Debate contribution: Crime and Policing Bill: Legislative Consent Motion

Debate contribution by Mrs Naomi Long on 16 March 2026.

MLA

Mrs Naomi Long

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

16 March 2026

Type

Debate contribution (made as a minister)

Business

Executive Committee Business

Heading

Crime and Policing Bill: Legislative Consent Motion

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5448998

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I beg to move

Thank you, Madam Principal Deputy Speaker. The Justice Committee has been very patient and very busy today, so I do not intend to take quite as long on this legislation as I did on the previous legislation. As Members will know, the Crime and Policing Bill was introduced at Westminster on 25 February 2025. The provisions in that Bill extend to Northern Ireland to deal with tackling serious crime, economic crime, sexual-related crime and increased public safety across Northern Ireland. Those provisions are primarily in the justice sphere and create new offences and more effectively deal with serious and organised crime and the protection of victims. Members will be familiar with the contents of the Bill and will recall that I brought forward two earlier legislative consent motions (LCM), which received the agreement of the Assembly on 23 June 2025 and 2 February 2026. The contents of this LCM relate to amendments tabled at Lords Report Stage. As Members will be aware, the amendments were previously tabled at Lords Committee Stage but were withdrawn due to the Opposition's concern that the use of digital ID would become mandatory. However, the UK Government have confirmed that it is not a blanket requirement mandating the use of digital ID to purchase or receive knives or crossbows. It is simply making provision for alternative forms of ID, digital or otherwise, to be used. The Department has engaged with the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission in relation to the amendments. The commission has advised that the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) analysis provided by the UK Government appears to be broadly sound and that the provisions in the Bill, which will extend to Northern Ireland, are compliant with article 2(1) of the Windsor framework. There are five provisions for which I am now seeking the consent of the Assembly to extend to Northern Ireland. Those measures are set out in clauses 31 to 35 and would put in place robust age verification requirements for the remote sale and delivery of knives and crossbows by amending the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 and the Crossbows (Northern Ireland) Order 1988. The provisions in the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 have not yet been commenced for Northern Ireland. However, I consider it important to amend them through the Crime and Policing Bill so that they are robust and ready for implementation. My Department plans to progress an extensive programme of work in the next mandate to fully commence all the provisions. Given the plans for the programme of work and the interconnected nature of the provisions, I believe that the best approach is for the amendments to the primary legislation related to age verification for the sale of knives and crossbows to be commenced as part of a single package of related measures in the next Assembly mandate. As part of that planned programme of work, the Department also intends to consult on whether further primary legislation relating to knives should be introduced in the next mandate; for example, a new power for police to seize, retain and destroy illegally held bladed articles held in private where the police are lawfully on private property, provisions to increase the maximum penalty for offences relating to offensive weapons and to create a new offence of possession of a weapon with intent to use unlawful violence, and the offence of threatening with an offensive weapon or knife. That approach would enable the provisions to be commenced as part of a composite package that the Assembly could consider as a whole, rather than adopting a piecemeal approach to commence what is a complex legislative reform piece. Separately, we plan to introduce secondary legislation in the next financial year to outlaw private ownership of offensive weapons, such as flick knives, zombie knives, machetes and ninja-style swords. That will bring Northern Ireland into line with other UK jurisdictions. An associated surrender and compensation scheme for such weapons will also launch in the next financial year. Turning to the content of the LCM, the amended provisions would replace simple age checks with stricter two-step buyer verification checks at point of sale and point of delivery. Those provisions were the result of Commander Steve Clayman's independent end-to-end review of online knife sales, which was commissioned by the Home Secretary following the Southport attack in the summer of 2024. The overall aim of the provisions is to prevent knives and crossbows from getting into the hands of under-18s by linking the verified buyer at checkout with the person who receives the parcel. Turning to each clause in turn, a new clause would be added to clause 31 of the Bill for Northern Ireland, mirroring that of clause 31 for England and Wales, which relates to remote sales of knives. It is already an offence under article 54(1) of the Criminal Justice (Northern Ireland) Order 1996 to sell a knife and certain articles with a blade or point to persons under the age of 18. Article 54(4) of the 1996 Order provides a defence to that offence, where the person charged can prove that they took all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence to avoid committing the offence. The new article 54A, which will be added to the 1996 Order once section 37 of the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 is commenced, sets out the conditions that must apply to prove the defence in the case of remote sales. Condition A requires the seller to operate an age verification system that is likely to prevent a person aged under 18 from buying a knife. That legislation and associated guidance, however, does not stipulate what such age verification should look like, meaning that there are no defined standards for sellers to meet. Condition B requires the seller to ensure that, when the article is dispatched, the package is clearly marked to indicate that it contains a bladed article and that it is also clearly marked that the package should not be delivered into the hands of a person under 18. Condition C requires the seller to take all reasonable precautions and exercise all due diligence to ensure that, when the package is delivered, it is handed over to a person aged 18 or over. That applies whether the seller delivers the package themselves or through a third party. Condition D requires that the seller must not arrange the package to be delivered or deliver the package to a locker. The new clause in the Crime and Policing Bill removes and replaces condition A to strengthen age verification requirements. Conditions B to D remain the same. Under the replacement condition A, the seller must obtain from the buyer a copy of an identity document issued to the buyer in physical form and a photograph of the buyer. The seller must be satisfied, on the basis of those items, that the buyer is over 18. On the basis of the ID and photograph, a reasonable person would need to have been satisfied that the buyer was aged 18 or over. The new clause also allows the Department of Justice to prescribe, by order, subject to draft affirmative procedure, that an alternative process for age verification can be used. That is to ensure that legislation keeps pace with future potential developments around ID. Clause 32 deals with the delivery of knives and, subject to the agreement of the Assembly, will extend to Northern Ireland. Clause 32 amends sections 38 to 42 of the Offensive Weapons Act 2019, which provides for several offences and defences relating to the delivery of knives bought remotely, which have not yet been commenced in Northern Ireland. It is considered that those provisions need to be strengthened, as there have been instances where knives were delivered to lockers and residential premises without proper checks. Clause 32 is complex and contains multiple provisions, which I will now summarise. I will begin with the delivery of bladed products to residential premises or lockers by UK sellers. Once the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 is commenced in Northern Ireland, a UK-based seller will commit an offence under section 38(2) of the Act if, for the purposes of supplying the bladed product to the buyer, they deliver the bladed product or arrange for its delivery to residential premises. In addition, the UK-based seller will commit an offence under section 38(3) of the 2019 Act if, for the purposes of supplying the bladed product to the buyer, they deliver the product or arrange for its delivery to a locker. Defences for both offences are provided for in section 40 of the Act, but those are vague and do not provide sellers with clarity on what is actually required of them. Clause 32 does not amend the offences, but it provides for replacement defences to place a more stringent requirement on sellers. For example, a seller charged under section 38(2) of the 2019 Act with an offence of delivering a bladed product to residential premises will need to show that certain delivery conditions have been met if they are to rely on the defence. Those delivery conditions are that the person finally delivering the bladed product was shown by the person into whose hands it was finally delivered an identity document issued to them in a physical form, or took such steps to verify their age and identity as may be prescribed in regulations made by the Department of Justice, and that, on the basis of that document or those steps, a reasonable person would have been satisfied that the person was over 18 and that, if the buyer was an individual, that that person was the buyer. I will now turn to the delivery of bladed products to persons under 18. Where a sale is carried out remotely by a UK-based seller, or where a corporate body, such as a delivery company, has entered into arrangements with that seller to deliver the bladed products, section 39(6) of the 2019 Act, which, as I said, has not yet been commenced in Northern Ireland, currently provides for an offence for a delivery company to deliver them to someone under 18. However, it is recognised that there are situations in which the delivery company engaged by the seller to deliver the product may subcontract that delivery to other companies. We believe that it is essential that all companies in the chain are liable for prosecution if, when the bladed product is finally delivered to residential premises, it is not delivered into the hands of a person aged 18 or over and if the buyer is an individual as opposed to a company. As I have mentioned, section 40 of the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 contained a range of defences to the offences provided for in section 39. Clause 32 amends section 40 of the 2019 Act to replace those defences with ones with more stringent requirements. For example, it will be a defence for a main contractor or subcontractor charged with an offence to show that the delivery conditions that I outlined were met. In addition, clause 32 inserts a range of new offences into the Offensive Weapons Act 2019, relating to the delivery of bladed products to collection points. These offences capture sellers and all contractors in the delivery chain, making them responsible for marking packages containing bladed products that are to be delivered to collection points as needing age ID verification. Clause 32 also provides for a new offence for a collection point operator, or someone acting on their behalf, to hand over a bladed product to a person who is not an eligible person following a remote sale unless the specified collection conditions are met. The collection conditions will be that the person who collected the bladed product showed the individual giving them the bladed product an identity document, issued to them in physical form, and that, on the basis of that document, a reasonable person would have been satisfied that that person was over 18 and that, if the buyer was an individual, they were the buyer. Section 42 of the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 makes provision in relation to a new offence for delivery companies related to the delivery of bladed articles following remote sales by overseas sellers. Clause 32 amends section 42 to capture all companies in the delivery chain and add more stringent requirements for defences to apply. I move on to crossbows. A new section on remote sale and letting of crossbows will be inserted for Northern Ireland, replicating section 33 for England and Wales. This will put in place age verification requirements that sellers need to follow when selling or letting crossbows remotely to reduce the chances of persons under 18 being able to buy or let a crossbow. As with knives, the seller will be required to obtain from the buyer a copy of an identity document such as a passport or driving licence, issued to the buyer in a physical form, and a photograph of the buyer. On this basis of the things obtained, a reasonable person would need to be satisfied that that buyer was over 18. The new section also allows the Department of Justice to prescribe by regulations an alternative process for age verification, such as digital ID. Sellers will need to ensure that, when the package is being dispatched, it is clearly marked to indicate that it contains a crossbow or part of a crossbow and that, when finally delivered, it should only be delivered into the hands of the buyer. Did they take all reasonable precautions and exercise all due diligence to ensure that, when finally delivered, it was given into the hands of the buyer and that the package would not be able to be delivered to a locker? A new section for Northern Ireland on delivery of crossbows will be inserted, which will replicate section 34 for England and Wales. This creates a range of offences and defences relating to the delivery of crossbows to premises following a remote sale equivalent to those for knives that I have just described. A new section for Northern Ireland, "Sale and delivery of crossbows Northern Ireland: supplementary provision", will also be inserted, which will replicate section 35 for England and Wales. That new section will provide interpretation to the definitions used in relation to the new offences detailed above. It will also make general provision, including in respect of the Assembly procedure for regulations made under the Crossbows (Northern Ireland) Order 1988, as amended. In conclusion — Madam Principal Deputy Speaker, you will be relieved to hear those words — I fully appreciate that the Assembly's preference is to legislate here in Northern Ireland on matters for Northern Ireland where possible, and that is my preference. This Bill, however, is in its final stages in Parliament, and, with the legislative constraints in the current mandate, it is not possible to bring equivalent provision via an Assembly Bill in the near future. Therefore, I believe that, on this occasion, it is appropriate that these amendments be made in a Westminster Bill, and I ask for the House's support in passing the motion. Before I finish, I place on record my thanks to the Justice Committee and to my Executive colleagues for their consideration of the issues enclosed, as I know that it was done in a fairly short turnaround. I thank you for considering this, and I look forward to hearing any questions or comments that Members have.

2,579 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 15:13 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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