Speech by the Home Secretary to Congress 2007

Jacqui Smith MP, Home Secretary, address to Congress 2007

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Thank you, Congress. It's a real pleasure to be with you this afternoon.

A little less than three months ago, I had the honour of being asked by Gordon Brown to become Home Secretary.

There are few more fundamental rights than the right to safety and security. It is the foundation on which we build a country and communities where people can get the most out of their lives - at home and at work.

The full weight of that responsibility was brought home to me very quickly, with the terrorist incidents in London and Glasgow just a few days after I was appointed.

And as we meet on the sixth anniversary of the terrorist attacks in the US, it is right that we remember not just the victims of 11^th September 2001, but also those affected by the bombings in London of 7^th July 2005 and other incidents.

In the UK, the trade union movement has played a prominent and crucial role in our response to these attacks. I pay tribute to the individual members in the transport, health and emergency services who have shown great courage in the face of the threats, and have led by personal example and professional expertise.

And I applaud the TUC for the ideas and experience you have contributed to the debate on how we develop a partnership approach to tackling the issue.

Wherever possible, you have tried to identify the practical lessons that can be drawn for the future - what more can be done to support the individuals working at the frontline of society, and what more can be done to support communities in their attempts to build understanding and prevent extremism.

Delivering security for our citizens is not, of course, a challenge that is confined to countering terrorism. Ensuring that we can all feel safe in the other vital aspects of our lives - in our homes, in our local communities and in our places of work, as well as in wider society and within our international borders - these too are pressing issues.

And in keeping with your approach, my instinct is also to look for the practical lessons I can learn and the practical steps I can take to make a difference for local communities.

That means delivering the right support to parents and communities to tackle anti-social behaviour, and providing the right tools to local crime-fighting agencies to allow them to get on with the job of making our neighbourhoods safer.

And, at a time when crime has been falling but people's fear of crime remains disproportionately high, it means building public confidence in policing through greater community engagement and accountability.

As we all know, fear of crime can in itself have a damaging impact on communities and individuals. It can weaken the social fabric, breed mistrust, put public spaces out of limits, and foster suspicion or intolerance of others.

The situation is not helped, I might add, by those who seek political advantage from unnecessarily shrill warnings that we are facing anarchy on our streets.

Of course, tragic events affect us all, and rightly make us question whether we're doing everything we can to tackle crime. But Britain isn't broken. Burglary is down 60% since 1995; violent crime is at its lowest for a decade; and the chances of being a victim of crime are at their lowest for 25 years.

These aren't the symptoms of a broken society. And to suggest otherwise is not only wrong, it blurs the issue. Such a broad-bush statement takes the focus off the need for targeted action that gets results, and does nothing to resolve people's concerns.

What does work - what will address these fears - is communicating what we are doing to tackle crime in ways that people find visible and meaningful.

By April of next year every local area with have its own dedicated neighbourhood community policing. And by July we will ensure that everyone has access to local crime statistics - so that they get a clear picture of progress in their area and can use this information to feed in their views on what local crime-fighting priorities should be.

As a movement, of course, we are no strangers to the power of the community-based approach - indeed, you are its pioneers! Trade unionism is, and has always been, an expression of active citizenship.

It's by no means the only form that active citizenship can take, but when I think of the contributions being made by individual members - as school governors, youth workers, local councillors - to communities up and down the country, it shows how valuable that resource is in strengthening the social fabric.

In certain parts of the country and in certain sectors of the economy, your role in strengthening the social fabric is becoming important in new and perhaps unexpected ways.

In recent years, the UK has not been alone in seeing higher levels of migration, as mobility has increased and people have wanted to come here to live and work.

It's not a challenge we can simply wish away. And I know it is one that the TUC has addressed head on. Your report on 'The Economics of Migration' from June took a principled and clear view on the benefits - for host nations and home nations, and for migrant and native workers alike - while recognising the need for rules and rights to be fairly applied.

And, since February, the work of the TUC Commission on Vulnerable Employment has used personal testimonies to bring home the difficulties faced by migrant workers without adequate information about their employment rights.

Everyone who joins the workers registration scheme receives your booklet explaining rights at work. The work that you do in this field is vital - and we should strengthen it.

So my commitment to you today is this. I will examine how the Border and Immigration Agency can help everyone who gains a work permit to learn about their employment rights - including the value of joining a trade union - and I have asked Liam Byrne in my team to report on this by the 1^st October. Legal migrant workers should receive a clear and early message on the benefits of joining a union to get the protections they deserve.

As Gordon set out yesterday, the UK economy now has the highest levels of employment in our history, and we expect another 5 million skilled jobs to be created in the next decade. We will work to ensure that British workers have the skills they need to make the most of these opportunities.

And we have put in place measures to make sure that migration is managed properly - and illegal working and abuse of the system prevented - as the economy continues to grow.

To get that balance right, we've set up the independent Migration Advisory Committee to advise on where Britain needs migration and where we don't, so that we can conduct our national debate about immigration with respect - and on the basis of evidence, not anecdote.

I can announce today the appointment of David Metcalf as the Committee's first chair. As a member of the Low Pay Commission since its inception in 1997 and a board member of the Union Modernisation Fund since 2005, I know that both government and union colleagues have valued David's service.

And in his new role David will feed his expertise in labour markets into our considerations on where migration is needed and how it should fit with our plans for a points-based system for immigration.

The system, which will go live early next year, will give us a clear sense of the numbers of people entering the country, and will help to match their skills with our needs.

It will ensure that those who benefit most from migration - employers and educational institutions - have a stake in ensuring the system isn't abused. When employers want to employ skilled migrants they will need our licence to do so, and we will be rigorous in our approach.

When a firm applies to sponsor a migrant, we will ask about convictions for labour exploitation. We will use that pattern of behaviour when we decide how often to check they are playing by the rules. And when we spot bad behaviour, we will make sure that the action we take in response is seamless across government.

On migration, as with fighting crime in our communities and defeating the terror threat, I hope I've made clear my belief that we can only make an impact when we work in partnership.

Security, in all its forms, matters to us all - job security and personal safety just as much as local, national and international security.

With an emphasis on taking practical steps to make a local difference, my ambition is to build renewed trust in our institutions - not just in the organisations that uphold our laws and protections, but in the civic framework of shared values, rights and responsibilities that we all hold dear.

I look forward to working with you closely to do this in the months and years ahead.

Thank you.