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Mr. Peter Atkinson (Hexham): Perhaps the hon. Gentleman can solve a mystery for me. One day last summer, outside this very building, a police officer was directing coaches that were parking opposite Abingdon green. Noticing the unusual badge on his helmet, I asked him which force he belonged to. He said that he belonged to the Royal Parks constabulary. Apparently, Abingdon green is a royal park.
Mr. Mackinlay: Abingdon green may well be, but I am not sure that the highway is. I bumped into a British Transport police officer outside St. Stephen's entrance. Although he was clearly off duty, if an incident had taken place there he might have been the first police officer available, without having the powers and competence of a police constable. My Bill seeks to remedy that.
Hon. Members will recall the news footage of the poll tax riots a few years ago, when a scaffolding bar was pushed through the windows of a police car in the vicinity of Trafalgar square. It was a British Transport police car. A couple of years ago, riots in Northumberland avenue were instigated by--supposedly--football fans following an international competition, and a Ministry of Defence police car was attacked.
The forces defined in part I of the Bill are highly professional. In some parts of the United Kingdom, MOD police are invariably armed, and the force is substantial, comprising some 4,000 officers--much more than some "Home Office police" forces. The Atomic Energy Authority constabulary is also very much an armed police force, which obviously means that we trust its members and recognise their professionalism and competence. The British Transport police are much valued by the public, and are seen every day to be carrying out their duty of maximising public order, assisting the public and, in some instances, having to arrest people. The Royal Parks constabulary also does a very professional job, especially in maintaining security and ensuring that ceremonial events are properly policed--along with other agencies.
Mr. John Greenway (Ryedale):
I congratulate the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay) on securing the debate. With typical resilience, he has pursued the issue
The issue has arisen before. The hon. Gentleman and I both commented on it in the Standing Committee considering the Bill that became the Police and Magistrates' Courts Act 1994. I suppose that anyone outside the House who heard what the hon. Gentleman has said today would think, "This seems an awfully good idea; what is the stumbling block?" When we were in government, there was always a Home Office Minister on hand to tell us what the stumbling block was, but we are now in opposition, and I have sought no official advice from the Home Office. What I shall say is entirely my own reaction to what I read yesterday when the Bill was available for the first time in the Table Office.
I do not mean to disparage the hon. Gentleman in any way, but this is not the first time in recent weeks when, at around 2.15 pm on a Friday, we have found ourselves discussing a Bill that was printed only about 36 hours earlier. It does not help us to prepare or to consult organisations that would clearly be affected by the Bill, were it to be given a Second Reading.
The issue is perhaps more relevant to police forces that are listed in part I of the schedule--particularly the British Transport police and the Royal Parks constabulary--than to those in part II. I know that the hon. Member feels equally strongly about the Ministry of Defence police, but the British Transport police do an excellent job and there is an issue as to what needs to be done, if anything, about their powers and the exercise of control over their function. Clearly, however, there are some major problems with the House accepting the Bill.
Arguably, there is an issue about whether certain police authorities should call themselves police, as they are not police in the conventional sense of the word. I do take issue with the hon. Gentleman, however, on clause 2, where he seeks to give the powers of a constable to constables in these other police forces. The powers of a constable are unique and historic. It surprises people that many of the powers that constables exercise daily are the powers that are invested in the citizen. The police whom the hon. Gentleman seeks to bring into the ambit of the Bill are able to operate for that reason; they are trained to know just what citizens' powers are available to help them with their work.
I ask whether a sufficient case has been made about the mischief that the Bill seeks to address. I take the hon. Gentleman's point that, given the growth of the private security industry, we would not wish to have a plethora of other police forces, but all the existing police forces work in either public or extremely tightly controlled areas such as docks or Atomic Energy Authority establishments. Doubtless, we shall want to have the time and opportunity to delve into the history of all those forces. I am sure that we would find that they are properly constituted.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. Alun Michael):
I welcome the opportunity to debate the jurisdiction of the larger non-Home Office forces. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay), who has been tireless in promoting and representing the interests of non-Home Office police forces. His persistence in bringing the issue of their jurisdiction to the Floor of the House is legendary and explains all the relationships to which he referred. I remember his energetic efforts in this area during the passage of the Police and Magistrates' Courts Act, and I agree that we need to be clear and precise about the issues: who is a police officer, what is a police force and, equally, what is not a police force and who is not a police officer.
During the debates on that Act, a variety of different organisations were referred to and I cannot resist the temptation to refer again to the Barnet Dog Handlers, which, we discovered, was technically a police force, although it did not really exist and it did not have any employees. They do not seem to have been sighted over the past three or four years or, indeed, for several decades before that.
Other forces are clearly part of the police family and observe the same standards, supervision and training. That is especially true of the British Transport police, who deal daily with members of the public, albeit in the limited environment of the railways, and who have to observe exactly the same standards of behaviour and arrest, and so on, as the police generally.
Such non-Home Department forces are an important and intrinsic part of policing and of the maintenance of law and order. Because of the Government's desire to deliver the best policing, we welcome the idea that we should provide an effective and efficient working relationship between Home Department forces and other forces. Therefore, I sympathise with the Bill's good intentions. We are already considering some of the issues that my hon. Friend raised.
We need to balance the desire for an extension of jurisdiction for some non-Home Department forces against the necessity of maintaining clear areas of responsibility and accountability between them and Home Department forces. Above all, we must guard against leaving scope for confusion over responsibilities or for conflict in operations between the forces. The arrangements in the Bill are directed at a clear target on which we are agreed, but they may have accidental and unintended consequences in that they would give jurisdiction in areas where my hon. Friend would not want it. That is the basic problem with the Bill. It attacks a mischief, a problem that needs to be resolved. However, we must make sure that it does precisely what it intends to do and does not accidentally have effects that were not intended.
It is important to bear in mind the fact that any legislation needs to be justified by the facts and to have proportionate objectives. The naming of police authorities
has been referred to. There are such residual elements in the context of the naming of joint bodies. The Police Federation, the Association of Chief Police Officers and the Superintendents Association are allowed for by legislation. I am sure that such issues should also relate to joint bodies such as the Police Information Technology Organisation, and so on, to ensure consistency.
The Bill's provisions are the main issue. As the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) said, the Bill was published just yesterday, and there has not been time to go through it in detail. I appreciate the reasons for that. It is difficult for a Back Bencher to introduce legislation covering all the bases, but my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock has made a brave effort in bringing important issues to the House.
The Bill contains provisions for regulating the use of the term "police" and related terms, and for amending the law on the powers of certain constables. The clauses would radically alter the existing arrangements for the so-called non-Home Office forces. First, they would place new statutory restrictions on the use of some terms describing police officers and forces and, secondly, they would provide for enlarged jurisdiction for constables in non-Home Office police forces so that they could wield their full powers and privileges anywhere in England and Wales. Of course, there are corresponding provisions for Scotland and Northern Ireland.
I understand that, broadly, the condition is that the constable must think that the circumstances require him or her to exercise those powers and that either another constable is asked for help or there is no other constable available. The Bill also seeks to regulate the power of the Secretary of State in respect of non-Home Department police officers. I can see the attraction in the proposal to extend the jurisdiction of all constables in non-Home Office forces, so that they can exercise their powers anywhere in England and Wales to assist the public or a local police force. Members of the British Transport police who have left transport territory and are perhaps travelling by car between one railway station and another to pursue their duties could come across an incident and face a problem. The fact that they should be able to give assistance to the local police force because of their experience makes sense, but it is a complex area that needs careful consideration.
The main point is constitutional. The limited jurisdiction of some of the forces reflects their constitutional position. By and large, the non-Home Office forces are not about policing the general public. As I have said, the British Transport police do, but that is not the case for some of the other forces listed in the schedule. Some of them are about protecting private property; some are about protecting specific interests. It would be wrong--
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