Police Funding, Crime and Community Safety

Debbie Abrahams Excerpts

Wednesday 24th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[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.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

I am going to make some more progress, because we have limited time for this debate.

I cannot agree with many of the contentions put forward in today’s motion, but I welcome the opportunity to set out the reforms that the Government have pursued since 2010 to improve policing, deliver better value for money for taxpayers, and better protect people and communities from crime. When we came to power in 2010, it was not only the country’s finances that the Labour party had left in a mess. The financial crisis made public spending cuts across the board necessary. We had just been through the worst financial crisis since the second world war and had the biggest budget deficit in our peacetime history—bigger than that in Portugal and bigger, even, than the one in Greece.

Even without the pressing financial imperative, however, the problems in policing were glaring. Police forces were bloated with bureaucracy. Officers’ productivity was held back by targets and red tape. Local policing priorities were dictated from Whitehall. Police pay and conditions were hopelessly out of date, and, while police forces were supposedly held to account by police authorities, in reality only 7% of the public knew that those unelected committees even existed.

We brought in a radical programme of police reform to transform inadequate structures and institutions, bringing much-needed changes to open up the workforce, reform pay and conditions, overhaul outdated systems and technology, and make policing properly accountable. We cut red tape and freed up about 4.5 million hours of police time, the equivalent of 2,100 full-time police officers. We took steps to root out the waste and inefficiency that existed in police procurement and IT. We set up the College of Policing to improve police standards and training. We established the National Crime Agency to co-ordinate the response to serious and organised crime.

In 2011, we introduced police and crime commissioners to bring real local accountability to policing in a way that was never possible under invisible and faceless police authorities. In just a few months’ time, the public will have the opportunity to hold policing in their area to account in the strongest way possible—at the ballot box. For those pioneering PCCs standing for re-election, they will be defending their record and will be judged on their record over the last three-and-a-half years. Those standing for the first time will be judged on their ideas to improve policing in their areas. All will have a direct, democratic mandate to hold their local police force to account, to cut crime and to keep people safe.

When I introduced my programme of reform, those on the Opposition Benches claimed it would lead to a perfect storm of more crime, lower confidence and less visible policing. However, thanks to the hard work of police officers and police staff, and thanks to the leadership of chief constables and police and crime commissioners up and down the country, none of those predictions has come true. As I said earlier, crime is down by more than a quarter since 2010, according to the independent Crime Survey for England and Wales. Labour Members can shake their heads, but this Government have done more than any other to ensure that crime statistics are accurate and can be trusted by the public. In 2012, I transferred responsibility for crime statistics from the Home Office to the Office for National Statistics to ensure that they are properly independent. In 2013, I commissioned Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary to inspect crime recording practices in all forces in England and Wales. In 2014, it published a report on each force, as well as an overview of its findings. As a result of its scrutiny, we are already seeing more accurate crime recording.

I have made previously hidden and under-reported crimes a priority, and I hope Members of all parties will welcome the fact that today we see more victims of sexual and violent offences having the confidence to come forward and report those crimes. While crime has fallen, public confidence has been maintained and the proportion of police officers on the front line has increased.

[Debbie Abrahams]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs May]

I give way to the hon. Lady.

[Debbie Abrahams]

Unfortunately, my constituents are not at all happy. Burglary has increased by 100% over the last year, according to police recorded crime figures. What is the Home Secretary doing to monitor the potential increase in vigilantism?

[Mrs May]

I am sorry, but I thought the hon. Lady said “invigilantism”. It is very clear—HMIC is very clear about it—that the police have the resources they need to do the job they need to keep people safe and secure. They are doing that on a day-to-day basis across the country. Public perceptions of crime are improving nationally and locally. Fewer people are worried about burglary, and more people believe the criminal justice system is effective.