make a test. When the police have reasonable grounds for supposing that there would be serious disorder, serious disruption or intimidation, they can impose conditions which are subject to judicial review. That is the nub of the change that we are proposing.

799 Part II applies in Scotland, except for clause 11 and clause 13. Scotland has a separate regulatory structure for the control of marches and certain minor changes to the structure are made by the amendments to the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 in schedule 2.

§ Mr. John Mark Taylor (Solihull)

I am most grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. He has dealt most tolerantly with so many interventions. Will my right hon. Friend turn his mind to the anxiety of many people about gatherings and so-called festivals at archaeological sites and ancient monuments? At an appropriate stage, will my right hon. Friend consider amendments to part II to assist the police to deal with these matters?

§ Mr. Hurd

Such amendments will be considered, as I know that many hon. Members feel strongly about this. My hon. Friend the Minister will deal with this in the winding-up speech.

I will not dwell on part III, which deals with racial hatred and provides additional protection against incitement to racial hatred. I hope that the provisions will be acceptable to the House.

§ Mr. Tony Marlow (Northampton, North)

Will the Secretary of State comment on part III?

§ Mr. Hurd

I am prepared to say a great deal, but in the interests of brevity I will leave it to my hon. Friend to find other ways of making his point.

Part IV consists mainly of measures against football hooliganism. Last summer, with the help of all parties, we passed an Act to control the sale and possession of alcohol at football matches. We now propose to introduce an exclusion order scheme, which will enable the courts to ban convicted hooligans from attending football matches. The purpose of this scheme is to exclude the troublemakers and especially the ringleaders who instigate much of the violence. Anyone found guilty of a football-related offence may be subject to an exclusion order and any breach of that order would be a further offence for which he could be sent to prison. It has been said, since we published the Bill, that exclusion orders will be hard to enforce without membership cards. Certainly I hope that the scheme will stimulate the clubs to make greater speed on membership cards. It is a powerful scheme, even without membership cards. An offender who has an exclusion order added to his sentence will have his photograph taken. He will know that photographs are circulated and he will also know that, more likely than not, there will be closed-circuit television on any ground he is tempted to visit. This knowledge will be a powerful deterrent against his defying the order.

The exclusion order scheme will not apply in Scotland but the further measures against football hooliganism in schedule 1 will apply there as in England and Wales. There will be a new offence of possessing a smoke bomb at a football match, as recommended by Mr. Justice Popplewell in his interim report. In the light of experience and protest, mini-buses are brought within the scope of the alcohol ban which applies at present to coaches and trains.

§ Mr. John Carlisle (Luton, North)

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way and I shall be brief. Most of the football industry will welcome this clause. Can the Secretary of State clear up two points? Will those people who are excluded because of violence during a game or on the approach to a game be subject to the law in other 800 forms? The Bill talks about certain football matches—I think the words are "the football ground concerned". What about other grounds? Will offenders be excluded from grounds other than those where the offence took place?

§ Mr. Hurd

It is not a substitute for other penalties or other sentences. It would be for the court to decide the scope, both in terms of the geography and duration of an exclusion order.

§ Sir John Farr (Harborough)

Photography has attracted a great deal of interest. Can my right hon. Friend comment on the possibility of adding fingerprinting to clause 30 as well as photography? Will my right hon. Friend seek to take some action relating to the hooligans' passport when an exclusion order has been served? These are the people who behave badly in Britain and then go abroad and besmirch our name at soccer matches on the continent.

§ Mr. Hurd

I am prepared to think about the second point. Photography is crucial. It would not be possible to take people's fingerprints at football grounds. Photographs can be circulated and there is an increasing use of closed-circuit television. I will consider what my hon. Friend said, though I consider that the circulation of photographs will probably be the effective technique.

§ Mr. Merlyn Rees (Morley and Leeds, South)

I understand that parts of this Bill include some of the recommendations of Popplewell part one. I understand that Popplewell part two—the final report—is expected shortly. Will its recommendations be absorbed in this Bill at a later stage or will there be separate piece of legislation?

§ Mr. Hurd

I hope to make a statement about Mr. Justice Popplewell's final report possibly later this week. Much of his report deals with matters that do not fall within the scope of this Bill.

It is 50 years since the Public Order Act 1936 was passed. It has stood the test of time pretty well, but the events of recent years have confirmed the need to update the framework of public order law to ensure that it is strong enough to protect the public in 1986 and hereafter. We have tested each proposal in the Bill against that standard. In Standing Committee, if the Bill gets a Second Reading, the House will repeat those tests—quite rightly, that is what Standing Committee is for. Some will speak, quite naturally, as they have begun to do from the Opposition Benches, this afternoon, for those who define liberty in terms of the right to march, picket and demonstrate, to go unhindered to a football match, to do what they like on housing estates and in shopping precincts without police interference.

§ Mr. Kaufman

Nonsense.

§ Mr. Hurd

Well, we shall judge what happens in debate. We have to balance those rights, which are understandably of concern, against the rights of the public to be protected from disorder, destruction, intimidation and hooliganism. We shall listen carefully to suggestions that might improve the balance that we have tried to strike. I hope that, like its predecessors, the present team of Home Office Ministers has a reputation for constructive listening.

Before the discussion of detail gets under way, can I leave the House with just one thought? The Government do not believe that there is any intrinsic merit in piling up 801 fresh powers for the police. The police need their powers, not for their own satisfaction or aggrandisement, but to protect the public more effectively. This is a Bill for the better protection of the public. I am certain that the public stand four square behind that argument. In no respect is it more important than in public order. I commend the Bill to the House.

§ Mr. Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton)

I beg to move, to leave out from "That" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof, this House declines to give a Second Reading to a Bill which, at a time when serious crime has increased by 40 per cent. under this Government and the crime clear-up rate has markedly declined, contains no proposals which are likely to be effective in preventing disorder, while diverting scarce police resources from fighting crime and at the same time seriously undermining traditional civil liberties. This debate takes place against a background of a crime wave which continues to be the most alarming that the country has experienced in modern times, and the collapse of the Government's policy on law and order. The newly published volume of "Social Trends" documents that 3.5 million serious crimes are now committed in Britain each year—nearly 1 million a year more than when the Government came to office. In urban areas, the crime increase in places such as greater Manchester and south Yorkshire is more than twice the national average. "Social Trends" confirms that, over the nation as a whole, little more than one third of those crimes are being cleared up—a reduction from 42 per cent. when the Government came to office.

Fear of crime has now become a plague, casting a grim shadow across Britain. No fewer than 12 per cent. of all inner-city residents say that they never go out alone at night because of crime. More than 60 per cent. of women living in inner cities feel at least somewhat unsafe and 60 per cent. of those aged over 60 say that they feel very unsafe.

Against that background of soaring crime and a serious decline in proportionate police success in combating it, the pressure on overstretched police forces grows ever greater and more oppressive. Chief constables and police authorities in many parts of the country document those severe problems that seriously hamper their strenuous efforts to combat crime.

Three months ago, the greater Manchester police authority sent a plea to the Home Secretary, documenting the cuts that it might have to make, including a stop on recruitment entailing a fall in police numbers and closure of some police stations. It said that increased insurance costs alone, consequent upon the abolition of the greater Manchester council, will cost the force £700,000. Although the Home Secretary has partially increased the greater Manchester police authority's determination, he has still not met its full needs, yet he claims that his response to such requests will be based on need.

The district auditor recently completed an inquiry into the west midlands police authority. His conclusions included the verdict that that force suffers from insufficient resources for operational policing. He reports: Several senior officers told my staff that their sole objective is to get through the day without a major catastrophe. The district auditor declared: 802 The manpower available for operational policing is often frighteningly low. The chief constable of the west midlands, Mr. Geoffrey Dear, says in his report on the Handsworth riots: currently we are training all personnel in relation to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. Such commitments inevitably reduce the uniformed control capacity. The Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, Sir Kenneth Newman, forecast a few weeks ago another huge increase in crime in London. He warned that, without extra manpower, some burglaries would not even be investigated—that when, in London, the clear-up rate for burglary is only 10 per cent. Today's press reports the estimates submitted by Sir Kenneth to the Home Office and comments that they do not provide even half of the manpower increase that Sir Kenneth says that he needs.

The Government are so ashamed of their response to the financial requests of the police that they have done their best to confuse and mislead Parliament by throwing up a smokescreen around the true figures. Last month, in the House, the Home Secretary, obediently followed by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, tried to imply that the Government are planning an increase in finance for the police in real terms for the next financial year. The operation was renewed with a planted story in The Times only last week. However, on the most favourable estimates, the Government are planning a reduction in expenditure on the police in real terms this year.

A study of the fine print of ministerial answers shows that the Government's claims of an increase are based on a comparison of this year's budget with that of next year. The problem for the Government is that the pressure on the police this year has caused them to spend £101 million more than their budget. The Home Secretary tried to imply last month that the increase is due to expenditure on police overtime during the miners' strike. When I asked him, the Minister of State admitted to me that the Government had no idea of the cost of police overtime during the miners' strike and that their estimate of all special payments in connection with that dispute is about £9 million—only a small fraction of the £101 million overspent.

If the previous Home Secretary had tried to deceive the House with such manipulation of statistics, I would have accused him of deliberate sharp practice. The present Home Secretary being what he is, all I say is that he has got himself into a muddle. It is unquestionable, however, that the only realistic way in which to compare expenditure levels is to set one year's expenditure, when it is known or can be estimated, against the next year's plans. Such a comparison shows clearly whether there is to be an increase or a decrease. To base comparisons on spending plans that have been exceeded is financial chicanery.

If Mr. Roberts, the Grantham grocer, had based his accounting not on what he spent but on the smaller sum to which he would have liked to limit himself, Mr. Roberts would never have been awarded an alderman's robe, let alone be able to lay it down with honour, as he would have been an undischarged bankrupt at the time.

On the Government's present inflation estimates, they are budgeting for an expenditure reduction of 0.75 per cent. on the police next year. On today's inflation rate, the reduction is 1.8 per cent. Far from doing their best to ease the burdens of the police, in this Session the Government are legislating to increase them. The Shops Bill is before the House of Lords at the moment. Mr. Andrew Mackinlay, the excellent and enterprising prospective 803 Labour candidate for Peterborough, recently wrote to the Association of Chief Police Officers asking about the expected effect on the police of the Sunday opening of shops. I have here the reply that he received from the honorary secretary of the Association of Chief Police Officers, Mr Brian Hayes, the chief constable of Surrey. About the deregulation of Sunday shopping, Mr Hayes says: Traffic … police presence on Sundays might need to be increased and the current practice of minimum manning would need to be re-assessed. Parking regulations would require major revision to incorporate Sundays, as many existing regulations do not apply after 6.30 pm on Saturdays. The increased restrictions would then need to be enforced.

§ Mr. Nicholas Lyell (Mid-Bedfordshire)

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

§ Mr. Kaufman

No. May I conclude this quotation from a very respected chief constable? About the potential increase in crime as a result of the deregulation of Sunday shopping, Mr. Hayes says: Longer opening hours would provide increased opportunities for persons, particularly juveniles, to commit offences of theft, and there could be an increased risk to shop staff, especially females, who are required to take cash to the bank or to travel home during the hours of darkness. There is also a possibility of an increase in offences of public disorder, criminal damage and violence if late night shoppers come into contact with early evening drinkers. In summing up, the chief constable of Surrey said: It would be difficult to be more precise on the matter of cost, but if Saturdays are any yardstick, we should not underestimate the possible difficulties.

§ Mr. Lyell

Before the right hon. Gentleman drags away this smelly red herring, will he tell the House what he estimates it would cost local authorities if they set out to enforce the present law on Sunday trading?

§ Mr. Kaufman

The hon. and learned Member for Mid-Bedfordshire (Mr. Lyell) must follow the creditable example of the future Labour Member for Peterborough and write to the secretary of the Association of Chief Police Officers. What the hon. and learned Gentleman describes as a smelly red herring is, in fact, a letter from the secretary of that respected body. I would bet that if I had quoted from him something derogatory about the miners, the hon. and learned Gentleman would have cheered.

§ Mr. Hurd

Does the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) not expect to be called when the House debates the Shops Bill?

§ Mr. Kaufman

I do not know. After what has happened in the Cabinet, there may be other changes in the House. Who can tell?

If the chief constable of Surrey is correct, the Shops Bill may even increase the number of disturbances with which the Public Order Bill claims to deal.

Public order offences are only a tiny fraction of the crimes committed in Britain each year. Despite the costs caused by their ugly destructiveness, the financial costs to the economy of disorder and rioting—as distinct from the grave, human and social costs,—are small compared to the cost to the nation of financial fraud which is estimated to exceed £3 billion a year. Yet despite the Financial Services Bill, which the House is to debate tomorrow, the Government are taking little more than token action in dealing with fraud, compared with this extremely heavy-handed Bill.

804 On 20 December the Financial Secretary to the Treasury admitted to my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Mr. Soley) that criminal prosecutions are undertaken in only a small number of fraud cases. On Saturday The Times gave the excuse: The cost of trials, an average of £500,000 in such complex City cases, makes the Department of Public Prosecutions or the tax authorities reluctant to press cases unless they can safely predict conviction on serious charges. Such considerations of cost and difficulty did not deter the public order trials connected with the miners' strike. One Orgreave trial cost £500,000 and a trial in Nottinghamshire cost £1.5 million. In total, the estimated cost of trials arising from the miners' strike is said to be millions of pounds and all, without exception, ended in ignominious defeat for the prosecution.

The Government's approach to such offences 7eveals a great deal about their real definition of law and order which they apply very differently in a socially and discriminatory way to working people on the one hand arid to City swindlers on the other.

There is great public concern about disorder and riots because such crimes are the most visible of all. They are catapulted into our living rooms by the vividness of television. The nation would welcome firm and effective action to prevent such disorders, provided that such action is compatible with civil liberties. The Opposition would support such action.

Although the Bill is stuffed with new offences and penalties, there is no evidence that it would have the tiniest effect in preventing disorder. I have read press accounts today of the Metropolitan police report on the Broadwater Farm disorders. Having studied the accounts I have no reason to doubt the veracity of that inquiry. Yet it cannot be denied that if this Bill had been an Act at the time of the Broadwater Farm riot, not one event described in the Metropolitan police report would have been prevented and the riot would have proceeded as scheduled. Even people like Mrs. Donna Kiffin, who warned the police several days in advance that such a disturbance was in the offing, could not have influenced the outcome.

It is unlikely that, if the Bill had been in force, there would have been more arrests for public order offences at Broadwater Farm. Another official inquiry prepared by Chief Constable Dear into the Handsworth disorders revealed that only a small proportion of the offences with which people were charged after the disturbance were public order offences—48 out of 355. All the Bill will do, at best, is to create new offences for which people involved in riots can be arrested. However, the evidence shows that sufficient offences are already available to the police and that the courts can already impose heavy sentences, as happened with the recent life sentence on a football hooligan.

At best, the Bill is innocuous and in some ways even comic. At worst, it will impose unnecessary new burdens on our sorely pressed police forces, will invade civil liberties and create new tensions between the police and the public at a time when it is essential that relationships between the police and the public should be strengthened and improved.

Before the Christmas recess, the Opposition assisted and expedited legislation giving powers to ban alcohol from football grounds. In so far as that legislation has been successful, the Opposition are glad that they did so. But the Opposition are still waiting to hear about the 805 Government's success in their other objectives. In April the Government called upon the football authorities to report within six weeks on a practical scheme of membership cards. Nine months later no progress has been made and a group of northern football clubs which I met a few weeks ago assures me that such a scheme continues to be impractical, whatever the Home Secretary has said this afternoon.

The Government asked the football authorities in April to accelerate the introduction of closed-circuit television. The Home Secretary seems to have little idea of what is happening, as he said on BBC radio on 6 December: closed-circuit television is now becoming quite usual in football grounds. Yet the Minister responsible for sport told me six days after the Home Secretary's categorical statement that only 27 grounds in the football league and the Scottish football league have closed-circuit television systems. That is a mere 21 per cent. of the total, yet the Home Secretary has said that closed-circuit television is an adjunct of the other proposals in the Bill. On that basis, the Bill can have no helpful effect on 80 per cent. of football grounds.

In place of the Government priorities which now seem to have been abandoned, the Bill contains two new proposals. One is the creation of exclusion orders by which football hooligans will be banned from matches. In principle, the Opposition see no objection to that. We are baffled, however, about how that will work. The police organisations with which my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith and I have discussed the matter are just as baffled. No one has the slightest idea of how the orders are to be enforced or what will happen if an excluded person turns up at a ground from which he has been banned. The Home Secretary seems to say that such a person would be photographed. The clause dealing with photography is one of the most obscure clauses that I have ever seen.

Clause 30 empowers a court to make an order that a person subject to an exclusion order should be photographed. However, the Bill does not state what will be done with the photographs. When the Bill was published, I had meetings with the Police Federation and the Association of Chief Police Officers. At each of those meetings with some of the most distinguished police officers in the country, we sat round the table, with cold towels figuratively round our heads, trying to puzzle out the implications of the photography clause. We agreed that a direct consequence would be an encouraging increase in the sales of the magazine Amateur Photographer. We were equally agreed that that could not be the Government's entire objective. We mused upon the possibility that the photographs could be pasted into albums and that police officers could while away long winter nights turning the pages and admiring these mugshots.

We were sure that it would be impracticable for such photographs to festoon the turnstiles of football grounds, with stewards comparing, one by one, the faces of customers in the queue with these pin-up pictures. It would be impossible to imagine any situation more likely to provoke a riot rather than keep out a rioter. So we must take it that clause 30 is the Home Secretary's little joke.

§ Mr. John Carlisle

The right hon. Gentleman is giving a graphic description of what could happen and those of 806 us involved in the football industry have some sympathy with what he says. However, will he accept the point made by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, which was that there would be a deterrent effect on those photographed after committing a violent offence inside or outside a ground? In the same way, there is a deterrent effect in the curfew orders in the Criminal Justice Act 1982. That is partly what this Bill is about. If it deters offenders from going to grounds, it will have gone some way to remedy this awful problem.

§ Mr. Kaufman

If I thought that the act of photography would turn a hooligan into a law-abiding citizen, I would advocate the mass sale of cameras. In "A Clockwork Orange" the gentleman was tamed by listening to Beethoven. Perhaps we should try that solution if the photography does not work.

§ Mr. Tony Lloyd (Stretford)

The people who would recognise those who had been excluded from football grounds, but subsequently got into the grounds, are their colleagues at those grounds. They would quickly realise that the provision was almost unenforceable and it would come into contempt.

§ Mr. Kaufman

I accept what my hon. Friend says, which implies that they would gain entry to football grounds; exclusion orders are designed to prevent that.

Let us look at other parts of the Bill that are far from a joke and, indeed, have the most serious implications, for example, clause 10. I hope that the Home Secretary will follow this, because the implications of what I have to say are serious.

Following the Handsworth riots in October, I asked the Home Secretary what action could be taken to speed up the payment of compensation under the Riot (Damages) Act 1886 and to expand the scope of that Act to take account of loss of income after riots. The Home Secretary gave me assurances that those issues were being considered. Indeed, he said that he shared my desire that the 1886 Act should be implemented in such a way as to bring as effective and prompt relief as possible.

However, far from assisting with such matters of great importance to innocent citizens who have suffered great material damage, the Bill ensures that in future very few people, if any, will be compensated under the 1886 Act. That is because the new offence of violent disorder will largely replace the old offence of riot. That is the view of ACPO and of the Home Office, which stated in its press release on the publication of the Bill: Riot … will be the least commonly used public order offence, reserved only for very serious cases and the Home Secretary confirmed that view today. Yet far from reassuring us that this grave charge will be sparingly used, the Home Secretary's assertion is worrying, because clause 10 confines eligibility for compensation under the 1886 Act and the Merchant Shipping Act 1894 to those affected by clause 1—the riot clause—which creates the new offence of riot which is rarely to be used.

It is unacceptable that those suffering material loss to their livelihood as a result of disorders should be deprived of compensation by the Government's juggling and manipulating the law in this way. We shall insist that the Bill be amended to remove that unjust treatment.

807 Both the new offence of riot and the other new offences of violent disorder and affray are defined far too widely, in a manner which goes against previous Government assurances and against the authoritative views of others.

In proposing the new offence of riot, the Law Commission stated that the offence should deal with persons using or threatening violence such as would cause a person of reasonable firmness present at the scene to fear for his personal safety. Paragraph 3.17 of the White Paper said that the Government agreed with the Law Commission's proposed statutory definition. In proposing the new offence of violent disorder, the Law Commission defined it in relation again to a person of reasonable firmness present at the scene". Again, the White Paper stated: The Government is content to accept the Law Commission's proposed statutory definition. The same proposal and the same criterion apply to the new offence of affray. Yet for each of these new offences, the Bill, in clauses 1, 2 and 3, negates the Law Commission's proviso by the subsection which states: No person of reasonable firmness need actually be, or be likely to be, present at the scene. That dilution of necessary safeguards in the creation of the new offences, each of which carries substantial penalties, is all the more disturbing in view of the judgment of the House of Lords in the Kamare case, in which the present Lord Chancellor participated. The judgment stated: The essential requisite was the presence or likely presence of innocent third parties not participating in the illegal activities in question; it was the danger to their security which constituted the threat to public peace and the public element necessary for the commission of the offence. Nowhere are the protections more glaringly absent than in the Bill's version of the new offence of disorderly conduct. When the White Paper was published in May, I welcomed its proposal for the new offence. As an inner city Member of Parliament I am daily made aware of the misery caused to defenceless people—often pensioners, often women—by loutish conduct that goes far beyond boisterous high spirits. The Home Secretary has taken to quoting my welcome of what the White Paper said as some sort of endorsement. I only wish that he would require my endorsement of everything he does and that when I give my endorsement he would do what I endorse.

I should still welcome the creation, with appropriate safeguards, of such a new offence as was described in the White Paper. However, I have to say that clause 5 creates a new offence which has not the slightest chance of accomplishing what I advocate and what the White Paper proposed. Instead, it is fraught with the most serious dangers by its breadth of scope and lack of clarity.

Moreover, clause 5 seriously departs from specific commitments contained in the White Paper, which said of the proposed offence of disorderly conduct: The Government recognises that there would be justifiable objections to a wide extension of the criminal law which might catch conduct not deserving of criminal sanctions. The White Paper went on: For this reason, the offence contains the safeguard that the behaviour must actually cause someone to feel alarmed, harassed or distressed (not that it is merely likely to do so). Yet the Bill scraps what the White Paper says is a necessary safeguard and specifically lays down that an offence is committed if behaviour or the use of words is likely to harass, alarm or distress another person. That was repudiated by the White Paper.

808 Again, the White Paper insisted, in italics, that the victim—as the White Paper called her or him—should have suffered substantial alarm, harassment or distress. The Bill does not contain the word "substantial". Yet again, the White Paper proposed what it called a sufficient maximum penalty of £100. The Bill provides for a £400 penalty.

The Home Secretary seems to misunderstand what he is proposing. On the day of the publication of the Bill, he claimed on "The World At One" that the new offence of disorderly conduct would cover the kind of hooliganism where a group rushes up and down outside a block of flats terrorising people who live inside without actually causing a breach of the peace. That is precisely what the Bill will not do.

First, the new offence does not require a victim, as was required in the White Paper. Secondly, the provision that the person charged is committing an offence only if he ignores a warning by the police is a complete fantasy. Can anyone imagine a gang harassing an old person on a housing estate, on hearing that the police had been called, deciding to wait until they arrived, wait to be warned and then persist in their behaviour? They would have run off long ago.

The Government, quite rightly, have included in the Bill a requirement for a police warning before arrest—

§ Mr. Douglas Hogg

Before charge.

§ Mr. Kaufman

Yes, before charge.

§ Mr. Hogg

rose—

§ Mr. Kaufman

I accept the hon. Gentleman's point, even before he makes it. I apologise for my error.

The police are well aware that the offence is so widely drawn that it could be used at whim. That is a power that the police do not want, as the chief constable of Essex, on behalf of the Association of Chief Police Officers, told me in a letter stating: We are anxious to see a balanced approach which gives police adequate powers to maintain public order but does not lose the British police its reputation for restraint and impartiality.

§ Mr. Ken Weetch (Ipswich)

Clause 5 is somewhat controversial. I have experienced a large number of complaints about loutish behaviour in shopping precincts in Ipswich. I have attended meetings with residents, shopkeepers and the police, who want to do something about the problem. However, they cannot do anything about such behaviour because it must relate to specific incidents, which they do not observe happening.

I would appreciate a strong lead from my right hon. Friend. Is he rejecting the clause in principle, or does he believe that the principle is worthy but the clause needs substantial amendment in Committee?

§ Mr. Kaufman

I am saying what I said when the White Paper was published last May. From my experience in my constituency, which is similar to my hon. Friend's experience, I know of the profound concern felt by those subjected to loutish behaviour that frightens them, but with which the police cannot deal under the present law. That is why I immediately welcomed the proposal in the White Paper. This clause will not deal with that sort of behaviour—

§ Mr. Ivan Lawrence (Burton)

Why not?

§ Mr. Kaufman

I was about to explain why not. Clause 5(5) requires a person to be warned by a constable arid then 809 to persist in his behaviour before an arrest without warrant can take place. Let us take the example of old ladies who are regularly harassed. It is inconceivable that the louts would hang around for the arrival of the police, wait for a warning from a police officer and then meekly accept arrest. That is why I describe the clause as a fantasy. The behaviour to which my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Mr. Weetch) and I object, and which we want dealt with in the Bill, will not be caught by the clause.

If the Government could draft a clause that effectively dealt with the sort of complaints that so many hon. Members have experienced, I would, as I said nine months ago, look upon it with great favour. The problem is that the Government, after nine months, have found it impossible to draft such a clause. The clause that they have drafted fails to deal with the sort of behaviour that concerns my hon. Friend and myself, while creating an offence that has grave implications—not for those with whom we are trying to deal, but for other people. That is why I cannot accept the clause. If the Government put forward amendments in Committee to deal with such behaviour, clearly I should be prepared to consider them.

The offence in the clause will provide no protection for the vulnerable about whom I am primarily concerned, but will create circumstances in which the police will have the power to pick up anyone they choose of whose behaviour they disapprove. The Times, on 7 December, warned that the offence was extremely broad in its potential application and that police application of it will require tough monitoring if the old 'sus' problems are not to recur. The Daily Telegraph leading article on 9 December described the disorderly conduct offence as "questionable", and went on to say: Parliament will have to ensure tight drafting to deter police excesses reminiscent of 'sus' and to prevent those who merely give vent to boisterous high spirits from obtaining criminal convictions. I endorse those words. Unless appropriate amendments are tabled, the Opposition will oppose the clause.

Even more dangerous are the proposed limitations on the right to peaceful assembly, whether marches or open-air gatherings. Again, the Daily Telegraph rightly warned: The controversial new powers to impose conditions on the size, location and duration of demonstrations will clearly require sensitive policing if they are not to undermine freedom of assembly. We object to the length of notice that will be required for marches and processions. The Bill provides for six clear days, while the Select Committee on Home Affairs recommended three days and the Association of County Councils said that 36 hours would be adequate. Ministers may point to Scottish legislation, which lays down a seven-day period, but there is a major difference between the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982 and this Bill. The Scottish Act provides that notice should be given to a local authority—the Regional Islands council. This Bill requires that notice is given to the police.

It is one thing for a decision about a march to be in the hands of a democratically-elected body, but another to force on to the police responsibility for imposing conditions that rest on political judgments. That is unfair to the police. Moreover, it is a role that the police simply do not want, as the chief constable of Essex has made clear.

810 Representatives of the Police Federation with whom I have discussed that point said: We do not want to have put into the hands of the police decisions which can be interpreted as political decisions. I fully concur with the statement of Mr. Leslie Curtis, the chairman of the Police Federation, who said: The police of Britain must not be seen either as Maggie Thatcher's boot boys or as a people's militia. The trouble is that the Bill goes a long way towards turning the reluctant and unwilling police into Maggie's boot boys.

The conditions in the Bill allow the police to impose on marches what can, in effect, amount to a ban by the police rather than by an elected authority. Of course, the police will use their discretion. They may, without conditions, allow a march by parents protesting against a road accident blackspot—but not one protesting against the arrival of cruise missiles. Indeed, the Home Secretary mentioned Greenham common in his speech. By doing that, inevitably they will be expressing a judgment on the merits of one against the other.

Moreover, if parents wish to demonstrate speedily and effectively, following an accident to one of their children, they will be able to do so only if the police agree to accept shorter notice. That limitation, based on value judgments that are inevitably subjective, is an unacceptable invasion of civil liberties.

§ Mr. Douglas Hogg

rose—

§ Mr. Kaufman

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will allow me to proceed.

What applies to marches applies even more to peaceful open air assemblies, since the restrictions imposed in the Bill are unprecedented and, once again, can result in a de facto ban, although no banning power is contained in the Bill. The Government may claim that the new power of imposing conditions on open air meetings and gatherings can deal with disorder, for example, by providing powers to stop violence on a picket line, but, as the Home Secretary said, there are already ample powers to deal with violence and obstruction, whether on a picket line or elsewhere.

The Bill will give the police the power to limit peaceful picketing by small numbers of people. That the police may not necessarily use the power does not detract from its existence and, moreover, as there is no notice provision—we would completely oppose it—the power to impose conditions on assemblies is even more random and capricious than the limitations on marches. I cannot do better than quote a letter sent to the Home Secretary by the secretary of the Police Federation which, speaking of that power over assemblies, scornfully declares: It is ill conceived, totally impractical and entirely inappropriate to deal with the type of spontaneous disorder resulting from static demonstrations, pickets or football matches … we can see absolutely no merit in legislation that seeks to close a stable door after the horse has bolted and we suggest that this part of the White Paper has little or no merit from the point of view of practical application. That is said by the Police Federation.

That dangerous innovation has less merit from the point of view of our traditional civil liberties. It is significant that in stating the circumstances in which conditions can be applied to marches, the Bill adds to the present limited criterion of "serious public disorder" the alterntive criterion of serious disruption to the life of the community". 811 It is significant that the "serious disruption" criterion can be applied also to open air meetings and gatherings. What is more, the Home Secretary has given an example of what that can mean. He referred to a demonstration outside Selfridges about South African oranges, and suggested that under the new powers the demonstration could be moved away from Selfridges. However, the whole point of such a demonstration is that it should take place at the point of grievance. By moving it away, the police would be making a political judgment. Moreover, they would be making an even greater and more fundamental judgment that the right to demonstrate is less important than the right to shop. It is a provision based on the view that demonstrations on matters of principle are not part of the life of the community. In a democracy, the right peacefully to state a point of view is at least as precious as the right to buy oranges, but the Bill tips the law against that right to state a point of view. The only defence for the Government is that at least they are consistent. The Prime Minister is ready to give to those attending open air meetings the same right of free expression as she gives to those attending Cabinet meetings.

§ Mr. Hurd

May I press the right hon. Gentleman—on the oranges rather than on the Cabinet? As he accurately said, the test is one of serious disruption. Is he saying that in his view there is no balance to be struck, and it would be reasonable for the demonstration that he said I gave as an example to disrupt Oxford street to such an extent that it was closed to shoppers in the weeks before Christmas? Would he think that that was carrying the right to demonstrate a little too far? Does he accept that there is a balance to be struck?

§ Mr. Kaufman

Of course, there is a balance to be struck, but it will not be struck by the provisions in the Bill because the police will define subjectively what "serious disruption" means. All that I say to the right hon. Gentleman is that there are powers already in the law to deal with the disturbance that he mentions. It was he who chose the example of Selfridges and the oranges. It was a good example because it shows that he regards shopping as more important than the right, in a democracy, of peaceful protest. If that is his point of view, it is as well that we should know that it is.

Apart from odd corners, this is in parts a silly Bill and in parts a pointless Bill, but above all it is a dangerous Bill. The Home Secretary talks of a Government strategy for dealing with crime but in fact the Government have no strategy for dealing with crime. It is likely that the main outcome of the crime prevention seminar at No. 10 last week, in so far as it has any result at all, is that burgled householders will find it even more difficult in future to get their insurance companies to pay up. The Police and Criminal Evidence Act, now coming substantially into force, imposes bureaucratic burdens that will reduce police effectiveness. The Public Order Bill will reduce further that effectiveness, through dragging substantial numbers of police away from fighting real crime to supervising and interfering with the rights of free peaceful assembly, and it will do so against the wishes of the police themselves.

What do police who have been involved in coping with disorder say about the underlying causes of that disorder? In his report on the Handsworth riots, Chief Constable Dear declared: 812 I would never seek to minimise the problems of being young, black and unemployed in a decaying inner city environment. Black youths suffer particularly from the effects of prejudice, unemployment and scarce resources. These and other ills cannot be ignored and deserve to be addressed by society as a whole. There is not a word in the Bill, nor any other action by the Government, that addresses the ills that Chief Constable Dear says cannot be ignored.

Last month, Commander Alex Marnoch, who was in charge of Brixton at the time of last autumn's riots, and in whom the Home Secretary has such confidence that he is now being transferred and given responsibility for both the Palace of Westminster and Buckingham palace, slated: if unemployment continues to rise and the stabilising middle-aged black population continues its exodus to safer areas, further major disturbances will be inevitable". The article quoting Commander Marnoch stated: He called for fresh initiatives from the Government, the local council, and education, housing and social services departments. Commander Marnoch said: 'Unless there is an influx of extra jobs, or the population moves away, we are going to have serious problems.' Yet there is not a word in the Bill, nor any other action by the Government, designed to ward off the further major inevitable disturbances of which he warns. Indeed, last month's housing investment programme allocations for capital spending on housing are only 29 per cent. of the level when Labour left office. Last month's rate support grant settlement for the partnership authorities increases by £400 million to £2,600 million the amount of rate support grant that the partnership authorities have lost under the Government. Youth unemployment in Britain stands at 1,250,000, nearly three times what it was under Labour. Nearly half a million of those under 25 have been out of work for over a year.

While those scandalous facts persist, no legislation will have any hope of dealing with the dreadful disorders from which this country has suffered so grievously in recent years and months. At the end of his report on the Handsworth riots, Chief Constable Dear quoted these words: 'Utopia is not a republic of fraternity to be taken by violence. Neither can it be taken by men who have no vision of better things for mankind.' We in the Opposition reject the violence that is a curse upon the Britain whose values we cherish. We also reject the men and women who have no vision, the men and women who sit on the Government Front Bench. I call upon the House to vote for the amendment.

§ Mr. Mark Carlisle (Warrington, South)

The right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Mr. Kaufman) addressed the House for 49 minutes. For somewhat over half of that time we heard what might be looked upon as the right hon. Member's set speech on crime. It seemed to me to have precious little to do with the Bill that we are debating, although it may have a considerable amount to do with consolidating the right hon. Gentleman's position in his party. He spent the other half of that time making what seemed to me to be Committee points. With great respect, most of them were wrong, certainly as regards affray and clause 5. At no stage did the right hon. Gentleman give any reason for his announcement that the Opposition intend to divide the House against the Bill.

Before I turn to the Bill, upon which I intend to speak briefly, may I point out to the right hon. Gentleman that 813 I am sure that a general debate on crime would be welcomed, but that is not what we are debating today. In answer to his set speech on crime, I would point out to him that today there are 13,000 more policemen than there were when his party was in office, and that we are spending a third more, in real terms, on the police than was spent at that time.

The right hon. Gentleman attacked my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Home Department and suggested that one ought not to talk about increases in proposed expenditure. He ought to talk to his right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition and to all his colleagues. From 1979 to 1982 they did nothing but attack the present Government. However, their attack was based on the figures of proposed expenditure, for instance, upon education. I was told, not that we were spending more, but that we were cutting what was being spent; not on the basis that we were spending less than had been spent in the year before, but on the basis that we were spending less than it had been proposed by the previous Government should be spent on education. Therefore, the Opposition must get their act together.

As for the right hon. Gentleman's dissertation on the Shops Bill, I appreciate that he likes to parade his intelligence before the House, but he took rather a long time to tell us that if shops were not open there would be no shoplifting! That point may be factually accurate, but it does not add to this debate. I turn, therefore, to the Bill that we are debating.

There are two principles upon which both sides of the House may be able to agree. First, the maintenance of public order—the right for people to be able to walk about freely and to pursue their lives without fear of attack and intimidation, and particularly without fear of attack from the mob—is a fundamental responsibility of the Government. Secondly, the traditional freedom to protest, march and demonstrate is an equally important right, as is the right peacefully to picket. Those rights must be preserved in a democratic society. However, while we preserve those rights, we must safeguard the rights of other people so that the right to protest peacefully is conducted without interference, violence, intimidation or threats, and without infringing the rights of other citizens. That balance, to which my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary referred this afternoon, is the balance that the Bill tries to assess.

I hope that the right hon. Member for Gorton will at least agree with me that we as a society are not being very successful about either of those issues. One has only to consider the degree of hooliganism and the riots in various areas of this country to realise that our society has not been very successful in maintaining order so that people can go about their lives without fear and intimidation. The scenes at the Warrington Messenger and during the miners' dispute show that we have not been successful in creating a balance between, on the one hand, the right to picket peacefully, and on the other the right not to be intimidated by threats. These are basic problems which the House should consider and which the Bill attempts to tackle.

The right hon. Gentleman is right when he says that the inadequacies of the existing law are not nearly so important in terms of controlling football hooliganism and maintaining public order as is the inability to enforce the existing law. I repeat, therefore, that it is far more relevant 814 that now there are 13,000 more policemen than anything that the Bill can do. However, the fact that there are inadequacies and difficulties over enforcing the existing law does not mean that there are not certain areas of the law that are inadequate and need to be reformed. They have been identified by the Law Commission, by the Government and by Select Committee on Home Affairs, and they are referred to in the Bill. Despite what the right hon. Gentleman says, the Bill attempts to tackle the problems without the graphic widening of police powers that he suggests.

Many other hon. Members want to speak in this debate. I intend to deal with parts I and IV. I understand that part I follows the Law Commission's proposals. It is a sensible codification of the common law. With great respect to the right hon. Gentleman, I suggest that he should speak to his right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Aberavon (Mr. Morris) who is about to leave the Chamber. If he does so, I think he will find that he was wrong about the point that he made concerning affray. The law, as provided for in the Bill, on both riot and affray is consistent with the current law and the Law Commission's proposals. In any event, this is a Committee point. I may be wrong, but I am prepared to risk saying that I believe that I am right and that the law on affray at the moment is as is set out in the Bill.

As for clause 5, I agree with the right hon. Member for Gorton that there is room for argument about whether it is necessary to show that what was done was with the belief that it was likely to harass someone, or whether it is necessary to call witnesses to prove that someone has been harassed. But these are Committee points. There is genuine concern about a type of behaviour which causes alarm and harassment, but which is not dealt with at the moment. Again with respect to the right hon. Gentleman, his points on clause 5 were completely misconceived. He said that, because one cannot arrest a person without a warrant, it is similar to saying that one cannot proceed against him for that offence.

As for part II, the major part of the Bill, the background against which we have to consider it is the enormous increase in demonstrations and marches of all kinds in recent years. We are told that during the last 20 years there has been a fourfold increase in marches and demonstrations in London, and that during the last 10 years they have doubled. Demonstrations and marches take a great deal of police time and money. This has an enormous effect upon police morale. Saturday after Saturday and Sunday after Sunday large numbers of policemen are involved in policing demonstrations and marches. It is right, therefore, to examine whether the balance is right, or whether it can be varied to relieve the police of those problems.

The House ought to accept that "serious disorder" is not the only ground on which the police may impose conditions. The volume of traffic and the way in which people move around the country compared with 1936 makes serious disruption of the life of a community an equally fair test in deciding where the balance lies between the rights of the protester and the rights of the individual.

The Bill therefore needs to be tested against three questions. First, should those who organise marches have to give notice? Secondly, should there be a general power to impose conditions on the basis of serious disruption as well as serious disorder? Thirdly, should those conditions as a whole be applicable to static demonstrations as well as to marches? Any sensible assessment of those three 815 questions leads to th