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Home Affairs and Justice

My hon. Friend makes some valid points. Although the police are judged on how they deal with antisocial behaviour, the gathering of statistics on behaviour that often stops short of the criminal is not particularly robust, and perhaps we can consider that. I am afraid to say that North East Lincolnshire and the area covered by Humberside police was rather late to pick up on the national agenda—on police community support officers, for instance. I know that some people argue that we need more warranted officers, but when PCSOs were on offer, I and other Members of Parliament for the area urged the police authority to go down that route. Unfortunately, the police authority did not agree, so it was one of the last parts of the country to get community support officers. That may have fed into people's feeling that they are not safe, despite the fact that crime is going down. They are beginning to see the community support officers on the street, and I am pleased that the current chief constable has worked hard to pull the situation back because we started so very late. I raised the matter with the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Mr. Coaker), who kindly visited the constituency and met people who were troubled by antisocial behaviour. He came up a couple of months ago, and I think that he found the visit very instructive. When he was being questioned by victims of antisocial behaviour, I found it interesting that people were again saying, ““Why don't the Government do something?”” It was similar to the response to the attacks on the fire services. He responded, ““The Government have done this, and have done that.”” We should consider how well councils, the police and other organisations with which we work to tackle antisocial behaviour and crime are using the powers available to them. There are two unitary authorities in my constituency, and one of them is certainly a lot further behind the other in using the powers available to it—when one has experience of two neighbouring authorities, one can compare and contrast. I want the Government to give people a bit of a push to use the powers that are already available. Probably only a minority of people are responsible for the antisocial behaviour in our communities, and they hold us to ransom. The Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill is a carry-over Bill, but I welcome one particular aspect of it—the extension of crack house closure powers to deal with premises at the centre of serious and persistent disorder or nuisance regardless of tenure. That is vital. Whether councils are slow to act or not, they have powers to tackle antisocial behaviour, as do registered social landlords and housing associations. However, there was a gap in relation to private landlords and owner-occupiers. I am pleased that the powers are now available to tackle that part of antisocial behaviour. Literacy and numeracy are linked with criminality and antisocial behaviour. It is a sad fact that the majority of people who commit serious crimes in this country have very poor literacy and numeracy skills. The same goes for the whole prison population, and we have to tackle that problem by taking a more integrated approach. I do not know how many Members saw it, but there was an instructive documentary on TV. People will think that I spend all my time watching TV—in fact, it is rather rare that I do, but this documentary was very instructive. It was called ““Last Chance Kids”” and I think it was filmed in Barking and Dagenham; it was certainly that part of the world. It was about a primary school that focused on ensuring that every child gained some ability to read in a year. The head teacher had given herself a year to try to improve such skills. It was instructive to note that young boys with the poorest literacy and numeracy skills were the most disruptive in the class. Antisocial behaviour, which could lead to more serious behaviour, was therefore beginning in primary school. The pupils were bored and, as they progressed through the school, they had no connection with what was happening, so they became disruptive in the classroom and in the playground. They began to bully. By the end of the year, the head teacher had managed to get all the children reading, and their behaviour improved enormously. We must therefore consider such matters when we discuss criminal justice and antisocial behaviour. Drug treatment orders are currently available when someone is convicted of a crime, but should not we consider numeracy orders? That might sound a bit trite, but prisons do not tackle offenders' literacy and numeracy. We must examine that in greater depth. Literacy and numeracy could be improved, for example, through offender management when people are released from a custodial sentence or in other ways. However we do it, we must make people who commit crimes literate and numerate. If we are to break the cycle of criminality, we must give them the necessary skills, which start with the most basic—literacy and numeracy. I would love tests to be conducted on those convicted of a crime to assess their skills. In the neighbouring constituency of Grimsby, which is also covered by North East Lincolnshire, there is a wonderful project called Space, which is run by the Rev. John Ellis. It featured in The Sunday Times magazine a few weeks ago. Like the head teacher in the east end who was trying to get some of the toughest kids and those with most difficulties reading, Space takes some of the most challenging young people in our community and tries to break the cycles of antisocial behaviour and criminality. It is achieving astounding results with some of those challenging young people. We must get people reading and improve people's skills. I hope that the Government's agenda and some aspects of the Queen's Speech will contribute to that, but it is not easy to do. It will take a generation because it has to work through society before we genuinely experience the impact of such policies. Regeneration is also necessary to tackle antisocial behaviour and criminality and make people feel secure in their homes and communities. Sorry about this, folks, but I am going to mention another television programme. I am sure that some hon. Members have heard of ““Location, Location, Location””. It recently covered the worst and best places to live in Britain. North East Lincolnshire came out as the sixth worst place. That was based on all sorts of statistics. We are a coastal area, with infrastructure problems; we are remote and so on. However, if a local authority and other agencies are trying to get investment and bring in teachers and doctors to their remote urban area, they do not need Phil and Kirstie going around saying that it is the sixth worst place to live in Britain. I am sorry to say that Grimsby regularly features in a book called ““Crap Towns””—I am not sure whether that is unparliamentary language. Barrow upon Humber in north Lincolnshire has been judged an excellent place to live. It is, therefore, not all bad news, and Cleethorpes beach has blue-flag status, which is wonderful. How is North East Lincolnshire council trying to bring investment into the area and get away from the image of Grimsby as a dreadful place to live? The council wants to change the name of the local authority from North East Lincolnshire to Grimsby. It makes no sense to use all that money to change the name of the local authority, which is well described by North East Lincolnshire, because that is where it is. The money could be better used in tackling antisocial behaviour, for example. Finally, I know that other hon. Members wish to speak, so I will be brief. I am not sure how many barristers are still left in the Chamber, although I see that some of the usual suspects have gone, so I might be safe to talk about this—[Interruption.] Ah! I might even get some answers, now that one of them has walked back in. Thanks to changes that the Government introduced, I recently had to spend some time on jury service. It was very instructive, particularly when one not only had voted for the legislation under which the defendants had been charged, but had even been a Parliamentary Private Secretary at the time and therefore knew the legislation fairly well. It is not often that my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Medway (Mr. Marshall-Andrews) and I agree, but from my experience as a juror I thought that the judges were excellent in their handling of cases. I thought that the police were excellent, too. However, my opinion of the prosecution and defence barristers was somewhat lower. The cases in which I was a juror involved sexual offences. Having served as a juror on such cases, I still have concerns about how we handle them. I got the impression that people judge the victim, particularly based on how they behave in court; indeed, I have read about the issue since and spoken to various organisations. If we are to achieve justice and deal with victims, we have to do something about people's perceptions of victims and how they should behave in court. We need a far better explanation of what constitutes consent in cases involving sexual offences. We also need much more simplicity in saying what ““beyond reasonable doubt”” means, which does not necessarily have to mean beyond all doubt. The barristers might be able to help me here, but I did not understand why, if a sexual crime is involved, the jury did not get to see a transcript of the victim's statement to the police. The jury receives only a statement from the defence and has nothing against which to compare and contrast it. I am told that there are good legal reasons for that; but if one is judging a case in which it is one person's word against another's, it is wrong to have just one version of events and not to be allowed the other version. We cannot do justice if that system is maintained. Thank you for calling me in this debate, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I also thank the House for bearing with me.