Oral Answers to Questions

Jayne Kirkham Excerpts

Monday 21st October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

6. What steps her Department is taking to increase public trust and confidence in policing.

[Jayne Kirkham (Truro and Falmouth) (Lab/Co-op)]

11. What steps her Department is taking to increase public trust and confidence in policing.

[Siân Berry (Brighton Pavilion) (Green)]

14. What steps she is taking to monitor and maintain standards of police conduct.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jess Phillips]

I thank my hon. Friend and as a local to Warwickshire I take a keen interest in those matters myself. Of course, I will meet him, along with the Minister for Policing, Fire and Crime Prevention, my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North and Cottingham (Dame Diana Johnson). It is vital that the public can trust that those who police us, and who are in charge of our police, are held to account as everybody else should be.

[Jayne Kirkham]

Despite town and city councils in Cornwall employing street rangers and antisocial behaviour officers and having ShopWatch radios funded from their precept or business improvement districts, shop managers still struggle with shoplifting and ASB. The record under our Conservative PCC on answering and responding to 101 calls is poor, and those crimes are chronically under-reported. Shop workers feel powerless and there is a desperate need for more neighbourhood police. Can the Minister explain how trust in police and the rule of law will be restored to retail staff and shop managers?

[Jess Phillips]

As the Home Secretary laid out, extra neighbourhood policing is important not just because we need more police on our streets, but because when our constituents—shop workers and those who own businesses—call the police, if they get no response confidence drops. The neighbourhood police that there will be across the country, including in Cornwall, will help with confidence, not just with crime.