Police Station Closures: Solihull and West Midlands
Debate between Khalid Mahmood and Jack Dromey(6 years, 8 months ago)
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Jack Dromey
The decisions are actually proposals from the chief constable in the first instance—I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is criticising the chief constable—and then they go to the PCC. The simple reality is that our police service in the west midlands faces increasingly impossible pressures because of the cuts that have been made by the hon. Gentleman’s Government, and he has not once stood up and opposed those cuts or voted against them.
Mr Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham, Perry Barr) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend recognise that my constituency, which neighbours his, has lost more than 15 community support officers, numerous police officers and a huge number of support people due to police stations closing? That is purely the responsibility of this Government, who have failed to fund the police service properly.
Jack Dromey
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. He hears in his community what I hear in mine. He hears, for example, about elderly residents’ fear of going out at night. Local retailers increasingly complain that people do not come out when it is dark, such is people’s fear of going on to the streets in some of our communities.
Do Government Members not talk to police officers like we do? One officer said to me, “Jack, criminals increasingly have free rein to do what they want, because there are simply not enough of us to keep our community safe.” Do Government Members not know that response times are going up, including for victims of domestic violence? Do they not understand that the hollowing out of neighbourhood policing undermines the struggle to combat the growing and uniquely awful threat of terrorism?
The Prime Minister said, “We cut police and cut crime, we protected budgets, and our approach is fair.” Yes, the Conservatives cut police, but she is wrong that they cut crime and protected budgets. Some £145 million has been cut overall and there has recently been, in effect, a £12.5 million real-terms cut. As for fairness, the west midlands certainly has not been treated fairly compared with Surrey, the Thames valley or Hampshire, for example.
The police also have paid a price. We do not hear Government Members standing up for them. The thin blue line is being stretched ever thinner. There are mounting problems of sickness and stress. Officers frequently put their lives on the line to protect the public, and some are seriously injured as a consequence. The hundreds of officers in the west midlands who were forced out under regulation A19 paid the price with their jobs.
What cheek Conservative Members of Parliament have to come here and protest about the impact of police cuts when they are guilty of a lamentable failure to stand up for the police service. They supported the biggest cuts since the war, including recent real-terms cuts. To blame our chief constable and our police and crime commissioner is completely wrong. We could give numerous examples of Conservative attacks—my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) mentioned back office staff—but let me quote what the Minister said about head office at Lloyd House:
“Officers and staff in the West Midlands do an excellent job keeping our communities safe and this refurbishment will not only save money, but will also mean they will have an improved working environment to carry out their vital duties.”
The Conservatives have sought every spurious way possible to escape responsibility, but they cannot. The people of the west midlands know that the Conservative party has failed to stand up for them and that Labour always will.
Citizens Advice Bureaux (Birmingham)
Debate between Khalid Mahmood and Jack Dromey(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Mahmood
The hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) is not dealing with the real issue. I have two CAB in my area—one in my constituency and one just outside—which serve some of the most deprived people in the area. Those people have real issues in respect of health, housing and mental health. An organisation called COPE: Black Mental Health Foundation, which provides advice on mental health issues, will close in the next two months because the city council is not providing any support. The Asian Resource Centre is also closing. As my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey) says, there will be huge issues around support for the most vulnerable in our society, but there has been no dialogue at all with the city council on that.
Jack Dromey
My hon. Friend is, of course, right; it is not just the CAB. Some of the 13 organisations that are threatened are the Afro-Caribbean Millennium Centre, Age Concern in Birmingham and Perry Barr, the Birmingham Asian Resource Centre, the TUC Centre for the Unemployed and the Chinese Community Centre. A whole range of advice services catering for the needs of the various communities of Birmingham are all facing closure. In total, between 80,000 and 100,000 people seek advice from those 13 advice services each year. That is one in 10 of Birmingham’s citizens, or one in four families. Such is the scale of need that those admirable institutions meet at present.
It would appear that the cuts are not just cruel and callous; they may be unlawful as well. The National Council for Voluntary Organisations, an admirable organisation, has written to Birmingham city council to raise concerns over the legality of the cuts in relation to consultation and equality impact assessments. Many of us will give evidence in any proceedings that are held because we know from our experience that there was no proper consultation in advance, and that no serious impact assessments were conducted. The council made the decisions just before Christmas, and it has gone hell for leather to implement the next stages without proper consultation or impact assessments.
It is essential that the Government and the council act. If a solution is to be found that will secure the long-term future of these admirable organisations, there will need to be at least interim funding while we seek a long-term solution.