Police and Justice Bill

moved Amendment No. 53: Leave out Clause 5 and insert the following new Clause- ““POLICE AUTHORITIES AS BEST VALUE AUTHORITIES The following amendments to the Local Government Act 1999 (c. 27) shall have effect- (a) section 1(1)(d) is omitted; (b) section 1(4) is omitted; (c) section 24 is omitted.”” The noble Baroness said: My Lords, we are back to best value once more. I make no bones about the fact that the amendment would disapply best value legislation to police authorities. It seems to me that the proposals in the Bill leave police authorities with all the responsibilities to secure best value but none of the powers to make sure that it happens. This is an impossible situation. Subsequent letters between the Government and myself have failed to find a meeting of minds, so I will plod on and expand once again on why I do not like what the Government are proposing. Best value effectively does two things: it adds the word ““economic”” to police authorities’ responsibilities to ensure an efficient and an effective police service for their area and it gives them a responsibility for ensuring continuous improvement in their force. But to make sure that these things happen, the legislation says that an authority must commission a best value review to assess what is working and what is not. Where it is not working, an improvement plan must be put in place to remedy the situation. The Bill proposes to remove this power to commission reviews. If a police authority cannot do reviews, it cannot do best value because it has lost the ability to assess what is working and what is not. It is as simple as that. The Government believe that this can be replaced by the existing power of authorities to require reports from chief officers. But that is not the same at all. It lacks the crucial element of assessment, particularly the requirement to look at what is now called contestability—in other words, competition. I think we all accept that best value as applied by what was formerly the ODPM—now the DCLG—became a classic example of red tape and bureaucracy gone mad. Sometimes it tied up far more resources than it ever saved, despite its intentions of greater economy and efficiency. The sensible way to remove this red tape is to remove the legislation, not tinker with it so that some bits apply and some do not, particularly when the bits that have been removed carry a meaningful purpose. If the overarching aim of best value is still required, it would be easy enough to add ““economic”” to the requirement on police authorities to be ““efficient”” and ““effective”” and to include a duty to secure improvements as a specific function of police authorities. But let us be clear that keeping the duties without the powers is an iniquitous and impossible task. It would be better, I suggest, to disapply best value altogether and be rid of this obsolete requirement. I beg to move.