Policing and Crime Bill

My Lords, this is a very useful issue to have talked about. I assure noble Lords that I understand the intentions behind the amendment. We share concerns about the use of glasses in violent incidents. The noble Baroness mentioned Professor Jon Shepherd, who has worked very closely with the Home Office over the past few years. We are keen to see something like the Cardiff model develop. I had to ask what a polycarbonate vessel was. As has been said, when you pick up some plastic vessels the whole pint squishes everywhere, but I understand that polycarbonate vessels are more substantial. We would like a system whereby these are used on a voluntary basis. Most places are responsible. We would not want to remove all glasses because of an irresponsible minority. However, I take the points made by noble Lords. It is interesting that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Mackay, referred to Glasgow. The only injury that I have sustained to my face resulted from having been hit by a brick in a fight in a pub in Glasgow. What a person was doing carrying a brick around is another question, the answer to which has eluded me. However, it certainly was not a piece of glass, so different weapons can be used. One has to think of that. The noble Lord, Lord Monson, asked about statistics. It is interesting to note that the British Crime Survey of 2007-08 estimated that there had been 87,000 violent incidents involving glass. That is a considerable number, but what it does not tell us—I tried to drill down into this—is how severe these incidents were. Some of them are likely to be less serious, such as threatening someone with a glass, bottle or whatever, but others will involve more serious injuries, and injuries inflicted by glass can be pretty awful. But certainly research suggests that the cost of glass-related violence is probably about £100 million a year, so this is not an insubstantial issue. In the public consultation on the detail of the code of practice, we proposed a condition which could be locally applied by licensing authorities to prevent premises serving alcohol in glass containers at certain times. This is done by some pubs that serve drinks outside and we will all have been to such pubs, so this happens to an extent already. Of course, in light of our earlier debate, if we decide on Report to proceed with amendments which would make local councillors interested parties within the terms of the Licensing Act, which I think that we will do, there may no longer be a need for the locally applied portion of the code. But should this condition be in the final code, which of course also depends on the results of the consultation, licensing authorities could require the use of safer alternatives to glassware where appropriate. However, at this stage, imposing on authorities a statutory requirement to consider it places undue weight on one condition when in fact they should consider lots of options available to them and impose only those conditions appropriate. I share the consensus within the House that we need to look at this in more detail and consider substitutes. I will talk to my team about where we can go in the future on this. However, I do not believe that at the moment we should include this measure in the Bill.