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The Committee consisted of the following Members:Alan Sandall,
Committee Clerk † attended
the Committee Public Bill CommitteeTuesday 23 February 2010(Afternoon)[Mr. Frank Cook in the Chair]Crime and Security BillClause 39Extension
of licensing
scheme 4
pm Question
(this day) again proposed, That the clause stand part of the
Bill.
The
Chairman: I remind the Committee that with this it will be
convenient to discuss the following: new clause 3-Limitation
on powers to immobilise, restrict or remove
vehicles- '(1)
The Private Security Industry Act 2001 is amended as
follows. (2) After section 4
there is
inserted- "4A
Limitation on powers to immobilise, restrict or remove
vehicles (1) A person may not
carry out an activity to which paragraph 3 (immobilisation of vehicles)
or 3A (restriction and removal of vehicles) of Schedule 2 applies
unless he is either- (a)
a public authority, or (b)
acting on behalf of a public
authority. (2) For the purposes
of subsection (1), the person carries out an activity on behalf of a
public authority in
particular- (a) if he
is, and is acting as, the public authority's employee,
or (b) if he is acting pursuant
to a contract for the supply of services with the public authority only
where that contract does not allow him, or any other person, to benefit
from a variable financial incentive which is dependent on the number of
vehicles immobilised, restricted or
removed."'. New
clause 27-Prohibition of immobilisation or restriction and
removal of
vehicles- '(1) A
person commits an offence if the person carries out any of the
following
activities- (a) the
immobilisation of a motor vehicle by the attachment to the vehicle, or
to a part of it, of an immobilising
device; (b) the demanding or
collection of a charge as a condition of the removal of an immobilising
device from a motor
vehicle; (c) the moving of a
vehicle, or the restriction of the movement of a vehicle, by any
means; (d) the demanding or
collection of a charge as a condition of any release of a vehicle which
has been so moved or
restricted; unless that
activity is carried out with the consent of the owner, keeper or user
of the vehicle. (2) A person
who is an occupier of any premises commits an offence
if- (a) another person
carries out, in relation to vehicles on those premises, any activities
falling within subsection (1), and
(b) those activities are carried out with the
permission of that occupier or for the purposes of, or in connection
with, any contract for the supply of services to
him. (3) A person guilty of an
offence under this section shall be
liable- (a) on summary
conviction, to a fine not exceeding the statutory
maximum; (b) on conviction on
indictment, to a fine. (4) The
Private Security Industry Act 2001 is amended as
follows- (a) omit
section 6; (b) in Schedule 2
omit paragraphs 3 and
3A.'. New
clause 30-Code of conduct (Private Security Industry Act
2001)- 'The
Secretary of State shall by regulations make provision for the
introduction of a code of conduct in respect of vehicle immobilisation
activities and the issuing of penalties for parking on private land
undertaken by any business licensed under section 4A of the Private
Security Industry Act 2001 (inserted by section 39 of this Act),
including making provision for requirements for appropriate signage on
private land and maximum levels of penalties which may be
levied.'.
The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department
(Mr. Alan Campbell): I was responding to the
right hon. and learned Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham who was,
unusually, promoting the notion of a ban-albeit a delayed
one-that would be introduced, ironically, through a statutory
instrument. Therefore, I assume that this is a rather academic
discussion. Mr.
Douglas Hogg (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con): The
Minister will recall that I suggested an amendable statutory
instrument.
Mr.
Campbell: Amendable, but a statutory instrument
nevertheless. That will not be necessary because the short history of
the issue shows that the Government have moved from the licensing of
individuals involved in wheel-clamping to the current proposals on the
licensing of companies. We have demonstrated our intent, and we would
not have got to this stage-a major part of a major
Bill-were we not determined to take the correct action that will
have the desired effect. I do not accept that we should have a ban,
albeit one that hangs like the sword of
Damocles. I
shall respond quickly to my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent,
South, who suggested that we could avoid the problems if the owners of
private land simply fenced it off. We had a short discussion about
whether that was mainly a rural issue. It is an urban issue, too,
because there are many areas, including old people's homes,
hospitals and a variety of private land, that require some form of
parking control. There is a host of areas for which it would be
impractical to insist that if owners did not want people to park there,
they should fence them off. That is why we are making our current
suggestions.
The hon.
Member for Romford highlighted the need for the action we are taking,
because he gave a number of examples of the type of unacceptable
behaviour that we are trying to get rid of. These include release fees,
signage and so on, which will be an important part of the code of
practice.
I
want to concentrate slightly longer on the comments made by the hon.
Member for Winchester, who set out a range of objections to the route
we are taking. I shall try to persuade his colleagues and others that
ours is the right route. He advocated that local authorities should
take control of the situation. Like the hon. Member for Romford, I
cannot recall from the evidence session that the representative of
local authorities showed a great deal of enthusiasm for the idea of
them taking this on. We kept coming back to the perennial cost question
and an acknowledgment that, were we to go down that route with an
entirely different model, there would be a cost involved. I am not sure
that the local taxpayer should pick up the cost. The way in which we
are proceeding represents a fairer and more proportionate
system.
Tom
Brake (Carshalton and Wallington) (LD): I wonder whether
the Minister can recall any enthusiasm from the witnesses for the
Government's
solution.
Mr.
Campbell: The hon. Gentleman says that but, in fact, we
have been consulting on a range of proposals for some time. I accept
that nobody came out in complete support of everything that we were
doing. However, by and large, we have managed to satisfy a majority on
most of the issues raised in those sessions and during the consultation
process, such as what a code of practice would look like, or crucially
whether there should be an independent appeals mechanism. I admit that
at one point it was not clear that that was what we were
proposing-but we are. People often have their own views and put
forward alternatives. However, in the absence of a clearly more
acceptable alternative, I think that we have broad support for our
suggestions. The
hon. Member for Winchester mentioned incentivisation, which we have
discussed before, with regard to whether there will be a great
incentive to carry out wheel-clamping to maximise profits.
Incentivisation might have an attraction now, because there is a fairly
open-ended and loose system through which people can make extortionate
profits, but part of what we are doing is to put limits on things such
as release fees and to address issues regarding what happens if
vehicles are impounded overnight and whether people have to pay for
that. Many incentives that might have been in place will not exist
under the scheme that we are advocating. The hon. Gentleman also
mentioned the need for an appeals procedure. As we will discuss later,
there will be not only such a procedure, but an independent
one. The
hon. Gentleman also spoke about some entirely unacceptable examples of
people who were forced to abandon their cars during the bad weather
coming back to find that they were wheel-clamped. I cannot give a
complete undertaking that that will not be possible in the future, but
if we address issues such as signage and release fees, many of those
problems could be resolved. If Members of Parliament and others are
thinking about going to the companies and saying, "Surely this
is unfair," please remember that companies will need to have an
appeals procedure and, under the code of practice, they will also need
to have a complaints procedure. Beyond that, there will also be an
independent complaints procedure, through which I am sure some such
complaints could be not only heard, but
upheld.
Mr.
Hogg: With regard to the appeals procedure and its
independence, who will determine the criteria that the independent
appellate body will have to apply?
Mr.
Campbell: The code of practice will set out clearly what
companies will be allowed and not allowed to do. It will deal with
issues such as how much had been charged, whether the signage was
adequate, whether there was information about whom one could complain
to, which company was responsible in the first instance, and how one
could get in touch with the appeals procedure. All that will be dealt
with in the code of practice. Therefore, in a sense, the independent
adjudicators will not only be addressing the code of practice because,
as we will get on to later, legal minds will be brought to bear, so I
am sure that they will be able to bring some reasonableness and common
sense to the
issue.
Mr.
Hogg: I am sorry to press the Minister on this matter, but
it is important. An element of discretion will always be involved, and
I am trying to ascertain whether the independent adjudicator in the
appeals
process-
The
Chairman: Order. I ought to advise the Committee that we
are straying into the area covered by Government amendment 110 and
Government new clause 10. It is not strictly
relevant.
Mr.
Hogg: Given that the issue has been raised, Mr.
Cook, whether it would be convenient to deal with it now is a matter
for you. If not, I will postpone my comments-whatever you think
fit.
Mr.
Campbell: The hon. Member for Winchester also raised the
question of self-regulation. We are not going down that route. He
talked about some of the problems that have arisen with ticket parking.
We are determined not to go down that route because we want to ensure
that our proposals have teeth. He also asked, as his defence of using
local authorities as the best route on this matter, whether the
proposal amounted to a licence to print money. I remind the Committee
that we intend to cap fees and, through that, to change business
behaviour.
Let me
say-I do not think that this has been raised, but it is
pertinent to the whole of our deliberations-that while the
proposal is about changing the behaviour of the businesses currently
involved in vehicle immobilisation, it is also about changing
motorists' behaviour. The reality is that quite a number of
people who are clamped are clamped for valid reasons-they should
not be parking where they have parked. Therefore, we must have a system
that is
proportionate. Finally,
the hon. Gentleman expressed concern that if it was left to the
companies, and not the local authorities, the companies would simply
disappear, and rebrand and relaunch themselves. I have two points to
make about that: first, they would still need a licence if they
attempted to do that; and, secondly, the Security Industry Authority is
very experienced in dealing with such practice, because it has been
attempted in other areas of its activity. It is very good at holding to
account people who try to evade the rules and directors who think they
are being clever by setting up a different company. I am confident that
we are taking the right
route. By
restricting wheel-clamping activities to local authorities, new clause
3 would effectively ban wheel-clamping on private land, because of
course local authorities have no power to control parking on private
land. We
would be taking quite a big step if we went down that route. Some people
have advocated that as a way forward, but we believe that a system of
licensing businesses will deal with the matter more
effectively. Let
me briefly turn to new clause 27(1), which would ban wheel-clamping and
related activities, restriction and removal against a release fee.
Subsection (2) of the new clause would mean that an occupier of the
premises would be committing an offence automatically if anyone else
carried out wheel-clamping and related activities on his premises with
his permission. It would only require the occupier to have given
permission for the activity to take place, or for those activities to
be carried out under a contract for the supply of services to him. That
would not be the right approach. It is appropriate to allow
wheel-clamping on private land in England and Wales to continue. I know
that that is not a universal view, but that is our belief, subject to
the new controls on the wheel-clamping businesses. We want to strike
the right balance between the rights of motorists and the rights of
landowners, who are entitled to control or prevent parking on their
land. For example, businesses in a town centre or near a railway
station will quite reasonably want to keep their parking space free for
customers. We do not believe that we should limit their choice of how
they do that, provided that they comply with the law. We want to ensure
that the sector is regulated properly and that we get rid of
exploitation and excess, which is what our measures will do.
New clause
27(3) would restrict the penalties available to a fine without the
option of imprisonment. As we discussed that matter earlier today in
relation to amendments 90 to 93, I will not go into any more
detail. New
clause 30 would create a statutory requirement to make regulations that
would provide for a code of practice for the business licensing scheme.
The provision is unnecessary because the Private Security Industry Act
2001 already provides for regulations to be made whereby the Secretary
of State can specify the conditions to be attached to any licence that
the Security Industry Authority issues. We have made it very
clear-and I am happy to repeat it again-that we plan to
make regulations that will be the basis for a code of practice. We
expect that they will cover warning signs, release fees and a range of
other matters. We will put it in secondary legislation because, having
listened to a fairly lengthy debate both inside and outside the House,
we want to decide on the contents, and consult publicly on the details.
I hope that I have explained sufficiently why new clauses 3, 27 and 30
are not necessary, and I hope that clause 39 will stand part of the
Bill. Shona
McIsaac (Cleethorpes) (Lab): Thank you for calling me to
speak in this debate, Mr. Cook. I shall try to be brief. I
tried to catch your eye earlier, but the Under-Secretary stood up and
blocked
me. 4.15
pm
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