Lord Cormack
Main Page: Lord Cormack (Conservative - Life peer)
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, the noble Lord raises a topical question, with the PCC elections coming up in May. The presumption of anonymity is a College of Policing guideline, and it expects that to be derogated from only when there are operational reasons for doing so; so that is a case for the chief officer of police, in the circumstances. The PCC holds the chief constable to account for the overall performance of the force, and the Mayor of London similarly holds the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police to account. Paragraph 18 of the Policing Protocol Order 2011, which sets out the PCC’s roles and responsibilities, says that,
“the PCC must not fetter the operational independence of the police force and the Chief Constable who leads it”.
Lord Cormack (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Blair, referred to apologies, but one thing that has caused widespread concern is that the apologies do not appear to have been as unequivocal as they should have been.
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, it is up to the commissioner in his private meeting with certain high-profile figures to deal with the matter in the way he thinks fit. One has to remember in these cases that there are sometimes public policy reasons why people’s identities should be revealed. It is obviously a sensitive issue, but one has to remember that in child sexual abuse cases, by and large, these are under-represented people and we want to encourage as many of them as possible to come forward. They face tremendous obstacles in doing so and they must be supported.