Lisa Smart

There are elements of this Bill that we Liberal Democrats welcome; there are also some that we would not spend this much parliamentary time on, and some that we raise a weary Liberal eyebrow at, while we dust off the well-worn reasons why civil liberties really do matter to all of us. The biggest disappointment for us is the missed opportunities—the topics not covered and the chances not taken. We welcome the opportunity to scrutinise the Bill as it works its way through Committee and beyond. We will push the Government to go further in some areas; in others, we will suggest that they take themselves off for a little lie down in a quiet room, as they seem to have got themselves a little overwrought. The key thing that Lib Dems will be pushing for is a serious commitment to restoring proper community policing, because without that, we simply will not deliver the frontline policing that my constituency and communities across the country need and deserve. We all agree that everyone should feel safe in their own home and their neighbourhood, but after years of Conservative mismanagement, that is not the reality in too many of our communities. The previous Government gutted neighbourhood policing by slashing over 4,500 police community support officers since 2015. It should come as no surprise that 6,000 cases are closed every day without a suspect even being identified, or that just 6% of reported crimes result in a charge.