Police Funding, Crime and Community Safety

Andy Burnham Excerpts

Wednesday 24th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham (Leigh) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House recalls that the Chancellor announced in the Autumn Statement 2015 that there would be real-terms protection for police funding; notes that, based on the scale of cuts proposed, police budgets will fall by between nine and ten per cent over four years in real terms; further notes that the failure to provide real-terms protection for the police budget will lead to further cuts in police numbers in addition to the 18,357 police officers already lost since 2010; notes that the inclusion of cybercrime in crime statistics will show that crime has doubled; notes the heightened threat of a terrorist attack in the UK and the operational role of neighbourhood police in preventing such an attack; and calls on the Government to honour the Chancellor’s statement to the House and provide real-terms protection for the police budget.

We called this debate for one simple reason: the public have not been told the truth about police funding or crime figures. With the second police and crime commissioner elections just weeks away, people need the facts so this evening we set the record straight.

A matter of weeks ago the Chancellor of the Exchequer stood at the Dispatch Box and made this explicit promise to the police and to the public:

“There will be real-terms protection for police funding. The police protect us, and we are going to protect the police.”—[Official Report, 25 November 2015; Vol. 602, c. 1373.]

I am sure Conservative Members remember that because they waved their Order Papers. It could not have been clearer—“real-terms protection”. That was not an off-the-cuff remark or a slip of the tongue. It was the centrepiece announcement of the Chancellor’s autumn spending review statement, made with the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister at his side; it was the traditional rabbit out of the hat that we have come to expect on such occasions, designed to produce mass waving of Order Papers.

There was once a time when, if the Chancellor of the Exchequer made a statement of that kind in that way to this House, it would have meant something more than just a grab for the next day’s headlines. People could trust it to be true, because it had been said by a Chancellor of the Exchequer at the Dispatch Box in the House of Commons, but it seems that we live in different times. Ministers these days, from the Prime Minister downwards, are decidedly less attentive than they used to be to the veracity of what they say at the Dispatch Box. Every Member of this House should worry, because in the end it goes to the heart of trust in this place and what we all do.

Surely, of all public services, the police should be able to trust the word of Ministers of the Crown when commitments are given here. Would it not be a sign of disrespect to people who put themselves in harm’s way on our behalf day in, day out if the Chancellor was writing cheques that he knew he would not be able to cash? You would think so, wouldn’t you, but in today’s politics Ministers think they can say what they like and get away with it.

This evening I will present to the House new analysis which shows that the Chancellor has broken his promise to the police and to the public. He has failed to provide real-terms protection for police budgets in 2016-17. In fact, he is about to cut those police budgets yet again, for the sixth year in a row. For the six years that he has been Chancellor and the six years that the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) has been Home Secretary, we have had six years of cuts to the police. What a record! And to think that the Conservatives used to call themselves the party of law and order.

The issue before the House tonight is this: are we prepared to let the Government think that they can get away with making promises to this House and then breaking them within days, or are we going to do something about it? Are we going to hold them to account and make them honour the promise they made to our local police forces?

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

I do not want to go too far back in history, but if my right hon. Friend looks at 3 February 2010 he will see that there were 18,000 more police officers under the Labour Government, but the increase in the budget for 2010-11 was 2.7%, and the Conservative party felt that it was not enough at the time.

[Andy Burnham]

I was just about to make that very point. The cuts that we are now facing come on top of the loss of 18,000 police officers over the previous Parliament, as my right hon. Friend has just said, and 12,000 of them were front-line officers. Thousands of police community support officers and civilian staff have lost their jobs. We have begun to see the break-up of neighbourhood policing, which was a great achievement of the previous Labour Government, bringing police out of their stations and cars and back into communities, restoring trust and bringing down crime. That is a record that Labour should be proud of.

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

Is my right hon. Friend also aware that commitments were given that the sale of police stations and other buildings would help to ensure that there were additional police officers on the frontline? In my constituency we have lost St John’s Wood police station and Harrow Road police station, and I understand that Paddington Green police station has now been sold, yet our police numbers are still nearly 30% down on where they were in 2011.

[Andy Burnham]

The same story is repeated all over the country. I ask my hon. Friend to think about the cuts that have been made to other services alongside the police, such as those to councils, mental health services, social care, disability benefits, ambulance services and fire services. All those cuts pile extra pressure on our overstretched police forces. That is what we are seeing. The cuts now being planned come at a time when this country is facing multiple challenges on many fronts, and when the threat level has never been higher, so something has to give.

[Stephen Doughty (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that there is a stark contrast with the approach that the Welsh Labour Government are taking, with funding for hundreds of extra PCSOs in Wales making up for the shortfall they have seen as a result of cuts elsewhere?

[Andy Burnham]

I think that people will hear what my hon. Friend has said and make their own judgment. Who protects community safety? Who stands up for the police? When people come to vote this May, there is the evidence that when Labour is in government, when we run councils and when we have Labour police and crime commissioners, we protect front-line and neighbourhood policing and we improve community safety. My hon. Friend makes that point very well.

The question we have to ask the Home Secretary today is this: how many more consecutive years of cuts can police forces take before public safety is seriously compromised? England and Wales already have far fewer police officers per head of population compared with international counterparts. If the ratio drops even lower, there are real fears that were a Paris-style attack to happen here, and, importantly, were it to happen outside London, there would simply not be the ability to surge enough police officers—specifically, fire arms officers and specialist units—on to the streets quickly enough to protect the public.

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

I understand that the right hon. Gentleman is giving this a bit of welly as part of his rehabilitation, but I am confused about two things. First, I have yet to hear him acknowledge that over the past seven years crime has continued to fall quite significantly. Secondly, I have yet to hear him refer to his own recommendation of 10% cuts in police funding, which he made not six months ago. Would he care to enlighten the House on both points?

[Andy Burnham]

I will come on to both points. I am doing fine, thanks. I hope that the hon. Gentleman can see that I will be standing up for police forces, even if he is not. I will come on to both points he raises, because I do not think that his Government are telling the correct story about what they are doing to the police. They are not providing real-terms protection; they are cutting the police. Ministers also stand at the Dispatch Box and say crime is falling; the Policing Minister said it just days ago—complacently. They fail to point out that the crime figures they quote do not include online crime, which is about to come into the crime statistics for the first time. In the last six years, crime has changed—it has moved online—but the relevant figures have not been counted, so I would not be so complacent if I were him.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned what was said at the autumn statement about what I was meant to have said. What I would say to him is that there is far too much spin coming from the Government Dispatch Box. He should look at what I actually said. I am about to come straight to that issue.

I have talked about the specialist and firearms units we need to protect the public. However, neighbourhood policing is crucial, is it not, if we are to collect the intelligence to combat the terror threat. My worry is that if the Government proceed in this Parliament with year-on-year cuts, they will break up the neighbourhood teams. Let me take the House in detail through what I am saying and through the figures we are presenting.

Analysis by the House of Commons Library of next year’s police grant settlement to individual forces shows that they will not be protected in real terms; in fact, they will not even be cash-protected. In 2015-16, the overall allocation to individual forces, excluding special payments to London, was £7,452 million. In 2016-17, it will be £7,421 million—a £30 million cash reduction, or £160 million in real terms.

[Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)]

A few moments ago, the right hon. Gentleman rightly said that the level of threat is severe, and we are all aware of that. May I make the same invitation to him that I made to his Front-Bench colleague, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey), in the previous policing debate? The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the importance of armed police officers. The Leader of the Opposition has made it clear that, in his vision of policing, even if those officers are armed, they will not be allowed to use their weapons. Will the shadow Home Secretary admit that that is a dereliction of duty? Will he take this opportunity, while he is speaking from the Dispatch Box, to clarify the Opposition’s position?

[Andy Burnham]

I can tell the hon. Gentleman now that the Leader of the Opposition said that that was simply not the case. There is no change whatever to long-established policy when it comes to the police keeping the public safe.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that, in addition to the cuts, the 4.6% police precept rise in the west midlands, which was apparently negotiated by the hon. Members for Solihull (Julian Knight) and for Dudley South (Mike Wood), amounts to nothing more than local people paying more money for less police?

[Andy Burnham]

The Government are cutting the police at national level, making local people in the west midlands—and in Greater Manchester too—pick up the bill, but people are getting less in terms of police on their streets. We know, do we not, that the Government are very good at making cuts in urban areas such as Greater Manchester and the west midlands and at taking money elsewhere. That is the reality: our constituents will be paying more for less. The Chancellor and the Home Secretary have broken their police promise to our constituents.

[Dawn Butler (Brent Central) (Lab)]

Talking about cuts, we have lost 108 police officers and 104 PCSOs in my constituency since 2010. The only increase we have seen has been in voluntary special constables—and that was 98. The Government are trying to police using volunteers, not police officers.

[Andy Burnham]

I will come to that as well. The Bill we will debate in a week or so is all about having a part-time police force to deal with the growing threat we face from online crime and fraud and from terror. That is simply not an answer to the challenges of the future, and I will come to that before I finish.

[Catherine McKinnell (Newcastle upon Tyne North) (Lab)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Andy Burnham]

I will make a little more progress, and then I will give way to my hon. Friend.

Let us just get the facts on the record: 36 of the 43 police forces in England and Wales have now received their grant allocations from the Home Office, and these show a cut in cash terms. How does that deliver the Chancellor’s pledge of real-terms protection? Worse, all police forces in England face real-terms cuts next year. If the same level of cuts is sustained over the spending review period, as we suspect it will be, that will equate to overall real-terms cuts in the police budget of between 9% and 10%.

The House will recall that right up until the spending review—[Interruption.] I am coming to the point. Right up until the spending review, the police had been told to expect cuts of over 20%. Senior police officers say that they were still expecting cuts of over 20% the day before the spending review settlement. The hon. Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) nods because he knows I am right about that. It was sustained pressure from Labour Members that forced a rethink from the Government.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mrs Theresa May)]

rose—

[Andy Burnham]

I will give way to the Home Secretary in a moment.

After the Paris attacks, the whole question of police funding had to be looked at in a new light. I wrote to the Home Secretary and said that while of course efficiencies could be made, anything over 5% cuts in real terms over the course of this Parliament would be dangerous. That was completely misrepresented by the Chancellor in his autumn statement, and I am pleased to correct the record today.

[Mrs May]

When my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse), who was a distinguished deputy Mayor for policing here in London, referred to the 10% figure that the right hon. Gentleman had quoted, the right hon. Gentleman said that there was far too much spin from the Government side of the House. The figure actually came from a Labour party press release where he said:

“Of course, savings can be found. The police say five to ten per cent over the Parliament is just about do-able”.

He accepted 10%, so why is he now so worried about cuts in funding?

[Andy Burnham]

When that press release was issued I said that up to 5% would be do-able—[Interruption.] No, I have said this consistently, if the Home Secretary will just listen. I said that up to 5% cuts would be doable, and we stand by that; that up to 10% would be difficult; and that over 10% would be dangerous. She was threatening to cut the police by over 20%, so let us get the facts straight. She will recall that she asked Cobra to review police funding in the light of the Paris attacks. My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey)—the shadow Policing Minister—and I also consulted the police in the light of the Paris attacks. We listened to what they had to say, as the Home Secretary will have done. They said that over 5% would be difficult, if not dangerous, and I put that in a letter to her before the autumn statement. Let us get this right so that the public are not misinformed and there is no spin from the Government Dispatch Box.

In his desperation to play politics in the autumn statement, the Chancellor tried to misrepresent my position, but he outdid himself, because he misrepresented not just my position but the Government’s position. He dressed up a 10% cut as budget protection, and we now know that it is nothing of the sort. No doubt the Government’s defence will rest on the claim that they gave councils extra freedom to increase the police precept to make up the shortfall, but that does not hold water. For the Chancellor to give the guarantee in this House as he did, he would have needed firm agreements from local councils and PCCs that they would raise the extra cash locally, but he did not have those agreements—not even from Conservative PCCs. The Devon and Cornwall and Cambridgeshire forces will not be raising their precepts by the full amount recommended by the Government, and Hertfordshire is actually shown to have lowered its precept. [Interruption.] The Home Secretary says, “It’s their decision”, but let me tell her again: she promised real-terms protection for police budgets, and she is not delivering real-terms protection for police budgets. She has broken her promise to the police. I am afraid that she cannot just shrug that fact off. The Conservative PCC for Devon and Cornwall, Tony Hogg, says this about the implications of the spending review for his force:

“While I completely welcome the Government’s changed position on Police funding, it remains a fact that central Government funding to Devon and Cornwall Police in 2020 is estimated to be 19% less in cash terms (real terms 32% less) than it was when I commenced office in November 2012.”

A 32% cut in real terms, with 43 officers going next year and 28 police staff going too, is not on, and the Government cannot just shrug it off.

The next claim that the Government will no doubt make is that authorities that have used the precept freedoms to the full will have been able to protect their budgets, but that is not true either. The Hampshire independent PCC, Simon Hayes, said:

“The Medium Term Financial Strategy...shows an estimated budget shortfall of £6m by 2019/20 assuming 1.99% council tax precept increases from 2016/17 onwards.”

He cannot make up the shortfall from his precept.

Let me apply the same test to the Home Secretary’s police force and my own. Next year, Thames Valley police will see a real-terms cut in central Government funding of £5 million. The income raised by the full use of the precept does not cover that shortfall. Forces such as Thames Valley also have to contend with other cost burdens loaded on to them by the Chancellor, including the apprenticeship levy and the extra national insurance contributions. In the case of Thames Valley, those amount to more than £6 million. That is money out of front-line policing. What is the net effect of that in the Home Secretary’s police force? She should listen to this: 95 officers going next year, as well as 51 police community support officers and 161 staff. There we have it. The Home Secretary has broken her own police pledge to her constituents.

Let us look at my force, Greater Manchester police. According to figures from the Library, central Government funding will be down by £8 million in real terms next year. The force has made full use of the freedoms from the precept, but that will not make up the shortfall. As my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) said, the force will be paying more for less. As the PCC for Greater Manchester, Tony Lloyd, puts it:

“Contrary to the Chancellor’s rhetoric, this is a cuts budget.”

[Catherine McKinnell]

My right hon. Friend is making a powerful speech and highlighting the differential impacts, as well as the impact across the board. I want to give the House the example of Northumbria police. Just 12% of its revenue comes from the council tax precept. That is far below the national average of 25%, and that hampers its ability to make up for the shortfall. Northumbria is the worst hit of all forces, with local residents paying more for less.

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The more deprived parts of the country have less ability to raise money from their council tax base, so they cannot make up for the Government’s cuts. I am sorry to tell her that the situation could be about to get even worse. The Guardian reported yesterday that the Home Secretary is about to bring forward a new police funding formula—after the mess that the Policing Minister made of the last one—which will divert funding away from urban forces towards rural ones.

[Mrs May]

indicated dissent.

[Andy Burnham]

The Home Secretary is shaking her head, and I am glad; I hope that she will tell me that that is not true. Recently, £300 million was miraculously made available for local government in England at the last minute, but—surprise, surprise—barely a penny went to any council represented by Labour. It all went to councils represented by the Conservatives. If the police funding formula did the same, it would add insult to injury and make a complete and utter mockery of the Government’s already dubious commitment to creating a northern powerhouse.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I have listened carefully to the shadow Home Secretary for 22 minutes, and his entire assessment of how the police are doing is based on the amount of money that the Government have given them. There has been absolutely no mention of smarter policing, better procurement or better use of technology. We heard yesterday in the Home Affairs Committee from a former Labour Member of this House and former Minister who is now the PCC for Merseyside. She has managed to halve the budget for her office compared with that of the former police authority, and all that money has gone into front-line policing. There is more to policing than the amount of money that the police receive from central office.

[Andy Burnham]

I could not have put it better myself. Vote Labour. Vote for a Labour PCC. Labour PCCs will work cleverly to protect front-line policing, and they will drive innovation and reform. Protect our police by voting Labour in May. I thank the hon. Gentleman for making my point better than I could have done.

[Richard Fuller (Bedford) (Con)]

On the point about additional funding for policing to plug some of the gaps that the right hon. Gentleman has talked about, as he knows, the reductions are over five years, during which time some PCCs may take control of their fire authorities. Does he believe that it would be right or wrong for PCCs to use fire budgets to plug perceived gaps in their police budgets?

[Andy Burnham]

I think it would be wrong, and I am very worried about the proposal to put fire under the control of the PCCs, because fire will be the poor relation. Already, thousands of firefighters, fire pumps and fire stations are at risk from the local government settlement. I put it to the hon. Gentleman and all Conservative Members that considering the cuts to the police, and to the fire service as well, we must all ask ourselves the question: is there adequate emergency cover in all parts of the country? I believe we are getting to the point at which some people will say that that is no longer the case. We need to look at those two things together. Putting two underfunded services together will not necessarily create a financially viable or safe service.

I want to move on to the crime figures, because I am conscious of the time. The Government’s alibi for their police cuts so far has been that it is okay to cut the police because crime is falling. That is basically the argument made by the hon. Member for North West Hampshire, who formerly had responsibility for policing in London— but is it true? The latest recorded crime statistics in January showed large increases in violent crime, knife crime, hate crime and sexual offences.

As ever, Ministers will say, “Look at the British crime survey,” but as I have said, crime has changed: it has migrated online. We might see a downward trend in the traditional volume crimes such as burglary and theft in the British crime survey, but when we ask the British public whether they have been the victim of online crime, they will probably say, “Yes, I have been.” If those figures are not included in the British crime survey, it is no wonder that we do not have an accurate picture of crime.

[Kit Malthouse]

rose—

[Andy Burnham]

I will give way one final time.

[Kit Malthouse]

I recognise the issue that the right hon. Gentleman raises, but will he accept that we cannot patrol to prevent online crime? The solution to online crime is not throwing bodies at it but about throwing technology at it, which can be done either relatively cheaply or much more efficiently.

[Andy Burnham]

What we should not do is to throw volunteers at it, which is the Home Secretary’s idea. [Interruption.] I will come on to explain that. This is about both technology and people. We need sophisticated teams to deal with it. It is fair to say that most police forces do not have such a capability at the moment, and they will not get that capability by having their numbers and their budgets cut. We need a sophisticated response to online crime.

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

The hon. Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse) is trying to suggest that there is no link between crime and the reduction in support and funding for police services. In Greater Manchester, £8.5 million and 1,600 staff have been cut, and we know that there has been an increase in crime. In my constituency, the number of burglaries has doubled year on year. Is that not the effect of what the Government are doing?

[Andy Burnham]

That is directly the effect of what the Government have done, compared with what they inherited. How on earth can that police force now develop the capability to deal with the threats we will face in the future? The argument that crime is falling so we can cut the police will not work any more. Ministers are going to have to get a new script. It is not safe to cut the police, because crime is becoming more complex.

[Mrs May]

I am grateful to the shadow Home Secretary for giving way to me a second time. He is making an argument about the importance of accuracy in reporting figures. May I therefore ask him why, in relation to a Labour party press release on crime statistics issued in January, under the heading “crime up 6 per cent, the biggest increase”, the UK Statistics Authority wrote to my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (James Cleverly) to say that

“by focusing on police recorded crime without appropriate caveats, and omitting evidence from the more complete and reliable source (for most violent crimes) of the Crime Survey for England and Wales, it may have given, in parts, a misleading impression”?

Will the right hon. Gentleman now apologise?

[Andy Burnham]

No, I will not, because, as my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington said, the figures were accurately reported. The challenge today is for the Home Secretary to explain her claim that crime is falling, because I am afraid the recorded crime figures do not show that, and some experts say that the British crime survey is about to show that crime has in fact doubled. That is the issue that she has to explain, and she will have to work hard to do so.

Tackling online crime is one of the biggest challenges we face, but as I have said, forces do not have the capability. The question is, how are they going to do that with these further cuts? To be fair, the Home Secretary has floated one idea, which I have just mentioned. She told the BBC website in January that she was planning to recruit a new army of volunteers to help solve cybercrimes. She said that

“volunteers who specialise in accountancy or computing”,

as well as IT professionals,

“could work alongside police officers to investigate cyber or financial crime”.

I ask in all honesty, is that really the best the Government can come up with to crack the complex crime challenges of the future—Theresa’s temps, a Dad’s Army of retired accountants to take on and defeat the sophisticated international organised crime and fraud networks?

The week after next, we will debate the Home Secretary’s Bill, which will propose that powers be given to volunteers without their becoming special constables. Is that really the answer—a part-time police force? It does not equate to a vision for policing in England and Wales that is up to the challenges of the future. A part-time police force is no answer to the growing threats we face from cybercrime and terrorism. When it is the only answer that the Government can come up with, it is a sure sign that their cuts have gone way too far.

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

It was suggested by the former deputy Mayor that these things can be done by sophisticated algorithms that can filter out such crimes. Actually, the victims of such crimes still feel that they need a police officer to come round and speak to them. That is the problem, especially when 1,000 front-line police officers in Merseyside are being cut.

[Andy Burnham]

We have seen this cost cutting and privatisation elsewhere, haven’t we? Take NHS 111, which was going to solve everything because of the algorithms that the call handlers would use. Has the service to the public been better than under NHS Direct? In no way. My hon. Friend has got it absolutely right. The Government suggest that it can all be done on the cheap, but people know it cannot.

In conclusion, the official line from the Government has been, “We’re protecting the police and crime is falling,” but that claim is something that should be added to the growing fraud statistics. The truth is the opposite: the police are being cut while crime is rising. They are cutting the fire service and the Border Force even more deeply—Tory cuts that are putting people’s safety at risk. That is the message that we will take into the PCC elections. Our police do a difficult job in a dangerous world. They deserve our thanks and respect, particularly those of the Government of the day. If promises are made to them, they should be kept. As we have shown, Labour is prepared to stand up for the police and protect community safety. That is what we are asking the House to do tonight by making this arrogant Government honour their commitment to the police. Real-terms protection should mean just that. What better way is there for Members on both sides of the House to show their appreciation for their local police forces than by voting for the Opposition motion tonight?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

The point that I am making is very simple and I am happy to repeat it to the hon. Lady. The Labour party consistently looks at the amount of money that is spent and at the number of police officers, but what we need to look at is how money is being spent and how the officers are being deployed. It is not just me who is saying that. Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary has made it clear that there is no simple link between officer numbers and crime levels, between numbers and the visibility of police in the community or between numbers and the quality of service provided.

[Andy Burnham]

I am listening carefully to what the Home Secretary is saying and she has repeated the claim that she is protecting the police in real terms. Is she therefore denying the figures from the House of Commons Library that show 36 out of 43 police forces in England and Wales receiving cash cuts in their allocation from the Home Office for 2016-17?

[Mrs May]

When the right hon. Gentleman looks at figures for overall police spending he needs to look at figures for overall police spending, because they include the money being spent. He was very careful. He said when he looked at his figures that he was not looking, for example, at the extra grants for London through the capital city grant. He was not looking at the money being spent on the emergency services mobile scheme that we are introducing to replace Airwave. He needs to look more carefully at the figures that he is citing.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

I have to say that I agree with my hon. Friend. If we look at the figures, we see that the cash change in resource reserves since March 2014 in the West Midlands is £27 million. The choice has been made to put that money in reserve—into the bank balance—rather than into officers on the frontline.

[Andy Burnham]

I thank the Home Secretary for giving way one more time, because this is an important debate and people need the truth. They will have heard that she did not answer my last question about Home Office cash cuts to 36 police forces, so let me ask another question. She loves to read out what I said—5%, 10%—but I have already gone through what I said and the letter I wrote to her. Let us get the facts straight. Why did David Jamieson put forward those plans? It was because until the day before the spending review, the Home Secretary was telling the police that they could expect 25% cuts. That is what she was telling them; that is what they were planning for. What happened to make her change her mind the day before the spending review, and back down on the 25% cuts that she was planning?

[Mrs May]

The right hon. Gentleman is trying to make an argument where there is none, because he knows full well the processes of determining the comprehensive spending review, and the discussions that take place between Departments and the Treasury that result in the final figures that the Chancellor announces. In truth, the Labour party decided what its line was going to be on police funding, and when the Chancellor stood up and protected police budgets, instead of sensibly changing that line, it decided to carry on with it anyway because one should never let the facts get in the way of an argument.

The right hon. Gentleman argues that the inclusion of cybercrime in the crime statistics will show that crime has doubled, but the uncomfortable truth for the Opposition is that crime has fallen by more than a quarter since 2010, according to the independent crime survey for England and Wales. That is one of the most authoritative surveys of victims of crime in the world. It is administered by the independent Office for National Statistics, which captures the experience of more than 30,000 households. The survey dates back to the 1980s and shows that crime is at historic lows. People in this country are as safe as they have ever been.

The ONS has been clear: its preliminary estimate on fraud and cybercrime does not mean that crime is rising, and certainly not that it has doubled. In fact, it confirms what we have long known, which is that such crimes have for too long gone unreported and unrecorded. That is why the Government welcome the work of the ONS to capture those crimes.

The right hon. Gentleman notes the heightened threat of a terrorist attack and the important role of the police in preventing such attacks, and I will go on to speak about that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

I am sorry, but I am conscious that there is only limited time for this debate, and I am coming to the end of my remarks.

As I said earlier, the proportion of officers on the front line has increased from 89% to 92% since March 2010. That has been achieved at the same time as we have set about the urgent task of repairing the country’s finances, reducing the deficit and ensuring the long-term health of our economy. That task is not yet finished. As my right hon. Friend the Chancellor made clear in the autumn statement, over the course of the last Parliament, we made huge progress in rescuing the economy. Now we must rebuild it and we must protect our economic security in an uncertain world. We must also ensure that we have the resources to respond to the growing and emerging threats that we face. We have done that by protecting police funding in real terms, once the local precept is taken into account.

This is not the first time that the right hon. Member for Leigh and his party have made tall claims about crime and public safety. In 2011, the right hon. Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) argued in this House that our reforms would lead to “a perfect storm” of higher crime, lower confidence and less visible policing. None of those predictions came true.

In 2012, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) said that the model of community policing was being denigrated by the Government. In fact, we have always supported a model of community policing, and we put PCCs in place to ensure that local priorities were taken into account. As I have just indicated, Conservative PCCs are doing a better job in that area than Labour PCCs are.

In 2013, the Labour party’s review of policing, led by Lord Stevens, warned of

“a danger of the police being forced to retreat to a discredited model of reactive policing”.

As I have said, however, a greater proportion of officers are now on the front line. In 2014, the then Leader of the Opposition claimed that abolishing direct democracy through police and crime commissioners was a “sensible” saving. Yet in three months’ time, the Labour party will stand candidates in elections for every single police force area in the country.

In 2015, the Labour crime and justice manifesto suggested that

“a further 30,000 police officers could be lost after the election under the Conservatives”.

HMIC has been clear, however, that every force has the resources it needs to deliver effective policing and to continue cutting crime.

[Andy Burnham]

rose—

[Mrs May]

Given that it is the right hon. Gentleman, I will give way one last time, but I am virtually at the end.

[Andy Burnham]

I am very grateful to the Home Secretary. She has just said something that goes to the heart of our debate today. She said that the Government had protected police budgets in real terms, once the police precept is taken into account—she said something along those lines. Will she accept that that caveat was not in the Chancellor’s autumn statement?

[Mrs May]

No. I am sorry, but we have been through this, and I am not going to go over it again for the right hon. Gentleman.

At every release of the independent Crime Survey for England and Wales, the Labour party has ignored the most authoritative measure for crime in this country, because it does not show what it wants it to show. As I said earlier, Labour decided what its campaign would be six years ago, and they have doggedly stuck to it ever since. They operate on the basis that if you say something enough times, people will believe it, regardless of the facts—[Interruption.] They ignore the evidence that points to lower crime, safer communities and police reform that is working. [Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

I am pleased to see your happy countenance, Mr Speaker, for I rise depressed. I thought coming to this place that I would avoid tedious arguments about inputs and instead participate in a debate about results, policy and methods. In 2008, when I became deputy mayor for policing in London, I inherited a police force that had lost its way but was awash with cash. At that time in the capital, significant crime types were rising, not least teenage murder. During my four years, I helped, cajoled, bullied and persuaded the police to refocus at the same time as cutting significant amounts of money from the police budget. During that entire period crime fell, particularly some important crime types such as teenage murder. In my first year, there were 29. In my final year there were eight. It convinced me there and then that there is little connection between resource and output and results in policing. It is much more about focus.

What is depressing about the argument that the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) has made today is that it fundamentally misunderstands the nature of modern policing and modern crime. Government and many police and crime commissioners throughout the country are trying to refocus the police on some of the challenges that they face.

[Andy Burnham]

The hon. Gentleman has mentioned the Met he inherited in 2008. I would not argue that it was perfect, but does he accept that the Metropolitan police of 2008 were a universe away from the Metropolitan police of 1997, who failed properly to investigate the murder of Stephen Lawrence?

[Kit Malthouse]

I will accept that there have been significant changes in the Metropolitan police—that is absolutely right—but I think it is universally accepted that, when we got into office in 2008, under the then commissioner the force had lost focus. The point I am making is that it was not delivering while at the same time it was receiving significant budget increases. It was literally awash with cash. That position had to be corrected. That has to happen across the whole country.

In my entire time in the policing community, I never came across a police force that had adopted what are in many ways the four pillars needed for modern policing. The first of them is investment in intelligence. About 80% of the time the police know just about where, when and by whom a crime is going to be committed, yet they never invest as much as they should in intelligence. Technology is changing the face of crime fighting. Automatic number plate recognition, data analysis, facial recognition, advanced forensics: no police force in the UK invests enough in them.

I have yet to find a police force that measures the efficiency of investigation. Murder in London fell from a high of 211 back in 2005 to just 101 in my final year. Should we still be investing the same number of police officers in murder? Of course not. There has to be some kind of peace dividend and efficiency saving.

There is also innovation. If police forces are really going to grasp the challenge of the future, they have to invest in innovation. There is not a single police force in the country that has an innovation officer spreading new methods and techniques across the force.

Finally, I want to say a word on cybercrime. The right hon. Member for Leigh made much of that. It is a prime example of where technology is going to solve the problem. When I was a kid, anyone could open my grandad’s Mk2 Escort by thumping the door with their thigh. Now car crime is negligible in police terms because of changes in technology. Cars got better. The truth is that banks and financial services organisations invest in technology to prevent and detect crime, and the police have to do the same. One programmer—one smart programme—will solve more cybercrime than 1,000 police officers ever could; that is what I call efficiency.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Policing, Crime and Criminal Justice (Mike Penning)]

I was laughing at the shadow Policing Minister, Mr Speaker, and I apologise for doing so as this is a very serious day and a very serious debate. Like the Home Secretary, I pay tribute to the emergency services that are still on the scene at the former power station at Didcot. I spoke to the chief fire officer earlier today and, on behalf of the House, expressed gratitude for the work that they are doing at the incident, which is very harrowing for them as well as for the loved ones and families of those who are still missing and those who have been injured and killed.

I listened carefully to the speeches made by the shadow Home Secretary and by the shadow Policing Minister. I think that I might have heard his speech before—perhaps before the election, before the shadow Home Secretary wanted a 10% cut to policing, or perhaps I heard it last week, and perhaps I will hear it again next week. The shame about having this debate, curtailed as it is, is that we will have a debate next week, led by the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, on the Committee’s report. I bet that I hear an almost identical speech then from the shadow Policing Minister.

When we look carefully at what the Labour party is saying, we can see that on the one hand they are saying that we should have allowed cuts of 10% to policing until 2020 whereas, on the other hand, we hear speeches galore from Labour Back Benchers saying, “These cuts are not good.” What cuts? The cuts that happened between 2010 and 2015? Or those that would have happened had this country been foolish enough to elect a Labour Government?

The shadow Home Secretary is trying to say that we should not have taken into consideration the precept that is allowed—the 2% or 5%. Every Home Secretary has done that and every Chancellor has done that, when we look at how we fund the police. All of a sudden, we have a completely different narrative—“We want to cut it, and we want to cut it even more.” It fascinated me.

[Andy Burnham]

rose—

[Mike Penning]

No, I will not give way. I am afraid that the shadow Home Secretary went on for far too long, as the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee said. Perhaps next week we might hear the same speech again.