Article:
July 2010 |
MIssion impossible
Government makes promise it can’t keep: cut police budget without cutting front-line services
As the excitement over the change
of government subsides and the honeymoon
period ends, the Home Office
has the impossible mission of cutting
millions of pounds off the police budget
while still honouring its promise to
protect front-line services. Now that our new Home Secretary
has settled in, Theresa May has the
daunting task of balancing the policing
books and, whatever she does, her actions
will cause upset.
There will be uproar from the public
if front-line services are cut and crime
soars, so that’s not a good option. There will be uproar from police officers
if pay agreements are broken,
but there will be problems from other
government employees if they have
their pay cut or frozen when the police
do not.
We are told the first line of cuts will
be in the non-front-line departments
but that assumes you can cut millions
from the policing budget, perhaps lose
thousands of support staff, and that it
will not affect the smooth running of
police services.
Whilst there is no doubt that budgets
can be shaved in some areas,
there are many that cannot. If you cut
support staff then front-line officers
will have to take more on and, inevitably,
front-line services will suffer so
this proposal, which sounds palatable,
may not have the outcome the
Government would expect.
As so many of the tasks previously
done by police officers have been
taken over by support staff, cutting
back here means that front-line officers
will have to take back these
additional tasks. The Police Federation
points out that with the number
of support staff growing each year,
the government is running the risk of
threatening the long-term resilience
of the Police Service – all for some
short-term savings (see page 11 for
the federation’s case).
The next area for cuts comes under “efficiency savings”. Again, whilst
there are areas that money can be
saved by being more efficient, forces
have been championing efficiency
savings and best value for the past
decade so unless they all have done
an appalling job, it’s unlikely that this
will be an area where a vast amount
can be saved quickly.
One of the obvious areas to be
targeted for cuts is police overtime,
which reached almost £400m last
year. However, if the politicians are
assuming all these extra hours officers
have been required to work is
unnecessary and will have little effect
on front-line policing, they will have to
think again.
Overtime up 90%
Headlines highlight dramatic statistics
that claim police overtime has
increased by 90% in the past ten
years, implying chief police officers,
police authorities and home secretaries
over that period have allowed this
increase without good cause which, of
course, is nonsense.
Much of this overtime has been in
response to major incidents, terrorism,
floods, political demonstrations
and major crime, such as dealing with
serial killers – all of which cannot be
planned for and require immediate
and substantial police resources.
Overtime savings can be made
(see here for ideas) but can we
really just reduce the overtime bill by £100m, for example, without a huge
knock-on effect on front-line policing? If this much overtime is stopped, important
front-line policing operations
would suffer.
Funding police response
How will a chief officer be expected
to provide a rapid response to a
bombing campaign, a plane or train
crash, an infectious-disease outbreak
or another Yorkshire Ripper if he has
no overtime budget? Would the Home
Office fund such unexpected and expensive
police operations?
As a police officer in the Seventies
and Eighties, even then we had restrictions
on overtime and you needed a
good reason to work over your normal
working week. Overtime was usually
required as the result of being made
to work on a demonstration, search
for a missing child or canvass for witnesses
in a major crime – pretty much
as it is today in most forces.
So over to you Home Secretary, how
are you going to make massive cuts in
the cost of policing without it having
a major impact on front-line policing? And please tell us how chief officers
and police authorities budget for the
unexpected.
Furthermore, when a major incident
occurs, tell us where we will get the
officers to deal with it if you are not
prepared to pay for them.
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