Police Integrity

Andy Sawford Excerpts

Tuesday 12th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

My hon. Friend may not be aware that one of the matters that has been referred back to the Police Negotiating Board and that will be considered by the College of Policing is rewarding individual officers’ skills and development. The first and second parts of the Winsor review proposed an interim arrangement that did indeed suggest that recognition for neighbourhood officers be looked into. The Police Arbitration Tribunal did not feel it was appropriate to take forward those proposals and I accepted the PAT’s recommendation, but further work will be done on ensuring that there is appropriate payment for skills that are developed.

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

One of my local police officers, Inspector Hillary, regularly tweets as he goes about his business in the area. Although the Home Secretary’s statement is at the hard end of accountability and particularly redress, does she agree that that everyday form of engagement and accountability is important to giving the public confidence in their local police officers, and does she welcome that initiative? She has avoided the question three times, but will she say specifically how much these changes will cost local constabularies? She is going to swipe money away—she says it is work, but that is people’s jobs. How much money is she going to swipe from Northamptonshire constabulary to pay for this?

[Mrs May]

The use of social media by police officers is one of the matters that HMIC considered when it was looking at integrity. Social media can be used extremely positively, and a number of forces are making active use of Twitter to get messages across to members of the public and interact with them. If Inspector Hillary is doing it in that way, I commend that officer. HMIC picked up some evidence of inappropriate use of Twitter, so it is important that forces make clear to officers what is and is not acceptable.

I have answered the question about resources several times: we will be discussing with forces and the IPCC what the appropriate level of resources is and what it is therefore right to transfer from individual police forces. I have to say to the Opposition that the concept is a simple one: work is being done in police forces that in future will be done in the IPCC, so it is appropriate to transfer resources.