In a community where knife crime is prevalent, how can the Minister ensure stop and search is used effectively without exacerbating racial tensions?

What measures will the Government take to address disparities in stop and search practices?

How will data collection be improved to ensure fairness in the use of stop and search powers?

Knife crime has risen significantly. The Home Secretary’s statement is inadequate. She focuses on young black men but ignores other victims like white people despite their minority status among knife crime victims. The inspectorate noted that police cannot explain why stop and search disproportionately targets certain groups due to drug possession searches, which are lower among black people than whites.

How does the Home Secretary's proposal today take on board the 'fundamental reset' of the Met’s use of stop-and-search powers recommended by the Casey report?

In 2021, the Home Affairs Committee inquiry found increased racial disparity in stop-and-search powers against black individuals compared to previous findings. The MP requested evidence of an independent and comprehensive study on the efficacy of stop-and-search tactics and a commitment to undertake an equality impact assessment.

The MP sought confirmation that the statement is part of a wider strategy to tackle underlying causes and problems, as well as the use of weapons in violent crime.

As a black mother herself, the MP questioned how the statement addresses long-standing concerns of black mothers about the use of suspicionless powers and its fit with the Casey review.

The MP inquired about the number of repeat offences among 220,000 arrests and how many resulted in custodial sentences.

Quoting Maya Angelou and questioning the effectiveness of a tool that yields a 9% success rate in finding weapons or items linked to burglary, the MP asked why a public health approach is not being used.

Concerned about under-10-year-olds being stopped and searched improperly in the past, the MP requested assurances that this has changed.

Highlighting increased knife crime alongside expanded suspicionless stop-and-search powers, the MP questioned why a press release-based policy was favoured over properly resourced community policing.

Suggesting the use of knife wands for more effective searches, the MP asked if such tools would be considered by police forces.

Inquiring about the percentage of stop-and-search operations currently filmed by body-worn cameras, the MP sought more detail.

Emphasising responsible usage, the MP encouraged MPs who think stop-and-search tactics are wrong to speak with officers delivering tragic news.

Frankly, I hope that my residents in Walthamstow are not listening to this statement, because it is just plain offensive to those of us at the heart of this challenge. Just a few weeks ago, I got up to ask the Prime Minister about a 16-year-old boy murdered in my community outside his school, and another 16-year-old in court charged with that murder. This weekend, last night, I was sat with residents, having an emergency residents’ meeting because we had had a serious shooting in my community—another young man, critical but stable in hospital. None of my residents would dispute the role that stop and search can play, but we are all arguing—begging, pleading—for this Government to recognise the epidemic of youth violence in our country. If the Home Secretary cares about these young people, as she says she does, she should invest in their future. Under her Government, investment in youth services has plummeted from £158 per head to just £37.

Despite the Government’s efforts to free up the time of frontline police officers by reducing the amount of bureaucracy and paperwork, which takes up more and more of their time, officers often say to me that this increases year on year and so reduces the amount of time they can spend on the beat. What steps are the Government taking to cut out the paperwork and free up frontline time to keep our communities safe?

The Minister talked about common-sense policing, but I have to ask what sense she applied when making a statement about suspicionless stop and search while making no reference to the well-evidenced racist discriminatory use of it. Does she not think we should be focusing on solutions that would actually make communities like mine safer, like reversing education cuts, ending school exclusions, improving mental health services and taking people out of poverty? If she has already said that the police have the powers necessary, why is she arguing that they have greater powers for this particular practice, which actually leads to less confidence in policing?

Last year, a response to a freedom of information request revealed that the gap in the stop and search rates between white people and black people was greater in Wales than in England. We do not know the latest rates, however, as the Home Office does not provide regular Wales-specific data on stop-and-search rates by population. Before the Home Secretary pushes for further use of stop and search in Wales, will she commit to regularly publishing Wales-specific data so we can properly understand the effect of this policy on our communities?

Across our country, including in my Slough constituency, knife crime is up by 70% compared with seven years ago, but, shockingly, there is only a 1% success rate in terms of the policies of the Home Secretary. She is today asking the police to ramp up the use of stop and search but, as I have said, in terms of the conviction rate, there is only a 1% success rate. Meanwhile, we have had funding to youth centres slashed—decimated—over the last decade, so is the Home Secretary embarrassed by the failures of Conservative Government policies over the last 13 years, and can she explain why black people are, despairingly, nine times more likely to be stopped and searched than everybody else?

The framing of knife crime as a black issue is frankly lazy and a dangerous narrative. We need to work with all our communities to understand the core issues around the root cause of crime, and why some of our young people feel that they need to carry a knife. Some of them are victims. I want all my Vauxhall constituents to feel safe and go about their daily business, but stop and search on its own is a blunt tool. The Independent Office for Police Conduct found that a single black boy was searched 60 times—60—between the ages of 14 and 16, leaving him fearful of the police. No Member of the House will think that is an effective use of police time, so can the Home Secretary outline what measures she is taking to end what the IOPC found is the “disproportionate impact” of stop and search on black, Asian and minority ethnic people?

Will the Home Secretary commit to an independent evaluation of her proposals, with particular emphasis on the impact on confidence in policing among marginalised minority communities and on community relations?

Institutional racism is a fact. It is also a fact that stop and search is not used proportionately or sensibly. Liberty has said that stop-and-search powers are “ineffective” and “discriminatory”, disproportionately impacting on black communities. These powers will worsen existing divisions between police and communities when public trust and confidence in the police is at a serious low. So can the Home Secretary confirm what evidence she has that ramped up stop and search will tackle serious violent crime?

Policing by consent depends on trust and confidence in the police. Officers are increasingly stopping law-abiding young people, under the spurious claim that they “smell cannabis” when none has been smoked or is present. And then the police are refusing to provide the necessary receipts and documents to those they have stopped. That failure to follow guidelines is shattering the trust that young people have in the police. What is the Home Secretary doing to address that?

Why on earth does the Home Secretary think it is a good idea, in a free and democratic country, to encourage more section 60 searches, known as suspicionless powers, which allow an individual to be stopped without cause, without need and without reasonable suspicion, instead of adopting a targeted, intelligence-led approach? Is it because of a lack of intelligence in the Home Office?

Welcoming the Secretary of State’s statement, Jim Shannon inquired whether advice to police forces on mainland England and Wales regarding stop and search would be extended to Northern Ireland. Given that the PSNI uses this tool effectively for combatting drug trafficking, seizing lethal weapons, and uncovering criminal activity under high threat levels, he asked if the Home Secretary's guidance would cover them or if she would request her colleague to do so.