Pauline Latham
Main Page: Pauline Latham (Conservative - Mid Derbyshire)Department Debates - View all Pauline Latham's debates with the Home Office
(6 years, 8 months ago)
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Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)
I commend the speech by my right hon. Friend the Minister for Policing and the Fire Service, who spoke with a lot of sense and compassion about policing. He recognises that if we had countless amounts of money, we would love to spend a lot more, but that we need to be careful about how we spend money, because it is not our money; it is the people’s money—taxpayers’ money.
I associate myself with the remarks that everybody has made about the fantastic work that police forces do on our behalf. The police often run towards danger, when our natural instinct is to run away from it. Sometimes, as we have seen here in Parliament, people lose their lives looking after the people they are paid to protect. No one can fail to be very grateful for the work that they do at all times on our behalf.
Ruth George
The hon. Lady represents a constituency in Derbyshire, as do I. Is she not concerned, as I am, that police in Derbyshire tell me that they are being put in more danger because of the cuts? There are 411 fewer officers, so police officers have to respond to dangerous incidents on their own, putting them in even more danger than they should be in.
Mrs Latham
I thank the hon. Lady for that comment. I will talk a lot about Derbyshire. I recognise that she came into the House recently, but the number of police officers is broadly similar to what we have had for some time.
When Members of Parliament met the police and crime commissioner, Councillor Hardyal Dhindsa, recently, he was not able to tell us how he would spend more money if he got it, he could not tell us what his budget covered and he was not able to give us any facts whatsoever. We have looked at his budget, and he is not as desperate for funding as he claims.
Interestingly, the police and crime commissioner spends a lot of his time going around parish councils in Derbyshire, frightening the life out of parish councillors, who do their very best for the people they represent, often with no political affiliation—certainly in my area. He is telling them that there are cuts, so he cannot do this and he cannot do that. He has got rid of most of the police in the rural areas I represent. The parish councillors are really worried about the future when they do not need to be. Yes, he has closed police stations and reduced services in much of my area, but the area that he represents as a councillor does not have to face any cuts. He should look much more at how he can spend the money more efficiently and effectively, because in Derbyshire, as in most places, the majority of the funding comes from the Government grant and the rest comes from council tax.
The police in Derbyshire are having to do many more things than they used to do, particularly in respect of domestic violence, rape and modern slavery in particular, which there has been a lot of in Derbyshire. There has also been grooming of young girls. With Operation Retriever, it was the first place in the country where it was found that young men were grooming girls and trafficking them. We have prosecuted many people successfully for that.
Since 2011, Derbyshire police have put significant amounts of money into their reserves. Between 2010 and 2016, during the so-called austerity period, the reserves increased by 60%, yet the number of police officers went down by more than 18%. Those numbers are now going up—the police are recruiting as we speak. The police and crime commissioner justifies the need for more money by saying that he faces cuts.
Eddie Hughes
I make no comment other than to say that my understanding is that in the west midlands, the police and crime commissioner has reserves of more than £100 million.
Mrs Latham
My hon. Friend makes a valid point. Why do police and crime commissioners need these enormous reserves when they talk about cuts all the time?
Mrs Latham
No, I will not.
Derbyshire was the only force nationally not to sign up for the outsourcing of back-office services, a measure that was proposed to increase efficiency and make savings during this so-called period of austerity. Clearly, that is a logical way to save money by being much more efficient. Similar-sized forces in Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire, which surround Derbyshire, have smaller reserves than Derbyshire.
Derbyshire police were saving up money to spend some of it—only some of it—on a new fire and police headquarters, which was desperately needed, but that was not all the money they kept. I was very interested to see that Essex has a police, fire and crime commissioner—the first in the country. I might recommend that if I thought it would be good for Derbyshire, but with the current incumbent, it certainly would not be good for Derbyshire because he would not know where his budget was.
The police and crime commissioner for Derbyshire clearly does not want to increase efficiency and make savings. It is clearly an ideological decision by this left-wing police and crime commissioner who does not want to change anything, because he wants to blame it all on the Conservative Government. There are lots of examples of waste: in the last budget, he proposed extra expenditure provisions—much more spending than has ever been spent before—on hotels and conferences. Now, why would that be when he says he cannot afford police officers?
Mrs Latham
No, I will not give way. I have limited time. I am sorry.
It is clearly better to have better budgeting, which he needs to be implementing considering the income generated by Derbyshire police through such methods as vehicle maintenance and property leasing. I find it concerning that between 2014-15 and 2015-16 catering expenses have doubled. That money could have been spent on police officers, who we need for the additional crimes they need to investigate, such as cyber-crime and the pornography that is being generated and people are watching in Derbyshire.
The Derbyshire police need to spend money on their IT systems, which are very out of date, and they need to look at the terrible situation, faced by all areas of the country, of trying to keep tabs on the perpetrators of terrorism. We have had them in Derby. We have had terrorist suspects, shootings and all sorts of things over many years. The police and crime commissioner needs to look at how he can focus his efforts on proper policing, giving value for money for the people of Derbyshire and providing a much better service.