Police

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Wednesday 13th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Browne]

I have given way before, twice. When budgets are tight, it puts an even greater onus on Government to achieve greater efficiencies and value for money—an even greater onus. We recognise the importance of the police.

Although funding reductions are unavoidable, the Government have substantially reformed the police over the last few years, and that reform is working. We have fundamentally changed the accountability framework for policing, introducing direct democratic accountability. Police and crime commissioners were elected in November and are now actively consulting on their police and crime plans and budgets for 2013-14. Those plans will set the scale of their ambition for the future, but already they have begun to demonstrate that they are driving forward innovative and flexible use of their budgets and taking bold decisions.

We have already seen evidence of that bold leadership, with forces looking seriously at how they manage their estate, including the future of New Scotland Yard here in London. We have seen the determination of other PCCs to put more police officers on the street through raising the precept, in some cases; others are restructuring their budgets to secure the future of police community safety officers; and others are looking to push collaboration to new areas to secure value for money for their electorate. There is no one-size-fits-all approach, but innovative policy making is taking place to achieve greater community safety and value for money. In the knowledge that they will be held to account directly by the public, PCCs are seeking to take measures to maintain and improve the service to the public within what is, as I have already admitted, a very tight financial climate.

PCCs, their chief constables and the officers and staff they lead are now supported by the new College of Policing. The college will support the fight against crime by equipping the police with the skills and knowledge they need to provide the very best service to their communities. Headed by an outstanding chief constable, Alex Marshall, and with Professor Shirley Pearce as its chair, the college will work in the public interest, supporting the police in their critical mission to cut crime by driving professionalism and integrity in policing.

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

As the Minister probably knows, the chief executive of the college gave evidence to the Home Affairs Committee yesterday. Will he help me with the budgets of the new landscape? As he knows, the Serious Organised Crime Agency and the National Policing Improvement Agency have been abolished and will now form part of the National Crime Agency. The total budget of SOCA and the NPIA was £865 million, but the NCA’s budget will be £400 million and the college’s budget will be £50 million. What has happened to the rest of the £865 million?

[Mr Browne]

The right hon. Gentleman makes a fair point, which we considered at length during the Committee stage of the Crime and Courts Bill. The crucial point is that only a small proportion of the NPIA’s budget is being transferred to the NCA. From memory—I do not have the paper to hand—I think the figure is £12 million or £13 million. The functions covered by the vast majority of the NPIA’s budget will not be transferred to the NCA. It is not accurate, therefore, to conflate SOCA’s budget and the NPIA’s budget and say that between them their budgets were bigger than the NCA’s budget, because quite a lot of the NPIA features will not be transferring to the NCA.

Few things could be more directly relevant to public confidence and the British model of policing by consent than the integrity of our police officers. Police officers are citizens in uniform and their fellow citizens must be able to have confidence that they exercise their powers without fear or favour. That is why my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary announced a range of measures to enhance police integrity in the House yesterday. Greater independent investigation of the most serious and sensitive complaints against the police will be made possible by rebalancing resource between the Independent Police Complaints Commission and force professional standards directorates. A publicly available list of struck-off officers will ensure that those who are dismissed for misconduct cannot re-enter the police by the back door. We will significantly strengthen vetting of all officers, particularly the most senior officers, and we will introduce national registers of pay and perks, gifts and hospitality, contact with the media and outside interests.

All that will be underpinned by a code of ethics for the police—a single set of ethical standards by which officers and staff will work. The college will own and develop this and PCCs and chief officers will ensure that it runs right through policing and the careers of police officers and police staff. Accountability, professionalism and integrity—these are the areas where our reforms are focused and on which we are making a substantial difference.

We also rely, however, on being able to continue to attract the very best people into policing. For the avoidance of doubt, outstanding people are already attracted to some of the most difficult and demanding jobs available in our police forces. We need to ensure that we continue to attract the people with the right skills and expertise to forge a force fit for the 21st century. That means opening up policing. We are consulting on three direct entry schemes that will open up the police to a wider pool of talent, so that forces will be able to bring in people with diverse backgrounds and new perspectives. Combined with the strong leaders already working in forces and the improved nurturing of internal talent through the College of Policing, we will have a police force that is even better equipped to fight crime.

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[Mr Hanson]

One police force where crime has not fallen happens to be that of Devon and Cornwall where, as I recall, the hon. Gentleman is a Member of Parliament. I may be wrong, but I think he is a Member of Parliament in Devon and Cornwall, and that is one area where crime has not fallen. When he stood on his election manifesto for 3,000 extra police officers at the last election, did he think that three years later he would go back to Devon and Cornwall police with a higher crime rate and 415 fewer officers? I do not think so.

Let me continue. The Government are scrapping antisocial behaviour orders and putting at risk crime-fighting tools such as the European arrest warrant. Yesterday in Committee we had a debate about the European arrest warrant and the Minister—who stood on a manifesto saying that he wished to keep that warrant—could not tell me which aspects of it he intended to opt back in to because he was fettered by nine Conservative Members. He has sold his soul to Government positions.

The Minister knows that the Labour party would have cut 12% from police budgets—I am honest about that. We would have cut £1 billion over the three-year period, including the year of this grant, because that is what we said we would do. During a debate before the general election, I recall the Minister debating police numbers with me. On 27 October 2009 he said:

“People like to see a visible police presence in their communities…I am genuinely astonished that the Conservatives want to make drastic cuts to budgets”.

In the same debate, the Minister spoke about his Conservative council in Somerset:

“The Conservative cut in funding for the police was kept secret before the county council elections in June.”

He promised 3,000 police officers but he is now promoting a 20% cut to the budget. His proposal cannot get much more secret than that.

In response to a debate that set the tone for this three-year budget, the then hon. Member for Chesterfield, who lost his seat at the general election to my hon. Friend the current Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins), said:

“Such cuts, should they snowball and continue in the next year or two, will be a tragedy.”—[Official Report, 3 February 2010; Vol. 505, c. 340.]

That was the then hon. Member for Chesterfield speaking from the Liberal Democrat Front Bench. I expect that the Minister will not listen to me and I accept that. We have had honest debates and I have seen more of him in the past three weeks than I have seen of my wife because we have spent lots of time in Committee.

[Keith Vaz]

I do not wish to interrupt this pre-Valentine’s day discussion between my right hon. Friend and the Minister, but did the Committee consider the budgets of the various organisations being set up by the Government? Does my right hon. Friend share my concern that the sums do not add up? Where has all the money gone, bearing in mind the responsibilities that will be transferred to the new organisations? Did he manage to elicit any more information than I received from the Minister today?

[Mr Hanson]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, and the Committee explored in some detail the differences between the budgets for the Serious Organised Crime Agency, the National Policing Improvement Agency and the new National Crime Agency. We shed light on the fact that there is a major gap in the funding, but we could not get answers on where that funding has disappeared. I am sure that my right hon. Friend, who so ably leads the Home Affairs Committee, will explore that in some detail over the next few weeks.

The Minister and I will not have a meeting of minds on this matter, but perhaps he will listen to a few voices from out in the community. For example, an individual who shall remain nameless for the moment said:

“I just want the public to understand how tight things really are because I think there’s a feeling out there that it’s OK.”

That was the Conservative police and crime commissioner, John Dwyer in Cheshire, complaining about the fact that he has to bring forward a budget axing 38 police officers and 25 back-office staff.

In a statement this week, Nick Alston, the Conservative police and crime commissioner for Essex, said that the force’s financial position is

“even more challenging than I suspected when taking office just over two months ago.”

The police and crime commissioner for Cornwall, Tony Hogg, again a Conservative party member, said that the Government’s offer of freezing council tax in exchange for a 1% increase in grant would leave the force facing a “fiscal cliff” in two year’s time and an annual shortfall of £1.8 million. He added:

“There would be a critical reduction in pro-active crime reduction, there would be a critical reduction in partnership, community and early intervention…and a critical reduction in police visibility and hence reassurance to the public.”

I look forward to the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Dan Rogerson), among others, voting for the budget today. The local police and crime commissioner thinks it will cause great difficulties in Cornwall.

In Gloucestershire, the police and crime commissioner—not Labour—said that

“we won’t be able to absorb the cuts the Government expects us to make next year and in subsequent years which could affect frontline services and our ability to reduce crime. If we use our reserves, which has also been suggested…we would have no money to replace…equipment or improve our infrastructure.”

The police and crime commissioner in Cumbria—again, not a Labour member—said:

“It is without question a challenging position with the financial forecasts indicating that £10.2 million of savings will have to be delivered between 2013/14 and 2016/17…in addition to the £12.1 million of savings already achieved.”

Those are police and crime commissioners, not Labour members, and they are all expressing concerns and having to raise money.

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[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

It is a real pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds (Mr Ruffley). He speaks with enormous knowledge about policing issues, and, as one who has attended many debates on the police grant —both in opposition and supporting the Government—he has always come to the Chamber with good and fresh ideas. It is a mystery to me why he is not in the Home Office doing the job, because he knows so much about it.

I must say that I was a little disappointed by the Minister’s opening remarks. I like the Minister, who has appeared before the Home Affairs Committee and who is always very robust, but in a debate of this kind there is no need for knockabout stuff, because we are dealing with extremely serious issues. I am still a bit puzzled about why the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice was not here to open the debate. He may have other important business to deal with, but I should have thought that he would be able to open a debate of this kind, as he has done in the past. Obviously a deal has been done on the Front Bench, however, and we are happy to hear the Government’s view.

I, too, was present at the memorial service for Paul McKeever, and, like the shadow policing Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Delyn (Mr Hanson), and the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds, I want to express my appreciation for a life that was dedicated to public service. He was the policeman’s policeman. Hundreds of people turned up at Southwark cathedral on Saturday, including the Home Secretary—who read the lesson very eloquently—the shadow Home Secretary, the policing Minister, the shadow policing Minister, and the entire hierarchy of the police service. That was because Paul McKeever was very special as an advocate of what the service does throughout Britain. I think it right for us to start our debates by paying tribute to the work of the police force in this country.

Let me now make some remarks about the new landscape of policing, and about the reduction in the overall police grant and how it will affect some of the important institutions that the Government have created.

Let me say first that I am a great fan of what the Home Secretary is doing in reforming the landscape of policing. I am attached not to particular organisations, but to the services that are provided for local people. However, as we approach the halfway point in those changes in the landscape, I am not entirely convinced that at the end of the day we shall meet the Home Secretary’s original objective. When she started the process in 2010, her aim was to unclutter the policing landscape, but I think that we may well end up with more organisations rather than fewer.

Secondly, I should like to know what is happening to all this money. Of course there cannot be an immediate transfer from one organisation to another. However, the Home Affairs Committee has been studying the matter for the last two years, and in the course of our latest inquiry, into leadership and standards in the police, we have been looking at the organisations that are being abolished or reformed and the new organisations that are being created. I am afraid that the sums do not add up.

Evidence was given to the Committee by the former policing Minister, the right hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert). When I asked him what the budget of the new National Crime Agency would be, the Home Office director of finance was sitting next to him, and he did not know what it would be. We do know that the combined budgets of the National Policing Improvement Agency and the Serious Organised Crime Agency amount to about £860 million. We also know that the budget of the National Crime Agency will be about £400 million. Yesterday, in his assured evidence to the Committee, Alex Marshall said he would have a budget of £50 million and a staff of 600.

I am not very good at maths. I will not reveal my GCSE grade to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, but I am sure that you did better than I did. However, I think that we are about £315 million short. We are not talking about a few bob here and there; we are talking about a lot of money, and in the context of the overall reduction in the police grant over a number of years, it is really serious money. I am not trying to put the Under-Secretary of State on the spot—I do not know whether he will be winding up the debate—but it would be great if those sums could be confirmed, either today or in writing to me or to the Committee.

[Richard Drax]

Is not one of the downsides of all these budget cuts, particularly in constituencies such as Dorset, which contains vast rural areas, the temptation to bring all the officers in from the rural areas and to close local police stations? I think that there is a loss of confidence, not in what the police are doing but in their ability to do it, because there is no one out there.

[Keith Vaz]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Because of his profession, he knows about these issues. I am sure he is an assiduous Member who works tirelessly on behalf of his constituents. One of the public’s first concerns is whether they can see their local police officer—the bobby on the beat—walking around, and whether they can go to the local police station and report crimes and feel safe as a result. Not all of us can have a Dr Who-type TARDIS—I certainly do not—but it is important that we give that visibility in respect of both the physical building and police officers.

Where responsibility for counter-terrorism will lie is not yet settled. The Government are ring-fencing its £563 million budget, and I support that, but there is to be a new landscape of policing, and a decision needs to be made soon as to whether it will stay with the Metropolitan police or move to the National Crime Agency. My distinguished colleague from the Home Affairs Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Mr Winnick), will correct me if I am wrong, but I think we recommended in one of our reports that it should go to the National Crime Agency, as counter-terrorism is a national issue.

[Dr Huppert]

indicated assent.

[Keith Vaz]

Another Select Committee member, the hon. Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) is also present, and he is nodding in agreement. We suggested that in part because we were worried the NCA might not have enough to do, which is, indeed, the case at present. It has very few staff and it is not yet established to the satisfaction of the Government and the Select Committee. We need to have a decision on this matter soon, and we were promised a decision after the Olympics. I do not know whether the Minister wants to answer that question now, but if not, I am happy to wait until the winding-up speeches.

I am also concerned about the huge amount of money currently being spent on historical investigations. The Select Committee has asked witnesses about that on many occasions. At present we have Operations Alice, Elveden, Weeting. Tuleta, Pallial, Yewtree and Herne. We heard only yesterday from the Home Secretary that Herne—which has been under way for the past year, with a number of police officers involved, and at a cost to the taxpayer of £1.2 million—will now be taken over by the chief constable of Derbyshire. That operation deals with important issues involving undercover agents and the recent public revelations, and a lot of money is being spent on these matters. I calculate that £44.8 million is currently being spent on the police investigating other police officers who have failed to come up to scratch. A lot of money is going to the Independent Police Complaints Commission, too, to deal with past errors by certain police forces, such as at Hillsborough. In discussing the reduction of the grant to local police and crime and commissioners, we need to consider all the money currently being spent on all these operations.

The hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds is the spokesman on good procurement in this House, and we have had many discussions about the matter. I welcome the decision of the deputy mayor of London, Stephen Greenhalgh, to take a careful look at how the Metropolitan police have spent their procurement budget. He took evidence from Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe on the issue. When we commission companies to act if the public sector cannot act, we must choose only companies with a good track record. Only yesterday it was announced that G4S was going to have to hand back to the taxpayer about £70 million. We should take into account the expenditure from the police budget that goes on companies such as G4S. The Select Committee was very clear that, as a result of the big mistakes G4S made, it ought to have handed back all its management fee of £57 million plus all the other money it ought to have spent. My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North became an internet hit with his famous “humiliating shambles” soundbite. He will always be remembered for uttering those words on the Select Committee—and for many other words uttered, too, of course—because it was, indeed, a humiliating shambles. As the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds has said, we ought to be very careful about dispensing public money to private companies that do not come up to scratch.

Finally, I want to say a few words about the need to carry people with us. The Minister, who has responsibility for security matters, is an avuncular type who seeks consensus. We will see that when he comes to the Dispatch Box. I will not say he is the most courteous of the Home Office Ministers as the others might get upset if I were to do so, but he does not pick a fight. The current Home Office policy is, in effect, picking a fight with the people who have to implement the changes, however. Now is not the best time to be cutting police officers’ pensions, forcing them out under rule A19 and cutting their pay retrospectively—although I perfectly understand why we might need to make changes for new recruits.

I remember my last conversation with Paul McKeever on this subject. He passionately supported treating police officers with the respect, courtesy and dignity they deserve. My only real row with the former Prime Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), was about police pay. He was quite robust with me when he asked me not to go on a demonstration under the last Labour Government in support of the police who were having their pay cut. I said to him then—and I say to the Home Secretary and Home Office Ministers now—that we must carry the work force with us. If we say we have the best police service in the world, the only way to express our admiration for what the police have done is to treat them with proper respect—to have a dialogue with them, to stop cutting their pay and conditions, to speak to them because they know best day in, day out. As we have seen recently in Manchester and other parts of the country, they lay down their lives for us. They go out in the morning and they do not know whether they are coming back at night, unlike all of us in this Chamber today. If we do not carry them with us, the world-class brand reputation that we currently have will be damaged for ever.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (James Brokenshire)]

I thank all right hon. and hon. Members for participating in what has been a lively debate on the police funding settlement. I recognise a number of the points about reductions in funding, but we are confident that they are manageable. The police are making the necessary savings and have transformed how they deliver the service to the public. That has been achieved along with reductions in overall crime.

We inherited the toughest fiscal challenge in living memory and are having to take tough decisions, but I recognise, as do the Government, that the police do an incredibly important and challenging job. Our reforms recognise and build on that. As right hon. and hon. Members have highlighted, this year again we have seen many examples of professional, selfless and brave front-line policing to keep the public safe and to fight crime. As the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi) highlighted, our thoughts are particularly with the families, friends and colleagues of Fiona Bone and Nicola Hughes.

I would also like to recognise the work of the late Paul McKeever, with whom I had the pleasure of having a number of meetings and exchanges. He would have said—and I would agree—that we have the best police force in the world, and I pay tribute to the work they do, day in, day out, to keep us all safe. I also pay tribute to the work of our chief constables and senior officers in achieving savings, driving efficiencies and cutting crime.

Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary has challenged forces to drive through efficiencies and has shown that about half of the savings required nationally can be achieved just by forces raising their performance to the average of their immediate peers. There are other areas, however, where the police can make, and are making, further savings, without affecting the level of service to the public—for instance, by adopting an increasingly national approach to buying equipment and services. My hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Dr Huppert) made the point about how efficiencies can be secured through such routes.

Forces are rightly prioritising front-line delivery. The number of officers working in back-office roles fell by 20.3% between March 2010 and March 2012, and we are encouraging forces to consider options for reforming support services, including collaboration. HMIC has stated that forces have plans to deliver 87% of the required savings by March 2015, indicating that police forces are working well towards the savings that need to be made. Its report also stated that the proportion of officers in front-line roles is due to increase to 89% in March 2015. Furthermore, its report found that, as well as crime going down, victim satisfaction was up and response times to emergencies had largely been maintained.

We have also made changes to how the police procure their goods and services. We estimate that the police can save up to £200 million per year by 2014-15 on commonly purchased police goods and non-IT services. We have continued our reform of the police. PCCs have now been introduced and are holding the police to account, while ensuring that the public have a say in how policing is delivered in their community. As we have heard, the College of Policing has also been introduced and the package of measures announced by the Home Secretary yesterday will further enhance the integrity of the police.

A number of important points have been made today, particularly by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Mr Ruffley), to whom I pay tribute for the work he did in opposition. He continues to highlight the need to focus on freeing up police time. The Government are clear that the police should be focusing on fighting crime, not paperwork. The work we have done to reduce bureaucracy could result in up to 4.5 million hours of police time saved across all forces every year—the equivalent of more than 2,100 officers back on the beat.

[Keith Vaz]

I welcome the way in which the Minister is conducting the debate from the Dispatch Box. Will he clarify one point in respect of the Home Secretary’s very good statement yesterday? Will the register of second jobs that police officers are now going to have to declare be held by HMIC or by the College of Policing?

[James Brokenshire]

That is one of the details relating to the most effective way to deliver on the type of register that is being established. I am sure that, given the very good scrutiny that the Home Affairs Select Committee provides, the right hon. Gentleman and his Committee will follow through on the important issues that will follow from the well-received announcement by the Home Secretary yesterday.

I want to comment on some of the points that have been raised today on the arrangements for damping and on the police allocation formula. The Government will conduct a fundamental review of the formula, as the Minister of State, Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton Deane (Mr Browne) said earlier, and we will seek the views of police and crime commissioners across England and Wales. Determining how funding should be allocated to the police is a complex and important matter. It requires careful consideration and it will take time. In that context, it is important that that work is undertaken before we can consider the arrangements for damping.

The right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) highlighted the question of the National Policing Improvement Agency budget. He focused on the funding for the College of Policing but, in addition, the Home Office will be engaged in funding relating to the provision of Airwave and to the Police ICT Company Ltd. The right hon. Gentleman was trying to connect one element of funding to another, but there are other elements involved. I hope that this is a helpful explanation.

A number of points have been raised about police pay and conditions. My hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds said that pay accounted for a large proportion of police spending, and that the police pay bill was a key issue. Our aim has been to have pay and conditions that support forces in driving out costs and making the best use of their resources. That is why we have asked the police, along with the rest of the public sector, to take a two-year pay freeze, and subject to any decisions by the Police Negotiating Board and an agreement on staff pay, we expect the Government’s policy for public sector pay restraint also to apply to the police. We have also taken forward proposals relating to the Winsor review. The reforms from part 1 will save about £150 million when fully implemented and will give chief officers greater flexibility in how they deploy their officers and shape their work forces.

I was interested to hear the assertion from the Opposition Front Bench that Labour would be looking for 12% savings. However, the Opposition apparently also support reforms to overtime and shift patterns, the pay freeze and the police arbitration tribunal’s decision on police pay. They must therefore be talking about 12% plus all those elements. When we analyse that, we find that they are in substantially the same position as the Government, although they did not accept that. If they are saying that they would implement 12% savings, which of those elements do they not accept? They will need to consider that question carefully, and it is interesting that they have not responded to that question today.

The right hon. Member for Leicester East asked me whether the counter-terrorism element should be part of the National Crime Agency. He and his Committee highlighted that point in their recent report. I can tell him that there will be no wholesale review of counter-terrorism policing arrangements in England and Wales until after the NCA is up and running. We judge that to be the right time to look at that issue, although we recognise that it needs to be examined in the context of the changed landscape for policing. On the point about rural policing, the formula distributes funding based on relative work loads in an area, and apportions according to population sparsity to address the specific needs of rural forces.

The hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) highlighted regional organised crime units, and in many ways he touches on the important issue of collaboration. I had the pleasure of going to the east midlands special operations unit last year, and I saw how special operations come together and how collaboration can make an important difference. The Government strongly support that model of forces coming together in that way.

The hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) highlighted a point about partnerships, and I am sure that police and crime commissioners will focus on that when considering how they apply the community safety fund and budget. Yes, there is still more to do, but we are confident that with a clear focus on making the necessary changes, the police will continue to provide the service that the public deserve, alongside delivering value for money for the taxpayer. I pay tribute to the work of the police in doing that, and to their success in cutting crime and keeping our community safe, and I commend the motion to the House.

Question put,