Police Service Strength
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
House of Commons Home Affairs Committee Police Service Strength Fifth Report of Session 2009–10 Report, together with formal minutes, oral and written evidence Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed 19 January 2010 HC 50 Published on 26 January 2010 by authority of the House of Commons London: The Stationery Office Limited £0.00 The Home Affairs Committee The Home Affairs Committee is appointed by the House of Commons to examine the expenditure, administration, and policy of the Home Office and its associated public bodies. Current membership Rt Hon Keith Vaz MP (Labour, Leicester East) (Chairman) Tom Brake MP (Liberal Democrat, Carshalton and Wallington) Mr James Clappison MP (Conservative, Hertsmere) Mrs Ann Cryer MP (Labour, Keighley) David TC Davies MP (Conservative, Monmouth) Mrs Janet Dean MP (Labour, Burton) Mr Khalid Mahmood MP (Labour, Birmingham Perry Barr) Patrick Mercer MP (Conservative, Newark) Margaret Moran MP (Labour, Luton South) Gwyn Prosser MP (Labour, Dover) Bob Russell MP (Liberal Democrat, Colchester) Martin Salter MP (Labour, Reading West) Mr Gary Streeter MP (Conservative, South West Devon) Mr David Winnick MP (Labour, Walsall North) The following Member was also a Member of the Committee during the inquiry: Ms Karen Buck MP (Labour, Regent’s Park and Kensington North) Powers The Committee is one of the departmental select committees, the powers of which are set out in House of Commons Standing Orders, principally in SO No 152. These are available on the Internet via www.parliament.uk Publication The Reports and evidence of the Committee are published by The Stationery Office by Order of the House. All publications of the Committee (including press notices) are on the Internet at www.parliament.uk/homeaffairscom. A list of Reports of the Committee since Session 2005–06 is at the back of this volume. Committee staff The current staff of the Committee are Elizabeth Flood (Clerk), Eliot Barrass (Second Clerk), Elisabeth Bates (Committee Specialist), Sarah Petit (Committee Specialist), Darren Hackett (Senior Committee Assistant), Ameet Chudasama (Committee Assistant), Sheryl Dinsdale (Committee Assistant) and Jessica Bridges- Palmer (Select Committee Media Officer). Contacts All correspondence should be addressed to the Clerk of the Home Affairs Committee, House of Commons, 7 Millbank, London SW1P 3JA. The telephone number for general enquiries is 020 7219 3276; the Committee’s email address is [email protected]. Police Service Strength 1 Contents Report Page Key facts 3 1 Introduction 5 2 Trends in service strength 7 Trends over the past five years 7 Factors influencing these trends 8 Future projections 9 3 Managing with less 13 Efficiency savings 13 Collaboration and mergers 15 Working with the private sector 16 Administration of police funding 19 Council tax capping 20 Conclusions and recommendations 22 Formal Minutes 24 Witnesses 25 List of written evidence 25 List of Reports from the Committee during the current Parliament 26 Police Service Strength 3 Key facts • There was a 4.8% increase in police officers and a 15.5% increase in police staff employed across the service between 2004 and 2009. • 13 forces out of 43 reported an overall decrease in officer numbers between 2004 and 2009, ranging between -0.9% to -7%. • Three forces reported a rise in officer numbers of over 10%. • Ten forces reported an increase in staff numbers of over 25%. • In the last financial year, officer numbers rose by 2.9% across the service and staff numbers by 3%. • 71% of police budgets is spent on police salaries and 16% on pensions, meaning that in total almost 88% is spent on the workforce. • Central funding to the police service increased by 19% in real terms between 1997/98 and 2008/09. • The police national grant is expected to increase by 2.7% in 2010/11. • The future is more uncertain: the Association of Police Authorities estimates that forces may be able to manage a 5% cut in overall spending without reducing uniformed staff budgets; a 10% cut on the other hand would be likely to require forces to reduce these budgets by £260 million, or 5,800 officers. Police Service Strength 5 1 Introduction 1. Over the course of 2009 a number of media reports expressed concern that police forces were being compelled to cut their workforces as chief officers struggled to deal with the impact of the recession.1 Evidence we took from the Association of Chief Police Officers’ finance lead, Chief Constable Dr Timothy Brain, in March 2009 suggested this concern was warranted, particularly in forces which are disadvantaged by the way in which the police national grant is distributed.2 The Government has dismissed such claims on the grounds that the police service has received relatively high levels of funding in historical terms— central funding increased by 19% in real terms between 1997/98 and 2008/09—and will continue to do so in the next financial year.3 More recently, however, the extent of the financial uncertainty faced by all public services beyond 2011 has become apparent. The President of the Association of Chief Police Officers, Sir Hugh Orde, has suggested that police budgets could be cut by up to 20%.4 2. In the past we have warned the Government against fixating on maintaining a specific number of officers at the expense of measures to improve efficiency in deployment; however, we have also heeded cautions from the Police Federation, amongst others, about the implications for resilience should officer levels be allowed to fall significantly.5 We were therefore keen to take evidence from representatives of the police service to establish the legitimacy of these concerns and explore how forces can minimise the effects of funding cuts on service delivery. 3. In the first instance we wrote to all 43 territorially-based police forces and authorities in England and Wales asking them to provide data on: • The number of police officers and staff currently employed by their force; • How this figure has changed over the past five years, including details of business areas where reductions or increases have occurred; • Any comments on the relationship between these trends, the most recent Comprehensive Spending Review funding settlement, efficiency savings targets, the force’s overall financial position and any other factors; • An indication of likely changes to the workforce during the remainder of 2009/10 and in 2010/11; and • Plans the force is putting in place to deal with reduced funding in future years. 1 See for example “Thousands of police to lose jobs as forces feel the pinch”, The Times, 24 February 2009,www.timesonline.co.uk; “Force fears budget cuts will harm service”, Police Review, 20 February 2009, p 12 2 Oral evidence taken before the Home Affairs Committee on 31 March 2009, HC 254 (2008–09), Q 102 3 Home Office, From the Neighbourhood to the National: Policing our Communities Together, July 2008, p 8 4 “Police budgets to be cut by 20 per cent, says senior officer”, The Independent, 18 November 2009, www.independent.co.uk 5 Home Affairs Committee, Seventh Report of Session 2007–08, Policing in the 21st Century, HC 364, paras 301, 229 6 Police Service Strength We are grateful to the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) and the Association of Police Authorities (APA) for collating their responses, and to those individual forces and authorities who also chose to send a separate response. 4. On 24 November 2009 we took oral evidence from the Deputy Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Tim Godwin, and the Chief Constable of Bedfordshire Police, Gillian Parker on service strength data relating to their forces; from the Chief Constable of Avon and Somerset, Chief Constable Colin Port, the Chair of Avon and Somerset Police Authority, Dr Moira Hamlin, and the Director of SouthWest One, Dr Simon Humberstone, about how public bodies in the South West of England are working with the private sector with the aim of maximising resources; and from the Minister of State responsible for Crime and Policing, Rt Hon David Hanson MP. We also explored how the National Policing Improvement Agency is helping forces to release officers to the frontline in our evidence session with the organisation’s Chief Executive, Chief Constable Peter Neyroud, on 15 December 2009 and cite that evidence in this Report. We thank all those who contributed to our inquiry. Police Service Strength 7 2 Trends in service strength Trends over the past five years 5. The most recent Home Office figures show that as of 31 March 2009 the police service employed: • 147,085 (full-time equivalent) police officers, including 2,811 employed by the British Transport Police (BTP) and 504 seconded to central services; • 80,542 police support staff, including 1,246 employed by the BTP; • 16,831 Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs), including 324 employed by the BTP; • 469 traffic wardens; • 3,083 designated officers; and • 14,469 special constables, including 218 employed by the BTP.6 6. The Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) provided us with a table showing how figures for the two largest categories have fluctuated over the past five years, broken down by force.7 The table shows that over the five-year period: • Despite a tiny fall in officer levels of -0.15% in 2007–08, overall there was a 4.8% increase in police officers and a 15.49% increase in police staff across the service; • 13 forces out of 43 reported an overall decrease in officer numbers between 2004 and 2009, ranging between -0.9% to -7.04%; • Three forces reported a rise of over 10% in officer numbers; • Three forces reported an overall decrease in staff numbers; and • Ten forces reported an increase in staff numbers of over 25%.