Policing (England and Wales)

Margaret Greenwood Excerpts

Wednesday 10th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab) [V]]

I would like to begin by paying tribute to the officers, community support staff and other staff at Merseyside Police, and to police forces across the country, for all the work they have been doing to help keep our communities safe. The past year has been particularly challenging, and we owe them a huge debt of gratitude. I would also like to express my condolences to the families and friends of those officers who have lost their lives to covid.

A decade of Conservative Government austerity policies has had a damaging effect on police forces up and down the country. There are almost 24,000 fewer people working in the police now than in 2010—that is around 9,000 fewer police officers, 7,000 fewer police staff and 7,000 fewer police community support officers. The service cannot deal with these levels of cuts without there being an impact on public safety and on the stress levels of the remaining police workforce. That has to be a concern for us all.

Ministers will point to repeated statements about plans to recruit an additional 20,000 police officers as cause for celebration. However, the Government’s increase in police numbers will happen only over several years. In the meantime, our overstretched police officers are having to make up for 10 years of Conservative Government austerity.

In Wirral West, we have felt the impact of Government austerity. A decade of budget cuts by central Government reduced the number of officers in Merseyside Police by nearly a quarter. In 2010, Merseyside Police had over 4,500 police officers, but then, because of Government cuts, they lost over 1,100 of those officers. Those figures are breathtaking and have impacted on the safety of our communities.

Now, numbers in Merseyside are increasing, and by the end of March next year the force will have more than 4,000 officers, but that will still fall short of the numbers we had in 2010 and the Government have not announced any plans to replace the PCSOs or the police staff who have been cut. So, when the Prime Minister says,

“The most important thing politicians can do is back the police”,

does he really mean it? Why, then, is he freezing police pay?

The chair of the National Police Chiefs Council has spoken out about how

“sustained pay restraint can have wider impacts on the wellbeing of officers and staff, who work so hard to protect the public.”

Freezing pay is no way to value hard-working public sector workers, nor is it any way to build a service, and there is concern that the retention of police officers could become an issue.

According to the Minister for Crime and Policing,

“The retention of experienced police officers is a priority”,

and yet the Government are freezing their pay. How can it be right that the Government are freezing the pay of police officers and staff at a time when they have made such a vital contribution to public safety throughout the course of the pandemic? Will the Minister think again and press the Chancellor to make sure that the police receive the pay rise they deserve?

This year police and crime commissioners have had to take very difficult decisions at local level. The Merseyside commissioner proposed an increase to the police precept, the part of council tax ring-fenced for local policing. The increase to the police precept equates to £10 a year on a band A property—the lowest council tax band but the one paid by the majority of households on Merseyside. It is no secret that there is growing reluctance from police and crime panels to continue to support raising precepts in this way. Indeed, while endorsing the commissioner’s budget plans, the police and crime panel on Merseyside also recommended that she strenuously raise their concerns with Home Office and Treasury Ministers and challenge Government decisions to shift the burden of paying for the police from central taxation on to the shoulders of local council tax payers.

That the Government expect council tax payers to pay more to help towards the cost of policing shows that they have totally failed to understand the devastating impact of their austerity policies on people up and down the country. At a time when we are seeing a huge increase in the number of people using food banks, this increase in council tax will hit those families who are already worried about keeping up with their bills and putting food on the table. It is a fundamental responsibility of Government to keep citizens safe, and along with that comes Government responsibility to ensure that the police are properly resourced.

To conclude, I would like to ask some questions of the Minister. How long will it take for police officer numbers in Merseyside to reach 2010 levels? Will he confirm whether the Government have any plans to replace the police staff and PCSO roles that have been cut since 2010? And what steps will he take to repair the damage that this Government have done to policing since 2010?