Ms Stella Creasy

I think all our hearts will have been broken by the words of Sarah Everard’s family. The honest truth is that what this report covers did not happen in a vacuum. This weekend women in Walthamstow will hold a vigil to reclaim Hollow Ponds, which is a lovely open space, but there have been repeated concerns about sexual harassment and offences there. I cannot tell the Minister whether those concerns are merited, because my local police, Waltham Forest police, have refused a freedom of information request about the number of crime reports or offences at the site, just as they refused an FOI to explain why they were using community protection notices to deal with violence against women offences. I mention FOIs because the police refused to respond to me, as the local MP, and to local women about how they are dealing with violence on our streets and concerns about street safety, which Lady Angiolini includes in her report. There is a problem with the Metropolitan police. We have known that for many years, and many reports show that. That is why for many years, many of us have campaigned to make misogyny part of our hate crime rubric, because we have seen the difference it has made to how other police forces approach these issues. The Minister will be aware that it is now nearly three years since this House passed the Protection from Sex-based Harassment in Public Act 2023 to bring those measures into power and finally hold organisations like Waltham Forest police to account for their disrespect for the safety of women in my community. Can the Minister give my residents some assurance that misogyny will be implemented as a hate crime and that we will see the cultural change that will tackle the fundamentals she is talking about?