Policing (North Wales)

Guto Bebb Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2012 Westminster Hall

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Mr Crausby, and to see so many colleagues from north Wales here to debate this important issue.

It is not often that I can begin such a debate by saying that we can learn something from the Welsh Conservatives, but today I am privileged to be able to do so. The Welsh Conservatives have cancelled their Llandudno conference this year, apparently because of security costs. I am not sure whether they think extra security is needed to hold back the crowds or to ensure that none of their politicians get out to hear what local people think. Wherever they plan to skulk off to instead, I hope they face the full weight of the law for non-payment of the £20,000 that the Imperial hotel is likely to lose because of their bad business practice in cancelling so late. Leaving aside their cowboy capitalism—I see that the hon. Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb) does not wish to intervene—the Conservatives’ decision has betrayed a fact they have been trying to deny since the general election, which is that good security costs money, and without enough funding, security will suffer.

That principle brings me to today’s debate, ahead of next week’s vote on more cuts to the North Wales police force. The first duty of any Government is to protect their citizens, or to put in place the brave men and women who do that for us. We all rely on our police forces to keep us safe, and we in north Wales are extremely lucky to have an excellent force, which provides a top-class, professional service to our communities. Our police force, however, is being let down, and law and order—cyfraith a threfn—is being woefully let down in the process.

Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary was asked to advise the Government on possible efficiency savings in the police force, and said that

“cost cutting and improvements in productivity could, if relentlessly pursued, generate a saving of 12% in central government funding without affecting police availability—but only if there was a fundamental ‘re-design’ of the system”.

Despite that advice, the Government are pursuing a 20% cut in police funding, stripping the police of 8% more of their funding than the experts said could be removed safely.

[Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way, and I congratulate her on securing this debate. Is it not the case that the Labour Welsh Government are cutting funding to police forces by 6.3%, compared with 6.9% from central Government? Would she defend that difference?

[Susan Elan Jones]

I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman’s crib sheet comment, but I remind him that the Welsh Government, who are dealing with a very difficult situation from the UK Government, are increasing the number of police community support officers by 500. I urge him to reflect on that. I also note his non-comment on his party’s lack of funding in his own constituency, Aberconwy, thanks to the cancellation of its Llandudno conference.

Despite HMIC’s advice, the Government are pursuing a 20% cut in police funding. On the ground, that means that since the last general election, North Wales police has lost 85 police officers, or more than 5% of its whole force. By 2015, it is forecast that more than 360 staff could go—179 officers and 186 civilian staff. After years of steadily rising numbers of police officers, so many are now being cut that already we have fewer officers in north Wales than we did a decade ago. Meanwhile, the population of north Wales has increased by over 12,000.

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[Susan Elan Jones]

In a moment—I must make progress. The offences that I have listed are exactly the kinds that tend to increase when police numbers fall. HMIC published research last summer that acknowledged that lots of factors affect crime rates, but it also stated that

“there is relatively strong evidence for the potential of an effect of police numbers on crime, particularly with regard to property and other acquisitive forms of offending.”

It also noted:

“Research suggests that frontline officer numbers are one factor in a force’s ability to fight crime.”

In north Wales, official statistics obtained by my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Clwyd (Chris Ruane) show that since 2001, crime broadly decreased as officer numbers rose. It is good common sense—more police officers can fight more crime—but, sadly, the Government parties seem determined to ignore the links. Their line is to quote one sentence from last year’s Home Affairs Committee report. I suspect that the Minister may wish to do that today, so I will save him the task. It says that

“there is no simple relationship between numbers of police officers and levels of crime”,

but that line has been carefully cherry-picked. The rest of the report is full of evidence to the contrary. In the same paragraph as the quotation that the Government like, the Committee offers a clarification:

“However, the loss of posts will have an impact on the range of services that the police provide and the way in which they are provided.”

The report also notes the evidence of Mr McKeever, the chairman of the Police Federation, who said in his evidence that

“there is a clear trend in the relationship between police officer numbers and crime.”

The report also references Councillor Burns-Williamson, deputy chair of the Association of Police Authorities, who told the inquiry:

“My guess is that, given the cuts over the four-year period…probably crime levels will start to rise.”

Elsewhere, even the Conservative Mayor of London agrees that “numbers matter”.

[Guto Bebb]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way again. On the basis of her argument, I take it that she is against any cuts whatsoever to the police budget, but is that not contrary to the shadow Chancellor’s comments over the past two weeks?

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[Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Crausby.

This has been an interesting debate, but it did start out in an extremely partisan manner. Indeed, many hoteliers in Llandudno in my constituency would be amazed at the glee with which their loss of business is seen by Labour Opposition Members. To return to the issue that we are debating today, we need to consider the comments made by the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd). The new plans have had teething problems. They are clearly not working in his constituency, and I accept his comments. But it must be stated that the chief constable’s decision to change the way that the service operated in north Wales has been positive in some parts. In my constituency—I have visited the police station in Llandudno and Llanrwst, for example—the response to the changes has been positive, with the view of the officers being that they are spending less time on paperwork and getting more support across north Wales. That is important, because previously north Wales was, for some bizarre reason, split into three almost independent sections—east, central and west—and little or no support passed between them.

The changes have ensured that the police are able to serve north Wales as an entity. From my position, representing Aberconwy in the centre region, there has been an improvement, with support officers coming from Corwen, for example, to support officers from Llanrwst. We should welcome that effort to ensure that we make best use of the resources. I pay tribute to the chief constable, who is doing a difficult task in trying to deal with cuts to the budget, which are not being denied by Labour Members. We have heard the shadow Chancellor comment that he cannot guarantee a reversal of any cuts. Yet in a debate such as this we get opportunistic chants from Opposition Members claiming that things would be significantly different if they were in power.

It is important that we consider the way that police numbers grew in north Wales during Labour’s time in office. It is true that the number of police numbers in north Wales increased by 13% between 1997 and 2000—I pay tribute to the Labour Government for increasing police numbers—but in the same period the number of civilian officers working for north Wales police increased by 84%, so it is debatable whether resources were put on to the front line.

[Chris Ruane]

Does the hon. Gentleman think that the increase in resources is a prime reason why north Wales was one of the safest places to live in the whole UK?

[Guto Bebb]

It is interesting that the hon. Gentleman says that the increase in resources is necessarily the reason why North Wales police have performed well. The hon. Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones) said that higher police numbers equated to falling crime. It is tempting to say that that must be so, but during Labour’s time in office there was a significant period when the number of police officers in north Wales increased but crime increased and a period when the number of police officers declined and crime declined.

There is a perception that more officers working will have an impact on crime levels, but statistics from the Labour party’s period in office do not necessarily support that view. My view is that the use made of those officers is just as important as the number of officers. Similarly, getting rid of waste and double practices, such as having three areas in north Wales that did not work together, is just as important as the numbers.

The number of police officers in north Wales has been reduced by 108, according to statistics that I have seen from North Wales police, but the chief constable has also said that it is looking to recruit an extra 72 officers in the next financial year. There is a tendency for the Opposition to portray everything as bad and fragile, when in the year to September 2011 there was a 1% decline in the total number of crimes committed in north Wales.

It is dispiriting for officers in north Wales, who are working hard to try to deal with these issues, to be told that the police service in north Wales is failing, when we have seen a decline in police numbers.

[Mark Tami]

The hon. Gentleman mentions the morale of front-line officers, but what does he think of the constant attack by the Government on those working in the back office, as if they do no work whatsoever and can be dispensed with just like that?

[Guto Bebb]

Again, I am surprised by that comment, because throughout this debate I have heard Opposition Members saying that we must put the resources on the front line. There is a choice to be made. If the number of officers increased by 13% in the Labour years, is there a justification for an increase of 84% in non-police officer staff at that point? That question should be asked. This is not an attack, in any way, shape or form, on any individuals working within the system, but we need to ask whether an 84% increase in those numbers was justified, when the number of front-line police officers increased by only 13%.

[Albert Owen]

The hon. Gentleman is using selective statistics. In addition to the police officers going, the number of police community support officers was increased. People wanted policing in the community. As a consequence of investing in those PCSOs in the communities, crime came down in local communities across north Wales.

[Guto Bebb]

I accept that comment. But if we include PCSOs and special constables in the totals, North Wales police are better served now than they were during the period the Labour party were in government.

It is important that we discuss the context of this debate, which is that we are facing a severe financial crisis. This Government are willing to get to grips with that issue. The chief constable in north Wales is willing to challenge the way that things worked in the past and to take difficult decisions to try to ensure that the allocated funding goes further.

It is important to mention the unacceptable degree of hypocrisy from Opposition Members on funding. They say that a 6.9% cut from Westminster is unacceptable in this financial year, but that a cut of 6.3% from the Welsh Assembly can be defended on the basis that the Assembly’s funding has also been reduced. This is the crux of the issue. Choices and priorities have to be made by the Government. We see in the Opposition, and in the performance of the Welsh Assembly, a complete and utter abdication of responsibility and willingness to take hard, difficult decisions.

When I get a full explanation from the shadow Chancellor about why and how he can save the North Wales police service, although he will not reverse a single cut that we have made, I will take the arguments of Opposition Members more seriously.

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[Albert Owen]

I am certainly not saying that there should be no cuts. As the hon. Member for Aberconwy has said, there was without doubt a reduction in police numbers between 2008 and 2010, but that was achieved through efficiency savings. Also, the police authority in my area made it clear what it was doing, and the local people supported it because they understood it. What local people do not accept—if the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire is not aware of this, he needs to talk to people in his constituency—is the across-the-board cut to policing just because of the Government deficit reduction plan, coupling the savage cuts with police cuts. People wanted to make a choice, and that is the difficulty.

I will deal with the shadow Chancellor, because obviously the papers from the Conservative Whips keep rolling out that line. What he said was that in 2015 he will be left with higher debts and higher borrowing than we would have had in 2010, which will be a difficult situation and he will have to make difficult choices. However, I assure the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire that I will be fighting within my party to ensure that policing has a priority. I ask him and the hon. Member for Aberconwy to do the same, because rather than having this knockabout, they should stand up for policing in their local communities.

[Guto Bebb]

I wish to correct the hon. Gentleman, because he must have misheard my comments. I actually said that there was a reduction in police numbers between 2006 and 2008, not between 2008 and 2010—those figures are correct.

[Albert Owen]

Front-line police officers, yes, but the total amount including PCSOs and special constables rose. The police authority made that choice, which the people of north Wales accepted because they saw extra policing on the street. Prevention of crime and reducing the fear of crime are as important as police officers tackling criminals, and the Government have overlooked that with their “one-cap-fits-all” cuts throughout the country.

Opposition politicians are not the only ones whingeing. The Police Federation chairman has said that we are going back to the policing levels of the 1970s, with fewer than “215 officers per 100,000”, which is a difficult level for the future. The reduction in the number of staff in north Wales has been by more than 200 but, even worse, it is projected to be 360 by 2015. It is no use blaming the police authority, as Ministers suggest. The chief constable of Gloucestershire, in many ways a similar area to north Wales and to north-west Wales in particular, has said that policing is on “a cliff-edge”. He is not an Opposition politician, and he cites closed police stations, sold-off vehicles and the departure of senior managers and a third of the police.

What else can go in the future to make the projected cuts that are being talked about? The answer is obviously the front line. However the front, middle and back are defined: if we do not have the resource in the first place, we cannot put it on the front line. I worry, as the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd pointed out, about when there are serious incidents. Since I have been a Member of Parliament, there have unfortunately been a number of murders and serious crimes in my area; I know the amount of police resources used in such circumstances, when they are taken from elsewhere. If we have a thin blue line and then take police away to serious crime or incidents for many months, communities face a difficult period. That is why it is no coincidence that robbery figures have gone up by more than 60% and burglaries by some 12%; there is a link between the number of such opportunist crimes and a time of high unemployment and social deprivation in many areas. Those crimes are worrying to the individual because of the theft and the damage to property, but also because of the damage to people. People’s confidence goes, as does business confidence in towns and communities throughout the country. Those factors cannot be separated out.

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[Chris Ruane]

I will provide solutions. I will come to them. When my right hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson), the shadow Minister, announced an inquiry into the future of policing, the Minister said that that was political abdication. Now is the time to have an inquiry, as we are going into a double-dip recession with massive cuts. Now is the time to analyse the issues facing a modern police force in the 21st century, but the Minister called that political abdication.

Another issue is the decline in the number of criminals caught and prosecuted. In north Wales, there was a drop of 11.5% between April and November last year. I do not believe that that is the fault of the police. North Wales is a big geographical area. It requires a lot of policing and resources, and a lot of funding.

I have given the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake), a bit of a roasting, and the hon. Member for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb) deserves the same. He did not stand up for his constituency when his party pulled out of holding its spring conference at Llandudno, and he has not stood up for policing in north Wales. The cuts are dangerous, and are having a dangerous impact in our communities. All he can say is to ask what the Labour party did. He and his Government are in power now, and they are implementing cuts too far and too fast.

[Guto Bebb]

I said that it is easy to spout platitudes from the Opposition Benches. The truth of the matter is that the Labour party has not explained how it would deal with the current deficit and ensure that the cuts in north Wales would be avoided in view of the shadow Chancellor’s comments that he would change any spending cuts undertaken by the Government.

[Chris Ruane]

The hon. Gentleman’s complacency is unbelievable, as is that from his colleague, the junior Minister at the Wales Office, the Under-Secretary of State for Wales. When faced with these horrendous statistics, he said that it was most important that crime continues to fall in Wales, and that the latest figures showed that recorded crime is down 7%, which is even better than the 4% fall for England and Wales. That is complacency.

The Home Secretary did not stand up for policing during the cuts review. Other Ministers stood up for their Departments and their cuts were lowered. The chief police officers said they could cope with 12% cuts, and that was what the Labour agreed to. Our answer was to listen to what the professionals had to say, and to back them with 12% cuts. That was our answer then, and that is our answer now. The Tory and Liberal cuts are too far, too fast. There are also cuts in court costs. Denbigh magistrates court and Rhyl family court have both closed in my constituency. The prison population is at an all-time high. We are coming to a double-dip recession, and we know that crime patterns follow employment patterns.

The cuts are wrong; the pacing is wrong; the timing is wrong; and the scale is wrong. The pacing is wrong because the cuts are front-loaded. All the cuts are coming to suit the political timetable of a general election in 2015. The Government are front-loading the cuts and introducing them thick and fast to avoid the political consequences in 2015. The timing is wrong. We may be going into a double-dip recession when crime rates will rise, but the policing cuts are bigger than ever. The scale is wrong, because 12% is acceptable, but 20% is not.

Hon. Members have asked what Labour would do. When Labour left power, unemployment was coming down, confidence was going up, and growth was going up. Since then, all three have gone in the opposite direction. That has led to £158 billion of extra deficit, which is the responsibility of the coalition parties. That is what the shadow Chancellor meant when he made his comments. He cannot plan for 2015 and say that he will not cut this or that. We do not know how much more of a pig’s ear the coalition Government will make. How high will the £158 billion go? Will it perhaps go to £258 billion? Our solution would not have been to have an extra £158 billion of extra deficit.

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[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

I welcome you to the Chair, Mr Leigh, and I thank the previous Chair, Mr Crausby, for his chairmanship in the early part of the debate. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones). She has raised an important issue and generated a significant debate.

Contributions from my hon. Friends the Members for Vale of Clwyd (Chris Ruane), for Ynys Môn (Albert Owen), for Alyn and Deeside (Mark Tami), and for Wrexham (Ian Lucas) have highlighted the concerns felt by their communities, and I also pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Mr Llwyd) for his concern about western north Wales. We have also heard interesting contributions from the hon. Members for Aberconwy (Guto Bebb) and for Montgomeryshire (Glyn Davies), and from the right hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake). He was helpfully reminded of his election pledge to support 3,000 extra officers during this Parliament, although he has since voted for cuts that over the past 18 months have led to a reduction in police numbers of some 8,000 officers.

I pay tribute to the chair and members of North Wales police authority, and to Chief Constable Mark Polin and his team. They have done a professional job over many years to ensure that north Wales is still one of the safest places in the UK in which to live. There has been great police support, good detection rates and sound community-based policing, and the engagement at levels of inspector, constable, sergeant and police community support officer has been helpful to Members of Parliament and to my constituents.

North Wales is a challenging area to police. It contains large rural areas, two languages and strong urban areas where crime is driven by urban challenges. There is also the cross-border challenge involving crime that potentially enters north Wales from parts of north-west England. There are the ports of Holyhead and Mostyn, which is in my constituency, and a range of other issues that create a complex and challenging model with which North Wales police authority must deal. I speak today as shadow Police Minister, but also, proudly, as the Member of Parliament for Delyn, which falls within the area of North Wales police authority.

The partnership of North Wales police authority with local councils and Members of the Welsh Assembly—who, as has been mentioned, were re-elected in May last year on a pledge to support 500 police community support officers—is important, and the authority’s co-operation with neighbouring forces has led to a reduction in crime over the past 10 years. At the start of the last Labour Government’s term in office, there were around 65,000 crimes each year in north Wales. By the last year of the Labour Government, that had fallen to 44,919 crimes—a reduction of over 30% that meant 21,000 fewer victims per year. As has been mentioned, victims feel 100% of the crime committed against them, and to have 21,000 fewer crimes is a compliment to the efforts of North Wales police authority and the Labour Government.

That reduction in crime was due to a range of issues such as new ways of working, innovation, the previous Government’s approach to community safety and attempts to make authorities work with the police, better co-operation and prevention, closer working partnerships, improvements in CCTV, an increase in DNA testing, automatic police number plate recognition to look at cars crossing the border, improvements in vehicle safety, station improvements, a whole range of criminal justice measures, and increased confidence in policing and co-operation with the communities as a whole. I contend, however—this is the central argument of the debate—that one of the biggest issues in helping to support policing and reduce crime over that period concerned the number of officers who were on the beat and visibly engaged with their communities.

In 1996, the last year of the previous Conservative Government, 1,378 officers walked the beat and worked in North Wales police authority. By the last year of the last Labour Government, 1,578 officers were in place—there were 200 additional officers in north Wales. Additionally, as has been mentioned by my hon. Friends and the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd, 159 PCSOs were put in place in north Wales during the last five years of the Labour Government, to help to support levels of policing and visibility on the ground. That was coupled with a rise in the number of special constables, which again helped to increase police visibility. There was a major increase in police numbers at the same time as a major reduction in crime, and 21,000 victims of crime were saved.

[Guto Bebb]

On a point of accuracy, is it not the case that the number of special constables in north Wales fell significantly between 1997 and 2010?

[Mr Hanson]

I would contend that. When I was the Minister responsible for policing, I encouraged and set a target for an increase in the number of special constables over the course of this Parliament. The hon. Gentleman cannot escape the fact that, during the last Labour Government, there were 200 more police officers and 159 PCSOs in north Wales. After the first year of this Government we have seen a worrying fall in police numbers for the first time, and we are likely to see a further fall over the next few years.