Police Funding Formula

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Tuesday 1st March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Keith Vaz]

The hon. Lady is right. That is the point the Committee makes in our report. Different areas have different demands. Policing has changed. It is not as it was 20 years ago or even 10 years ago. Therefore, the police must say what they are doing now, and the Government must say what they want to fund. Of course, the situation in Wales requires special attention.

The indicators proposed by the Home Office in determining funding—there are only four—fail to take into account many of the points raised in the report, and thus miss 70% to 80% of police demand that is not linked to volume crime. The Home Office needs to make absolutely clear what tasks 21st-century policing is expected to take on, and then decide how much it is prepared to fund.

It is of course important that police forces work in a collaborative way. Indeed, the Government are working in a collaborative way. When the Minister came before the House in November to tell us that the police funding formula review was being suspended, he was not then the Minister with responsibility for the fire services. The Government have decided to look across the Government and ensure that they collaborate properly. If they can do so, so can local police forces. If that happens, it must be part of the funding review formula.

One key Committee recommendation was the appointment of an independent panel to assist the Home Office in formulating the revised proposals. That is not because we do not trust Home Office officials to add up. We need a robust and defensible way of looking at the formula and it needs to be independent. Therefore, the Committee went to the trouble of suggesting the kinds of organisations that should sit on the panel: the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, the College of Policing, the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Royal Statistical Society. You will notice, Madam Deputy Speaker, an emphasis on those who can add and therefore crunch statistics. There is an ongoing project between the London School of Economics and Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary to provide a sound academic basis for identifying the underlying demands on police time. Let us use the expertise of our academic institutions. Such work, when led by the independent panel, could make the Minister’s job even easier.

[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Keith Vaz]

This is the last time I will give way because I know that other Members want to speak.

[Mr Thomas]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. When he and his fellow Committee members were looking at the potential balance of an independent panel, did they consider experts on serious and organised crime? It will be important to understand the impact on London’s police force of the pressures the Met is under to help to continue the battle against serious and organised crime.

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[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax). I have always enjoyed campaigning for the Labour party in his constituency. I strongly support the idea that the next police funding formula should be based partly on the number of bars and clubs in an area, because I think that, on that basis, London would see a substantial increase in its funding.

Perhaps, as I have started off in a consensual spirit, I might invite the hon. Gentleman to agree that the number of major events taking place in a police force’s area should be taken into account as well. Wembley stadium is very close to my constituency, and requires a substantial police presence to ensure that it is policed properly and effectively.

I very much enjoyed hearing from my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), the Chair of the Select Committee, about the work that the Committee had done. If he will forgive me for saying so, I thought the most worrying part of his speech was his suggestion that, according to some reports, police forces will have no detailed or clear information about the funding formula until 2019. I hope that the Minister will be able to set the Select Committee’s concerns at rest. At the moment, the Metropolitan police has no sense of clarity about its funding for the rest of this Parliament from 2017 onwards. As I said in my intervention on my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East, there is huge concern about this in London, given the role of the Metropolitan police in tackling serious and organised crime, and its importance in the fight against cybercrime, the increasing importance of which the whole House acknowledges. There is a sense that rising crime in London is putting substantial pressure on the available police resources.

Two weeks ago, Europol published a major report on the scale of the illegal activity of people trafficking by organised criminal gangs across Europe and beyond. London was identified as one of the centres for trafficking people into this country and in which the criminal gangs manage their operations. This re-emphasises the point that London, through the Metropolitan police, needs as much resource as possible to tackle and bear down on serious and organised crime, particularly if we want to tackle illegal immigration and other forms of organised crime. Hon. Members will be only too aware of the terrorism threat that we face, and I gently suggest that London faces a particular challenge to be tackled through counter-terrorism measures. I hope the Minister will ensure that the funding formula takes account of the particular threat that London faces.

[Richard Drax]

Speaking as an ex-serviceman, I watched the atrocities in Paris and noted that the police there, who were already armed, were expected to enter the buildings immediately to rescue people. There was no time to hang around. My concern is whether we have sufficient funding and training facilities to ensure that those who find themselves in such a situation here, God forbid, are equipped to enter such buildings immediately. It costs a lot more money to equip and train people to that level of expertise.

[Mr Thomas]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. We need to ensure that police forces work collaboratively so that there are enough trained individuals. I gently suggest to him that the Metropolitan police has particular expertise to share in this regard, and that its training facility at Hendon continues to turn out extremely highly trained and effective police officers to work in the Met and elsewhere. He is absolutely right to suggest that the attacks in Paris last year brought into sharp relief the terrorist threat that we all face here in the UK and, I gently suggest, in London in particular.

An ongoing challenge for the Metropolitan police is the fact that crime is rising again. Recorded crime is up 5% in the last 12 months. Violent crime in London is up 22%. The Metropolitan police is operating in the context of 1,600 police officer posts having gone since 2010 and almost 3,000 police and community support officer posts having been axed in the last five years. In my constituency during that period, 137 police officers, sergeants and PCSO positions have been axed. We were used to neighbourhood policing involving a sergeant, three or four police constables and three or four PCSOs. We are now reduced to just one PC if we are lucky, and one PCSO if we are very lucky indeed.

More recently, we have also seen revealed the substantial pressures on the Met, which have led to more and more police officers from the suburbs, particularly Harrow, having to be moved from the borough where they normally do their policing work to police major events or to respond to rising crime in inner London. In the past 12 months, on occasion, 22% of police officer time in Harrow has been abstracted to other boroughs—in other words, 22% of the time Harrow police officers have worked has been spent not policing the streets of Harrow, as it should have been, but policing other streets in London. The Minister may argue that that is an operational issue for the Metropolitan police chief, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, and I would accept that it is, but it is an operational issue being driven by the shortage of resources at his disposal.

Harrow is one of the safest boroughs in London, but we still face significant crime problems, there is still a significant fear of crime, and significant problems with antisocial behaviour remain. My constituents and other constituents in Harrow want to know that our police officers are out policing our streets, instead of policing streets elsewhere in London. What is particularly concerning my constituents, such that I felt it necessary to intervene in this debate, is a proposal to merge Harrow’s police force with those in Barnet and in Brent to create a tri-borough command. The proposal would axe two of the three borough commanders in this area and create just one borough commander for the three areas. Brent has a bigger crime problem than Harrow and its force has the particular challenge of managing events at Wembley stadium. Barnet also faces a very different set of challenges and, again, is an area with slightly higher crime than Harrow. My constituents fear, rightly, that if there is a tri-borough commander, Harrow police will be more easily deployed into Brent or Barnet and away from Harrow.

Given the lack of investment in Harrow police station compared with that in the Wembley and Colindale police stations, my constituents fear that if the tri-borough proposal goes ahead, there will be a question mark over the future of Harrow police station. If the Minister does not feel that he can intervene to reassure my constituents in today’s debate, and I recognise his reluctance to do that, I ask him to have a quiet word with Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe to encourage him to drop this plan for a tri-borough command and reassure my constituents that there will still be one borough commander accountable to us in Harrow for the quality and effectiveness of policing in our borough, instead of our having to share this with those other boroughs. On that point, I welcome the Select Committee’s report and look forward to the Minister’s response.

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[Mr Gareth Thomas]

May I encourage the hon. Gentleman to oppose the merger of borough command units as well? If they succeed with Harrow, Brent and Barnet, I would have thought that a Kingston-Sutton merger might be next. Does he agree with me that that is a step too far and that the Policing Minister might usefully intervene with the Metropolitan Police Commissioner to that effect?

[James Berry]

I know that locally there will be mixed feelings if that is proposed in south-west London, but I do know that the reforms brought in by this Government and the previous Government mean that these matters are entirely in the hands of the local police body, which in the case of London is MOPAC, or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, rather than the Policing Minister. They are an operational matter for MOPAC and the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. I have not seen the proposals yet, but I would certainly want to be reassured that there was no less democratic accountability and no less focus on local policing if that was going to happen in Kingston. I will wait to see the proposals and I am sure that all London MPs will have something to say if and when they are published by the Met police.

The Committee’s report records a rather unhappy period for the Home Office in which the Minister came to this House and apologised unreservedly, which was recognised in the report. I am sure that the Minister is absolutely committed to putting the situation right. The Government are to be commended for attempting to create a fair funding formula, which is recognised in the report, and that is something that previous Governments have not tried to do.

The terms of the funding formula are yet to be decided. It is no easy task; I certainly do not envy the Minister. Indeed, it is such a tricky task that both the shadow Home Secretary and the shadow Policing Minister cannot be in the Chamber for this important debate. No doubt they are scratching their heads and working out what their alternative funding formula would be. I welcome the Home Affairs Committee’s report and am pleased to have participated in its production. I am sure that the Minister will give it his full consideration in deciding the eventual outcome and I am sure that although there will be some winners and some losers, the public will be able to see that the funding formula at which the Minister arrives is fair to all forces. I hope that it will protect London, along with the special and vital functions performed by the Metropolitan and City of London police to keep us safe.

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[Mike Penning]

I am trying to be honest, as I always am when at the Dispatch Box or giving evidence to a Select Committee. Is this in my destiny today? Could I start a new consultation tomorrow? Yes I could, but I would not have the information within my grasp to do that. I have not got a date from Sara Thornton for that report. It is enormously difficult getting 43 police chiefs to agree where they will place their capabilities. For instance, East Midlands police covers homicide in the whole area, but most of the other ROCUs do not. Things such as cybercrime and encryption need to come with us because it should not be for the House or a Minister to tell chief constables “That’s what you should be doing”. The constables should be telling us where the capabilities will be, so that we can help with the funding formula.

[Mr Gareth Thomas]

The Minister will remember from the opening remarks of my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) that there has been speculation that the review will be put off until 2019. I appreciate that the Minister cannot give a timetable, but can he categorically rule out it starting as late as that?

[Mike Penning]

No Minister would stand and give such categorical responses—I cannot, because that would be wrong. We are determined to ensure—the Met is crucial to this—that we have an understanding from the chiefs and the PCCs about where they are asking the capabilities to be delivered from, whether ROCUs, local collaboration or the NCA. Then we can come forward and get it right.

I have a great deal of time for the hon. Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) and her response was very measured, but when in government the Labour party said that it would implement this measure but it did not, and that is part of the discussion that we are having. Crime has massively changed since then.

Police Grant Report (England and Wales)

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Wednesday 10th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Policing, Crime and Criminal Justice (Mike Penning)]

I beg to move,

That the Police Grant Report (England and Wales) for 2016–17 (HC 753), which was laid before this House on 4 February, be approved.

I crave your indulgence, Mr Speaker, because I noticed that the new Serjeant at Arms was in his place earlier and I was hoping that he would still be there now, although I mean no disrespect to his deputy. I know the new Serjeant at Arms well. He comes from a great regiment, and we will miss him at the Ministry of Justice where he looked after our security. I am sure he will do a fantastic job here.

I was enormously proud when I was appointed the Minister for Policing, Crime and Criminal Justice. Early on, I encountered a great deal of lobbying about the grant from colleagues here, as well from police constables and police and crime commissioners around the country. The lobbying was about whether the grant was fair, whether it should be changed and whether police forces would be able to survive further cuts. We inherited a really difficult economic situation and the Treasury quite rightly asked the Home Office to investigate whether further cuts could be made. A very good job was done in the last Parliament of taking really difficult financial decisions to address the funding issues we inherited. What was really good was that in most cases—I say in most cases—discussions were sensible and pragmatic, and we can see from the fact that crime has fallen since 2010 and has continued to fall under this Government, that it is possible to do more with less.

[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

If the Minister and his ministerial colleagues decide to extend the term of the Metropolitan Police Chief Constable, Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, will they make it a condition that Sir Bernard is not allowed to merge Harrow police with any other borough command? If that were to happen, Harrow police would inevitably be diverted to police other parts of London.

[Mike Penning]

Unlike the previous Labour Administration, we believe in police officers making the decisions they need to make for their communities, and we do not believe in a top-down approach. We have devolved operational policing to make sure that chief constables and the Metropolitan Police Commissioner can make operational decisions and other decisions such as how local community funding is run, whether that is though the Mayor’s office or through PCCs. I know that the Labour party opposed PCCs extensively, but it has sensibly changed its mind, not least on account of much lobbying from Labour PCCs. I shall not in any way instruct the Metropolitan Police Commissioner on how he should police in London and the Mayor will not instruct him on operational issues; those are matters for him.

What I will say is that there will be more money for policing in London than there would have been if a Labour Minister were standing at this Dispatch Box. Labour wanted to cut 10% of its funding budget—and perhaps I will come back to that later.

Safer Neighbourhood Policing: London

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Tuesday 5th January 2016 Westminster Hall

[Ms Buck]

As I will briefly refer to at the end, we have seen a redeployment of officers within a reduced total and rebadging, which has led to confusion and a dilution of what neighbourhood policing was originally about.

The Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime’s review of the local policing model stated last summer:

“Neighbourhood policing under the LPM is distinctly different to the previous ward based 1:2:3 delivery model which was identical across all London wards”.

The previous model’s critical defining element was a core service common to all London wards that could be enhanced or supplemented. Despite the uplift of officers into neighbourhood policing, as referred to by my neighbour, the right hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field), the move to a single dedicated ward officer with a single dedicated ward PCSO represents a 77% reduction in ward-based neighbourhood policing when compared to the 1-2-3 model. In my borough of Westminster, we went from a total full-time-equivalent police strength of 1,632 in 2010 to 1,661 in 2012—there were changes in 2011 that meant that 2012 was a better base year—and then down to 1,327 in June 2015. The redistribution under the new service has led to a dramatic drop in our total police strength, which has led to the reduction in neighbourhood policing I have mentioned.

[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

If I am lucky enough to catch your eye, Mr Evans, I hope to dwell on another aspect of neighbourhood policing that I hope my hon. Friend will comment on with concern, namely that the Met proposes to pilot the merger of borough commands, in particular Brent, Harrow and Barnet, about which my constituents will be particularly concerned.

[Ms Buck]

I hope that my hon. Friend is able to catch your eye, Mr Evans, and to develop that theme, because it is a real concern. I suspect that he will also want to discuss the theme of leadership that I am developing. Borough leadership is important, but neighbourhood leadership, which was defined for neighbourhood policing team purposes as being ward-based, is also important. Relationships do not happen by themselves; they happen because people in leadership roles are equipped and skilled to build them.

We have already seen a dramatic reduction in police numbers. Underneath that and within a reduced total, we then saw a reclassification of what a neighbourhood police officer is. We have also seen a fundamental dilution of the original model of ward-based safer neighbourhood policing. The combined impact of that led the MOPAC review of the local policing model to conclude that the

“visibility of officers within neighbourhoods remains an issue raised by communities and key stakeholders”.

Well, it can say that again. As Commissioner Hogan-Howe told the GLA:

“The irony was…that we put more officers into neighbourhoods but people saw fewer people dedicated to their area.”

That is central to the point, and it happened because additional duties were given to safer neighbourhood police officers under the LPM. The MOPAC review states:

“Although the LPM has allocated… additional police officers to”—

the new definition of—

“Neighbourhood Policing, with a greater ability to flex resources, to realise the crime and ASB reduction, and respond effectively to community concerns, it has at the same time allocated additional functionality previously undertaken elsewhere.”

The review continues:

“There are a number of functions within the neighbourhood policing strand of the LPM which are required but which impact on the opportunities for officers to be visible within the…MPS Neighbourhoods.”

Those functions included the investigation of neighbourhood crime, appointment cars, e-graded calls, hospital guards, crime scene management, custody constant watches, and aid, all of which were not previously undertaken by neighbourhood police teams.

Since that initial review was carried out, I am aware that some areas of additional functionality have been moved back to response teams, which has had a marginal impact, but additional functionality still remains a problem. We need only to talk, as I am sure all my hon. Friends here are doing, to local police teams to hear why they are unable to undertake the visibility policing or the relationship building and community work that they used to do. It is because they have additional policing duties to undertake.

The other critical change that took place under the LPM was to aid. One of the most important strengths of the SNT model was its ring-fencing, but the abstraction of staff from neighbourhood teams to other duties is now a constant element. According to MOPAC, neighbourhood officers undertook some 102,000 hours of aid over the 12-month period prior to the review. Assembly Member Andrew Dismore, the former Member for Hendon, obtained figures for the two boroughs that he represents. In just three months over last summer, Camden lost a total of 1,293 officer shifts to other boroughs, averaging 99 shifts a week, and Barnet lost a total of 951 officer shifts, averaging 73 shifts a week. I can also speak from local experience: I will not name the ward because I do not want to get the officers in trouble, but when trying to solve neighbourhood problems and talking to the police about dedicating some resources to help, I have been told:

“No joy this weekend as I was on my own. I had planned to be with 3 other PCs but they got put on AID at short notice.”

That is a regular refrain. Problem-solving work is often taken away.

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[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I want to focus on the possible merger of borough commands in Harrow, Brent and Barnet and to set out my fears for Harrow under such a plan. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) and to my right hon. Friend the Member for Tooting (Sadiq Khan) for their wide-ranging analyses, but I hope you will forgive me, Mr Evans, if I am ferociously parochial in setting out my fears about what the pilot merger might mean for my constituents.

I have no reason to dislike the people of Barnet or Brent, and a merger may seem sensible—for example to those who think that reducing the number of chiefs would mean more resources to be allocated to the front line. I fear, however, that it is the thin end of the wedge. Barnet and Brent are very different from Harrow in policing terms and have higher crime rates. Brent has many of the characteristics of an inner London borough, as well as responsibility for Wembley stadium and all the major events that take place there, and those things give rise to complexities in policing. Harrow is an outer London borough and already many of its police officers are allocated shifts in other places to help to deal with rising crime—sometimes in inner London, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Tooting mentioned; they may also help with the policing of major events, as needed. I fear that if the merger happens a new tri-borough commander will be greatly tempted to shift the police on occasion into Barnet, and certainly into Brent, to help with their policing challenges.

It is difficult to see how the borough commander under the new tri-borough arrangement could continue to be based in Harrow rather than Brent or Barnet. I am relatively pessimistic about the prospect because, given the operational challenges in Brent in comparison with those of Harrow and Barnet, logic would base the new borough commander for the three boroughs in Brent. Clearly, there would also be a case for Barnet, given that many people arrested in Harrow are already transferred to its new and more modern policing complex in Colindale. The temptation would be for CID resources to be shifted to where the tri-borough police commander would be based. Operational challenges in Brent and the modern police station with its better cells complex in Colindale suggest, on the face of it, that a tri-borough commander would be unlikely to be based in Harrow.

Inevitably, resources shift over time to where the commander of a team is based. One of the first pressures will inevitably involve the shifting of CID resources to help to bring the teams together. One can see a logic to that, but I fear that the CID offices would be taken out of Harrow and that complex policing work to detect the perpetrators of crimes might not be immediately available in Harrow as it is at the moment.

Perhaps the biggest immediate concern, however, would be the loss of a visible experienced and accountable borough commander for Harrow. My hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North rightly focused on the requirements of neighbourhood policing at ward level, and issues such as the need for a dedicated sergeant, police constables and police community support officers at ward level; but there is also a need for a dedicated, experienced and highly trained police officer, who has the confidence of the chief constable, to run the police force in each borough. That officer needs to be someone of the calibre to engage with other stakeholders such as council officials, NHS workers and leading community representatives. I fear that if the borough loses a very experienced officer who can engage with Members of Parliament and senior councillors and direct resources quickly when alerted to problems, there will be a slowing down in the tackling of crime and antisocial behaviour. I pay tribute to recent borough commanders on my patch who, when I have gone to see them about particular crimes, have quickly grasped their significance and have diverted time to looking into them and responding more appropriately.

I worry that, in the long term, basing the borough commander for Harrow in Brent or Barnet will call into question the future of the police station in south Harrow, which serves the whole borough. It is not fit for purpose now and it needs investment; but I fear that with a borough commander based elsewhere that would not happen.

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[Ms Buck]

rose—

[Mr Gareth Thomas]

rose—

[Mike Penning]

I will give way in a moment if I can. It is not for us to say what police stations should be open. Those days have gone. We said we would not make the 10% cut that the Labour party recommended. We said no cut. In fact, there is a £900 million funding increase for London over this spending round.

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[Mr Gareth Thomas]

rose—

[Sadiq Khan]

rose—

Metropolitan Police Service

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Wednesday 6th February 2013 Westminster Hall

[Mr Gary Streeter (in the Chair)]

Before I call Mr Gareth Thomas to speak, let me just say that we have a cast of thousands this afternoon for this important debate. So, if I can impose a five-minute voluntary time limit to begin with—not including Mr Thomas, of course—we will see how we get on.

[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am grateful to Mr Speaker for allowing this debate. It is right to begin by saying that we in the House owe a continuing debt of gratitude to the men and women of the Metropolitan police. They are, in general, superb public servants, doing a very difficult and very important job extremely well.

The Met was rightly praised for its work during the Olympics and the diamond jubilee last year, but its less high-profile work—the bread and butter of policing work, through its contribution to keeping our communities safe, pursuing criminals and supporting victims—remains fundamental, and the overwhelming majority of its officers do that with considerable skill and dedication.

Nevertheless, the future of policing in London is under scrutiny, and with good reason. Under the stewardship of the Mayor of London and the Conservative party, the Metropolitan police have already seen a drop of more than 4,000 uniformed police—police constables and police community support officers—on London’s streets since the general election, a period in which all Members will acknowledge that there were major riots and growing concern about gang violence. To take just one borough—my own borough of Harrow—we lost 100 PCs and PCSOs, a cut in front-line uniformed police officers of 19%, which is one of the biggest cuts. A cut of almost 20% in the Government’s grant to the Metropolitan police, which was supported by the Mayor and Conservative Members, is the driving factor behind the cuts to police funding that are now being debated across London.

Using a choice of statistics that the characters in “The Thick of It” would have been proud of, the Mayor’s plan promises more police recruitment. However, the truth is that there will be fewer police officers and fewer PCSOs by 2015, and that police officers are likely to be significantly less experienced than now. That drop in police numbers is noteworthy of itself, but comparing the number and percentage of crimes solved reveals that the Metropolitan police saw in 2011-12 a sharp drop in the number, and crucially in the percentage, of crimes being solved. In 2011-12, 22,600 fewer crimes were solved in London than in 2009-10, and the percentage of crimes solved dropped to 21.6%.

Those figures are perhaps not surprising when cuts to the number of prosecutors available to the Crown Prosecution Service in London are taken into account. It would be interesting to hear the Minister and the Mayor of London explain how they think that the number and percentage of crimes solved are likely to rise with fewer police and even fewer prosecutors.

According to the figures that the Mayor of London has published, two thirds of London boroughs will still have fewer police officers by the end of 2015 than they had at the time of the last general election. Estimates for the number of PCSOs per borough have not been published, but with further substantial cuts to PCSO recruitment—some 1,100 will be cut by 2015-16, according to the Greater London assembly’s police and crime committee—it looks as though every borough will have significantly fewer uniformed police officers in total patrolling their streets by 2015 than they did in 2010.

Some people think that PCSOs are an expensive waste of time. I am not one of them, certainly not after I saw the difference that two PCSOs made to stopping trouble outside the gates of one of my major secondary schools. The head teacher said that he and members of his senior team went from being called out to deal with an incident at school closing time four afternoons out of every five to just twice in three months, after PCSOs were stationed outside those gates for the 30 minutes from the end of lessons. So PCSOs do a vital job, offering a direct reassuring presence to the public, helping to build the confidence that is necessary to gain intelligence, and—crucially—supporting the victims of crime.

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

I echo what my hon. Friend is saying about PCSOs. In Newham, PCSOs have certainly been valuable when incidents have occurred that could possibly have heightened community tensions, particularly around the time of the riots and shortly afterwards. Being without PCSOs would be a real problem for us.

[Mr Thomas]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point based on her own constituency experience. I suspect that, as I do, she feels that the cut in the number of PCSOs is noticed in her borough, as it certainly is in mine, and I suspect that it is also felt more widely across London.

By comparison with 2010, when Members last faced the people to ask for their support, there will be considerably fewer sergeants in London by 2015. Some estimates suggest that 1,300 sergeants will be axed. Inspectors and chief inspectors are also going, and superintendents’ numbers are likewise being cut. In short, the positions occupied by experienced police officers are being axed. The Mayor’s plan describes those positions as “supervisory grades”. In truth, those roles, and crucially the experience and skill mix of the senior staff occupying them, are fundamental to the effective pursuit of the criminal, the passage of the accused through the legal process and the sensitive support of the victim.

[Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the experience of those officers who have had many years in the police is vital for the coaching and support of officers who are new to the service? I have noticed in my own constituency the difference that that coaching and support has made, particularly in areas of Feltham and Heston that suffered a large number of burglaries before Christmas. The advice that those more experienced officers were able to give to PCSOs who were on the front line was vital.

[Mr Thomas]

My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point about the value that experienced police officers bring to the coaching of new recruits. It is worth noting in passing that the Mayor’s plan envisages specialist crime squads at borough level—such as local burglary, town centre or robbery squads—essentially being raided for staff, who will then be redeployed. So we sense that, as my hon. Friend suggests, a huge amount of vital experience is set to be lost to the Met when it is still needed.

It would be good to hear from the Minister what discussions he has had with the Mayor and the Association of Chief Police Officers staff in the Metropolitan police about how the cuts that I have described will also impact on national efforts to confront organised crime, or how cuts in the positions occupied by experienced police officers and the movement of staff from specialist units will impact, for example, on the work of Operation Trident. It certainly prompts the question how cuts in the Met will impact on its ability to support the UK Border Agency in its efforts to track down, arrest and deport illegal immigrants.

[Gavin Barwell (Croydon Central) (Con)]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. Like me, he represents an outer London borough. He has not said anything about the changes in the draft crime and policing plan to the resource allocation formula that was put in place by the previous Mayor. By 2015, my own borough will gain 117 officers compared with the number in 2011. Does he agree that changing the formula in that way is a welcome development for outer London?

[Mr Thomas]

It is good to have the hon. Gentleman here. However, looking at the figures between March 2010 and April 2012, I see that Croydon lost 175 PCSOs and police officers, and it experienced the same percentage cut in police numbers—a cut of 19%—as Harrow did. Moreover, the figures for 2010—just in terms of police officers for Croydon—compared with the figures for 2015 suggest that there will be a net increase of just one police officer in Croydon. Add in the likelihood of further significant cuts to the number of PCSOs, in the way that I have described, and I suspect that the reality of police numbers in Croydon will be a significant fall.

[Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab)]

I just want to point out that it depends on what people’s starting point is in 2011 as to whether we end up with more or fewer police officers in Croydon. If we take as our starting point the month immediately after the riots that deeply traumatised people in the borough, we end up with fewer police officers than at that time, and the public generally view the number that we had immediately after the riots as wholly inadequate—

[Mr Gary Streeter (in the Chair)]

Order. Interventions should be brief.

[Mr Thomas]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing some particularly “Croydon colour” to the point about the number of PCs and PCSOs—a number that we will see falling in Croydon.

[Gavin Barwell]

The hon. Gentleman is not necessarily comparing like with like. He is comparing the number of officers that were working in Croydon in 2011, which is the basic borough command unit strength plus additional officers who were temporarily allocated, with what the Mayor is saying the fundamental borough command unit strength will be in 2015. If he makes a like-for-like comparison, he will find a significant improvement for many outer London boroughs. Does he welcome that improvement?

[Mr Thomas]

I welcome any increase in police numbers, given the significant cuts that have been made and, in truth, will continue to be made up to 2015. The figures that I cited are from a freedom of information request about the cuts between March 2010 and April 2012, and the hon. Gentleman has said nothing about whether he supports the Mayor’s decision to axe 175 posts in Croydon during that period. The figures that I gave for the numbers of police officers in 2015 and in 2010 are from evidence given to the London assembly’s police and crime committee.

As I have said, the Mayor and his staff deliberately chose 2011, because it was the lowest point for police recruitment, with a freeze on recruitment that no one was told about. With respect, the hon. Gentleman will be judged by his constituents on what has happened since March 2010, when the general election campaign started, and what the position will be by 2015, and I am afraid that they will see a reduction in the number of police officers and PCSOs in Croydon, unless there is a dramatic change before then.

Local police teams are essentially being squashed under the Mayor’s plan. Instead of each community in Harrow having at least a sergeant, three police constables and three PCSOs, there will be only one PC and one PCSO dedicated to policing each community. In my constituency, the areas of west Harrow, Rayners Lane and north Harrow, which cover four wards, will go from having 28 uniformed police officers dedicated to those communities to just eight. Perhaps we should not be surprised. After all, in July last year, Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary, commenting on the Metropolitan police, noted the plans to cut police officers and PCSOs, as well as police staff, by 2015.

The inspectorate’s survey of whether police officers were available when they were most likely to be needed showed a decrease in the proportion of police officers and PCSOs in visible roles at key times. In an FOI request, I asked for the proportion of safer neighbourhood team staff on duty at 9 pm on a Friday at the end of November, and the answer was just 20%. Response teams were, of course, available, but I was surprised by how low the figure was. We need to be cautious with such figures because they offer a one-off snapshot, but that underlines the concern that many constituents and many Members of Parliament have about whether enough police are now available on our streets at key times.

Although the Mayor’s plans are at pains to appear committed to safer neighbourhood policing—they retain that language—in practice, it is clear that that model of policing is as good as over. There is talk in Boris’s plans of one borough-wide safer neighbourhood panel, but local ward-based panels, which enable local people to develop a relationship with the local police teams and talk through the challenges faced in their communities, are not mentioned at all. Will the Minister explain whether such forums are to be abolished?

Victim satisfaction rates in London are poor, compared to those in the rest of the country. The ambition to lift the rates is laudable, but having fewer senior and experienced police officers and lots of new inexperienced ones, along with less of a visible deterrent in the form of vital reassurance policing hardly suggests that a convincing plan to increase victim satisfaction is at the heart of the Mayor’s thinking on the future of the Met. The plan that is being touted around London boroughs is being aired for just one hour, and the Mayor of London himself cannot even be bothered to go and hear ordinary Londoners’ concerns around the capital. The Metropolitan police service is one of our city’s greatest assets and deserves inspired political leadership, but instead it is being asset-stripped, and our constituents will lose out.

No debate about the future of the Metropolitan police can take place without a reflection on the story of Stephen Lawrence’s murder and the failure of the investigation, because it still resonates all these years later, in part because of the continuing failure to ensure that the senior ranks of London’s police reflect the communities they aspire to serve. If recent media reports are to be believed, there is not one black or ethnic minority participant on the strategic command course, which is

“the conveyor belt for middle-ranking officers being groomed for senior-officer rank.”

I find it difficult to believe that, in the 21st century, there is not one ethnic minority candidate with the talent to be groomed for a senior command position in the Metropolitan police—not one.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. Will he join me in commending the local commander in Harrow, Borough Commander Dal Babu, on all his work, and does he share my concern about the commander being one of the people not chosen to go on the strategic command course? He would have been admirably suited for the course.

[Mr Thomas]

I agree with my right hon. Friend, and I will come on to that point in a second.

The Metropolitan Police Commissioner has pledged to act on the issue. That pledge is extremely welcome, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister that he is encouraging the commissioner to be ambitious in his thinking.

My right hon. Friend just mentioned my own excellent borough commander. He was one of the Met’s few senior Muslim officers before he retired this week. Chief Superintendent Dal Babu’s story reminds the House of the ongoing need for, in his words, “radical measures” to boost ethnic minority recruitment into the Met, into its specialist units—for example, firearms and the criminal investigation department—and, crucially, into its senior ranks. During his time in the Metropolitan police, Dal Babu helped repeatedly to challenge discrimination and bias. Just one example of his work is a pilot mentoring scheme for talented senior officers. Surprisingly, however, ACPO rejected the idea of rolling the programme out more widely, to encourage more black and ethnic minority officers in middle and senior-ranking posts to be ready for higher commands. As Chief Superintendent Babu points out, there is a significant gap between our collective ambitions for a representative police force in our city and the reality. It would be useful to hear the Minister underline publicly what I believe is a cross-party view, that the senior ranks of the Met need to be much more representative of the communities of London.

More recently, the Mayor of London announced plans to close some 65 police stations and sell them off. In my borough, Pinner police station and the front counter at the civic centre are set for closure, although I understand that there is now a question whether Pinner will be closed after all. Given that the civic centre front counter has long been manned by volunteers, I would be surprised if much in the way of revenue savings would be generated. What is striking, though, is the scale of the cuts to police stations in some parts of London. Croydon will lose five of its six stations. Barking and Dagenham will lose three of its four. Havering will lose four of its five, and Waltham Forest is set to lose four of its five. I understand that the police station in Tottenham—a visible signal of reassurance to a community devastated by the riots—is set for closure, too. What is far from clear are the rationale and criteria for each closure, particularly when the deputy Mayor has promised that, where a face-to-face service closes, it will be replaced with another such service. I ask gently, as the Minister can perhaps throw some light on this: how much money will be saved by that scale of closure, given that promise of replacement face-to-face services?

The Mayor’s plans create uncertainty about not just police stations; there has been a sharp reduction in the number of police cars available to the Metropolitan police. The car is a fairly fundamental bit of equipment for police work. According to information obtained through freedom of information requests, almost 200 police response vehicles were axed across London in the first two years of this Government—a 16% drop. I am not sure why the Mayor thought that it would be a good idea to cut by almost a third the number of unmarked and marked police cars in Haringey, which was a flashpoint of the 2011 riots.

Gang crime remains one of the most modern challenges that the Metropolitan police face. It is a huge issue in much of inner London, but it is becoming a problem in the suburbs as well. In a debate in this Chamber on 4 December, a series of Members—in particular, my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck), but also my hon. Friends the Members for Walthamstow (Stella Creasy) and for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) and the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field)—pressed the Minister on the future funding of the anti-gang initiatives that are in place. My hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North noted that funding had been cut already and was likely to face further significant reductions.

The police and crime committee of the Greater London assembly has noted that community safety funding often pays for independent domestic violence advisers, who are crucial in supporting domestic violence victims to come forward. Such funding also pays for restorative justice projects, substance and alcohol misuse programmes and, crucially, programmes to divert young people from gang and youth violence. Concern about whether such funding will continue threatens to destabilise projects that have made a difference in addressing gang crime, supporting the victims of domestic violence and preventing antisocial behaviour.

I ask the Minister, as my hon. Friends did in the debate on 4 December, to clarify whether Home Office grants to London for community safety, youth crime and substance misuse will again be substantially cut back next year. Does the Home Office still plan to end funding to London through its ending gang and youth violence funding pot in March?

Championing the safety of constituents is surely a Member of Parliament’s most significant responsibility. The cuts in police funding, coupled with the Mayor’s half-baked crime and policing plan and further cuts to programmes that address some of the causes of crime, leave my constituents and Londoners in general less safe and more vulnerable. I urge the Government to think again.

[Mr Gary Streeter (in the Chair)]

The wind-ups will begin at 3.40 pm. Eleven colleagues have caught my eye. We now move on to our voluntary four-and-a-half minute time limit for speeches.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Field]

This is an important debate, and rest assured that Conservative MPs have had various meetings on these matters with Stephen Greenhalgh, deputy Mayor of London, and with the Mayor himself.

The new local policing model reflects the financial constraints that any Mayor, of whatever colour, would have experienced. Part of it involves making police more accountable to local people. One reason for closing down our local police stations is that we are trying to put more money into bobbies on the beat rather than necessarily into bricks-and-mortar institutions. There will be an extra 2,600 officers in the safer neighbourhoods scheme as the role of safer neighbourhoods teams changes to cover reassurance and enforcement. Neighbourhood officers will be available for far longer hours, and neighbourhood inspectors will be a key point of accountability. That is good news, and I hope that the Met starts connecting with local people so that communities can work together to protect our youngsters.

[Mr Thomas]

I say gently to the hon. Gentleman that the figures from the police and crime committee of the Greater London Assembly show that by 2015, there will be 202 fewer police constables patrolling the streets of Westminster than there were in 2010, and that does not take into account how many police community support officers will go as well. Even according to the Mayor’s figures, there will be significantly fewer police officers in the hon. Gentleman’s borough.

[Mr Gary Streeter (in the Chair)]

Order. Before the hon. Gentleman answers, I would be grateful if he could draw his remarks to a conclusion.

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[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Streeter. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas) who has done a service to his constituents and to the people of London in bringing this important issue to this Chamber.

The fact that 15 of my right hon. and hon. Friends have attended this debate, plus the hon. Members for Cities of London and Westminster (Mark Field) and for Croydon Central (Gavin Barwell), shows that they share an interest in the importance of policing in this great city. I have not yet noticed a Liberal Democrat attending this debate. Perhaps they are too embarrassed about their general election pledge for 3,000 extra police officers to turn up in person. We will put that to one side for the moment.

In this debate about the future of the Metropolitan Police, my hon. and right hon. Friends have spoken with passion about their concerns for their constituencies. London is a complex city to police and faces many challenges. My right hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Dame Tessa Jowell) mentioned that the Olympics was an important event. Such international events in this great city are commonplace, week in, week out.

We have heard about the importance of recognising the potential for London’s being a focus for terrorist activity and about the prevention of terrorism. My hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick) mentioned the river boat scheme. We heard of appalling acts of murder in this city from the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster. We heard about gangs and guns, and of the importance of neighbourhood policing, about which my hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) talked. We have heard about the historical hangover of the riots in Croydon from my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon North (Steve Reed). During his election campaign, I was pleased to go to Croydon police station to see its importance to the community. Historical inquiries were mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz), the Chair of the Select Committee, who is also present, showing the importance of the debate.

Those are big issues, and policing London is a complex matter. The community reassurance that neighbourhood policing brings to London, which has been mentioned by all my right hon. and hon. Friends, and the cohesion not only to fight crime but to be a presence on the streets of London, to communicate with its citizens, have been important. Many of those matters are rightly devolved to the Mayor, but the central contention of my right hon. and hon. Friends today has been—I put this strongly to the Minister—that the choices made by the Mayor in London are wrong and that the choices made by the Minister on budget and organisation since 2010 have compounded those wrongs and made policing in London much more difficult.

As the Minister knows, we have an honest disagreement about funding. When I was the Police Minister, in the last year of the Labour Government, we planned to make some savings on policing—some 12%—but the Minister’s proposals have meant a 20% cut, which is effectively £540 million lost to the Met budget by 2015, or 4,200 police officers. That is a real challenge. From May 2010 to date, the Metropolitan police has lost 2,285 police officers and, importantly, 1,900 police community support officers. My right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) mentioned the importance of those numbers, as did my hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden.

Police station closures are pivotal. We need to make savings in the policing budget in London, no doubt, but 65 police stations are proposed for closure. Today, my hon. Friends the Members for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick), for Westminster North (Ms Buck) and for Croydon North have mentioned the importance of those stations to their constituencies, showing that somewhere someone is getting this wrong. The reassurance demanded by the constituents of my right hon. and hon. Friends on such issues is simply not being given. No doubt the Minister will say that crime is down. I welcome the fact that crime in certain areas is falling, but it would be in certain areas, because, after all, Labour put 15 years of investment in as Mayor and as Government. As pointed out today, however, the rate of crimes solved has also fallen; and the level of recorded crime has fallen, but the level of reporting to police is falling.

The issues are serious, and in drawing attention to them I make no criticism of Bernard Hogan-Howe or the Metropolitan police. My hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West mentioned their service day in, day out, putting their lives at risk. Indeed, on Saturday, I will go to Southwark cathedral to pay tribute to Paul McKeever, the former chair of the Police Federation, who was a Metropolitan police officer. He knew and had pride in the service that the Metropolitan police provide to this great city. The challenges of the budget cut and of the decisions on how that cut is made have been reflected strongly in what my right hon. and hon. Friends have said today.

[Mr Thomas]

Will my right hon. Friend do two things? Will he join me in congratulating Joanne McCartney, a Labour member of the Greater London assembly, who has led the effort to explore the consequences of the Mayor’s budget cuts? Will he also ask the Minister for particular clarity on the Home Office fund for ending gang and youth violence and on whether it will cease in March 2013, as many of us fear, or whether there has been a rethink?

[Mr Hanson]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, because we are not concerned only with the direct police budget. Resources also come through the community safety fund, which was mentioned by right hon. and hon. Members. In the last year that I set it, it was £13.2 million for London. This year, it is £5.3 million, and next year it is disappearing altogether. That is £13.2 million in the last year of a Labour Government but that is now no more, in the third year of a Conservative and Liberal Administration.

Policing

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Wednesday 24th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hanson]

I certainly welcome the fact that the Conservatives have a candidate standing in every area, unlike the Liberal Democrats, who voted for the policy but are not seeing it through and therefore are not committed to it. We in the Labour party have put a lot of effort into selecting candidates, and more than a third of them are women, which is very promising.

[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Further to the intervention from my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), is not what has happened in London particularly instructive in terms of the context for this debate? Mayor Boris Johnson has presided over almost 1,500 police officers being cut and almost 2,000 police community support officers being lost. Is that not part of the Conservative record and to be regretted?

[Mr Hanson]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, as that is part of the Conservatives’ record. One of the things that we will be campaigning on outside London in these elections is their appalling record on cutting police throughout England and Wales.

Today’s debate is a chance for us to try to engage the public in these elections to ensure—if this is possible—a good turnout. The Government’s record, to date, has been appalling. Hon. Members should listen not only to me, but to the former chief constable of Thames Valley police and head of the soon-to-be-dissolved National Policing Improvement Agency. He said:

“If you could have constructed a manual on how not to conduct an election, the Home Office have managed to tick off just about every element of it, including holding it in November, which is almost guaranteed to be dark and poor weather.”

He continued:

“So there are significant problems with getting a decent turnout…If they get elected on a 15% turnout it’s going to be pretty shocking.”

On 13 December 2010, the Home Secretary said at the Dispatch Box:

“With a strong democratic mandate from the ballot box, police and crime commissioners will hold their chief constable to account for cutting crime.”—[Official Report, 13 December 2010; Vol. 520, c. 708.]

However, only last month, research commissioned by Victim Support showed that 90% of people questioned had no idea what this role entailed or what it did. On Monday, a survey by the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners suggested that 85% of people either knew “not very much” or “nothing at all” about this election—nearly two in five knew nothing about it whatsoever. The same survey, only this week, showed that the number of people asked who were certain to vote was 15%. The Minister of State, Home Department, the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Mr Browne), whom I believe is to wind up today’s debate, even though he cannot be bothered to come to hear the opening speeches—

--- Later in debate ---

[Damian Green]

May I make some progress? I am conscious of your warning about going on too long, Mr Speaker.

The Opposition said that because of the cuts, emergency response times would increase, but they have held up. They said that neighbourhood policing would suffer, but there are more neighbourhood officers now than there were in May 2010. Most importantly of all—it is at the heart of the debate—they said that crime would go up, and they were wrong. Crime has gone down by 10% under this Government. That is the situation across key crime types, with recorded violence down 13%, burglary down 7%, criminal damage down 22%, vehicle crime down 15%, robbery down 5% and knife crime down 9%.

Much has been made of the situation in the west midlands. I know that the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) will wish to know that crime there is down by an impressive 13% since the election. I hope that west midlands Members of all parties will welcome that.

Labour has been proved wrong on all its key claims. Police reform is working, and crime is falling. I am grateful to the Opposition for giving me the opportunity to point that out today. They were wrong to claim that forces faced 20% cuts. No force faces cuts of that level.

[Mr Thomas]

The right hon. Gentleman referred to reports by HMIC, so he will presumably be familiar with the concerns that it made clear earlier this year about the future performance of the Metropolitan police, given the cuts that the Mayor of London is likely to push through. Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that there is even more concern, particularly in the suburbs of London, about rumours of significant closures of police stations and custody suites and mergers of borough commands?

[Damian Green]

The hon. Gentleman has not quite got with the democratic project yet. As he knows, policing in London is the responsibility of the Mayor and the Deputy Mayor. The hon. Gentleman had his chance earlier this year to put his arguments against the Mayor of London’s crime policy, but those arguments failed. The people of London voted to re-elect the current Mayor of London, and he has an excellent Deputy Mayor who is dealing with those matters.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Blunt]

My hon. Friend has raised an important issue, and I would be very pleased to meet her and colleagues from Rape Crisis to look at the linkages, and at the proper examination and analysis of data in this area. It is important that we continue to improve our knowledge.

[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

T7. Will the Secretary of State explain how he thinks that axing 1,000 posts at the Crown Prosecution Service will help him to bring more criminals to justice?

[Mr Kenneth Clarke]

I am sure that my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General has ensured that, in making changes to the budget and staffing of the Crown Prosecution Service, he is not reducing the quality of service that it provides. These things are not best measured by whether a body has ever-expanding payrolls or budgets; that tended to be the approach of the former Government, in which the hon. Gentleman served. We are trying to produce better value for money, in order to cope with the appalling financial crisis that we inherited from our predecessors.

Police Grant Report

Gareth Thomas Excerpts

Wednesday 14th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Nick Herbert]

I strongly agree. There would be little point in recruiting additional police officers—if we had the budget to do so, and we do not—if they did not spend their time out on the beat, delivering the visible and available policing that the public want. One paradox of the past 10 years is that, in spite of a substantial increase in police officer recruitment, the public still feel that the police are not sufficiently visible or available.

[Mr Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

What discussions has the Minister had with Boris Johnson about the impact of these cuts in London? I ask in the context of the Mayor having already decided to cut 455 police officers, and refusing to guarantee the long-term future of safer neighbourhood teams in each London borough.

[Nick Herbert]

I have discussed these matters with the deputy Mayor who has responsibility for policing. I shall discuss them with the Mayor, and I have had a number of discussions, as has my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, with the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. They do not believe that the budget cuts, which the House will vote on today, amounting to—I repeat—less than 1.5% of what the Government provide to forces, require them to reduce the number of officers in the force. However, we will take no lessons about cutting police numbers from Opposition Members, as they clearly would not guarantee force levels and left this Government with the responsibility of managing the public finances properly.

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[Mark Tami]

rose—

[Mr Thomas]

rose—

[Nick Herbert]

I am going to make a little more progress.

Of course, the challenge of tackling the deficit does not end this year; as we go forward, it will be vital for the police to deliver better value for money. The Government’s spending review will report in October, and we will not know until then what future police funding will look like. However, the Chancellor made it clear that unprotected Departments, including the Home Office, will face spending reductions, implying an average real cut of around 25% over the next four years. Whatever the outcome of the spending review, value for money considerations will become a new imperative for police authorities and forces.

We have been working constructively with the Association of Chief Police Officers to discuss how forces can meet the considerable challenge of reducing spending on this scale. Our joint ambition is to do everything possible to protect front-line services. We appreciate the importance of police functions that the public do not always see. Those can still be front-line services, but as I have repeated to chief constables, the people’s priority is to maintain visible and available policing, and that is what we must all strive to protect.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nick Herbert]

Yes, I have had the misfortune to read all the previous Government’s documents. The problem is that despite the suggestion that greater savings could be achieved, for instance through collaboration, it has not always happened. Today we find ourselves in a different environment in which forces and authorities face a new imperative to find those savings. The Government are willing to ensure that those savings will be made, in return for greater local accountability.

The quid pro quo for returning power and enabling far greater local decision making is that we will be tougher about driving savings through central procurement, and about collaboration between forces where it is clear that there is a policing need—for instance in relation to serious crime that crosses force borders—or that by working together, forces can achieve better value for money. We do not support the compulsory merger of forces, as I reaffirmed to my hon. Friend the Member for Crawley (Henry Smith), but a great deal more can and must be done through enhanced collaboration.

The Government have also already announced a full review of remuneration and conditions of service for police officers and staff. We want to ensure that pay and conditions support the delivery of an excellent service and provide value for money, so that they are right for both those who work in the service and the public. Spending on the work force accounts for about 80% of police expenditure. It is therefore right to examine carefully arrangements such as the use of overtime. We will provide more information about the review, including its timing, shortly, but we will expect it to report by January next year.

[Mr Thomas]

Will the Minister give way?

[Nick Herbert]

No, I am going to draw to a conclusion now, if the hon. Gentleman will forgive me. I know that many Members wish to speak.

This Government inherited a £155 million budget deficit, one of the worst in Europe and the largest in our peacetime history. This country cannot sustain a situation in which, without action, in five years’ time we will be spending over three times more on debt interest alone than on the entire criminal justice system. Achieving savings will mean driving value for money and delivering more for less. The criminal justice system, including policing, is no more immune from those imperatives than any other public service.

It is our responsibility to tackle the deficit, restore the health of the public finances and ensure that we are able to fund high-quality public services in the years ahead. We have not ducked that responsibility. It means taking tough decisions but the right decisions, and it means showing leadership. Chief constables and police authorities must show leadership, too, in demanding the savings that we can all make. For those reasons, I commend the proposal to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hanson]

I look forward to the people of Devizes learning that the hon. Lady has voted for £1 million to be cut from their police grant—unless my speech convinces her to vote with Labour Members to oppose those cuts. She asked an important question about what the Labour party would do to reduce the deficit. We went into the election campaign with clear commitments. Conservative, Liberal Democrat and Labour Members did not oppose the settlement that we debated on 3 February; we agreed the grants for this year in February. For future years, we agreed that we would spend money above the rate of inflation on policing, health and education, and make the savings that we needed through a deficit reduction plan for other matters.

[Mr Thomas]

Does my right hon. Friend remember his visit to Harrow police station in January to hear from yet another borough commander about the need for a new police station to help Harrow police do the job that they need to do? Does he share my disappointment that the cuts will reduce the capital available to the Metropolitan police, and are probably yet another excuse for the Mayor of London to continue to refuse to help Harrow police get the equipment and facilities that they need to do their job?

[Mr Hanson]

Today’s cuts not only reduce the capital budget but take some £28 million from London’s budget. I believe that the Mayor is still one Boris Johnson, who has already agreed not to raise the precept this year. That means a real cut not only, through inflation, on the precept, but in the grant.