Where is the challenge to conventional thinking?

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Although we don’t yet have the full details, the police reorganisation announced this week by the Home Secretary is already looking like a bit of a mish-mash – and a major missed opportunity for a more thorough debate around the best way of organising policing. Leaving aside the obvious own goal of not taking the opportunity to devolve policing to Wales, and the way that ends up undermining the First Minister and Labour’s Senedd election campaign, there are other ideas which seem not to have even been considered by what has shown itself to be a centralist and centralising government.

At the heart of the issue are two demands which appear to be in direct conflict, but that conflict is more to do with being wedded to the idea of single police forces than any practical necessity in terms of policing. Those two demands are: firstly, for a more local and accountable approach to policing; and secondly for the rationalisation of more specialist areas of policing. Even if policing were to be devolved to Wales, we would still face the same issues when debating whether to have a single Welsh force or multiple forces. However, there are plenty of international examples of an approach which does not put all ‘policing’ under a single organisation, but there seems to be a lack of willingness to learn from them. The Home Secretary’s intention to set up a national force to deal with certain crimes makes sense (although whether it should be a single EnglandandWales body or two separate bodies is an area for disagreement). But taking out those activities where a rationalisation of specialist resources is beneficial should reduce rather than increase the need for a reduction in the number of forces. An area like Dyfed Powys, for instance, is already too large for any serious degree of local control and accountability – an all-Wales force would be even less so.

Why could we not, instead, split policing between: smaller, more local forces – at county/ county borough level perhaps? – responsible for bobbies on the beat and the sort of low level activity which is most people’s experience of crime; regional forces responsible for investigating more serious crime; and a national (Welsh) force responsible for more specialist activities? And why does traffic policing have to fit into the same structure? The UK seems to be hung up on the idea that ‘policing’ is a single activity which has to fall under the remit of a single body, but abandoning that view opens up the possibility of reconciling the demand for more local accountability for community policing whilst still having resources and expertise in depth to respond to other needs. It’s what happens in many other countries, and it generally seems to work, but the centralising mindset seems unable to consider it. It’s the sort of different approach which a Senedd with control over policing could follow, although it would still require politicians willing to challenge convention.

Electing the police

Tweet Police Authorities are not exactly the most transparent of organisations. A large part of the membership consists of councillors appointed by their own local authorities, but the remaining members are appointed by means which are something of a mystery to most.

The idea that there should be more openness and accountability, which is what lies behind the government's proposals for elected commissioners is one which I think has a lot of merit. But agreeing with the principle is not the same as agreeing with the proposal.

Electing a single Police Commissioner for each force will, I think, inevitably politicise policing, and it will put all the power into the hands of one individual on a winner takes all basis. Directly electing a representative police authority, on the other hand, would create a body which would still have party political representation on it, but would also represent a wider spectrum of opinion in the area covered.

And my first reaction to the idea that any increase in the police precept would have to go to a local referendum is that it sounds to me like a recipe for an annual referendum on the police budget. Some might argue that to be a good thing; but why single out the police? Holding an annual referendum on the level of one form of taxation is a genie which I suspect they'd regret releasing from the bottle.

The Labour response to the proposal seems to centre around the idea that we shouldn't hold an election because the wrong people might win it. Whilst Gordon Brown might be wishing he'd thought of that one earlier, I really don't think that stands up as a reason for opposing what is being proposed.

This is, however, a proposal where the 'Welsh way' might well be different. We've called for devolution of policing before, and that would give us an opportunity here in Wales to consider an alternative approach.

Constraints of Democracy

Tweet Carmarthenshire County Council, like all elected authorities, sets its council tax in the full glare of public scrutiny. So there was a good debate last week during which the Labour/Independent members attempted to justify an above-inflation rise of 3.3%, whilst the opposition Plaid group put forward a reasoned case for a lower rise.

In the meantime, police authorities which do not face direct election for their membership set their own council tax precepts, often with much less attention. I understand that Dyfed Powys are looking for an increase of over 5%, for instance.

The furore over the increase in the neighbouring South Wales force has been somewhat exceptional, but has amounted to an argument about whether the increase should be 5% or 9.8%, with the Chief Constable threatening all sorts of repercussions if the authority don't do what she wants them to do.

But would either authority have been talking about an increase as high as 5% even, let alone 9.8%, if their members had to face the electorate directly and account for their actions? Somehow, I doubt it. It was almost certainly not her intention, but I suspect that the Chief Constable of South Wales Police has actually strengthened the argument for more democratic accountability.

Democracy in action?

Tweet I have a fairly open mind at this stage about the suggestion of replacing the current police authority set-up with directly-elected authorities. In principle, electing people to the authorities seems to me to be preferable to appointing them behind closed doors, even if many of the people appointed have themselves already been through an election to become local councillors. To be worthwhile, however, the police authorities would need to have a real degree of control over policing, and not just be rubber-stamps for whatever the Home Office decides.

I'm not convinced that the reasons given by opponents of the idea at the weekend stand up terribly well, though.

I'm reluctant to disagree with a councillor from my own party, but I simply can't go along with Lindsay's argument that we shouldn't make this change because there is a danger that extremists could end up serving on police authorities. It's true, of course, and most of us would not welcome such an outcome – but it sounds a little bit like arguing that we shouldn't hold elections because the turnout might be low and the wrong people might win them.

It was the comments of the WLGA leader, John Davies, which seemed to me to be particularly lacking in validity. He expressed concern that the police authorities and local authorities might end up working to different political agendas – conveniently ignoring the fact that Dyfed-Powys (his and my home force) covers the area of four different counties, so there is no way that they can currently be guaranteed to be following the same agenda anyway.

He also argues that this would add another level of "unnecessary and extremely costly" bureaucracy. I'm really not sure how replacing nominees with elected members either adds another level or needs to cost any more.

I suspect that Cllr Davies is actually more concerned about losing part of his personal power, however. In Pembrokeshire, the county council's 'Independent' members of the police authority are not elected by the council, but are in the gift of the Leader of the council – who has a total of 34 paid posts to which he can appoint his councillors. The Leader is none other than the very same Cllr John Davies. And I'm sure that he weighed things up very carefully before appointing himself as one of the county council's representatives on the Police Authority.