Tories propose elected police commissioners
Local communities would be able to vote for their own police commissioner under Conservative plans announced today.
Tory leader Michael Howard said the scheme was not meant to supersede the job of a chief constable but would replace “inconspicuous” police authorities.
He told an audience in Manchester that the Conservative plans would make police accountable to local people who would then be able to influence the type of policing and police priorities in their area and hold the chief constable to account.
The Conservatives envisage that the directly-elected commissioner would take on the same responsibilities as the current police authorities, namely approving an annual budget, producing yearly and three-yearly plans with the chief constable, and appointing the chief constable and his deputies.
This would apply to all police forces, other than the Metropolitan Police. The Metropolitan Police Authority’s powers would be assumed by the Mayor of London, and the Home Secretary would continue to appoint the Metropolitan Police Commissioner.
Mr Howard said his approach to policing was “tough and no nonsense: more police – less paperwork and political correctness; drug rehab for youngsters – and tougher sentences for career burglars and drug dealers; an end to early release from prison; and criminals to serve their sentences in full.”
He reiterated his pledge to put more police on the streets and said he would “cut away at the paperwork which keeps the police chained to their desks. That politically correct form the police have to fill in every time they stop someone will go in the appropriate filing tray – the bin.”
The Conservative leader said that currently police were “accountable to the wrong people: quangos and bureaucrats – not to local communities.
“So we will replace them with directly-elected police commissioners – directly accountable to local people. Imagine the galvanising effect of a contest between two or three candidates for the job, each of whom published a manifesto to which local people could then hold them.
“I can already hear the cries of horror from the criminal justice establishment: ‘You can’t give ordinary people a say over law and order. What a terrible idea’. Well I trust people. I believe local people should have more power – after all they understand what is best for their local communities. I want them to have a say.”
Mark Oaten, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman said that the idea was “dangerous” and could “lead to all sorts of extreme groups being elected to run local policing.
“It could create conflict between chief constables and elected officials leading to a breakdown of effective community policing.”
He suggested that a better way to increase community control over policing would be for elected councillors to draw up a minimum policing guarantee with the chief constable.
And Home Office Minister Hazel Blears said that the Conservatives could not be trusted on their pledge to increase police numbers.
Mr Blears said: “Today’s claims about police numbers are being made without making clear how they would be paid for, other than through fantasy savings to the asylum system. At the same time the Tories are committed to cuts of £35 billion to public spending.”
She added: “Michael Howard’s record on police is one of broken promises and fewer officers. The Tories twice promised more police in the 1990s – yet while Mr Howard was Home Secretary, officer numbers fell by 1,132.”
