Oral Answers to Questions Debate

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Department: Home Office

Oral Answers to Questions

Margaret Greenwood Excerpts
Monday 13th July 2020

(3 years, 8 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Rosie Cooper Portrait Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
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What steps she is taking to allocate adequate funding to police forces.

Margaret Greenwood Portrait Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
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What steps she is taking to allocate adequate funding to police forces.

Geoffrey Clifton-Brown Portrait Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)
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What steps her Department is taking to increase police funding.

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Kit Malthouse Portrait Kit Malthouse
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The hon. Lady is perhaps confusing her figures, shall we say? Lancashire police received a £22.6 million increase in funding this year, which will allow it to recruit another 153 police officers over the next 12 months—less than 12 months now—up to March next year. It is making good progress, and has recruited 66 already.

Margaret Greenwood Portrait Margaret Greenwood [V]
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Recently, coastal communities such as West Kirby and Caldy in my constituency have seen huge numbers of visitors in search of relaxation and exercise. This has placed additional strain on Merseyside police, which has been working hard to respond to the concerns of local residents about crowds on beaches and in parks. Merseyside police estimates that the cost of the pandemic to date is £4.1 million, due to overtime, the cost of PPE, specialist cleaning and lost income. Will the Minister give an assurance that Merseyside police will be reimbursed for these costs?

Kit Malthouse Portrait Kit Malthouse
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I have had a number of telephone conversations with the chief constable of Merseyside police over the last few weeks and months, as has my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, and I am pleased to say that that force is in good heart, as far as we could tell. Happily, it is running well in advance of its recruitment allocation. I am told that, at the end of March, it had recruited 220 police officers, against an allocation of 200, which does give it extra capacity to deal with the problems that the hon. Member has outlined. Notwithstanding that fact, there are obviously extra costs for policing with covid-19, and we are in conversation with the Treasury about how we might address them.