HC Deb 31 January 1985 vol 72 cc402-4
7. Mr. Michael Forsyth

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will call for reports from the chief constables concerned as to what measures the police are taking to deal with intimidation during the miners' dispute.

Mr. Brittan

I have received a number of such reports. Significant police resources have been deployed to deal with the problem of intimidation, and substantial numbers of prosecutions have been brought.

Mr. Forsyth

I am glad that my right hon. and learned Friend will be able to establish the facts of the matter. Is it not an outrage and a disgrace that the European Assembly should have announced its own inquiry into the policing of the dispute, which is aiding and abetting those Opposition Members who have been carrying out their back-stabbing campaign against the police? Will he give an undertaking to the House that he will refuse to co-operate with that inquiry?

Mr. Brittan

The policing of the dispute is outside the competence of the European Assembly, and the Government will make no facilities available for the inquiry.

Mr. Ashley

Is the Home Secretay aware that intimidation should always be condemned, even by the European Assembly, but that to suggest that the police are always right and that miners are always wrong is crucially misleading and is an oversimplification of what is happening in coal areas today?

Mr. Brittan

It would be, but it is not a suggestion that the questioner or anyone else has made.

Mr. Brandon-Bravo

Has not the burden on our police forces been made much more irksome by the conduct of Her Majesty's Opposition?

Mr. Brittan

They have not helped.

Mr. Barron

When the Home Secretary asks the chief constables for reports, will he also report on the intimidation of members of the NUM by some police officers? I say that because 75 per cent. of the cases in my local magistrates' court that have been brought against pickets from my area are now being dropped because there were no grounds for them going there in the first place.

Mr. Brittan

That does not prove what the hon. Gentleman has said. If the hon. Gentleman has evidence of cases of the kind that he describes, I am sure he will want to pursue them through the complaints procedure, which has been substantially strengthened by the Government under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.

Mr. Peter Bruinvels

Will my right hon. and learned Friend congratulate the chief constables on making it possible for so many courageous miners to go back to work, realising that there are jobs for them? Will he also ensure that there is no intimidation by the European Assembly in denying the rights of those working miners to go to work?

Mr. Brittan

I can certainly give my hon. Friend the assurance that he last sought. I agree with him that in the past 11 months there has been a major threat to one of the most fundamental civil liberties that we enjoy—the right to go to our workplace. The fact that that threat has not been successful is due in large measure to the courage and success of the police force.

Mr. Mason

Is the Home Secretary aware that I wrote to him on 10 December 1984 asking him to give me an assurance that all those mineworkers who have been arrested and since acquitted should have their photographs and fingerprints erased from the record? The right hon. and learned Gentleman's private secretary sent me an interim reply on 28 December informing me that he was contacting the chief constable of Nottinghamshire and asking for a report. Since then, silence. The Home Secretary is supposed to be in charge. Is he not big enough and has he not the responsibility to assure all those chaps who I described who have been acquitted of all charges that their photographs and fingerprints will be expunged from the record?

Mr. Brittan

I shall look into the point that the right hon. Gentleman makes, and respond to him as quickly as possible.

Mr. Holt

When my right hon. and Learned Friend asks chief constables for a report, will he also ask for a report on a case in Cleveland where an ex-miner, who had been on strike, was to be brought before the Crown court but the judge refused to hear the case on the ground that he would not be able to put together a jury which would not be influenced or intimidated?

Mr. Brittan

I regard that report as a matter of considerable concern.

Mr. Kaufman

Is not the worst intimidation that has taken place during the strike the intimidation of the crime victim and the taxpayer? Is it not a fact that policing the coal strike has cost £200 million and has in addition resulted in a huge increase in crime, as frankly stated by the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis? Is it not a fact that the Prime Minister's policy of provocation and confrontation has produced an exacerbation of the worst crime wave on record, and cost taxpayers and ratepayers far more than the Prime Minister ever hoped to save through the butchery of the coal industry?

Mr. Brittan

I do not think that anyone will be impressed by that sort of rhetoric. As the right hon. Gentleman talks about provocation, he should address himself to those who have assembled in hugh numbers to frighten their fellow workmen and prevent them from going to work. If he is genuinely concerned about the cost of the dispute and its impact on crime generally, he should have been at the forefront of those urging the National Union of Mineworkers not to condone or support in any way violence on picket lines or anywhere. He has been singularly absent from any such activity.

Mr. Kaufman

rose—

Mr. Mason

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In view of the inadequate nature of the reply by the Home Secretary, I shall raise this matter on the Adjournment at the earliest possible opportunity.