Police and Justice Bill

moved Amendment No. 14:"Before Clause 2, insert the following new clause—" ““REVISED POWER TO ALTER POLICE AREAS BY ORDER In section 32(3) of the Police Act 1996 (c. 16) (power to alter police areas by order)— (a)   leave out ““either””; (b)   in paragraph (a) for ““or”” substitute ““and””.”” The noble Baroness said: Amendment No. 14 focuses on the Government’s plans to compel police forces to merge. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, and the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, for their support for the amendment. The Government say that they are in favour of neighbourhood policing and local accountability. We support them in that. They say they want a police service that is fit for purpose in the 21st century. We support them in that. Those are both laudable objectives. But then the Government career off on the wrong course, which cannot achieve those objectives. They insist that police forces should be merged even where local opinion is firmly against that, even where the results could be damaging for effective policing and even when they have not given the federal alternative the opportunity to prove itself. We cannot support the Government in that. My amendment focuses on the importance of the Secretary of State going ahead with the merger of police forces only when he has the consent of the relevant police authorities. The report of Denis O’Connor, of Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, on which the Government are relying to press ahead with their forced merger, said:"““The constitutional implications . . . are significant””." We agree. In the 1960s, when police force amalgamations were last considered, a royal commission was established that took two years to report. Legislation was introduced a year later. It was recognised that the structure of police forces is a fundamental issue on which the public, the forces themselves and their police authorities need to be properly consulted. We believe that the way in which the Government are proceeding could not be more different. The previous Home Secretary’s proposals to amalgamate forces were announced last September, when he gave them just four months to respond. He attempted, in the words of the Labour chairman of the Association of Police Authorities, to ““bully and bribe”” authorities to agree to his proposals and to meet the deadline—a tactic that backfired spectacularly when not one authority submitted to it. In February, the Home Secretary again gave police authorities an ultimatum—this time to submit proposals for voluntary mergers within just three weeks. Again, almost all the authorities concerned refused. But the Home Secretary announced that he would proceed with compulsory amalgamations regardless. The basis of the general restructuring is founded on the report Closing the Gap. It has been shown that the methodology of that report is in some respects fundamentally flawed. Several academic analyses have questioned the methodology and conclusions, one of the most recent being Barry Loveday’s Policy Exchange report, Size Isn’t Everything. The Police Act 1996 already provides that the Secretary of State can require police forces to collaborate in the interests of efficiency and effectiveness. That renders amalgamations unnecessary, yet the Home Secretary has not used those powers. It would surely be appropriate to use them now as a more cost-effective alternative to amalgamations. Yet the Government have rejected the alternative proposals for a federated model, which were put forward by police and police authorities. If the Government are truly more interested in addressing an alleged inadequacy in the protective services and are less interested in moving towards a national police force, I hope that they will give alternative options the opportunity to prove their worth. The Government claim that they have rejected the idea of a national police force, but their reorganisations are moving us steadily towards that model. There would be 12 police chiefs, rather than 43, who would effectively answer to the Home Secretary and not their local communities. There has been no accurate costing of any of these amalgamations. But police authorities are convinced that the impact will be the loss of a significant number of police officers. I am aware that yesterday the Home Secretary in another place made it clear that the 25,000 figure quoted in the press as a potential loss of numbers was the worst-case scenario, but he did not deny that there would be losses, which was interesting. The financial basis of the exercise is deeply flawed. Like most reorganisations, this is likely to cost more and save less than the proponents of the plan would have us believe. The federal approach would allow greater collaboration between forces on protective services. Services such as air support, firearms training and clothing and vehicle procurement, to name but a few, could be done effectively through collaboration on a formal footing. That would have the advantage of enabling individual forces to maintain their independence and local accountability to their communities. I am very grateful to Surrey County Council for sending me today a copy of a speech made there on behalf of a police authority, which clearly states the commitment that Surrey has to making a federal model work. It feels that it has the resources and the ability to make it work well. On 15 May, the Home Secretary stated that he had been told that the federal option had been tried in several areas and had not worked particularly well. That is not what I understand from the experience of police authorities. Can the Minister say where a formal federated system has been implemented and has failed? The advantage of the federal approach, as one of the available solutions, was set out in the Association of Police Authorities’ paper Joining Forces, which was submitted to the Home Office earlier this year. I understand that, so far, there has been no response from the Home Office. Yesterday, in another place, the Home Secretary said that he would not lay an order for enforced police mergers before the summer Recess. He said that he would go ahead only with those where there had been a voluntary agreement. He also stressed time and time again that he believes that the destination of mergers across the country should remain the same. He said:"““The destination that has been outlined . . . is the correct one . . . I repeat that the strategic direction and the ultimate destination . . . are correct . . . the destination that we want to end up at, which was identified by my predecessor as Secretary of State, is the right one . . . I do not seek another destination””.—[Official Report, Commons, 19/6/06; cols. 1058-60.]" It is vital today to try to persuade the Government to think again. Amendment No. 14 would amend Section 32 of the Police Act 1996, so that mergers can still go ahead, but only in circumstances where the police authorities make a request to the Secretary of State for a merger and the Secretary of State believes that such a merger would be right and in the interests of the efficiency or effectiveness of policing in those areas. It has the benefit of allowing mergers to proceed where it is right that they should do so, while protecting policing from enforced mergers at the will of the Secretary of State where local opinion is firmly against his direction and local requirements would not benefit from those mergers. That must be the right way forward. I beg to move.