Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill
Baroness Doocey Excerpts(15 years ago)
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Baroness Doocey
My Lords, I have two amendments in this group and I would like to speak briefly to both of them. As this is the first time that I have spoken in this stage of the Bill’s passage. I need to declare an interest as a member of the London Assembly, a member of the Metropolitan Police Authority and a member of the Home Office Olympic Security Board. I am pleased that I do not have to say all that every time I stand up to speak.
I shall deal first with Amendment 156 and then go on briefly to Amendment 165. The purpose of this amendment is to clarify the powers of the London Assembly to co-opt independent members to the police and crime panel, which might otherwise be subject to legal challenge. The Bill establishes police and crime panels throughout the country but there are different arrangements for London. Outside London each police and crime panel will consist of 10 or more members of the local authority plus two independent members who are co-opted. Within London the police and crime panel will be one of the Assembly committees, formed as a panel, and it may co-opt independent members. To make this possible the Bill removes the restriction in the Greater London Authority Act which provides that only Assembly members may serve on ordinary committees of the Assembly. However, I believe that the Bill is very unclear on certain aspects. It does not make it explicit that the London Assembly could appoint independent members. It also does not make it explicit that if the London Assembly did appoint independent members, it could allow them to vote. There is no provision in any of the other legislation that gives the Assembly such powers, so if the Assembly were to appoint independent members to the police and crime panel it could be open to legal challenge.
This amendment would remedy that deficiency by giving the London Assembly the specific power to appoint independent members to the panel, thereby removing the possibility of legal challenge. The amendment is important regardless of whether the current London Assembly wishes to appoint independent members because it would make the Bill sustainable in the long term. I should add that the amendment would not give special treatment to London; it would merely try to treat London in the same way as the rest of the country.
My noble friend Lady Hamwee has covered many of the points on Amendment 165 and I do not intend to repeat what she has said. I would just agree wholeheartedly with her assessment that it is essential that the panel has the right to summon the Metropolitan Police in London and senior members of the police staff to give evidence. For example, if the Mayor of London identifies neighbourhood policing as a priority, the panel will need information about the allocation of resources within the Metropolitan Police, and about its performance, in order to inform its deliberations. As the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, said so powerfully the other day, we on the Metropolitan Police Authority hold the commission and the police to account in public. We question police officers, including senior police officers, and we receive and publish information provided by the Metropolitan Police. It is very important that we continue to do this, and that there is openness and transparency. It is important also to point out that the amendment enjoys the support not just of my party but of all parties on the London Assembly.
Lord Harris of Haringey
My Lords, I put my name to Amendments 156 and 165, which deal with the panel arrangements in London. It is worth reflecting on the way in which the London arrangements will be substantially different from those in the rest of the country. The Bill replaces the panel responsibility on the London Assembly. Therefore, one will not be able to make—in the way that one will elsewhere in the country—the automatic assumption that every relevant local authority will be represented on that forum. There will be representatives from various parts of London, but it is possible that some parts of London will not be represented on the London Assembly panel. Therefore, it is worth remembering that the London arrangements for the panel are significantly different.
This highlights also the importance of Amendment 156 in dealing with co-opted members. It is designed not to frustrate the Government's intention but to tidy it up. If there are such co-opted members, they should be appointed by a resolution of the whole London Assembly, which would avoid some of the complexities that the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, highlighted. I support the points made by her and by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, about who could be summoned to a panel. This is a particularly important issue, not just in London but around the country.
In the past, I talked about two particular difficulties with some of the arrangements in the Bill. First, where is the visible answerability of the police service in any particular area to those who are holding it to account? I understand the Government's argument, which is that in London the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime will hold the police service to account, and that outside London it will be the police and crime commissioner—or the police and crime commission, if the House’s preferred option goes forward. However, the scrutiny process will be very strange if the only scrutiny that is possible will be of the actions of the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime—or the deputy MOPC, because the mayor will almost certainly appoint a deputy—and, in areas outside London, of the police and crime commissioner.
There are a number of problems with that. It will mean that the entire focus of discussion will be about political debate. One elected politician will appear before a group of other elected politicians, possibly with one or two independents. Discussion will focus on the political decisions that the policing and crime commissioner, or the mayor’s office, have taken. That is all well and good: people may say that that is as it should be. However, I suspect that one will lose a lot of the granularity around what has happened in the police service in that area in the intervening period with which the panel is concerned.
We are told that the chief officer of police—the commissioner of police in the metropolis—may attend meetings of the panel. However, they will not be obliged to attend, but may attend by their own grace and favour. The importance of Amendment 165 and parallel amendments is that they would ensure an expectation that certain senior police officers could be required to attend. That will be critical to ensure that the discussion moves away from the political knockabout that all of us in Committee enjoy and have participated in at various times in our life, and towards scrutiny of important policing issues. The panel will have the power to call before it senior police officers who are responsible for the area of policing that is being debated. This will be critical to remove some of the political knockabout that will otherwise happen and to provide at least some, though not all, of the visible political answerability that is so necessary to policing.
Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill
Baroness Doocey Excerpts(15 years ago)
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Baroness Doocey
My Lords, I should like to address Amendments 103, 105, 112 and 116, the four amendments in my name in this group. The purpose of the amendments is to ensure democratic legitimacy to the function of police and crime commissioner as exercised in London. I have no objection to the concept of the Mayor of London, acting as the PCC, appointing a deputy mayor for policing and crime. The issue that arises is the fact that the deputy mayor for policing and crime will not be an elected person. The mayor has the right to appoint anyone to this position.
Mayors are not infallible. London has so far had two elected mayors. Both have appointed a range of unelected people to a wide variety of important posts, some of which have resulted in controversy, resignations and sackings. I recognise that no such mistake has been made in the appointment of the chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority or, in fact, any of the appointments, but the fact is that that very important principle still stands.
However, I believe that there is a much more fundamental objection. Were the mayor to appoint an unelected person to the post of deputy mayor for policing and crime, it would negate the whole purpose of the Bill. How on earth can an unelected police and crime commissioner be accountable to local communities? Does not this proposal to hand the powers of the PCC to any unelected individual make a nonsense of the Government’s argument about democratic legitimacy?
Previously in Committee, my noble friend the Minister said:
“Cabinet Office research in 2008 showed that more than two-thirds of the public wanted an elected person to hold the police to account … It means an elected individual charged with being the voice of some of the most vulnerable people … I believe that police and crime commissioners will be both visible and democratically accountable”.—[Official Report, 11/5/11; col. 940.]
My noble friend made the same comment earlier this evening.
Therefore, I echo what the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, said earlier. Why on earth should every area outside London have a democratically elected individual carrying out the job of PCC, but not London? What rationale is there for treating London differently from any other part of the country? Whatever misgivings one might have about certain sections of this Bill, it is essential that the new legislation works in practice and does what it is supposed to do. But it must also be logically consistent and ensure the same degree of democratic accountability throughout the country. These amendments would achieve these objectives by obliging the Mayor of London, in delegating his functions as PCC, to choose a deputy mayor for policing and crime only from elected Members of the London Assembly.
Lord Harris of Haringey
My Lords, I will speak to an amendment that is in my name, to four other amendments to which I have added my name and to an amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. The amendment in my name is Amendment 110. I have to confess that this is possibly a refugee from what should have been another group. However, it could stand on its own here. It essentially deletes Clause 19(4), which is about the power of the deputy mayor for policing and crime to,
“arrange for any other person to exercise any function of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime which is, in accordance with subsection (2), exercisable by the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime”.
This comes back to the issue that we keep raising in relation to policing and crime commissioners: their ability to delegate functions to people who are not accountable in the same way. The proposal is that, even though this is an activity which is specifically the responsibility of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, and specifically should be carried out by the deputy mayor, it should not be possible to delegate this to any other person in such a cavalier way.
I also wanted to speak to Amendments 103 and 116, which essentially say that the deputy mayor for policing and crime shall be a Member of the London Assembly. If your Lordships and the Government are not minded to accept the principle of direct election, then the second best must be that the person delegated by the Mayor of London must themselves be an elected person, a Member of the London Assembly. It really is extraordinary that the Bill gives such latitude to the Mayor of London to appoint someone whom they have not met and may have no personal direct mandate. One could create a justification as to why it would be inappropriate to have a direct mandate, but it seems to me that the main thrust of this ought to be that that the person who is acting on behalf of the Mayor of London in this very important role should themselves have at least been subject to the electorate for at least part of London, if not the whole of London. It is important that the deputy mayor of London for policing and crime should be an elected Member of the London Assembly, and Amendments 103 and 116 deal with this.
I have also put my name to Amendment 105, which enables the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to delegate to any person the functions that would otherwise be carried out by the deputy mayor for policing and crime. The issue is the same: whether it should be possible for these functions so easily to be delegated to people who are not elected. Amendment 105 would at least require the mayor to delegate them to somebody who was part of the structure of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime rather than to someone completely different. What would be the point of having a Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime if the mayor could say, “Well, one of these functions I am not having done by somebody who works for the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime; I’ll have it delegated somewhere else”? I suspect that this was an unintended consequence of something else when the drafting was done, but it seems to be a very strange arrangement.
Amendment 180 would involve Members of the Assembly in the appointment of police officers of ACPO rank other than simply the commissioner and deputy commissioner. I spoke earlier today about the importance of that responsibility being shared. It is an important issue of governance. It is also important that senior officers of the Metropolitan Police not only see the line of accountability to the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis but recognise the importance of democratic accountability. The involvement of Members in the appointments process would help facilitate that.
Baroness Doocey
My Lords, I should like to speak briefly to the amendments in my name in this group—Amendments 73, 152, 159, and 160 to 163. Their purpose is to make the provisions of the Bill consistent with those proposed in the Localism Bill. That Bill will change the relationship between the London Assembly and the Mayor of London, as set out in the Greater London Authority Act 1999, because it will give the London Assembly a new power to reject by a two-thirds majority the Mayor’s statutory strategies.
However, this Bill makes no equivalent provision. As it stands, it would not allow the Assembly to reject the Mayor’s draft policing and crime plan. Consequently, once both Bills have become law, the London Assembly would have the power to reject every one of the Mayor’s strategies, with the sole exception of the police and crime plan. This discrepancy makes no sense. There are no substantive differences between the police and crime plan and other mayoral strategies that would justify it being excluded. These amendments, which are supported by the Mayor of London and all political parties on the London Assembly, would remedy this discrepancy.
The amendments also propose that the power to reject a draft police and crime plan would be exercisable by the whole Assembly. I am very aware that the Bill’s provisions suggest that none of the functions of the police and crime panel should be carried out by the full Assembly. However the whole point of vesting this specific power in the full Assembly, as opposed to in a committee of the Assembly, is to provide consistency with the provisions of the Localism Bill in relation to mayoral strategies.
These amendments would ensure that accountability arrangements within the Greater London Authority are coherent and internally consistent.
Lord Harris of Haringey
My Lords, I have put my name to the amendments to which the noble Baroness, Lady Doocey, referred. It is extraordinarily anomalous that two Bills that we will be considering at the same time in your Lordships’ House have such very different provisions for the role of the London Assembly and the strategies of the mayor. It seems sensible that they are made consistent. The proposal that the London Assembly has the power to reject—or, when it comes to the Localism Bill, perhaps even amend—the plan is extremely important and it would be sensible if the power was consistent across the two pieces of legislation.
Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill
Baroness Doocey Excerpts(15 years, 1 month ago)
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Baroness Doocey
My Lords, I would like to address my remarks to how Part 1 will impact on London. I need to begin by declaring an interest as chair of the London Assembly. I also serve on the Metropolitan Police Authority and the Home Office Olympic security board. I have a number of concerns about this Bill, not least the Government's plans to implement it in London from 1 October this year. There are two reasons for my concerns: the Olympic Games and the London mayoral elections.
The Games are not just a London issue; they will affect every police force in the country. They take place between July and September next year but there are also many preparatory events—notably the torch relay, which will start on 18 May, last for 70 days and impact on every area of the UK. The Olympics present the biggest peacetime challenge the police have ever faced and officers from all over Britain will be involved in providing mutual aid. The logistics of this huge operation are truly mind-blowing. The Met has spent years planning for every eventuality and will continue to refine those plans right up to the Games. To force the police to divert their efforts from the security of the Games to a major reorganisation at this critical time almost beggars belief.
If that was not enough there is also the issue of the mayoral election in London next May, the outcome of which is uncertain. It is quite possible that a new policing system could be put in place this October, designed to reflect a Conservative agenda, only to be dismantled again next May if another party wins the mayoral election. Such an expensive and time-consuming process should happen only once. The Bill does not stipulate when its provisions will be implemented and the Government are free to choose a sensible date. I strongly urge them to do so.
My next concern involves the democratic legitimacy of the office of police and crime commissioner as exercised in London. The Bill provides for the post of elected police commissioner to be carried out by the Mayor of London, in the form of the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime. The mayor may appoint a deputy mayor for policing and crime with most of the same powers and responsibilities. However, there is no requirement for the deputy mayor to be an elected person. The mayor could simply hand this job to a non-elected friend, making a complete nonsense of the argument about democratic legitimacy.
I have a specific concern regarding the proposed system of police complaints in London. The Bill proposes that, where senior officers below the rank of deputy commissioner are subject to complaint, responsibility should be moved from the Metropolitan Police Authority to the commissioner, who will hear not just the complaint but the appeals. This would make the commissioner both judge and jury, and remove all elements of independence and transparency. I believe we should remedy this by making the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime the relevant appeal body. Like other noble Lords, I believe that the powers of the police and crime panels need to be significantly enhanced. I have three specific proposals for London: that the panel should be able to reject the mayor's draft police and crime plan by a two-thirds majority; that the panel should have the power to require senior officers from the Met to provide information and attend meetings; and that the power to co-opt voting independent members to the panel should be vested in the London Assembly, to ensure that such appointees have a proper statutory basis that is not open to challenge.
One of the greatest weaknesses of the Bill is its provisions for the hiring and firing of chief constables and I share many of the concerns that other noble Lords expressed. We need appropriate procedures to ensure that those appointed have the necessary professional knowledge and experience, that dismissals are for professional or disciplinary failures and not political convenience, and that operational independence cannot be compromised by inappropriate political pressure via the threat of a dismissal.
My final point concerns the duty of the Home Secretary to issue a strategic policing requirement to deal with national threats. Under these proposals, police and crime commissioners would effectively be free to disregard such requirements in favour of political expediency or re-election strategies. They must be obliged to respect them. When we move to Committee, I shall seek to address all these issues.