Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Monday 6th June 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

My Lords, Clause 55 allows a police area returning officer and local returning officers for elections of police and crime commissioners to recover charges for services rendered or expenses incurred for the efficient and effective conduct of elections. The provisions on expenditure are modelled closely on those for the European parliamentary elections, where there are returning elections for the overall region and local returning officers. Regulation 15 of the European Parliamentary Elections Regulations 2004 sets out similar provisions to those in the Bill. Expense accounts may always be independently assessed by a court on an application made under Clause 56. Therefore, I suggest that Amendments 193 and 194 are unnecessary and ask that they not be pressed.

Amendment 194A, tabled by the noble Lords, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, Lord, Lord Rosser, and Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, would set a minimum turnout for PCC elections. We have had several discussions on this in other legislation. We do not impose minimum turnouts for other elections. I reject the proposal to single out the election of police and crime commissioners.

My noble friend Lord Shipley asked about the voting system and made the case for AV. I am grateful to my former colleague, the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, for his point about the dangers of AV. I will not go through that all again tonight. We have recently had a referendum on AV. We have probably almost exhausted the subject. In the context of the Bill, the supplementary vote system is tried and tested in the United Kingdom. It is simpler and easier for electors to understand than the alternative vote system and it is easier to count the votes. The supplementary vote system is being used as it is most consistent with the position of elected mayors and is deemed appropriate for election to a single executive position that is not part of a body such as a committee or a Parliament.

Amendments 201 and 199A would amend Clause 58. They seek to ensure that any provisions made by order are necessary and relevant only to the election of police and crime commissioners. As this clause enables the Home Secretary by affirmative resolution procedure to make provision about the conduct of police and crime commissioner elections, all provisions will require approval from both Houses of Parliament. In any event, Clause 58(1) expressly provides that such an order may make provision only as to the conduct of elections or the questioning of such elections, so the order-making power is necessarily already limited.

Amendment 201A in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, Lord Rosser and Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, would place a duty on the Home Secretary to consult the Electoral Commission. However, this is already a requirement under Schedule 10. Noble Lords have mentioned comments from the Electoral Commission. I should perhaps mention that until I took on this post as a Minister I was a member of the Electoral Commission. I am bound by confidentiality clauses not to disclose matters that I learnt while I was a member of the commission, but I can tell noble Lords that the Government have worked, and continue to work, closely with the Electoral Commission, the Association of Electoral Administrators, the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers and other bodies on the organisation of elections. We were particularly asked about the intergovernmental group which is addressing what effect the plethora of elections might have on the practicalities and their impact on the people who are required to hold elections. The group met last week and is currently considering the plans for co-ordinating returning officers and local returning officers, and they are being consulted on the options. The group intends to meet once a month. Therefore, I assure noble Lords that this work is in hand and under way.

Amendment 200A would prevent any of the existing electoral criminal offences being made in secondary legislation applying to PCC elections. I assure your Lordships that these provisions are vital to ensure propriety in elections and we take them very seriously.

The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, mentioned donations and expenses. The Government intend to bring forward amendments to put much of this regulation into the Bill before it completes its passage through the two Houses. We have worked in consultation with the Electoral Commission in drafting the provisions, and I assure the noble Lord that we shall look to draw on the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000 to ensure that there is propriety in the way that such elections are conducted.

Amendment 190A to Clause 52 would prevent a person serving a prison sentence on remand voting in PCC elections. I assure your Lordships that, as the Bill is currently drafted, convicted persons serving a prison sentence are unable to vote, as with local government elections.

Clause 66 prevents a serving police officer and other people who work in the policing field standing as a police and crime commissioner. Amendment 216 would include within the definition of “member of staff” in this context any person who provided services for another person under their direction and control. The provision covers employees, independent contractors and those seconded to work for the policing body by their usual employer where these people work under the direction and control of the relevant policing body. We consider that these are the types of workers who will be involved in the running of the policing body and who will need to be covered by the disqualification.

My noble friend Lady Harris raised the very important matter of transfers. I assure her that we are working closely with the Association of Police Authorities and the Association of Police Authority Chief Executives. The APA has already put the secondary transfer schemes to us, and I assure my noble friend that we are now considering them very carefully to try to seek a resolution to this matter. I confirm that we will commit to considering this matter further and therefore I ask her not to press her amendment.

On that basis, I ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

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[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I am very pleased to have the opportunity to set out our thinking on this matter. However, I would have thought that the noble Lord would make an excellent police and crime commissioner. I am disappointed that he is not looking in that direction.

As the noble Lord rightly said, in our discussion of Clause 68 my noble friend set out the Government's position that the role of the police and crime commissioner is a full-time job and is therefore incompatible with the holding of other full-time positions. As such, should a Member of the House of Commons wish to serve as a PCC they would have to stand down as a Member of Parliament. It is right, therefore, that similar provisions apply to this House.

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

My understanding is that membership of this House, as opposed to the House of Commons, is part-time and therefore fully compatible with any other part-time employment.

While I am on my feet, it might help the Minister if I add some other questions. When I became a Member of this House I was also chairing a committee for the Committee of the Regions of the European Union and for the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg. I was also a member of Lancashire County Council and leader of the Association of County Councils for England and Wales—but we will not go back to the Welsh issue for the moment. All that was deemed compatible.

I therefore do not understand why the Government are ruling out this particular area. A suspicious person—which of course I am not—would think that perhaps the Secretary of State does not want in the future, were the Government's proposals to go through, Members of your Lordships' House who know some of the problems that are happening in these new police arrangements coming back here and talking to the Minister about them. I beg the Government to think twice.

My recollection when I came into your Lordships' House was that Viscount Thurso wanted to renounce his title and become a Member of the House of Commons, which he did. Your Lordships then got a trifle snippy about people who had been Members of the House of Lords going into the Bishops' Bar, and some of us changed that rule. I am quite worried about this. I think that the Government are seeking to keep an arm's length from people. After all, I presume that as a Member of the House of Lords I will still be able to vote for the person who represents me. I have no intention of standing, but were someone else from Lancashire to stand, I would want to hear their views in here because, from my experience of Lancashire, I am sure that they would inform your Lordships in great detail with great knowledge and great assistance.

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[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, I cannot resist suggesting that it may be that the Government want the commissioners to be able to sleep—from the examples given, we were all rather short of it. Fortunately, this Chamber is quite helpful sometimes in that respect.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I am in awe of the multitasking skills of your Lordships’ House. I do not know when your Lordships manage to sleep. I must reiterate that the job is full time and not part time. However the role of a Member of your Lordships’ House is perceived by individuals inside or outside the House and whether it is regarded as a part-time or full-time requirement, the role of the police and crime commissioner is definitely full time in every sense of the word. In our debates on the amendments so far, we have discussed what a large role it is. We have had long discussions about whether the commissioners will get around their patch or have enough time for meetings with other bodies with which they will need to build cohesive relationships. Yes, they will, because it is a full-time job.

Perhaps I may explain the situation as far as your Lordships’ House is concerned. As I have said, if a Member of Parliament wishes to serve as a PCC, they would have to stand down as an MP. Given the role and the demands of the PCC, and the demanding job of an MP, there would be no way in which they could carry out both functions. It is right therefore that similar provisions apply to this House.

[Baroness Harris of Richmond]

My Lords—

[Baroness Browning]

I think that this is where I was stopped last time—I do hope to get beyond this.

[Baroness Harris of Richmond]

I beg my noble friend’s pardon but will she confirm that, if an MP decides that he or she wants to stand as a police and crime commissioner, they would have to resign before they decide that they want to stand?

[Baroness Browning]

Certainly, they would have to stand down at the point at which they put themselves forward for selection or they would have to give notice at that point. Once the period of the election for the police and crime commissioner begins, they could not have an interest in being a Member of Parliament. The point is that there simply is not time to do both demanding jobs. This is not about what other people do, how other people take on public appointments or how they perceive the time factors. The fact is that the role of the PCC is full time.

I should correct something that I have just said. Apparently, an MP would not have to resign and trigger the by-election until elected. If they were an unsuccessful candidate, they would not have to trigger a by-election. I apologise to your Lordships’ House. In a way, that is almost digressing from the point that I hope I will be able to make between now and 3 o’clock in the morning.

[Lord Beecham]

Some of us are anxious that matters should not proceed for very much longer but for just a little longer. Perhaps the Minister, who is obviously adept at multitasking, could consider the implications of the Localism Bill, on which we are to embark tomorrow, and particularly the position of elected mayors. Is it the Government’s view—perhaps the Minister will need to take advice on this—that elected mayors should be full time? Surely it would be her view, and that of the Government, that the position of elected mayors in the 12 authorities that might confirm the mayoral system in a referendum next year and will thereafter have to combine the position of elected mayor with head of paid services would be a full-time job. Will she also confirm that there is nothing in this Bill to prevent such an elected mayor, even one combining the position with that of head of paid services in an authority, from serving as a Member of this House? In that event, what is the difference when it comes to the elected police commissioners?

Furthermore, it is not so long ago that eminent judges sat in your Lordships’ House as Law Lords. As I understand it, there was some controversy over whether they should continue to do so. They no longer do so but it can hardly be argued that theirs was not a full-time responsibility of the highest order. That did not appear on that basis to cause any problems. The problem of the position of the Law Lords was that they were both making laws and then interpreting and adjudicating on those laws. That is not a comparable situation with that of police commissioners. Is there not an inconsistency in the approach that suggests that, even if the job were deemed to be full time, about which some of us would have reservations, that should disqualify anyone from sitting in this place and being a commissioner?

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

My Lords, will the Minister also confirm that in the register of interests for your Lordships’ House, none of us is required to signify whether we are in full-time or part-time employment outside this House? I would consider that, in choosing and voting for someone to be a commissioner, were this Bill to become an Act, they could not serve in Lancashire and be a Member of your Lordships’ House, although Surrey may be possible as a combination. It would be no more difficult than being in charge of running a bank or a huge business and being a Member of this House. The Government are not being logical, and that surprises and shocks me.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I will try to take some of the shock out of the noble Baroness’s reaction to this and explain the thinking behind it. So far as this House is concerned, life Peers do not have the option of standing down, and therefore disqualifying Members of this House from standing as a police and crime commissioner would in effect be a life ban. In this area, we are following the model set out in the European Parliament (House of Lords Disqualification) Regulations 2008. There is a precedent for a similar situation already on the statute book. Further, as hereditary Peers are elected but without terms of office, a hereditary Peer who stood down to serve as a PCC would not easily be able to return once their term of office as a PCC ended. Therefore, rather than disqualifying a Member of this House from standing as a PCC, this clause prevents a serving PCC from sitting or voting in this House. This enables Members of the House to stand as a PCC if they so wish and to return to full membership following their term of office as a PCC. It does, however, allow them to devote all their energy to representing the public that elected them as a PCC.

I would suspect that, as in many other elected offices that the public are involved in, there is quite a mood these days about how much time an elected representative devotes to the task in hand, whatever it is. The public scrutinise, often at very close quarters, the time spent by those elected to that type of office. I must therefore reiterate that whatever people regard as the time commitment made to serving in your Lordships’ House, a police and crime commissioner’s job would be a full-time job in every sense.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her response. I do not wish to detain the Committee. Three points have been raised in this debate. The first is that the issue of the European Parliament is a red herring. We changed the law because there was a problem with a Liberal Democrat MEP who, because of European law, would have been disbarred from standing for and accepting a seat in Europe because she was also a Member of your Lordships’ House. That was why we made provision for a special leave of absence.

The second issue is that many Members of your Lordships’ House also have full-time responsibilities. We have many lawyers. Indeed, I see the noble Lord, Lord Carlile, in his place. He always strikes me as being not only a hardworking lawyer, but also an assiduous Member of the House. The noble Lord, Lord Lyell, mentioned the Lords Spiritual, and we heard from my noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Tope. What is of concern is that the Home Office seems to be enunciating a new rule which states that the Home Office is now deciding whether it is appropriate or not for your Lordships to take on another responsibility. It is not for the Home Office to so decide. I should tell the noble Baroness that I am certain of one thing: if this is put to the vote at the Report stage, she would lose it.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, this has been a very interesting and important debate. My noble friend and other noble Lords raised very pertinent questions about the status of the elected police commissioner and chief constable as corporations sole, the financial consequences of the proposed arrangements, referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and the financial relationship between the commissioner and the chief constable. I will start with that. Since it is the commissioner who will set the precept and ultimately sign off the plan, he will have considerable influence over the chief constable, because he who controls the resources tends to pull the strings. It will be rather like the relationship between Her Majesty's Treasury and the Home Office. My experience of friends in the Treasury over 10 years as a Minister was that they delighted in micromanaging the affairs of departments, which they did not think could organise a you-know-what in a brewery. It will be inevitable that the commissioner, who in the end will have total control over how much money the chief constable gets, will be able to exercise considerable operational control. We should bear that in mind when we consider the construct of the Bill.

My other concern is about the lack of good corporate governance when it comes to the concept of corporation sole and issues of expenditure, contracts and the employment of staff. As I said on our previous day in Committee, it is puzzling that the party opposite, the Conservatives, who 20 years ago were very concerned about ensuring good corporate governance both in the public and private sectors, seem to have forgotten all this when they came to construct the Bill. This has been a very good debate and noble Lords have used their experience of how the police service currently operates to tease out some of the issues.

The noble Lord, Lord Carlile, talked about the chief officer as chief executive. He thought that it was probably a good thing, provided that it was done in the right way. The problem I have with that is that, as I read the Bill, the chief constable, being corporation sole, is not just the chief executive; he or she is also the chair and the non-executive directors. It is the realisation of a Gilbertian fantasy: the Lord High Everything Else. The chief constable is not just the Lord High Everything Else; he is the Lord High Everything. Of course the noble Lord was right to ask the Minister whether there will be structures, such as good employment practice and all the other constraints and necessary safeguards, and I am sure the Minister will seek to give an affirmative response, but, in the end, it will be down to the chief constable as a corporation sole. As the noble Lord, Lord Stevens, said, in the end those who make, for instance, employment decisions will be employed by the chief constable, the corporation sole, and that must have an impact on their behaviour.

This corporate governance structure, or the absence of it, would never be contemplated by the Government if this were a private sector operation. The idea that you can have one person without some kind of board structure and without non-executives to give the check and balance would not be contemplated. Why is this kind of structure being contemplated in this part of the public sector? It is a puzzle to me. I have always paid tribute to the previous Conservative Government for the emphasis they gave to good corporate governance, the encouragement they gave to the Institute of Directors and the CBI and the work by Cadbury. The previous Conservative Government encouraged all these things. Why are they ignoring that when it comes to this Bill?

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

My Lords, I am grateful. This has been a very constructive debate on a very important part of this legislation. In her opening remarks, the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, mentioned the corporation sole, and I shall begin by setting out where the Government are coming from on this. As Members of the Committee will know, a corporation is a body that has its own legal personality distinct from that of its members. This means that a corporation can own property, enter into contracts and take part in legal proceedings in its own capacity and that its assets, rights and liabilities are those of the corporation rather than the members. Typically, corporations have more than one member. Such corporations are called corporations aggregate. Local authorities are a typical example. However, a corporation can consist of only one person: the corporation sole. The sovereign is a corporation sole, as are various ecclesiastical figures, such as bishops, and various other public offices have been created corporations sole by legislation, such as the Treasury Solicitor, the Information Commissioner and the Children’s Commissioner, so this is not something completely new that has been contrived for the purposes of this legislation.

The amendments concerning this part of the Bill and particularly concerning the chief officer’s status as a corporation sole remove or limit the status to apply to employment matters. They also remove the chief officer’s ability to enter into other contracts and agreements, including the ability to borrow money and sell property. The Government are clear about the need to establish chief constables as corporations sole. This legal status will allow them to employ staff in their official capacity and thus have greater control over running their forces. We believe that it is a very important move for chief constables to be able to have that more direct link with the employment of the police. I accept what noble Lords have said about the status of existing police officers who are not employed as such by any one particular body. It is quite right that that has been mentioned. But this does not in any way detract from the oath that they take or from their status. They would go into a direct employment situation as far as the chief constable is concerned.

My noble friend Lord Carlile of Berriew clearly set out what I thought was exactly spot on as to why we want to do this. In terms of the increased capacity that the chief constable would have, particularly in the employment field, we want to ensure that a PCC is also enabled to focus on accountability rather than on running the force. Those two roles are quite distinct. We believe that the corporation sole allows the chief constable to fulfil that clearly defined role. The legal status that allows them to employ staff in their official capacity is very important in its vital function in the context of providing greater autonomy over the day-to-day management of the force. It is at the heart of clear operational independence, about which a lot has been said in our deliberations so far. This clearly, we believe, would contribute to it.

However, noble Lords have raised issues that are of concern and I hope that I can reassure them. As currently drafted, there are parts of this part of the Bill that we intend to change. Perhaps I may set them out. The noble Lord, Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, and my noble friend Lady Harris raised the concern that chief officers will have significant powers to enter into contracts and agreements. It is our intention to consider this further. We will consider laying amendments which would prevent the chief constable from borrowing money and require him or her to obtain permission from the police and crime commissioner before entering into any contract other than a contract of employment. I hope that noble Lords will accept that we have already revisited this. They have made some important points around this aspect and at later stages of the Bill we will bring forward government amendments to try to correct this.

The amendments tabled by my noble friends Lady Hamwee and Lord Shipley and the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, would mean that, while the chief police officer would be able to appoint a chief finance officer, they would not be required to do so. Nor would they be required to appoint someone suitably qualified to hold that role. Currently, the Bill will require each chief police officer to appoint a chief finance officer of the force and require that person to be a member of a chartered financial institute. This is not about gathering chums around; it is about making sure that there is proper professional support for the role. I understand that the requirement for separate chief finance officers reporting to the chief police officer and the police and crime commissioner may on the face of it seem like duplication. Several Members of your Lordships’ House have mentioned that tonight but I stress that this is not the case. The noble Lord, Lord Dear, made the point that there is a situation here with the police authority and the chief constable.

The Bill makes key changes to the current system of financial governance for the police, flowing from the fact that it will be the chief police officers who employ the police staff currently employed by police authorities. The Bill provides for chief police officers to be corporation sole so that they can do this in their official capacity. As two distinct bodies both legally capable of holding moneys and entering into contracts, it is right and proper that chief police officers and police and crime commissioners both have suitably qualified people responsible for the propriety and efficiency of their financial affairs.

The provisions in the Bill set up two distinct bodies whose financial responsibilities will have to be formal, clear and accountable in law and to the public. I want to clarify any confusion between the role of the two. The chief finance officer to the force will be primarily involved in the propriety of operational spending and employment. The PCC’s chief financial officer will have the overall oversight of spending, including grant-making functions. I can confirm that there is no reason why there cannot be group audits of these two functions.

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[Lord Harris of Haringey]

I want to question whether my noble friend has got the correct nuance of the argument. We have to be very clear about what we are trying to achieve with this Bill. My understanding is that the Government are trying to achieve stronger accountability, and that the mechanism for accountability is an elected police and crime commissioner—or we may end up with some other model. The danger is that, inadvertently, that accountability will be weakened. While my noble friend is right to say that being able to set the overall budget and strategy provides some degree of control, it does not provide the full picture. If you have a situation in which the corporation sole status of the chief officer of police is untrammelled—I was very pleased to hear what the Minister said about putting some limits around that, and I think it would be helpful to see those sooner rather than later—the danger is that chief officers of police will ignore what the body to whom they are supposed to be accountable will say are the key strategic issues that matter to their local communities. We would not want every minor arrangement in respect of an individual investigation to be referred to the accountable body, but we should have some system that ensures that those key decisions lie clearly with the body to which the chief officer of police is being held accountable.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I am very grateful for the further contributions that have just been made to the debate. I can assure my noble friend Lord Carlile of Berriew that if, for example, forensic science commissioning were suddenly needed, there would not be a time lag while permission was sought. That is not our intention. I also take on board what noble Lords opposite have said about getting the balance right. I can assure the Committee that we will bring forward an amendment that I hope meets the concerns that have been expressed.

[Lord Soley]

Would the Minister answer my question, which arose from the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Harris, about the number and type of weapons purchased? Does she need more time to find out what the situation would be if it is a corporation sole? Does she want to come back to the Committee, or can she answer the question now?

[Baroness Browning]

I hope that I can answer the noble Lord now. The situation will be as it is now.

[Lord Soley]

So the situation now would override the corporation sole nature of the body.

[Baroness Browning]

Yes, that is right. I ask noble Lords not to press the amendment.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

My Lords, the Minister has given a very helpful explanation in relation to the chief financial officer. I do not think anyone is suggesting that the chief officer of police should not have financial support from somebody who was suitably qualified. It is told, no doubt apocryphally, that the Metropolitan Police, when it was under the control of the Home Office, had only two qualified accountants responsible for a budget of £3 billion, which may have explained why it did not have a system for knowing whether it had paid bills more than once. Having a senior financial person who is a qualified accountant is not the same as having a chief finance officer, which has a specific meaning in local government law. It is clear that the post is intended to have that specific meaning in local government law. I do not think that anyone is suggesting that we should move away from the situation that exists at the moment, where every force has a senior finance person, but the person who is clearly responsible for accounts and everything else resides within the police authority or, in this case given the Government’s construct, with the police and crime commissioner.

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[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, this has been a very interesting debate. I am very grateful to noble Lords for the history that has been contributed. Not much of it appeared in my notes but it has helped me to put into context the City of London and the role of its police. I hope noble Lords will not mind if I begin by paying tribute to that police force. It is a small force but it has in recent times dealt with significant investigations and major incidents. It has dealt with them and acquitted itself extremely well. Because of its position it has a national role. I hear what has been said about the movement of financial services around not only the country but the globe. None the less, the force has taken a lead in tackling white-collar crime that continues today.

When the noble Lord, Lord Harris, began, I thought this would be one of those sublime moments when, as a politician, one could sit back, listen to two arguments and make up one’s mind as to which was the more persuasive. As a Minister, I do not have that luxury, as Members will know, more is the pity. It would be very nice to do so. However, the noble Lord, Lord Harris, lost me when he mentioned motoring offences in comparison with what my noble friend Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville said about the much more significant and recent role that this police force has played. Neither the Mayor of London nor the Metropolitan Police Authority has a role in the governance of the City of London Police.

The position of the Common Council as the police authority for the City of London Police has, as we have heard, remained essentially unchanged. It was not altered by the Police Act 1996, which created the police authorities that currently exist outside London. Nor, I have to say to the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, was it changed when his Government introduced the Greater London Authority Act 1999, which created the Metropolitan Police Authority. Therefore, when he asked me why we are not doing this and said that the amendments are reasonable, I noted that he did not refer at all to what his own Government did. I assume they, too, when they were legislating for London would have looked at this issue. There was no offering or crumb there to persuade me that the previous Labour Government looked at this and decided that it was an appropriate thing to do.

[Lord Rosser]

The Minister’s argument is that she has been so overwhelmed by the decision of the previous Labour Government that it cannot possibly be challenged or questioned. Is that the argument for keeping the City of London Police?

[Baroness Browning]

Not at all, my Lords. We studied very closely the actions or lack of actions of the previous Labour Government. I assure the noble Lord that they are on our radar screen all the time. However, we have this situation not just because of the many years that the City of London Police has been in place but because of the exemplary way in which it conducts itself. The size of the population of the City of London has been mentioned. There are 8,000 voters but one must put that in the context of there being 25 wards in the City, of which only four have residents. To translate that into representation would be quite complex. The City of London is unique and has unique policing governance to recognise that fact. I suspect that various Governments down the years have looked at this and probably all came to the same conclusion. It operates on a non-party political basis through its lord mayor, aldermen and the members of the Court of Common Council. The governance is tailored to the particular institutions and traditions of the City of London. I am sorry to disappoint your Lordships, but it is not my intention to change that tonight. I hope the noble Lord will withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

My Lords, I am enormously grateful to Members of the Committee for their consideration of the amendment. I am particularly grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, for his history lesson as it demonstrated the extraordinarily effective lobbying power of the Corporation of London over the past two and a bit centuries.

Noble Lords have asked why the previous Labour Government did not address this issue. I was very engaged in the discussions that led to the creation of the Greater London Authority and I can let your Lordships into a secret: the then Prime Minister, who was renowned for his bravery in taking on international conflicts when other counsels might have prevailed, was not prepared to enter into a conflict with the massed troops of the Corporation of London. He did not wish to see tanks trundling down Ludgate Hill towards Westminster to try to suppress any uprising on the part of the unruly citizens of Westminster vis-à-vis the traditional powers and role of the Corporation of London.

I am sure the Committee will recognise that my amendment is very modest. It does not propose subsuming the City of London Police into the Metropolitan Police. It merely suggests that the City of London Police should be accountable to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime in the same way that the Metropolitan Police are. That would not necessarily mean any disruption of the City of London Police’s excellent work, particularly on economic crime. It may have been unfair of me to refer to the heavy load of traffic offences with which the force deals. I was talking to a colleague in the House earlier this evening who remarked that the City of London Police dealt with a particularly high number of cases of indecent exposure, and that that factor should be taken into account when arguing for a separate force. However, the argument has always been about economic crime, certainly during my involvement in this area. We are talking about 213 new investigations during the past year, which is a comparatively modest figure.

This was intended to be a minimalist amendment to try to bring the City of London Police into line with some of the arrangements prevailing in the rest of the country. London is already an anomaly in the Bill, as we shall discuss further in a few minutes. The amendment is not intended to destroy the City of London Police or its work; it simply tries to create a system of accountability which would at least be parallel to that in the rest of London, if not in the rest of the country.

I note that the Minister is as susceptible as all previous holders of that office and, indeed, all previous Ministers in every other department of government, when it comes to the lobbying power of the Corporation of London, to which I defer. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Rosser]

One reads with interest the amendment, which, as my noble friend Lord Harris of Haringey said, provides for the deputy mayor for policing and crime to be elected, on the basis that it ought to be done on the same terms as the Government proposed for everywhere else in the country under the Bill, namely, for the police commissioner to be directly elected. Clearly, as long as the Bill remains as it is, where there is no elected police commissioner, we will not press for the deputy mayor for policing and crime to be elected. We will be consistent and say that we will stick with the same arrangement in London as the Bill currently has, having been amended by your Lordships' House.

If the Government are to make an effort in future to restore elected police and crime commissioners to the Bill, it would appear rather odd if they did not also say that, if that is what is to happen outside London, Londoners should also be able directly to elect the person who in reality will be responsible for policing. The arrangement that we appear to have at present is for an elected mayor to appoint a deputy mayor, who takes over the role that, if the Government get their way, an elected police commissioner will have elsewhere. I suppose the only parallel—although it is hardly a parallel—is that, if we had elected police commissioners and one were suspended or otherwise unable to operate, that elected police commissioner would, as the Bill stands, appoint someone from their own staff to act in their stead. The arrangement that we appear to be moving towards in London is not that of the mayor waiting to be suspended or otherwise unable to act before appointing someone, but that the mayor, immediately he or she comes into office, appoints someone else to act as the deputy mayor responsible for policing and crime.

We look forward to the Minister’s response on this. As I said, as long as the Bill remains as it is without elected police commissioners, we do not wish to be inconsistent by saying that the deputy mayor for policing and crime in London should be elected. However, if the Government intend to try to restore elected police commissioners to the Bill, we look forward to their explanation of why they think Londoners should not be able to elect the person responsible for policing as well.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, these amendments would prevent the mayor holding the mayor’s office for policing and crime and would instead create an elected deputy mayor for policing and crime to hold that office.

This Government’s policy is to introduce a directly elected police and crime commissioner in every force area in England and Wales outside London but, as your Lordships are only too well aware, these provisions have been removed from the Bill. It therefore seems rather odd that your Lordships should now be debating whether those self-same provisions should apply to the Metropolitan Police Service. I noted the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, about wanting to remain consistent. However, having struck out from the Bill the part that proposed elected police and crime commissioners, your Lordships now seem to be applying the same arguments to elect the deputy mayor for London.

The Government had not intended to introduce a new elected person to hold the police to account in London for the very simple reason that the whole of London already elects a single person to take responsibility for strategic issues such as policing, and that of course is the Mayor of London. The mayor is in the unique position of having responsibility for a whole force area and, as such, it seems sensible for him to have overall responsibility for holding the police to account as well.

The amendment would create a situation in which both the mayor and the deputy mayor had a direct democratic mandate across a whole force area, although they might have different ideas about what should happen. I do not think that that could work. It is right and fitting that the mayor should take on formal responsibility for holding the Metropolitan Police to account and, in turn, the mayor should be directly accountable to the public for how that is done. I am tempted to say to the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, “Nice try”, but I regret that I am not able to accept his amendment.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lords who have contributed to this short debate. As ever, the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, highlighted what he called the thin end of the wedge. There is a choice and it goes to the heart of the Minister’s response to this. One can either envisage that the deputy mayor for policing and crime is elected by all Londoners on the same day and in the same manner as the Mayor of London, in which case the logic is that the 8,000 electors in the City of London should cast a vote for the deputy mayor of London as they vote for the Mayor of London. Alternatively, if the noble Lord preferred it and would be happy to support it on a later occasion, we could exclude the 8,000 electors from the Corporation of London area and have a deputy mayor elected on a slightly different franchise from that of the Mayor of London. That would, of course, completely undermine the Minister’s argument about how difficult it would be if these two individuals were elected on the same basis. The Government cannot have it both ways—I am trying to—by saying that we should not include the City of London in this. If you do not include the City of London, you therefore require that the franchise for the deputy mayor of London should be different from that for the Mayor of London and the argument about having the same franchise, being elected on the same basis and possible conflict, disappears.

The reason for including it was to try to achieve some consistency with the arrangements for the election of the Mayor of London. If it makes the Minister happier I am sure that we can construct the amendments in a way that excludes the City of London. That would then mean that she had achieved her objectives in terms of my previous amendment as well as this one. I am not clear that even had we altered the franchise slightly the Minister would have been happy with the amendment.

I have to say that there is a difficulty. I do not believe through very close observation that it is possible for the Mayor of London to fulfil the full range of activities of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime. I was certainly clear when I chaired the police authority about the amount of time that that took up. The role of being responsible for the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime will take up more time than that, and it would be impossible to combine that with the other responsibilities of the Mayor of London. The present Mayor of London, who no doubt is the role model for which the MOPC is being created, tried for a period, having made a manifesto pledge, to chair the police authority as well as being Mayor of London. After a comparatively short period, he decided that it was impracticable and not possible. We now have the situation that the Mayor of London appoints the chair of the police authority.

The difficulty is arguing that the arrangements will somehow be an improvement in transparency with current arrangements. Essentially, you are saying that the Mayor of London will appoint a person to fulfil the responsibilities in respect of holding the police service to account. That is the arrangement that we have at the moment. The Mayor of London appoints the chair of the police authority and that person, who is called the deputy mayor, although it is not a statutory title, fulfils those functions. That dilutes the principle of direct accountability. People might feel that the Mayor of London was doing a wonderful job on transport arrangements, introducing bicycle schemes, representing London on an international stage in such a way that all Londoners feel that the cockles of their hearts are warmed by seeing him perform. They might feel that or they might not, but they might have very different views about the conduct of the role on policing.

Under these arrangements being proposed by the Government, people cannot differentiate between them. All of it is subsumed in the responsibilities of the single elected mayor and the mayor can distance him or herself from what happens in policing by the fact that they appoint somebody else to do it. That is a weakness. If the Government are intent on restoring the principle of direct election to the rest of the Bill they need to think again about restoring the principle of direct election to the position in the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime. If they are worried about duplication, they could take policing out of the Mayor of London’s area of responsibility. That is not something that I would personally advocate. The proposals are intended to balance those different responsibilities.

I will think carefully about what the Minister has said. When we know the Government’s intent it will be clear whether something like this needs to be put into the Bill at a later stage. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

My Lords, I will speak to an amendment that is in my name, to four other amendments to which I have added my name and to an amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee. The amendment in my name is Amendment 110. I have to confess that this is possibly a refugee from what should have been another group. However, it could stand on its own here. It essentially deletes Clause 19(4), which is about the power of the deputy mayor for policing and crime to,

“arrange for any other person to exercise any function of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime which is, in accordance with subsection (2), exercisable by the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime”.

This comes back to the issue that we keep raising in relation to policing and crime commissioners: their ability to delegate functions to people who are not accountable in the same way. The proposal is that, even though this is an activity which is specifically the responsibility of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, and specifically should be carried out by the deputy mayor, it should not be possible to delegate this to any other person in such a cavalier way.

I also wanted to speak to Amendments 103 and 116, which essentially say that the deputy mayor for policing and crime shall be a Member of the London Assembly. If your Lordships and the Government are not minded to accept the principle of direct election, then the second best must be that the person delegated by the Mayor of London must themselves be an elected person, a Member of the London Assembly. It really is extraordinary that the Bill gives such latitude to the Mayor of London to appoint someone whom they have not met and may have no personal direct mandate. One could create a justification as to why it would be inappropriate to have a direct mandate, but it seems to me that the main thrust of this ought to be that that the person who is acting on behalf of the Mayor of London in this very important role should themselves have at least been subject to the electorate for at least part of London, if not the whole of London. It is important that the deputy mayor of London for policing and crime should be an elected Member of the London Assembly, and Amendments 103 and 116 deal with this.

I have also put my name to Amendment 105, which enables the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to delegate to any person the functions that would otherwise be carried out by the deputy mayor for policing and crime. The issue is the same: whether it should be possible for these functions so easily to be delegated to people who are not elected. Amendment 105 would at least require the mayor to delegate them to somebody who was part of the structure of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime rather than to someone completely different. What would be the point of having a Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime if the mayor could say, “Well, one of these functions I am not having done by somebody who works for the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime; I’ll have it delegated somewhere else”? I suspect that this was an unintended consequence of something else when the drafting was done, but it seems to be a very strange arrangement.

Amendment 180 would involve Members of the Assembly in the appointment of police officers of ACPO rank other than simply the commissioner and deputy commissioner. I spoke earlier today about the importance of that responsibility being shared. It is an important issue of governance. It is also important that senior officers of the Metropolitan Police not only see the line of accountability to the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis but recognise the importance of democratic accountability. The involvement of Members in the appointments process would help facilitate that.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, there is a great number of amendments in this grouping. I shall try to do justice to as many of them as I can.

Amendments 61, 62, 107 and 116 would prevent the mayor appointing as deputy mayor for crime and policing anyone who was not already a Member of the London Assembly. I understand the concerns that lie behind the amendments. It is argued that if PCCs elsewhere are directly elected to their position, the deputy mayor should have some democratic legitimacy. We touched on this in previous amendments. However, it is important to remember that the deputy mayor does not occupy the Mayor's Office for Crime and Policing; the mayor alone may hold that office. The mayor may appoint a person to whom to delegate the day-to-day responsibilities of the office, but I emphasise—particularly to my noble friend Lady Hamwee because she raised this matter—that the liability and accountability to the public rest squarely on the shoulders of the mayor, whatever the nature of the delegation. For that reason, I suggest that it is not necessary for the deputy mayor to be elected, although there is no reason why they could not be.

To require the deputy mayor to be an Assembly Member would also limit the mayor's discretion to 25 people, many of whom already have important responsibilities. Until the Greater London Authority Act 2007, Assembly Members were not able to serve on the Transport for London board. While they are now able to do so, there is no requirement for any of the members or the chair to be an Assembly Member. In fact, none of the current members of the Transport for London board is also an Assembly Member; the accountability comes through the mayor. I therefore ask that this cluster of amendments not be pressed.

Delegation is very important in any organisation. No one person, be that the mayor or the deputy mayor, can carry out all the functions of an organisation from making strategic decisions to replying to letters. The Bill sets out that the mayor may delegate to the deputy mayor, who in turn may also delegate functions.

Amendment 109 would seriously restrict the mayor's ability to delegate to the deputy mayor, meaning that the mayor would have to carry out all the day-to-day functions of the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime. With a role as large and strategic as the mayor’s, it must be right that day-to-day functions are able to be delegated. As such, I ask that that amendment not be pressed.

Amendment 105 would restrict the mayor's ability to delegate functions so only the deputy mayor or an employee of the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime may have functions delegated to them. I would be very concerned that this would prevent the useful shared services that already exist in the GLA, as it would require that all of the mayor's functions in respect of policing and crime are performed by the staff of that office. In order to ensure that the mayor can make sensible decisions about the most efficient and effective way of working, I ask that this amendment not be pressed.

Amendments 106 and 109 make it clear that the mayor retains overall legal responsibility for any function he or she should choose to delegate. This is a fundamental principle of the law on delegation. The mayor could not choose to delegate overall responsibility of his or her functions even if he or she should wish to. As such, these amendments would have no practical effect and I ask that they not be pressed.

Amendment 114 would forbid any person but the mayor from exercising any rights of his or her office or using any property. That would effectively be a bar on the mayor from delegating any functions, as nearly all functions would require that person to exercise some rights of the mayor.

Amendments 110 and 111 would prevent the deputy mayor from delegating any functions that he or she has been delegated by the mayor. This would mean only the mayor or the deputy mayor could carry out any function of the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime. Were this the case then the mayor's office could have no effective staff, as every function from appointing a junior member of staff, to replying to a letter on behalf of the mayor's office would need to be carried out by either the mayor or the deputy mayor. Similarly, Amendments 103 and 112 would prevent the mayor and deputy mayor from delegating functions to any person but a London Assembly Member. I do not think it is right that only the mayor, deputy mayor or a London Assembly Member are able to perform the basic administrative functions of that office. Any organisation needs to allow for effective delegation to be efficient, but the amendments would prevent that and so make the office bureaucratic, if not actually impossible. For that reason, I would ask noble Lords not to press those amendments.

Finally, Amendments 97 to 101 make similar changes to restrict the ability of a police and crime commissioner in delegating functions. Your Lordships may care to consider what effect if any the amendments will have following the vote on the first day of this Committee. Had that vote not taken place, I would be arguing that PCCs also need to delegate, and it would be as inappropriate to expect police and crime panel members to handle a PCC's correspondence or to interview the staff.

I would have made similar arguments in respect of a PCC as I have in respect of the mayor; that it is right that conflict of interest considerations prevent them from delegating functions to a police officer, and the law is already clear that they cannot delegate overall responsibility for any function. I do not think that Clause 18 has any practical effect any longer, and as such, neither do the amendments sought.

To pick up on some of the other points raised, my noble friend Lady Hamwee mentioned the question of term limits on MOPC. As drafted, the amendment would mean that the current mayor would not be able to take on MOPC if successful in the 2012 election, as only the mayor can hold MOPC. That would leave the office vacant. This is probably not the place to open up the debate on how that problem might be resolved, but no one other than the mayor would be able to fill the role of MOPC and how that would be decided and how that situation would be dealt with is not clear in the proposals that have been brought forward.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

The Greater London Authority Act provides for circumstances in which the office of mayor is vacant. It provides for arrangements in which the statutory deputy mayor under the Greater London Authority Act—not to be confused with the deputy mayor for policing and crime—assumes the functions of mayor. Surely those arrangements are covered under the Greater London Authority Act.

[Baroness Browning]

I am not up to speed with the Greater London Authority Act, but I would have hoped that in bringing forward amendments that created the circumstance, there would have been provisions to decide how to deal with the situation that I described and could well happen in respect of the sitting mayor and the elections due next year. So if the noble Lord does not mind I will not engage in the detail of that. Those proposals are simply not in front of the House today and I am going to move on to the role of the London Assembly.

These amendments would establish the London Assembly as the police and crime panel for London. I appreciate the position that noble Lords have taken with this. Like them, I am keen to ensure that the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime in London is properly challenged and that its decisions are tested on behalf of the public on a regular basis. However, I see that the police and crime panel must comprise members of the London Assembly so as to ensure proper accountability.

The first question to address here is why there should be a bespoke committee of the London Assembly called the police and crime panel rather than, as proposed by noble Lords, the functions being conferred on the London Assembly as a whole. The reason is one of practicality. Having a dedicated committee, representative of the wider London Assembly, will ensure that sufficient attention and scrutiny can be paid to delivering its policing responsibilities and would also allow for independent members to be brought on to the panel to ensure diversity and the right mix of skills. Independents would be appointed subject to the existing rules of the Assembly.

This smaller group will be able to focus its attentions on the important business of scrutinising, in detail, the actions and decisions of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime—particularly in respect of the police and crime plan. The requirement for the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to produce a police and crime plan is a statutory requirement. It is right and proper that the London authority, through its police and crime panel, should have the appropriate opportunity to review and report on the draft police and crime plan. This is a very important element of its scrutiny role. However, given the statutory nature of the police and crime plan, and the accompanying requirements made of it by this legislation, it would not be appropriate for the police and crime panel to have the power to veto the plan itself.

Finally, these amendments would introduce a role for the London Assembly in the appointment of the commissioner and the deputy commissioner, and their senior team. I will address these in turn. The Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police remain royal appointments, subject to the advice of the Secretary of State, due to the number of important national and international functions that they undertake. In making this recommendation, the Secretary of State must have regard to any recommendations made by the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime.

It has been proposed that the London Assembly should also be a part of these considerations. Requiring the London Assembly to do so, be that directly through the police and crime panel, would add an additional layer of bureaucracy to the process, which would delay the decision further. The proposed amendments would also establish a role for the London Assembly in the appointment of the assistant commissioners, deputy assistant commissioners and commanders of the Metropolitan Police. Such appointments under this legislation will now be made by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, in consultation with the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime. They will no longer require the approval of the Secretary of State, which reflects the Government’s commitment to reduce interference from the centre and reduce bureaucracy.

The Government feel that the commissioner is best placed to make decisions about the make-up of his top team. The role of the police and crime panel for London is to scrutinise the decisions taken by the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime in London. It is not its role to scrutinise the decisions of the commissioner and neither it, nor the GLA more widely, as these amendments propose, should therefore have a role in the appointment of the commissioner’s senior team.

Furthermore, allowing the assembly to call in the Metropolitan Police Commissioner to give evidence will mean the commissioner having to answer to two masters. The commissioner is held to account by the mayor and the mayor by the assembly. These clear lines of accountability are needed.

I have not been able to go into a lot of detail—we had a long list of amendments before us—but I hope that your Lordships who have tabled amendments will feel able not to press them.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, there is a long list of amendments because there are a lot of issues. I would have been considerably happier if we had been able to unpack this package somewhat. From listening to the Minister’s reply—she has been saddled with this, I accept—it seems to me that some of the provisions are straining to apply to London the model provided for the rest of England and Wales. That feels very awkward and very inappropriate. I cannot see that we will finish the debate about London tonight, so I think that we will have to come back to aspects of it.

On delegation, at one point I referred to that as “trickle-down”, but I think that the Minister’s reply vindicates that description. I have realised, a bit late in the day, that “Delegatus non potest delegare”, as we all say—

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Tuesday 24th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, one way to deal with that would be for the Government to write letters in response to the amendments so that the technical details, which might normally be addressed in the winding-up speech of the Minister, could at least be on the record and placed in the Library. When we come back on Report, the noble Baroness and other noble Lords would then have the benefit of a Government response. I do not know whether that is helpful. It might be one way in which to alleviate the concerns of the noble Baroness.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

My Lords, in response to the noble Lord’s suggestion, I am very happy to agree to that.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, that will be helpful. I would merely add that I have always had a bit of a concern about responses being dealt with by letter because they would not be in Hansard and easily accessible by those who may seek to look for them. In fact, this is a matter on which the Leader’s Group on the working practices of the House of Lords has made some suggestions.

To turn to the issue of piloting, the very number and variations of proposals for amendments demonstrates the importance of the issue. Whatever model of governance we end up with, we all have a great concern that it should work well. After all, that is our role. Certainly, piloting is not equivalent to not taking the changes forward, which is why my amendment would provide for pilots for a two-year period. I see a lot of sense in a longer period but I did not want the suggestion that this was a matter of trying to undo the proposals to become mixed up with the issue of piloting.

Piloting is hardly a new concept. It is what the outside world regards as sensible, about which a lot of people, having become aware of this issue over the past couple of months, have commented on to me. The Government do it as well. Last week, the Merits of Statutory Instruments Committee had a statutory instrument on dentistry which was taking forward the piloting of new arrangements. It is not simply directed at a yes or no answer to the proposition but tests all the aspects of that proposition, including—I come to them again—the checks and balances, which, if they are too limited, will be insufficient. Checks and balances have to be sound in themselves individually, and extensive. Otherwise, they will be ineffective because ways around them will be found.

I have always thought that it was necessary to look at checks and balances in the round. There may be different views of the role of scrutiny; that is, the role of the panels here. The tagline of the Centre for Public Scrutiny—I am a member of its advisory board—is, “Good Government Needs Good Scrutiny”. It should not be in arrear or by way of commentary. If it is oppositional, it should be active, constructive, collaborative and preferably consensual, thus providing a reality check.

This is not just the role of the police and crime panel. Another major area of concern expressed by your Lordships is the boundary of responsibility and function between police and crime commissioners and chief constables. We have a protocol in draft form. We debate the term “operational”. Seeing how the model works and where the boundaries lie in practice would be more than useful: it is essential. The decisions that must be taken above the local level is an issue that was touched on at the last stage when the noble Lord, Lord Laming, raised child protection. Counterterrorism is an obvious issue, but child protection, trafficking and a number of other matters may have to be dealt with not just very locally but at levels above that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Henig]

I rise briefly to support the amendment, and I do so for a number of reasons.

First, there is a tremendous lack of detail in the legislation, as has been mentioned before. Some very general ideas are put forward, but there is not much supporting detail about how it will all work in practice, as we have already commented. I am particularly concerned about how a PCC would interact with local government—not just with the councils but with all the bodies that local councils work through, including such local strategic partnerships as still exist and the crime and disorder partnerships that have been mentioned. I am also concerned about the relationship between the PCC and the panel, however the panel ends up and whatever powers it might have. There is clearly a relationship there that needs to be tested, and at the moment we have a very dim idea of how that would actually work.

There is another set of reasons why I would like to see some pilots, relating to the electoral system. We have not talked about this yet, although I am sure that we will in due course. The Government have come forward for these PCC elections with an electoral system which I would like to see work, particularly in places such as Thames Valley and West Mercia. We have not actually had elections like these before in our history—one-topic elections over considerably large areas of the country, such as Thames Valley, where we have three local authorities, not one. I would be interested to see what the turnout would be in such elections and how the election campaign would be conducted. It seems reasonable to suggest that that would be worth studying. I would certainly want to see different models. I would like to see something happening in the West Midlands or Thames Valley because of the huge size of those places, but then you have very compact areas such as Cheshire and Warwickshire, which have rather different dynamics. It would be interesting perhaps to tweak the modelling to emphasise slightly different things in slightly different places.

Politicisation is something that we have talked about. It is a huge problem for all of us and we are all very worried about that. Clearly, some sort of trialling might give us a handle on how elections could be conducted perhaps without party-political slanging. I would, for example, like to know whether we are right in thinking that no independents could conduct these elections. That was raised two sittings ago, and the point was raised that we are assuming that these elections will be contested by party-political candidates; yes, I am assuming that, because of the expense of the exercise. Maybe I am wrong—maybe independents could contest them. Again, one might get a better idea if one had some sort of pilot running.

My very last point is that, while it is no secret that I have grave concerns about the proposals in this legislation, I am always prepared to admit that I might be wrong. Actually, what the Government are proposing might be fantastic for policing and I might have it wrong; my concerns might be misplaced. I am always ready to put my hand up and say that that is the case. Equally, however, I would expect the Government to be as flexible and say that perhaps they have got it wrong. It is possible. If we were in the private sector, it would not be seen as a terrible admission of anything to trial something before you went full tilt; you would say that it was very sensible. I do not see why in the public sector one should not adopt the same kind of cautious approach.

For a whole number of reasons, I strongly support the amendment.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, before I respond to the debate that we have just had regarding the issue of pilots, it might help the House if I clarified the position regarding policing in Wales, which was spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Elystan-Morgan. Within this group of amendments, and a number of subsequent groups which we hope to debate later today, there are specific amendments that address matters of devolution and I dare say seek to probe the Government's negotiations with the Welsh Assembly Government. I am aware that there was not enough time at Report and Third Reading in the other place to debate the specific provisions within this Bill that had to be amended as a result of the failed legislative consent Motion. I therefore feel it is appropriate to set out publicly and on the record the narrative behind these provisions and, I hope, avoid any misunderstanding of the Government’s position.

I am grateful to noble Lords who have tabled amendments that will provide me with this opportunity. The Government have worked hard to try to secure a negotiated solution specific for Wales in the spirit of the devolution settlement. I must emphasise at the outset that policing is a reserved matter under the devolution settlement. However, there are related matters that are devolved.

At the start of the planning for this reform in government, Ministers in the Home Office sought, and entered into, early engagement with the Welsh Assembly Government at both ministerial and official level. Their intention was to discuss how the Bill would apply in Wales and how it could respect those devolved institutions. On a number of occasions throughout the Bill’s development, the Home Secretary and the Policing Minister met the Welsh Assembly Government's Minister for Social Justice and Local Government, Carl Sargeant, who was reappointed earlier this month to the same ministerial portfolio. Indeed, the Policing Minister also made visits to Cardiff to speak to the Welsh Assembly Minister and his officials to address directly the concerns of the Welsh Assembly Government and the Members in the National Assembly for Wales.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wigley]

I apologise to the House that I missed the earlier part of this debate, although I have heard all of the Minister’s comments. She mentioned the role of local government and that there might be an involvement in the activities that she has just outlined. Can she confirm that each local government area would have a voice in this, as they do at present on the police authorities—a unique situation in Wales, where every authority is represented?

[Baroness Browning]

I have to say to the noble Lord that these negotiations and discussions are still ongoing. However, I hear what he has said and will certainly feed back what he has suggested today.

We have also amended the Bill to ensure that the provisions on community safety partnerships do not touch on matters in respect of which Welsh Assembly Government Ministers have functions. I hope that this account explains how we have reached the provisions set out in the Bill at present. Policing remains reserved. It is this Government’s intention to secure the same reform for the people of Wales as for those in England, following the decision taken in the first session of this Committee. The Bill now removes the current arrangements for policing governance, but I can assure your Lordships’ House that there are ongoing discussions to make sure that we get this absolutely right. I am grateful for the patience of your Lordships’ House. There are amendments that relate specifically to Wales not only in the current group but in subsequent groups.

I turn now to pilots. The amendments tabled by my noble friends would require the Government to pilot police commissions—or police and crime commissioners, as remains the Government’s intent—in certain police areas before establishing them across England and Wales. In the spirit of constructive debate, I will deal with this group as though the amendments affected the original policy and clauses that would have established police and crime commissioners in England and Wales. Your Lordships will know that we are in difficult territory here. We are dealing with two very different bodies in the context of piloting.

I shall not repeat what I have said in debates on previous amendments but I spelt out some of the research that has been done, which clearly demonstrates the public’s appetite for more engagement with policing in their local areas. The success of the crime mapping website launched this year is evidence of this, with 410 million hits since January. Cabinet Office research showed that more than two-thirds of the public wanted an elected person to hold the police to account. I heard what my noble friend Lady Hamwee said about not praying in aid the experience of the Mayor of London. However, I cannot ignore what has happened in London. They mayor is there and the policing structure in London is there, and has been there for a while. While it was not exactly floated as a specific pilot, none the less we cannot ignore the fact that since the Mayor of London took on responsibility for policing, MPA correspondence has more than quadrupled. For these reasons there is no need to conduct pilots to establish these matters. Pilots also present practical problems.

[Baroness Henig]

In the research that the Minister cited, and certainly in the research that I have seen, when members of the public were told that police and crime commissioners would have a party political label, I understand that only 7 per cent of them wanted individuals with a party political label to be in charge of policing. That is not quite the same as what we are being told by the noble Baroness.

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

My Lords, will the Minister accept from me that the fact that people checked on crime in their local area does not give an indication either way? My husband checked but I assure the noble Baroness that he would be very cross were she to assume from that that he is in favour of the Government’s proposals.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I would not dream of presuming what the noble Baroness’s husband has made of all this. That would be a step too far for a mere Minister. My noble friend referred to the uniqueness of police forces across the country. That is the essence of this matter. Each police force is unique in its nature. Nobody is suggesting that what works in London will be exactly replicated in the Devon and Cornwall forces, or any other force. That is why piloting such a scheme would not give us a representative picture of what one sees in forces across the country. It would be interesting perhaps, but I genuinely believe that it would not take us any further forward, and it would cause delay.

There are practical problems associated with pilots, such as how they would be chosen, who would decide that matter and who would be denied democratic policing while they were carried out. Also during the piloting scheme the two different forms of police governance would be running alongside each other, which would cause uncertainty. The noble Lords, Lord Condon and Lord Dear, with their vast experience in this area, referred to the uncertainty that this would create not least among chief constables. We are looking to the chief constables to show the leadership that is needed in working with the police and crime commissioners on these reforms to introduce the change that will allow the public to believe that the duo at the heart of these reforms will make a difference to the way that they see the police and can engage with them and with policing matters in their area.

[Lord Clinton-Davis]

Is the noble Baroness arguing that there are no common factors, or that there are some? Is it not reasonable that where there are some, the alteration that is envisaged should take place?

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, of course, there are common factors across all police forces, although each force is unique. However, notwithstanding those, I believe that spending time on pilots would cause uncertainty, as I have said. Costs and delay would arise in sorting out this publicly recognised issue—that the public want to engage with policing in their area and to be represented by somebody who is democratically accountable directly to them. That very important matter is at the heart of these changes.

Noble Lords have continued to ask about checks and balances. I cannot commit to changing the text of the Bill in order to satisfy the demands with regard to pilots. However, I am genuinely open to discussing checks and balances across the piece. I say to my noble friend Lord Bradshaw that although I have attended meetings, I have not yet held meetings to discuss checks and balances, as I promised the House on the previous Committee day. A letter will be sent out today to those noble Lords who have expressed an interest in the protocol, inviting them to meet immediately after the Recess so that I can hear their views. Other meetings will be offered as the Bill goes through your Lordships’ House. I hope to hold them before the Bill leaves this House. Given those assurances, I hope that the noble Baroness will not press the amendment.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, this has been a serious debate, for which I am grateful. When my noble friend Lord Bradshaw talked about hacking in the garden, I thought that he would mention pulling things up by the roots, but perhaps I should not pursue that. I believe that his reference to meetings concerned an earlier regime—I am not sure whether that is quite the right term—but certainly before the noble Baroness took up her ministerial office. I am grateful to her for her offer to hold discussions throughout the passage of the Bill.

I take very seriously the issue of certainty, which has been raised. I accept that the problem of uncertainty is inherent in the proposal for piloting or trialling. There is certainty and uncertainty on the one hand, and on the other there is getting it right—that is the dilemma we are in—and making sure that there are proper checks and balances, as the noble Lord, Lord Dear, said. The coalition programme for government refers to “strict” checks and balances.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I am grateful to noble Lords for raising the potential implications of the protocol or memorandum of understanding for the non-geographic police forces within England and Wales. Of course, the Bill does not change the governance structures of these bodies. With the exception of the Serious Organised Crime Agency, they are not answerable to the Home Secretary, who is to issue the protocol. The protocol will not vary the interaction between the Home Office and non-geographical forces. That is why in the Bill we have safeguarded the direction and control of chief officers. Through that, their operational interaction with, for example, the British Transport Police and others remains unaffected.

There are also questions about how the protocol, as it is currently conceived, would apply to these bodies, which differ from the geographical police forces significantly in terms of their functions. The Committee has touched on some of these this evening. The governance arrangements and relationship with the public, although overlapping, are often quite different. However, I appreciate that at least some of those forces may benefit from such a protocol being in place. I genuinely welcome further discussion on the merits of widening the protocol's scope.

However, this has not been the immediate focus of the protocol as drafted and we would be keen to discuss that further, including of course detailed discussions with the bodies concerned. I reiterate that Members of the Committee who have expressed an interest in the protocol as currently drafted will receive an invitation to discuss it in more detail with me. Those letters should go out in the next 24 hours. I hope that after the recess we can have a more detailed discussion about that protocol.

The Government expect police and crime commissioners, community safety partnerships and other criminal justice bodies to co-operate in order to deliver the best service to local communities across the force area. Their priority should be tackling crime and disorder for the benefit of the local people. Therefore, they should work together to overcome any particular issues. Clause 10 sets out in legislation a reciprocal duty to co-operate for police and crime commissioners and authorities comprising community safety partnerships. It also requires police and crime commissioners and other criminal justice agencies within their force area such as the probation, prison and court services to make local arrangements to work effectively together.

We want to establish a framework that enables commissioners to develop strong relationships with these key local partners. Those relationships will be critical to commissioners in order to make the most sustainable impact on crime and community safety. The clause sets the foundations for that framework and we expect commissioners and local partners to build on that through strategic engagement and dialogue. They will work together to provide the most effective and efficient response to the needs of their local communities. It is important to see Clause 10 in the context of other measures to advance joint working in the Bill, such as grant-making powers, provisions to elevate crime and disorder strategies to a force-wide level and to commission reports to examine any element of those strategies.

The noble Baroness, Lady Henig, asked specifically about payment by results. I hope that she will find it agreeable for me to write to her on that issue. I know that she focused on Clause 10.

I do not think it necessary to further labour the duty with a memorandum of understanding which has the potential to become burdensome on the professional and experienced services that certain amendments within this group are seeking to bind in law. We have agreed a way forward with the protocol and I hope that noble Lords will avail themselves of making their views on specific issues known to me. However, I want to keep that light touch because there is a danger if too much detail is set into the protocol it will become a burden. That is not what we want it to do.

The noble Lord, Lord Beecham, was concerned that an individual would carry the power and responsibility. But I gently remind the noble Lord that if they are elected by the public, that person, whatever badge they had when they stood for election, would have had to present themselves to the public and convince them that they were able to do the job. They would have to carry out those important functions not just in an honourable way but in a competent way. Therefore, they would have to gain the trust of the public.

This is often the cause of debate. We say that we trust the public, but do we really? I do and I believe that our democratic process is such that if we give the public an opportunity to elect somebody to an important and responsible role such as this—as we do in other areas of our democratic process—we should trust them. The police and crime commissioners will of course have the scrutiny of the panel behind them which will hold them to account and who will be an important check and balance on the way in which they carry out their duties.

[Lord Beecham]

Does the Minister not see that, in all the partnerships that arise, there will be only one person—the elected police commissioner—who stands alone? In no other case will he be engaged with a single individual. He will be dealing with a properly constituted body, whether that is the Lord Chancellor's Department—he will not have a direct relationship with the Lord Chancellor—the Prison Service, the National Offender Management Service or the youth offending teams.

We will have a situation where an individual, elected as the noble Baroness said, deals effectively with a number of corporate bodies. Does that relationship not look odd constitutionally? My noble friend Lord Harris pointed that out. Is there not a danger that, with their having been invested with that elected authority, there may be a temptation, which may be difficult to resist, for an unprecedented—in our system—degree of pressure on other parts of the criminal justice system?

[Baroness Browning]

The Mayor of London might well be described as having similar power as constituted already and already elected. I was not aware at the time that that was an argument brought forward to oppose the powers of the Mayor of London. I do not know whether I am reading the noble Lord correctly. I understand why he is concerned but he has not yet persuaded me. I am sorry to tell him that.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

I am not aware that the Mayor of London currently has powers in respect of the criminal justice bodies that are listed here.

[Baroness Browning]

I hear what noble Lords are saying. I am not persuaded of the argument because I believe that there are sufficient checks and balances as far as the police and crime commissioners are concerned to ensure that they carry out their duties, not only in a robust way but in the way that we would all expect them to carry them out in their relationship with all bodies, whether at a local or national level. I remain unconvinced, I am afraid, by the noble Lord's arguments in that area.

[Baroness Henig]

I also trust the public, but in the only cases that I can see that might be compatible—elected mayors—there have been one or two examples of extremely problematic situations in the past few years. If they were repeated in the policing sphere it would have the most serious consequences.

[Baroness Browning]

I understand why the noble Baroness says that, which is why, of course, the checks and balances need to be in place. We are all frail as human beings, even the highest. That is why the Bill needs to ensure—and I believe it does—that there are checks and balances for police and crime commissioners. That is one of the things we might discuss in our negotiations across the Committee before this Bill leaves it. However, I do not want noble Lords to think that I am persuaded that the principle of a democratically elected police and crime commissioner is something that we are going to depart from. It is the core of the Bill.

[Baroness Farrington of Ribbleton]

The Minister has, with a very welcome style, promised meetings before the Bill leaves the House. In my experience, those meetings would be most helpful prior to Report stage, because it is then much easier for Members with a detailed interest in this legislation to consider what their position will be on Report.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I quite accept that and it would be my intention to do exactly that. There is a gap between Committee and Report and I hope that we can usefully fill the hours in between discussing these matters.

The public, through a police and crime commissioner, will receive a stronger voice within the wider criminal justice system; moreover, the commissioner would act as an advocate for the system’s independence. I do not believe there is a need to restate in this Bill the legal consequences were any individual, irrespective of their public position, to seek to undermine or frustrate the well established legal processes within England and Wales. As with the operational independence of a chief constable, no clauses in this Bill seek to undermine or influence the independence of the judiciary, the Crown Prosecution Service or the legal responsibilities and foundation of other criminal justice bodies.

To that end, it is right and proper that we simply list in Clause 10 those bodies and authorities which the Government expect a PCC to develop a co-operative working relationship with rather than leave it to chance or allow for uncertainty and doubt or, at worst, preach to the converted and issue guidance on how the separate bodies should go about each other’s business.

I am most grateful to noble Lords who have spoken on the subject of the British Transport Police.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

Now that the noble Baroness is leaving the amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, perhaps she could tell us whether she is saying that the sole purpose of Clause 10(4) is to remind these paragons who are going to fulfil these roles in future that these are people they ought to talk to and collaborate with. In that case, it seems unnecessary to include the list in the Bill unless the Government have some further intention in mind going beyond simply saying, “Well, these are people you ought to talk to”.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, the Government have no intention or expectation that they will go further in the way that the noble Lord has outlined. We just felt that it was important to put it in the Bill but not to the point of being prescriptive in any further detail than that. I can assure the noble Lord—if this is what is in the back of his mind—that there is no hidden agenda of mission creep here in terms of the powers. I do not know if I have interpreted what he has said correctly but if that is what he was suspicious of, I hope I can reassure him on that point.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

My Lords, that is an extremely helpful comment. Let me put it round the other way. Does Clause 10 contain within it an expectation that those bodies listed will themselves collaborate? We have heard examples of where some of the individuals and bodies have stuck very carefully to what they regard as their independence and have not seen it as their responsibility to collaborate with other partners.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, we hope that with the election of police and crime commissioners there will be a real culture change in the way in which these bodies work together. We hope that we will break down Chinese walls where bodies do not co-operate and that they will work together where it would definitely be to the public’s advantage that they do. One of the police and crime commissioner’s duties will be to build these relationships and ensure that they advance the fight against crime. That is their objective. We do not want to be too prescriptive in the Bill but, on the other hand, we also want to make the intention behind the role very clear. I reassure the noble Lord that if there are problems at a local level—and there are bound to be, because we are talking about human frailties and people taking positions; we are all familiar with that—a police and crime commissioner will make it his or her priority to rebuild bridges and co-operate right across the piece to ensure that they fulfil the main objective of their job, which is to reduce crime and represent the people’s view on crime reduction in their area. It may sound rather worthy but culture change is not always easy to bring about. It does not always happen simply by dotting every last “i” in the primary legislation.

I turn to the British Transport Police. As I hope noble Lords will recall from exchanges during passage of the Policing and Crime Act 2009, some of the matters that have been raised tonight were to have been considered within the context of the quinquennial review of the British Transport Police Authority, which was to have been carried out under the previous Administration but was not progressed. Nevertheless, this is an opportunity for the Government to re-examine these proposals and to consider them within the wider context of the Government's plan to reform the governance of the 43 Home Office forces within England and Wales. I therefore undertake to consult my ministerial colleagues in the Department for Transport on the various issues raised by these amendments and to consider how they might best be progressed. Once I have done so I will write to noble Lords. I say particularly to the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner of Worcester, that I have just had my ministerial duties defined this week, and alcohol and drug use are included in my responsibilities. I was very interested to hear what he said about the lack of British Transport Police involvement. I promise to take the matter away and consider it as I thought that he made a very strong point.

I am grateful to those who contributed to the debate on these amendments, and I ask those who tabled them to consider not pressing them.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

The noble Baroness has very helpfully addressed a number of the points. However, I am still not clear whether she has addressed the central point of some of these amendments—the call for a statement somewhere of the relationship between the new structures and the non-territorial forces. It is not part of the protocol about operational independence, about which we will no doubt have plenty of interesting discussions; it is about the relationship between police and crime commissioners, or whatever we end up with, and those other forces. For example, I raised some points about the Civil Nuclear Constabulary. I am not sure that the Minister addressed the point about the value of some sort of codification of how these relationships are managed.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I am sorry if I did not make that clear in my remarks, in which I focused very much on the British Transport Police. The same would apply to other forces. We will look at it, and I promise to write to the noble Lord.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, I am not sure that the noble Baroness responded to my amendments on the role of victims and victim organisations and the contribution they can make in the two areas that I mentioned, or indeed to the amendment on community safety partnerships. I think that the word cornucopia was used about this grouping. If these amendments have somehow slipped out of her notes, I hope that she will nevertheless be able to look at the issue. I am particularly concerned that, although the Bill makes a reference to the role of victims and so acknowledges their place in what might be called—to use a term that is used quite often—the wider landscape, I read that as a little bit of a gesture. I would like to see those matters brought far more centrally into the way in which the new arrangements are to operate.

[Baroness Browning]

I quite take the point that the noble Baroness makes. I promise to write to her specifically on those matters.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

I thank the Minister for her helpful comments and responses to what has been a wide-ranging and very full debate—a cornucopia indeed, as has already been mentioned. I think that essentially four issues have been raised, although not necessarily by everybody, as we have gone through the debate.

The first issue concerns the duties of collaboration. As with the last point that has just been raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, I think that there would be room for the Minister to make the offer to write on that in a bit more detail. As my noble friend Lady Henig and the last speaker have pointed out, some of the details might skip out and not be caught properly, so I think that correspondence on those issues might help. The general concern is to flesh out some of the frameworks that are in the Bill so that we have a better understanding, when we go forward to Report stage, about how these things will work.

In that context, there was an exchange between my noble friend Lord Beecham and the Minister on the rather subtle point—it may not have been given enough air to grow and flourish in the debate—about the difference between an individual dealing with a range of corporate bodies and a body corporate, should there be such, that was to have the same responsibilities. That is quite an important issue. Again, we would benefit from having a bit more flesh on why the Minister thinks that a single individual should have that capacity and would not get carried away as was suggested in the discussion. The point was made that, if elected persons such as mayors have a particular remit and take an aggressive stance on some issue, they tend to stray into areas that perhaps were not thought of when a democratic mandate was first given to them. We think here perhaps of the experience in Doncaster.

The second point was about the direction of travel, on which there were also a number of exchanges. I think that we ended up at what is the right place to be, which is that the fact that the “criminal justice system” is explicitly mentioned in the Bill as an area with which the new structure will engage is not meant to mean anything other than is appropriate. On our side, we would like further clarification on that. The idea that there is some sort of creeping organism embedded in the Bill that will somehow express the Home Office’s territorial interests has been rightly rejected by the Minister, but I think that the sense on our side is that we would like a little bit more on that, either in correspondence or perhaps in Hansard, to explain why those particular groups, rather than others, are mentioned and why the Government think that it is appropriate for those groups to be there. In her concluding remarks, I think that the Minister said that nothing should be read into this other than that it makes good sense for these bodies to collaborate.

The third point was on the British Transport Police. I am very grateful for the support that my amendment received from the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, and from my noble friend Lord Faulkner. As I said at the beginning of my remarks opening the debate, the British Transport Police has a long history in policing. This may not be well known to your Lordships, but the phrase “the booking office” comes from the British Transport Police because, in the early days of rail travel, you had to go and book in your travel with the British Transport Police-equivalent at the time before you were permitted to travel. It became known as “the booking office” because the journey was written down in a book—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Henig and the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, have explained the purpose of their amendments, which we are discussing. I want to refer only to one or two aspects.

This group of amendments seeks to address the considerable powers that are given virtually unchecked and unchallenged under the Bill to police and crime commissioners, while very little meaningful power or responsibility is given to the new police and crime panels. As my noble friend Lady Henig has said, the Bill provides for the Secretary of State to determine a commissioner’s salary. We know very little about how the Secretary of State might do this. At one stage, certainly in the media, there were suggestions of six- figure salaries, though it now appears that the Senior Salaries Review Body may be called in.

However, that raises the issue of why the Secretary of State wants to determine directly the salary of a police and crime commissioner. As has been said, the approach seems at odds with the Government’s declared stance of devolving responsibility as far down the line as they can. Is the view that Whitehall knows best on this issue? Is the Secretary of State of the view that each commissioner should be paid the same irrespective of the geographical size and diversity of the area covered, the population of the area, the size of the budget and of the force and the levels of crime? Or is the Secretary of State of the view that commissioners’ salaries should differ? If so, what factors does she consider should be taken into account? How will she take into account any specific local or area factors? Does she intend to take into account the views of the police and crime panels or, indeed, the views of anybody else other than those of the Senior Salaries Review Body, if that is to be used?

I acknowledge the concerns that the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, and probably others, have about some of the salaries that are paid to chief executives of local authorities. But if you devolve responsibility and you believe that that is right, you have to accept the consequences and not simply say that because you are concerned about what might happen you will automatically keep everything at the centre. Of course, the salary of a local authority chief executive is, in that sense, determined by the local authority members, as are the salaries, if any, to be paid to council members and the council leader. One of the amendments spoken to by my noble friend Lady Henig provides for the salary of a police and crime commissioner to be determined by the police and crime panel. The panel should be in a better position than the Secretary of State to know what salary will be appropriate to the responsibilities and complexities of the position, and what salary is likely to be needed to attract appropriate candidates for the position. It could be argued that that would also enhance the position of the panel and provide a check by the panel to the largely untrammelled authority and power given to a commissioner under the terms of the Bill.

We have discussed other amendments relating to the ability to enter into contracts. As was said by the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, the amendments were intended, at least in part, to probe what powers the Bill seeks to give or to remove. We have heard concerns expressed by my noble friend Lord Harris of Haringey about some of the amendments spoken to by the noble Baroness.

I hope that because most of my comments related to the determination of the salary the Minister will recognise the concerns behind the amendments on salaries, reflect that in her response, respond to the concerns expressed by my noble friend Lord Harris about the provision that appears to prohibit an elected policing body from entering into a collaboration agreement with another elected local policing body, and explain the Government’s thinking behind that.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, the Bill provides for the Home Secretary to determine the salary of Police and Crime Commissioners. These are unique positions, being directly elected. The Home Secretary has asked the Senior Salaries Review Board to make recommendations to the appropriate levels of pay by September this year. The SSRB is now calling for evidence to help it to decide on its recommendations. Furthermore, the SSRB will consult with partners as it considers appropriate, and this will ensure further that its recommendation takes into account the views of relevant groups.

Specifically, the Home Secretary has asked the SSRB to recommend pay arrangements that are adequate to encourage, retain and motivate candidates of sufficient quality; recognise the extremely challenging fiscal climate and wider constraints of public funding; meet the demands and expectations of the public in terms of getting value for money; reflect the essence of the role as an elected public figurehead and ambassador; provide transparency and robustness in determining PCC pay levels; recommend an approach to establishing PCC pay levels that is simple to administer and is based on a range of single salary points pay structures; and take account of, where applicable, the salary levels and responsibilities of other similar roles in the wider public sector, including elected executive mayors, MPs and MEPs. We believe that these requirements will ensure a fair pay level for PCCs, which I believe is the concern expressed by noble Lords.

The salary payable to a chief constable is one benchmark, but only one. There are other criteria that must be considered, such as demographics. In any event, the job of a chief constable is very different to that of a PCC. The SSRB provides independent advice to the Prime Minister, the Lord Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Defence on the remuneration of holders of judicial office, senior civil servants, senior officers of the armed forces, and other such public appointments as may from time to time be specified. We believe that the SSRB is the right body to provide independent advice on the levels of PCCs’ salaries. Noble Lords have said that these are probing amendments, and I therefore ask for them to be withdrawn or not moved.

I turn now to contracts. The wording used in the Bill,

“contracts and other agreements (whether legally binding or not)”,

is designed to make it clear that the mayor’s office and the PCC can enter into contracts—in other words, agreements creating legal rights and liabilities, and agreements with no legal force, such as memoranda of understanding, protocols or service-level agreements. If the proposed amendments were made, the Bill would merely refer to “agreements”. Because a legally binding contract is a kind of agreement, we would say that the PCC would still be able to enter into a contract and there would not actually be any effect on the scope of the PCC’s powers.

I turn now to the amendments in relation to protection from personal liability. I understand that the intention is to reduce the protection available to the office of the PCC and its staff by reversing the burden of proof in relation to whether a questioned act or omission was done in good faith. Under the Bill as it stands, a person who challenged an act or omission of the PCC would have to prove that it was done in bad faith. The effect of the amendments would be that it would be for the PCC to prove that the questioned act was done in good faith. The concern here is with civil proceedings where the standard of proof is on the balance of probabilities. Whether it is the claimant who has to prove that it is more likely than not that the PCC acted in bad faith, or the PCC who has to prove that it is more likely than not that it acted in good faith, is unlikely to matter in most cases.

I should also stress that these provisions are concerned only with the personal liability of the person holding the office of commissioner for policing and crime and their employees. The provisions do not restrict the liability of the office itself, and a claimant harmed by an act or omission of the PCC or their staff in the exercise of their functions would still have legal redress against the office.

Bearing in mind the high-profile nature of the role of the PCC and the difficult issues that it will have to deal with, it may be a tempting target for legal challenge. We would not want the office or its staff to carry out their duties in a defensive fashion, out of fear of attracting personal legal liability for their actions. Rather, the Bill as drafted strikes the right balance in allowing the legitimate claimant legal redress, while giving the PCC a sensible level of legal protection.

Much has been said about the supply of goods and services. I should stress that Clause 15(3) merely replicates Section 18(3) of the Police Act 1996, which applies to police authorities at present. The provision is not new. Noble Lords asked particularly about this, and perhaps I may examine what the amendments would do. We do not believe that there is a particular advantage in using the Local Authorities (Goods and Services) Act 1970 with policing partners instead of the Police Act collaboration agreement provisions. The 1970 Act simply allows for agreements to be made about the provision of goods and services. However, when both parties concerned are policing bodies, making an agreement under the 1970 Act would circumvent the safeguards in the police collaboration provisions of the Police Act 1996, which would take priority. For example, there would be no requirement to have regard to any guidance issued by the Home Secretary to provide advice on best practice in drawing up agreements, and there would be no requirement for consultation with the relevant chief constables before making the agreement.

Other noble Lords have raised the matter of panels in this group of amendments. Although I recognise the intention to ensure that all panels, regardless of how they are established, are treated equally in the provision of financial resources, that is already the case. It is for that reason that I resist the amendments. Funding for all panels will be borne by the Secretary of State, regardless of whether they are established by local authorities or by the Secretary of State. For panels established by local authorities, paragraph 11 of Schedule 6 makes clear that it is for local authorities themselves to decide how that money is paid to or distributed between themselves. The Secretary of State will provide funds amounting to those required for a scrutiny officer and to cover running costs of meetings, which will be distributed at the discretion of the legal authority. That leaves local authorities the freedom to establish their own processes.

For panels established by the Secretary of State, in the case of Wales, or where no panel was formed under other circumstances, it cannot be left to local authorities to make those arrangements. In those cases, the Secretary of State will work directly with the panel to provide financial resources. That is what paragraph 20 of Schedule 6 provides. The liabilities of police and crime panels established by local authorities will be borne by the relevant local authorities, as they are with other local authority committees. The liabilities relating to panels established by the Secretary of State will be borne by the Secretary of State.

If I have not answered any specific questions, some of which were quite technical, I apologise and I will ensure that they are responded to by letter. I hope that, under the circumstances, the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

I seek a little more clarification about Amendment 94 and the response given about elected policing bodies not entering into collaboration agreements. I understand that that takes forward a heavily amended bit of the Police Act 1996. I think that I am right to say that there is no consolidated Police Act available for us to refer to, so it is difficult to track through the changes. The previous Government had a policing Act at least once a year, so there were always changes to confuse one.

Is it being said that the prohibition is here because other arrangements permit the same thing to happen between elected policing bodies? Is the wording of police authorities changed in the Police Act 1996 to permit that?

[Baroness Browning]

I do not want to venture into territory where I may in any way mislead the noble Lord, but my understanding is that Clause 15 provides support for more effective collaboration arrangements between forces by securing that where an arrangement can be properly made by a collaboration agreement with another force rather than contracted out, the collaboration agreement should take priority. That is already established in statute.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness. If it is the case that collaboration agreements are entered into between what under this terminology would be the elected policing bodies, that is helpful. I was slightly surprised that one reason given why that was the preferable arrangement was that it removed a requirement to take account of guidance issued by the Home Office on how such arrangements might operate, given that I understood that the intention of government policy was that there would be far less guidance from the centre in future and that it would all be left to local action by the elected policing bodies.

[Baroness Browning]

I hope that I can assist the noble Lord by telling him that a police authority may not enter into an agreement with another police authority under Section 1 of the 1970 Act in respect of a matter which could be the subject of a police authority collaboration agreement. If I have understood that correctly, the collaboration agreements take priority.

[Baroness Henig]

I thank the noble Baroness for her response on the financial issues. She was so kind as to say in our previous setting that she was a listening Minister; we all appreciate that. I reiterate that I have no problem with the national framework but what I wanted was some local variation within it. I have no problem with the Senior Salaries Review Board undertaking its work; that is absolutely appropriate. I have no difficulty with the points made by the noble Lord. I want a national framework, but I am asking that within it, there should be the possibility of local variation.

The reason for that is straightforward. The whole purpose, as I understood it, of the introduction of commissioners is to empower the public in local policing. One area that the public will be interested in is the salaries of those individuals. If there was some way in which there could be a local dimension in setting the salaries within a national structure, that would be helpful in enabling local people to feel involved in the whole exercise. I was trying to bring an element of localism into this, while of course not ruling out that there should be a national framework in which it will operate. I listened carefully to the Minister and will happily withdraw my amendment.

[Baroness Browning]

I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, but a thought has just occurred to me. There is always the danger with salaries, particularly with someone who is elected, that a Dutch auction ensues of who will do it for least. We want to get value for money in setting the salaries, but we want the salary to be fair. With elected positions, there is a danger in how the candidate might canvass the electorate in trying to bid themselves down. That will give an advantage to people with a lot of personal wealth or a lot of money behind their campaign. I think that the Home Secretary, with SSRB recommendations, is a much more stand-apart arrangement and would mean that we would not go down that route.

[Lord Beecham]

Does the noble Baroness’s statement that we should trust the electorate to choose not extend to their capacity to distinguish the cases to which she referred?

[Baroness Browning]

The noble Lord is quite right to chide me. In fact, as I was saying it, I remembered my words to him earlier; they were ringing in the back of my mind. This is not about the electorate; this is about the motivations of the candidate who is not as worthy as we would like to apply for these positions. If the salary has been set by a body such as the SSRB, through the Home Secretary, it is complete and divorced from anything that a candidate might say in seeking to put themselves forward or any questions a candidate may be asked during their selection.

[Lord Rosser]

I hope that the noble Baroness would accept that even if the Secretary of State was determining the salary, someone could fight an election knowing what the salary was and running their campaign on the basis that they would send half of it back.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Browning]

Off the top of my head, given that many people’s salaries are set by the SSRB—I declare an interest that for many years mine was—I do not recall any of them sending any of it back.

[Lord Rosser]

Does that not show that the fears just expressed by the Minister are unlikely ever to occur?

[Baroness Browning]

No, my Lords, because in another place, where I served for nearly 20 years, it was not an uncommon practice—not when one appeared before the electorate but in the selection process—for people to be asked about their financial position with a view to that influencing the selection process. I think it is much healthier to have that professionally assessed and divorced from anything to do with either the selection or the election of the police and crime commissioners.

[Baroness Henig]

I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

UK Border Agency

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Wednesday 18th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dholakia]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their response to the report by Mr John Vine, independent chief inspector of the UK Border Agency, Preventing and Detecting Immigration and Customs Offences, published on 13 May.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

The UK Border Agency has issued a full response to the chief inspector’s report. We accept all 10 of his recommendations, eight in full and two in part. I will place a copy of the response in the Library.

[Lord Dholakia]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the clarity of her Answer. In the present climate, terrorists pose a serious threat to the security of the United Kingdom. What is being done to establish proper co-ordination between the work of the UKBA and our intelligence services, something that was identified in the Vine report? I ask the Minister to ensure that the allegations made in the 100,000 calls made by the public to the agency each year are recorded and published, particularly to build confidence that adequate measures are being taken to protect people against immigration and customs offences.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Browning]

I hope that I can reassure my noble friend. At the time when the inspection of the UKBA was being conducted, the agency was in fact part way through a programme to assess how it manages intelligence. My noble friend is right to point out that intelligence is absolutely key to securing our borders. That is why the agency is willing to accept the report because it will inform the action that will be taken to ensure that intelligence operations are improved. My noble friend also asked about reports made by the public. One of the recommendations in the chief inspector’s report deals with that. We have accepted the recommendation and intend to take action on it.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, it is welcome that the recommendations are accepted, but does the noble Baroness accept that they are one of a number of responsibilities being placed on the UK Border Agency that include the immigration cap, the student visa system and the policy of preventing the children of failed asylum seekers being held in detention, which the Government have still to implement, as well as the issue that we discussed yesterday, that of returning asylum seekers to the Democratic Republic of Congo and other countries? Yet the UK Border Agency’s budget is being reduced by 20 per cent. Is the noble Baroness confident that the UKBA can do all this and at the same time cope with the massive disruption brought by reductions in budget and staff?

[Baroness Browning]

I hope I can reassure the noble Lord that I do believe that that is possible. That is why the emphasis on intelligence and the way it is gathered and disseminated has been a key plank of the new Government’s negotiation with the UK Border Agency over how it operates in future. We regard security of the borders as a very high priority for all the reasons that the noble Lord mentioned. Intelligence is so important here that making sure that the agency maximises the efficiency of its intelligence operation is why we have quite openly accepted the recommendations of the chief inspector’s report. We are anxious to improve security with all the help we can get, including from this report.

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, the Minister will be aware that one of the recommendations of the report pointed to the need to focus on those responsible for organising and facilitating the illegal entry of people and goods rather than on the individuals. Does she agree that we owe that not just to the British people as a matter of securing the borders but, as a duty of care, to the people who are imported from overseas into slavery? This is big business; it is a matter of human decency.

[Baroness Browning]

I totally agree with my noble friend. The agency is very clear that the processes that it uses are as important as the efficiency with which it uses intelligence. As my noble friend has indicated, it needs to make sure that fairness is also at the heart of the way in which it conducts its business.

[Lord Tomlinson]

On overseas students who are in this country—I remind Members of my earlier declaration of interest—does the Minister accept that the state university system would be a much more secure place if we knew precisely where the students who have been given visas actually are? Will she try to encourage the UK Border Agency to follow the lead given by some private sector higher education colleges in introducing a system of digital identification at lectures so that we know precisely where our students are and exactly what their record of attending lectures is?

[Baroness Browning]

I am very grateful for that suggestion and am very happy to follow up on it.

[Lord Roberts of Llandudno]

Is the Minister confident that for those with different languages coming into the United Kingdom there are officers who can communicate with them effectively when they arrive here?

[Baroness Browning]

If the due process of law and the regulations are to be followed properly, that is an essential ingredient. If my noble friend felt that this was causing a problem at any point for people receiving due process of law and regulation, I would certainly wish to investigate it.

[Lord Avebury]

My Lords, will my noble friend say anything about the use of intelligence to improve the quality of decision-making by the UKBA, which, as we heard only recently, is incapable of making decisions on a regular basis that are not challenged successfully on appeal?

[Baroness Browning]

This is an area in which the agency has openly accepted, particularly in response to this report on intelligence, that it needs to make improvements. It is genuinely looking to improve the way in which it carries out its functions.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Wednesday 18th May 2011 Lords Chamber

The Thames Valley police force is roughly analogous to the diocese of Oxford and to what used to be called the Oxford Regional Health Authority area of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, is right: there is no heart; it is a false area; there is nothing really that brings it together. But even in the West Midlands, my own patch now, if you had one person who came from Coventry, what confidence would there be in Wolverhampton? I think that there would be great concern, because you would have lost the balance that you have with our current police authorities. That is why it is so important, if we are to continue with a single commissioner, either elected or appointed, first, to ensure, as my noble friend wishes to do, that there are regular engagements between that individual and the communities; and, secondly, to strengthen the role of the panel. The panel will consist of elected councillors from the different local authorities. They will be able to provide some connect between the work of the police and the local community, but they will be able to do so only if they have sufficient authority and power to exercise proper checks and balances in relation to the police commissioner.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to the debate. Perhaps I may begin by putting something on the record, because many noble Lords have mentioned the operational independence of the police. In particular, the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, drew attention, I believe, to the case of Madeleine McCann. I can assure your Lordships that there was no question of the Home Secretary directing the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police to carry out this exercise. Due to the international expertise that exists in the Met, there were discussions between the Home Office and the Metropolitan Police. The commissioner took the operational decision to support the investigation on that basis. It was felt appropriate that funding should flow from the Home Office because of the additional costs associated with policing that case. I hope that that reassures people who have been concerned about that aspect of it.

For the benefit of noble Lords who were not here last week when we produced the protocol document, perhaps I should also repeat that the whole area of governance, and the relationship between a police and crime commissioner and the chief constable, is set out in a draft document that is still open to consultation. I hope in due course to have further discussions with Members across the House so that we might see how that document can be improved. Again, the governance and independence of the police are key to that document.

This is an unusual debate by any standards of what has taken place in the House previously, and I shall attempt to address as much of what has been said as I can, given the circumstances. I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Harris, is having difficulties with her voice at the moment, but if she is able formally to move her Amendment 31, which proposes a new model of governance, a police commission, perhaps we might then have a little more clarity in our proceedings, because the amendments in the group which we have been discussing are consequential to that amendment. None the less, I shall try to be as constructive as possible in relation to what has been said today.

I was asked about the role of the PCC in tackling crime; the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, referred to it in her opening remarks. Had the Bill not been amended as it was last Wednesday, the PCC would have been empowered to make grants to community safety partnerships within their force areas. It was envisaged that the PCC would determine local priorities for crime reduction and who was best placed to handle both the symptoms and, crucially, the causes of crime within their force area.

The amendments propose a new model whereby a police and crime commission will be created, consisting of a police and crime panel with the power to elect a police and crime commissioner. If you directly elect an individual, you have to be able to allow that individual to carry out the mandate on which they have been successfully elected. The elected individual needs strong and effective checks and balances—I am in total agreement with that. What is proposed, however, is not an effective check and balance but a slow and bureaucratic decision made by committee.

In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, I assume that the police and crime panel to which the amendments refer is the panel as set out in the Bill. This is fundamentally the same model as we have now with police forces accountable to police authorities—a model which, as was discussed last Wednesday, simply does not provide the public with a mechanism for holding their police service to account. The proposed model would fail to provide the democratic accountability that policing needs and the public demand. If anything, it turns the clock back. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, mentioned the watch-committee style of policing governance which was abolished in 1964. The model proposed, as I understand it, would place politicians in control, with no direct accountability to the public, which is what the original provision sought to do. The watch-committee style of system, with politicians in control but with no direct accountability to the public, resulted in corruption and politicisation of the police. On the first day in Committee, the noble Baroness, Lady Hilton of Eggardon, and the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, respectively reminded your Lordships of the cases of Chief Constable Athelstan Popkess in Nottingham and of Councillor Bookbinder in Derbyshire. Surely we do not want to return to that.

Amendment 19, to which the noble Lord, Lord Laming, spoke, would add to the list of duties on which the police and crime commissioner should hold the chief constable to account. The noble Lord was concerned that it should mention duties imposed by any enactment, specifically those under the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Children Act 2004. All of us here want our police to comply with all their statutory duties. That is why Clause 1(7) already provides for the PCCs to hold the chief constable to account for the exercise of all their functions, which naturally include those legal obligations with which the chief constable must comply. The Government are happy to take this opportunity to reassure the Committee, because I know that views on this are widely held, that they take very seriously compliance with the Human Rights Act and the Children Act. However, the inclusion of the duties under those Acts, let alone every other enactment, would muddy the list of functions which are particularly important for PCCs. The Government do not consider it necessary to include the provisions of the Human Rights Act or the Children Act in Clause 1(8), much as the provisions of those statutes are of course recognised to be important.

However, given the strength of feeling that has been expressed today, we are willing to revisit this point and to ensure that the correct balance is struck between the general and specific duties of the chief constable. I make the offer of one-to-one discussions as the Bill progresses with noble Lords who have a particular interest in this area to make sure that we get that balance right.

[Lord Laming]

I thank the Minister most warmly for that. I gladly accept the opportunity to have a discussion.

[Baroness Browning]

I will be very pleased and willing to set up such a meeting.

The amendments of the noble Lords, Lord Hunt, Lord Rosser and Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, require the PCC to arrange public forums for a police area. Much has been said today about the need for public forums and interface with the general public. We expect PCCs to engage regularly with the public and with representatives of communities in the police area. However, we also expect PCCs to decide how best to go about that engagement. They would be democratically elected and held accountable to their electorate. We would also expect the police and crime panel to have an overview of how that function is carried out.

PCCs would have been accountable directly to the public. The noble Baroness, Lady Henig, queried this in her opening remarks but there would have been no doubt in the Bill that they would have been directly accountable to the public. That is why the Bill, as introduced, contains provisions in Clause 14 to ensure that the PCC is required to obtain the views of the community. Clause 34 also makes it a statutory requirement for police forces to have regular meetings within their neighbourhoods and to develop other innovative ways of engaging their communities to ensure that they talk to a representative and diverse group. I hope that assures noble Lords who have been concerned that the police would be divorced from the public by the proposed changes in the original drafting of the Bill; that is neither the intention nor the outcome of the original drafting. We believe that this is sufficient assurance to ensure that PCCs’ policing arrangements reflect the priorities of the community, which is most important.

Noble Lords have already made their intentions clear in respect of Amendment 31, which I shall refer to as “the new model”. We shall not object to that amendment if it is moved later in our proceedings. However, it is not necessary to make these changes as well and I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment and for noble Lords not to move theirs.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

The Committee will be grateful to the Minister for the way in which she has addressed the issues raised in the debate and for the extent to which she is clearly prepared to engage with the House on them. However, I would be grateful for an indication of the Government’s intentions on this matter. Clearly it will go back to the House of Commons. At the moment we have the amendments approved by the House last week, and when in due course we get to Amendment 31 that will no doubt be approved by the House without further discussion. However, assuming that it does not magically become the desire of the Government to achieve what is contained in the amendments, no doubt they will come back with something not very dissimilar from what we started with.

I take from her tone that the Minister wants to engage with Members of this House in making the detail work. Presumably, therefore, she would wish to see amendments passed to the rest of the fabric of the Bill—the consequential matters contained in my noble friend’s amendments—so as to provide hooks on which she on behalf of the Government can respond to the concerns of Members of the House. Clearly if my noble friend withdraws the amendment today and we carry on not making further changes to the Bill, all that will go back to the House of Commons will be those five amendments the noble Baroness, Lady Harris of Richmond, spoke to last week. That will not provide enough space for the Government to respond constructively in the way in which I am sure the Minister would wish.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his remarks because we are in rather uncharted and new territory—not least myself. My approach to this is that before the Bill returns to another place—between now and then—I am willing to engage with noble Lords across the House in areas where we might seek negotiation and concession. In that way, when the Bill is presented before another place, it will reflect the views of noble Lords, even though because of the technical constraints now before us we may not have had the fullest debate that we might have had, had the amendment not been carried last Wednesday. I am genuinely keen to be constructive, as I pointed out last week in the discussion about the protocol. It is a draft document which contains some important points about the relationship between the police and crime commissioner and the chief constable, and the whole question of the governance and independence of the police. It has been consulted on very widely with the relevant authorities but there is still room for Members of the House to have an input into it.

On specific issues—for example, on police and crime panels—I am happy to sit down with noble Lords. I can make no promises off the top of my head about what changes might be made, but I am willing to explore where they may be made. If we can come to agreement, even if it is outside the Chamber, I hope that will be reflected when the Bill comes before another place.

However, I must be quite honest with the House: it has been already stated by the Home Secretary publicly that, following on from our debate last week and the result of the vote, it would be the Government’s intention —I am sure this comes as no surprise—to seek in another place to reinstate directly elected police and crime commissioners. However, outwith that, further discussions can take place to take account of genuinely held concerns in areas where many in the House have a great deal of expertise and experience and feel keenly about matters.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

I am grateful to the noble Baroness—I am sorry to prolong this—for that extremely helpful statement. However, I am slightly confused procedurally. I do not suggest that the noble Baroness will be able to answer this tonight but I hope that within the course of the next few Committee days she will be able to give a definitive view. Presumably, at some stage before the Bill leaves this House, if it is possible to reach agreement on issues outwith the prime question on which I understand the Home Secretary has clearly expressed her views, that will mean amendments being brought forward, either on Report or Third Reading, which will put into place those areas where agreement has been reached.

[Baroness Browning]

I admit openly that I am probably just as confused as the noble Lord is about the procedural matters that will follow. I have to take advice on an almost hourly basis. A great deal will depend on how Part 1 of the Bill progresses. I will have to take legal advice on into which context we put amendments that have been debated or voted on. At the end of the day, noble Lords may well have to take my word that concessions that we have agreed to will appear not in subsequent stages in this House but in another place. It will depend on the technicalities, which are for those with more expertise than me—on whom I rely—to know. I am genuine in my desire to make progress and to be as constructive as possible, but we are constrained in what we can and cannot do now because of where we are.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

I am grateful. I understand we are constrained; I am worried that we should not be even further constrained by the fact that when the Bill emerges from here at Third Reading, in whatever form it is, it is then not possible for the other place to look at those issues about which the Minister has given reassurances simply because there are no extant amendments to those clauses where a concession might be appropriate. I am not suggesting that the Minister should try to address that matter today—I realise that a lot of work will have to be done on it—but it is an important point.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

My Lords, the Minister may help me on the salary intended to be paid to the commissioner, but my understanding is that we are talking about a six-figure salary.

[Baroness Browning]

It is a matter that we believe the Senior Salaries Review Board should determine.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath]

I cannot anticipate what the board will decide, but I would have thought it inconceivable that anyone would be elected who said that they would treat this post as a part-time post. I think we have all been working on the assumption that this will be a full-time responsibility. I would much prefer it to be a non-executive appointment around a strong corporate governance structure. That would be most satisfactory. In the construct that the Government had in the original Bill, before noble Lords sought to improve it last week, it would inevitably have been a full-time job. My great fear is that to justify re-election, if the commissioner is to be elected, or reappointment, if the commissioner is to be appointed, the commissioner will spend day after day interfering in the work of the chief constable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

Since the noble Baroness, Lady Farrington, has taken this up with me, she and I know each other very well—we have worked together on matters relating to local government for the best part of 30 years—and I do not in the least mind being rebuked by her. However, I am trying to make the Bill work better by all of us attending to what might otherwise mislead.

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, when the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Haringey, mentioned Flanders and Swann and a song, I thought that he was going to quote “The Bindweed and the Honeysuckle” because they both strove and ended up in the same place by climbing around each other and working together. I thought that perhaps he was going to draw the example of how closely the chief constable and the police and crime commissioner would work—in other words, there would be contact between them and a strong working relationship.

Before I respond specifically to the amendments, I would like to say that I stood for elected office at general elections on five occasions. Many in this House—most, in fact—will know what it is like to be part of a political party, to campaign and so on. It is all great fun and all very serious stuff, but for most people who aspire to and achieve elected office, once they are elected, the fact that they wear a party badge does not necessarily mean that that influences everything that they do in their working life, representing people who have not necessarily voted for them. So I have a much more open view when noble Lords describe elected police and crime commissioners being badged as Labour, Conservative, Liberal Democrat or whatever. I think that most people who are serious about elected office—of course many of them will come via a party route, but not all—try, having achieved that office, to do the job to the best of their ability for the good of the community that they serve, regardless of party politics. That has been my experience, having served in another place. I hope that noble Lords will take some encouragement from that; I do not share their concerns that police and crime commissioners will be seen as simply representing any one political party if they have stood on a party ticket or been known to be associated with a party.

My noble friends Lady Hamwee and Lord Shipley’s Amendments 16 and 52, allowing for the police and crime commissioner to act in conjunction with the chief constable when carrying out the PCC office core functions, appear to me to be a step too far in seeking to ensure that the PCC is legally bound to act in all respects in partnership with the chief constable. The duty that has been conferred on the police and crime commissioner by Clause 1(6), to which the amendment refers, simply lifts the current legal duty placed on each police authority today and places it firmly on the police and crime commissioner. It would be difficult for the police and crime commissioner of a force area to deliver the duty of the current police authority to maintain an efficient and effective force if they were bound to abide by that duty with the same chief constable that they are required to hold to account. This is not the case now, nor should it be in future.

Further amendments that were laid by the noble Lords, Lord Hunt, Lord Rosser and Lord Stevenson, seek to protect the operational independence of chief police officers—something to which the House returns with these amendments—while at the same time placing a specific prohibition against the police and crime commissioner doing anything that would lead to the chief constable breaching his or her oath of office as a constable. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, raised that. Nothing in the Bill makes any changes to the office of constable or to those provisions in the Police Act 1996 that already establish the oath in law.

I draw your Lordships’ attention again to the draft protocol that has been submitted, which has been mentioned. There are areas about the protocol that we need to discuss collectively in this House. The Government have not yet determined whether the document should be placed on a statutory footing. That is an important aspect of the protocol, on which I would be interested to hear colleagues’ views from across the House.

The draft protocol goes beyond the proposed amendments that we are discussing to provide a suitable safeguard on matters related to command and control, and seeks to address the entire relationship between the PCC and the chief constable. I remind the House that, in drafting the protocol, the Government have taken great care to consult ACPO, the APA and the Association of Police Authority Chief Executives. We have committed to working with partners and with Members of this House to develop the draft into an effective tool that will set out the principles and the relationship and interaction between the parties that should follow.

I turn to Amendment 40A. The noble Lords’ drafting of the new clause is laudable. I do not believe that anyone in this House would disagree with the fundamental principles that are set out. However, I suggest that it is not necessary or desirable to set out these principles in the Bill. As I said, the Government have been working hard in partnership with others to produce the draft protocol, and within the protocol are enshrined the same principles as are outlined here. I am not going to go through each of them at the moment, because I am aware that we have spent quite lot of time on this amendment. However, they are important principles; all of them have merit in their own right and this is something that we need to come back to in the context of the protocol.

The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, said that he would not read out the oath, but it is worth remembering the attestation at this stage because it is important. A police constable swears:

“I ... do solemnly and sincerely declare and affirm that I will well and truly serve the Queen in the office of constable, with fairness, integrity, diligence and impartiality, upholding fundamental human rights and according equal respect to all people; and that I will, to the best of my power, cause the peace to be kept and preserved and prevent all offences against people and property; and that while I continue to hold the said office I will to the best of my skill and knowledge discharge all the duties thereof faithfully according to law”.

When a police constable swears that oath—it applies to all constables, however high up the career ladder they go—we as politicians should respect it in the context in which it will be kept. I am sure that we can trust chief constables particularly to keep that oath, knowing that they have made it and therefore are bound by it, and will not be forced to show partiality or depart from that oath on the basis that they might be leant on by anyone.

Asylum Seekers: Democratic Republic of Congo

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Tuesday 17th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the evidence for their assessment that asylum seekers returned to the Democratic Republic of Congo will be safe.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

My Lords, failed asylum seekers are returned to the Democratic Republic of Congo only when we and the courts are satisfied that it is safe to do so. The Court of Appeal in December 2008 upheld the finding of the immigration and asylum Upper Tribunal that failed asylum seekers returning to the Democratic Republic of Congo were not at risk of persecution merely because of their involuntary return. Furthermore, inquiries made by the Foreign Office in Kinshasa have found no evidence that the returnees removed from the UK to the DRC have been mistreated. Nevertheless, each case will be considered on its individual merits.

[The Lord Bishop of Winchester]

My Lords, I declare an interest as patron of the Southampton and Winchester Visitors Group and welcome the Minister to her new responsibilities. This is the third time I have asked this question. Each time I have had the same ostrich-like unsatisfactory answer from two different Governments and three different Ministers. It is a real puzzle to me that the noble Baroness can give me these assurances if the Government and the Border Agency undertake no follow-up and rely for their information on those with whom those who return will not talk in the face of the information that they give to those with whom they have talked. Is the noble Baroness really up to speed with the number and consistency of reports of ill-treatment that constantly come back to this country and tally with the material about abuse and other things in the very country-of-information material of the Home Office itself?

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I am concerned to hear what the right reverend Prelate has said about his previous attempts to shine some light on this problem. Certainly, if through him or any organisation he puts the Home Office in contact with, there is evidence that needs to be examined or even re-examined, he has my personal assurance that that will be done.

[Lord Avebury]

Is there a policy of refusing DRC asylum seekers on the grounds that, although they might be at risk in certain areas of the country, they should internally migrate to somewhere else where they would be free of persecution? Can the noble Baroness remind us what the courts have had to say about this policy of internal migration?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, I cannot give my noble friend a factual account today of what the courts have said about internal migration because I have focused on what happens to returnees, and it was in that context that I responded to the right reverend Prelate. However, I give the noble Lord this opportunity, if he would like to take it. If he has evidence of a matter that we should be looking at as a Government, I will have it examined. I should add that I have had briefings that show that third parties, NGOs and others have brought cases to our attention but there has been no follow through yet in asking for specific evidence that we can investigate.

[Lord Dholakia]

How much emphasis does the Minister place on matters relating to in-country reports, particularly those produced by Amnesty International? Is there systematic monitoring of the cases of the returned asylum seekers?

[Baroness Browning]

I can assure my noble friend that in respect of the Democratic Republic of Congo, we have no recent reports, from NGOs, the UNHCR or other such bodies, that remain to be investigated. Yet again, if there are internal reports that we should be made aware of, I would be interested to receive them because my understanding is that there is very thorough communication within the Democratic Republic of Congo and through our advice received in this country, and as yet I have seen no evidence of individual cases or trends that need to be looked at. I should add that a new report is coming forward this summer. It will be a year since we saw the last consolidated report, and it would be very helpful if that information was available to incorporate into the new report.

[The Earl of Sandwich]

Will the Home Office strengthen its links with the International Organisation for Migration, which has the responsibility for following up these people?

[Baroness Browning]

I am very happy to agree to that, and I will ask officials to look specifically at what the noble Earl has suggested.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, this is Christian Aid week, and up and down the country large numbers of people are raising funds to alleviate poverty in the most needy parts of the world, including the Democratic Republic of Congo. Is it not unfortunate in this of all weeks that any Minister should suggest a weakening of the commitment in the coalition agreement to enshrine spending 0.7 per cent of national income on overseas development aid? Is the Minister in a position to affirm that that commitment remains intact?

[Baroness Browning]

I am most grateful to the right reverend Prelate, who I am very pleased to say I was able to work with on occasion in another place. I am able to give that guarantee on behalf of the coalition Government. That is the Government’s stated position, and that is the policy we shall pursue.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

My Lords, why are the children of failed asylum seekers still held in detention in spite of Mr Nick Clegg’s promise that the coalition would end it?

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, we take very seriously the question of children. It is a matter that, coming new to this brief, I particularly wish to focus on. We will do all we can because we realise that the wider family, and children in particular, are particularly affected, and it is very important that while we carry out the procedures that are necessary to assess asylum seekers’ status, we take a humanitarian approach to the younger children.

Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Monday 16th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Avebury and Lord Hunt, for the opportunity to debate these Motions. A large number of points have been raised and I will do my best to deal with the issues to which they give rise.

The Motions before us deal with two distinct subjects: changes to the rules relating to domestic violence, which were addressed by the noble Lord, Lord Avebury: and changes to tier 4 of the points-based system, which are covered by the Motion of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. Both noble Lords raised matters of progress on the part of the Home Office and the way in which we have made information available. I hope to deal with that point, which applies to both the noble Lords’ Motions. I will deal with the Motions in turn, starting with the Motion of the noble Lord, Lord Avebury.

Domestic violence is an important issue. The noble Lord is quite right to say that it is an area where the Government are only too well aware that we need to balance two equally important principles: first, that residence in the UK is a privilege reserved for those who can make a positive contribution to the UK and abide by its rules; and, secondly, that victims of domestic violence should be protected. We, of course, attach great importance to that.

As has been mentioned, the Home Secretary has made clear the Government’s and her own personal commitment to tackling violence against women in all its forms. Tackling domestic violence is an important part of the overall strategy and we have made clear our commitment to supporting and protecting its victims. Every year approximately 1,200 people, who had come to this country to marry, apply to the UK Border Agency for indefinite leave to remain following incidents of domestic violence, so it is not such a small problem after all. The UK Border Agency gives priority to these domestic violence cases, which are dealt with proactively by specialist case workers. Improvements in the process have ensured that decisions are made quickly and fairly. Currently, more than 62 per cent of domestic violence applications are decided within 20 days. In 2010, leave was granted in 67 per cent of cases.

As has been mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, some applicants face a particular problem because they are destitute and have no recourse to public funds. When I was first presented with this brief, I too had a lot of questions for officials, particularly around what constituted a minor crime. I share her concern that we have to make sure that we get this right. She gave examples of offences such as shoplifting and the non-payment of TV licences. The Government have recognised the risk that women in this position might feel trapped in an abusive relationship. Because of this we have continued to fund the Sojourner Project to provide refuge places for these vulnerable victims. In just over one year of operation, the project has provided vital support to 725 women and more than 420 children. However, Sojourner is not a long-term, sustainable solution, so we have announced that after April 2012 women on spousal visas in need of refuge places will be able to access welfare benefits while their claim for indefinite leave to remain in the UK is considered. This is a major step—it has been welcomed—in ensuring that this vulnerable group remains protected and safe from abuse. Therefore, I hope that I can reassure the House that the Government’s commitment to safeguarding victims of domestic violence, whatever the changes being made in legislation, is a high priority.

I turn now to the changes the Government have recently made to the settlement rules. Having looked at them as a new Minister and asked a lot of questions, I do not believe that these changes are incompatible with the commitment that we have given to protecting women and girls in abusive relationships. The Home Secretary’s Statement in November 2010 made it clear that there must be an end to the link between temporary and permanent migration. We must be clear that settlement is not automatic—rather, as I have said, it is a privilege to be awarded only to those who abide by the laws of the country. The UK Border Agency has always taken into account the character and conduct of applicants for settlement and other categories of leave. The rules have always provided that leave will “normally be refused” if it is undesirable to permit the individual to remain because of their character, conduct or associations, so in that respect the changes serve to give more certainty to applicants. I take on board what the noble Baroness said about women’s reluctance to come forward. It is a very difficult area, but I hope that this measure will provide more clarity.

The new settlement rules mean that the UK Border Agency will be taking a more objective view about what type of offending should lead to a refusal. That should help where there are areas of uncertainty. They provide a more direct response to the sentences imposed by the criminal justice system. Set against this are the difficult and vulnerable circumstances of women and girls in abusive relationships. We need to get that balance absolutely right and to support them against the equally clear requirement for applicants for settlement to be free of convictions.

In cases where we have a moral duty to protect a victim of domestic violence, I can assure your Lordships that there would be no question of requiring them to leave the UK or to remain in an abusive relationship because of a minor conviction. For example, I would not expect the non-payment of a television licence to be regarded as a major matter of criminalisation. If such a case had arisen previously, the applicant’s behaviour would have been considered under the character test, and there would have been no certainty that settlement would have been granted under the previous rules. As now, the agency would have considered whether to exercise discretion outside the rules. That provision is not being removed.

As to the arguments that the introduction of this new rule introduces or increases the likelihood that a victim of domestic violence would not come forward, I believe that the rules are now much clearer. I hope that the noble Baroness may wish to discuss this matter with me further, and perhaps we may take a closer look at the clarity that the changes should bring. For the reasons I have outlined, I am not persuaded that there is a high risk, or one that we cannot take action to mitigate. I do not doubt that reluctance to come forward exists for many reasons—for example, a mistrust of authorities or the control being exerted by an abusive partner, as the noble Baroness mentioned, but we should not respond to that risk by condoning criminality by domestic violence applicants. It is a question of the balance that I mentioned at the beginning of my speech.

That underlines why the work of corporate partners such as Eaves, which runs the Sojourner Project, and others such as the Southall Black Sisters and Rights of Women is so important. I have seen correspondence and I know that their views are being listened to. We welcome and support the invaluable assistance to victims of domestic violence offered by such groups, and will continue to work with them, in particular to ensure that everyone involved is clear that the UK Border Agency will give the most careful and sympathetic consideration to all the facts in any application affected by the rule change. The individual and the circumstances surrounding them will still be important.

My noble friend Lord Avebury asked for a written response to paragraph 27 of the Merits Committee report. I am very happy to do that and I will of course write to him.

I turn now to the Motion of Regret in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. The issue at hand is whether the Government should have published a more comprehensive analysis of the outcome of the student consultation. The noble Lord referred in particular to the 29th Report of the Merits Committee, which states:

“The Statement has been laid without an Impact Assessment—the Explanatory Memorandum … says that one has been prepared but is awaiting final clearance by the Regulatory Policy Committee. There are also significant gaps in the analysis of the consultation responses”.

Your Lordships will recall—and it has already been mentioned—that there was a debate on similar issues in this House on 3 May in the context of the debate on the consultation on limiting economic migration. The statement of changes relating to the student consultation predates that debate and it is therefore unsurprising that the Merits Committee’s reports on the two consultations raised similar issues. However, I should reiterate what my predecessor said during that debate. We are quite clear that it is right and proper to provide the Merits Committee with the information that is necessary for it to do its job. I give my assurance to the House that in future that will be the case.

The issue having been raised, however, it would be remiss of me not to put this again in the context of previous practice in this area. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, drew the attention of the House to the fact that the Home Office has form in this matter. I gently remind him that that form predates the current Government. While it is generally accepted as good practice, there is no legal obligation on the UK Border Agency to consult on changes to the Immigration Rules, because that does not involve primary legislation.

In March 2010, the previous Government made significant changes to tier 4, the student route, without a formal public consultation. Despite taking the views of key partners, they did not publish any formal explanation of findings. Similarly, in March 2006, following consultation, the previous Government published their policy for a points-based system, but did not publish the 517 consultation responses they had received.

I am satisfied that this Government have gone to great lengths to seek the views of the public and the sector, and to take account of these views in developing our final policy. On 23 November, the Home Secretary informed Parliament that she intended to hold a public consultation on reforming the student visa system. As has already been pointed out, this process began on 7 December 2010, when the Home Secretary announced our proposals and the consultation paper was published. The consultation ran until 31 January 2011, shorter than the standard 12 weeks, in order to announce decisions at a time that would allow the sector and students to plan for the following academic year. Our consultation received more than 30,000 responses—10 times as many as the consultation on economic routes—and officials spoke to representatives of no fewer than 200 institutions during the consultation period. On 22 March, the Home Secretary made a full Statement in the other place setting out the detail of the Government’s decisions and the public reaction and data that had informed those decisions. On 31 April, we published a detailed statement of intent describing the full policy package, and laid changes to the Immigration Rules to implement the first changes resulting from the consultation.

However, the brief window between the closure of the consultation and the announcement of policy meant that at the time that the statement of changes was issued, further work was necessary to ensure that the impact assessment was of high quality and accurate. Work continues and I can confirm that the impact assessment will be published when the next changes are made to the Immigration Rules in June—next month. The Minister for Immigration has confirmed that the impact of these changes will be a reduction in the number of main applicant visas in the order of 70,000, along with a reduction of about 20,000 in the number of dependants. It is true that, like the previous Government, we have not simply published every consultation response. We published a summary of the 30,000 responses to all the questions asked and answered in the consultation. We also indicated the level of support in relation to every response. We felt that this was helpful information for Parliament and interested parties to have.

The Government code of practice on consultation states:

“Following a consultation exercise, the Government should provide a summary of who responded … and a summary of the views expressed”.

I hope noble Lords would agree that that is what has happened. Consideration should be given to publishing the individual responses received but, in this instance, the volume of responses made that impractical. The level of response demonstrates a high level of public engagement with the policy development process, and the changes we have made to our final policy show that we have genuinely listened to and taken account of the views expressed.

We have received positive feedback from the university sector. Perhaps I may now pick up on the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, about the economic impact. Universities UK said the reforms,

“will allow British universities to remain at the forefront of international student recruitment”.

It is also the case that we will close tier-1 post-study work after 2012, but the brightest and best graduates will still be able to move into skilled sponsored employment through tier 2. The Government recognise the important contribution that international students make to the UK’s economy and to making our education system one of the best in the world. The Government’s aim is not to stop genuine students coming here, with all the implications that that would have for the wider economy, but to eliminate abuse and to focus on the high-quality and high-value sectors.

I am most grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this important debate. I gently invite the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Avebury, who have tabled these Motions of Regret, to consider not pressing them.

[Lord Avebury]

My Lords, we are most grateful to the noble Baroness for her careful reply and for answering some of the questions put to her by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and me. I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, for saying that domestic violence is a matter of principle, not of numbers. That is the way that we have always looked at it. It does not matter whether there is only one case, or even none. That still means not that women in abusive relationships were not deterred by the previous set of rules but that they will be more deterred by a mandatory penalty imposed as a result of any convictions.

I am grateful to the noble Baroness for saying that she will give us a written answer to the eight questions posed by the Merits Committee, two of which were dealt with in more detail by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. He was asking, in particular, about the economic impact of the changes, as did the Merits Committee in the third of its questions. The noble Baroness told us that there will be 70,000 fewer applications as a result of the changes, but she did not then go on to say what the impact of that will be on the economy of the country. Obviously, if there are 70,000 fewer applicants, that means less money coming into universities at a time when they are facing serious cuts to the money that they receive.

[Baroness Browning]

I am happy to confirm that the brightest and best students, who have the greatest contribution to make to the UK and our economy, will continue to be welcomed under the student route, but the scheme is looking at the brightest and best, as opposed to the number hitherto.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Wednesday 11th May 2011 Lords Chamber

Should we put this to the vote today? The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, raised that point right at the beginning. I would refer him to my experience with the Mental Health Bill back in January 2007. A week after my appointment, I found myself on the Floor of the House faced with an amendment moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, which was supported by the Conservative Benches. Many of the Cross-Benchers also went into the Lobby with them. We had a vote and I lost it by 225 to 119. It is entirely appropriate for this House to vote on the first day in Committee, and I hope that it will do so.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Browning)]

My Lords, I thank your Lordships for such a warm welcome from across the Committee. I would appreciate it in any circumstances, but I have been in this post for only 48 hours, and the very last thing I was told was, “Oh, by the way, there is a Committee stage to take on Wednesday”, so I have particularly appreciated your kindness and generosity this afternoon.

I am very grateful to my noble friend Lady Harris of Richmond and to the noble Baroness, Lady Henig, for tabling this amendment as they have given us an opportunity to discuss other models of accountability. Indeed, our debate today has been wide ranging, so wide ranging that I believe it would be a great pity if we were denied through a vote any chance of discussing what are clearly matters that many noble Lords consider to be very important that will follow from the first group of amendments.

In winding up this debate, I will not be able to cover every point that has been made. Not only have they been wide ranging, but there is clearly common cause in many areas of policy. I cannot go out on a limb as a new Minister and say, “Okay, I’ll go along with that”, but I will take away from this debate and subsequent debates where I feel we might improve the Bill with the contributions of noble Lords. I stand in great awe of the vast experience in this House, whether noble Lords are in favour of the Bill or not. This is your Lordships' House at its best. This is what this House is about. It is where that experience and expertise come together. I may not always appreciate it, but I am sure I am going to be very grateful for the opportunity to hear first-hand.

I am new to the role, and I have had to ask myself some searching questions in taking on these new responsibilities, but I hope to set that out. I shall begin by dealing with one or two areas that your Lordships have raised that perhaps have common cause and where it might be helpful if I respond specifically to points raised.

The first was raised by my noble friend Lady Harris who was very concerned that commissioners will have fewer powers than police authorities. Police and crime commissioners will not have fewer powers than the authority. However, they will be subject to checks and balances. I hope we can go into more detail on that because it is clearly a matter that we have to get right. They have got to be there. The police and crime panels have been mentioned, and we will come on to them later in the Bill. They will have the power of veto over the proposed precept, and there will be other measures that we will perhaps want to discuss in more detail.

The noble Baroness, Lady Henig, who has put her name to this amendment, spoke about how PCCs will work with local partnerships, which is very important. They will be able to bring community partnerships at force level better to tackle areas of concern. They will also be able to make grants to partnerships to respond to local needs, rather than responding to centrally imposed initiatives. Getting this right and targeted at local level is extremely important.

Many noble Lords referred to the protocol which was published yesterday and which I hope your Lordships have been able to access in the Printed Paper Office. I clarify that it has “final draft” printed on it. In other words, the draft is final, but it is still a work in progress. Some noble Lords have expressed concern about the protocol and others were perhaps not aware that a lot of work has gone into it. The work in it has been contributed to by many bodies, including the Association of Police Authorities, the Association of Chief Police Officers and the Association of Local Authority Chief Executives.

When we see the final version of the protocol, which people will now have an opportunity to contribute to, it is important that it gets right the balance between the commissioner and the chief constable. We all recognise the sensitivity of this, and I was very encouraged, for example, that on publication today the Metropolitan Police put out a statement which welcomed the publication of the protocol. It said that it provides clear direction on the roles of chief constables, PCCs and the Home Secretary, ensuring the balance between operational independence and appropriate public accountability. I emphasise that this is not the final version of the protocol but the final draft, so there will be an opportunity for a lot more input on this. The MPS specifically welcomes the inclusion of the fact that the PCC must set the strategic direction and objectives of the force and decide the budget of the force while the chief constable will remain operationally independent. That is something that has been focused on by all sides of the Committee during today’s debate.

Many people have raised issues that come up in later amendments. If your Lordships will forgive me, I shall not go into them in too much detail, although I have copious notes. I hope that you will instead indulge me while I share with the Committee my personal view on the amendments in this group. I am pleased to say to the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, that I quite take the point that she raised about Wales, but there will be a meeting on Friday between Home Office officials and the Assembly. We recognise that that matter needs to be addressed rapidly.

The noble Lord, Lord Dear, who made a compelling contribution today, wrote in the Times last week that he has seen this reform evolve into the Bill and that he firmly believed that the introduction of police and crime commissioners will lead to better policing in our country and a better, more responsive public service, something that any public service reform should aim to achieve. I am very grateful to the noble Lord for that, and for his contribution today. Many people have spoken in support of the principle, and it is to the principle of the amendments that I want to address my remarks rather than drill down to the detail, which I hope we will do in later amendments.

I have no doubt that your Lordships will want to continue in the true spirit of this House and seek to review, revise and improve the Bill in the days ahead. However, I am clear that, once the case for reform is considered and a model is set out in its entirety, review and improvement are precisely the tasks in hand here, rather than dismissal or fundamental alteration of the PCC model.

Perhaps I may share with your Lordships the reason why I agree with the principle of the Bill. This was touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss and my noble friend Lord Hamilton—my noble friend used the term the “middle classes”; I think that I know what he means by that. I was a Member of Parliament for nearly 20 years in rural Devonshire. As my noble friend said, I had a lot of dealings with police authorities and the excellent Devon and Cornwall force. I think that any of us who have observed, worked and had ongoing communication at close quarters with both police authorities and police forces, including chief constables, recognise that they are excellent people who achieve a lot and work very hard.

However, I have in recent years expressed to police authorities and chief constables my worry that a serious disconnect has grown up between them and the public. I shall not call them the middle classes, but what I will call them is that great body of the British people who live their lives by the law, who seek to keep the law, who respect the law and who bring up their children to respect the law. When that group of people—label them however you will—starts to believe that the police are not on their side nor are there for them, we should regard it as a dangerous slippery slope.

That was my experience as a Member of Parliament. It is no reflection on the Devon and Cornwall force, which I regard very highly; my concern came about because of the way policing changed, because of directives that came from on high, and because we did not look at how we might keep that connection with the public.

Disabled People

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Thursday 5th May 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow my noble friend Lord Rix who has, for many years, been such an inspiration to us all in the field of disability. I also congratulate my noble friend Lord Fellowes of West Stafford on such a memorable maiden speech. Congratulations are due, too, to the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, who has brought this important debate to your Lordships’ House today. I begin by declaring my interests: I am the named carer for an autistic adult who is in receipt of state disability benefits, a vice-president of the National Autistic Society and patron of Research Autism. I hope that your Lordships will indulge me if I confine my remarks to that group of people who would come within the autistic spectrum, people with learning disabilities and those with chronic long-term mental health problems, because I believe there is such an overlap affecting all three of those groupings.

In his opening remarks to the debate, the noble Lord, Lord Low, used the word fearful—a word which other Members of your Lordships’ House have picked up. It is not just people with disabilities who are fearful at present. I hope that your Lordships will not mind if my opening remarks are extremely personal, not just to me but to many other people, as I am sure that many of your Lordships will recognise what I am about to say. I am a parent and I, too, am fearful. If you have a child who is born with a lifelong disability, you know that that child—however long its lifespan and whatever difficulties it will encounter—was not only born with that disability but will die with it. You also know that while you are on this earth, you have the opportunity to try not only to allow that child to fulfil its own potential but to do what you can as a parent to make provision for what will happen to that child when you are no longer around to support it.

It is perhaps in the whole context of things when, as parents, we concern ourselves with all our children’s education, particularly with disabled children's ability to take on what are euphemistically now called life skills, which are so important—perhaps more than we realise at the time—that your waking thought almost every day is: “Have I done enough and what will happen?”. My concern about the Government's reforms, many of which I support, is that, with the grouping which I have mentioned in mind, the reform of DLA is, for example, to reduce by 20 per cent over the next three years the amount of money spent. The focus will be on those most in need, which sounds quite laudable when you listen to it. “For those most in need” sounds a fair way to spend resources which we know are restricted but for the autistic community, for the learning- disabled community and for those with ongoing mental health problems—some have two or three of those conditions—there is a real fear.

I pick up on the excellent speech made by the noble Baroness, Lady Campbell of Surbiton, about independent living. It is probably only in the last 20-plus years that we have really taken on and embraced the opportunity for people with a range of disabilities to be included in society and to exercise their right—and it is their right—for independent living. That will vary from disability to disability and from individual to individual but I know that however severe that disability, each step of the way is hard fought for and won. It is not something which is handed out; very often, people end up having to go to court to exercise their right to get the sort of support they need to sustain independent living.

It is a long process. For many in that group it takes years to bring about, step by step, an ability to look after themselves and to make sure that their personal care can be coped with, that they eat properly and have the right nutrition, and that they maximise their own desire to take part—often in work but more particularly in social activities, too. For example, part of that package of care which is paid for by the state could well be for somebody to be a friend to that person two or three times a week in a befriending package, since they cannot access or make friends as the rest of us would because of the nature of their disability. I cannot emphasise how important what might seem very small, individual parts of a care package are to making the quality of life worth living and to enabling that person to live independently and to take their part in society, as the rest of us do without really thinking about it.

However, when I look at what the Government intend to do, I am concerned that those who have achieved independent living, which has taken many years to construct, will find that because they are no longer regarded as the most in need, those valuable building blocks that have been put in place over many years to allow them to achieve that level of independence will no longer be regarded as important enough to be supported. I say to my noble friend with all due respect, but with absolute certainty, that if what has taken years to put together is removed, it will fall apart in a matter of months. With many disabilities, it is not the case that once you have solved a problem, you have solved it for the rest of that person’s life. It is a bit like a mosaic. This is not a broad-brush painting where you can identify the picture. It is a mosaic made up of many small pieces, all of which are interdependent and important in their own right, but when you have achieved the mosaic, it is a picture that has allowed somebody to take their place in society and fulfil their potential and those important dreams that we heard about just now.

This is not special pleading or the bleeding hearts brigade, but the words of a mother who for 40 years has been on that journey with a child. I am, of course, not the only one. I know that there are thousands of mums like me up and down the country who say to my noble friend in all sincerity: realise where we have come from in the past 20 years and where we are now. The reason why there are so many more payments for DLA and other disability benefits is because 20 years ago people would have been in institutions or, more often than not in the case of people with learning disabilities or autistic spectrum disorders, would be sitting at home, unoccupied, living out an existence with well meaning but very worried elderly parents. The crisis would come only when something happened to those parents, and then the state would know the full cost and consequences of dealing with disabled people in crisis. The cost of dealing with people in crisis is always far more. In fact, it is off the Richter scale compared with the minuscule cost of the basic building blocks that will allow so many disabled people to continue to live independently. I say to my noble friend: do not take those blocks away. It would set this country back years and cause mayhem and disadvantage to the most vulnerable people.

Extradition: Gary McKinnon

Baroness Browning Excerpts

Thursday 16th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Browning]

My Lords, having been actively involved in the other place in the Gary McKinnon case, I have read his psychiatric reports that were made available to the Home Secretary before the general election. I understand that the Minister is seeking further medical reports. Does she agree that the evidence already before the Home Office shows overwhelmingly that the threat of self-harm is not an idle threat but is very real? Does she also agree, in the light of the damage that has been caused to the American Government by Wikileaks, that, rather than trying to imprison an autistic savant, the Pentagon would do well to employ Gary McKinnon to sort out the weaknesses in its computer system?

[Baroness Neville-Jones]

If I might respond to the first part of my noble friend’s question, one of the factors that influenced my right honourable friend the Home Secretary to stay the judicial review that was in progress was precisely the desire to take a second look at the question of Gary McKinnon’s medical condition. The House will understand that she has asked for a separate and impartial view to be taken of his medical state.