The crime commissioner of the West Midlands has urged ministers to bring back the old police authorities.
Bob Jones, who became the force’s first directly-elected commissioner last year, backed calls from Lord Stevens, the former head of London’s Metropolitan Police, for the post to be axed. The recommendations came in a report by the Independent Police Commission chaired by Lord Stevens and set up by Labour to help it draw up proposals for policing in the run-up to the next election.
They could form part of Labour’s election manifesto although they will now be reviewed by Labour leader Ed Miliband and Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper.
Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) were created by the current Government in an attempt to make forces more accountable to the public by giving them a high-profile and directly-elected figurehead to scrutinise their work.
But Lord Stevens’ report said: “There is mounting evidence of serious difficulties in how PCCs are operating on the ground. There is little public knowledge of, or support for, this experiment in democratic policing.”
Highlighting disputes between Police and Crime Commissioners and Chief Constables in forces such as Lincolnshire and Gwent, in Wales, he said there had been “well-documented problems” with the relationship between some PCCs and colleagues.
“It remains difficult to envisage how a single individual can provide effective democratic governance of police forces covering large areas, diverse communities and millions of people.
“In sum, we are confronted with the spectre of an experiment that is failing.”
The report called for the creation of new policing boards, involving the leaders of existing local councils, to replace PCCs.
It also said police forces should review their borders to make sure they matched the borders of councils.
Mr Jones said: “I welcome the report of the Stevens Commission. It is a very authoritative contribution to the debate about the future of policing. This raises the very valid question: with what do you replace them?
“I think there are much better models. Even simply reverting to the previous police authority model would be better: given that the Home Secretary says her only measure of success is reducing crime, it is worth remembering that police authorities oversaw the biggest reduction in crime since records began.”
Mr Jones said that one option would be developing the local policing and crime boards which involve local communities and the region’s councils and would produce a more collaborative approach to decision making.
Mr Jones also welcomed the report’s call for a greater focus on neighbourhood policing and working in partnership with local agencies to prevent crime.
Lord Stevens warned that budget cuts and a focus on securing convictions rather than preventing crime meant “neighbourhood policing, responsive to the concerns of local communities, is being threatened”.
Other ideas in the report include giving police officers a new chartered status and allowing them to be struck off a professional register if they are guilty of misconduct.
