| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
12.12 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Kate Hoey): I congratulate the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Mr. Davey) not just on winning the chance to hold the debate, but on winning it this week, which is an important week for the Metropolitan police.
I am sure that the House will join me in sending our best wishes to the Commissioner who, as hon. Members probably know, is in hospital. We hope that he is recovering well.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton on the measured way in which he opened the debate. The subject sometimes raises emotions, but I hope that we can deal with it in a constructive and sensible way. We share the desire for our police service in London to operate effectively and to meet the needs of Londoners.
Expenditure on the Metropolitan police is substantial public expenditure. It is important to all of us who live and work in London, because the money spent represents a huge investment in the safety of us all. As hon. Members have mentioned, London has unique capital city requirements which place special policing demands on the Met, who also have national functions that make them a special police service.
It is worth reminding ourselves, as the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) did, of the size of the area for which the Metropolitan police are responsible, and their numbers: 20 per cent. of police officers in the whole of England and Wales are in London. The force is unique in the country, which brings further demands in terms of resources and the nature of policing.
Yesterday, the Commissioner's annual policing plan was published, together with the efficiency plan. This is the first time that an efficiency plan has been produced. Ambitious targets are set out. It is important that the two plans are seen together, because efficiency gains will contribute to more effective policing.
The Government are committed to providing the right level of financial support to ensure that the Metropolitan police can deliver their policing objectives. The House will recall that, in December 1998, the Home Secretary announced a £28.8 million cash boost for the force. That increase means that the funding available to the police for tackling crime and disorder across the capital will rise by 1.7 per cent, from £1.715 billion in 1998-99 to£1.744 billion in 1999-2000. I therefore do not accept that there is a budget shortfall.
Mr. Simon Hughes:
The Minister is, of course, right about the figures, but a 1.7 per cent. increase is clearly below the rate of inflation. To avoid further debate on matters of fact, can she put it on the record, first, that in the coming year there will be a real-terms cut in the budget of the Met, and secondly, as the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) correctly pointed out, that the proportion of the budget coming from the precepted London ratepayers is going up, at the same time as, in real terms, the subsidy from the Government is going down?
Kate Hoey:
I shall go on to deal with the precept, as hon. Members need some accurate information. I do not accept that there is a budget shortfall. As I said, the 1.7 per cent. increase for this year brings the total to £1.744 billion. In addition to that, there is the money
The hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton spoke about the problems associated with the millennium. We recognise the special needs of London, and we allocate the special grant each year. As the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) said--he is, I think, the only Member present who is from outside London--some people outside London do not like that. The special payment was raised last year, and this year it has been raised again from £151 million to £176 million, specifically to deal with the Met's national and Londonwide functions.
We must retain public confidence in policing. Even with the special payment, the overall spending increase for the Met is in line with the rest of the country. They have not received preferential treatment, but they have not been penalised, taking into account their extra tasks. The special payment is 100 per cent. Home Office grant. It is not charged to London taxpayers or the taxpayers of Kingston.
The council tax payer in London is not paying for the extra services that the Metropolitan police must provide, such as anti-terrorist duties, protection for royalty, VIPs, and the policing of special events such as lobbies of Parliament, pickets and rallies. Within the special grant this year, there should be sufficient funding for the millennium celebrations to be adequately policed.
The new funding that we have given the Met is the first instalment of the extra £1.24 billion pledged to the police over the next three years in the comprehensive spending review. It takes into account a 2 per cent. year-on-year efficiency improvement target, which we set as part of the CSR settlement.
As has been said, funding for the Met is not just a matter of central Government funding. The receiver for the Metropolitan police has estimated that net revenue expenditure, which includes the precepted amount for 1999-2000, will be £1.88 billion. That produces an increase of about 3 per cent. in the Met's budget over 1998-99, and brings it broadly in line with the national increase. The budget balances the Commissioner's need for increased resources with the interests of council tax payers in containing their contributions.
The hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton mentioned the precept. It is important to consider what London council tax payers will pay for policing next year. For band D properties, the cost will be £77.44 for the year, which is an increase of less than 60p a month over 1998-99, and the total annual charge is less than the cost of a television licence or a road fund licence for a car.
I appreciate that Opposition Members in particular usually point out figures to make things look disadvantageous to the Government, but the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey should ask people whether they are prepared to pay that extra 60p a month. He said that people never tell him that they want local
police stations to close and police numbers to be reduced. I am absolutely certain that, when those figures were spelt out, they would say that they would pay the extra money.
Mr. Hughes:
As I said in my speech, I am sure that the people of London are happy to make a contribution; I have never heard a protest.
The Minister has helpfully given the figures. First, if she can, will she tell us how the 1.7 per cent. increase from the Government to the Met for the coming year compares with the percentages for other police services? Is the Met at the bottom of the league table, in the middle or at the top? Secondly, what percentage increase in the precept can Londoners expect and how does it compare with increases for other police service precept payers around England?
Kate Hoey:
I shall try to give those figures before the end of my speech, but I should add that, in the Metropolitan police district, the proportion of policing spending raised from estimated council tax in 1998-99 is 12.5 per cent. That is the ninth lowest proportion across all police authorities in England and well below the English average of 14.5 per cent. We are not being unreasonable by asking London council tax payers to contribute a little more for policing next year.
To look at the Metropolitan police in a different context, according to the latest figures from the Audit Commission, expenditure on policing per head of population in the Met area is £218.30, which is double the national average of slightly more than £114. Clearly a great deal of money is going into the police per head of population. We have to be sure that it is being spent in the best possible way on reducing crime and the fear of crime, which is what the police are for and which makes people feel much safer.
I want to answer a couple of points before I go on to discuss efficiency. The hon. Members for Orpington (Mr. Horam) and for Kingston and Surbiton raised the potential closure of police stations, which arouses great emotions, especially in the immediate vicinity of such stations. Police stations are a visible form of reassurance for the public, but last week's Audit Commission report on the police estate found that changes in crime patterns and the increasing use of problem-solving and intelligence-led policing methods, rather than random policing, mean that some police stations are unsuitable for policing in the 1990s. We must accept that. Police forces must review their estate, because, ultimately, better estate management can serve the public better.
When police stations are being threatened with closure, it is essential that the reasons why such a step might be taken are discussed fully, not only with community policing consultative groups, but with the local people. The police must be able to justify a closure, not only for operational reasons, but for reasons that will reassure people that taking such a step will help to make policing better. I know that it is extremely difficult to make those arguments because I have had such cases in my constituency, but Members of Parliament sometimes have to face the fact that difficult steps must be taken in their own constituency and that it is right, although not easy, to argue for them to be taken.
The hon. Members for Twickenham (Dr. Cable) and for Southwark, North and Bermondsey mentioned the national police funding formula. The hon. Member for
Twickenham, who has had to leave--to support the new deal in his constituency, I hope--said that he was not sure whether he understood the formula. It would be very dishonest of me to stand at the Dispatch Box and say that I understand it completely, but one or two people in the Home Office truly understand this difficult and complicated way of working out how much money police forces throughout the country receive.
We inherited the formula from the previous Government. We have refined it, as did the previous Government, but it is not perfect. We have commissioned some independent research to examine whether there are additional costs in policing inner-city urban areas that are not reflected in the formula. All hon. Members who represent inner-city areas well know the particular difficulties with policing those areas. We hope that the research will come up with conclusions that we can use constructively. Although there will never be a formula that satisfies everyone, we have to try continually to make improvements.
Recruitment and retention are clearly important because the Met are an ageing force--we must attract new, younger people. In 1998, for the first time in five years, the Met advertised nationally for recruits and Hendon is being used to capacity. I urge all London Members of Parliament to visit Hendon to see the enormous changes that are taking place in police training; a lot of what came out of the Macpherson report is being worked on at Hendon and such a visit would be useful.
We are trying to do more about retention. We want to retain officers, because it is a pity to train them up only for them to leave the force early. Retention has a lot to do with morale and the police feeling that they have the support of the community, and we have to work on that quickly.
Pensions are a problem which faced the previous Government and face this Government. No Government would want to face up to the huge long-term costs of the pensions shortfall, but a consultation document was published last March and firm proposals will be introduced soon. We are considering the costs and benefits of introducing a funded pensions scheme for new entrants, but that will not be a panacea. We need to get this right and look ahead, although Governments always tend to look at the present rather than the future. This year, however, we recognised the increased burden of police pensions and increased to 14.5 per cent. the proportion of police revenue funding allocated on the basis of police pension commitments.
Setting budgets is not about consistently looking for increases in cash; it is also about achieving more and better with available resources, and 1999-2000 is the first year in which we have required forces to produce efficiency plans. I recommend that all hon. Members read the Met's efficiency plan. Hon. Members may have pressed for more cash to be injected into policing, but we have taken positive action to make sure that everything we invest in our police delivers more efficient and effective police services.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |