Police Funding

Mark Reckless Excerpts

Wednesday 8th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)]

I should first declare an interest: I am a member of the Kent police authority.

It is a pleasure to follow my hon.—and perhaps learned—Friend the Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman), and I particularly welcome the emphasis he placed on the need for the localisation of policing decisions, as opposed to the centralisation that went on before. It is also a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Jack Dromey), who I have not previously had the pleasure of hearing make a speech. There has been strong representation from the west midlands in today’s debate, and Members representing constituencies in that area have put their case well. The Conservative party was welcomed by chief constable Chris Sims in October when he organised the security for our conference, and we were very impressed with the service we received.

May I first tackle two propositions put forward by Labour Members? The first is that morale in the police is plummeting and that this settlement will lead to a worse service being provided by them. That is not my experience; I am consistently struck by the professionalism of officers in Kent and elsewhere in the country where I meet police officers. In Kent, we have been planning for many months for these grant reductions. The work that has been done and the engagement of every different area of Kent police in finding substantial savings has been extraordinarily impressive. I have not detected any reduction in morale. Officers and staff appreciate that there has been a very serious recession across the country and in the private sector, where many people have lost their jobs, had pay freezes or had severe pay cuts, and that the police family have come through that period very well. In addition, this Government kept to the third year of the pay review that had been agreed, and I know that that was greatly appreciated in many quarters.

The second proposition relates to the debate about police numbers and the level of crime. I heard the interview that the Minister for Policing and Criminal Justice gave on Radio 4, in which he made perfectly sensible remarks, and I do not understand the excitement of Labour Members about this issue. The hon. Member for Walsall North (Mr Winnick) said that the number of West Midlands police officers had increased from 7,135 in 1996 to 8,536 this year. The level of crime did decrease over that period, certainly according to the British crime survey, which Labour Members particularly like to cite. What the hon. Gentleman did not say is that nationally quite a reduction in police numbers took place during part of that period—until about 2002-03—and thereafter those numbers rose. According to the British crime survey, there was a consistent reduction in the level of crime throughout the period—that started in 1994, as we heard from Labour Members yesterday. That does not correlate with the trend in police numbers over that period, so there is no simple link and it is very difficult to show such a correlation statistically.

What I know from my constituency is that police officers, effectively placed and doing the right thing, can make an enormous difference. For example, we introduced neighbourhood task teams to support neighbourhood policing. Medway has had two teams, comprising a sergeant and five or six constables, which support the neighbourhood policing teams, concentrating on particularly difficult high-crime areas. One huge success has been that, through working with other agencies, they have almost eradicated street prostitution in Chatham, which has been a problem for centuries. This is about working with other agencies. A particular team has helped bring about that success, but overall it is not possible to demonstrate a direct or simple relationship between police numbers and crime, and we need to recognise that.

Decisions on police numbers should be taken by local communities. The single most important change that we are about to see in policing is that, for the first time, this will not be about the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe) suggesting that the Home Office commission research to decide what to do, or even about this House debating what we want police numbers to be and where we want them to be; this will be a decision for each local community to take, through the commissioner who they elect to oversee and organise their police force locally. That will be a hugely healthy change from the current situation.

I have always found, both as a councillor and as a member of a police authority—and in this House, to an extent—that democratic oversight is one of the key drivers of value for money in public services. This is about scrutinising what the employees, the officers and the people delivering the service are doing and ensuring that they are delivering value for money for the taxpayer. I am not convinced that the same savings have been made in national Government as have been made in areas where there is more direct democratic oversight: in local government and, to an extent, in police authorities. If each Department were to report to the relevant Select Committee and the permanent secretary were to put his budget before that Committee for approval and discussion, item by item, that would help us to find savings.

The Government have set out a strong savings programme, but what I see when I participate in the budget review group and the audit and finance committee of our police authority in Kent is that members of the authority, a majority of whom are elected—it is the elected members who must pass the police precept every year—subject the police officers to an enormous degree of scrutiny. Through that process we have made much more substantial savings than we have been ordered to find by the centre. When we examine the reductions in police grant that are coming, the decision will be taken locally as to what the level of precept will be.

Kent’s new chief constable, whom we brought in from Norfolk, where he had been deputy chief constable and had done fantastic work in improving public confidence, making significant savings and restructuring the force, said that he sees these grant reductions as an opportunity to deliver a more efficient and effective force. [Interruption.] Some hon. Members say that he has no choice, but very often when the money is increased by year and there is not the great pressure to find savings and be efficient, it is human nature for people occasionally not to act as efficiently as they might. Perhaps more people are employed in a particular area or perhaps the focus is on something that needed to be done some years ago when things have moved on and it is not necessarily the priority it once was. It is by finding such savings and having proper democratic oversight of that process that we should be able to make our policing more efficient and effective.

[Jack Dromey]

The constant quest for efficiency and effectiveness is common ground between us, but what has the hon. Gentleman got to say to the people of the west midlands who are led by a chief constable who is the national champion on bureaucracy and they have a police service that has already made very significant changes to promote efficiency and effectiveness, but it now says that because of the scale and speed of what it is being asked to do, there will be significant cuts to front-line policing and some of the best, long-serving officers in the police service will be compulsorily retired?

[Mark Reckless]

Having a national champion on bureaucracy in the way that it has been organised by the Association of Chief Police Officers, which is an organisation that does not entirely respond to this House and has little if any statutory basis, is not the way to tackle bureaucracy. We have had far more success in finding savings in Kent by having a majority of elected members who sit down with the officers who spend the money.

[Keith Vaz]

The hon. Gentleman rightly says that the work is best done locally, and he showed me the good work being done in Kent when I went to visit his constituency, but there is a need to share good practice. What I saw in Rochester and Strood ought to be rolled out in other parts of the country. So even though the savings are made locally, there needs to a mechanism—it could be the Home Office or this could be done through Jan Berry—that will make sure that other police authorities can follow what Kent is doing.

[Mark Reckless]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman, the Chair of our Home Affairs Committee, for his comments. He has kindly arranged to use our website to promote some of that good practice, such as the safe exit scheme and our offender management unit, in which we are working closely with probation and other agencies. There is enormous scope for savings through such collaboration.

I do not understand why most forces in the country are not making significant savings through collaboration. I know that Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire have quite a strong programme, but I have not seen any other forces that have anything like the level of collaboration or are making the savings that have been delivered in Kent and Essex. That might be because the forces and counties of Kent and Essex are of a similar size and there might not be the sensitivities about one force being perceived to be taking the lead. It might also be because the personalities and individuals involved are particularly committed to the process. We now have, however, one single directorate to deal with all organised, serious and major crime. A substantial number of police officers have been transferred from each force into a joint directorate that reports to a single assistant chief constable. We have a single director of IT and we procure all our services through a joint procurement centre, and I do not understand why other forces have not taken the opportunity to find savings so that they can reinvest them in the front line. It is happening to an extent, but collaboration elsewhere has been very disappointing.

I am speaking about collaboration not just between forces but between different agencies, such as working with councils—a point we heard about from my hon. Friend the Member for Gillingham and Rainham (Rehman Chishti). In Medway we have a basic command unit that is coterminous with the unitary council. That might have assisted us, but it is by working as a team and focusing the resources on the areas where the public want to see them used that we have managed to find savings, to cut crime and to improve confidence at the same time.

Although the process is different in policing from elsewhere in the public sector, there will be the introduction of directly elected police commissioners alongside the front-loading of the reductions, the potential pay freezes for two years and the review of terms of conditions—and I greatly welcome the work that Tom Winsor is doing. I made the point in my ten-minute rule Bill about the importance of police forces’ being able to make a rational decision about how many officers, PCSOs and other civilians they need—that issue has also been mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Amber Valley (Nigel Mills) and the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak—and it is essential that forces should have the freedom to make that decision. I am delighted that Tom Winsor is working so hard on that and we look forward to his interim report in February. We must knit together the democratic control and the greater efficiency through collaboration, as well have as a sensible review of terms and conditions while recognising how much the police do and what they do to serve this country and our communities. These estimates and the proposals for directly elected police commissioners are the way forward. They will lead to a revolution in policing in our country that will put the public in charge. It is possible for that to happen even in the tightened financial environment in which we find ourselves.

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[Graham Evans]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point and I agree with him, but the situation varies from force to force. The leadership and management of individual forces are important; best practice has been mentioned in that regard. Cheshire constabulary has invested a lot of time in special constables because the force is relatively small, and I respectfully suggest that other forces—I am not thinking of any particular force, but perhaps the metropolitan and larger forces—could learn a thing or two about recruiting specials.

The hon. Gentleman says that the officer in charge of his constabulary is never sure how many specials will be on duty at a certain time, but this comes down to leadership and management. The senior officers in my constituency know exactly how many special constables will be there on the all-important Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, which is when additional help is strongly appreciated. I have spoken to special constables who have ambitions to become regular policemen. They work during the day and volunteer their time in the evenings, including Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I do not say that they could be a long-term replacement, but merely point out that in the short term I do not accept what I hear chief constables say about front-line cuts in officers. There are creative ways in which specials can be used as a solution in the short term, rather than talking about headline cuts.

PCSOs also play an important role and really involve themselves in the community. I have heard worrying stories about many PCSOs being lost across the country, but they can be paid for through local precepting in town and parish councils. I also find that moneys are held in town and parish council accounts for emergencies. I encourage all chief constables and senior officers to look around their communities to see whether any funds have been siphoned or hidden away for a rainy day. I get very concerned when I hear about those vital officers being made redundant, because I do not accept that it is necessary, especially in the short term.

When I went out on Friday night and in Runcorn previously, I was struck by the fact that Cheshire force sends its police out singly. They go out on their own but have significant and efficient back-up available at a moment’s notice, which means that there are many police officers on public view. Earlier, I heard it said that 11% of officers are available at any one time, but in Cheshire a significant number of officers are out on the beat working on their own, and support is there for them very quickly if need be.

Cutting the amount of police time spent on paperwork has not really been mentioned. A previous Prime Minister talked about being tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime. One thing that we could do as a society and as a country is to tackle the abuse of alcohol. Virtually every call on Friday evening involved people who were badly intoxicated and reliant on alcohol. They had lost structure in their lives and it was quite pitiful to be called to the streets or their homes to assist them.

I cannot help feeling that local authorities that grant long, late-night licences to clubs in town centres and elsewhere, enabling alcohol to be served at 2 and 3 o’clock in the morning, put huge pressures on police authorities and forces. Things might be relatively quiet until 11 o’clock at night, but at 2 o’clock in the morning there is mayhem on the streets with intoxicated people brawling. On Friday night—I was told that it was a relatively quiet night—PC Frost was out in force but there were still several arrests of people fighting in the streets of Northwich. Local authorities have a big role to play and they need to communicate better with the police regarding recommendations on late licensing.

[Mark Reckless]

My hon. Friend refers to PC Frost and the need for other agencies to work with the police as appropriate. Is he aware of an incident in Kent in which the police control centre received a call—this has been publicised—from a woman asking the police to come out because someone had stolen the snowman she had built in her front garden?

[Graham Evans]

Yes, we were laughing about that on Friday night. The Kent accents were particularly distinct and we had a laugh about it. There are still plenty of snowmen in Cheshire—at least there were when I left on Monday. [Interruption.] Snow joke indeed.

Local authorities will grant late night licensing to pubs and clubs on the one hand, but on the other they are particularly restrictive regarding new businesses. In my area, a new application has been submitted for a restaurant bar in a particularly pleasant location, but because it is a continental-style restaurant—it has no taps on the bar and serves continental lagers and wine by the glass—the local authority restricts its licence. People have to drink up by 8 o’clock and the doors have to be closed, which makes the business unviable. We need to look at our licensing laws and help the police do what they are supposed to do, which is to protect us from violent criminals.

To sum up, police forces do not have to cut front-line policing but should utilise the special constabulary. If people want to become police officers, there is no better way of showing commitment than by volunteering their time and serving their community in the current difficult economic climate.

--- Later in debate ---

[Vernon Coaker]

The Minister will hide behind local precepting and councils raising money to make up some of the gap, but that is smoke and mirrors—a sleight of hand. There is a 20% reduction in central Government funding to police forces across the country. That goes beyond the HMIC recommendation. Hon. Members must understand that although some money can be saved through efficiency, that amount cannot be saved without impacting on the front line.

[Mark Reckless]

rose—

[Vernon Coaker]

I will give way after I finish this point. The Home Secretary failed to fight the police’s corner in the spending review negotiations, so it falls to Parliament to stand up for the law-abiding public against these reckless cuts.

[Mark Reckless]

Does the hon. Gentleman not recognise that the difference between 20% and 12% that he describes makes no allowance for savings from things such as a pay freeze and changes in terms and conditions?

[Vernon Coaker]

I am quoting the Green Book and the HMIC report. We will see over the next one, two, three and four years whether the hon. Gentleman is right in the statistics that he has quoted from this book—that saving and this saving. We will see whether what he says stands up in police forces in Kent, Nottinghamshire, the west midlands and elsewhere across England and Wales, or whether we will see massive losses of police officers, police community support officers and police staff. Then we will see who has understood the statistics and figures correctly, and who is actually right. I will have a side wager with the hon. Gentleman, and it will not be me who is out of pocket, but him.

I repeat the call that has been made to the Home Secretary and other Ministers to go back and say to the Treasury that the police spending settlement is not acceptable, that it must be reopened and improved. Will the Minister give us that commitment in discussing the estimates for 2011-12, or does he just intend to carry on with the settlement as it stands? As the hon. Member for Hexham said, choices are available to the Government. The Minister can try to argue for a better deal, like those for schools, hospitals and the Ministry of Defence. The big casualty in the comprehensive spending review was the Home Office, and therefore the police service and police forces of this country. I know that the Minister says that there is no link between levels of crime and police numbers, but that is not what the public say.

Let us look at some examples. The hon. Member for South Dorset is already getting cold feet about reductions in police officer numbers in his area, and he will not be the only one. Hon. Members will have to go back and say that things will be tough. There will be police officer cuts across the country: Greater Manchester police have announced a cut of 1,387 officers and 1,557 staff; North Wales police have announced that 440 posts will be cut, made up of 230 police officers and 210 staff; Northumbria police have announced a cut of 450 civilian staff; Thames Valley police have announced 800 staff cuts, but there is no breakdown between police officers and police staff; and West Midlands police have announced a cut of 2,200 posts, made up of 1,100 police officers and 1,100 staff.

Whatever the book says, and whatever Government Members say, I am willing to go to each and every one of their constituencies and ask the public whether they want fewer police officers or more police officers on their streets. I will ask them whether they believe that the Government should have prioritised police spending more in the Budget so that police officer posts, police staff and PCSOs could have been protected, or whether they were a price worth paying.

A few months into this new Tory-led Government, I believe that people will be astonished that police recruitment has been frozen, thousands of police officer posts are to be lost and experienced police officers will be forced to retire, including in my own area of Nottinghamshire.