Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Lord Dear Excerpts

Monday 4th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, I am conscious of the hour and the fact that our Benches are filled to hear this debate, but this is a very important group of amendments. My noble friend Lady Henig and the noble Baroness, Lady Harris, have raised some important points about that come back, really, to the consequences of having a corporation sole, in which one person has enormous power and responsibility.

My amendments relate to the powers exercised by the police and crime commissioner. Under Clause 39, “Appointment, suspension and removal of chief constables”, huge authority is given to the police and crime commissioner to appoint a chief constable and to require their suspension, resignation or retirement. When it comes to the appointment, there are some safeguards, because the police and crime panel has a veto power on the appointment. We may disagree about the number of the panel voting in favour, but it has a veto power. When it comes to suspension, retirement or requirement to retire, the safeguard is much less. Although the police and crime panel can undertake a scrutiny process, as set out in Schedule 8, in the end, the police and crime commissioner can ignore the panel's recommendation.

My worry is that the police and crime commissioner who is seeking re-election when year two or year three is coming up and who is in some trouble may well consider sacking the chief constable as a visible sign to the public that he or she is doing something. There are circumstances—my noble friends have hinted at them—where that would be a jolly good thing to do, but at other times it will not; it will be a political action by a police and crime commissioner. Where are the safeguards? In the end, there are none because, whatever the panel says, the police and crime commissioner can ignore it.

I have a series of amendments which relate not only to the chief constable but to the circumstances where the same may be required of other chief officers and also to the situation in London. Essentially, this provision should apply only where it can be shown: that there is good reason—in other words, that it is in the interests of the force, for reasons of efficiency or effectiveness; that there has been appropriate consultation with the chair of the police and crime panel; that there has been proper investigation of the circumstances leading up to such an action; and that the approval of the Secretary of State is given. If Ministers consider that that gives the Secretary of State overweening powers, I must say that I have not been persuaded that the essential nature of the tripartite arrangement—the role of the Home Secretary, the police authority and the chief constable—should be so torn up that there are no safeguards to be undertaken by the Home Secretary if the police and crime commissioner decides to take such an action where, as I said, there is virtually no effective scrutiny other than the PCP recommendations.

This is a very important group of amendments. There is unease about the power to be exercised both by the police and crime commissioner in relation to the chief constable and other senior officers and then by the chief constable in relation to those employed by him as a corporation sole. We would look to the Government to recognise those concerns and to give some reassurance.

[Lord Dear]

My Lords, two amendments in this group, Amendments 189A and 192CA, stand in my name. One refers to the appointment of a chief constable and the other to the dismissal of a chief constable.

In Amendment 189A, I suggest that new words are inserted into Schedule 8:

“A police and crime commissioner should take advice from HMCIC before making any decision as to the appointment of a chief constable”.

I shall come back to the word “should” in a moment. This relates to the suggestion that the advice from an outside agency is taken prior to any decision being made by the PCC and prior to the subsequent discussion of that by the panel. We are looking at this in the context—we have talked a lot about context through the various stages of the Bill—of the fear of the untrammelled exercise of power by the PCC. There are a good many examples over the years of police authorities looking only around their own feet rather than at the broader horizon. The risk is somewhat greater when one has a fully elected individual who has very few of the constraints that police authorities have.

Although I am absolutely sure that, in the majority of cases, if PCCs come into being, they will exercise their power sensibly, in your Lordships' House we are often preoccupied with the thought that some of them might not. In this case, the lack of exercise of the sort of expertise that one would look for would lead to the risk of a blinkered mentality or, as has already been mentioned this afternoon, a silo mentality and a failure to take account of the talent that is available in the wider sphere nationally. Quite obviously, that would lead to a very insular approach from that PCC, the appointment of safe bets, perhaps the appointment of candidates who are personally known and favoured by the PCC, and the appointment of people who are locally or regionally accented. In other words, the whole thing would be driven inwards rather than outwards.

At the moment, there is no national pool of talent within the police service, which is managed in much the same way as some multinational corporations, national organisations or the Armed Forces manage their emerging top positions. The report by Mr Neyroud, which was published earlier this year, and the report that we expect to have from Mr Winsor, which is expected at the end of this calendar year, will have an emphasis on leadership within the police service and I dare bet will propose a whole raft of new developments, formalisation, and improvement of the present structure. I hope they do. On various occasions in your Lordships’ House, I have spoken at length about the crying need for better leadership and structured leadership within the police service.

The system at the moment involves a mixture of advice given to police authorities by ACPO, by the Home Office and by the inspectorate. The inspectorate, which I have included in the amendment, offers advice at varying stages prior to the shortlist being constructed by the Home Office and then offered to the police authority. It offers advice on the shortlisting carried out by the police authority itself and then at the interview stage. My experience of seven years as an inspector of constabulary was that I was asked by police authorities to sit on a large number of appointment interviews when chief constables were being considered. Usually, the advice that I gave was followed and sometimes it was not. I did not take it personally when my advice was rejected, but I saw it as an exercise of democratic accountability in the best possible sense.