Policing and Crime Bill (First sitting)
(8 years, 9 months ago)
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The Chair
Before we begin, I have a few preliminary points. First, will people switch any electronic devices to silent? Tea and coffee are not allowed in sittings. Today, we will first consider the programme motion, and then the motions to allow us to deliberate in private about our questions before the oral evidence sessions and to allow the reporting of written evidence for publication. To save time, I hope that we can take those matters formally.
Ordered,
That—
(1) the Committee shall (in addition to its first meeting at 9.25 am on Tuesday 15 March) meet—
(a) at 2.00 pm on Tuesday 15 March;
(b) at 9.25 am and 2.00 pm on Tuesday 22 March;
(c) at 11.30 am and 2.00 pm on Thursday 24 March;
(d) at 9.25 am and 2.00 pm on Tuesday 12 April;
(e) at 11.30 am and 2.00 pm on Thursday 14 April;
(2) the Committee shall hear oral evidence on Tuesday 15 March in accordance with the following Table:
Time | Witness |
|---|---|
Until no later than 10.45 am | The Police Superintendents’ Association of England and Wales; The Police Federation of England and Wales; UNISON |
Until no later than 11.25 am | The Fire Brigades Union; The Chief Fire Officers’ Association; The Association of Metropolitan Fire and Rescue Authorities |
Until no later than 2.45 pm | Barnardo’s; The Children’s Society; The NSPCC |
Until no later than 3.15 pm | The Association of Police and Crime Commissioners |
Until no later than 4.00 pm | The National Police Chiefs’ Council; The Metropolitan Police Service |
Until no later than 4.30 pm | The Royal College of Psychiatrists; Sally Burke, ‘Get Maisie Home’ Campaign |
Until no later than 5.00 pm | The Independent Police Complaints Commission; The College of Policing |
(3) proceedings on consideration of the Bill in Committee shall be taken in the following order: Clauses 1 to 6; Schedule 1; Clauses 7 and 8; Schedule 2; Clauses 9 to 11; Schedule 3; Clauses 12 and 13; Schedule 4; Clauses 14 to 21; Schedule 5; Clauses 22 and 23; Schedule 6; Clauses 24 to 28; Schedules 7 and 8; Clauses 29 to 33; Schedule 9; Clause 34; Schedule 10; Clauses 35 to 39; Schedule 11; Clauses 40 to 102; Schedule 12; Clauses 103 to 107; new Clauses; new Schedules; Clauses 108 to 112; remaining proceedings on the Bill;
(4) the proceedings shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at 5.00 pm on Thursday 14 April. —(Mike Penning.)
The Chair
On the basis of the programme order, the deadline for amendments to be considered at the first line-by-line sitting of the Committee on 22 March is at the rise of the House on Thursday 17 March.
Resolved,
That, at this and any subsequent meeting at which oral evidence is to be heard, the Committee shall sit in private until the witnesses are admitted.—(Mike Penning.)
Resolved,
That, subject to the discretion of the Chair, any written evidence received by the Committee shall be reported to the House for publication.—(Mike Penning.)
The Chair
Copies of the written evidence the Committee receives will be made available in the Committee Room.
The Chair
Good morning and welcome. We will now hear oral evidence from the Police Superintendents Association of England and Wales, the Police Federation of England and Wales, and Unison. Before calling the first Member to ask a question, I remind all Members that questions should be limited to matters within the scope of the Bill and that we must stick to the timings in the programme order. The Committee has agreed that we have until 10.45 am for this session. Will the witnesses please introduce themselves for the record, starting with Ben Priestley?
Ben Priestley: Thank you. My name is Ben Priestley. I am Unison’s national officer with policy and negotiating responsibility for our members in the police and probation services in England and Wales.
Chief Superintendent Curtis: I am Chief Superintendent Irene Curtis. I am president of the Police Superintendents Association of England and Wales.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: Good morning. I am Gavin Thomas, the president-elect of the Police Superintendents Association.
Steve White: I am Steve White, the chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales and a serving officer for Avon and Somerset police.
Metin Enver: Good morning. I am Metin Enver, the strategic adviser at the Police Federation of England and Wales.
James Berry (Kingston and Surbiton) (Con)
May I add for completeness that in my practice as a barrister, I have represented a number of these organisations? That is my declaration of interest.
Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)
Q Good morning. I would like to ask questions on four parts of the Bill, starting with part 3 on the police workforce. In your view, what issues are raised by what is proposed in the Bill, including potentially to arm directly employed and volunteer police community support officers with CS or PAVA spray?
Steve White: We have some concerns in relation to mission creep to a degree and the current accountability in relation to community support officers, and certainly in relation to volunteers. The proposal raises a question of accountability and how that would work. There is absolutely no doubt that many volunteers who work with the police service up and down the country do excellent work. There also needs to be recognition that we have a fully regulated special constabulary, with all the powers and accountability that that responsibility comes with.
We have police community support officers with varying degrees of powers, depending on their deployments and chief constables. It is very important to recognise, for example, that the use of CS is at a lower point of the force continuum than Taser. Are we suggesting that perhaps Taser would also be given to PCSOs, because it is a lower use of force? I do not think that is being suggested, but putting PCSOs in positions where they would have to deploy CS was never envisaged as their primary role as community support officers. When it comes to the use of force, and the current accountability and powers that fully attested police officers have, there is a huge degree of accountability, training and experience that goes with the deployment of that kind of device.
It would be interesting to hear Unison’s point of view on what the PCSOs think of the proposal. I know that Unison has been doing some work around that, but I do not think the picture is particularly clear. We definitely have some reservations about that.
Ben Priestley: As Steve has mentioned, Unison has some concerns about this proposal. The major concern is that the Bill’s proposal around the arming of police community support officers with gas was not part of the Government’s consultation that preceded the Bill. That is surprising for such a major step in quite a different direction. Given that there has not been any public consultation or consultation with stakeholders, our view is that this particular element of the Bill—the proposals around CS gas and PAVA gas—should be removed from the Bill. We would argue strongly for that, because in the public interest there is clearly a need for consultation in respect of volunteers being issued with CS or PAVA spray.
That keys into a much bigger debate around the Government’s proposals to create in the Bill two new specific, designated, volunteer roles: community support volunteers and policing support volunteers. I am sure we will get on to that in the debate here, but Unison’s view is certainly that it is not appropriate, for a range of reasons, for volunteers to be granted through designation a whole range of policing powers that could extend, it seems from the way the Bill is currently drafted, to virtually every power currently available to a police officer, with the exception of the five or six reserved powers that the Bill sets out. That would be a real step change in the use of volunteers. Unison agrees that volunteers can be used proportionately within policing, but this is, as Steve has mentioned, a mission creep too far and we are certainly opposed to the vision for volunteers to be granted those powers.
The Chair
We have limited time available. I intend to move on and, if there is time left at the end, to deal with any additional questions then. Before moving on to a different line of questioning, is there anything that any of the witnesses wants to add to what has already been said that is in any way different? Otherwise, I will move straight on to the next questioners.
Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con)
Q I want to focus on police complaints, if I may. I assume that everyone on the panel thinks it absolutely correct that police officers are held to account for their actions, regardless of whether they have chosen to leave the force. I am sure you are aware of the proposal in the Bill to close the loophole that removes people from that disciplinary procedure if they have retired or left the force. Do you think it appropriate that former officers should be held to account for allegations arising from their conduct in the force after they have left the force? If so, do you think a 12-month time limit is long enough for that to take place?
Chief Superintendent Curtis: I totally agree. It is absolutely right that officers are held to account for wrongdoing. We are as keen as anyone that bad officers are removed from the ranks of the police and, if appropriate, placed on a barred list.
We have to bear in mind proportionality. We are talking about employment issues around misconduct, not criminal events. If there is a criminal allegation, we can continue it right up to an officer’s death. An officer can be arrested and dealt with for any criminal allegations relating to when they were serving as a police officer. There are not many professions—or any that I am aware of—in which, beyond retirement or resignation, people can continue to be subject to disciplinary conduct.
On some occasions, that might be helpful for officers. When there are allegations against officers who have retired, they may want to come back and take the opportunity to defend themselves and to correct any situation they feel has been put across negatively. We must be careful not to hold people to account forever for something that took place in their employment.
We must think about the purpose of doing this. It is so that if there is serious misconduct, we can put someone on a barred list. We agree with the barred list and think it is a good idea. There are some issues about the five-year limit, which we may come back to, but in principle we think it right that people are held to account while they are in the job. There is a limit and 12 months is appropriate. If it is not 12 months, where do you draw the line? Do you take that limit up to two years, three years or four years? I think 12 months is an appropriate length of time in which to hold people to account for employment issues, as opposed to criminal issues.
Steve White: A couple of issues from us. We have some reservations in relation to keeping people to account after they have left the service. As a serving officer, there are significant restrictions on an individual’s private life—that is something that you sign up to when you become a police officer—but to continue to have restrictions after you have either decided to leave the service or moved on for whatever reason, I think, requires some careful thought.
I echo what Irene said in terms of this being about employment issues, as opposed to criminal matters. That is an important point to remember. We welcome the ability of people to be voluntarily put on the struck-off list—that makes perfect sense. What we need to be careful about is dealing with misconduct and complaints with serving officers, which generally takes far too long anyway—it goes on for years and, to a certain extent, that is because it is allowed to go on for years. It is not good for the public, for the police service or for the individuals who are subject to the complaints either. I do wonder if the 12-month period just means that if there is anything in the system prior to an officer leaving, it gives the professional standards department or the Independent Police Complaints Commission a little bit of breathing space and extra time, which I would say is not necessary.
These things need to be cleared up as quickly as possible. I am not talking about officers not being held to account at all; I am talking about an incentive to make sure that it happens in the shortest possible time for the benefit of the complainant, the service and the individual.
Jake Berry
Q Mr White, one of the most important things about this change is upholding public confidence in the police force’s ability to deal with complaints. To be absolutely clear in terms of the question I asked, do you believe that 12 months is proportionate or would you like to see that reduced?
Steve White: Absolutely. I would like to see that, when police officers leave the service, everything is dealt with: they leave the service and they are able to move on with their lives. To continue with a degree of restriction because there is a 12-month period where they have got to wait and see if something comes out of the woodwork is unhelpful and I think it would be counterproductive, because you are just going to give the ability to the service or any kind of investigatory authority not to have to worry too much about it until day 364 and, all of a sudden, something appears—it happens all the time: you get to the time limit and something suddenly appears.
I absolutely agree with you that there has got to be public confidence in the service—of course there has. Sixty-nine per cent. of the public say that the police do a good or very good job, so it has to be kept in proportion. The vast majority of officers do a very difficult job under very difficult circumstances. The police service in England and Wales is not riddled with corrupt police officers.
The Chair
In my anxiety to make progress, I think I knocked an hour off the amount of time we have got available. For the record, we have until 10.45 am.
Lyn Brown
Q Do you believe that under a single employer arrangement the discrepancy between a firefighter’s right to strike and the ban on police officers taking strike action might be a source of friction? Secondly, there is a duty of collaboration in the first part of the Bill. Do you know of a situation where any of your colleagues have refused to collaborate under the current system?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I will try to be as brief as I can—I will bear in mind the hint on the timescales. In terms of the first question, there are significant cultural differences between the fire service and the police service. You only have to see the learning on collaboration between forces, let alone with other emergency services—Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary has commented on it several times. We must not underestimate the power of cultural differences in this. There are dynamics of a heavily unionised service coming to join up with a service that is not unionised, particularly under the single employment model.
In answer to your second question, I am not necessarily sure about the language around refusing to collaborate. I have already articulated one reason for it and there are many other reasons as well, such as, for instance: single funding; annual funding, which does not give any longevity in terms of planning; and misaligned geography in terms of coterminosity. Two forces exist that are not coterminous to the Fire Brigades Union: Avon and Somerset constabulary and Devon and Cornwall police. You have a fire service that crosses over those two force areas. That does present some challenges itself.
Lyn Brown
You do not agree with it, then.
Steve White: The police service and, indeed, my members—the 124,000 people who I represent—recognise and value the expertise that the fire service brings, and we work incredibly well together at the scenes of many, many incidents and operations; of that there is absolutely no doubt. Provided that that separation of professional responsibility remains, I do not necessarily think that there is an issue. We have sympathy with some of the issues in relation to the fire service. I am sure that they have similar concerns for issues that we have. I am sure we would continue to work very closely together, so I do not necessarily see it as a massive issue. Of course, when we had the police service escorting green goddesses—I experienced this through disputes years ago—it was because of strike action, but even so, I think the fire service recognised the limits and capabilities of the police service. We just have to be pragmatic, deal with it and be professional in dealing with it.
In relation to collaboration, let us be brutally frank: collaboration between police forces and other agencies is not working as efficiently as it should. It is absolutely true that that is the case. Sometimes it is cultural. Sometimes it is managerial. Sometimes it is about egos. Sometimes it is political. There needs to be a locus to ensure that collaboration within the police service and across other agencies happens as effectively and efficiently as possible. Indeed, there have been many instances where my members have been working within collaborative organisations and have seen the frustrations—why are there three different annual leave policies for three forces that are collaborating on specialist operations? They have to go to three different resource units to take time off. Our members can see that it is not working as well as it should.
I am not saying that people have refused to collaborate; I am just saying that from a cultural perspective, there is still quite a lot that needs to happen. There is an opportunity for a central locus to say, “No. You need to collaborate under this framework and get on with it.”
Ben Priestley: The issue of industrial action is maybe not as important as some might initially think. Forty per cent. of the police workforce can join a trade union. It is a reasonably unionised workforce. Over half the workforce is in a trade union, and there has not been a history or a tradition of industrial action. That, I think, is testimony to the good quality of employment relations and the negotiating machinery that we have. Whichever service we are thinking about, it is the quality of the industrial relations that determines whether there are industrial disputes or not. As the saying goes, it takes two to tango, and very often industrial disputes are an indication of a failure of the system, rather than any in-built problem with the fact that certain workers have a right to strike.
In relation to the broader concept within the Bill of a single employer, once we begin to unpack that, there is an awful lot in it that will have to be dealt with and that will involve police services, and potentially fire and rescue services, in a huge amount of work—for what end? It brings together four or five different negotiating bodies under one or maybe two or more employers. The Bill is unclear whether the police and crime commissioner will be the single employer, whether he or she can delegate to the chief constable and whether the chief constable can then delegate to another individual within his or her force. That part of the Bill hopefully can be examined properly in Committee, and we certainly would like to put evidence up at that stage to help the MPs on the Committee to understand some of the complexities around the single employer model.
In relation to the duty to collaborate, I think the Government supported the establishment of the emergency services collaboration working group, which reported last year. I am sure the Committee will want to have a look at its report, which said that in about 90% or 95% of cases, collaboration was already happening. It is difficult for us to say exactly what the quality of that collaboration was, but most of the respondents to that survey said they were entirely happy with the level of collaboration. The group showed and said in its report that the jury was out on whether collaboration was actually going to save money. The Government make some fairly steep claims in relation to what collaboration will or will not do in respect of saving money and efficiencies. There is no actual evidence at this stage that collaboration will save money. The Committee might want to gain further insight into that as part of its deliberations.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I will add an observation and a couple of quick points. In my mind, ultimately the question is whether this is good for the public and whether it delivers a service to the public. There are definitely opportunities within this for efficiencies, in terms of coterminosity around estate, procurement and fleet requirements and HR functions, for instance. There are definitely opportunities for efficiencies there. There are already examples of that taking place in parts of the country, in force areas, with fire services.
I refer you to the HMIC report of July 2014 on meeting austerity. To reinforce my point about some of the challenges of this, that report referred particularly to the difficulties around collaboration. In preparation for this Committee hearing, I read Ken Knight’s review. That almost mirrored the language used, with there being exactly the same challenges within the fire service. We are overlaying another area of complexity on top of the challenges that Steve has just articulated, in terms of how we are trying to collaborate among ourselves. Ultimately, the terms “patchy” and “fragmented” are used in both reports. That demonstrates some significant challenges in terms of how we would actually make this happen.
Mims Davies (Eastleigh) (Con)
Q Have any benefits of collaboration actually been seen? I heard quite a negative picture, but were there any benefits that the panel could see?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: There have been benefits but, again, I refer back to my previous comment. To give you a slightly historic answer on this, going back to that report, HMIC recognised that collaboration in policing was patchy and fragmented, and in the way that we were approaching it at the moment it would not meet the demands of austerity. That is partly because there is a vacuum in terms of who makes that decision.
Mims Davies
Q So you cannot point to one single benefit, just patchiness?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: There is patchiness across the country, but in terms of macro-efficiency and cost effectiveness, I would have difficulty. I could probably highlight individual examples where there has been good practice. However, one issue that HMIC also highlighted is that the service has not been good at picking up those good practices in one part of the country and then transposing them very quickly to another part of the country. Sharing that learning has not been quick enough. That is an internal issue for the service—
Mims Davies
Q Historically, would you have expected good practice to move as quickly as that?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: There is a cultural issue within the service of not picking up learning quickly enough and then investing in that learning in another part of the country. I think that actually we still have a way to go with that.
Steve White: There have been some benefits from collaboration, but it depends on what you are saying that the outcome of a collaboration is. Over the past four years, with resources having been taken out of the police service, a lot of our ability to continue to provide a service has come from collaboration. An example is our federation conference last year. We asked the Home Secretary to visit and so there was a big security issue, and bomb dogs were needed. There are no bomb dogs in Dorset, but we had a dog which came all the way from Cornwall. That is a long distance to travel, but it meant that although there was not a dog on duty in Dorset, because of that collaboration they were able to deal with that issue. There are some question marks over that in terms of whether it might have been easier to have had a dog locally but, anyway, that is what happened.
One example of collaboration which has always worked quite effectively and has been in place for quite some time is the central motorway police group within the West Midlands. That is a collaboration between a number of forces that has always been very effective, and has been in place for a number of years. To a degree, that is a model of something where collaboration can be effective and can improve efficiency and the service to the public. It depends on whether you are talking about collaboration as a way of improving the service to the public, or just keeping the wheel on.
Mims Davies
Road safety partnerships are clear examples of significant collaboration between services. I am surprised that that was not given as a clear example, but that is helpful.
Jake Berry
Q I have a question specifically on the points of collaboration mentioned by Chief Superintendent Thomas, who said that the sharing of good practice had been patchy and slow across the country. Do you think that increasing collaboration will increase or reduce the speed at which good practice is shared across the country?
The Chair
Before anyone answers that, I shall bring Lyn Brown in on a similar point and we can take the two questions together.
Lyn Brown
Q I have heard of decent collaboration between fire services and between fire services and police services. The one thing they all had in common is that they wanted to do it and they found ways to do it, locally, that had benefited them. I think that asking people to collaborate willingly is a better methodology than trying to force a structure upon a police service. Do you agree?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I agree with that point. My only other observation goes back to what I said earlier; ultimately, this is for the public good. The public can have a different experience in different areas, as in the example you just gave: you can have two chief executives, of the police service and the fire service, coming together in an effective relationship and making collaboration work, yet just down the road, across the county boundary, that has not happened. Is that the type of service we want, in terms of it being that diverse, across England and Wales?
Jake Berry
Could you answer my question?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: Do you mind repeating it?
Jake Berry
Q You said that the sharing of good practice was patchy across the country; do you think that further collaboration will increase or reduce the speed at which good practice is shared across the country?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I think it will increase it.
Jake Berry
So that will be a good thing?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: To give an example, I quoted the HMIC report; as a result of that we were collectively involved in a piece of work about how to take it forward. That produced a report called “Reshaping policing for the public” and as a result of that there is now a board within policing trying to look at how we transform the service in terms of wider collaboration, looking at workforce specialist capabilities, the digitalising of the service, local policing and the business enablers that create collaboration effectively. So a lot of work is being done to share practice and ideas.
Jake Berry
So increasing collaboration will improve the service?
Chief Superintendent Thomas: Yes, I think it will.
The Chair
This is quite an important issue in the Bill and I want to make sure that anybody who wants to pursue a point, particularly on collaboration, has the opportunity to do so. Will anyone who wants to do that signify now to me?
Gerald Jones (Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney) (Lab)
Q On collaboration, the police and the fire service are two distinct services. Although both require a high level of public trust, I suggest that the fire and rescue service is more of a humanitarian service. What are your thoughts on merging those two services? Do you think that would blur the distinction between the two?
Steve White: There has to be a clear distinction, in relation to the professionalism and the role, between the two organisations, if only for the benefit of the public; we need to make sure that they understand what service they can expect from the two services. I think that they do anyway. As for collaboration and making efficiency savings, I used to work in a police station, St George in Bristol, which was an old Victorian building. The front was a police station and the back was the old fire station. To an extent, this is not a new idea; it is what we did years ago. Provided there is that distinction, in terms of the professionalising of both services, of course, we will continue to work closely together; we already do, as I said.
Does it make sense to have one workshop working on fire engines and police cars? Of course it does, because that is clearly something that could be managed. However, do we think it is a good idea to have the fire service knocking on people’s doors and doing welfare checks? It is all very well until you have to do something else where you require a power. Most things in policing are not just straightforward. You cannot just say, “Go and knock on the door and make sure someone is okay,” because the police have had a call about a concern for welfare. When there really is a concern, you need the resources that the police service has to deal with the issue. If someone answers the door and says, “No, I’m fine”, are we going to say, “Can we check your smoke alarms as well, since we’re here?”? I just think it is a dilution of the professionalism of the two services and we need to be careful about that mission creep, accepting that there are areas where we can come back. We have had joint emergency service control rooms in various parts of the country in the past, with varying degrees of success, to be fair.
Of course, when you compare the demand on the fire service with the demand on the police service, it really is significantly different. I think there are opportunities there but there need to be distinct arms of the fire service and the police service.
Ben Priestley: In response to that question, I want to raise a development that has taken place in Durham police, which in a sense contextualises what the Government are aiming to do in the Bill around emergency services collaboration. Durham police now employs—with some local government funding, I think—two or three police community support officers who are also first responders and, by virtue of their job descriptions, retained firefighters. What degree of split those individuals have in respect of those three roles is difficult to determine at this early stage.
However, reading the Bill, I am confused by the provision entitled
“Prohibition on employment of police in fire-fighting”.
I am confused about whether that means that once the Bill is enacted those PCSOs in Durham will have to stop their retained firefighting duties. Because it says very clearly,
“No member of a police force may be employed by a fire and rescue authority or a relevant chief constable for the purpose of—
(a) extinguishing fires”.
I think you can personify the issue with those roles that Durham has invested in—presumably on the basis that it is an innovative, collaborative project—and the provision in the Bill that appears to prevent that, for the good reason that Steve has just pointed out, which is that there needs to be clear demarcation between the roles of firefighters and those working in policing. The Bill seems to present an impediment to that. I pose that as a question that might be explored at Committee stage.
Amanda Milling (Cannock Chase) (Con)
Q I want to pick up on the point about the distinct roles. Nobody is suggesting that policemen should be fighting fires and firemen should be arresting criminals. I want to focus on the PCC responsibility for fire. Do you not agree that that will address some of the barriers that we have seen in some cases, where there has not been as much collaboration and integration between the two? The Bill still recognises the flexibility for that local case to be made, with different models within that. Finally—this is three questions in one—this also provides some direct accountability to the public from fire authorities to the PCCs.
The Chair
Before you answer that, there are two further questions on this area. I will take those and then, once we have responses, we can move on to another theme.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
Q I have a very specific question, given that this part of the Bill applies only to England, and policing in Wales is not a devolved matter. Are there any implications for Wales and are there any cross-border implications of this proposal for collaboration?
Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)
Q It pains me a little to hear words such as “there is no evidence” of collaboration work. I think it was mentioned “as we are approaching it at present”. We have seen examples from fire and ambulance services around the country, where they use first responders incredibly well, and it increases the level of service at little extra cost. Is this not about a culture and an ethos? In fact, is it not empire building and something that you guys need to sort out, rather than our having to legislate for?
The Chair
There is quite a lot to go at there. Who wants to start? Chief Superintendent Thomas.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I’ll have a go. In terms of efficiencies and accountability, I agree. Within the Bill at the moment there is a gap, which I think has been left open for consideration, around inspection and standards. At the moment, HMIC is the inspectorate body for the service. In terms of taking this forward, in my judgment it makes sense that if it comes under the arrangement of the PCC, both fire and police should come under the same inspectorate, to have the same standards and ultimately to have that transparency—that voice—for the public, which is what HMIC is, in terms of ensuring that the standards are maintained by both services. In my judgment, I urge the Committee to think about where that would place HMIC under that arrangement.
We have said already that there are efficiencies, and these are being demonstrated in areas of good practice across the country—in joint procurement, estate and so on. Ultimately, this is public money that we are trying to spend, so if we can get the best effect for the money we are spending to deliver services to the public, in my judgment that is good.
On your question about Wales and cross-border implications, there could potentially be some issues there. We have forces that border Welsh forces. My home force, Gloucestershire, neighbours Wales, but I cannot give you any specific examples that I can see of where there would be tensions. In terms of being professional, we would work through that on an everyday basis.
On first responders and culture, I agree with you. I said earlier that when you are talking about a big change, culture is always a key element, particularly in bringing two organisational cultures together to make things more effective. I think we are more open to new ideas. There was your example of first responders. There are examples outside this country where that has been done. Ireland has done some work on using that, and I think that was quoted in the consultation. We are open to that, but the point I was trying to make earlier is that the significant cultural issues within the two organisations should not be underestimated, and it would take some time to work through those if the arrangement came under a single PCC organisation.
Steve White: In relation to your first question, on accountability, in my 27 years of policing experience I have never seen working closely with the fire service as a particularly problematic issue. I have seen many issues with the police service trying very hard to collaborate with other agencies, such as social services and health. You could probably say that on a day-to-day basis we actually do more of that, and that is probably something that needs to be resolved on a day-to-day basis, as opposed to the accountability of the fire service and the police service. What about the way that we collaborate with social services? On a Friday at five o’clock, social services offices close their doors and then, all of a sudden, reports of missing people and children come in, and the police service has to deal with it. That is a much more important area of work, because we work very closely with the fire service. In terms of accountability, yes, of course there needs to be accountability around that.
I question whether a lot of PCCs actually have the physical ability to take on not just the work that they are doing in the police service, but the work with the fire service. I cannot answer that question, but much more thought and work needs to be done on other areas of collaboration that ought to work much more effectively. That is probably more important. To be fair, there is not an issue with the fire service—that is really what I am saying; we work really well together. There are the examples that I have mentioned about sharing some back-office functions, resources and workshops, and those will, of course, provide efficiencies. I am fairly relaxed about the other issue of first responders. We use the resources that we have and if we can have access to those resources and use them in a different way, I think that makes perfect sense.
On Welsh devolution, the position of the Police Federation of England and Wales is that the devolution of policing in Wales is a political decision, but that has to be taken in the round with the political context in Wales and what happens with further devolved powers for other areas there. I suggest that there needs to be some consistency, though, because again, the public can get awfully confused otherwise. There also needs to be a recognition that sometimes we require not just the police service, but the fire service, to deal with things outside their areas through some form of mutual aid, so it is important that we have consistency. Whoever is in charge of the fire service in Wales, or the fire service in England, we need to make sure that we have that consistency of standard and interoperability.
Ben Priestley: The Home Affairs Committee reviewed the progress that police and crime commissioners have made. When it published its report—albeit that was two years ago—the Committee said that it was too early to determine whether the introduction of police and crime commissioners had been a success. It said that even by 2016—this year—it would probably be too difficult to assess that and that it would need a further term. The Government are therefore pushing ahead on the PCC project very quickly. As Steve indicated, the question is whether the Bill is trying to fix a problem that does not actually exist. Given that collaboration is taking place and the current democratic structures appear to be working reasonably well, do police and crime commissioners have the capacity to take on this new role?
There is a bigger question about which roles the Government have decided to give to PCCs and which they have not. Two years ago the Government took the decision to break up the probation service in England and Wales and privatise most of it. That comes back to Steve’s point about which of the services the police service would partner with most naturally. Arguably, in terms of agency, the probation service is closer to the police service than the fire and rescue service is. Yet the Government made a clear decision to keep police and crime commissioners totally out of the procurement for the new contracts to provide probation services locally. They would not be given powers to commission services for the care and rehabilitation of offenders in communities, notwithstanding the close partnership between police and probation. We need to ask why the Government are doing this for the fire and rescue service when they did not do it for the probation service.
On democratic accountability, the Bill’s proposals about the future role of police and crime panels are not sketched out well. If the Government get their way on merging police and fire, there is no proposal in the Bill to rename the crime and policing panels. One would expect “fire” to at least appear in the title, if one were encouraging the public to understand what the new scrutiny body is doing. Perhaps we should even change the name of the police and crime commissioner; there is no mention of fire in his or her title.
However, I think that there is another issue about democracy that is more fundamental. It appears from the Bill that the Government, through the offices of the Secretary of State, will eventually be able to mandate merger in circumstances where a police and crime commissioner wants it, but where the fire and rescue authority does not. At the end of the day, the Government can mandate that. That is not good for democratic accountability, and it is certainly something that we, as a trade union, would want to challenge.
The Minister for Policing, Fire, Criminal Justice and Victims (Mike Penning)
I have sat and listened for a considerable time to the answers to the questions. I know four of you very well, although I do not know Mr Priestley at all. We have talked outside this room and I have seen huge amounts of collaboration taking place. What amazes me is that, when my colleague asked a moment ago, “Give me an example of where collaboration has worked”, there was almost complete silence from the federation and the Police Superintendents Association, although your members are out there doing it. There is a brand new fire station in Winchester that is also a police station, with an armed response unit in the yard. If the witnesses were outside this room and not on the panel, I am sure they would agree—because they have said so to me before—that it is very difficult when there are areas that refuse to collaborate. The purpose of the Bill is to bring that forward. When you were giving evidence a few moments ago, why did you not say that there is a huge amount of collaboration but it is not across the force? What really worried me is that, when asked about the effect on Wales, Mr Thomas said that yes, there would be an effect, but he had no idea what it would be. That is an unbelievable thing to say. When you said that there would be an effect on Wales, but could not tell us what it would be, what did you mean? Perhaps you could elaborate on the areas where collaboration is taking place very well and those where it is not, which the panel and you and I know to exist.
The Chair
There is a bit of a challenge there. We need to get responses, but I am anxious that we move on. There are many areas of the Bill that we have not yet covered.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I will go back to what I said earlier. My overriding concern goes back to the comments on respecting previous collaboration arrangements and the experience of the citizen being different in different parts of the country, even in a neighbouring county—it goes back to the heart of the issue. The term “consistency” is used a lot in inspectorate reports at the moment. How do we get consistency? I am absolutely in favour of localism and local favour in delivering our services, but some of those services are absolutely critical to the safety of our fellow citizens, so getting a level of consistency across the country is a goal that we must achieve.
Going back to the point about Wales, the macro example is going to provide inconsistency because the Bill does not address that element with Wales and not England, so it does provide an element of inconsistency on that point. However, as Steve has just said, it is for the Welsh Assembly to make that decision.
Steve White: May I come back to the point on collaboration? I made the point that PFEW’s position is that collaboration could still work a lot better. I gave some examples where it is working effectively, but that is not to say that everything is working perfectly. You are right, Minister, that we have had conversations outside these rooms about some of the frustrations that our members bring to us where collaboration does not work as well as it should. In one of my previous answers I said there are a number of reasons for that: some of it is ego; some of it is political pressure; some of it is just trying to get people to work together. In the current structure of 43 forces, with 43 chiefs and 43 PCCs, it is sometimes very challenging to get them to agree on what they are going to let go in terms of control and how it is going to work.
The culture of the service is beginning to change. Yes, there are examples of good collaboration out there, but I still think that there are many more opportunities where collaboration could be even more effective, up to the point of reducing the number of forces we have in England and Wales, to make that collaboration and the efficiencies and learning that can be gained from it. Why do we still have a service that does things, in the vast of majority of instances, 43 different ways? It makes no sense.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: May I make a quick observation on that? Steve has just made a good point. Under the current arrangements, as I said earlier, the decision is made within the police and crime commissioner arrangements. The power to make a national decision around consistency is not there at the moment—it is a vacuum.
The Chair
I will take two quick questions, one from Carolyn Harris and one from Mims Davies, then we will move on.
Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)
Q Do you think there is any merit in a statutory responsibility for emergency services to respond to and collaborate on major incidents such as flooding and terrorism?
Mims Davies
My question was on a different point. I will wait until you move on.
The Chair
Okay. Can you respond to that and I will then bring in Jack Dromey who has several points to make. Then we can take it from there.
Steve White: In my experience, we already work incredibly effectively, certainly in my own force of Avon and Somerset. The recent floods in Somerset are a prime example of where excellent work is done through collaboration. Whether or not it needs to be mandated through legislation is a matter for yourselves, I suppose. The police service is a can-do organisation; we make things work.
Jack Dromey
Q Thank you for your sharp-end experience answers on parts 1 and 3 of the Bill. You have been very helpful. May I ask you to turn to part 2 of the Bill on police complaints, discipline and investigation? Is the IPCC fit for purpose?
Chief Superintendent Curtis: There is absolutely no doubt that the police service needs an independent, effective organisation that can act on behalf of the public to ensure that police complaints are dealt with effectively. We and our members have had some concerns over many years around the quality of investigations from the IPCC and the timeliness of investigations. Those concerns have not been allayed in recent years. We have many meetings with senior members of the IPCC where these issues are raised, and we are still not satisfied that the IPCC is delivering a good service to members of the police service and, more importantly, to the public.
Steve White: In short, the answer is no. In terms of the faith that the service and our members have in the IPCC, there are significant concerns. There is a recognition, from a Police Federation of England and Wales perspective, that there is no room in the service for people who are corrupt and for officers who do not adhere to the standards of conduct; we have no interest in keeping those people within the service. However, we also have a significant interest in ensuring that there is an independent authority or commission with the appropriate powers to effectively investigate in a timely and professional manner the complaints made on a daily basis against our members, the vast majority of which are shown to be erroneous and unfounded.
I am reluctant to use the word “crisis”, but I cannot think of an alternative—I think there is a crisis of confidence in the IPCC within the police service. While we welcome some of the changes that the Bill proposes on that, there is still a fundamental issue around having a truly independent system of investigating complaints against the police service. I do not blame the public for sometimes being confused when they hear that neighbouring forces, or indeed forces themselves, are investigating the complaints being made to them.
The PFEW position has always been that a system similar to that of Northern Ireland, with an independent ombudsman, would be much more effective. There would be greater confidence in the service in that kind of system. Recent incidents have caused deep concerns among our members in terms of their ability to have faith in the IPCC to do such an important job and to do it effectively.
Ben Priestley: From Unison’s point of view, we agree with many of the points that colleagues have made. The timeliness issue is particularly brought home when our representatives represent members in IPCC proceedings. It is very difficult when those proceedings last longer than many would think they would.
The other problem within the police service—I acknowledge that the Government have been trying to address this—is that there is no single misconduct procedure for police staff across the forces in England and Wales. Anybody looking in at the police service from the outside would regard that as slightly strange. It is certainly something that the IPCC has been lobbying hard for. I think we are at one with the Government. We have had contact with Home Office officials who wish to put through, as part of the Home Secretary’s integrity programme, a single misconduct procedure for police staff, which would align in many respects with the one that relates to police officer colleagues. That is part of the bigger picture.
Chief Superintendent Curtis: Following on from Steve’s comment about a confidence issue, there is a huge issue around proportionality and the way in which officers are dealt with for conduct issues. In my six years as a national officer for this association, the blame culture in policing has got progressively worse, and it is having a huge impact on morale and the confidence of officers to do their job. I am talking about the fact that when things go wrong, the initial assessment of what went wrong should be defining whether someone has been very bad or naughty in their job, or whether they have been human and made a mistake. That boundary has gone now, and everything seems to be pushing towards more serious misconduct. If we look at the ratio of attrition and the outcomes for gross misconduct investigations, very few of them actually result in dismissal, which is the main sanction for gross misconduct hearings.
The IPCC has a key role to play in tackling the whole issue of the blame culture in the police service. If we look at how the aviation industry has changed the way it looks at mistakes made within aviation, it is all about learning from mistakes that are made and prevention for the future. I noticed that there was an announcement last week, in relation to the NHS, that doctors and nurses are going to be provided with immunity for admitting mistakes. We now have a situation in policing where people will not hold their hands up for very minor mistakes on the basis that they feel people will come down on them like a ton of bricks. We must get back that sense of proportionality in how we deal with conduct issues in policing. The IPCC has a key role to play in that, as do police forces, but the IPCC in particular.
The Chair
Q May I use the Chair’s prerogative? There is an interesting dichotomy between, on one hand, someone who makes a misjudgment or human error and, on the other hand, someone who wilfully commits an act of misconduct. It is difficult to make a judgment about what was in their mind at the time when they took the action. How would you determine where that boundary is, or is it a matter of doing so case by case?
Chief Superintendent Curtis: That would come out in the investigation. Sometimes it is really clear. When dealing with corruption cases and so on, it is sometimes really clear that bad people are involved. That is where we should be focusing our efforts. Resources should go into taking bad and corrupt officers out of the service. We all want that to happen.
However, when people have made some sort of genuine error—we are all guilty of that and most of us have got away with it throughout our service when we have made mistakes—surely it is more important, particularly when a member of the public is concerned, that someone can hold their hand up, apologise and explain what happened and why they did it. We can learn from that, particularly when there are systemic issues for why the mistake happened. The service can learn from that and prevent it happening in future. We do not have that learning culture in the service because of the way the IPCC and, to be fair, forces conduct themselves. The initial assessment should make that much more clear.
If you look at the whole ethos behind the conduct regulations that were introduced in 2008, it was about making a much better distinction in the severity assessment phase. However, the severity assessment can be reviewed throughout the process, so as soon as it becomes clear from an investigation that the individual made a genuine mistake, the severity assessment should be reduced and the investigation should take a different tack.
James Berry
Q May I address this to the Police Federation? Mr White, you have already adopted on a non-statutory basis changes to your core purpose—your sort of mission statement. Can you tell us what benefits your organisation has seen?
Steve White: I think, first and foremost, that the public interest element, which I think is probably what you are talking about in terms of the way the federation operates, has always been there because the organisation has been about the welfare of our officers and the efficiency of the police service. Both those strands are in the public interest. If you have a happy, healthy and efficient police service, you will provide a better service to the public. That is effectively what it means. The point I am making is that we have always done that. We are now making it completely overt that that is what we feel the Police Federation contributes to policing in this country. I think it is right and proper to make that absolutely clear.
James Berry
Q I just want to come back to the point that my namesake, Mr Berry, made with respect to the barred list and officers who have left the service. The purpose of police misconduct proceedings is to promote public confidence and protect members of the public and colleagues in the force. If a serious but non-criminal allegation came to light about an officer some years after they had left, do you think the College of Policing or senior officers should have the ability to put that officer on some form of barred list or somehow flag up the fact that the allegation has arisen, so that they cannot re-enter, even if they are not going through a full-blown disciplinary procedure?
Steve White: The barred list is a new thing and, as I said earlier, we welcome officers’ ability to put themselves on it voluntarily, if you like, to deal with an issue once and for all. I guess this boils down to my argument about how long you let it happen and what the ultimate sanction will be. We are talking about non-criminal matters, so the ultimate sanction would be for someone to lose their job. If they have been out of the service for three or four years and there was a finding against the individual that was so serious they would lose their job, they are not in the employ anyway, so I am not quite sure what the benefit would be.
James Berry
Q I entirely agree with you and I made this point in the Chamber, but I am asking about someone being put on some form of barred list so that they cannot get back into the service. That is what the benefit would be to the public interest and public safety.
Steve White: How would that process work? We would have an allegation, but we would not have the power to investigate or even interview the individual, so we would just have to put them on a barred list. Is that justifiable? I get what you are saying, but I am not quite sure how it could work in practice.
James Berry
Q But you would support a voluntary type of system, such as the one that the General Medical Council has?
Steve White: Yes. Indeed, even if it does not go so far as a barred list, if such an individual did try to rejoin the service, one would hope that there would be something in place to indicate that there might have been a question mark somewhere. I don’t know, but I am not quite sure how it would work.
Chief Superintendent Curtis: I support Steve’s point about the opportunity for people to put themselves on to the list voluntarily. That would be a really useful inclusion. We need to look at proportionality here, and we need to think about how many cases in which these things come to light we are talking about. They are very few and far between, but there is an impact on individuals where it is a more minor case. How do you determine whether or not something is more serious? Should officers have this hanging over them? Remember that this is an employment issue, and we are not talking about a criminal issue. Should this be hanging over them for the rest of their life? I feel that that would be really unfair. We are trying to create something here to deal with a minority, but it could potentially impact on the majority. I think that that is disproportionate and unfair.
I would like to make a point regarding the five-year limit, or the publication for five years of the barred list. I wonder whether there could be some more flexibility around that. The point I raise is that there could be an officer with 26 years’ exemplary service who, due to circumstances that arise, ends up with a drink-driving conviction. They get dismissed from the service for gross misconduct and go on the barred list, and rightly so. Should that person be prevented from using the skills and experience that they gained over that 26 years, not as a police officer but in the wider policing family and supporting a policing role, because of a drink-driving conviction? I wonder whether it is a proportionate response to say that for five years that person can work in a whole range of organisations but, according to the Bill, not as a consultant for a private sector organisation that is working with the police force. There are a lot of limits on what that individual could do.
I wonder whether a solution to that might be for the independent chairs of panels, where we have them—that is a proposal that we as an association put forward—to make a recommendation in individual cases, in the light of the full facts of the circumstances, about the length of time someone should stay on a barred list. That would be instead of going for an absolute term of five years for everybody, no matter what the extent of the misconduct issue. There could be some flexibility around that, because it seems such a waste to the public of somebody’s skills and experience, and of those 26 years of exemplary service.
James Berry
Q May I ask a question of clarification? Is it the length of time for which an individual remains on the barred list or the length of time for which that list is published to which you object?
Chief Superintendent Curtis: I would say it is about being on the barred list.
Jack Dromey
Q May I just ask one final question in relation to police complaints? You said in your evidence just now that you accept the importance of a strong, independent investigator to hold the police to the highest standards. However, Steve, you spoke about something of a crisis of confidence in the existing arrangements, and you then spoke about the specific issue of the blame culture and proportionality. Do you think that those issues are adequately addressed in the Bill?
Chief Superintendent Curtis: I am not sure how the blame culture could be addressed through a Bill, although I would be interested to see how the NHS proposals are taken forward. I would ask that the Home Office look at those from a policing perspective to see whether that is something that could be considered for policing. That would help to address the blame culture issue in policing. I am not sure that giving the current IPCC further powers actually addresses the underlying issues of investigative skill levels and time limits, which are our association’s two major concerns.
Jack Dromey
Q Can I ask a question on a different part of the Bill: part 4 on bail? In the debate on Second Reading, there was a strong view across the House, with the example of the Gambaccini case, about the legitimacy of some of the proposals in the Bill relating to people waiting for long periods of time for a decision to be made. My first question is, do you accept what is being proposed in the Bill?
Secondly, there is an issue not addressed in the Bill, which has come to be known as the Dhar clause, about what legitimate restrictions there might be to prevent people from absconding, particularly those who are accused of terrorism.
Steve White: On the pre-charge bail issue, we have a lot of empathy for people in that situation. However, in the increasingly complex world of policing and the kind of investigations that need to take place, particularly with significant and serious allegations, there needs to be a recognition that we must ensure that we get the investigation right.
We need to be able to investigate the offence appropriately, to find and access the evidence, and for the Crown Prosecution Service and other agencies that need to be involved to be cognisant of timescales. Sometimes it is not the police’s decision or wish that the bail gets extended. Sometimes it is circumstances beyond our control, whether it be with the CPS or other agencies.
There needs to be a recognition that an arbitrary limit of however many days could result in people not answering to justice, because we are physically unable to make the case in that time period. Of course, there is also a significant resource issue, certainly for day-to-day district operations, regarding the physical capability of individual officers with relatively low-level cases being able to do the work they need to do in a timely manner, so that decisions can be made about charge.
This is not about the high-profile Paul Gambaccini cases; this is about the day-to-day cases, where someone has been arrested and the CPS says, “No, you need to bail them, because you now need to go out and get X, Y and Z.” For the officer, with all the other roles and responsibilities that they have got, to do that in a quick and timely manner is difficult. We have empathy; people should not be on bail for any longer than they have to be. I think the service can get better at it, but it is dangerous to have an arbitrary limit that could result in people not answering to justice.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I will answer your second question first. I think it is legitimate to look at whether, in the Dhar case, certain conditions could be placed on individuals. It is right and proper to look at that.
I have a number of wider points I want to make around the proposals on this. I acknowledge the fact that in the consultation, 65% of respondents felt there was a need to look at how we change bail. The service has been undergoing a pilot, which is being peer reviewed as we speak. Certainly, from what we have seen, the use of bail in terms of managing it, has had quite an effect on the length of time for people on bail already.
This goes to the heart of transparency and accountability. Where I have a slight concern is, where the presumption is that we will not use bail, we will still be releasing people under two types of status. If you have been in custody and are released, there is no further action. We have done an investigation while you have been in custody and the matter is closed, and you move on. Or, you are released from custody, not on bail, but still subject to investigation. That is a whole new status that I am not clear on. It falls between any sort of legal identity in our current systems.
The service is going to have to look at putting some process around that, because not only are there people on bail, there are other people in this process as well: the victims, the witnesses and the public. Policing will have to put in some sort of process to manage this. The original rationale for this proposal was that you will still have people who are subject to investigation waiting for notification from the police as to, when that investigation is concluded, whether they are going to be proceeded against in court or not. Bail provided a framework of timescales for that. Absolutely, we want swifter investigations and swifter justice.
There is another, more personal point for the association, because the proposals are that a superintendent or above would be the rank that will extend bail beyond 28 days. Since 2010, the superintendent rank has had the largest decrease in numbers, by more than 26%, so there is going to be an extra demand on that. I looked slightly with tongue in cheek when I saw the options presented in the Bill. The first option was looking at extending bail through the courts and the Crown courts; the rationale for that being, I understand, that there was a capacity issue. I have not seen a lot of detail about what the capacity issue is for my colleagues undertaking this role within the service. I shall leave that for the Committee to consider.
The Chair
We have four minutes left.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I shall stop there if the Committee have no further questions.
The Chair
Does any member of the Committee have a completely new question, or want to pursue something? Let us take three very quick questions.
Mims Davies
Q I want to touch on the opportunity, through the Bill and through secondary legislation, to change the rank structure. Is that a welcome opportunity?
Carolyn Harris
Q I want to bring up the facility in the Bill for PCCs, police commissioners, to make their own decision as to whether they take on the receiving and recording of complaints. Do you have any problems with that?
The Chair
We have three minutes left. I suggest that we take up Lyn Brown’s suggestion on firearms. It is so big a subject that we could not possibly cover it in the time available. If we could get some written evidence on that, it would be really helpful. Let us have some quick responses now on the other points.
Chief Superintendent Thomas: I shall address the question about rank. I am not wedded to the rank or the label; it is more the role and the responsibility that goes with it. As you are aware, there is a lot of work being undertaken in the service at the moment to come back with solid proposals around what that might look like.
Metin Enver: On the rank structure, we currently have a police consultative forum, which is one of those areas where this is discussed. There are so many changes afoot at the moment and our position is very similar to that of the chief superintendent.
Chief Superintendent Curtis: I covered the PCC issue earlier. The most important things are that the public have a point of contact to make a complaint to; that, where possible, that is dealt with as quickly as possible; where there is an apology to be made, that apology is made; and where an investigation needs to take place, it takes place efficiently, effectively and proportionately. We are not precious about who is the best person to do that. It is really a matter for you, but it is about making sure that, whatever is proposed, the public have that point of contact. The only question mark around that is that, if it is different in every force area, you end up with the public not quite knowing who to contact to make a complaint—is it the PCC or is it the force? I am sure that that can be resolved through process. Those are the most important issues for us: it is about the outcome we are looking for.
Metin Enver: Very quickly, on the PCC issue; at the moment, clearly, the chief constable is an apolitical figure. The service would need some reassurance that decisions are being made in an independent manner and that there is not political interference in those decisions.
The Chair
As there are no further questions, may I thank the witnesses for the clear and comprehensive way that they have answered a whole range of questions? We now need to move to the next panel. Thank you very much.
Examination of Witnesses
Matt Wrack, Paul Hancock, Councillor John Edwards, Councillor Dave Hanratty, Chief Fire Officer Phil Loach and Chief Fire Officer Dave Etheridge gave evidence.
The Chair
Q We will now hear evidence from the Fire Brigades Union, the Chief Fire Officers Association, the Association of Metropolitan Fire and Rescue Authorities and the West Midlands fire service. We have until 11.25 am to conduct this session. For the purposes of the record, may I begin by asking the witnesses to introduce themselves?
Matt Wrack: I am Matt Wrack. I am the general secretary of the Fire Brigades Union.
Chief Fire Officer Etheridge: Good morning. I am David Etheridge. I am the chief fire officer for Oxfordshire County Council fire and rescue service and also the vice-president of the Chief Fire Officers Association.
Councillor Hanratty: Good morning. I am Councillor Dave Hanratty. I am the chair of Merseyside fire and rescue authority.
Chief Fire Officer Loach: I am Phil Loach. I am the chief fire officer of West Midlands fire service, attending as the representative of the AMFRA chief fire officers.
Councillor Edwards: I am John Edwards, chair of the West Midlands fire and rescue authority and also chair of AMFRA.
The Chair
First, I should thank people for taking the time and trouble to appear before the Committee today. We very much appreciate the wisdom that we hope you will be able to bring to our proceedings.
Lyn Brown
Q May I ask you what effect you think transferring governance to police and crime commissioners would have on the fire service? Do you fear that PCCs will seek to raise funds via the privatisation of fire services, should governance be transferred? Do you know of any colleagues refusing to collaborate under the current system, which would need a swingeing power to place them under PCCs at the behest of the Home Secretary?
Matt Wrack: We have made our views clear: we do not support the shift in governance of fire to PCCs. There are a whole number of risks in that. We think there is no appetite within the fire and rescue service for it, and there is no public appetite for it. As was touched on in the earlier session, it begins seriously to blur the lines between the role of the fire and rescue service and the role of the police service, and the people who perform those roles. We have grave concerns about that.
On privatisation, the first concern is that this is seen widely among those within the fire and rescue service as a takeover. The police service is clearly far larger in terms of personnel, resources and so on. Fire is a much smaller public service. Nevertheless, fire has a unique reputation among our communities. Among firefighters, this will be seen as a takeover. We are concerned, in terms of the funding squeeze, that the area of the two services that would come under the greatest pressure as a result of such takeovers is fire.
On collaboration, I want to make a number of quick points that arose from the previous session. First, I think there is some confusion about different types of collaboration. Operational collaboration among fire services is built into the very fabric of the fire and rescue service. It happens every single day. For example, on the question about Wales, there will be border areas where Welsh fire stations attend daily predetermined attendances in English fire and rescue service areas. That happens on a much greater scale with major incidents and so on.
There is a huge amount of experience of collaboration over many years between fire and various agencies. We are concerned that one thing that is not being addressed in the discussion here is greater collaboration with local government. Fire is currently a local government service. We are concerned that there are very few councillors here. We do now have two councillors here, but they are from metropolitan authorities. There are no councillors here to give the views of non-metropolitan fire services. A great deal of collaboration is going on in other areas, such as the fire service and the ambulance service, and the fire service and social services, but, again, there is nobody here from ambulance trusts to give evidence to the Bill Committee.
Chief Fire Officer Etheridge: From a Chief Fire Officers Association angle, the most important thing is that we fully welcome the move of fire into the Home Office. We think that that is the right thing to do for national resilience and national security, and we think that it will enhance the way in which the conversations can take place, at a very strategic level, about managing the risk to the UK. It is a very positive move.
On the governance issue regarding PCCs, CFOA’s position has been very clear: where there is a local need and a local business case, and where that will make a positive impact on efficiency, effectiveness and, most importantly, public safety, we feel it is entirely appropriate for there to be a conversation around the governance model that oversees the fire service. However, the most important thing is where that local case is made.
A patchwork of different governance structures sits over the whole UK, but it is a patchwork quilt that knits together well and operates effectively. The fire service is held in very high public esteem and we need to ensure that we can maintain that. To support what Matt from the Fire Brigades Union said, when it comes to operational delivery, we have a seamless approach of that blue light emergency delivery right across the UK. I absolutely believe that the emergency services in the UK are the best in the world.
The Chair
Q Does either Councillor Edwards or Councillor Hanratty want to say anything about the governance issue from the point of view of elected members?
Councillor Edwards: Certainly, we have no problem with collaboration. We collaborate all the time and we have been doing so for many years. The most recent example across the country is the national fire control collaborations that we have done after the national failure of the regional controls some time ago. There are many examples. As Matt said, every day the fire service collaborates with the police, the ambulance service and other services at emergency incidents. We have no problem at all with that and we are looking for better ways to collaborate all the time. The problem with a forced takeover of the governance of fire and rescue authorities is that it puts some of that collaboration in jeopardy. If we are going to be engaged in a prolonged discussion with a local PCC about a merger or a takeover—possibly a hostile takeover—it will detract from the collaborative efforts in which we are currently engaged. It will be a distraction.
An absolute concern of mine in the face of a hostile bid for the fire and rescue service is the impact on the neutrality of the fire service. We are not a law and order service. We have access to communities and individual residences where people welcome the fire service and will share a lot of information with us. We work with lots of disadvantaged young people and people who are sometimes on the edge of the criminal justice system and we bring them back into the mainstream. We would start to lose some of our impact in the event of a loss of our neutrality.
My other concern about a takeover is that, in the metropolitan area—I speak on behalf of the six mets—we are all engaged, in one way or another, in some form of devolution pathway. We are going to be in a situation next year, if we are not careful, where one part of government is telling the elected mayor that he should be looking at us and the other part is telling the PCC they should be looking at us. Our favoured route is with the combined authorities and the elected mayor—that is where we naturally fit as part of local government. We have done lots of work with our local councils in delivering a very wide health and wellbeing and prevention agenda. We have a lot in common with the police; we have a lot more in common with our local authorities and the health services. That is the track we are engaged on.
Councillor Hanratty: We have to be very careful what we wish for here. The PCCs were an experiment. We are still in the very early stages of the transition and how the PCC will work and operate. I think the police service has a lot to contend with in today’s society. When you look at the implications of the Bill on the police force, I think they just need to get on with the job. The fire and police services are unique. The fire service is very unique—we are the envy of the world. Why would you want to disrupt, disturb or disband that? We get through more thresholds than any other organisation in the public sector. The work is not just about saving lives; it is about changing lives. We have proved that time and time again. We are a very efficient and effective service and we need to get on with the job.
Regarding collaboration: we have been doing it on a daily basis for a number of years. I know the fire Minister is due to visit Merseyside and we will prove to him exactly the types of collaboration we are undertaking at the moment. It is not just with the police or the ambulance service; it is with the health service, local authorities and any other partner that will engage with us. We are at the forefront of looking at public services and how we can assist in reducing the overall burden on the health agenda. We can impact on that. We are doing a fantastic job. Why would you want to change it?
The Chair
Q Could you say a word about coterminosity and the devolution settlement in your region—our region?
Councillor Hanratty: At the moment, the boundaries of police and fire are similar. The issue we have at the moment is that the ongoing discussion about Liverpool city region includes Halton, which is part of Cheshire. The issue among local authorities is whether Halton should come into the Liverpool city region. That is not for us to get involved with. We have said we will go along with the Liverpool city region bid. If it comes to the discussion in the next term and our ask for the city region, the fire service would happily engage with those discussions, as we do at the moment.
James Berry
Q Mr Wrack, this question is to you. In your response to the spending review, you said that the Government’s modelling of the fire service was dangerous and ludicrous. You described the PCC proposals in the Bill as “parochial” and “maverick-driven”. You said they would put the public at risk. Today, again, you are saying that the proposals are dangerous. I have two questions. First, would you agree that using this kind of language is simply scaremongering and brave firefighters will keep the public safe, regardless of what model they work under?
Secondly, would you agree that these comments are driven by your view of PCCs—you made clear in the document that they are a failed model? In fact, many PCCs are doing a very good job and we will hear from some in this Committee.
Matt Wrack: In terms of the PCC model, we do not apologise: we are critical of that model. We think there is a good tradition of local government in the UK; it is a very good model, and fire sits within it. As I have said, we are slightly alarmed that no one from the elected member side is giving evidence in terms of their experience—outside the mets—of delivering a local authority fire and rescue service in the current situation.
But putting that to one side, the PCCs are in. We are now debating the question whether there should be the power for PCCs to put in a bid to take over the fire and rescue service. We are very concerned about that for a number of reasons, which we have put in our response to the consultation. That is on grounds of professionalism. I think some of my colleagues on the panel have highlighted that. The fire service is a unique brand that has pioneered collaborative working in many areas of public services, has pioneered preventive work and has pioneered community engagement. Anything that puts that at risk should be closely scrutinised, and we think there are risks in terms of the model that is proposed—the PCC takeover—of doing exactly that.
We have not got on to it, but there is also the question of the single employer model. Clearly, as a trade union, we have concerns about our members’ terms and conditions, as we are, rightly, entitled to do. There is a whole host of questions in relation to that area that have not been answered in terms of where we are with the Bill currently.
The Chair
I want to be careful about this. It is a perfectly legitimate line of questioning, but I am anxious that this session should not become about just one issue or one organisation, because there is a lot of expertise to be had, for the benefit of the Committee and therefore the Bill. It is a legitimate line of questioning, but I do not want it to dominate the proceedings. Do you want to come back on that, James?
James Berry
Q The reason why I asked the question was that they are very serious allegations. No one wants the dangerous situation that Mr Wrack described in his written documents so, Mr Etheridge, could I ask whether you agree with the FBU’s analysis as it was put in the written documents to which I have referred?
Chief Fire Officer Etheridge: Partly.
Jack Dromey
Q There are two issues. I will come back to what James said in a moment, but the first and a dominant issue is this. You have said in your evidence that you already co-operate; and that you are in favour of greater co-operation and integration, not just with police but with a range of statutory providers including local government. By the way, on that, presumably you are not opposed, therefore, to strengthening a duty to co-operate. Can we, then, come to this question? Is it the case, from what is being said by the fire service, that you are not proposing that there should be circumstances in which there could be a “hostile takeover”, to use the words of John Edwards, by a PCC of a fire service?
Chief Fire Officer Etheridge: That is a very good question. The whole issue of collaboration is, for me, very much based around common sense: what is the right thing to do for the local citizen? We can look at all the emergency services. We can look at fire combinations and collaborative working. If the challenge of the leadership is to try to zip up those organisations from the citizen to the state, it takes on a very different feel around that service delivery.
A huge amount of collaboration is going on across the UK. Lots of it goes on in a very silent way where fire is involved with things such as cadet schemes and Prince’s Trust schemes. We are involved with things such as Fire Fit campaigns in schools. We now have fire services up and down the UK that collaborate with local authorities on road safety—they oversee the road safety team. A huge amount of work goes on. So we do not necessarily need a duty to collaborate to collaborate. However, what is very important, and one thing that we therefore welcome from this duty to collaborate, is that it will, we think, have great potential to speed up the process around collaboration.
If that is supported by some effective benchmarking to understand what is going on in the service—a couple of those issues were touched on by the Public Accounts Committee and the National Audit Office in relation to the effectiveness of fire and rescue—I think there is an opportunity to smarten up the way we work with that collaboration, but I really would emphasise that when we start to talk about collaboration it seems as if we are coming from a new place, where we have never touched this before. Over one third of fire and rescue services in the UK now co-respond with ambulance services. The outcome of that for the citizens of the UK is fantastic. There are people walking around now in this country who would not be if the fire and rescue service had not got involved with that.
That takes leadership, an enormous amount of courage and a big leap of faith, from unions and the leadership of the service, and from clinical governance around ambulance services. It is a huge step, but it is one of those things where we will have a conversation in 10 years’ time saying, “I can’t believe we didn’t do that 15 years ago.” There is an enormous amount of work going on.
Chief Fire Officer Loach: I would just like to add, and bring a little bit to the discussion, that this should not be seen as just opportunistic ways to involve ourselves with other agencies. This all comes from the heart of integrated risk management planning. We look at who we should be collaborating with to reduce vulnerability from fire or fire service-related emergency incidents. We then seek to see if we can add value to other public services at the same time. So I think any actions taken going forward that would jeopardise our ability to do that should be carefully considered.
Matt Wrack: I think Mr Dromey’s final point about the possibility of a hostile takeover is one area where there is particular concern within the fire and rescue service—that, if the business case is not found to be convincing within the fire and rescue service, or other areas of local government, for example, that are currently responsible, the idea that effectively that could be forced through by the Secretary of State causes considerable concern among a number of partners in the fire and rescue service.
Jack Dromey
In the words, therefore, of Dave Etheridge, a conversation—yes; greater collaboration—yes; but you are not supporting the notion of the potential hostile takeover? Is that the view of the fire service?
Chief Fire Officer Etheridge: Are you asking me that question? Absolutely—very clearly, if there is a local need, if there is a business case, predominantly that must be around public safety. Clearly there are some police and crime commissioners who are very ambitious. There are some police and crime commissioners who come from very different angles on things. Our role as the professional leaders of the service, therefore, is to ensure that we are the guardians of the service; but we are also here to ensure that the future is very positive around the service. Therefore we are a big advocate of making sure that, if there is a business case, that is based around public safety. We have spoken already about the demarcation lines between services, and I think the Bill is clear around ensuring that a firefighter remains a firefighter.
Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)
Q I wanted to ask a question to Councillor John Edwards. Do you not agree that, for the public, it is quite helpful to have one accountable person? With the police and crime commissioners, it has really improved things for the public, having one person that they can go to with issues. I heard many of the same things when the police and crime commissioners were being mooted, from the police authorities, that I now hear from members of fire authorities. Do you not think it would be helpful for the public to have one person to go to? Also, dealing with operational issues will remain with the professional lead in the fire service. The issue is about the fire authority, not the fire officers.
Councillor Edwards: I think there is absolute sense in what you say. In my experience as a chair of a fire authority we have the best of both worlds. We have a person—the chair of the authority—to whom most of the public relate. We are the best-known member of the fire authority, for obvious reasons.
Maria Caulfield
Q Do you think most members of the public know who is on the fire authority?
Councillor Edwards: I think they do. I think certainly the correspondence that I get—directly, and the contact through social media—makes it really clear that there is a wide understanding of what the fire authority is and who chairs it; but we also have enough members on the fire authority to do the governance and accountability. We have a scrutiny committee, for instance, that holds the service and me to account. It is more difficult to do that with one person.
I am not arguing for no change. We are in a devolved area. We are embracing change. We are embracing our combined authority but embracing the potential move to an elected mayor in 2017. I am not against change, but I also think that a service like the fire and rescue service needs an accountable body of some sort to hold it to account and to provide the governance. I have seen no evidence that the police and crime commissioner could do that any more effectively than the fire and rescue authority does.
The Chair
This seems to be a theme that the Committee is anxious to discuss. I want to pursue it, but I am also aware that we only have 15 minutes left. I propose that anyone who wants to say anything about this particular theme—the accountability and visibility of the police and crime commissioner—pursues it now, and we will then hopefully move on to other things.
Carolyn Harris
Q Good morning, gentlemen. Do you think that the levels of scrutiny under the PCC model will be as rigorous as they are now?
Amanda Milling
Q I just wonder how a fire authority with individuals who are appointed to it—they are not elected by members of the public—can possibly be as democratically accountable to the public as a police and crime commissioner whose name is on the ballot paper when it comes to the election.
Lyn Brown
Q I think we perhaps have forgotten in this room that, in many cases, the general public—the people who we serve—voted against there being mayors and one person who might have this kind of control. The issue around PCCs is that there are going to be elections in May without the public, who voted against the mayoral system, knowing that mayors are going to be responsible for PCCs. Do you think that that might equate to a democratic deficit?
Craig Whittaker
Q I have two questions, if I may. First, it was mentioned earlier that there was nobody here representing the ambulance service. However, I know that Phil Loach, as well as leading the West Midlands fire service, also sits as a governor for the West Midlands ambulance service. It was said earlier that a third of collaboration happens between fire and ambulance services; does that mean two thirds does not? I wonder if he could give us a view on that. Secondly, I want to go back to Matt Wrack’s earlier comment that a PCC takeover would be dangerous. Do you all agree?
The Chair
I am going to bring Jake Berry in and then try to get some quick responses, before we move on.
Jake Berry
Q Could you say specifically how you think the current governance arrangements, in terms of there being a panel, are better, more publicly accountable and more democratic than what is proposed in the Bill?
The Chair
I know there is quite a lot in there, but it is all pretty much around the same theme. Shall I start with Councillor Edwards?
Councillor Edwards: On the appointed versus elected argument made by Amanda Milling, members of fire authorities are elected in their own local areas. I chair West Midlands fire and rescue authority. I am a member in Sandwell and was then nominated to the fire authority by Sandwell Council. We have an arrangement: there is a provision in the Act that established the fire and rescue authorities for a section 41 member—that is me. I report back to Sandwell Council on matters concerning the fire and rescue authority, and members of the public can come to Sandwell Council and ask me questions directly about what I do in that role. There is a very good record there on accountability.
The current governance arrangements have worked since 1986, when the fire authorities were put in place. I do not think anybody has had a problem with accountability in the fire and rescue service. I think everybody well understands the fire authority concept—it has been there a long time—and they know how that works. It contains scrutiny arrangements that hold the fire and rescue service to account. I do not think it is flawed.
Jake Berry
Q I think that was a specific response, but it did not actually answer my question, which was: how are the current governance arrangements better—not how long have they worked—than what is proposed in the Bill?
Councillor Edwards: I am actually not arguing for the current arrangements. All the mets are caught up in a devolution agenda. There will be change, within that agenda, in how the fire authorities work. We need to explore what that will look like with elected mayors and the combined authority, but there will be a change in governance anyway. In some ways, what I am saying is that we are going to change at some point in the very near future. Do we need an additional change in the meantime by moving to a PCC? Two changes in possibly four years might be a little bit wasteful. It is like digging a road up twice. Why would we do it? The change we want is through the combined authority and the elected mayors.
The Chair
Q We are heading for the buffers in terms of time, so I will ask each of the respondents to be as brief as they possibly can. The Committee needs to understand that they will answer the questions in their own way, and it is for them to determine how they answer; there is not time for us to come back and cross-examine them. Mr Phil Loach, is there anything that you would like to add?
Chief Fire Officer Loach: The question that was originally asked is whether scrutiny arrangements would be better, or whether they are better. I cannot answer that question. I do not know, because the PCCs may be something in the future. All I can say is that the scrutiny arrangements at the moment are effective, which should be seen by our successful track record in reducing incidents and engaging on a wider agenda.
On the specific question about ambulances, it is a rapidly developing picture. Indeed, the health agenda has come up as probably the single most important agenda on which the fire service should be engaging, not only to complement the reduction in its own incidents, but to contribute to a wider vulnerability agenda. Although it may be one third, half or up to two thirds, it is a rapidly developing picture. The Association of Ambulance Chief Executives recently updated its position to support things such as co-responding and wider engagement, and we should seek to keep open the widest channels of collaboration to allow us to engage not only through the ambulance service, but through social care in local authorities as well.
Councillor Hanratty: As I said earlier, I think we have to be careful about what we wish for. At the present moment, the dialogue that we have with the PCCs is very good, very constructive and very forward thinking. Our doors are open for discussions with any of the public services. That has been proven, and again I defer back to the Minister.
When you have a major incident, as we had with the floods up in Cumbria, Lancashire and Yorkshire, Merseyside fire and rescue service is there to assist. When we had the two major incidents in Cheshire and the one in Didcot, Merseyside fire and rescue service was there to assist. We are a highly professional organisation—a first-class emergency service.
The problem we have now is that all our staff are looking over their shoulder and thinking about whether their job is going to be in jeopardy. Morale is low because of that. We need to get on with the job. Our actions speak for themselves.
The accountability is a lot better than it used to be. I could ask the same question of the PCCs. How many people voted for the PCC? There is a question for you. Are they known within the local community? That is another question for you. Do they need to have a higher profile? Yes, of course they do. Do the chairs of fire authorities, or the fire authorities as organisations, need to have a better profile? They probably do, but our communication, organisation and collaboration work is absolutely first class. I invite any of you to come along to Merseyside, and to the other metropolitan authorities, to see the fantastic work that we do.
Chief Fire Officer Etheridge: I have a couple of points. First, a point was made earlier about the members of fire authorities not being directly elected, but being appointed. For the benefit of the Committee, there are 14 county council fire and rescue services in the UK, so those councils have a fire and rescue service within them. I am in one within Oxfordshire, so the members that oversee Oxfordshire fire and rescue service are directly elected. I have a scrutiny panel, really, of 62 elected members. Believe me, I am scrutinised and my performance is scrutinised. Of course, the service produces a performance report and we are required to put our annual statement of assurances in to central Government.
The key thing for me here—this is certainly the view of the Chief Fire Officers Association—is that some of the elements that came out of the National Audit Office, the Public Accounts Committee and our current work with the Home Office on the reform agenda on openness and transparency need to be supported by an effective set of benchmarks. When they are established, it will be lot easier for services to be held to account and for individual chief fire officers to be held to account, regardless of the governance model over the top of them. We are certainly keen to make sure that the fire and rescue service covering the UK is open and that its performance can be challenged.
Matt Wrack: I have three quick points. First, on the current model versus what is proposed, we have disagreements with a whole range of politicians on many occasions, but we have political balance in the current system, both at a local level and nationally in terms of fire service employers. That allows a lot of collaborative work.
I want to pick up on one other point that people have made about some of the groundbreaking work that has been done on co-responding. That has been pioneered through joint work between the Fire Brigades Union and the national employers, without any involvement by central Government at all. That is being done currently. It is groundbreaking and it is possibly the biggest change in the fire service in our lifetime. That is being done under the current arrangements.
On the argument that police and crime commissioners would be more accountable, the proposal is that someone would stand for PCC election without responsibility for fires, so people would be voting for someone to be a PCC without responsibility for fires, but they may subsequently take over that responsibility and, by the way, they may do so whether the local community agrees or does not agree with it. Again, it is not just the views of those in the fire and rescue service but the views of local communities that should be taken into account in any such discussion.
Gerald Jones
Q My question is about any concerns that your members and staff may have about the perceived lack of independence from the police. I am assuming there are concerns. If there are, could you highlight the key ones?
Matt Wrack: That view has been expressed very clearly by the union, but it is a very big concern for firefighters at a local level who, every single day, do pioneering work that has been developed probably over the past 15 years, as was touched on earlier. Youth engagement and fire safety inspections are now much wider. There are some fantastic trials, for example in Greater Manchester, where the fire service is working closely with social services and health. That means getting access into people’s homes—I think Steve White from the Police Federation touched on this earlier—and failing to recognise the very distinct roles puts that at risk. The idea that a single employer with a single chief executive does not blur those lines misses some serious points.
Chief Fire Officer Loach: There is an operational uncertainty in terms of neutrality and impartiality. We deal with vulnerable people and we need to make sure that that remains unfettered. From a governance or strategic management perception, we need to understand and be assured that budgets would remain separate and that the fire service would be funded according to its integrated risk management plan, not necessarily on the grounds of affordability against policing.
Councillor Hanratty: This is about the trust for individuals who are going into a person’s home. Last year, the fire service nationally carried out around 670,000 home fire safety checks. In Merseyside, it carried out about 50,000. If there is any suggestion that we are reliant on the police, we may not get through those thresholds. We know that the risk elements for people are changing. They are living longer, there is more independent living and there are more mental health issues. If we do not get across those thresholds, those people will be more vulnerable and will become a higher risk, and they will be more prone to be caught up in a fire and a fire death. We need to prevent that as best we can.
The Chair
I am afraid that brings us to the end of the time allotted to the Committee to ask questions. I thank the witnesses for their forbearance, the wisdom they have imparted to us and their evidence.
Policing and Crime Bill (Second sitting)
(8 years, 9 months ago)
Public Bill CommitteesRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Chair
Q 45 We will now hear evidence from Barnardo’s, the Children’s Society and the NSPCC. We have until 2.45 pm for this part of the session.
I thank the witnesses for coming along and providing us with the benefit of your advice. We really appreciate it. Perhaps you could introduce yourselves, starting with Iryna.
Iryna Pona: I am Iryna Pona, and I am a policy adviser at the Children’s Society. I lead on our policy work with vulnerable adolescents.
Cassandra Harrison: Hello, I am Cassandra Harrison, and I am deputy director for policy and public affairs at Barnardo’s.
Alan Wardle: I am Alan Wardle, head of policy and public affairs at the NSPCC.
Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)
Q I will ask an open-ended question. Is there anything more that the Bill could do that would prevent child exploitation online?
Alan Wardle: It is really good that the Bill covers child sexual exploitation, although it is a bit of a missed opportunity in that there is only one measure, which relates to the livestreaming of child abuse—that is obviously a very serious matter. In terms of the prevention agenda, there are some things that could be done on child abduction warning notices, which Cassie can talk about in particular. In terms of child sexual exploitation, we are increasingly seeing that so much of this is done online. It is about understanding how children increasingly live their lives. The child sexual exploitation plan brought out last year made no real mention of the online elements. Again, it is about thinking about how we can better integrate the online and offline aspects, particularly with local police forces. We are concerned that, although the capacity of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre has quadrupled recently, and it is doing some great work, local police forces do not necessarily have the skills or expertise to be able to deal with some of these crimes. Making sure that each police force has a dedicated online team that has the skills and capacity to look better at these issues would help to prevent child sexual exploitation. I am happy to talk about that in more detail later if that would be helpful.
Lyn Brown
Q Who will talk to us about it in more detail? Cassandra was it?
Cassandra Harrison: I can talk to you about some of the prevention measures that we would like to see. It is not specifically about online abuse. Like the NSPCC, we welcome the fact that the Bill is closing the loophole in relation to online streaming. Child abduction warning notices are used by the police to collect and document evidence in order to dissuade people they suspect of grooming children from contacting those children by saying they have no permission to associate with them. The effectiveness of those notices is limited because breaching them is not a criminal offence. The Government responded to this and created sexual risk orders and sexual harm prevention orders.
The Solicitor General, in the passage of the Serious Crime Act 2015, committed to reviewing the effectiveness of the notices, including how they interact with child abduction warning notices. The process is supposed to be that when child abduction warning notices are breached, things are escalated by the police, who can use one of the legally enforceable orders. However, there is no clear indication at present as to whether that is happening in practice. Some anecdotal evidence we have suggests that that is quite patchy and in some cases no further action is being taken, which is quite concerning. We would like the Government to use the Bill as an opportunity to commit to report publicly on the use of those different measures, and to make sure that they are working effectively to protect children. What we all want is early intervention and prevention of this terrible type of abuse, which we know can have a terrible impact on children.
Iryna Pona: To add to what Cass has said about child abduction warning notices, we would also like to see provisions in the Bill to enable police to use child abduction warning notices in relation to vulnerable 16 and 17-year-olds, because 16 and 17-year-olds are a separate group. They are very vulnerable to being sexually abused. At the same time, because legally they can consent to sexual relationships, they are often seen and responded to in a different way. Practitioners and police are not always sure how they can best protect them.
We believe that the Bill should address the gap in the law that says that police cannot use child abduction warning notices to disrupt predatory individuals who are targeting vulnerable young people aged 16 and 17. Currently, child abduction warning notices can be used only in relation to a very small group of 16 and 17-year-olds—those who are in the care of the local authorities, but only those who are under care orders under section 31 of the Children Act 1989. The majority of young people aged 16 and 17 who are in care are looked-after children under section 20 of the Children Act, so the majority are not covered and are very vulnerable to being targeted.
In addition, we know that young people seek help from local authorities because they are homeless. We estimate that about 2,800 young people are accommodated by local authorities every year, often under section 20, but not under section 31 or other provisions, because sometimes local authorities do not accommodate them as looked-after children, so for years they live in hostels and other types of accommodation. We know from our practice that they are very vulnerable to being targeted for sexual exploitation and police have very limited powers to disrupt that exploitation.
The sexual risk orders that Cass mentioned are very helpful but they require a high evidential level of proof. The guidance on sexual risk orders says that child abduction warning notices are complementary to sexual risk orders and can be used as speedy early intervention tools, so not being able to use them for vulnerable 16 and 17-year-olds is a big gap that it is to be hoped the Bill will address.
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
Q You mentioned in passing the College of Policing, and perhaps the interpretation of how to put this legislation into effect might vary from police force to police force. How serious an issue is that?
Alan Wardle: We think that it is worrying. In particular, as I mentioned, in the online space there is a huge variation in how police forces respond to this. The report last year by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary into online child sexual exploitation found that over half of police investigations were either inadequate or required improvement, which we think is not really good enough. It is quite often forgotten that what happens in some of these delays: computers which were seized had not been examined for up to six to 12 months, and in some cases that have been followed up, those delays meant that more children were abused in real time.
There is a serious issue. Particularly with the nature of CSE and online CSE, that whole idea that a victim, the offender and the police force are all in the same area is increasingly untenable. How do we ensure that police forces are not operating as individual businesses, and all have the best technology? Are they procuring that in the best way? How do we ensure that the best technological brains are helping the police to identify and track these children and offenders? The variety in performance across the country, in terms of how the police are dealing with online offences, presents real challenges—we do not underestimate the challenges for the police, who are making a lot of effort, but the pace at which technology is moving and offenders are operating mean that they are always playing catch-up.
We need to be much smarter about how police forces are resourcing each other, and crossing and supporting each other in terms of sharing best practice, technology and tools that identify risk, because we hear from forces that some of the tools are not being used for cost reasons. There is a lot of irregular or, I should say, uneven practice across police forces that needs to be levelled out on online grooming and the way in which online criminals are targeting vulnerable children.
Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)
Q Two related questions. First, Alan, you made reference to the importance of prevention. For example, I have worked closely with the Dot Com Children’s Foundation on prevention strategy and primary schools helping young people to avoid risk and harm. Are there any additional proposals in the Bill that you think we might focus on in terms of the prevention agenda?
Secondly, you made reference to the HMIC report and the uneven approach across the police service to tackling the obscenity of child sexual exploitation and abuse—there is now a great national will to do so. Will the three of you say something further about your views on the resource allocated to that? I am aware of the tremendous pressures on the police service, with the West Midlands here today increasing its public protection unit from 300 to 800 to cope, but it is still struggling. Are there points that you would like to make to us about resource and more evenness—your word—of approach in the next stages?
Alan Wardle: I will take the second question first. One of the issues is that you need specialist staff online, but increasingly front-line officers need to have an understanding of how online permeates every aspect of how children live their lives. A couple of weeks ago, we heard of a case where a girl had taken a picture of herself—she was under 16—and put it on Instagram. There was a boy at the school, and one of his friends got it and started looking at the picture, sharing it from his phone—we know it was not the boy. The phone was then captured. Because no children were deemed at risk, that was then put in a file where he will probably not get it for six to 12 months—this is a 14-year-old boy. At that time in his life, it is massive. The police do not really have any understanding of the impact.
These things need to be dealt with in real time, so, rather than that, how do you deal with that child in that instance? It is not necessarily that we are saying you need thousands more police officers; it is more about how you ensure that police officers, particularly front-line police officers, have the skills for and understanding about online, how young people are living their lives and how those two are enmeshed and embedded. If you are able to deal with some of those things in a quicker, more responsive way, assessing risk properly and dealing with these situations, that could be a way of freeing up police resources.
There are resource issues, but it is not necessarily a case of throwing a huge number more of police officers at it; it is also about ensuring that, as well as having specialist police officers at CEOP and the local level, the front-line police officers understand the online threat and how young people are living their lives, because for them there is no real distinction between the on and offline worlds.
Jack Dromey
Q And on the prevention agenda?
Alan Wardle: On the prevention agenda, I do not necessarily think that the Bill is the right place for this—I am not sure. There are not necessarily many legislative solutions, other than the ones that my colleagues have talked about. We argue, as a lot of organisations do, that statutory personal, social and health education is a really important preventive measure. It helps children to understand issues such as consent and to talk about topical issues that have been in the press recently such as sexting. That would be helpful, but I am not sure whether it is within the Bill’s remit. Police forces should have a much greater understanding of the nature of this crime. Speaking to and engaging with young people and understanding at a local level what children are worried about and what concerns them is one of the most important ways of preventing CSE.
Cassandra Harrison: If I could pick up the points about prevention and resourcing, the police spend a huge amount of money—I understand that it was estimated to be about £1 billion in 2015—investigating allegations of child abuse. If we were more effective in prevention, perhaps we could reroute some of that money and save it in the longer term. Of course, such things are always easier said than done. As Alan said, it is really important for police forces to engage in that kind of early intervention and prevention work.
One of the things that I would like to take the opportunity to raise is harmful sexual behaviour. If prevention is core to tackling CSE—and we all believe that it is—we should look much more closely at how the system deals with children who display sexually harmful behaviour. There has been a recent surge in awareness of that. The internet and technology have played a role in making it more visible and in increasing its prevalence through access to online pornography, for example. Some of that behaviour is not a cause of concern—for example, sexting between teenagers who are in a consensual relationship—but there is a wide spectrum. At the extreme end is peer-on-peer sexual abuse, where children exploit other children and there is an age gap or a power imbalance—for example, in a gang context.
There is a significant overlap of the risk factors and characteristics of the children who display harmful sexual behaviour and those who are victims of child sexual exploitation. They include low self-esteem, learning disabilities and a history of abuse or trauma. It is estimated that about a third of cases of child sexual abuse are committed by young people—children—under 18, which is a significant proportion of that type of abuse. A lack of access to support can work counter to early intervention. We should make sure those children get the support they need so they do not go on to abuse others later in their childhood or as adults. We would really like to see Ministers use this Bill as an opportunity to give that point greater consideration and think about what role the police can play in that.
Carolyn Harris (Swansea East) (Lab)
Q Do you believe that there are enough resources—training, education and the latest technology—to help tackle CSE at a local level?
Iryna Pona: May I answer that and add to what Alan and Cassandra said about prevention and resources? One of the issues we have seen through our work and the policy work we have done is that there is a lack of data. The police need to know where to target their resources so they are used efficiently. For our latest report—“Old enough to know better?”—we asked police forces through a freedom of information request how many 16 and 17-year-olds they have recorded on their system as at risk of sexual exploitation. In those cases, they are able to intervene early, and they have intelligence about how children can be targeted.
The responses we received were very diverse; there was no consistency. Only six police forces could give us real numbers, and some refused. Some of the numbers we were given were in three digits and other were just two-digit numbers. The discrepancy in the systems for flagging and assessing children is an issue that can perhaps be addressed by giving better guidance to police forces about how those young people should be flagged on their systems and how those cases should be followed up from identification and early intervention through all the stages to sentencing. When those young people turn 18, there is an issue of how they are passed on to services for vulnerable adults and supported appropriately in a way that meets their needs. That is one of the issues that can help the police to allocate their resources and know how much they need to target different areas.
The Chair
Q Anything else on resources?
Alan Wardle: Again, I think it is a question of how resources are allocated and prioritised. There is an issue we have come across, again, with registered sex offenders, where there was a company providing monitoring software for registered sex offenders, called Securus Software, which had to withdraw from the market because police forces were not prepared to pay the £40 a go that it costs to monitor a registered sex offender. We would say £40 is pretty small beer; if someone is a registered sex offender that money would go to monitoring the websites they are on. It can look at patterns of words, to see if they are moving back into reoffending behaviour. That is one prevention piece that is very important: how do we ensure that people who have already offended, who are serving community sentences and suspended sentences, do not continue to reoffend?
We do hear of some cases where there is a bit of a false economy going on: to save a small amount of money and not to monitor sex offenders—the risks that that is storing up are vast. We know the police are under pressure; but how do we make smart choices so that such technology is shared across police forces, and so that they know what is most effective, what is working well and what is good at managing risk? Those are the sort of things that we hear quite a lot of. It is about how to make sure that those decisions are being made in a sensible way, across the country.
Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con)
Q Do you welcome the additional support, or the additional provision of the super-complaints system detailed within the Bill; and is it a system where you could see yourself triggering a complaint against a force or a police officer?
Iryna Pona: I think it is welcome that the Bill aims to ensure that the complaints system is transparent, and that when you make complaints against the police you are informed of all the different stages that your complaint is at. I think it is a welcome focus. I think it would also be helpful to ensure the same thing in relation to victims of crimes. Currently there are huge discrepancies between different police forces and from case to case—for example in how much the victims of sexual offences are informed about the investigation of their case. It would be good if the changes made for complaints could be mirrored in relation to victims.
Jake Berry
Q Is it specifically the ability of third parties to trigger a complaint?
Cassandra Harrison: I have to say I am not familiar with all the detail of what is being proposed, but, as Iryna said, there should be greater transparency, and if third party organisations like mine had the ability to trigger complaints where we thought it appropriate, when we were working with young people and we felt they were not properly served, we would welcome that.
Jake Berry
Q Basically the idea is that if you take things like, for example, the outrage that we saw in Rotherham around the CSE, where there were lots of individuals who were treated very badly, it would enable a third party with an overview to speak to all the victims and trigger a complaint on their behalf, rather than having not to. Is that something you would be keen to be involved in?
Cassandra Harrison: It sounds sensible. I suppose, thinking about it at the moment, my only caveat would be that I would want to be very sure that the young people and children involved would be happy, in terms of the kind of participation that was being proposed.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Karen Bradley)
Q I have a specific point for Iryna, but I want to say welcome to all three of you, whom I work with lots on a daily basis. Your work, Iryna, with the Children’s Society, particularly on missing children, is incredibly valuable; I thank you for all you have done on that.
I wanted to ask something specific about something that struck me as you were talking about child abduction notices. Obviously, the Children’s Society has had a big campaign about 16 and 17-year-olds, and you will know that section 2 of the Child Abduction Act 1984 is clear about the fact that it applies to 16-year-olds and under, not to anyone older, and that is the reason for the current position. I take the point that you make, but I wonder whether you can envisage any situations—I am thinking particularly of honour-based situations—where a child abduction notice issued about a 16 or 17-year-old who had left home of their own volition, perhaps because of honour-based problems, might end up being detrimental to the child. Do you have any thoughts on that?
Iryna Pona: I think the child abduction warning notices will be informed by intelligence from all the different people who are involved in the safeguarding of young persons, so the police will be able to decide whether they will issue such warning notices if they also know that there are concerns around someone who maybe left home because of an honour issue. But we are talking about some of the vulnerable young people who will have a range of different agencies involved in their lives, and those agencies would know about different safeguarding concerns around young persons. So, hopefully, when a child—a 16 or 17-year-old—left, fleeing from home because of particular issues, the police would know those concerns and would not disrupt things. It depends on where the young person will go and they should be able to provide protection to that young person.
Karen Bradley
Q With honour-based violence, though, the evidence I hear—the testimony from those people who have escaped that honour-based violence—is that often the police did not understand the threat they were under. We know from the HMIC reports that there is a lack of understanding by the police of honour-based violence, and it needs to be addressed. We know of some of the most tragic cases, where the police made the child go back to the parents, even though the child had made the decision to leave and was legally able to do so. I have concerns around that, so perhaps we should talk outside the room about how such notices operate.
Iryna Pona: It might be useful to have guidance in that particular case, where we are talking about vulnerable young people, where there are safeguarding concerns and concerns about how police and local authorities can work together to provide the best response, including when and how they can use child abduction warning notices.
Jack Dromey
Q Two of you touched on this issue earlier on. Sara Thornton, who will give evidence later this afternoon, spoke last year of the two new challenges to the police of vulnerability and information, and, crucially, information sharing to spot vulnerability and protect the vulnerable.
It has been raised with us that there are problems about co-operation. For example, sometimes the NHS is not always what it should be in terms of co-operation on data sharing. What is your view on that, because it is a key issue? And might this Bill be an appropriate vehicle to take further steps on that?
Alan Wardle: Yes. That is a very important point. Identifying the number of children who have been sexually exploited has been challenging, and it is difficult to do so from the way that police statistics are collected, which will not identify children who have been sexually exploited. One of the things that we do know is the impact that grooming and sexual exploitation can have on the lives of young people and children. You will have seen the impact on young girls primarily in places such as Rotherham, but so few of those children get any support to help them to recover from that abuse.
Actually, there is the link from that to the health service. How can we ensure that the police have duties to ensure that information about who those young people are is shared with local clinical commissioning groups, for instance, because we would argue that all children who have been groomed should get the therapeutic support to help them to recover from that abuse? Most people think that those girls who had been groomed automatically get therapy counselling; very few of them do, which is shocking, frankly, given what they have been through.
We think that better data collection and data sharing about these children across the public services, to ensure that they are identified and better supported to help them to recover from the trauma they have been through, is absolutely vital.
Jack Dromey
Q There is a duty to co-operate in the Bill, in another context. That is something you might want to give consideration to, in terms of further representations to us.
Alan Wardle: Particularly around the data aspects of that, yes.
Mims Davies (Eastleigh) (Con)
Q I was just wondering about the data sharing and the duty to co-operate, and about what is appropriate and how children end up being exploited in a particular situation. Is schooling an area where you feel there should be better information about what is appropriate and where data should be shared when inappropriate behaviour has been found, perhaps within the school community in lessons?
Cassandra Harrison: Absolutely. Schools have a really vital role to play in protecting children from sexual exploitation. We know that they are the one universal service that sees pretty much all children, apart from those outside mainstream education.
It is really important that they can understand what is appropriate for them to share and for their role—it is schools, but also police and the health service, which has also been mentioned. In addition to any legislative proposals that would help to strengthen information sharing, which I would really welcome, we should not underestimate some of the cultural challenges, which are some of the hardest ones to get over. There already are certain duties, but making sure that those are really enacted in practice and giving people the understanding and confidence to be able to know when to do something is a really important part of that.
Mims Davies
Q Do think this is a mainstream issue, with inappropriate behaviour coming into mainstream, and schools, charities and people such as you—and the police at the extreme end—are picking up the pieces? Do you think in the Bill we can make a real change on that and get action earlier?
Cassandra Harrison: Certain stereotypes about victims of child sexual exploitation and who is affected have been quite prevalent, whereas actually we know from our work on the ground—last year, over 3,000 young people were affected by sexual exploitation—that this happens to children from all different kinds of backgrounds and communities, so we need to be careful to make sure we understand that, in your words, it is a mainstream issue, particularly, as Alan said, with the increase of online abuse. We carried out some research with our services recently that showed that this is now really affecting all children, because all children use the internet as part of their daily lives.
In terms of what might be able to be done, I think some of what you are hinting at is around sexting and things like that, which schools are increasingly seeing but perhaps they are not sure how to deal with it. I have already talked a bit about harmful sexual behaviour and making sure we have an appropriate response to those children, and I think providing greater clarity to schools—I think some work is already underway—to help them to be really confident about what kind of situation is concerning, and whether they need to take action in terms of the police or whether they can just deal with it in the school environment in an appropriate way, with the involvement of parents as appropriate, is important.
Alan Wardle: The sharing of that information is key so that schools do have that. Cassie is right that on the one hand it is an issue that affects children from all sorts of communities, but we do know that children who are particularly vulnerable are often targeted, whether that is within the school and whether with adults and whether those are children in care or perhaps, as we often see in places like Rotherham, girls who are going off the tracks a little bit at a certain stage in their life.
So how do schools, GPs and so on identify those children who are most at risk and then share that information and communicate that across the public services so that there is a joined-up response in local areas? Local areas need to see what types of behaviours are worrying them—is it grooming by certain groups or communities, or are there particular issues with peer-to-peer abuse within schools?—and make sure there is a tailored response to each of those. But actually one of the key things is making sure that information is shared across to ensure that we are seeking to best protect those children at an early stage rather than waiting for it to escalate to some of the problems we have seen in other places.
Cassandra Harrison: My understanding is that where children themselves have displayed harmful sexual behaviour but they are under 10 years old, because they are under the age of criminal responsibility that information is not necessarily shared, so if an incident happens when they are teenagers, the fact that there were incidents at an earlier age might not be picked up. That is something that might want to be considered.
Liz Saville Roberts
Q You mentioned schooling and medical services, but do you think that providers of digital platforms have a greater role to play in prevention and in sharing data?
Alan Wardle: Yes, as a short way of saying that. A lot of the tech companies are doing a lot of good work, particularly around ensuring that, for instance, a proliferation of illegal images of children is not able to be sent through their networks and so on. However, we do think that more can be done. There are some technologies that are available: anti-grooming technology, for instance, which some social network sites have.
There is a real lack of transparency among some of the big tech companies about how they moderate their sites, how many people have been groomed, how many images are being shared and how long it takes to respond to these things. So we know that they are doing things, but there is a lack of transparency. Again, openness about that data and sharing that data would be very helpful so that we would be better able to respond from a policy perspective to what is going on online, because that is where most children are. A lot of the big players—the Facebooks and the like—are the good guys. They are the ones who are around the table, having the conversation. More of the problems are with the unregulated sites in places such as eastern Europe, where it is very difficult for law enforcement to get to, and with ensuring that we get information about them and help parents and children to know what is going on so that they are better able to protect themselves.
The Chair
Q We still have a bit of time left, so it might be helpful to ask whether there are any issues in the Bill that you have concerns about and about which we have not asked any questions. Is there anything you want to raise with us that we have not had the foresight to anticipate?
Cassandra Harrison: I wanted to raise an issue that is not currently in the Bill but is something I would like to be considered. It is in relation to taxi licensing. The Bill clarifies and streamlines the system for the licensing of alcohol premises, and under the Licensing Act 2003 authorities that carry out licensing for premises that sell alcohol are under a duty, when carrying out their functions, to promote objectives that include protecting children from harm. We think there is a strong case for creating an equivalent duty for authorities that license taxis and minicabs.
We know from our direct work with children and young people that taxis often feature in CSE cases, that they are sometimes used to traffic children around towns and around the country. In some cases, taxi drivers have been perpetrators of CSE; the vast majority have not, of course, but they might have seen something. Taxi drivers have real potential to be our eyes and ears in the community but they often do not know exactly what to look for or might not feel that it is their role to intervene.
A lot of taxi licensing is very much down to local discretion, and placing a duty equivalent to the existing one for premises that sell alcohol could drive CSE prevention within taxi licensing, to drive some of the good practice that already exists. For example, in cities such as Oxford they have information when people apply for a taxi licence. When taxi drivers have to sit their local knowledge test they are asked about CSE issues and are given information and procedures. That would really drive that, and hopefully make it much more consistent across the country. It could have real benefit.
Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley) (Con)
Q It seems to me that with all the issues concerning children and young people—CSE and some of the other things you have spoken about—to help to prevent some of the horrific things that happen there is a plethora of things that will form a package. We obviously have the Policing and Crime Bill, which you are here to talk about today, but there is also the Investigatory Powers Bill going through. Do you think that as a package that is good thing, or not?
Alan Wardle: I should say that Ministers Bradley and Penning are both hugely committed to the issue and a huge amount of work has been going on. One of the challenges is that the pace at which things are happening, at which children are living their lives, at which technology is moving and at which some of these horrific things are being uncovered, means that it is a real challenge for Ministers, for law enforcement and for everyone to try to keep up with what is going on. So I suppose I should contextualise what I said earlier with that recognition.
One thing about the Investigatory Powers Bill about which we expressed concerns before but which, I think, has been rectified, is that from our perspective what is vital—putting aside the counter-terrorism aspects and the serious organised crime aspects—is that the police have the capacity fully to investigate the cases and take them where the evidence leads them. Whether it is grooming gangs or people who are trading illegal images of children, we know that they are very complex crimes, most of which are committed online. Blocking off avenues for the police to pursue will have a hugely detrimental effect on vulnerable children.
I would commend the way the Bill is set up at the moment, having gone through pre-legislative scrutiny from the serious organised crime aspect, particularly provisions looking at internet connection records. I think it is vital that that can be done. The NSPCC runs ChildLine and has to protect, on average, about 10 children a day whose lives are in immediate danger. So, selfishly from our perspective, we need to ensure that the police have the capacity to trace IP addresses for children whose lives are in immediate danger.
We think the Bill is fit for purpose to do that. In order to keep children safe it is important not to undermine the police’s ability to investigate fully these crimes that are very complex and often perpetrated by organised criminals.
The Chair
If there are no further questions, I thank the witnesses for their evidence, which has been really helpful. We do appreciate it. We can now move on to the next panel, the members of which are already here.
Examination of Witnesses
Winston Roddick, David Jamieson, David Lloyd and Vera Baird gave evidence.
The Chair
Q We will now hear oral evidence from the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners. There are several police and crime commissioners here. We have until 3.15 pm for this session. Several of the witnesses are probably known to many of us, but for the sake of the record, could they introduce themselves, starting with Winston Roddick?
Winston Roddick: That is my name, and I am the police and crime commissioner for north Wales. I am also the chair of the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners, and chair of the police reform and transformation board.
Vera Baird: I am Vera Baird, police and crime commissioner for Northumbria. I am chair of the supporting victims and reducing harm strategic group of the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners, which I hope you find impressive for the length of its title, if nothing more.
David Jamieson: I am David Jamieson, police and crime commissioner for the west midlands.
David Lloyd: I am David Lloyd, police and crime commissioner for Hertfordshire. I am also vice-chair of the working in partnership to improve policing board on the APPC, and the resources panel of the APPC, and I chair the emergency services collaboration working group.
The Chair
Thank you. You are very welcome and we look forward to an informative and productive session. Jack Dromey.
Jack Dromey
I must take the opportunity, Winston, given your announcement last week, to wish you all the best for the future, following your distinguished service.
Winston Roddick: Thank you.
Jack Dromey
Q May I ask you two related questions? First, the proposal to allow chief officers to designate powers on volunteers has been described by one of your number as an attempt to get “policing on the cheap”. In the light of the police funding and workforce reductions since 2010, do you have any concerns about that area of the Bill? Secondly, what issues are raised by the proposal to arm directly employed and volunteer PCSOs with CS spray?
Winston Roddick: On the first question, with regard to volunteers, I disagree strongly with the view that you have just repeated, which you heard from another person. The idea behind volunteers is not to buy policing on the cheap. It has one effect, which is bringing the people closer to the police and involving the public more in the police. Many members of the public feel that they want to contribute and have something worth while to contribute, and the police should not stand in the way of them volunteering to do so. I have empirical experience of meeting the people of north Wales on an almost daily basis with regard to their interests in policing, and many of them have expertise that they can share with the police.
Jack Dromey
Q The point is very well made. There is a long and honourable tradition going back 150 years of special constables, and of excellent work done by neighbourhood watches and police and crime panels. The people are the police, and the police are the people. Therefore, the role of the citizen is key. Can I press you or any of your colleagues further? Is the proposal to arm volunteer PCSOs with CS spray appropriate?
Winston Roddick: I have serious reservations about it. I speak only personally; my colleagues will express whether they have reservations. I think that the proposal raises points of principle about arming members of the public to do something by the use of arms, which goes further than the common law principle of acting in reasonable self-defence. You have to be very careful before you extend the right of one person to attack another by the use of any means. If we introduced it, it would certainly need tight regulation and tight teaching about how such implements should be used.
The Chair
Q The other witnesses might have a different take on that.
David Lloyd: In Hertfordshire, we do not call them volunteers; we call them specials. In the fire service they have a different name for it. It is quite normal to have volunteers working alongside; the tradition of having special constables in the Met is just as old as the Met itself. That must be right. Surely it must be for the chief officer to decide whether or not those people are able to do it. In my home village of Flamstead, our policing, broadly, is done by specials. Everyone in Flamstead is perfectly happy about that. To suggest that such people are not able to have the same training would be to misunderstand the role. Provided that the right training is in place, there should be no problem whatsoever.
Clearly, if a special turns up once every three months—there are not many who do—you may well not wish them to have exactly the same capabilities, but otherwise the specials in my village are out every single night. They are doing exactly the same job as a regular.
David Jamieson: Mr Howarth, I do not think that there is a problem with specials. They have a fairly long history and a well-defined role. I think that what was being suggested is that volunteers should come in at other levels. I have volunteers; I have 20 youth commissioners who have volunteered to give part of their time, and they do excellent work helping me keep in touch with people under 30, for a start. Then there are other people who work in communities. I know that in Jack Dromey’s constituency we have some excellent people who work very closely with the police as volunteers, doing a lot of work to bring security to the streets. That sort of volunteering work is the essence of what good communities are all about, and the police should give it every support.
Where I would have a problem—this is where I would be listening very carefully to what my chief constable said—is if we were bringing in volunteers to help with complex negotiations and investigation. I would have some difficulty seeing how we could keep levels of professionalism and security of information going if volunteers were involved behind the scenes in the actual process of investigating crimes. That is much more difficult. If my chief constable was going down that road, I would be very interested to hear a convincing argument as to how that was the right way to use volunteers.
Vera Baird: May I suggest that it is better to park specials —about which there is probably not much argument—and to concentrate on the essence of the Bill, which is to give policing powers to volunteers who are not specials? We have lots of volunteers and they are excellent—from neighbourhood watch to court observers and people who scrutinise the way in which cases have been run, especially rape cases. If they have not succeeded, we try to make constructive commentary about it. We have speed watch and a lot of very welcome and serious contribution from volunteers, but they do not have police powers.
What is now proposed is to safeguard a core of police powers and to keep them for police and police only, but it is a very small core. It is about arrest and stop and search, and all the rest will be available to be allocated to anyone who comes into the ranks of volunteers on any basis decided by the chief officer.
I have to make one point very clear: at a time when there have been such significant cuts to policing—in Northumbria we have lost 1,000 members of staff, plus almost 800 officers—bringing in volunteers with police powers is not going to be adding value, which is what volunteers are usually for; it is going to be the substitution of volunteers for people who have historically been contracted to do the job.
They will be people who are not paid, who are not contracted, who have no disciplinary link over them, who have no processes to go through, who are supervised in what way we do not know, who will not be supervised or overseen by the IPCC, and yet who will be able to have every power except the core ones. For instance, they will be able to execute warrants on houses, which means they will be able to break into houses to execute a warrant. If this power is given, they will be able to detain people for 30 minutes, as PCSOs can do now, though they will merely be volunteers and not contracted. They may be able to caution people and to take down their first account of something they are accused of. Presumably they will be able to strip search people. They will be able to exercise the discretion that a police officer does now, to decide whether an offence may have occurred and whether it should be investigated and what should follow—all of this without any of the contractual supervisory power that there is over somebody who is employed.
I do not want to call it policing on the cheap. I think it has to be thought through very carefully and, if it is to proceed at all, it has to go extremely slowly and incrementally. It is not going to be the case that a chief officer will know each and every volunteer in order to give them appropriate powers. How would that work, anyway? The public need to know exactly what powers those who have authority over them have. It would be giving powers by the chief officer to a category of volunteers. The average volunteer in Northumbria did 19 hours a year in 2014, so these are not going to be people who are well known, yet if they are in a category they will be given powers.
There is pressure on chief officers now because of the loss of staff—there is no doubt about that. If you are in a position where you have to go out after Raul Moat and you have 10 half-trained volunteers or nobody, of course you are going to have to have resort to them. It is a shame that chief officers have been put in that position, but they have been, so I suggest a very careful and slow process to avoid substitution for really qualified contracted people whom we have lost.
James Cleverly (Braintree) (Con)
Q Can any of you see an opportunity—some of these issues were brought up by our previous witnesses—in areas that are very fast moving, particularly in the digital space, for example with social media, where there is a lot of activity that I and, I suspect, many warranted police officers find bewildering? For example, could subject-specific experts be brought in to volunteer alongside warranted officers and give the additional knowledge that it would be very difficult to have permanently embedded in a force area?
David Lloyd: Exactly that. In Hertfordshire only the other week I was at an awards evening, next to a special who had been brought in specifically because of his IT skills. He has far greater IT skills than anyone in the constabulary and does that for free. He sees that as giving something back to society. It is very helpful to have, and you can dip in and out and use those skills in a specialist way, because it is no longer the case that if you sign up as a special you have to go out on the streets arresting people; you can be there and working in those specialist areas.
I disagree with Vera. Clearly, things are very different in Hertfordshire from how they are in Northumberland—and we have not lost any police officers, either. One of the reasons it is different is because we think about other ways of using people and volunteers, too, so that we get a far more effective, efficient use of local people. That is the way to do it.
David Jamieson: We have lost 2,500 officers and staff over the last six years, so we are not in the comfortable position that some areas are in. [Interruption.]
The Chair
I remind the Committee that this is not a debate, but an evidence-taking session.
David Jamieson: To answer Mr Cleverly’s point, there can be no substitute for officers who have the skills that we need to investigate complaints and crimes. With the chief constable, I am looking closely at how we build up that level of expertise.
James Cleverly
Q You expressed an opinion as a statement of fact and I want to explore that.
David Jamieson: Which fact do you mean?
James Cleverly
You said that there can be no substitute—
David Jamieson: First, if you have volunteers coming in to work on computers or IT, you would need those who supervise them to have at least the same knowledge as the people coming in. [Interruption.]
The Chair
Q I hear one question from several voices: why?
David Jamieson: I am giving a view from my perspective as a police and crime commissioner. I would be very worried if I did not have officers with sufficient capability to understand what those who were working in the force were actually doing. That applies to all levels of work, whatever sort of investigation was going on. There is a good example in forensics, where we bring in particularly scientific knowledge. Those in the force know what they are calling for and what they want out of the forensics team. Whether they have the high levels of scientific skills in those offices is a different matter. I think that you are getting to where I am. In the end, we have to have full-time, trained officers to do those jobs. Could we bring in specials and the others we have talked about with other skills, apart from those walking around the streets? Yes, of course we could. However, we have to be very careful if we are bringing people in to do highly complex work that involved cases and access to all the computer systems. We would need very close safeguards before we did that.
Vera Baird: I would jump at the chance. We have one guy—
The Chair
Can this be a brief response, because we have a lot of ground to cover?
Vera Baird: Yes. We have got one guy now who is funded by his firm, which is a financial business, to come in one day a month and help in exactly that kind of way—how to deal with online fraud. The more expertise of that kind that can be brought in, the better. It does not require one to have police powers.
The Chair
How would we categorise him?
Vera Baird: He is a volunteer, but he does not have police powers; he does not need them. It is giving volunteers police powers that is the problem.
James Berry (Kingston and Surbiton) (Con)
Q I have worked as a barrister in independent practice for West Mercia, Northumbria and Hertfordshire police—all very fine constabularies, as is yours, Mr Roddick. I want to come back to a point Vera Baird made earlier. You gave a long list of things that these volunteers would be able to do without being supervised by the IPCC under the police misconduct regime. Would I be correct in assuming that you would not object to them having those roles if they were under that regime?
Vera Baird: No, I gave you an equally long list of why it would not be appropriate. They are not contracted, they are not under a disciplinary regime, there is no guarantee of adequate—
James Berry
Yes, that is the point: under a disciplinary regime.
Vera Baird: That is insufficient.
James Berry
Police officers are not contracted anyway, but if volunteers are under a disciplinary regime does your objection fall away?
Vera Baird: No, not at all. It is about the contractual nature of it. A disciplinary regime that is external would be excellent and would be absolutely imperative, but there is a need for much more than that.
James Berry
Special constables are under the disciplinary regime.
Vera Baird: Yes, they are, but we are not talking about specials.
James Berry
So what is wrong with volunteers being under exactly the same regime?
Vera Baird: There is nothing wrong with it, but it is not sufficient. That is the point. I have given you a long list, and I am exhorted by Mr Howarth not to repeat it.
James Berry
Q Fine. I will move on to something else. One of the other proposals in the Bill—an entirely different one—is to transfer some of the functions currently exercised by the chief constable to police and crime commissioners, under the police complaints system. Transferred functions could include hearing appeals where complaints have gone against the complainant, so you would be doing that, if you wished. Is that something you would support?
Vera Baird: I would be satisfied to do appeals from complaints. If appeals were rendered independent, then doing them would give me some oversight of how the complaints had been done internally, yet without requiring me to have a whole separate police force to do the complaints, as it were. I would welcome that, but I would need some more staff, so I would need some more budget, Mr Penning.
The Chair
Yes, if they are brief. I thought that question was very specifically directed, but if any of the other witnesses want to add to that they are welcome to.
David Jamieson: For completeness, I agree with Vera on the point about dealing with some of the appeals that are currently dealt with by chief constable. That would give people greater confidence in the system. One of the problems we have at the moment is that people feel that the police investigate themselves. Whether they are right or wrong in making the assertion that that is not the right way of doing it, people feel that that is wrong.
For us to have the ability to do the appeals, if we go further and look at models 2 and 3, there really are some problems there. I think somebody called it statutory navel-gazing, in that we are trying to put so many statutory layers into the system that we are actually going to create a bigger problem. One issue is that if we took on the whole of the complaints, in some cases I would have to ask for an investigation to take place, but I have no powers to tell the chief of police to do the investigation. In effect, if an investigation needed to take place, I would have to look at it and say, “Yes, an investigation needs to happen. Chief constable, I am now giving it back for you to do.” So we would build in an extra layer, which I do not think would be very helpful to the public.
The Chair
Unless there is anything that either of the other witnesses desperately wants to add to that, I intend to move on.
David Lloyd: I wonder whether or not we have got the complaints system right. I imagine that everyone in this room has received complaints from members of the public about policing. Very often, they have forgotten the complaint by the time we have managed to get back to them, and there needs to be more independence in the process. Frankly, we have to find a way of breaking the link between discipline and customer service. Because we have not really done this the process is perforce a very lengthy one, which means that very often someone who just wants an apology only gets it after 12 months. That is not the best way of doing it. There are lots of things we should be doing. In fact, Vera is leading the way on complaints, up in Northumberland, so she has—unusually—hidden her light under a bushel. Although this might happen, I think that this is a good starting point for us.
Vera Baird: There is provision in the Bill to allow that. It would allow a sort of pre-complaint customer service resolution, which is what we are trying to do.
The Chair
Sorry to interrupt, but we have 10 minutes left and several people who have not yet had an opportunity want to ask questions.
Lyn Brown
Q I will ask three rapid questions about part 1 of the Bill. Where there is not a local agreement, the proposals allow the PCC unilaterally, in effect, to make the case for a takeover to the Home Secretary. Do you support the principle of hostile takeover? Given that the geographical areas of police forces and fire services are not coterminous, will that make reorganisations of these areas particularly challenging? Do you think that any of your members would be interested in raising revenue via the privatisation of front-line fire services?
Amanda Milling (Cannock Chase) (Con)
Q Just picking up on various pieces of evidence and reviews, collaboration has been described as patchy, probably at best, although there are excellent examples of good practice. I am interested to understand your views on the duty to collaborate and, specifically, on looking to extend the powers of PCCs to include responsibility for fire and rescue, and whether that would address the barriers that you might have seen on getting collaboration between and integration of the two services.
The Chair
We will take four questions. Then between you, where there is a common view, perhaps one of you could express it. Where there are differences of view—
Liz Saville Roberts
Q My question is for Mr Roddick. Given that Wales is in a unique situation—Welsh forces are answerable to the agendas of two separate Governments —what are the implications of the Bill as it stands for the forces of Wales, in your opinion?
The Chair
Finally, Jake Berry—I hope we will then have time for all the questions to be answered.
Jake Berry
Q My question is specifically on volunteer police community support officers. In terms of pressure on budgets, do you think that the ability to use volunteer PCSOs more fully will remove pressure on budgets? Do you think that it is appropriate for police forces to use reserves to preserve the role of existing PCSOs, or should they be replaced with volunteers?
The Chair
Who will answer first? Perhaps start with the north Wales-specific question.
Winston Roddick: I will, because there is a Wales-specific question, to which I will come in a moment. On the use of the expression “takeover”, I do not think that this is anything like a takeover: it is a first-class example of highly necessary collaboration. The statutory duty of myself, the police service and all chief constables is to provide an effective and efficient police force, and value for money, and to reduce crime. The additional words for the fire service are to save lives. While we share those common objectives, it makes perfect sense to me to work in unison—with a small “u” this time—to achieve the objectives.
As far as Wales is concerned, the need for collaboration does not respect geographical boundaries; it does not respect political boundaries; and it has to follow the pattern of crime and the needs of the people. For example, I suppose the European countries and Switzerland collaborate with other European countries; the Americans collaborate with the Canadians; and I am sure Scotland collaborates with the north of England. Therefore, devolution does not stand in the way of collaboration, and the need for collaboration does not stand in the way of devolution. Devolution, and the different position of Wales, is not a sound reason for not putting effective collaboration into effect.
David Lloyd: I will not say anything about Wales—unusually. On collaboration, it is right and proper that we have a greater duty to collaborate. If anything, I would say that the Bill perhaps does not state its intention firmly enough. I was reflecting on the fact that only two people around this horseshoe are from counties that have a fire authority. Most are combined fire authorities. That duty to collaborate could be more firmly noted so the direction we are heading in is clear. It is difficult to convince local fire authorities that they should collaborate, so I think that if we firmed that up a little it would be better.
To answer your question directly, I am comfortable that a case for takeover can be made. If there is a way of getting better value for money for local taxpayers and a more efficient service for individuals, it is incumbent on us to do it. I am very comfortable about that. I note the difficulty with geographical areas. That is something that has to be worked through. If we start it in the areas where the two work perfectly well and worry about the other areas afterwards, that is a better starting place than worrying about the few where there is a difficulty.
The Chair
I am required by the programme motion to bring proceedings to a halt at 3.15 pm. David Jamieson and Vera have slightly less than five minutes to share between them. I do not know which way round you want to do it.
Lyn Brown
Q Can I ask you to talk about privatisation?
David Jamieson: What has not been addressed in the Bill is this. There could be two reasons for a merger between police and fire. One is that there would be better governance—one assumes better governance of fire—but I have not yet heard a convincing case come out of the Home Office about whether the PCC role is a better way of handling a fire authority. When I hear that case, I will get much more excited about doing it.
The other thing is, would working together with the fire authority lead to benefits and savings? I would say that that depends on where you are in the country. The geographical differences make a lot of difference to what the benefits will be. We have begun to look at those benefits. In a large urban area such as mine—the second largest force in the country—they are much smaller than they would be in a large rural area, where there could be benefits from co-locating fire stations. The benefits in an area such as mine are very much smaller.
The issue of privatisation was raised. I suppose that that could happen anyway. That would be up to a PCC. Those are issues that Parliament has now delegated to PCCs to decide. I will not be going down that road, but there may be those who choose to do so. It will help PCCs during the passage of the Bill and when it becomes an Act for the Government to have the courage of their conviction. If they believe that PCCs are a better way of handling the fire governance, let them say so. I think it is wrong for PCCs to be able to make a unilateral decision in their area.
Vera Baird: I am in favour of the duty to collaborate. We already collaborate hugely with the fire service on day-to-day operations. The duty to collaborate will just mean that we all have to sit down. We have started a collaborative board in my area, which will have the fire chiefs, the chair of the fire authority, the portfolio holder from the county council that runs the other fire service—we have two forces—myself, the chief constable and the fire officers on it. We will have to go through our properties systematically to see what we can share. We already share some. We will go through things such as training and the great crime prevention work that the fire service already does through things such as the local intervention fire education course. It is out in areas where fires start and deprivation leads to crime. There are great opportunities for us to work collaboratively to provide a better services and make savings, and we will seize them with both hands.
Governance—takeover—is completely irrelevant until issues of governance actually arise. I think the Government have started at the wrong end in trying to press the change of governance, as David put it, without stating any rationale for it.
Jake Berry
Q Mr Howarth, we have a minute remaining.
Ms Baird, you recently said:
“When I was elected as Northumbria’s police and crime commissioner…the role was little valued and barely understood”.
By that, I suggest you meant that you had to do the job to see how it worked.
The Chair
Order. I just tried to bring you to a halt because we have now reached 3.15 pm, which brings us to the end of the time allotted for the Committee to ask questions of this group of witnesses. I am sure that your last comment will elicit some correspondence, but I am not sure that the whole Committee needs to hear it answered. I thank the witnesses for their wise evidence. If there is any disagreement between us, it is certainly conducted on a friendly basis.
Examination of witnesses
Chief Constable Sara Thornton and Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley gave evidence.
The Chair
Q We will now hear oral evidence from the National Police Chiefs Council and the Metropolitan Police Service. We have until 4 pm. Will the witnesses introduce themselves?
Sara Thornton: My name is Sara Thornton. Until a year ago I was the chief constable of Thames Valley police. I then became the chair of the National Police Chiefs Council, whose responsibility is to bring together the chiefs—primarily those in England and Wales—to work together, co-ordinate and collaborate on operations.
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: My name is Mark Rowley. I am assistant commissioner with the Metropolitan police. On top of my responsibilities with the Metropolitan police I am the National Police Chiefs Council lead for counter-terrorism.
Jack Dromey
Q Welcome to both of you. May I begin by asking about bail? The provisions in the Bill follow on from deliberations in this House, including by the Home Affairs Committee. I have two questions. The first is more general, on what was described last week as the Gambaccini case, where individuals are indefinitely on bail. The Bill seeks to address that. What are your views on that and the associated practical problems?
Secondly, I know that Mark has previously expressed concern about what we called last week the Dhar clause. In other words, if the police are to be required to take certain steps in respect of bail in future, the view has been expressed that as the law stands there are not sufficient powers for the police to prevent what happened in the Dhar case. I would be grateful for comments on those two related questions.
Sara Thornton: If I may, I will take the more general issue first. You referred to the Gambaccini issue. We understand absolutely the difficulties when people have uncertainty hanging over their lives for a very long time, so we absolutely understand when politicians want to legislate to deal with that. We are quite comfortable with the criteria, but the concerns we have are threefold. The first is in respect of the 28-day and three-month timescales and the basis for them. The College of Policing has done some survey work that looks at all bailed cases. The average times are a lot longer than that. Very often, people are bailed for a long time because of reliance on third parties—for example, third-party statements, whether they are medical evidence or cases from social services, or whether they are about phone downloads or computer equipment investigations. There are real issues about why people are sometimes on bail for a long time and the timescales do not seem to take much account of that.
The second issue is about the impact of bureaucracy. There has been some work—I think it is in the House of Commons Library—about just how many cases this legislation might apply to and the time it will take, in terms of superintendents’ time and court time. I understand that there are suggestions about how much that might cost. I know that the superintendents are concerned, because we have fewer of them than we used to have and the whole process in the Courts Service is to try to reduce the number of cases going through the courts. That is a second, practical issue.
Thirdly, I suspect that the consequence of this will be that far fewer people will be released on police bail. In some ways, that is a good thing, but I think a lot of people will be released on police bail but will still be a suspect in a live criminal investigation. So you are, in effect, creating a new category of person. The difficulty with that is they are subject to no requirement to review the case, and no framework, so potentially it is more problematic. If that were me, I do not know whether I would prefer to be on bail or still a suspect in a live criminal investigation.
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: I agree with all the general points that Sara has made. Speaking to the Home Affairs Committee on the back of a particular case, but without discussing that case, there was some debate around offenders who are on bail before charge—this is before charge, not post-charge.
Parliament has, in the past, legislated—this is not just about terrorism, but about all offences—to enable police to put conditions on people who are on bail before charge. Those conditions might simply be to make sure people do not flee—like handing in documents, a passport and so on—or they might be to stop reoffending, such as restrictions on association with believed criminal associates. We make the point that this is a very odd piece of legislation, because while Parliament legislated to allow these conditions to be put on, Parliament did not make it an offence to breach those conditions. That creates something that I have previously described as toothless. When someone breaches, the police have a power to arrest, but then have to release pretty much immediately, so it is of limited value.
Let me give some facts about the context of counter-terrorism, which was discussed previously. We are arresting a little shy of one person a day in the counter-terrorism network across the country—it was 339 people last year. About one-third of those arrests result in bail. Four in 10 of those on bail are there for terrorism offences, five in 10 for financial crime, fraud and so on, and the other one in 10 for a range of other matters. We look to use bail conditions to try to prevent people fleeing the country and to prevent reoffending, but we face the challenge that to breach the bail conditions is not an offence.
As we try to control the risks posed by potential terrorists, we have three things we can do, broadly. The first is surveillance. Surveillance is a very resource-intensive activity and is only used against the most dangerous individuals. The second control, of course, is ports controls, which, despite everyone’s best efforts, will never be completely perfect. The third control for people on bail is bail conditions and some ability to enforce them. In that context, it seems odd to have these powers that are unenforceable.
I will finally extend it beyond terrorism, because the same issues apply to officers dealing with complex cases, perhaps involving child abuse or domestic violence, where their long investigations sometimes involve digital evidence and there are real dangers about offenders and victims coming back together during the investigation. Those conditions are useful in that circumstance as well. Again, the lack of robust enforceability is a challenge. We have had conversations with the Home Office on these points, and I am aware that it is thinking about whether there is more that can be done.
James Berry
Q I should declare that I have been instructed in cases involving both of the witnesses in their previous roles as chief constables. Can I ask first about the Dhar case? There was a lot of public scrutiny of that case, but there were a number of complicating factors behind it, including the availability of passports. Generally speaking, as well as increasing the legal powers to enforce breach of bail, is there something to be done within the police service about the operational practice around seeking the correct bail conditions and enforcing them?
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: I will not talk about an individual case, because in every case you look at, you think there are some things to learn from it. I absolutely accept that, Mr Berry, and there are things we can learn from that case. The point about enforcing is exactly my point. Our ability to enforce is limited, and that affects the conditions that officers apply and how they follow up. If you know you are putting a power on somebody where you have little ability to follow up, that affects how you use it. That is an understandable reaction.
James Berry
Q Since that case, is there now routine consideration of flight risk for CT cases, to ensure that all action is taken to mitigate the risk of flight?
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: There always has been routine consideration. We are constantly looking to see if there is anything more we can do to reduce the risk of flight in any one case. That goes all the way through to our border systems in trying to spot people leaving the country, and all the way back to how we deal with people on bail.
Sara Thornton: If I may, I will give a volume crime example. If you were to bail somebody with conditions whom you were investigating for, say, domestic violence, maybe the condition you would put on them would be not to go near the victim. If that is breached, all you can do is arrest the offender and bring them into custody. The custody clock starts again and so, frankly, what you would probably do is bail them out pretty quickly. So there is very little, in fact there is no, sanction for that breach.
James Berry
Q Coming to the more general point about the limitation on the length of time you can hold someone on pre-charge bail, Chief Constable Thornton, you said that some people would not be released. What else would the police do to respond to that limitation on your powers in cases where at the moment you are taking longer to investigate?
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: There are several steps you can take, aren’t there? I share the concerns that have been articulated. We could always look at whether there are ways we can accelerate some components of investigation, and there will always be work we can do to improve on that front.
There are some fundamental limitations around issues that have been discussed already, such as digital evidence and some of the increasing challenges faced in that space. There is also the dependence on third parties for evidence—different professions and different expert witnesses. It is not in our gift as police officers and investigators to speed up any of those. That is a real challenge for us.
As has been said, you end up with this decision: do we keep somebody on bail or do we keep them under investigation but not on bail? I am not sure that the latter is actually a preference, but it is simply how the police will have to adapt in some cases, if the case is going to take a long time. You lose the guarantee that somebody is going to return to custody, and the suspect probably loses some understanding of the exact timescale of what is going to happen.
James Berry
Q Finally, are there any particular categories of offending in respect of which you are especially concerned about having a restriction on the time you can bail someone for pre-charge?
Sara Thornton: There are certain offence types and sorts of investigations. Any investigations that require the examination of digital forensic material will be problematic. Often, child sexual abuse investigations, where you have masses of third-party material within social services, can be problematic. Indeed, so can financial offences where you have got frauds and you are trying to get information from banks. It would be a mixture of different sorts of offence types, but also investigations that involve certain sorts of evidence.
Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)
Q Will you say what powers you actually need and how the system would work if it were an offence to break a bail condition?
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: In the same way that at the moment it is an offence to breach a bail condition post-charge, one could bring the same sort of approach pre-charge. You would not make it life imprisonment; it might be a year for the maximum sentence or something like that. It would not be the most serious offence but it would give some degree of traction.
If you were considering legislation, you could think about whether you put that in place for breaches of bail for all matters or just for serious crime and terrorism. There are ways you could consider it. You could consider how a subject may appeal to a judge against the conditions put on them. There are things you can put around it, but fundamentally it is the ability to say, “If you breach that condition, there is some follow-through from the legal system.”
Mr Kevan Jones
Q Sara raised the issue of domestic violence. It is terrifying for a woman.
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: Exactly.
Mr Kevan Jones
Q Would you cover that?
Sara Thornton: Absolutely. If it was an offence to breach police bail, for which somebody could be charged, not only would there be a sanction; it would also mean that when you look at their criminal record in future cases, you know that they have a history, on the record, of breaching bail. I am not completely confident whether a police bail has been breached now, but it almost certainly would not get to be a criminal record and I am not sure it would be that transparently available to all other police officers.
Jack Dromey
Q May I raise a completely separate issue? Sara, I remember an event that we were at last year where you talked about the new challenges of vulnerability and information. We heard earlier very impressive evidence from children’s organisations. In the Bill, we talk about a duty to collaborate and to co-operate, but in a different context. In relation to information and vulnerability, do you think ensuring that all statutory agencies fully and properly play their part in the identification of vulnerability by way of data sharing is something that we might usefully address in the Bill?
Sara Thornton: In terms of data sharing, I do not think that the problem is with legislation or lack of legislation. I think it is, for whatever reason, a lack of will or of a culture. Sometimes, frankly, it is lack of understanding of the law. I am not sure it needs any further legislation.
Mims Davies
Q Will you comment on the potential changes to the rank structure and whether there is a feeling at the moment that it is fit for purpose?
Sara Thornton: The College of Policing completed a leadership review last year. It made 10 recommendations, one of which was to look at the rank structure. As part of the debate about implementation, the question was asked, “Who owns the rank structure?”. It was unclear whether it was the Home Secretary, the chief constables or the college, thus the reason for this in the Bill.
My colleague, Francis Habgood, the chief of Thames Valley, is leading some work with the College of Policing to look at potentially rationalising the rank structure. Some of the work they are doing at the moment is looking at five key levels. It is very much a work in progress, but I think that all chiefs, when they read the leadership review, understood the issue and were pretty confident and supportive that we needed to do some work on it.
Lyn Brown
Q Police and firefighters perform very different roles. Firefighters have a right to strike, as is reflected in their particular terms and conditions. Police officers face significant restrictions on their public life and business interests that do not apply to firefighters. For many retained firefighters—part-time firefighters—a second job is essential. Do you think it would be unnecessary and inappropriate to inflict these terms and conditions on firefighters?
Sara Thornton: We already have experience in police forces. As a chief constable, I had police officers and police staff. Police staff were largely unionised, they could strike and they were not subject to the same terms and conditions. My argument would be that chief constables are quite used to running an organisation where there are different terms and conditions of service—some people can strike and some cannot. When I was a chief officer, on the few occasions when the unions did strike, it caused some minimal tension, but it was manageable.
Mims Davies
Q I was going to go on to ask about the changes to the firearms legislation and whether you believe it will help to keep the public safer.
Sara Thornton: My colleagues who run the National Ballistics Intelligence Service have been very involved with the work of civil servants and the Law Commission on this area. It is not an area I am expert in, but I understand from them that they are very supportive of the clarity of definition in the terms “lethal” and “component parts”, and of the offence for articles that would convert a firearm. Their one concern is on the definition of “antique firearm”. They would like the addition that it should be something that was manufactured prior to 1919, to make it absolutely clear. If that was added to the Bill, then they are very supportive of what is in there.
What is interesting, from doing some research for this appearance today, is just how many antique firearms are involved in crime. It is a significant number, and it is important that we deal with them.
Assistant Commissioner Rowley: If I may add to that, from a counter-terrorism perspective, one of the handful of factors that gives us an advantage in the UK is the low availability of firearms. It is not something that we should be at all complacent about because it is clearly not at zero and we have seen changes in the marketplace, so if Parliament is prepared to tighten up these loopholes, that is just another step in trying to maintain the competitive advantage that we have.
Amanda Milling
Q May I go back to collaboration? I will ask much the same the question that I asked the last panel, which is on the patchiness in the collaboration between emergency services. While we have examples of excellent practice across the country, there are examples where there has been resistance to change. I am interested in your views on the duty to collaborate and the extension of responsibilities. Specifically, I would like to understand how you feel about the single employer model and how that could improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the services.
Sara Thornton: Of course, the pattern of collaboration for police forces has not primarily been among emergency services but with other police forces and, in some cases, with local authorities and other organisations. There are substantial amounts of collaboration across the country—whether with regard to counter-terrorism, organised crime, the provision of firearms or the provision of technology—that are largely between forces.
In terms of collaboration with the fire brigade and the ambulance service, I think the duty to collaborate, which is on the face of the Bill, sends a very strong signal from Government that, “This is what we want you to do.” As you say, there are already some collaboration activities. They are patchy, but quite frankly there has never been that duty to collaborate. I think this is Parliament saying to the forces, the fire service and the ambulance service, “We want you to do this.”
In terms of what it says about police and crime commissioners, as I have understood it, where a local case is made, there can either be the governance arrangements or, indeed, the single employer. Again, that is where the local case is made—I think that provides a reasonable safeguard. Of course, there are areas where the police service is not coterminous with the fire service, but that is not the majority of areas. There are cases—for example, Dave Etheridge, my former colleague from Oxfordshire who was here earlier today—where they are part of the county council. It would be quite difficult to extricate part of the county council, but in a lot of places, if a local case is made, it seems to me that it is not insurmountable.
Since this was announced, I have met the chief fire officers. We have set up a little working group of chief police officers working with the chief fire officers. They are coming to the chief constables’ council in April because we are very keen to talk and to work out how we can shape this together to ensure that we can work together to protect the public.
Jack Dromey
Q May I ask a follow-on question? Sara, the duty to collaborate is welcome—of that there is no doubt. We are seeing ever more collaboration and integration not just with police and fire, but with other statutory services. We heard evidence earlier about the importance of dialogue between the police service and the fire service. We have elected representatives for the police service and we have elected representatives for the fire service, so is it not right that any eventual coming together should be by way of agreement between those elected representatives?
Sara Thornton: As I understand it, it talks about where a local case can be made. What I do not understand—I can give you a further note on this—is whether anyone can be forced into it. I would have to look into the detail on that, but, as I have read it, the local case suggests some sort of agreement.
Jack Dromey
Q The local case is made by the PCC to the Home Secretary. That does not mean that the views of locally elected representatives responsible for the fire service can be taken into account. That cannot be right, can it?
Sara Thornton: I think if the Home Secretary were to consider such an application, she would want to know what the views of the local fire authority were and I am sure that she would take those into account. It might be that you want to put in some qualification that, as part of that case, views need to be sought and to be part of the argument.
Jake Berry
Q I have one final point. Recent police research revealed that the PCC governance of police forces, as opposed to the old police panel governance, has saved the taxpayer around £2 million every year. If there were similar savings to be made by the extension of PCC governance to the fire service, do you think that both the fire service and the police service could usefully use those savings to prioritise front-line services?
Mr Kevan Jones
That is a difficult question.
Sara Thornton: Collaborations of all kinds deliver all sorts of benefits. They can concentrate expertise, save money, help you to deal with crises and share best practice. In the same way that we already have collaborations with the fire service, which are about shared control rooms and shared estate to save money, if there is more of that, there is more potential to save money.
The Chair
I thank the witnesses for their evidence. Not only the brevity, but the accuracy of their responses means that we managed to finish earlier than anticipated. The Committee will be suspended for 15 minutes.
The Chair
Q We will now hear oral evidence from the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the “Get Maisie Home” campaign. We have until 4.30 pm for this session. I ask the two witnesses to introduce themselves for the record.
Dr Chalmers: My name is Dr Julie Chalmers. I am a specialist adviser in mental health law to the Royal College of Psychiatrists. I am also a community psychiatrist, and I chair the multi-agency section 136 group at the college.
Sally Burke: I am Sally Burke. I am mum to Maisie, a 14-year-old girl who is struggling with mental health issues. She is also on the autistic spectrum.
Mr Kevan Jones
Q To start with, what are your general views on the provisions in the Bill about amending the Mental Health Act 1983?
Dr Chalmers: First, we welcome the focus on mental health crisis, following on from the excellent work that has been done by the concordat. The college is very much behind the principles that are driving the changes to legislation. Having said that, there are some very sensible changes. For example, there is the issue regarding clarification of a public place. My colleagues in the British Transport police and the healthcare workers who work alongside them have struggled with that issue. That is a very important change, because we know that the railway line is an important issue with suicide.
However, we have to step back and see section 136 in a much wider context of crisis care. I would be concerned that the legislation cart is coming before the horse. There have been significant changes in the past two years. Certainly, the number of people who are going to a health-based place of safety has increased. As you may know, the figures are variable, but it looks like about 80% of people, if not more, now go to these places. So there have been considerable improvements within the health services in their response to crisis.
We cannot do our job if we do not have the resources. Changes to the law could put pressure on the crisis services at a number of points, and I can expand on this if the Committee wishes. For example, there is the suggestion of changing the length of time to 24 hours. In principle that is an excellent idea. We want to reduce the time that people are subject to detention, particularly when that has been prompted by someone who is not a mental health professional. I think that 24 hours is a realistic timeframe in which to do that if the resources are in place. Generally, the areas that keep figures will tend to be the good areas. However, it is possible to meet people’s needs within a relatively short period of time, and do the assessment within several hours of presentation. That is perhaps not within the three hours that the college would set as the gold standard, but it is certainly within that longer period. It does become a problem if someone is intoxicated, or if they come in overnight when resources are less available and that gets passed on to the daytime services. There may be a knock-on effect.
The main problem that I see with the laudable aim of reducing the time for which people are subject to detention is when we come to the very small group of people who are subject to section 136 who need to be detained in hospital. As you have probably heard, approximately 20% of people need to come into hospital, and some of them will need to be detained under the Mental Health Act. If we cannot identify a bed for a person to go to, we might very quickly run up against this 24-hour time period. Then we—the AMHP, the approved mental health professional—are left in the most appalling situation. It is the job of the AMHP to make the recommendation for admission to hospital based on two medical recommendations. We have to say which hospital and which bed that person is going to. If we cannot identify that, then after 24 hours we will be in a position of acting unlawfully, because we have no way of detaining the person. I note that the Bill as it is currently written suggests that someone could be detained on clinical grounds. There is a lack of clarity around on what grounds we could extend.
I want to flag up to you the very important point that we may be in a situation where we cannot find a bed. That is not just me shroud-waving. The Committee will be aware that the Lord Crisp commission has highlighted the appalling situation where we are struggling to find beds. On occasions, we have to send people away, usually to independent hospitals. I will say a word about the difficulties there. Something like 500 people in a month have to travel more than 50 km to find a bed.
It sounds easy, “Let’s just find a bed in an independent hospital. Why wouldn’t they want to take somebody?” My team is in this position several times a month, where we will phone around several hospitals looking for a bed. Perhaps this sounds ungenerous, but sometimes it feels that if you have a choice you can cherry-pick the kind of patients you want to take. Often we think we are offered a bed, then we send the details and it is turned down. I am really concerned. Although I welcome it in principle, I just want to flag up the important resource issues that we might come up against with the 24-hour period.
Mr Kevan Jones
Q Like you, I welcome the broad provision that has been put in place but I have this concern. What will happen is that people will not be taken to a police cell—which is what we are trying to avoid—but will likely be kept at home because that is now deemed as a place of safety.
Without statistics being published, we will see the number of people being referred to police stations going down, but we will not know what has happened to them. Do you think there should be in the Bill an onus on a local force to keep statistics of what happens to people under sections 135 and 136? Otherwise, we could get a situation whereby the problem just gets masked rather than solved.
Dr Chalmers: Your point is very well made. As early as 2011, the inter-agency group made a plea for good statistics. If you do not know what is happening we cannot track it.
If I could just take you back. I think we need to distinguish section 135 from section 136. Section 136 will never occur in a person’s home. What I think the Bill seeks to address is the lack of clarity about whether you could undertake the assessment in the patient’s home when you had entered with a warrant. It is the police who will administer, if you like, the warrant. They will act on the warrant accompanied by the AMHP and a doctor.
Up to now it has been unclear whether you could stay in that person’s home to undertake the assessment, or whether the Mental Health Act as written required you to remove a person to a place of safety. I have done many assessments in a person’s home, and I think that is probably better than removing them, particularly if it is not clear that you will actually detain somebody in hospital. It is important to clarify that.
Your point about data is particularly pertinent to section 135, where those are not collected nationally. Of course, there are two 135 warrants. There is the one to enter a person’s home to remove to a place of safety, and one to return them to hospital. We do need those data.
Mr Kevan Jones
Q Can I clarify the position? The Bill would require a police officer to consult a mental health professional or nurse before removing someone from a place of safety, where it is “practicable to do so”. What is your view on that wording?
Dr Chalmers: My personal view is that that has slipped in. As far as I am aware, that was not consulted on. I do not necessarily know what the college position would be, other than to say it is always a good thing to talk. I would say that as a psychiatrist.
I just wonder whether that needs to be in legislation rather than in regulations or in the code of practice, because it is straying into an area of telling people what to do using the law, which I am not sure is particularly helpful. What we do know, based on evidence from the street triage projects, is that where people work together and there are conversations between police and healthcare professionals in some areas, it has led to significant reductions. If you include this provision, we are behind. The services are very patchy and variable. In some places it would work very well because police would have immediate access to somebody with authority to give advice. In other places, they would be foundering. Without bringing the resources alongside the law, there is the risk of setting people up to fail. Allowing things to develop in localities can find the best way of working, because there might be different pathways.
I have sidetracked your question, because I wonder whether we need to scrutinise whether that is a wise thing to have in statute rather than in regulation or within the code of practice.
Mr Kevan Jones
Q May I ask one last question on advocacy? Clearly, some individuals have family members or others to explain the law or situation to them. In many of these cases, individuals have no one. What is your view about making it a requirement for people to have access to advocates?
Dr Chalmers: It would be a pragmatic response. There are pragmatic responses and principled responses. It is essential that people have good information explaining in easy, accessible language what is happening to them and their rights at that point. Nursing staff in section 136 suites are well placed to do that. Again, I would imagine that that is patchy, but it is something that should be built into the specifications and reviewed.
The pragmatic answer is that for people on longer-term sections, for whom there is a statutory right to advocacy, the responses are patchy, so we have not got it right for the people who already have a statutory right to advocacy. I think stretching it to 3 o’clock in the morning is going to be very difficult.
Jake Berry
Q If I may address Sally: thank you for coming here today and for providing very detailed information about the journey you have been on with Maisie in advance of our meeting, for which we are all extremely grateful. As someone who has experienced the problems faced by yourself and Maisie at first hand, can you tell us a little about those experiences and what further you think we can do in the Bill to try to help parents who find themselves in the same situation?
Sally Burke: I have to state that of all the agencies we have worked with in crises, the police have gone the furthest in improving how they are with Maisie and understanding her. I welcome the Bill for not putting children in a cell as a place of safety. Maisie has not been in that position—just the thought of it—I did not realise at the time the damaging effect it would have had on her.
As Maisie’s parent my main concern was to keep her safe, but I was in too much of a state seeing my child doing the things that she was doing to make a long-term decision. With hindsight, I was able to reflect on what the police need to do in that crisis. I am now more hardened to it, so if Maisie wraps something around her neck, I can say, “Take that off”. Before, I would be going to pieces asking, “Oh, what do I need to do? I need to find a pair of scissors, but everything is locked away in a safe, so find the keys”. It is an awful predicament to be in, but you do get hardened to it, as you know, and a lot of police officers are hardened to those scenarios.
You need to have officers who can talk about mental health to parents. The approach of a lot of the front-line officers who turn up depends on their view on mental health. An older generation chap would think, “It’s attention-seeking, this. What do we do with this girl?” But younger people who we have had out seem to be more sympathetic and have more of an empathy on mental health and can deal with Maisie on a much friendlier, teenage level, which brings her down. If you have somebody who has quite a negative view on mental health thinking that she is having a behaviour fit and wants some attention, trying to bring her down in that scenario is not as effective.
It is also important to help a parent make a decision about the best way forward and the best place to go for safety that will have the best impact on that child in the long run. That is really important. My confidence has grown massively over the past two years since we first went into crisis. The first time I went into crisis with Maisie, if somebody had told me they were taking her to the moon right now to keep her safe, I would have said yes, because it was so horrible. You just cannot comprehend how you feel, as a parent. So I think it is about educating the officers who go out to these calls.
I have helped our local police force. I have been to conferences there and have heard the mental health cop talk to the officers and say, “60% to 70% of our time is spent on mental health conditions, yet we get hardly any training; 6% to 7% of our time is on criminal offences, or crimes, and how much training do you get for those activities?” When you see it in the balance, I think that would really help families and youngsters in mental health crisis.
Also, if you could sew into that, with your magic wand, some training on autism and learning difficulties, because that comes across as a bit of a grey area. Some officers just do not know what autism is and how to treat a child with autism. When Maisie is in crisis, she does not like to be touched, but an officer will come up to her and say, “Come on, Maisie, it’s okay” and she will freak out because she does not want to be touched. So there needs to be some education around how best to approach a child in that crisis scenario.
Jake Berry
Thank you, we really appreciate that. We have the College of Policing coming next so I and other colleagues, I am sure, will raise that issue with them. That has been extremely helpful.
Karen Bradley
Q Sally, thank you very much. Your point about the amount of time police spend dealing with this is exactly why we want to do what we are doing in the Bill. It had been too easy, I think, for all agencies to let the police deal with this problem. It had become a police problem, but it never should have been. Police should always have been the last resort; it should always have been other agencies stepping in. You say you have not had the personal experience of a 136, but I wonder, as you have come into contact with police, whether you have had any experience of the mental health triage that I know many forces have rolled out as part of the crisis care concordat?
Sally Burke: She has been 136, but not taken to a cell. She has been taken to the adult 136 suite in a mental health unit, or to our local A&E department. With the triage, do you mean the concordat?
Karen Bradley
Well, the triage; so having mental health professionals with the police at the same time. Is that something you have experienced in your area?
Sally Burke: No; I wrote it down as Julie was talking. It is a postcode lottery, with the concordat and there being mental health staff available. As part of our campaign, just this January, we got a children’s mental health team as a wrap-around service, because we did not have anything. If Maisie went into crisis at a weekend or out of hours, there was no child and adolescent mental health services team available for her at all. It was, where do we put this child? As for concordat and triage, no.
In our experience of Maisie’s bespoke package, agencies say that they will work together, but it is actually worse for us as a family, because they will talk to one another, but they don’t listen. [Laughter.] No, they don’t. They each have their own system, and boxes that they need to tick, and they do not cross over for the child. It is not what is best for the child; different agencies have boxes that get ticked in their protocol and it does not fit across the board, so lots of things get left because nobody wants to be accountable for this child.
At the end of the day, Maisie gets sent to units all over the country and every professional who works with her says it is more damaging for that to happen, but nobody wants to take the responsibility. So at the end of the day, we have got a child who is going through lots of trauma and not getting the help because, on paper, it looks great that all these agencies are working together, but, certainly where we are, it is not working.
Karen Bradley
Q Accountability comes through so many times on so many different cases. Can I suggest that my officials speak to you and we try to get together and look at what is happening in your specific area? Perhaps we can see if we can push things through.
Sally Burke: That would be lovely.
The Minister for Policing, Fire, Criminal Justice and Victims (Mike Penning)
You could go and see where triage is taking place, outside your area so that you can experience that as well.
Sally Burke: I feel that the NHS has made so many cuts—especially in our area, with mental health—that the police have had to take the brunt of where to put these children. If you continue to show that that is their responsibility, they are never going to put the money back into children’s mental health and tick the areas.
Karen Bradley
I would really like to show you the triage, so let us talk about that outside here.
Lyn Brown
Q You talked about how local authorities and agencies need to talk together. The beginning part of the Bill is about having a duty of collaboration between the ambulance, police and fire services. If we had a magic wand, where would you want a duty of collaboration to lie?
Sally Burke: In regards to mental health?
Lyn Brown
Q In regards to Maisie. How would it make it better for Maisie?
Sally Burke: Maisie has got post-traumatic stress disorder, so she can go into crisis at any point—even from a song being played on the radio, if that takes her back to memories that are not very nice. It is about having somewhere that is safe and suitable. If she had a broken leg, you would not put her in a cell because the general hospital did not have a bed. It is about having a professional who is caring—the police do care, I do not mean that—and properly trained to deal with that, because it is a medical condition.
Lyn Brown
Q Local council services?
Dr Chalmers: Yes, local authority, health and social care—and it should be accountable. There are two things that the college would like to bring to your attention for consideration. One is that there should be reporting through CCGs to the Secretary of State about the state of crisis services in the area and how they are developing, or not, against the concordat aims. There is also an anomaly within the code of practice to the Mental Health Act, which requires people like me—section 12 doctors, AMHPs—to be bound by the good practice in the code, but requires commissioners to just take account of it. They should have a statutory obligation to work within the code of practice, because the principles underpinning the code of least restrictive option would work. We should focus that on our area—what we are doing in our area to provide services that could avert crisis and alternatives to the dreadful situations that everyone finds themselves in, where they have to do the least worse thing.
Mims Davies
Q I want to ask Dr Chalmers about that place of safety and the work with CCGs and local authorities. I have experienced that in my patch: there is a kind of falling through the cracks, where the police do not want to use their cells as a place of safety. Do you feel that perhaps there should be some community hub, house or building? How would you term a place of safety? Is there some kind of crisis centre that we are missing, which CCGs could provide?
Dr Chalmers: I think we are always going to require the current, classic, hospital-based place of safety. In my ideal world that would be co-located with physical health services. In the use of section 136, among the problems that we see people presenting with, the problem of intoxication—not just with alcohol but now with so-called legal highs and synthetic cannabis—can cause people to crash very suddenly. Somebody who looks as though they are in crisis can become very physically unwell. There is an argument for having centres of excellence in urban areas, on the model of centres for stroke and cardiac emergencies, where the expertise is situated and you can move between one and the other.
For some people we also need some level of security. In its guidance the college specifies what a good section 136 suite looks like. I had the unfortunate news from a Health and Safety Executive investigator where someone was taken to a hospital-based place of safety where you could just open the door and walk out, and a tragedy ensued. For some people, there has to be a degree of security.
My colleagues in the child and adolescent faculty would highlight that a safe place for someone in crisis to be assessed is also necessary, particularly for children. The rough and ready survey that was done suggested that of the children who were picked up on a section 136, 30% do not have mental health needs and instead need social care and social responses. In an ideal setting, there would be a safe place for children to go that is age appropriate, too. Rooms have to be safe, so they look stark and sterile, but you can imagine a safe place for children where their families could come. Often with a section 136 suite there are no places for families to come and visit.
There is some evidence about alternative places before people are placed on a section 136, such as crisis houses. The crisis concordat is very good at flagging up areas of good practice. There was an initiative in Leeds that has been very successful. There was one using the Richmond Fellowship in Sussex, and that has been reported on. As I understand it—this may not be correct—the numbers were so small that they have expanded the resource to be a safe place to be in crisis. There is also the use of peer support. In London, users of service have provided safe places—they call them cafés—where people can go and be in a safe place with people to talk to.
I started by saying that you should not see 136 in isolation. I think you will get into trouble trying to fix one small part of the system; you will have knock-on effects and unintended consequences. You have to see it in the round of crisis responses.
The Chair
It is now 27 minutes past four. We have got three minutes left and two Members who want to ask questions. I do not think it is possible to get answers to two questions in the time available.
Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)
Q I am the MP for Lewes in Sussex, and we used to have one of the highest rates of patients with mental health problems being in police cells, but that is turning around. I want to highlight that it can work. Katy Bourne, the police and crime commissioner, has now allocated for mental health nurses to go out with the police. Is that something that you would like to see rolled out nationwide? It has certainly transformed care for patients in mental health crisis in Sussex.
Dr Chalmers: Certainly in my experience working in Oxfordshire—the city of Oxford was one of the nine pilot projects—we saw remarkable changes. There was a substantial reduction of, I think, 85% in the use of police cells as places of safety. Alongside that, there was a willingness among the commissioners and, in particular, the providers to increase the number of hospital-based places of safety. I would not be too prescriptive with the models, because there are a range of models. There is the nurse who goes out or there is someone in the control room. I think in the West Midlands they have all-singing, all-dancing ambulance, police and mental health all going together. If you give guiding principles, areas can perhaps decide what is best for them. I would hope that that would be driven by what is best for patients, rather than what is best for the budget.
The Chair
Thank you very much. On behalf of the Committee, I thank both of you for bringing your great wealth of professional and personal experience to our attention. It is very helpful. If there are no further questions, which there are not, can we move on to the next witnesses? Thank you.
Examination of Witnesses
Dame Anne Owers, Professor Dame Shirley Pearce and Alex Marshall gave evidence.
The Chair
We will now hear evidence from the Independent Police Complaints Commission and the College of Policing. This is our final panel today and we have until 5 pm. I should explain to our witnesses that we are bound by a timetable motion, so if I cut you off in mid-sentence at 5 o’clock, I am not being rude; I am simply fulfilling my obligations as the Chair.
Jack Dromey
Q Good afternoon. I have questions on two issues. One relates to the IPCC more generally and the second relates to bail, given the very important evidence that we have heard during these hearings.
On the IPCC’s role more generally, we heard evidence this morning from the Police Federation, which used the words you will have heard in the past about a “crisis of confidence” in the IPCC. In the previous Parliament, significant additional resource was put in, including by way of top-slicing. Now with a set of proposals being made at the next stages to develop and enhance the role of the IPCC—an additional resource for the IPCC—convince us that it will work.
I have one final point to throw in. In the evidence from the superintendents, they made powerful points in relation to how the inspectorate regime works and also about what they described as the difficulties of a blame culture within the police service and the importance of proportionality. Coming back to how it operates in other areas, you will know all about the parallel with pilots and the duty to report. If they report, they are not automatically disciplined as a consequence. However, if there are several incidents, action is taken on the systemic problem. Jeremy Hunt, the Secretary of State for Health, only last week talked about a culture of encouraging people to own up and take ownership of what they get wrong. I distinguish between that which clearly should be the subject of disciplinary action and what the police organisations said to us today. Dame Anne, convince us you can put it right.
Dame Anne Owers: I will do my best. As you say, we were given additional resources. Those resources, of course, had to be converted into buildings and, more importantly, people, and those people had to be inducted and trained and got going. Next year we envisage we will be in steady state, having virtually trebled our staff and also hugely increased the number of investigations that we do. When I first came to the IPCC, we were taking on just over 100 investigations a year. We envisage this year it will be about 450 and next year our target will be somewhere between 500 and 700. So it is a massive expansion in a short time, and of course it takes time in order for that to settle.
I am very aware of the comments not just from the police side, but from complainants and bereaved families about the length of time of investigations and the quality of investigations. I think you have heard from the National Police Chiefs Council about some of the things that you cannot avoid in investigations being long, but we need to make sure that we get through them as quickly as we can. The Bill gives us some of the powers that we need to be able to get off the mark quickly: for example, the power of an initiative so we do not have to wait for something to be recorded and referred, and the ability to more quickly close off an investigation by giving us the power to find a case to answer ourselves.
You referred to the health service, and health service staff have a duty of candour in relation to investigations. We have been looking for some time for something similar to apply to police witnesses in investigations so that we can be sure we get to the truth as quickly as possible. The combination of greater resource, which is now settling in, and greater powers will be helpful, and it is our determination that we will use them well. Also, as the Home Secretary announced in Parliament on Second Reading, we have pointed to the fact—we put this up to the Home Secretary ourselves—that our current structures need to change so that we can be an effective organisation at the size we now are, which is why we put up proposals for a single accountability and decision-making structure so that we can be as effective as possible. I hope that answers your first question, and we realise that you will be looking to see that we do all those things.
On the second part of your question, I am on record as saying that I think that the police complaints system focuses too much on blame and that it is too much seen as a gateway to the disciplinary system, rather than as a way of resolving problems. You would not have that in a commercial organisation. A commercial organisation would seek to put right what had gone wrong, but it would also be in a position where it sees complaints as really useful management information, rather than as things that terrify people because they think they are going to be dismissed. This Bill goes some way towards dealing with that in the sense that it now defines a complaint, broadly, as an expression of dissatisfaction. It is giving powers to resolve that swiftly, if possible and if the complainant agrees. It is also giving ourselves, or the police and crime commissioners, who will sometimes have to review those investigations or decisions, the power to direct or recommend remedies. At the moment, the appeals system has complaints being upheld, but complainants largely do not want them to be upheld; they want an answer. The Bill goes some way towards trying to create a more effective complaints system, but I would pass over to the Committee the extent to which you and others still think that it disentangles itself sufficiently from the necessity of finding blame, rather than finding the truth.
Jack Dromey
Q You make a very powerful point on that issue. I am familiar with continuous improvement cultures in blue chip companies from my former being. One element of that is that it is absolutely key that there is candour and that people constantly learn from the mistakes that are made to ensure that they do the job better in future. Do you want to say something more about the duty of candour?
The Chair
I think we are getting into the realms of very lengthy questions and potentially lengthy answers, and a number of people want to get in. Perhaps just a quick word on this.
Dame Anne Owers: I can write further to the Committee on this, if that would be helpful.
James Berry
Q My question is to Chief Constable Marshall. I should declare that I have worked as a barrister, and I lecture at the College of Policing—it is good to have experience. The College of Policing led on the barred list. That responsibility was given to you. Could you tell the Committee how it has worked in the time that you have had ownership of that portfolio and how the changes in the Bill will help to take it to the next stage?
Alex Marshall: The overall purpose of the College of Policing is: to build up the knowledge base in policing so that people can make evidence-based decisions; to set the educational standards for people joining policing and the education for people when they are in policing; and to set standards for forces and individuals. In that context, we have been operating the list for about 18 to 20 months, and it has achieved one place to go for all forces to ensure that someone who has been dismissed for gross misconduct in policing, or who left but would have been dismissed for gross misconduct, cannot get back into policing. The Bill puts that on a firm footing to make sure that we have the authority to do that and that, if we choose to do so, we can publish details from the list. We will still require forces to submit the data to us and to collect it in a consistent way.
James Berry
Q Thank you. This is my second and final question. You run the senior command course, on which I have had the pleasure of lecturing. That is the course senior officers go on in order to qualify to be a chief officer, effectively. Could that course be opened to senior fire officers to prepare them for appointment to chief constable posts in a single-employer model?
Alex Marshall: I came from there today—that is where I have been this morning—and it is already open to people from outside policing. For example, other Home Office departments and other parts of the military, and it will certainly be open to fire officers. The issue at the moment would be that to become a chief police officer, you must pass the four-day selection process, complete the course successfully, and be a constable. We will look at these proposals on how we bring people to that level and standard. It might just help very quickly to say that the current course has different elements such as professional policing skills, which is all about professional policing skills, and modules on leadership, ethics, business skills and working in partnership. Many of those areas, of course, will be common to senior leadership in many other organisations.
Jake Berry
Q Coming back to the point about your role, I think you were in the room when we had quite a lot of evidence from Sally Burke. She gave us some powerful evidence about the ability of police officers, when they arrive at someone’s house, to deal with young people in mental health crisis. Specifically what support could the College of Policing give officers to ensure that they get appropriate training to deal with situations like that? Is there more that the Bill could do to support that work?
Alex Marshall: I very much support the way in which the Bill gives greater protection, particularly to young people suffering from mental health crises and keeps them out of police cells, where they should not be. I think it reinforces the right areas. This is a very important issue for our members, particularly for the people on the frontline of policing. We have relooked at what we know about mental health, what the knowledge base is, what standards we set in this area and what education should be laid out.
We recently finished a consultation on brand new guidance for everyone who works in policing on dealing with mental health, reflecting the concordat and the work with voluntary organisations, and we will publish that in the next few weeks. There is still a lot we can do to improve the education of those officers and to set clear standards but, equally, the onus must sit with other organisations, particularly health services, to have the professionals on hand, particularly out of hours, to deal with someone who is in a crisis.
Jake Berry
Q I have one final point on this. You said that you were about to publish it. How long after publication will it be until it becomes accepted as practice?
Alex Marshall: It went out to a three-month consultation period that finished about six weeks ago. From memory, we are now adopting the consultation responses, including from charity and voluntary sectors. That will be published by us and then we will put it into the curriculum for everybody joining policing and for their training throughout policing. We will publish it to forces but, of course, we then rely on forces to adopt and use it.
Craig Whittaker
Q Dame Anne, could I just come back to you? It was really good to hear that the Government were listening to your ideas and allowed you to get on and do the IPCC work. Could I just touch on what you said? I think that you said that the Bill goes “some way” towards being an effective complaints system. Do I detect that we could have done more?
Dame Anne Owers: The decision was made, and I understand why, to proceed by way of amending current legislation, rather than starting with a blank sheet. There are still a lot of tie-ups between complaints and discipline in a way that you might not do if you started from scratch. To be honest, I am grateful for what there is, so I am not about to say that the exercise should not be done. I understand exactly the pressures of legislative time and so on. There is still quite a considerable tie-up between the two, but I hope that, between us, the police and crime commissioners and ourselves will be able to develop a more effective way of handling complaints in the first instance. You should not start an investigation by saying, “Who dunnit?” You should start an investigation by saying, “What happened?”
Jack Dromey
Q May I ask a completely separate question? Alex, I think this goes to you. We heard evidence earlier today—this morning from two of the three police organisations and this afternoon from the National Police Chiefs Council—in respect of the provisions on bail. Sara Thornton, in particular, raised concerns about the sheer scale of the numbers involved because of the trigger that is proposed in the Bill. In her words, because of the bureaucracy that would be attached, large numbers of superintendents would have to supervise the making of the necessary arrangements. Separate concerns were expressed about what we have come to call the Dhar clause, arising out of what happened in relation to the Dhar case.
I have read your evidence, and the final paragraph says that
“in relation to the Bill’s changes to the length and authorisation of pre-charge bail, the College is currently evaluating the outcomes of a pilot study that may provide a clearer indication of costs or benefits to these…changes. Until the evaluation is complete the College will be unable to provide a final view on this issue and we will endeavour to update Parliament”.
I have not seen an impact study prepared by the Government. There may be one in the Department, but I have not seen it. It seems from what has been said here that it is common ground that we need to change the bail arrangements and how they work. Against the background of the reservations that have been expressed, one would hope that you have evidence-based legislation, as opposed to legislation to be followed by an evidence base.
The Chair
You are asked to confirm an opinion, or not, but carry on.
Alex Marshall: We share the opinion that bail needs to be very closely managed and that long periods of bail are bad for everyone in delivering good justice. What we have been doing is separate from the legislation: we are looking at how bail operates in local forces and what tighter management controls might make a difference. We have not had the data analysed yet. We have been finishing it in the last couple of weeks, but early indications are that around 30% of all the people who are arrested are put out on bail and in the forces we looked at—about half of those in England and Wales—70% of those who were bailed were bailed for more than 28 days. The rough number of people arrested each year in England and Wales is just under 1 million: about 950,000, down from 1.5 million a few years ago. That gives you an idea of the scale.
We then looked at the reasons why bail went beyond 28 days. They include getting professional statements from doctors and others, getting phones and computers analysed, taking detailed statements from vulnerable victims of crime, getting banking information and details, and getting forensics analysed and back to the investigation. We agree that the time limits should be closely monitored, but can see the resource implications of requiring a superintendent and others to be involved in what looks like a very high volume. The onus will rest on many people across the system to respond much more quickly to requests from the police conducting their investigation.
James Cleverly
Q Dame Anne, there are proposals in the Bill for super-complaints. Could I have your views on the impact that will have on public confidence in policing and the integrity of the process of policing, rather than the individuals?
Dame Anne Owers: Yes, we have noted those. The proposal is that they would come to the inspectorate of constabulary in the first instance, not to us. It will be interesting to see how that pans out. We asked for, and have been given, a power of own-initiative to be able to go into an individual investigation when we need to. We would need to see how the super-complaints work because, at the moment, between ourselves and the inspectorate of constabulary we have quite a lot of powers to go in and look at themes and issues that are arising. We are always slightly worried that a gateway will open that then leads to many things that we cannot do anything about but will be expected to. We are waiting to see what happens.
James Cleverly
Q Okay, fair enough. Following that up, you mentioned the interrelationship between yourself and HMIC. Are there crossovers? Could there be convergence? Could you and should you work together closely, or indeed is there a requirement for two separate organisations?
Dame Anne Owers: My view is that there is a need for two separate organisations because investigating, which is inevitably reactive and responds to an incident, is different from inspecting, which is essentially preventive and regular. There is a close connection between them and with the work that the college does. Insofar as our work reveals problems and issues and we make recommendations, there is then an opportunity for HMIC to look at whether those recommendations are more than pieces of paper when it goes round and does its police effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy programme inspections. There is also an opportunity for the college to reflect on whether that should feed into authorised professional practice and standards. Between us, we ought to be able to create a virtuous circle.
Professor Dame Shirley Pearce: I think we are now working much more closely together. We have a concordat about how our executive and those at non-executive level work together. We have a system whereby the standards are set in one place—the forces—and assessed in another. It also requires us to look at and to monitor quite carefully the powers in the Bill, as we develop much further away from a system where we have a barred list of people who have been struck off, and towards having lists of people who are qualified to do the job and have licences to practise—therefore, we hold a list of people who have skills—to see how those powers are implemented. Do we actually have the right powers?
We welcome some of things in the Bill to give the college powers for individuals, but when it comes to forces delivering things consistently, we are still dependent on a rather heavy-duty code of practice which still only requires forces to have regard to it. As we implement this tripartite system more effectively, we are going to have to watch that we have all the right powers in the right place.
Amanda Milling
Q My question is for Dame Anne on the complaints framework. Can you see the logic of a single complaints framework for both police and fire under the single employer model?
Dame Anne Owers: I think there is a problem about that. It is a problem about our specific remit and about some of the incidents that may happen in a fire situation. Our remit is over bodies exercising policing powers. It is very clear. That can extend to Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, it can extend to some of the immigration functions of the Home Office and it is going to extend to gangmasters, but it about the exercise of policing powers. I think there is real difficulty in just transporting the Police Reform Act onto bodies that do not do that.
Also, under the PRA, every death or serious injury must be referred to us so that we can decide whether it needs to be investigated. I think there would be real difficulty if that provision were to be applied to anyone, for example, who died in a house fire. I do not think the two run together: we have considerable concerns about whether that complaints system is suitable for the fire service.
Carolyn Harris
Q The Bill allows for individual PCCs to decide if they will receive and record crimes. Do you think this is workable, or should there be a nationwide, uniform process which fits all sizes?
Dame Anne Owers: You mean recording complaints?
Carolyn Harris
Yes.
Dame Anne Owers: I have a lot of sympathy with that question. We are worried about the inconsistencies that may arise where, in some forces, the PCC will elect to be the person who receives complaints and in another force it may be the force itself. If you imagine, for example, a major public order incident which may involve quite a lot of forces, and we could have people directed to quite different bodies for complaints; or, indeed, forces which share a professional standards department, as some of them do. We would have preferred to see a system where either it is the PCC, or it is the force, under the oversight of the PCC.
However, I do think, as I am sure PCCs will say, that PCCs have developed some really innovative ways of dealing with complaints, some of which have worked very well. It would be useful to extrapolate broad principles and standards from them. I think it will be necessary to do that in regulations and in the statutory guidance we produce, otherwise I think issues of fairness and consistency may arise in those choices. That is one concern that we flagged up about the Bill.
Craig Whittaker
Q I want to go back to what you said about putting a time limit on bail. Surely, the current system, where we have no restrictions on bail, must be counterproductive? You said people would have to react more quickly, but surely a time limit focuses minds, makes people react more quickly, becomes much more productive and frees up more time in the long run? Surely, that seems like a common-sense approach?
Alex Marshall: I can see the purpose of a time limit. All I will say is that, so far, from the data we have looked at, the numbers are very high in terms of people who need to be bailed or who are bailed—whether they need to be, of course, becomes an interesting question—for more than 28 days to receive back forensic analysis, phone analysis, computer analysis, doctor statements and victim and witness statements from vulnerable people. Yes, of course, if people are working to a deadline, we might see a better response from all those other parties I have just listed. I just say: be careful about the resourcing consequences of imposing 28 days if that is not achievable by all those other parties. But yes, I get the common sense of your point.
Mims Davies
Q I want to pick up a question that I have asked during the day of different witnesses and put it to Alex. It is regarding the requirements around the rank structure, the changes there, how the current structure fulfils the requirements and how you envisage things going forward in terms of your role.
Alex Marshall: Last year, the College of Policing conducted a leadership review, saying, “We know that the nature of police work is changing quite substantially. What, over the next 10 to 15 years, do we need in terms of police leadership?” We have made 10 recommendations, which I think taken together would make quite a positive difference. One of them looks at hierarchy in policing. To put it in very simple terms, in a serious emergency the command structure in the police and other emergency services and other agencies is a very useful way of being clear about who is in charge, what the lines of accountability are and where difficult, critical decisions are made.
Having excessive hierarchy in any organisation, including the police—this is what we learnt during the leadership review—stifles innovation. Also, we want the professional at the front end to be a well educated, well trained, skilled individual who is accountable for the decisions that they make, like the community midwife coming to your house. We want that person to be taking responsibility for their decisions. We do not want hierarchy that stifles that decision making or innovation in the organisation. We think that at the moment the number of ranks in policing is probably too many, and that work is happening at the moment.
The Chair
If there are no further questions from hon. Members, I thank the witnesses for their evidence. It has been really helpful and insightful.
Dame Anne Owers: I just want to signal that we have some comments to make on the provisions about investigations of chief constables and others and about whistleblowers, which we can write to the Committee about if that would be helpful.
The Chair
That is fine.
Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Charlie Elphicke.)