Policing

Cat Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 4th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak in the same debate as so many Lancashire colleagues and to follow my parliamentary neighbour, the hon. Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies).

Lancashire has featured prominently in the debate, including the fact that the Lancashire constabulary has reserves. Under the funding formula, the Policing Minister’s local force in Hertfordshire has greater reserves than Lancashire. It has gained £6.6 million, while we have lost £24.5 million. Indeed, Lancashire faces a reduction in funding of between £134 million and £164 million between 2010 and 2020. The funding cuts are going to result in a fundamental change to policing in Lancashire. My hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Julie Cooper) has mentioned the huge decrease in police numbers. They have fallen from 3,611 in 2011, and we fear that by 2020 there will be only 1,699, if the cuts go ahead in full.

Statistics have been used liberally during this debate, but I want to share a very personal experience of community policing. When I finished work on 24 July 2013, I got the last train home from Preston to Lancaster, which arrives at about 11.30 at night, and then walked the short, 10-minute journey home. When I left the train station, a huge crowd of people travelled away from it with me. People slowly filtered off in different directions until I became very conscious that there was just one person behind me, following me suspiciously closely. An instinct kicked in and I decided to cross the road. This man crossed the road after me. I thought maybe I was making it up—maybe it was all in my head. I crossed back to the original side and he crossed back with me. That moment when you realise that you are not making it up—that you, at 11.30 at night in your home city, are being followed home by a strange man—is a terrifying one that can happen to any one of us.

I was very fortunate that I managed to come across PC Bruce Irvine, who was attending an incident while on the beat. At 11.30 on a Wednesday night, I could go to him and explain that a man was following me. He was able to put me in the back of his police car to make me feel safer and make sure that I got home safely. He spoke to the man who had been following me, who admitted that he had been following me and that he had intended to follow me all the way home to find out where I lived because he “liked the way” I looked.

The police cuts and the loss of community policing will have a real impact on real people’s lives. When my chief constable in Lancashire, Steve Finnigan, says that the cuts could result in Lancashire becoming a blue light only service, that terrifies me as a woman. When some councils talk about switching off street lights at night because of the cuts, that makes me question whether I, as a woman, can walk home safely from work in the evening. I am not the only woman in that position. Police cuts are having a huge impact on our communities and a particularly huge impact on certain groups that may be more vulnerable than others.

At a time when the national crime recording standard in England and Wales is showing an increase in the number of rapes and sexual offences being reported, I urge the Minister for Policing, Crime and Criminal Justice to take this matter seriously and to reconsider the proposals for Lancashire and other forces that have been adversely affected, including the neighbouring Cumbria force, because they will impact on women’s lives and make them scared to go out at night. Please consider that.