Examination of Witness (Questions 1-19)
CHIEF CONSTABLE
IAN JOHNSTON
CBE QPM
26 APRIL 2006
Chairman: Chief Constable, we do have
one little bit of housekeeping and that is members having an interest
to declare.
Mr Martlew: I am a member of the Transport
and General Workers' Union and the General Municipal Workers'
Union.
Graham Stringer: I am a member of Amicus.
Chairman: Aslef.
Mrs Ellman: I am a member of the Transport
and General Workers' Union.
Q1 Chairman: Chief Constable, you are
a most valued guest always for this Committee. I think you know
the ground rules by now. Would you be kind enough to identify
yourself for the record?
Chief Constable Johnston: I am
Ian Johnston. I am the Chief Constable of the British Transport
Police.
Q2 Chairman: Did you have something
you wanted to say to us first?
Chief Constable Johnston: I would
be happy to go straight into business.
Q3 Chairman: Is the British Transport
Police fit for the 21st Century as it is currently organised?
Chief Constable Johnston: It is
a lot fitter today than it was 18 months ago. The journey has
commenced and it is going very quickly, but there are still things
to be done. I think there has been great progress made around
infrastructure issues which HMIC were very critical of before.
There has been major investment in IT, in finance, in HR, in estates
and a major investment in Police Community Support Officers. There
is still work to be done around our control room arrangements
and around some matters within IT. I think there are opportunities
for us to develop our policing style and to enable the policing
formula, which works very well outside the railway environment,
and to build stronger partnership arrangements with the train
operators, Network Rail and London Underground.
Q4 Chairman: That is very encompassing
and very encouraging. How do you fit into the Home Office review
of police structures?
Chief Constable Johnston: The
Home Office's review is looking at why there should be 43 police
forces. A review was conducted by one of Her Majesty's Inspectors
of Constabulary into the capacity and capability of forces to
deliver what they call a range of protective services and these
are broadly speaking to do with counter-terrorism, the more upper
level parts of policing. That review drew some relationship between
the size of force and capability and as a result of that a process
of consultation was put in train which is leading towards an amalgamation
of those forces. The Secretary of State for Transport took the
view that it would be wrong for us to sit outside that process
and therefore agreed to conduct his own review of us, with his
own terms of reference, but to make sure it was timetabled with
and took cognisance of what was happening in that review. They
are two separate processes but they are aware of each other and
aligned.
Q5 Chairman: But this is not the
first time you have had a review in the last four years.
Chief Constable Johnston: This
is the fourth review in four years. It does put significant pressure
upon management time and it does concern front-line staff who
obviously, like most human beings, value some sense of continuity
in their lives.
Q6 Chairman: Do you support the Metropolitan
Police taking control of the British Transport Police for London?
Chief Constable Johnston: No,
I do not. I have got great admiration for the Metropolitan Police.
I think they do an absolutely fantastic job. I had the privilege
of working for them for a number of years and I think they have
got some massive strengths. I do think the present arrangements
provide the best possible service for the travelling public and
for the railway operators. I think we have got specialist skills,
I think we have got an understanding of the operating environment,
I think we bring knowledge of the commercial context in which
the railways run and I think we add significant value through
our specialist nature, but I think there is a real risk of dilution
of those skills. I think there is great value in having a single
police force for the railway. Railways crisscross the country.
Railways do not stop on the borders of London. I think what it
would do is introduce a new set of boundaries which would be more
difficult to manage than the existing boundaries. The relationship
between us and the Met operationally is outstanding and it has
been for years. We have well rehearsed protocols that served us
very well on 7 July and they have served us very well indeed in
terms of massive operations across London over the last decade.
Those present arrangements are first class and I am confident
they will continue.
Q7 Chairman: Do you think it would
affect the low level of crime on trains if the management were
to change radically?
Chief Constable Johnston: One
of the great strengths of the Met is in relation to what professionally
we call Level 2 crime. Level 1 crime is the anti-social behaviour,
Level 3 is the international crook and Level 2 is the body of
material that lies in the middle. I think where the Met brings
to bear great strengths is in that Level 2 area, but most of the
crime on the railways is within the Level 1 patch, it is the anti-social
behaviour, the route crime and the assaults on staff. It is that
sort of day-to-day policing which is the challenge for us on the
railways. Having had the privilege of working in both organisations,
I do not think the Met will bring to bear any greater expertise.
They certainly have not got our familiarity with the challenges
we have got or our awareness in a commercial context.
Q8 Chairman: And your people are
specially trained to deal with railways, are they not?
Chief Constable Johnston: Absolutely.
Q9 Graham Stringer: You have not
dealt with the main argument that the Metropolitan Police put
forward for a merger of the forces which is a unified command
structure. I would be grateful if you would give me the pros and
cons for that argument.
Chief Constable Johnston: I think
there are very legitimate arguments for having a single command
geographically and also equally strong arguments for having a
single command functionally. I think what the debate here is about
is whether or not the benefits of having a single police force
for London—and I can see some clear advantages in that—are
outweighed by the disadvantages of having, at present, 43 police
forces for the railway, because if you took the London bit away
from BTP there would be a major question mark about the viability
of the rest of the force which would mean it would have to be
dispersed to other forces. I think you would then have, in terms
of an integrated railway policing service, nothing at all. The
fundamental point for me is not that the argument for having a
single police force for London is unsound because I think there
is great merit in having that. My second point is that if you
think this is a boundary issue, you are merely creating a point
about boundaries elsewhere. So instead of the boundaries coming
between us and the Met they would come between the Met and all
the other forces around the outskirts of London. So you would
not get rid of a boundary problem, you would create new boundary
problems within that system. For me what you have to ask is what
the outcome is of this issue to do with boundaries and if the
outcome is something to do with technology, get your technology
lined up. We bought the same IT intelligence system as the Met
has got. We bought the same national radio system as the Met has
got.
Q10 Chairman: You have the same radio
system as the Met, have you?
Chief Constable Johnston: We have
additional radio facilities. We have two systems. We have the
airwave system, which is the national radio system, but under
ground we use the London Underground system. At present there
is a major bit of work going on between a development company
doing a PFI on London Underground and the airwave people about
bringing these two systems together, which would make good sense
for us and for everybody else. In terms of the boundary issues,
you should be asking what the issues are that come out of that.
The point I was going to make is that maybe it is to do with protocols.
I think we have got fantastically well rehearsed protocols in
operation with the Met. There is not a weekend that goes by when
we are not doing joint operations with them about football or
about events in London. These joint operations were tested to
the extreme in July and I think everybody is agreed that that
went extremely well in terms of an integrated policing operation.
I think the point about boundaries that they are making and one
police force for London is that if you get yourself one police
force for London and lots of police forces for the railway you
have to ask the question what is the issue that you are trying
to address? If it is about integration in some form you find out
what it is you want to integrate. If it is IT you join it up.
If it is protocols you join it up. If it is operating the culture
you have to find some way to join it up. I do not think you have
to go through all the expense, disruption and the organisational
uncertainty simply to address that problem.
Q11 Graham Stringer: Is there anything
that would have been better last July had there been just one
force? I understand the argument about if you integrate London
you disintegrate the rest of the service. I suppose what is at
the back of my question is whether there are any practical problems
which are driving the Met's view. Do you not accept that London
is different not just in size but also in terms of the range of
facilities, people and institutions there are here? It is much
more likely to be a terrorist target.
Chief Constable Johnston: Absolutely.
It is quite right that very serious consideration is given to
these issues. In terms of the BTP `s role in counter-terrorism,
the railways have been the number one terrorist target for 150
years. We had massive experience during the IRA campaign which
gave us a great platform to work from when we were dealing with
the more recent counter-terrorist campaigns. We are not a force
that is devoid of experience in this area, we have a lot of historical
experience and we have risk managed that in a very effective way
historically and our record is there for everybody to see. In
terms of could we have operated better during July, I do not think
there is anything in life that you cannot go back over and find
a better way of operating. We were totally joined up. We had our
people in their control room. We were part of a single command
structure for the whole of London. I spoke to Ian Blair very shortly
after nine o'clock that morning and I said to him that this was
an "Operation BEMBOW", which is the title of a joint
operation, and that the command of the operation was his, so there
was absolute clarity in terms of who was running the show and
we had absolutely no operational conflicts throughout the whole
of that period. The Met oversaw that particular single operation
extremely well.
Q12 Graham Stringer: You said that
you had been improving your efficiency via technology and other
organisational methods over the last 18 months. What was the main
driver behind that? Do you accept the evidence that the Met gave
which was that everything changed after 7 July?
Chief Constable Johnston: We were
in a position where we had been badly funded for a substantial
period of time, to the point where Her Majesty's Inspectorate
of Constabulary spoke about a legacy of neglect, the groaning
infrastructure and the rail review drew very similar conclusions.
Another independent audit came to the same conclusion. Part of
that process led to the appointment of the new police authority.
As soon as the new police authority was appointed it put in train
a programme of investment to address these issues and it has been
extremely bold and it has been extremely well led in addressing
those issues. Since the authority came into existence we have
had something like a 40% increase in budget to the British Transport
Police. We have spent that on totally stripping out all our old
IT systems which were very slow to respond and which left people
for 15 or 20 minutes trying to get into the system throughout
the country. We have modernised our finance department to give
us greater efficiency, we have modernised our HR department so
our people get dealt with properly and we have been able to get
a number of buildings which are much more fit for the purpose.
We have been able to invest in Police Community Support Officers
despite the lack of Government funding for those. That degree
of investment has been very important in taking us forward. I
have forgotten the second part of your question.
Q13 Graham Stringer: I think the
burden of the argument that the Met is putting is that London
is unique, you should have an integrated structure and the world
changed after 7 July. I am trying to get you to address those
arguments.
Chief Constable Johnston: The
world is constantly changing. This is not the first time it has
changed. We had the IRA who wreaked havoc in London through their
terror campaign. We have had lots of challenges in London around
diversity issues which have required the world to change. I do
not think this is the first time that the world has changed. I
think this is a massive new challenge. I think the nature of the
challenge is that the terrorists that we have been previously
dealing with had a different outlook on life. They did not want
to be caught. They did not want to kill too many people. The present
lot do not mind whether they kill themselves or who they kill
and certainly getting caught is not high on their agenda. The
whole rationale and the scale of the terrorist attacks on us now
are different. We have had very, very good investment in our response
capability to match that. The Department for Transport funded
some specialist response vehicles which have equipment on them
that is the best in the world. We have had people from all over
Europe coming to look at our equipment. We have recognised the
changing nature of the world and equipped ourselves to deal with
that. We contribute in a very useful way to the whole security
framework within London, a security framework which is managed
overall very effectively by the Metropolitan Police through something
called the Security Review Committee which meets every week, which
we go to and we respond to deployment challenges from that group
in a very positive and integrated way.
Q14 Mrs Ellman: If the Metropolitan
Police did take over the British Transport Police in London, what
would that mean for British Transport Police in the rest of the
country?
Chief Constable Johnston: I think
it would place a very serious question mark over our viability
as an organisation. In very broad terms, there are probably about
1,200 of our 2,700-odd officers in what you would call the Metropolitan
Police area. It would half the size of the organisation. That
would place a question mark on its viability. It would also place
a question mark over how you are going to police the rest of the
country given that you have now got this fresh border. So trains
would leave London and become the responsibility of somewhere
else on their route to other parts of the country. If the Met
took it over, I think there would be a very serious question mark
about the future of the British Transport Police and I think that
would be a very bad thing for the industry and the passengers
who use the system.
Q15 Mrs Ellman: In what way will
it be bad? What impact do you think that would have?
Chief Constable Johnston: I see
the outcome of that being no BTP. The rest of BTP's area would
have to be dealt with by different forces. If you were a passenger
on a train travelling out of Euston up to Glasgow, once you left
the Metropolitan Police area, which is on the borders of Hertfordshire,
you travel through a range of different force areas and if you
lost your baggage on the way I do not know who you would find
to deal with it. If you are a train operator and your train gets
damaged on that route, who would deal with it? If a train event
occurs in London it has knock-on effects around the country and
so you would lose the connectivity in terms of the policing operation
in dealing with the consequences of it. If you have football supporters
who get on a train in Millwall and who are perhaps travelling
up to some far part of the country, you would have a level of
disintegration of policing activity which would be dysfunctional
and not in anybody's interest. I think there is a whole range
of factors that would come to bear if that was to take place.
Q16 Mrs Ellman: In one of the alternatives
the Government has put forward for change they talk about changing
the method of payment to the British Transport Police, saying
it would be like any other privatised service. What is your view
of that?
Chief Constable Johnston: I think
this is a really challenging area. It is the cause of a lot of
friction with the rail industry at the moment. I think it is a
very complicated topic. The police service provides a public good.
It is not a private security organisation for a train operator.
It provides a range of policing services for the public who travel
on it, the people who come in and out of stations, so it is not
simply a security force. I think there is a tension around that.
In terms of the funding itself, apportioning policing charges
across operators is a very complex and difficult business. If
you do it on the basis of history you can rest assured that the
patterns of demand in the future will be different and there will
be people who will be dissatisfied about that. I think there is
a range of possibilities for addressing this which go from putting
a ticket levy on which provides some sort of evenness and some
transparency in terms of charging. There are some opportunities
to do it through additional government funding perhaps in relation
to counter-terrorism investment or, for example, in relation to
initiatives which do not benefit the railways. For example, the
criminal justice IT system that is going to be used throughout
the UK is being provided by central government funding but it
is not going to be providing central government funding for the
British Transport Police, and I have to make the case to the rail
industry about the business benefits of a joined-up criminal justice
system to them and that is a fairly difficult task to undertake.
I think the present arrangements are very troublesome and I think
it would be useful to explore other methods. I personally quite
like the ticket supplement because that works very effectively
in the airline industry, but I guess these are matters for people
other than me to decide upon.
Q17 Mrs Ellman: The Government suggests
that if the method of payment was changed it would provide more
informed buyers of services. Is that meaningful to you?
Chief Constable Johnston: I think
what we get out of the present arrangement is massive interest
by the train operators about levels of expenditure and a very
keen and very understandable desire to make sure that their profits
are maximised and their costs are minimised and that is a perfectly
acceptable commercial model. When that plays out into policing,
you are asking train operators to take into account the protection
of the capital from counter-terrorism. The consequences of a terrorist
attack on the stations in London go far beyond the economic implications
of the railways, they affect the economy as a whole. So you are
asking the operators at the moment to fund a security regime for
responsibilities which I think go beyond them. I think it is a
really complicated area. I think there is a role for some central
government investment in those sorts of areas.
Q18 Mrs Ellman: The Office of the
Rail Regulator suggests that the industry (train operators and
Network Rail) should pay more themselves, perhaps by being responsible
for patrolling the stations. What do you think about that?
Chief Constable Johnston: At the
moment our capital money comes through the DfT and that is about
£12 million this year out of a £200 million budget,
so it is a relatively small percentage. Most of the money comes
from train operators, from London Underground and Network Rail
and it is divided proportionately between those. All of the money
in a sense comes from the operators at the moment. I think what
I am saying is that there is probably a case for some expenditure
which addresses issues of public good, like the protection of
London against terrorism, which could be legitimately funded directly
by Government.
Q19 Mr Goodwill: I would like to
pick up on something you said earlier about the understanding
of the operating environment. How big a job would it be to equip
Met officers with the necessary skills to allow them to be deployed
on the network, and what particular problems were you talking
about?
Chief Constable Johnston: There
are technical issues about training. Our officers have track safety
training. To police the railways up and down the country we train
2,500 people. If the Met were to police the railways I am not
quite certain how they would decide who was going to be trained
if there were not a dedicated force to deal with the railways.
If there were a dedicated force to deal with the railways you
would have to say what is the difference between that and what
we have currently got? I think the bigger issue is one of culture
where we very much understand the implications of knock-on events.
When we have a fatality on the line we have a target time for
clearing that up in an efficient and effective way. By using that
approach we have reduced the delay minutes down from 120 minutes
three years ago to about 80 minutes now. We have got a culture
which I think recognises not only the operational implications
of policing interventions but also the commercial consequences
and they are commercial consequences in the sense that they are
passengers stuck in tunnels, so there are safety issues relating
to that. We also understand if you do something to a train at
Euston you can disrupt services all day long. It is clearly not
impossible for anybody to build up that level of understanding,
but this is a level of understanding which has been developed.
I am not saying it has taken 150 years to develop, but we have
been policing the railways for something like 150 years and so
we have got a culture which recognises our operating context.
We have used that to build very strong relationships within the
industry. We use that to build relationships with people who work
on stations. I am by no means saying that there is absolutely
no possibility of anybody else ever doing what we are doing because
clearly that is nonsense. What I am saying is there ought to be
a clear set of benefits because there are going to be costs associated
with this, so you need to have a very clear understanding of what
the benefits are and I think that we give good value at the moment
for it. I think with the investment that has been made in this
we can give even better value in it. I think we have got some
existing advantages through our present understanding which would
be a catch-up job for others to do.
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