Police Funding

Nick Hurd Excerpts

Wednesday 28th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Policing and the Fire Service (Mr Nick Hurd)]

Let me start with some common ground. I echo the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Louise Haigh) in registering the profound respect and admiration of Government Members for the dedication, commitment and bravery of our police officers. She is quite right to remind us that in this last week alone we have taken the time to remember the sacrifice of PC Keith Palmer on the cobbles a few yards from here, as well as welcoming the discharge from hospital of Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey, and I am sure that we all want to wish the brave police officer in Manchester a speedy recovery from the injuries he incurred when confronting an individual armed with a sword. She was right to say that those are all powerful reminders of the dangers that our officers routinely face on our behalf every day in every force. Of course they deserve our thanks, but as I have said before, they deserve more than that. We have a responsibility to ensure that they have the right tools and resources to do the job properly.

I would welcome a proper debate on how we police modern Britain effectively in a digital age in which more and more crime takes place online, and at a time when at last we as a society have got better at turning over the stones and supporting the victims of crimes that have been hidden for far too long, including domestic violence, sexual abuse and modern slavery. I would welcome a proper debate at this time of accelerating change when we have to be sure that police officers are more representative of the communities they serve and have the modern equipment and skills—not least digital skills—to stay on top of change. Judging by this motion, however, we will not be having that debate today.

[Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)]

The Minister has rightly praised the bravery of our police forces in their working lives. Does he therefore agree that it is simply not fair to leave them overstretched, as is happening in my large rural constituency of High Peak, where the police have to fob off youths’ antisocial behaviour by claiming that help and support are on the way when they know that that is not the case? The thin blue line is being stretched far too thinly, and this is putting the police in even more danger.

[Mr Hurd]

The thin blue line is stretched, and the Government recognise that. That is why we have brought forward a funding settlement that will see at least £450 million of new investment in our police system next year, and that will see this country investing over £1 billion more in our police system than we did in 2015-16. That is a funding settlement that the hon. Lady voted against.

[Sir Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton) (LD)]

The Minister has just talked about £450 million. Does he agree with the view of Sir David Norgrove, the chair of the UK Statistics Authority, that the Prime Minister misled the public—

[Sir Edward Davey]

I said “the public”, and I am quoting the chair of the UK Statistics Authority, who said that the PM had misled the public over claims that there was an extra £450 million for the police in 2018-19.

[Mr Hurd]

I will come on to clarify the numbers in a way that I hope the right hon. Gentleman will welcome. As he knows from our debates on this subject, I have always made it clear that the police funding settlement is a combination of contributions from the central taxpayer and the local tax payer, and if we want more investment in policing, it is the taxpayer that pays. Also, the statisticians were quite clear in recognising that the complexities were getting over-complex in such things as tweets and PMQs.

[Toby Perkins]

Are not the rows of empty Benches behind the Minister the most powerful demonstration of the Conservative party’s failure on policing? I am told that the Conservative Whips have had to text Tory MPs to ask them to come in and make those Benches look a bit fuller. Is it not an embarrassment that the party that once prided itself on law and order now has so few people who are willing to come in and defend its record on policing?

[Mr Hurd]

This side of the House voted for a funding settlement that will see additional investment of at least £450 million in our policing system; the other side of the House voted against it. Having looked at the motion and having listened to the shadow Minister’s speech, I recognise that the serious debate we need to have about how we police modern Britain will not happen today. In fact, the motion on the Order Paper contains the now predictable Labour cocktail of shroud waving, smokescreens, disregard for truth and complexity and, as we heard in the response to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes), the complete evasion of any detail of its own policies, which is a complete abdication of responsible opposition.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Hurd]

I would be delighted to give way to a former police Minister.

[David Hanson]

Will the Minister confirm a few things for me? First, in May 2010, there were 21,000 more police officers on the beat than there are now. Secondly, the burden on the taxpayer was not as high. Thirdly, the level of crime was lower. Fourthly, during the five years of the coalition Government the Liberal Democrats—the right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Sir Edward Davey) just intervened—voted to cut police funding every time.

[Mr Hurd]

I am about to come on to the history before I get on to the future. Again, I find it disappointing that Labour’s approach to the complexity of modern policing and its highly complex challenges is, as usual, to look back. Labour Members want to take us back to 2010, as the right hon. Gentleman has just encouraged me to do. Yes, we have a smaller police system than we did in 2010. Why? Because the coalition Government had to take radical action to get on top of a reckless and unsustainable deficit. Against a background of falling crime and stable demand on the police, it was recognised, not least by the thoughtful former shadow Home Secretary, Andy Burnham, that there was considerable scope to improve the efficiency of the police.

In London—our biggest force—we have broadly the same number of police officers as we did in 2008, we have less recorded crime than in 2008, and the police operation is costing the taxpayer £700 million a year less than in 2008. In Labour language, that means savage Tory cuts. To the rest of the world, it is a more efficient police force. I believed the Metropolitan Police Commissioner—[Interruption.] Labour MPs do not like to hear this, but I believed the commissioner, the excellent Cressida Dick, when she said:

“I think we can make some further savings. I am confident that the Met at the end of my commissionership might be smaller but could be as effective, if not more effective, through amongst other things the use of technology and different ways of working.”

As we are encouraged to look back, rather than forward, I want to take this opportunity to congratulate the police leadership and police and crime commissioners on their impressive work over the past seven years to deliver a more efficient service. I also recognise the contribution that frontline officers and staff have made to that process.

[Mr Francois]

On the behalf of my constituents, I thank the Minister for allowing greater flexibility in the police precept. In Essex, our excellent police, crime and fire commissioner, Roger Hirst, has taken full advantage of the precept, so that we will now be reinforced by an extra 150 police officers, which will take the Essex constabulary back up to 3,000 police, and we warmly welcome them.

[Mr Hurd]

I thank my right hon. Friend and other Essex MPs for making representations on behalf of Essex, as other MPs across the House have done for their areas. The point that the shadow Minister deliberately missed is that PCCs asked for that additional flexibility, and she also ignored the fact that they received overwhelming approval when they went to the public and asked the question. It is hypocritical to accuse us of unfair taxation and of using council tax to fund local policing, as Labour is the party that doubled council tax when it was in power. I am not taking any lessons on preventive taxation from the Labour party.

[Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)]

Seventeen young people have been murdered in London since the start of this year, and there is a lack of community policing. We need local links with policing, and police officers should visit schools. What does the Minister have to say about that?

[Mr Hurd]

I completely share the hon. Lady’s concern and dismay about the rise of serious violent crime not just on the streets of London but elsewhere. I will come back to that.

As a London MP, I would point out that we have broadly the same number of police officers as we did in 2008-09, when we last saw a spike in knife crime. This is not just about policing or police numbers; it is about the political will to work together to bear down on the problem. We should look back at the success of the previous Mayor of London and his deputy, my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire (Kit Malthouse), in applying pressure on the problem to move from 28 or 29 deaths a year down to eight. That is eight too many, but there was real movement, which had nothing to do with the number of police officers—the number stayed the same. It was about strategy and political will.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

Is it not noticeable that the Opposition’s case is entirely predicated on the amount we spend and on the numbers, not on effectiveness and outcomes? My right hon. Friend will be pleased to know that, due to a combination of better procurement, smarter use of technology, using community psychiatric nurses embedded in police teams and raising extra funding from the precept, the Sussex police and crime commissioner will recruit an additional 200 police officers in each of the next four years. That is what we can do when we think smart, rather than just getting obsessed with the amount of money spent.

[Mr Hurd]

I could not agree more. We are in an environment in which resources are limited, which puts pressure on our system to innovate and work together in new ways. There is excellent leadership in Sussex from Katy Bourne, and I am delighted that we have enabled Sussex to increase the precept to do more and deliver what the people of Sussex want.

[Mr Francois]

Can we just nail the point about whether PCCs asked for this flexibility? Roger Hirst in Essex conducted a survey to ask people across the county whether they would be prepared to pay a little more in council tax in return for more police, and he received a resounding yes.

[Mr Hurd]

Yes, he did, and he was not alone. There has been overwhelming support wherever the question has been asked, which is why Roger Hirst and others are on record as supporting the settlement for providing additional funding for police forces in 2018-19. This debate is a complete red herring from the Labour party. If we want increased investment in our policing, it has to be paid for. There are only two ways of paying: either we increase borrowing and the taxpayer pays interest on that borrowing, or we increase taxation. The vast majority of funding for our police system still comes from the central taxpayer, and we felt it appropriate to ask whether people would be prepared to pay an additional 25p a week to support local policing. Not surprisingly, the overwhelming answer was yes.

[Stephen Twigg (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Minister accept that relying on council tax for increased police funding is fundamentally regressive? Surrey raises half the money locally and Merseyside gets 80% of its funding from central Government. An equivalent increase in council tax gets a lot more for Surrey than it does for Merseyside. It is fundamentally regressive.

[Mr Hurd]

I wish the hon. Gentleman had made that argument when he was a member of a Government who doubled council tax. He is right that there is a long-standing issue with variation in the amount of money that forces raise from precepts, which cannot be sorted in one settlement. That is why, to try to create more fairness across the system, this settlement is structured on the basis that PCCs could increase their precept by a number of pounds rather than by a percentage. Again, I make the point that Labour has created a straw man because, even with these changes, the reality is that around three quarters of funding for our police system still comes from the centre. Very little has changed.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

The Minister is right about the need for innovation. In Northamptonshire, we now have a senior fire officer effectively in charge of community policing, while a police officer and a fire officer share a patrol vehicle to go around rural areas. At an operational level, it is dovetailing very nicely in Northamptonshire, but we need the Minister to sign off the transfer of governance from the county council to the police and crime commissioner so we can square the circle.

[Mr Hurd]

I thank my hon. Friend, not least for his persistence in making that point. He points to Northamptonshire as a beacon of what efficient smart working and collaboration can deliver. I expect to have news on the fire governance issue shortly.

[Sir Edward Davey]

rose—

[Mr Hurd]

I have given way at least once to the right hon. Gentleman and I need to make some progress so that Back Benchers can participate in this debate.

So much for the past—we are not in 2010 now. Things have changed, not least the pattern of demand on the police, and when demand changes, so must we. Of course, as the Office for National Statistics—our independent national statisticians—makes clear, the most reliable indicator of crime trends in the UK is the national crime survey, and it shows very clearly, although Labour never mentions this, that the long-term trend of our constituents’ experience of traditional crime is down; it is down by almost 40% since 2010. That is the most reliable indicator of crime, according to our independent statisticians, and it shows a long-term of trend of our constituents’ experience of crime continuing to go down. We are talking about 10% year on year, and 40% since 2010. That is to be welcomed, because what is happening in crime needs to be understood. It is complicated, but this is where I take umbrage, because the Labour party is deliberately misrepresenting the situation as far as I can see. We should welcome the trend that the official ONS statistics show, which is that people’s experience of crime continues to fall—

[Sandy Martin]

rose—

[Mr Hurd]

Let me just finish this sentence. The Government are not remotely complacent about that or out of touch with what is happening on the ground. We are well aware that the terrorist risk has evolved and escalated. Since the serious and organised crime strategy was published in 2013, the serious and organised crime threat, which is often not visible to our constituents, has evolved rapidly. We have made significant progress, but we believe there is more we can do to generate a truly comprehensive response, which is why we will publish a new serious and organised crime strategy later this year. As has been mentioned, we are seeing a genuine increase in so-called “low volume, high impact” serious violent crime—there is no getting away from that—which is devastating in its impact. Everyone in the House will share a concern to get on top of that, and we fully intend to do so with the forthcoming launch of the serious violence strategy.

[Vicky Foxcroft]

Does the Minister know when the serious violence strategy will actually be published?

[Mr Hurd]

It is imminent—and that does mean imminent.

The hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley is right; there is absolutely no doubt that our police are busier than ever. We saw a spike in emergency calls last summer, which has tailed off a bit but did cause problems. Recorded crime has increased significantly. Recorded crime is obviously not the same as people’s experience of crime and it is not what the national crime survey is tracking; obviously, it tracks what the police record. So what is happening there? Again, it is important to be clear about that and to get independent assessment from our statisticians. These are independent statisticians, not me, making it clear that most of this growth is down to two factors. The first is that the police are getting better at recording crime. She registered that, and she will know that they have been criticised for poor performance on that in the past.

Secondly and crucially, and I hope the House will welcome this, we are getting more victims of hidden crime coming forward with allegations that need investigating. This matters enormously, because for far too long victims of domestic abuse, sexual abuse, rape and modern slavery have not stepped forward, in part because they did not trust the system. The Prime Minister, the former Home Secretary, deserves great credit for this, because she challenged the police to be better at safeguarding the vulnerable and going after hidden crime. When I go to Manchester and I speak to the lady who runs the modern slavery unit there, she shows me a graph detailing an alarming increase in the incidents it is investigating, but she is the first to point out, “Minister, this is not new crime. This has been going on for a very long time. We are just getting better at finding it and investigating.” That is the undercurrent of the shift in recorded crime and if that reflects better police practice and more public confidence in our police system, as we are told, surely that is welcome.

However, it is undeniable that the shift in demand and these investigations are taking the police into more complex and time-consuming work, and that does mean that our police are stretched, as evidenced by the recent Her Majesty’s inspectorate of constabulary and fire and rescue services PEEL report on effectiveness, which clearly indicated that a minority of forces are struggling to manage demand.

[Sandy Martin]

rose—

[Mr Hurd]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his patience and give way to him.

[Sandy Martin]

Does the Minister accept that although the crime survey tends to give a better representation of the crimes that are apparent to the people who take part in it, people who are involved in drug-related and gang-related crime are far less likely to take part in it, meaning that those sorts of crimes are not reflected so well in the survey?

[Mr Hurd]

The independent statisticians at the ONS say that the survey, which has run for many years across many thousands of households and been used by successive Labour and Conservative Governments as the most reliable indicator of crime trends, is just that: our most reliable indicator. It is not perfect, but it is our most reliable indicator. It would be quite wrong of me and Conservative Members not to point out, against all shroud waving and talk about soaring crime, that the clear data from the most reliable indicator of crime trends shows that crime is going down. Except—it is very important to say this—we are seeing a genuine increase in low-volume, very high-impact serious violent crime. We are determined to get on top of that.

[Sir Edward Davey]

That is the point on which I wanted the Minister to reflect earlier. He is quite right about the survey evidence and right about some of the increase in recorded crime being down to better reporting and new, more complex crime, but it is absolutely clear that some serious crimes—gun crime, knife crime and the like—are rising. The ONS statisticians are clear in their reports on the crime statistics that there is an increase. I hope the Minister will confirm that and say what he is going to do about it.

[Mr Hurd]

I have confirmed that. I acknowledged explicitly, on the record, that that is the one area in which there is clearly a genuine increase. Because the consequences are devastating and it is massively unsettling for people, it is absolutely a top priority for the Home Office and the Government to get on top of it. The action we are taking is in the serious violence strategy which, as I have said, is imminent.

The point I am trying to make is that the Government recognise that there has been a shift in the pattern of demand on the police. We have listened to concerns and responded accordingly, because this is not new. The Prime Minister, who was the previous Home Secretary, recognised that when from 2015, despite the public finances still being in a difficult situation, she led the decision to protect overall police budgets in real terms.

[Naz Shah]

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the death of Stephen Lawrence and 20 years since the launch of the Macpherson inquiry. When she was Home Secretary, the Prime Minister committed to there being a much more diverse workforce. The truth is that the Minister can pick and choose from the numbers that represent how crime is recorded, but he cannot pick and choose the numbers on the diversity of our police forces. What is he going to do to support the Jon Boutchers of this world who are leading on this agenda?

[Mr Hurd]

I could not agree more with the hon. Lady about the importance of that agenda. We police by consent, on the basis of trust. That gets harder if the police are seen to be less and less representative of the communities that they serve. It is a long-standing challenge and I completely agree on that. In fairness to the police, the numbers are the best they have been for a very long time, although they are nowhere near where they need to be, not least in terms of leadership role models. It is an issue not just of retention but of how officers are retained and managed through the system. Where the police are taking positive action—I have sat with the Greater Manchester police sergeant who has led the work—they have really moved the needle. If people apply themselves to this issue, what can be done is really impressive, and it is really not rocket science. I have sat next to the Home Secretary at a roundtable on exactly this subject, and our message to police chiefs is that we need to see much more action. The Greater Manchester chief is bringing a plan to the chiefs on exactly that, to find a gear change on the need to improve the diversity of our police force. It is hugely important to us and, assuming the plan is sensible, we will get right behind it. I thank the hon. Lady for raising that important point.

I was talking about the decision of the current Prime Minister to protect police budgets in real terms from 2015. It means that, in 2017-18, we are spending £12.6 billion of public money on our police system compared with £11.9 billion in 2016—an increase of £700 million. As this shift in demand continues, we have recognised the need to go further. Having done our own demand review—a process in which I spoke to, or visited, every police force in England and Wales—we brought to this House what we believe to be a comprehensive funding settlement for 2018-19 and, for the first time, set a direction of travel for 2019-20. In the debate on the settlement back in December, I made it very clear that the settlement, as always, is a combined contribution from the central taxpayer and the local tax payer. I also made it clear that final numbers depended on how police and crime commissioners responded to their new flexibility in relation to precept.

Following the statistical release from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government this morning, I can now confirm what the funding settlement will deliver in 2018-19, and this is based on now hard information on what PCCs will do. I can confirm that we will see an increase of £282 million in council tax precept funding for police forces next year, and a £460 million increase in total funding. We will publish further information on these revised figures shortly.

I hope that the whole House will welcome confirmation of the increase in funding on the assumptions that we made when the settlement went through Parliament—opposed by Labour. All forces will see their direct resource funding protected in real terms in 2018-19, including council tax precept—opposed by Labour. The proportion of forces’ direct resource funding—grant plus money raised through the precept—will increase slightly in 2018-19, compared with 2017-18. It will increase from 30% to 32%.

I hope that the House will welcome the plans put forward by most PCCs to use the additional precept income to protect or improve frontline policing. For example, we have heard about Essex and about Sussex, but in Kent, the PCC, Matt Scott, has empowered the chief constable to recruit around 200 new officers—the largest recruitment drive in the force for several years. In Nottinghamshire, the PCC aims to increase police officer numbers from 1,840 to around 2,000 over the next two years. In Avon and Somerset, the PCC will recruit 300 new police officers and strengthen neighbourhood policing.

Looking ahead to 2019-20, I indicated our willingness to allow PCCs to increase the precept by a similar amount, subject to progress on some efficiency and productivity milestones that we are agreeing with the police and the PCCs. Let me be clear about the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), because we never hear anything about productivity or efficiency from Labour—[Interruption.] No, we do not. We do not ever hear anything. After all these years of belt tightening and austerity, it is still agreed with the police chiefs that there is still at least an additional £100 million a year of inefficiencies on the table which could be saved through more intelligent procurement. After all this time, there are still those savings on the table, and we will continue to pursue them.

The motion mentions concerns about counter-terrorism funding, and we take those very seriously. The Minister for Security and Economic Crime will directly address them in his wind-up, but we are well aware that the threat that we face from terrorism is becoming more complex and more hidden. Funding for counter-terrorism policing has grown steadily since 2010, and the 2015 spending review and strategic defence and security review protected funding for CT policing until 2020-21.

This year, we have provided £28 million of new money to CT policing, going to forces across the country to meet costs relating to those attacks. Separately, we have also provided £9.8 million in special grant funding to cover the cost of the police response to the Manchester arena attack, and a further £7.6 million in special grant funding to London.

I can also confirm—I hope that the House will welcome it—that we have agreed £1.6 million in special grant funding for Wiltshire police this financial year, and further funding as its investigation continues. It is, of course, critical that we ensure that counter-terrorism policing has the resources needed to deal with the threat that we face. That is why, in 2018-19, the counter-terrorism policing budget will go up by 7%, increasing by £50 million of entirely new money to at least £757 million.

[David Hanson]

The Minister will recognise that armed police response units are critical. He will know that there were 6,906 armed police officers in 2010 and that, as of last March, there are now 6,278—a reduction of 628 or 9% overall. Will the Minister tell us whether that figure changed or moved in the past 12 months, and where does he see the restoration of armed policing?

[Mr Hurd]

Allow me to correct a misunderstanding. There is a separate additional funding commitment of £144 million to uplift our armed police capability. We are significantly increasing the number of specialist firearms officers. Once the uplift programme is complete, there will be around 7,000 armed officers—exceeding the number in 2010—in England and Wales who will be better trained and better equipped than ever before.

It is important that we talk about cyber-crime, not least because Labour Members do not, which is surprising because it is the fastest growing source of crime. It is quite clear that our constituents—the public—are increasingly much more likely to be exposed to crime through their computers than they are on the high street. It is a relatively new type of crime. Forces are learning how to better investigate these crimes and support the victims. There are lots of challenges, not least in aligning our local, regional and national capability, and that is why the national cyber-security strategy for 2016 to 2021 is supported by £1.9 billion of transformational investment. I could not begin to tell the House what Labour’s plans are to protect people from cyber-crime; I doubt Labour Members know.

We are living in a period of rapid change. Crime is changing, demand on police is changing, the police are changing and technology is changing everything very fast. But one thing is constant: the unconditional commitment of a Conservative Government to public safety, and upholding law and order. Labour voted against a police settlement that will see an additional £460 million of public investment in our police system next year, including a significant uplift in the counter-terrorism budget. It will mean that this country will be investing £13 billion of public money in our police system next year, which is an increase of over £1 billion on 2015-16. That is a big number. Here is an even bigger number: £55 billion. That is what the Office for Budget Responsibility predicts the country will spend on paying interest on our national debt—debt that was racked up by Labour.

Despite the constraints, we continue to invest to support the police and to work closely with them, including on the serious violence strategy, and on the development of mobile working to transform the productivity of police officers and give them more time on the frontline. We are developing a national wellbeing programme to support frontline officers, and working with the police to develop a long-term vision of what digital technology can do for British policing. All this is to ensure that we do everything we can so that Britain continues to have a modern police force that is on top of change, not chasing it, and that is fit for the challenges of the 21st century.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Before I call the spokesman for the Scottish National party, it will be obvious to the House that a great many people wish to speak and that there is limited time available. Therefore, there will be a time limit of six minutes after the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) has spoken. I give this warning in order that hon. Members who wish to catch my eye can tailor their remarks accordingly.