Policing in the 21st Century

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Monday 26th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

We did, of course, look at the arrangements in Northern Ireland, but what we propose to introduce in England and Wales will include a directly elected commissioner and a police and crime panel, which will be drawn from local authority representatives and independent people who will be able to ask the commissioner of police to appear before them and explain what has been happening in their area.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

The inevitable logic of what the Home Secretary has said this afternoon is that we should be electing not only police commissioners but the local chief prosecuting officer. Indeed, it seemed from what she was saying earlier that she was moving in that direction. Surely the last thing people want in any of our constituencies is more party political interference in the policing of this country.

[Mrs May]

We are not talking about party political interference in policing. The picture the hon. Gentleman has painted does not accurately portray what I was saying earlier about directly elected commissioners. The directly elected commissioners will be called police and crime commissioners and they will have a wider role than simply looking at what is happening in relation to their police force; they will be looking at crime more generally and working with community safety partners. We are, however, absolutely clear that the operational independence of the police will remain.