Rural Crime and Public Services

Debate between Giles Watling and Louise Haigh

Wednesday 6th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Louise Haigh]

I could not agree more. The police have been cut to a level at which they are unable to prevent and respond to crime, and the demand on them is completely unprecedented, not only from new crimes, but as a result of other services being cut.

The police are now unable to respond to the basic task that we ask of them and that the Prime Minister asked them to do at the Police Federation conference eight years ago, which is to prevent and respond to crime—nothing more, nothing less. Police chiefs have warned the Government about the issue time and again. They have warned that local policing is under such strain that the legitimacy of policing is at risk, as the relationship with communities is fading to a point at which prevention, early intervention and core engagement are ineffective. This is a stark warning. Never before have police chiefs, usually incredibly reticent to enter political debate, spoken out so plainly about the risks facing public safety. Only yesterday, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Cressida Dick, told the Home Affairs Committee that it would be “naive” to dissociate police cuts from rising levels of crime.

While the lack of resources has hampered the police, there is no doubt that crime itself, and the demand on rural police forces, is changing. County lines is a clear and growing threat for rural forces. It has been partly responsible for a serious increase in violent crime in areas that do not traditionally suffer from it. County lines dealers from the cities are exploiting hidden poverty and a cohort of vulnerable youngsters in rural areas. With the numbers of looked-after children and homeless children rising, this is of significant concern. The exploitation of young and vulnerable persons is a common feature in the facilitation of county lines drugs supply, whether for the storage or supply of drugs, the movement of cash, or to secure the use of dwellings held by vulnerable people—commonly referred to as cuckooing.

As the Home Office’s own analysis of the rise in serious violence states, childhood risk factors, including economic stress, mean that interventions with vulnerable young people such as those excluded from school and looked-after children would be successful in reducing violence and drug demand. The Government are aware of this, but so far their response has been muted, and their continued refusal to fund the police properly is felt across the country.

[Giles Watling (Clacton) (Con)]

Does the hon. Lady not agree that it is our job as constituency MPs to stay in touch with our local police forces and to address their concerns? That is what I did, and that is how I managed to raise the precept in our local area and increase the police force there.

[Louise Haigh]

Raising the precept in the way that the Government have done is a fundamentally unfair way to fund police forces across this country. [Interruption.] I am sorry—I do not know which police force area the hon. Gentleman represents, but I am almost positive that raising the precept by 2% will result in significantly more in his force area than in my area of South Yorkshire, or in Northumbria, Cleveland, or many metropolitan areas that have significant demand.