First police commissioner elections to be held in May 2012, says Home Secretary
Elections for the new breed of police and crime commissioners could take place as early as May 2012 under plans announced by the Home Office.
In a consultation paper Policing in the 21st Century: Reconnecting Police and the People, the Home Office also set out proposals for:
- A new National Crime Agency – replacing the Serious Organised Crime Agency – to “lead the fight against organised crime and strengthen our border security”
- Greater collaboration between police forces
- Phasing out the National Policing Improvement Agency
- Cutting bureaucracy, introducing a “common sense” approach to health and safety procedures, and freeing up officers’ time
- Providing a clear role “for everyone, including members of the public, in cutting crime through beat meetings, neigbourhood watch schemes and voluntary groups”.
The Home Office claimed that the measures would make the police service in England and Wales “more accountable to the public and responsive to local people, more focused at a national level and more effective at tackling crime, as well as providing better value for money”.
The government said that the introduction of directly elected commissioners would also be accompanied by more opportunities for citizens to “volunteer with the police service, and within the wider criminal justice system”.
Police authorities – which are criticised as being “too invisible” to the public – will be abolished to make way for police and crime commissioners. “For the first time ever the public will be able to directly vote for an individual to represent their community’s policing needs,” the consultation paper said.
More information will also be published to help the public know what is happening in their area and “hold the police to account with accurate and timely information about crime, anti-social behaviour and value for money in their neighbourhood”.
The consultation paper said “the deal” for the police was a removal of micro-management by central government in return for much greater responsiveness to and engagement with the public.
Police and crime commissioners will have five key roles: representing and engaging with all those who live and work in the communities in their force area and identifying their policing needs; setting priorities that meet those needs by agreeing a local strategic plan for the force; holding the chief constable to account for achieving these priorities; setting the force budget and the precept; and appointing and, where necessary, removing the chief constable.
They will be able to appoint and lead their own team, and the government said it would not prescribe the arrangements that need to be made. Commissioners will be elected to a four-year fixed term.
The government nevertheless insisted that it would “absolutely” protect the police’s operational independence.
New police and crime panels will be established in each force area, drawn from locally elected councillors and independent and lay members. The role of these panels is to test the decisions of the police and crime commissioners, not the force, and to advise commissioners on their plans and budgets.
The panels will be able to make any concerns public, summon the commissioner to a public hearing and hold confirmation hearings for the chief constable’s post.
Prime Minister David Cameron said: “By replacing invisible police authorities with directly elected police and crime commissioners, we can forge a direct link between the police and the public, ensuring that the public have a voice in setting police priorities and have the power to hold the police to account for keeping our streets safe and secure.”
Home Secretary Theresa May added: “For too long, people have been faced with crime levels that are too high and a police service that has been focused on Whitehall targets to really get to grips with what matters locally.”
Police and crime commissioners will be expected to play a key role in making greater collaboration between forces happen “across a range of operational and back office support functions for which it is neither sensible nor affordable to adopt 43 different approaches”, the paper said.
Cllr Richard Kemp, Vice Chair of the Local Government Association, said local government had long campaigned for a shift of police accountability to the public and away from Whitehall.
But he added: "This paper does not delve deep enough into the government’s proposal of directly elected individuals. In difficult financial circumstances, we have to ask if this is the right time to change structures through additional elections, which could cost the same as 700 police officers.
“If the police are to be truly held to account at local level, then councils must be at the heart of any new system. Councils already have democratically elected councillors overseeing community safety, each of whom are scrutinised and held to account by that authority.”
Reintegrating police oversight into council structures would be the most cost effective solution, Kemp added, and would require minimal legislative changes.
The government said that many of the proposals would feature in the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill, which will be published in the autumn.
The public consultation will run until 20 September.
