Policing (England and Wales)

Sheryll Murray Excerpts

Wednesday 10th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con) [V]]

I thank the police for all they do, in particular the way in which they have policed the pandemic in this very challenging time. I thank the Government for their investment in the police force and, in particular, their commitment to increase the number of officers, which has meant nearly 300 additional officers in Devon and Cornwall so far, on top of the local growth numbers funded by our council tax payers. I understand that this additional resource has helped morale in our local force, which is incredibly important to our communities.

In my own police area, our excellent police and crime commissioner, Alison Hernandez, piloted an allowance for our hard-working special constables, who did a set amount of hours over the winter months. Will the Department work with her and the chief constable, look at that pilot and explore options to enable police forces to develop a special constabulary as a paid reserve, in the same way as Army reserves provide additional resources at times of need? This could be particularly useful to Cornwall when we have peak needs, as we do in the summer, when we will, I hope, again have an influx of tourists.

My second request is for the force to be able to do home-based lateral flow Covid testing of officers. It is essential that officers, who work shifts and often come into close contact with people through their job, have the ability to test close at hand. I ask the Department to look at that as a matter of urgency.