Paula Sherriff
Main Page: Paula Sherriff (Labour - Dewsbury)Department Debates - View all Paula Sherriff's debates with the Home Office
(6 years, 7 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
Order. I have been a bit worried about the hon. Member for Dewsbury (Paula Sherriff) because she has been jumping up and down quite a bit and has not been heard yet—so she must be heard.
Paula Sherriff (Dewsbury) (Lab)
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Figures obtained from West Yorkshire police show that they have dealt with 33,000 more 999 calls this year than last—an increase of nearly 10%—yet officer numbers are down by nearly a fifth due to Government cuts. It would cost the equivalent of another 80 officers to fully fund the Government pay settlement. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Louise Haigh), I too used to work in the police, and I know that frontline staff feel that this Government treat them not as public servants but as public enemies. Can the Minister guarantee that we will not face any further cuts to police numbers?
Sarah Newton
That is a totally unacceptable thing to say. My sister was a police officer. My nephew, I am very proud to say, has just joined our local police force. I do not see members of my family—members of the community—as enemies, and neither does anybody in the Home Office or any Member on any one of these Benches. Unlike Opposition Members, we have to inhabit the real world and we have to make the tough choices of having a strong and growing economy, so that we can fund the first-class public services that we want to see.