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Crime (London)

I will use the little time that I have to express my disdain at the motivation of the Conservatives in their conduct of this debate. It is a perfect example of calling a debate to obscure and confuse the issue under discussion. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Minister for laying to rest some of the bogus facts that have been put forward about the undeniable fall in crime of 20 per cent. over the past five years and the record numbers of police—35,000, with a further 1,000 promised. The double standards of the Conservatives show that they are confused and in denial. As my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) said, they claim credit locally for falls in crime but, on a London basis, claim that crime has not fallen. They oppose the investment that has gone in. We just heard the hon. Member for Putney (Justine Greening) say that she does not believe that anything has changed in London and that community policing is exactly what it was previously, but we know that there has been huge investment and that that is connected to what has happened to crime rates. I am afraid that the hon. Member for Putney and my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham know less about the situation in Hammersmith and Fulham than I do because I am the only MP here from that borough. In reality, the money for the police officers who were put into the ward, as mentioned by my hon. Friend, was taken out of another ward that had even higher crime, the reason being that, under the Labour council, those officers had been paid for by the council, but the Conservatives have moved them into wards that receive Government funding through the new deal for communities or section 106 moneys. Once again, they are using statistics and money to manipulate figures in a way that can disadvantage people locally. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham that if this debate is about reviving a flagging campaign, it certainly has not worked. I would say in defence of the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Johnson) that perhaps the reason why he walked out of the Chamber was that he was listening to his own policies being recited by Conservative Front Benchers. When one compares 1,000 extra police officers with being given maps or ending accountable stop and search, I am not surprised that he decided to leave the Chamber. When people vote in London next Thursday, they will vote on the issue of crime, and they will make a decision primarily about whether Ken Livingstone or the hon. Member for Henley is in a better position to deal with that. They will see on the one hand somebody who has a track record of investing in and reducing crime and on the other somebody who is not fit to take over that role—somebody whose own record does not allow him to take over that role. I refer in particular to the disgraceful episode that is documented on tape, where the hon. Member for Henley agreed to give details of a journalist to someone who became a convicted fraudster, on the basis that he was an old school friend of his, in order to allow that journalist to be beaten up. Somebody who is prepared to do that—[Interruption.] I can quote the details if hon. Members want. The only things in that conversation—