Police and Crime Commissioners

Lord Paddick Excerpts

Wednesday 29th October 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bates]

I respect the noble Lord’s great experience in this area, but we need to remember what the system was before. The previous Government commissioned an HMIC report—entitled, appropriately for the time, Police Governance in Austerity—which found that only four of the 22 police authorities inspected were judged to have performed well in two of their primary functions: setting a strategic direction and ensuring value for money. There has been a change there, and that is to be welcomed.

[Lord Paddick (LD)]

My Lords, one of the two objectives that the Government set for police and crime commissioners was to save money. In addition to the vast expense of many of these police and crime commissioners appointing deputies, we have also had to have two by-elections—once, tragically, because of a death and once because of resignation—which have cost between £1 million and £3 million. How much money has the change actually saved?

[Lord Bates]

Police budgets overall are reducing, which is not something that we chose to do but was the situation that we were faced with when this Government came into office. It should be said that the police are also overseeing one of the largest falls in crime that we have ever had in recent years. That is to be welcomed. The average salary of a police and crime commissioner is about half that of a chief constable. In many areas, people will regard them as delivering value for money. If people feel that they are failing in their responsibilities, they can vote them out, which they could not do before.