Antisocial Behaviour
Monday, 26 October 2026
Contributions
Graeme Downie (Dunfermline and Dollar) (Lab)Labour
8. What steps she is taking to tackle antisocial behaviour.
Gill German (Clwyd North) (Lab)Labour
10. What steps she is taking to tackle antisocial behaviour.
Alex McIntyre (Gloucester) (Lab)Labour
15. What steps she is taking to tackle antisocial behaviour.
The Minister for Policing and Crime (Sarah Jones)Labour
This Government are determined to tackle antisocial behaviour across England and Wales. From today, we are calling time on persistent offenders of ASB with the introduction of respect orders, honouring our manifesto commitment and cracking down on ASB.
Around 1,000 constituents in Dunfermline recently told me in a city centre survey that they were concerned about coming into the city centre, to places such as the bus station and the Kingsgate shopping centre, because of antisocial behaviour. Will the Minister agree to work with the Scottish Government on the respect orders to ensure that lessons can be learned on both sides of the border, so that people can feel safe in Dunfermline and across England, Scotland and Wales?
I am very happy to work with anybody who is committed to tackling antisocial behaviour. The Government have introduced not just respect orders, but extended dispersal directions. We have raised the maximum fixed penalties for public spaces protection orders from £100 to £500. We are passing legislation, putting neighbourhood police into our neighbourhoods and tackling antisocial behaviour.
My recent Pride in Place survey in Rhyl found that antisocial behaviour such as street drinking and fly-tipping is putting many people off visiting their own town centre. With respect orders coming into force today, what guidance is being given to police to make good use of them against repeat offenders so that people want to visit their own town centre again?
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I suspect that a lot of similar conversations are happening on Pride in Place boards across England and Wales. In north Wales we have seen an increase of some 60 officers in neighbourhoods since 2015, which will make a very big difference. I have talked to every police force across the country, written to all the chief constables and met all the different agencies that are part of respect orders, and everyone is lined up to do this work. Guidance has been published, and I look forward to seeing the first court cases—hopefully this week.
Far too many residents in Gloucester tell me about persistent antisocial behaviour in the city centre, and they are fed up with it. We are seeing a situation where people get off the bus and are immediately confronted by street drinkers, and the local corner shop is selling alcohol to them when they can barely stand up. The police are doing what they can but, given the challenges facing Gloucestershire constabulary, can the Minister outline what more can be done to tackle the antisocial behaviour blighting our city centre?
I went last week to Newcastle-under-Lyme, Southall and Hemel Hempstead, and I have been talking to all the police forces across the country. I expect my hon. Friend’s police force to take these powers in the manner in which they are intended—as a useful tool to help the police, local authorities, housing associations and other agents to tackle antisocial behaviour and introduce respect orders. We are increasing funding across the country. Importantly, we are also reforming policing to put local policing at the heart of everything we do, so that the public get the service they expect.
Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin) (Con)Conservative
Illegal car cruising is a real blight on communities, causing noise pollution and terrifying local communities, including pedestrians and legal road users alike, on private and public roads. Will the Minister look again at the legislation to see whether this particular crime—it is a crime—can be penalised in a different way? At the moment, the generic legislation for antisocial behaviour is not catching enough people and is not a deterrent.
I am happy to look into whether respect orders might cover the crimes that the right hon. Member talks about and help in this space. Of course we need to ensure that we have more police in our communities, and we will always look at the legislation to see whether there is more that we can do to come down hard on these kinds of behaviours, which make our constituents and our communities really not feel safe in their own environment. We will continue to work on that.
Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)Liberal Democrat
I would like to add to what the right hon. Member just said about car cruising. Along the A2300 approaching Burgess Hill, car cruising is causing misery to residents, with noise waking people up through the night. It is really intimidating more rural residents as they try to come from rural lanes on to the A2300. I am told by one local farmer that people are coming from as far afield as the Netherlands to get involved. A public space protection order is in place and Sussex police are doing what they can. Please, what else can the Government do to deter and break up illegal car cruising?
I recognise what the hon. Member describes. I have talked to the police about what more we can do in this space. I encourage everybody to report crimes as soon as they see them, because the police can put automatic number plate recognition cameras in place to retrospectively give people fines if they are breaking the law by car cruising. I know the police are looking for the resources to ensure that they can tackle these things. More neighbourhood policing, looking at shift times, and all these things can help.
Josh Babarinde (Eastbourne) (LD)Liberal Democrat
Too often, antisocial behaviour on our streets comes with a racist edge, and tackling it starts with naming it, something that shamefully the wannabe Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick)—I have informed him that I would be referring to him—could not do this weekend when asked whether calling the Leader of the Opposition a “Nigerian scammer” is racist. Will the Minister say what he could not, and outline what the Government are doing to tackle racist antisocial behaviour?
Of course that comment is racist. We know that race and religious hate crime is rising and we are very concerned about that. We have taken some legislative action when it comes to protests, around things like cumulative impact and places of worship. We have our social cohesion plan, “Protecting What Matters”, and we have invested record amounts of money—sadly, we have had to do so—to protect religious spaces for the Jewish community, the Muslim community, and those of other faiths including Sikhs. We have put in £250 million to protect our Jewish communities. There is more to do, but we are certainly in agreement that that was racist, and we need to tackle all forms of hate crime.
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)Labour
This month has tragically seen a fatal shooting in East Acton. I know that, as they used to say on “Crimewatch”, these things are incredibly rare, but at a community meeting I went to, which also involved the council and the police, it still felt very raw. There is consternation that the gangs, violence and exploitation unit, which has been instrumental in solving previous murders, is being wound up. I wonder whether the Home Secretary, or one of my other hon. Friends in the Department, could meet me and the borough west commander to find a way forward.
My hon. Friend is right that statistics are not the answer to everything, but gun crime has gone down in the last year in the new stats that have come out, so we are making progress. She is right, of course, to be concerned about the awful incident in her constituency. I am always happy to meet her and others to talk about such matters. We are putting funding into tackling county lines, into knife crime concentration funds and into our violence reduction units. All that funding is helping us to make progress when it comes to both knife crime and gun crime.
Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)Liberal Democrat
Businesses, constituents and pets in Tunbridge Wells suffer from destructive and often cruel catapult attacks. It is a problem that many of us across this House have seen in our inboxes. Kent police and Tunbridge Wells borough council are working together to manage the problem, including looking at public space protection orders. Can I ask the Secretary of State whether she has considered restrictions or a ban at a national level in order to strengthen the hand of local police forces and local authorities such as mine in Tunbridge Wells?
The hon. Member cannot ask the Secretary of State, but he can ask the Minister for Policing. He raises a legitimate problem. We recently had a roundtable on catapults and the harm that they are doing, and we are looking at what more we need to do. Respect orders will work in this space as well, and it is worth him talking to the police on that front, because we want to ensure that we are doing everything we can. We have seen some particularly nasty catapult attacks in particular areas of the country, which we want to see an end to. Respect orders might be an answer.
Mary Creagh (Coventry East) (Lab)Labour
I thank my hon. Friend the Policing Minister for her visit to Coventry last month to see the brilliant work done by the Labour council’s trading standards officers, in partnership with Coventry police, to tackle crime and antisocial behaviour on Foleshill Road, and the public spaces protection order for Edgwick Park, which has cleared that park, which is next to a school, of the drug dealers who used to blight it. Will she say what more respect orders can do to tackle this level of low but persistent antisocial behaviour that blights our streets?
It was a pleasure to visit my hon. Friend’s constituency and see the good work being done and the partnerships being forged. She asks what more respect orders can do. They are there to help tackle vandalism, public drunkenness, aggressive begging, irresponsible dog owners—I think all of us agree that is very irritating—and noisy or abusive behaviour. The Environment Agency can also use them for fly-tipping and persistent fly-tippers, so there is a whole raft of measures for which we can use respect orders. I look forward to seeing the results.
John Milne (Horsham) (LD)Liberal Democrat
Following recent changes, police are now able to seize vehicles that are used antisocially without first issuing a warning. This is potentially a way for police in my constituency to deal with illegal street racing meets on the A24 and the A264 from Kilnwood Vale down to Southwater. Can the Minister confirm whether this new power is proving to be effective, and how many vehicles have been seized thus far?
It is very early days, so I am unable to give the hon. Member the numbers at this point, but they will be collected by constituency. I encourage him to keep in touch with his local police to see what the numbers are. He is absolutely right that the power to seize a vehicle without giving warning is a powerful tool.
Source: UK Parliament Hansard API. Debate ID: 5424480.