Police Officers: Recruitment

Lord Watts Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Government’s target of 13,000 police, police and community support officers and special constables will be met to ensure an increase in neighbourhood policing by the end of this Parliament. We have put the funding of £100 million in place next year to ensure that resource is in place to meet that initial mission which we will complete and be judged on by the end of this Parliament. The police settlement has not yet been determined. It will be announced next week, before Christmas. It will be consulted on between Christmas and January and it will be a matter for approval by Parliament by February. As yet, much of the discussion is speculation. I simply say to the noble Lord that his record still needs scrutiny and he needs to remember that his Government reduced police officer numbers by 20,000, reduced the number of PCSOs from over 16,000 to 8,000 and reduced the number of special constables from 20,000 to 8,500 in the course of their term of office. We will meet our targets. We will meet our mission statement and he will judge us on that.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, the previous Government slashed neighbourhood policing and saw a massive increase in anti-social crime, knife crime and street crime. Does the Minister think the Opposition need to reflect on their past record before they come up with suggestions of how we fix the problems they created?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Opposition’s record is one of the reasons they are the Opposition now. The reason they lost the election is because confidence in policing dropped; confidence in the results and outcomes of policing dropped; shoplifting went up 29% in the last year, when the noble Lord was in office. There was also a 40% rise in shop theft over that period in office, and a reduction in the number of police officers. What we are trying to do—this is a difficult task, which I hope the House will bear with us on—is to increase the number of neighbourhood police, put in place respect orders, improve the quality of policing through confidence measures, invest in our policing and ensure that we secure the things the previous Government did not.

Respect Orders and Anti-social Behaviour

Lord Watts Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I may be going off script here, but I agree with the noble Lord. There is not a day when I come into London that I do not see someone jump a traffic light or ride on a pavement. Those matters are covered by existing sanctions, if the police can track those individuals. Many cyclists behave perfectly reasonably, which is also important, but if individuals break the law which is currently in place, the police should take sanctions against them.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, my noble friend the Minister has already dealt with the number of prison places but not with the shortage of prison officers left by the last Government. He also has not dealt with the last Government destroying the Probation Service. Does he have any plans to deal with those two issues?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Government will have plans to deal with those issues, but they are the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice. If my noble friend will allow me, I will draw his comments to the attention of my noble friend Lord Timpson, who represents the Ministry of Justice in this House.

Non-crime Hate Incidents

Lord Watts Excerpts

Tuesday 19th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

The Home Secretary has today announced potential reforms to the monitoring of police performance and what they need to monitor. If the noble Lord looks at what the Home Secretary said, he will see that there will be an ongoing process of monitoring police performance, and as part of that, the recording of non-crime hate incidents will undoubtedly be a key issue.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that in the last year of the last Blair Government, 207,000 on-the-spot fines were made, compared to 7,200 in the last year of the previous Government? Does he agree that we need to get back to community policing and to Labour ways if we are going to cut anti-social behaviour?

Police: Junior Cadet Schemes

Lord Watts Excerpts

Monday 11th November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am afraid that is a no for the noble Lord.

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not the case that, after 14 years of cuts from the Tories and the Liberals, we now find ourselves having to rebuild the police force? Does the Minister think that the Opposition should apologise for 13 years of cuts and take the blame for the problems that we have with our police service?

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

I am grateful to my noble friend for his questions. I am very proud of the fact that, when I was the Police Minister, we had the largest number of police officers on the beat in the country ever in the history of policing. That was eroded through decisions taken by the coalition Government. It was slowly built back up to its current level by the post-coalition Government, but they still cannot get away from the fact that they were responsible for a reduction in policing. Latterly that was recognised, which is to be welcomed. I want to build on that with our new neighbourhood policing model over our time in office.