Police, Fire and Rescue Services: Funding Reductions

Jeff Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 20th February 2019 Westminster Hall

[Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the effect of reductions in funding of police, fire and rescue services.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. I declare an interest as a member of a number of trade union groups, including the Fire Brigades Union parliamentary group. I start by placing on the record my appreciation for and gratitude to our police officers, firefighters and, indeed, NHS staff. I am sure that those sentiments will be shared by all Members.

The focus of the debate relates to the funding of the police and fire services, as pressures affecting those services in my constituency have been more acute in recent months. However, I in no way seek to downplay the funding challenges facing our health service and, in particular, the ambulance service. In many respects, they face similar pressures.

The last Labour Government had a well-known policy; it was a kind of catchphrase: “Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime”. And they had a proud record. Indeed, finance, resources and police numbers were all increased. Being tough on crime was not just a slogan. It meant more visible policing, a priority being placed on community policing, intelligence gathering and the detection of crime. I well recall attending PACT—Police and Communities Together—meetings at which there were consultations with community safety partnerships and local priorities were determined. There was a real sense of partnership.

In 2010, when Labour left office, there was a record number of police officers; it was in excess of 143,000. However, in the last decade, we have seen a systematic reduction in funding and what amounts to a downgrading of the police service. In every community, we can see the effects of the missing police officers who once patrolled our streets.

[Jeff Smith (Manchester, Withington) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. He is absolutely right. Greater Manchester police have lost nearly 2,000 police officers since 2010, and across south Manchester the problem is that the police are so stretched that they struggle to fulfil their duties, including proper investigation of the crimes that are happening. Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the biggest effects of the reduction is a loss of confidence among the local community that crimes will be properly investigated, and that that is not the fault of the police?

[Grahame Morris]

Trust and relationships are built over many years. Sadly, the impact of sustained funding cuts over nine or 10 years has been that much of the good work from the partnership arrangements, and often valuable intelligence, have been lost. It will take a colossal effort to regain that.

There are many implications from having fewer police officers. I am thinking of the reassurance that comes from seeing a police officer talking to residents in Peterlee town centre in my constituency, seeing officers walking down Church Street—a rare occurrence in the current climate—or community police officers gathering intelligence to combat drug dealing or engaging young people to tackle antisocial behaviour.

It is the view of many that the Conservative Government have abandoned their support for law and order by cutting more than 20,000 police officers, taking us back to numbers that we have not seen since the 1980s. Crime is now rising as a result. In my own policing area, Durham, the number of police officers is down by 25% since 2010; we have lost 360 police officers. The National Audit Office report on the financial sustainability of police forces identifies Durham as having lost more resources than any other provincial force between 2010 and 2018-19, with its funding from central Government cut by one third.

I hope that the Minister will join me in acknowledging that, despite every funding challenge being placed before Durham constabulary, credit must go to Chief Constable Mike Barton, Police and Crime Commissioner Ron Hogg and all the officers, staff and support staff of Durham constabulary. It has been rated as the only outstanding force in the country for the past three years, and has the highest crime detection rate in England and Wales. It has endeavoured to overcome its difficulties. Nevertheless, the fact that we have fewer police officers is manifest, and the consequences are there for everyone to see.

I want to say something about Grenfell. The County Durham and Darlington fire and rescue service is experiencing the same financial pressures as the police in my constituency. Before I move on to the circumstances that apply in my constituency, I want to comment on the Channel 4 “Dispatches” episode that aired on Monday night. It was called “Grenfell: Did the Fire Brigade Fail?” Unfortunately, the episode had the same flaw as some of the questioning in the Grenfell inquiry, and was blinkered from the wider context of the incident that led to the dreadful loss of 73 lives because it focused solely on the night of the tragedy.

On 14 June 2017, the London fire brigade was confronted with a fire spreading at an unprecedented rate. The crews’ experience and training would have taught them that, in a high-rise building, a fire would be contained within a flat in an individual concrete unit built to contain the fire. In such cases, it is clear why a policy of “stay put” would work. On that night, as the fire developed, the crews on the ground had to make decisions in that moment of pressure, panic and uncertainty. I ask everyone to consider what they would do in that moment, with a fire spreading rapidly in an unexpected manner, with lives being lost in front of them, watching colleagues and friends entering a building in the belief that they might not return. Are we to expect a fire chief on the ground instinctively to change established policy and procedures that had been ingrained into the service through training, and to develop new strategies on the spot?

To scapegoat the firefighters—the men and women who bravely risk their lives in a service whose purpose is to preserve life—is nothing short of a scandal. It will not get us any nearer finding those responsible for the tragedy. In the opinion of many people, including me, the fire service and the firefighters did not fail. The building and the policy failed. Policy fails when faulty and unsafe electrical appliances are not tested, when building regulations fail and when substandard windows do not contain the fire. A local authority fails when the cheap cladding that was used to wrap the high-rise building is actually made of flammable materials. Business fails when the companies that installed the cladding and produced it do not act when their product fails to meet safety standards.

It is easy to attack the fire service for decisions made in a moment of extreme pressure, but at some point those who made the decisions with time and forethought that placed residents in a dangerous building will have to be held to account. Perhaps that is not for this debate, but that programme raised such questions that I felt that I had to put something on the record.

I am offended when the fire service and firefighters are unfairly attacked. I have seen that in my constituency. County Durham and Darlington fire and rescue service is currently consulting on changes, as it is trying to manage excessive Government cuts. It has set out a number of options and is asking the public for their views. I have never met a fire chief or a firefighter who does not want to recruit more firefighters. The barrier to recruiting more firefighters is finance, which is determined by central Government, combined with the local authority precept. Our problem is that we are being systematically underfunded, and as a result, the fire service in our area is being downgraded. The Minister may disagree, but how can the loss of 11,000 firefighter posts nationally—one in five posts—be described as anything other than a downgrade of the service?

The scale of cuts to the fire service is nothing less than a national scandal. County Durham and Darlington fire and rescue service has lost 58% of its Government funding since 2012. In the current four-year settlement, its Government funding will reduce from £10.9 million to £8.9 million, and Government support for new fire appliances and other vital equipment has been almost totally axed. Hon. Members may recall that, some years ago, we were actually encouraged to develop resilience and to acquire equipment, particularly pumping equipment and boats, which might not be used so much in our area but could support neighbouring brigades during flooding incidents.

Our own chief fire officer in Durham, Stuart Errington, described a £1.3 million stealth cut, stressing:

“I’m not worried about PFI, I’m worried about capital spending.”

I place on the record my thanks to Stuart and to our firefighters for the work they do under the most difficult circumstances. I know from my conversations with the chief fire officer that he has raised concerns with the Minister about cuts and their implications for public safety. He said to me:

“I think everyone thought the cuts would stop after four years.”

He added:

“I’m still lobbying with the Home Office really hard to stop the cuts, because we’re getting to the point where we’re going to see some really big cuts, which will increase the risk to the public.”

I ask Ministers to look at the cuts to the police and to the fire and rescue service and to recognise that they have gone too far and are now endangering the public. The idea that fire services covering Seaham and Peterlee in my constituency could be reduced, at a time when they are actually dealing with more incidents, defies all logic and common sense. It makes the likelihood of death and injury greater, which cannot be acceptable.

I ask the Minister to address funding cuts. One issue in Durham is that the precept is not an effective means of raising finance. As a relatively deprived area, we have a low council tax base. Some 55% of households in County Durham and Darlington—it is more in my constituency—are classed as band A, whereas nationally a typical property is classed as band D. That limits the capacity to increase funding for the fire and rescue authority via the precept, compared with more affluent areas.

An example used by my own police and crime commissioner is that, if Thames Valley police increased its precept by the same amount as Durham, it would raise £17 million a year more. At some point we will have to question the sustainability of the precept as a means of financing both the police service and the fire and rescue service, particularly in the current climate, where the principle of resource equalisation—that more affluent areas should provide support to less affluent areas—which has stood since the second world war, seems to have been abandoned. We increasingly see a postcode lottery in resources and funding.

I point out to the Minister that the demands on policing and fire and rescue services—particularly in areas of high deprivation, such as mine—are complex and need to be funded appropriately. That will require the Government to recognise the needs of communities like mine and the limited ability of local areas to raise the necessary funding via the precept.