As Trevor Phillips began his Sky News show this morning, news broke of a mass shooting at Bondi beach in Sydney, where over a thousand people had gathered to celebrate Hanukkah.
New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said at least 11 had been killed, with 29 injured. State premier Chris Minns said the attack was ‘designed to target Sydney’s Jewish community.’ One of the suspected gunmen is dead, another is in a critical condition. Police are investigating if a possible third gunman was involved. Lanyon said the violence was not ‘our way of life’ and called for calm in the community. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said an ‘act of evil anti-Semitism and terrorism… has struck at the heart of our nation’, and suggested the incident will create a ‘moment of national unity’.
New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon:
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese:
Shabana Mahmood: Police response to rape allegations is currently a ‘postcode lottery’
Next week, the government will publish its violence against women and girls strategy, as part of the Labour manifesto promise to halve the rate of violence against women in the UK in ten years. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood spoke to Sky News this morning about the government’s plan to put specialist squads in each police force to deal with this ‘national emergency’. Trevor Phillips noted that the Institute for Government has said 50 per cent of the officers currently on sexual violence squads are trainees. Mahmood said that sexual violence is so pervasive that all police forces need to be capable of handling cases appropriately. Phillips asked where the police would find experienced, senior officers to form these specialist squads. Mahmood didn’t answer directly, but said a national programme was needed to fix the ‘postcode lottery’ inconsistency that affects victims who come forward with allegations.
Chris Philp: ‘A lot more money is needed’
On the BBC, Laura Kuenssberg pointed out that shadow home secretary Chris Philp had experience with the issue of violence against women from his time in government, and asked him to explain why successive governments have struggled to improve the situation. Philp said that the government and the police do take the issue seriously, but ‘the criminal justice system is quite slow… quite bureaucratic’. Philp argued that changes to ‘disclosure rules’ after a miscarriage of justice in 2018 have slowed the system further, and a lot more money is needed than the ‘£2 million’ pledged by Labour. Kuenssberg asked if the Conservatives should take some responsibility, given their cuts to the justice system. Philp claimed that there were record numbers of police when the Conservatives left office, and rape convictions rates had been increasing. He said numbers of police have gone down under Labour, and rape and sexual assaults have ‘gone up by 5 per cent’.
Shabana Mahmood: ‘Keir Starmer is not going’
Various papers have claimed Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham is plotting to return as an MP and challenge Keir Starmer. Burnham himself said there was ‘quite a lot of rubbish’ in the papers this morning. On the BBC, Laura Kuenssberg suggested to Shabana Mahmood that ‘lots of people’ in Labour think the Prime Minister ‘might be toast’ in 2026, and asked the Home Secretary what Starmer needed to do to stop that happening. Mahmood said that everyone in government needed to focus on the day job, and claimed Starmer was ‘laser-focused’ on making the change people voted for. Kuenssberg noted that Mahmood has confessed to thinking about being prime minister, and asked whether she would go for the top job if Starmer left. Mahmood said, ‘every single person has thought about it… but that is not the same as plotting to overthrow a prime minister, for God’s sake’.
EHCR chair Mary-Ann Stephenson: ‘Nobody is expecting there to be a toilet police’
Laura Kuenssberg also spoke to Mary-Ann Stephenson, the new chair of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, about guidance on single sex spaces. Stephenson said that in most cases it is easy to provide for everyone’s needs by having single unisex cubicles. Kuenssberg pointed out the EHCR’s guidance says trans women ‘should not be allowed to use women’s changing rooms or toilets’, and asked if employers should be expected to police that. Stephenson said that ‘social conventions’ are usually enough for people to obey the rules. She argued that it’s important that women ‘have access to single sex spaces’ and also that trans people ‘aren’t put in a situation where there are no services they can use’.
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