Policing

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hurd]

I thank my hon. Friend. As a fellow London MP, I join him, as I am sure will all London Members, in congratulating Met police officers on the work they do. He singled out the implications of this settlement for the London Met, which is rightly the best-resourced police force in the country in terms of numbers of police officers and funding per head.

My hon. Friend is right about his fundamental point, and it is one that the Labour party refuses to embrace. We operate a system in which accountability for police forces is devolved and rests with the police and crime commissioner or the Mayor. In London, that means the Mayor, and I would gently suggest to the Mayor that the combination of this increased investment, the reserves and the opportunities for greater efficiency means that what we need to see from him is action rather than more letters calling for more money.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

I would just ask the Policing Minister to confirm that a flat-cash grant to local police forces in fact means a real cut, given the level of inflation; that the money from central Government to police forces will be cut in real terms; and that while the counter-terror funding is welcome, the police chief Sara Thornton has warned:

“Fewer officers and police community support officers will cut off the intelligence that is so crucial to preventing attacks.”

I gently say to him that I am sure he must know in his heart of hearts that this is really not enough funding for police forces across the country, given the immense pressures they face. He and the Home Secretary will really need to make a much better case to the Chancellor; otherwise, they will be threatening the good work of police forces right across the country.

[Mr Hurd]

I hesitate to correct our very distinguished Chairman of the Select Committee—for whom I have great respect—and I welcome the welcome she has given to increased investment in counter-terrorism policing, but I do need to correct what she said. Once she has time to get into the details of the settlement, she will see that, in effect, we propose to move from flat cash at local police force area level to flat real, on Treasury assumptions. That is a significant shift. When she gets into the detail of it, she will see—[Interruption.] No, I am afraid that the cries from Opposition Front-Bench Members reflect the fact that they have not had time to read the statement or to understand the dynamics of the police funding settlement.

The right hon. Lady will know, or should know, that, in the context of the 2015 police funding settlement, there are two components to flat cash at local police level: one is the grant from the centre, and the other is the precept. In the context of increased precept, the cash from the centre would have fallen. It is not going to fall; it is going to be held flat. That means that, in terms of what police and crime commissioners would have expected for 2018-19, there is a £60 million upflip from keeping the grant from the centre flat, rather than reducing it, which is what would have happened under the 2015 settlement. It is complicated, but the right hon. Lady will see from the—[Interruption.] That is not being disingenuous; these are the facts.