Police: Independent Police Commission Report

Lord Condon Excerpts

Thursday 5th December 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Condon (CB)]

My Lords, I declare my registered interests in policing. For certain aspects of the Stevens report, I was one of the 40 commissioners, although today I shall speak for myself rather than for the commission as a whole.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, for arranging this debate. I agree with almost everything he said in his eloquent opening speech about the Stevens report. This is a serious piece of work, and I hope party politics will not get in the way of giving it the serious consideration it deserves. The most important part of the report is the attempt to restate the role and the purpose of policing. In all aspects of life, form should follow function. One should think about what one is trying to do before one thinks about how one is going to organise oneself to do it.

Policing can succeed and enjoy public confidence with or without elected police and crime commissioners. Policing can also succeed and enjoy public confidence within a national police structure, within a regional structure or with the status quo of over 40 local forces. Neither of these is the big issue. However, policing will not succeed and it will lose public confidence if the role and purpose of policing in the 21st century does not accord and resonate with the history and strengths of policing, and more importantly, with public expectation. That is the big issue and is what I would like to concentrate on.

The independent commission is right that policing should be about more than crime-fighting and should be about a wider agenda to promote safer communities. Preventing and detecting crime is, of course, at the very core of modern policing, and always will be, but it is also vital to promote and maintain order and safety. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, and the report have quoted Police Scotland’s policing purpose. It is worth restating that it says,

“the main purpose of policing is to improve the safety and well-being of persons, localities and communities in Scotland”.

It builds on what many of us have been saying for 20 or 30 years. I have been retired now for more than 14 years, but during my time as commissioner I described the role of the Metropolitan Police as:

“Working for a safer London”.

If this is the core role of policing, and it is restated and accepted, it should shape and influence future developments in accountability, organisation, leadership and so much more.

In 1989, I was appointed a young chief constable of Kent, based in headquarters in Maidstone. The week that I arrived all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, the local newspaper had, on its front page, a picture and a large article about the new neighbourhood bobby policing Maidstone town centre. I featured in a small article on about page 8—a one-inch column. It was a valuable lesson for me. Members of the public might have a passing interest in who their chief constable is—or nowadays who is their elected police and crime commissioner—but what really matters to them is whether they have local neighbourhood bobbies with an ongoing responsibility for them, whether they get reassuring, visible police patrolling and whether they get a prompt and courteous response when they have an emergency. As the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, said, local neighbourhood policing is the vital, fundamental building block of good policing. It must be preserved to ensure public confidence and support. A remote and reactive model of policing, whether driven by philosophy or just out of budgetary need, will lose public support. Crime will rise and public order will be harder to maintain.

Reported crime has been falling since 1995, for which I would like to claim a little credit, having been commissioner from 1993 to 2000. The fall in crime has been based on a partnership model of policing: partnership between police and local communities, between police and local political structures, and between police and local business. It is a truism that whichever party were in power at the moment would have to make draconian cuts to police budgets. However, unless there is a real focus on preserving neighbourhood policing, unwelcome and unintended consequences will follow. They are already bubbling up and starting to happen.

As I said, I was chief constable of Kent and have lived in that county for the past 30 years. Earlier this week, the current chief constable reported its latest crime figures, coinciding with the first year of the elected police and crime commissioner. For the 12 months to the end of October 2013, reported crime was up nearly 10%. Burglary, the crime which worries people the most—having their home or business premises broken into—was up over 25% in one year, which is unprecedented. These rises coincide with budget cuts of £50 million, a reduction of 500 police officers and a reactive form of policing being put in place. Anecdotally, I understand that more than half our police services are now beginning to experience rises in crime coming through in a similar way. You can get away with budget cuts; you can get away with huge cuts in policing; and you can get away with reactive policing for a while—but not for long. It is beginning now to come home to roost.

What, then, should be done, and what does the Independent Police Commission contribute to the debate? First, all parties should accept that the role of policing is broader than detecting crime: it embraces community safety and order. Secondly, neighbourhood policing should be protected and preserved at the heart of policing. Thirdly, one of the most vital partnerships—as others have said—is between local policing and local politics. Whatever organisational or accountability structures are put in place for policing, they must not inhibit police and local politicians sharing information, ideas, policies and the way forward on preventing crime and promoting community safety. Fourthly, as the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, has said, economies of scale, smarter procurement and innovation must start to mitigate the worst excesses of the budget cuts.

It is not impossible for the current elected police and crime commissioners to deliver those reforms. I am not doctrinaire about that; but the early signs are certainly not encouraging. My own view is that Northern Ireland and Scotland probably provide better examples of local policing enshrined within a national framework and I think a gradual evolution within “Police England” and “Police Wales” will probably be the way forward. Economies of scale, smarter procurement, career planning and development of leaders from within and outside the service would all be more effectively achieved within a national model that enshrines local policing—as would dealing with organised crime, terrorism and international policing.

However, I understand the party politics of this; that is probably too big a move to make. At the very least, police and crime commissioners must be relocated in a more collegiate, more productive structure that ensures they work more closely with the real aspects of local politics, local communities and local business to deliver safer communities. The Independent Police Commission is a valuable contribution to the debate. I hope that all parties will respond to these big issues and ideas with the due consideration that the report deserves and I look forward to further debate.