Yvette Cooper

My hon. Friend is right. This is about the fact of the crime—the disrespect—but also the sense of fear that it can create and the huge frustration among shopworkers about the crimes that they see. I am glad to see some signs of a change in heart on the Conservative Benches, with Conservative Members recognising how damaging their approach to town centre crime has been. The shadow Home Secretary, the right hon. Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), has written on Facebook that the police “must have ZERO TOLERANCE to shoplifting and phone theft in Croydon…otherwise it will escalate. Stealing, even less than £200, is illegal…The police must focus ruthlessly on catching criminals and always pursue every line of inquiry.” Who would have thought it? If that is what the right hon. Gentleman now believes, why on earth did he not take the opportunity during the two years that he was the policing Minister to scrap the £200 threshold, which sent all the wrong signals to the police? We do know one part of the shadow Home Secretary’s remedy for the disappearance of neighbourhood police and the soaring levels of town centre crime. He has said that “The wider public do have the power of citizen’s arrest and, where it’s safe to do so, I would encourage that to be used…including potentially a physical challenge”, otherwise it “will just escalate.” Putting aside the intriguing suggestion that the shadow Home Secretary wanders around with handcuffs in his pocket, I wonder whether he has misunderstood the Peel principle that the police are the public and the public are the police. What that principle means is neighbourhood police in the community, not leaving the community to pick up arms because the neighbourhood police have gone. As for Reform Members, it looks as if they are too busy dealing with their own internal antisocial behaviour to even show up. This Government will be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime, something that has not happened for far too long. Alongside the action on community crimes, the Bill introduces much stronger measures on some of the most serious crimes of all, including the knife crime that is destroying young lives—teenagers and young people who do not get to achieve their ambitions or fulfil their dreams, with parents and families left bereft.