Police: Funding

Lord Cormack Excerpts

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Cormack]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the comments by the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, what plans they have for the funding of policing over the next five years.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Bates) (Con)]

My Lords, the provisional police grant report to be published shortly sets out the Government’s decisions on police funding for 2015-16. No decisions have yet been taken on police funding beyond March 2016. However, as the police have shown categorically under this Government, it is possible to deliver lower crime while reducing budgets.

[Lord Cormack (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that Answer and congratulate him on his Dispatch Box manner, which has been exemplary since he became a Minister. However, does he not realise that there is very real concern in the country—not least in Lincolnshire, where the chief constable made a similar statement to Sir Bernard’s just a week before him? Is my noble friend confident that, apart from anything else, we will be able to continue to recruit candidates in the right number and of the right quality, because public confidence in the police service is being somewhat damaged by these statements?