Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Baroness Harris of Richmond Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2011 Lords Chamber

Lastly, and very importantly, Amendment 234Q removes the current proposed amendment to the Audit Commission Act 1998, which would set up chief constables and the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police as auditable bodies. The Bill would have the consequence of creating two statutory finance officers and duplicate audit arrangements again for one police fund. That would be a complete waste of resources and blur the lines of accountability. This amendment will, I hope, make it clear that the local elected policing body is the auditable body. I beg to move.

[Baroness Harris of Richmond]

My Lords, I have added my name in support of Amendments 41, 42 and 46, which the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, has set out in very clear detail, so I will be brief.

These are important amendments to test the implications of chief officers being corporations sole. Like the noble Baroness, I am uncomfortable with chief officers being given a legal status as corporations sole, and I look forward to an explanation from the Minister outlining answers to some of the questions that have already been asked about what this means for accountability and corporate governance.

The alternative amendments here deal with limiting the status of corporations sole to powers of employment only. As I understand it, that would prevent chief officers from owning assets or entering into contracts not directly related to employment. I have to say that I also have some significant concerns about giving chief officers unfettered responsibilities for employment of police staff without any role for the governing body. At the very least the latter should have an oversight role in grievance and professional standards, or the chief officer will become both judge and jury in these matters. But I am sure we will return to this later in the Bill. However, I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, that the most objectionable aspect of the current wording is the role that chief officers could play in determining how huge sums of public money should be spent, for instance through entering into multimillion-pound contracts or borrowing money in their own right. I hope that my noble friend the Minister can reassure me on this matter.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

My Lords, I shall speak to my Amendment 64B, which differs only in a minor fashion from one or two of the others, and in support of Amendments 66A, 67, 67B and 234A to 234Q, to which I have added my name. I want to say why all this stuff matters. It no doubt seems like a terribly arcane set of arguments, but I rather suspect that some of our discussions on this group of amendments will determine whether what the Government are trying to do on police accountability actually happens. The way that the Government have framed all this is a recipe to undermine police accountability rather than strengthen it. I am sure that that is not the intention, but I suspect we have ended up here almost by accident.

Let me explain what I mean: it relates to the amendments dealing with corporations sole. The Government have decided that it would be appropriate for chief officers of police and the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis to have responsibility for the employment of police staff—a function currently carried out by police authorities. I think that is the wrong decision because it places too much power in the hands of a single individual. It is the argument that we have about policing and crime commissioners, and everything else. However, it is particularly difficult in a policing context.

There is a tendency among some chief officers of police to have around them a group of blue-eyed boys and girls who they see as their favoured supporters, and who they tend to promote in favour of others. One of the checks and balances that we have at the moment is that appointments at ACPO rank—commanders in the Met and assistant chief constables and above outside—are appointed by a panel from the police authority rather than simply on the decision of the chief officer of police. I am suggesting not that chief officers of police would use this power capriciously but that the temptation or tendency might be there. Having worked closely with a number of chief officers of police, I am well aware that some of them have extremely strong personalities and that they like to get their own way. This is about creating some checks and balances on those very strong personalities from getting their own way on every single occasion. It is going to be particularly important on employment.

It is actually a protection for the chief officers of police not to be doing this or not to be taking sole responsibility. I lose track of the number of instances where there have been complaints following appointment processes in the police service—the police are a particularly litigious lot. The complaints were about whether processes have been followed properly, whether there has been favouritism or whether individuals have been discriminated against. For a chief officer of police to be able to say, “Actually, this was done through a proper equal opportunities process and properly documented by the police authority” is an important protection. However, Ministers in their wisdom have decided that the employment function for police staff, as well as for the appointment of senior officers, should pass to the chief officer of police.

If that is the decision that the Government have taken, it is of course not too late for them to reconsider this matter. I do not believe that it runs to the centre of the main political headline that the Government wish to achieve by all of this, so they have that opportunity but they have made that commitment. To make that commitment work, as police officers have a particular status of being officers of the Crown, if you transfer responsibility for police staff across to chief officers of police you have to create the legal framework around which that can happen.