Ann says

Low conviction rates for rape

I recently submitted a Freedom of Information request to the Crown Prosecution Service asking for information on conviction rates in rape cases. The response revealed that men aged 18-24 are less likely to be found guilty of rape by juries than older men in England and Wales. The conviction rate last year in rape only trials involving 18–24 year-old men was 32% – the lowest of any age group. The number of successful prose-cutions against men aged 25-59 was much higher – at 46 %. 58% of unsuccessful prosecutions were a result of jury acquittals. These low conviction rates will, sadly, only deter young women from reporting rape in the first place. Figures from the latest Crime Survey of England and Wales tells us that only 1 in 6 rape victims report their assault to the police. 40% of those who had not told the police said that their reason was they did not think the police could help. Young women are losing confidence in the justice system. It is essential that we restore it. I think we need a fundamental review of the justice system including the impact of rape myths on the decisions of juries. I hope to be able to win the ballot for a backbench debate on rape convictions in Parliament in the near future.

Labour MP for Stockport

Ann Coffey

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A People’s Vote

About 700,000 people from all over the UK, including Stockport, travelled to London last Saturday to support a People’s Vote on the final Brexit deal with an option to remain. I opposed the decision to trigger Article 50 in 2017 before it was clear under what terms we would be leaving the EU. It is now evident that the deal Theresa May will negotiate will not be beneficial to the United Kingdom. We cannot allow the UK to leave the EU with a bad deal, or even worse no deal because it would be catastrophic to our economy. I believe that we must now hold a second referendum on the final deal, with the option to remain. Public opinion has shifted, we must allow people to have the final say. Stockport for Europe interviewed me at the rally; you can watch it on twitter here.

Brexit Update With 77 other parliamentarians from all parties, I have signed a letter to the Director of Intelligence at the National Crime Agency and the commander of Specialist Crime at the Metropolitan Police seeking reassurance that they are pursuing criminal investigations into Vote Leave. You can read the full contents of the letter here.

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Legion D’Honneur recognition Earlier this year I was contacted by the family of Francis Scott, a Stockport resident who was awarded the Legion D’Honneur, France’s highest military award. Francis was awarded this for his service in the Royal Navy, clearing mines to prepare for D-Day in World War Two. Sadly his medal did not arrive before he passed away at the age of 92. When the medal did not turn up, his family asked for my help in finding it. I contacted the Ministry of Defence, who in turn raised it with the French Embassy, and the unusual decision was taken to reissue the award after the original was lost in the post. I’m delighted that Francis’ service has been recognised

Better Recycling at Green and Slater Residents in the Green and Slater sheltered housing scheme in Heaton Moor contacted me because they had no nearby recycling bins to use. The residents were keen to recycle more, so I contacted Stockport Council and we were able to arrange for four new recycling bins to be provided. Pictured with the Chair of the Housing scheme and one of the local residents who were delighted with their new bins.

Interview for Pure Innovations Radio Pure Innovations invited me to visit their media and art facility in Heaton Norris in September. I met with their painting group and stop-motion animation club, and was presented with a set of handmade coasters and a picture depicting Stockport Indoor Market that is now displayed in my office. I was invited for an interview (listen here) with the One Voice team, who record and broadcast a weekly radio show on Your FM. They were keen to ask about life as an MP, my involvement in politics and the importance of charities in our society. They also raised concerns about the impact of the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) system on local families.

Visit to the Olive Branch Café The Olive Branch is a café and community space in Edgeley that supports people who are homeless, vulnerable or at risk of social isolation. They offer many different services including a foodbank in partnership with Chelwood, an advice drop-in facility and access to computers. Volunteers and customers were hosting an exhibition put together by their afternoon craft group.

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Visit to Brinnington Groups I've been visiting St Luke's Parish Centre in Brinnington for many years now, and it was lovely to go again a few weeks ago. Home of the Movieland Community Cinema, St Luke's also holds coffee mornings and table top sales every Wednesday and Thursday morning. You can visit between 10am and 11:15am to meet some of the volunteers and pick up some bargains. I also visited the Sewing Bees group at First House, who meet every Wednesday from 10am to12 noon to chat and sew.

National Libraries Week Hundreds of residents joined in activities at libraries across Stockport during National Libraries Week earlier in October. I visited Edgeley Library as part of the celebrations, where staff joined with the Ebony & Ivory Community Organisation (EAICO) to host a sensory story time for children. This involved reading the book Handa’s Surprise while the children were able to feel and taste the different fruits mentioned in the story. It was also good to talk to Aba Graham, Creative Co-ordinator at EAICO, who was keen to discuss Black History Month and some of the activities happening throughout the rest of the year.

St Paul’s Primary School During the year I like to visit as many schools as possible to hear from the children about their experiences and listen to the concerns of teachers. This month I met with children at St Paul’s Primary School in Brinnington. The school council talked to me about their role as school councillors and about the suggestions they had made for the redesign of Brinnington Park. They also had ideas for new laws parliament could pass to improve their environment. It is always a pleasure to listen to children. They are always full of good ideas and so enthusiastic. We do need to spend more on schools so that every child has the opportunity to achieve. Children are our future. We should be supporting our children and the great schools in Stockport.

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Young Carers In Stockport, there are over 3,000 young carers, with the average age of 10. Signpost Carers in Stockport do fantastic work supporting young carers across nine schools in Stockport. It is crucial that young carers are provided with support in their childhood to ensure that their family’s situation doesn't impact on their education or opportunities. I wrote to the Minister for Children and Families about young carers in Stockport and asked that support for young carers in schools should be part of Ofsted’s inspection. You can read my initial letter and his response here. The minister said he understood that support for young carers was currently in the Ofsted inspectors handbook. But I subsequently visited Ofsted and it would appear that the Minister has got this wrong. Ofsted are due to conduct a review of their inspection framework, and I have written to the Minister and Ofsted to ask that support for young carers be included in this new framework.

Children’s homes My debate in parliament on children who go missing from care homes is available here. Afterwards I met the Children’s Minister to express my concerns about the impact on children of being placed far away from their home area. He assured me that this would be looked at in the new review into residential care.

I recently tabled a written question to the Ministry of Justice asking for information about the average waiting times in trials for sexual offences against children for each of the 74 Crown Courts in England and Wales. The Ministry’s response revealed that Manchester’s Minshull Street Crown Court is one of the slowest Crown Courts for processing child sexual offences. In 2017, it was ranked 7th out of 74 Crown Courts with an average waiting time of 186 days (6 months) from when the case was sent to court to the main court hearing. I am very disappointed that cases involving traumatised child victims are still taking up to six months from when they are first sent to Minshull Street Crown Court to the main hearing.

It is unacceptable as every day waiting can be torture for the victim and their families.

In addition, many children in Greater Manchester will have already been waiting for many months from when they first reported the crime. To have to wait another six months after their case is actually received by the Crown Court is a terrible extra burden for them. We need urgent action to ensure these cases are completed as quickly as possible. Read more in the Manchester Evening New here.

Minshull Street Crown Court one of the worst for delays in child

sexual offences

Offensive Weapons Bill Amendment

I have co-sponsored an amendment, tabled by David Hanson MP, to the Offensive Weapons Bill. The amendment would provide much needed legal protection for shop workers. Retail workers are on the frontline in policing and enforcing the ban on the sale of corrosive substances and knives to under-18s. They are the ones who have to say no, it is only right that they should have much needed legal protection. By introducing penalties for the those attempting to buy goods they are not entitled to, the law would provide legal protection for shop workers who we ask to act as police officers. The Bill sets out criminal penalties for shop workers and delivery drivers who complete sales but, there is no penalty for the person attempting to illegally buy age-restricted products. The amendment has support across the Commons as well as the Co-Op Group, the British Retail Consortium, the Union of Shop, Distribution and Allied Workers and the Association of Convenience Stores. The Bill is currently at the report stage of the commons. You can track the progress of the Bill through Parliament here.

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County Lines Update It is important that police forces continue to use the Modern Slavery Act to get convictions against drug dealers who exploit children for their own profit. Long sentences will deter others. Earlier this month, in Birmingham a member of a drug gang was sentenced to 14 years in prison for trafficking children to sell and supply Class A drugs. An offence under the Modern Slavery Act 2015. I was recently interviewed by the BBC’s Inside Out North West documentary on County Lines. I stressed how important it was that we view children who are exploited by criminal gangs as victims. You can read more about my interview and information on where to watch the full episode here. The St Giles Trust charity invited me to participate in a roundtable discussion on their recent pilot project. By using one-to-one caseworkers they supported children involved in County Lines to escape from criminal gangs. Their work was very impressive. All the children were not in mainstream education. At the end of the project all them were back in school with one boy achieving 5 GCSEs.

All Party Parliamentary Group for Runaway and Missing Children and Adults

Just before the summer recess the All Party Parliamentary Group, with the charity Missing People, published the report of our inquiry into safeguarding missing adults who have mental health issues. You can read the full report here. We found that hundreds of lives were being put at risk each year because adults with mental health problems are ’found and forgotten’ after going missing. In Greater Manchester 35 missing people were found dead in the region in the first six months of 2018, 22 of them had significant mental health issues. Of the 35, 13 had committed suicide. These figures highlight how vital it is to have more mental health provision to support people when they return from going missing.

Going missing is a red flag moment, it is a warning sign of crisis in someone’s life that should trigger support. Greater Manchester Police have announced a new ‘triage system” where mental health specialists work with the police to deal with call outs to people in crisis. You can hear Chief Constable Ian Hopkins discuss the initiative here. I have asked to meet the Minister for Mental Health, Inequalities and Suicide prevention to discuss how the APPG’s findings can be implemented.

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Anti-Slavery Day International Anti-slavery Day was held on October 18. I have been a longstanding campaigner against modern day slavery, particularly the trafficking of children who are exploited to sell drugs. To mark the day, the charity Every Child Protected Against Trafficking (ECPAT) delivered a petition, signed by over 120,000 people, to Downing Street asking for specialist support for child victims of trafficking. ECAPT does invaluable work on behalf of children and I am very happy to support them.

Northern Rail Inquiry

The rail chaos that affected many of you in May must never be allowed to happen again. That was my central message when I met the Office of Road and Rail, an independent regulator, recently to discuss the findings from their interim report into the May meltdown. The mass cancellation of trains and unsatisfactory bunching of services affecting rail travellers using Heaton Chapel station happened because the rail industry is very fragmented and there is no clear accountability for decision making and everyone blames each other. The regulator is now in the process of making recommendations to make the rail system fit for purpose and more accountable. There is no doubt that Network Rail must bear the responsibility for the chaos arising from the timetabling changes as it is their job to co-ordinate the frequency of services across the network. However, Northern must also take responsibility for not managing the timetable changes better and for not anticipating the extent of the disruption that would be caused, especially with a shortage of drivers. It is interesting that the usage of rail is decreasing and only 8 per cent of people now travel by train. This may be because of changes in the way people work, including more people working from home. However, if it continues to decrease this will impact on the revenue from rail travel and will raise the difficult questions of subsidies.

Recent Speaking Engagements In my role as an MP, I am regularly invited to conferences and speaking events to share my work and experiences. The Public Policy Exchange invited me to speak at their Conference on Young Runaways and Missing Children where I presented the APPG’s work on how to prevent children going missing from care. I also recently attended Inside Government’s Tackling Sexual Exploitation Conference which focused on my two reports, commissioned by the then Police and Crime Commissioner, on child sexual exploitation in Greater Manchester— Real Voices, published in 2014, and the follow up report Real Voices: Are they being heard?, published 2017. As a former social worker and student at Manchester University it was great to go back recently and share the findings of the APPGs work on the placement of children in care homes with students just starting out on their social work training.

Chief Constable’s interview on BBC Radio Manchester

BBC Radio Manchester conducted a live phone-in with Chief Constable Ian Hopkins from Greater Manchester Police earlier this month; listen here. The BBC contacted Greater Manchester MPs asking for our thoughts on the policing in local areas . Like all of the Greater Manchester MPs, I expressed concerns about the impact of cuts on neighbourhood policing. One issue I did raise was the need for greater communication between the police and the local community especially when the police have to change their priorities because of the impacts of cuts and funding. GMP’s new LiveChat, which is available through their website, running from 8 am to midnight will help better communication. The chat allows local people to report crimes, give police information about their local area, receive an update on previously reported crimes and ask an advisor anything police related. Great news!

Campaign emails

Many of you have written to me over the past few weeks as part of wider national campaigns on a variety of subjects including Brexit, the NHS, universal credit, education funding, pubs, disabled changing facilities, bees and puppy farms. To answer the concerns raised in the hundreds of emails I receive on campaigns I will, in future, regularly update the ‘Responses to Campaigns’ category of my website. Some of you expressed concern about funding for the NHS and how the Chancellor will deliver the extra £20 billion pounds promised for the health service. He will be presenting his budget to the House of Commons on Monday October 29 which will outline his tax and spending plans. I hope that part of any investment in the NHS will recognise the need to improve health and social care support in the community. Without that people will continue to stay in hospital, not because they need medical care but because there is not the support they need at home. Some of you also expressed concerns about inadequate education funding. The national formula for allocating grant does not ensure a basic funding level for every pupil irrespective of where they live. I have campaigned to change this supporting the F40 group of local authorities who are not fairly funded. There have been some changes in the formula and some schools have been given extra cash at the expense of other schools. But the problem cannot be solved unless there is extra money across the board for education. There are also worries about Stockport families losing out when they are transferred from their current benefits to Universal Credit in November. This would affect families on low incomes. I am especially concerned about families with more than two children losing out. We need strong tax revenues to finance increased public spending but there is a limit to how much can be financed from increases in personal taxation. We need successful businesses to provide employment, tax revenue and return on investments by pension funds. Big internet companies like Amazon must also pay their fair share. The impact of the uncertainty and the consequences of Brexit on the economy are worrying. Without a strong economy public services will continue to suffer.

Phone: 0161 483 2600

Web: www.anncoffeymp.com

E-mail: ann.coffey.mp@parliament.uk

Twitter: @anncoffey_mp

You can also find me on Facebook

I am always pleased to hear from you on the issues that concern you

Ann Coffey MP

Address: 207A Bramhall Lane

Stockport

SK2 6JA

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