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Criminal Law (Amendment) (Protection of Property) Bill

My hon. Friend raises an important point. I would hope that the police officer would exercise their common sense. A police officer is entitled to use reasonable force in apprehending a criminal, as is any citizen attempting to effect a citizen’s arrest under the law as it stands. Police officers are trained in the criminal law, and they know when they may and may not use disproportionate force, but that would not be the case under the Bill, because of all the anomalies that it contains. I suspect that a police officer would have more sense than to use disproportionate force. I have rather greater respect for the police service than do the Conservatives, given their suggestion that police officers might wish to use disproportionate force beyond that necessary to detain a suspect.