Sarah Pochin MP: speeches

Speeches

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  I will.

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  No, I am going to continue; I have given way once. Anyone who has come to this country illegally will never be entitled to claim asylum here again.

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  Now he is twisting things.

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  I will make a bit of progress. The immediate action needs to be that all these hotels are closed to illegal migrants, and that they are moved out of the community into holding centres to be processed and sent home. The conditions in which they are held in these processing centres will be humane but not luxurious. There will be no free tickets to theme parks and no free trips out into the community. I had an asylum hotel—the Daresbury hotel—in my constituency. My campaign in the recent by-election saw the hotel eventually shut down, but the implications of shutting the hotels are that these illegal migrants are dispersed in houses of multiple occupancy in our communities. In Runcorn, we have approximately 900 illegal migrants in 80 HMOs that we know about. Once in those HMOs, they are lost to the authorities, yet still live free at the taxpayers’ expense.

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  No, I am nearly finished. We need to prioritise our own citizens and stop this betrayal of our culture and our country. To finish, I would like to make this observation. The Home Office has just put out a contract to tender for asylum support and accommodation services to run from 2029 to 2036, so clearly, the Government have no plans to stop these hotels and are, in fact, facilitating them. The Minister can shake his head, but it is there online.

• 20 Oct 2025 · Asylum Seekers: Support and Accommodation · Hansard source

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  I accept that we have to start doing something radical that sends a message, will stop people coming to this country, and will stop the pull factors that send people to our shores.

• 15 Oct 2025 · Knife Crime · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms McVey. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) for securing this important debate. I will speak about some of my experiences as a magistrate for 20 years in Cheshire. I am sure many think of Cheshire as a sleepy county, but statistics show that knife crime increased there by 7% year on year from March 2024 to March 2025, which may surprise some. I will take time to look into that with my chief constable. Over my 20 years in court, I heard so many reasons—in fact, excuses—for why defendants might have been carrying knives at the time of the incident or when the police caught up with them. Those ranged from “I forgot it was in my pocket” to “I needed it for work”—that was always a standard one, no matter what they actually did for work. Today, there is a mandatory six-month custodial sentence for anyone caught carrying a knife in the community, but the fact is that magistrates often do not enforce it after listening to and accepting the mitigating factors put forward by the solicitor on behalf of the defendant. Sometimes, a suspended sentence might be given, but the point is that this is soft justice, and I have seen it time and again. The courts must get tougher on doing what they say they will do—doing what we ask them to do—and enforce that custodial sentence, because only by enforcing the custodial sentence will the message start to get through. I would say that the mandatory six-month sentence is not currently a deterrent, because people are not afraid of going to court. That is an issue for people like us who set policy.

• 15 Oct 2025 · Knife Crime · Hansard source

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  My point is that if stop and search is working, we will eventually get to a point where knives are found less often. That is the measure of success. We as politicians need to give our courts and our police the power to have a zero-tolerance approach to stop and search. The police need to have the confidence to carry out stop and search without fear of criticism. They need to be given funding to carry out thorough intelligence work on drug gangs, and they are doing an incredible job on the county lines operations that are now overtaking our society. However, they need to be given more funding for that work. The courts also need to be given the funding and resource to enact swift justice. Clearly, we also need education in schools and the community initiatives we have talked about. All of this is important, all of this is a package, but it starts at the top. It starts with us.

• 15 Oct 2025 · Knife Crime · Hansard source

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  Clearly, at the moment, the threat of a custodial sentence is not the deterrent that it has to be, which is an important point. The Sentencing Bill, which will have its next stage on Tuesday, will take away the power of magistrates courts to hand down custodial sentences of less than 12 months. That is a big issue, but I will talk about it on Tuesday. Finally, it is important for all of us, as politicians, to remember that David Amess was brutally stabbed and killed four years ago today. What we have talked about this morning does not touch on the extremists and the nutcases who are out there in society, and from whom we are all under threat. I acknowledge that today is the four-year anniversary, and I urge everyone to take the utmost care when we are out in our communities.

• 15 Oct 2025 · Knife Crime · Hansard source

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  I will make a little progress, if that is all right. My only observation about stop and search is that it has an effect, and I believe very strongly that stop and search needs to be brought back with absolutely zero tolerance. We need to support the police in putting aside any worry about being accused of being racist or of targeting particular groups in particular communities, because these policies work in taking knives off the street.

• 15 Oct 2025 · Knife Crime · Hansard source

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  Let me make a little progress, sorry. The other point about stop and search is that the police, and indeed politicians, should not congratulate themselves on how many knives are found through stop and search; we and the police should congratulate ourselves on how many knives are not found when stop and search is used to its maximum power, because that is the measure of success. I now come on to the point about why so many young men carry knives, and it is generally young men who carry knives. Again, over the years of my experience, I have seen the fear that young men often have—sadly, sometimes when they are going to school. People have said to me that they felt threatened at school, so they took knives into school. Of course, this also affects older men out in the community. There is a difference between these two groups, and it is a problem for magistrates. There is a difference between a young man, a youth, saying that they were frightened to go into school without a knife, and an older man going to a pub with a knife in his pocket. This is an interesting issue for magistrates, because magistrates need to have some insight into people’s lives. We have heard talk this morning about role models and that type of thing. It is a huge problem that we never see the parents when these young men are in court. The other thing is the problem of drug gangs and county lines, which we deal with all the time as magistrates. That culture on our streets is feeding this knife crime, and it is not just in cities any more. It is all over the counties, with young people—and they are often very young—carrying knives because they are drug runners.

• 14 Oct 2025 · Northern Ireland Troubles · Hansard source

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  Does the Secretary of State agree that this Government’s continued hounding of our brave Northern Ireland veterans—many of whom should be enjoying well-earned retirement after their loyal service to the British Government, not living in fear of prosecution for simply following orders—is nothing short of shameful?

• 16 Sept 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member—I was going to call him an hon. Friend, but I am not sure that is appropriate—and, yes, I could do that, but I think all Members know Reform’s policies on building prisons. [Hon. Members: “No, we do not.”] Let me finish my speech. The Bill proposes increased powers for the Probation Service such that it could shorten the length of a community order. It is entirely inappropriate for the Probation Service to be able to alter the sentence given by a magistrate or a judge. All this is open to abuse, and it means that the already stretched Probation Service can release convicted criminals from its books to free up capacity, rather than because rehabilitation or punishment has been successfully completed. The Bill is purposely vague and open to interpretation. It is not tough enough, and it does not address the problems our judicial system is facing. For that reason, I will not be supporting it.

• 16 Sept 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I was a magistrate for 20 years, so I hope that I speak with some authority and have something to contribute on Second Reading. This Bill is based on recommendations in the recent Gauke review, which falls woefully short of addressing the many concerns that the British people have about the current judicial system. Worse still, it does nothing to reverse the current trend for woke justice, and enables the further politicisation of our once great judicial system. The left will describe the Bill as progressive, but in fact it is unrealistic, requires vast amounts of investment and funding for the Probation Service, and will take years to implement, and in the meantime it puts the public at risk. The Bill makes whole life orders mandatory for certain types of murder, but does not specify which types of murder. It allows for “special sentences for offenders of particular concern” to be imposed for rape and certain other serious sexual offences, without giving any explanation of what that actually means. The British people want to know that life means life—that murderers, terrorists, rapists, hate preachers and paedophiles will be sent to prison and never allowed out to threaten the safety of the British people again, that they will face harsh conditions in prison, and that prison is punishment, not a soft option. The Bill does nothing to defend our democracy and end the era of two-tier justice in this country, where free speech is a crime punishable by a more severe sentence than sexual assaults or paedophilia. It enables the continued facilitation of the special treatment of defendants according to their racial, cultural or religious identity.

• 16 Sept 2025 · Sentencing Bill · Hansard source

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  I will make some progress, please. It allows for the even earlier release of dangerous criminals into the community on licence, reducing the time served from 50% of a sentence to a mere third. The implications for public safety in general, and for the safety of women from repeat offender domestic violence perpetrators in particular, are concerning. Prisoners recalled to prison for breaking licence conditions would receive a reduced sentence of, I believe, 56 days—it was 28 in the Gauke review—as opposed to serving the full term of their sentences. That would apply to criminals convicted of serious offences, which is a betrayal of justice for victims and for brave women who have gone through the harrowing experience of a trial. What of the Bill’s intention to eradicate custodial sentences of less than 12 months? That in effect removes the ability of the magistrates court to give out a custodial sentence, leaving only community orders available as a means of rehabilitation and punishment. By the time a streetwise defendant has pleaded mental health problems and declared they are on universal credit, there are very few options available to the sentencing bench, and without custody there are even fewer. These elements of the Bill are designed to free up prison spaces as opposed to administering the justice that the British people want convicted criminals to face in return for the crimes committed. There are no concrete plans to increase prison capacity, and there is no policy on deportation. This Bill is all about leniency, not about the reality of the dangerous places that prisons currently are.

• 16 Sept 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Does the new Secretary of State for Justice recognise sharia law and sharia courts in the United Kingdom—yes or no?

• 8 Sept 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Will the Secretary of State guarantee—yes or no—that no British serviceman or veteran will face prosecution for actions taken in Northern Ireland while serving their country?

• 21 Jul 2025 · Asylum Hotels: Migrant Criminal Activity · Hansard source

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  While migrant hotels cost the British taxpayer billions, migrants are now being moved into houses in multiple occupation, taking houses from local people and causing misery for neighbours. Can the right hon. Lady tell the House how many migrants have been moved into HMOs? What is the cost to the British taxpayer?

• 14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source

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  Not yet. The Government reward them by ruining their lives when they deserve nothing but our respect, support and gratitude. These prosecutions should not be allowed to happen. Why would we not defend those who defended us—those who put their lives on the line for us? I will defend them, and my party will stand up for them. I will not stand by and remain silent. I will speak for them. I am humbled by what they did for us, and I know that the British people feel the same.

• 14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source

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  Not yet. Those courageous men should be enjoying their hard-earned retirement, not facing prosecution for defending the British people from IRA terrorists. Those same British people value these soldiers, and are outraged at the unfair and unjust action of this Government. Why would a British Government of any political leaning include this commitment in their manifesto? Those brave soldiers were doing nothing more than carrying out orders from the Government of the day, as they are trained to do, without fear or question. These soldiers are fiercely loyal to their regiment, their Government and their monarch. Many were awarded bravery medals signed off by our late monarch Queen Elizabeth II, yet this Government are looking to renege on that. These soldiers faced extreme danger on our behalf. They were fearless on our behalf. They would have sacrificed their lives for us, and hundreds did. Many of the so-called IRA victims killed were murderers and terrorists. How on earth can anyone stand up to defend those people over our special forces? Yet, this Government reward our bravest service personnel by bringing these prosecutions, by threatening legal action, by putting them through the stress of a trial—

• 14 Jul 2025 · Northern Ireland Veterans: Prosecution · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Lewell, an honour to speak on this important and emotive issue, and an honour to speak to this petition, which means so much to me and my constituents. The treatment of our brave Northern Ireland veterans by this Government, and by previous Governments, is a national disgrace. I speak from the heart, as someone whose father served in Northern Ireland at the height of the troubles. He was prepared to die to protect every single one of us in this Chamber, either directly or indirectly. We should not be having this debate about honour and patriotism being rewarded with betrayal by our Government. The IRA wants to rewrite history. It is shameful that the British Government are allowing hundreds of our special forces veterans to be investigated over incidents that occurred decades ago to appease the Irish Government.

• 10 Jul 2025 · UK-EU Trading Relationship · Hansard source

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  In 1973, the UK joined the European Economic Community, which later became the European Union. Given this week’s visit by the French President and this Government’s desire for closer co-operation with the EU, will the Minister confirm that no new or existing trade deal will lead to this country rejoining the EU through the back door?

• 10 Jul 2025 · UK-EU Trading Relationship · Hansard source

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  1. What assessment his Department has made of the effectiveness of the new trading relationship with the EU.

• 8 Jul 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  The Secretary of State will be aware of the deeply troubling revelations over the weekend of the so-called Halal bride website. Does she agree that such practices have absolutely no place in Britain?