|
UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 407-i House of COMMONS MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE HOME AFFAIRS COMMITTEE
THE WORK OF BRITISH TRANSPORT POLICE
CHIEF CONSTABLE ANDREW TROTTER Evidence heard in Public Questions 1 - 12
USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT
Oral Evidence Taken before the Home Affairs Committee on Members present Mr James Clappison Mrs Ann Cryer David TC Davies Mrs Janet Dean Gwyn Prosser Mr David Winnick
In the absence of the Chairman, Mrs Cryer was called to the Chair ________________ Memorandum submitted by British Transport Police
Examination of Witness Witness: Chief Constable Andrew Trotter, Chief Constable, British Transport Police, gave evidence. Q1 Mrs Cryer: Chief Constable, would you like to introduce yourself. I am Ann Cryer and I am chairing this session. Chief Constable Trotter: I am Andrew Trotter, Chief Constable of British Transport Police. Q2 Mrs Cryer: Thank you. What do you regard as the main issues facing the British Transport Police at present? What do you wish to achieve during your time as Chief Constable of that organisation? Chief Constable Trotter: We are an organisation, from some modest history of some five or six years ago, that has seen some considerable increases in investment from the rail industry, and there has been a commensurate increase in performance across the board over the last few years. Quite clearly we run now into a very different financial environment, and so the challenge of difficulties in the rail industry as far as finance is concerned and the impact it has on us. At the same time, as far as I am concerned, we have had considerable decreases in every crime type over the last few years, with increases in detections. I intend to continue that improvement. I am going to have to do it for less money. That is the real challenge that we have right now. Of course the public's concern is not only around crime, it is around antisocial behaviour. I am making my officers more visible at night, with solo patrols where appropriate, and really engaging much more not only with the public but with rail staff and the rail industry to give them a better service. The service has been very good, but there is obviously room for improvement. Quite clearly the public are concerned about misbehaviour as much as anything else and I intend to continue to drive that down. Mrs Cryer: I am well aware of your officers being present on Leeds City Station late at night. It is very reassuring for a woman travelling alone. Q3 Mrs Dean: You have obviously mentioned the financial constraints at the moment. Are you having to consider reducing police officer numbers? Chief Constable Trotter: I am having to look at a whole range of things. We have been well funded by the rail industry over the last few years, but quite clearly they are looking for efficiencies and economies, as we all are, and I am looking to drive out most costs from back-office functions wherever possible - not only police staff but police officers doing intelligence functions and things such as that. They are perfectly worthwhile and very good jobs that they do, but I must preserve the frontline wherever possible. It is certainly my intention through a range of methods and means to continue to drive out those inefficiencies and to continue to improve. It is a real challenge, but we have been doing this for some years now, flushing out inefficiencies. We have put a lot more police officers and PCSOs on the frontline, and I am going to continue wherever possible to do that, wherever I can maintain the frontline whilst making those efficiencies behind the scenes. Q4 Mrs Dean: Have you been able to quantify how many officers' posts? Also, how do you propose to fill the gaps that you create? Chief Constable Trotter: We are going through our budgets at the moment for next year. One of my areas already is looking at reducing the number of supervisors. Whilst that is a reduction in police officer numbers, if I can reduce the supervisory ratio I can still keep constables and PCSOs on that frontline. It is looking at things like HR. I have taken 20% out of the HR costs over the last couple of years. I have amalgamated control rooms. In some cases we do lose police officer numbers, but it is the visible impact that I want to maintain. Even if my overall numbers go down, it is the ones outside that I want to keep up. Q5 David Davies: Chief Constable, we have been told by your predecessor that BTP sometimes feel a bit left out when it comes to the arrangement of new IT products. Hand-held devices were probably one particular area. Is that still a problem? Do you feel you are adequately consulted when these projects are being brought in? Chief Constable Trotter: I do now. You mentioned particularly mobile data. We of course were one of the pioneers of mobile data and then managed to bid successfully for Home Office money to supply more, so I am quite pleased with what happened on that front. As far as the search arches that we use for looking for knives, again we were one of the pioneers of that. It is not so much about being left out of the consultation; it is more about being left out of the money. There is a tendency for Home Office money that is pushed through by ACPO colleagues to be tagged "Home Office money" and occasionally we have to fight quite hard and say, "We're a police force that covers England, Wales and Scotland, fully engaged in everything from murder to bye-law offences, and we should be engaged and be shown a fair share of the money." That is one of the issues that tends to happen from time to time, and it is just making sure that we are fully represented. I sit on ACPO cabinets because I have ACPO responsibilities. My other colleagues have ACPO responsibilities for the Olympics and things such as that. We try to represent not only BTP but to get engaged in national policing issues. My Scottish Assistant Chief Constable sits on the ACPOS Committee. We are very well represented, but it is making sure that we are there when there is money to be handed out so that we have a part of that. Q6 David Davies: Is the pensions issue now resolved? There has been an issue around people moving from the Home Office force to BTP and back again. Chief Constable Trotter: It has not been resolved. In the past police officers could move in and out of British Transport Police and retain their pension rights. I think it is vital that continues. I do not want British Transport Police to be an island of only BTP officers. I think it is very important for cross-fertilisation of ideas and to refresh the organisation at every level that people to come in and out of Home Office and Scottish forces. The current arrangements preclude that, other than to a great disadvantage of the officers trying to come in. Lord Adonis has been very helpful in trying to resolve this. We are running into problems because the Home Office and Treasury, so we understand it, do not want to re-open the police officer 30 years scheme. I am again pushing back on that. I do believe that we cannot leave BTP to be just BTP officers. In every other force in the country people move in and out and they certainly should in BTP. Q7 David Davies: Chief Constable, you will have seen that there has been some criticism of levels of stop and search, particularly section 44s, of the Metropolitan Police. I do not necessarily share that criticism, but there we are, it is there. Have you felt that criticism yourself and have you acted to try to reduce the numbers of random stop and searches taking place? Chief Constable Trotter:
Stop and
search under section 44 is clearly there to protect the railway. Be it 7/7 or Q8 David Davies: One of the concerns that I have had occasionally on the frontline, as it were, has been that the current laws around search, the PACE rules, do not allow people to take into account a previous criminal record when making a decision as to whether or not to carry out a search. In some instances I have seen people stopped for committing an offence that would not really be arrestable, but the radio checks reveal that that person has a very long record for carrying knives or guns or drugs or something, and that person is basically a prolific criminal. I would have thought at that point it would be reasonable to carry out a stop and search, but PACE does not allow it. All officers are taught this, and I have looked at the PACE regulations and a previous criminal record is not something that officers can take any account of at all. Do you think it is time perhaps to look at that? Chief Constable Trotter: If we move away from section 44 to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, good stop and searches are very much a part of a preventative campaign as much as anything else. It is a street matter, so we are dealing with street drug dealers, we are dealing with robbers - the sort of people who are on the streets, often in areas of high crime - and, as far as we are concerned, those people coming onto railway stations. A good use of intelligence about the proliferation of, say, drug dealers and the location of robbers would legitimise the use of those powers. I want my officers only to use the powers they are entitled to use, and not to stretch them in any way whatsoever, but I think that by good intelligence and good targeted operations the powers that we have are quite robust and we do use them to good effect. The way that we use stop and search and the search arches and things like that are part of the dramatic reduction in crime that we have seen, and not only in BTP. Robbery has really gone down over the last five years - an over 50% reduction in robbery, which is quite dramatic - and most other Home Office forces have seen similar reductions. A lot of that is to do with good, visible policing and proper use of stop and search powers. Q9 Mr Winnick: As you have said in reply to Mr Davies, Chief Constable, sensitivity of course is very, very important and action should not be taken that could be counterproductive. Recognising that, nevertheless bearing in mind what happened on 7 July nearly five years ago, do you feel there are steps in technology which could help, which were not around or not used at the time, that would prevent a massacre along the lines which sadly and terribly happened on 7/7? Chief Constable Trotter: DfT and TRANSEC have been working very closely with us, looking at a whole variety of new bits of kit. We have seen the different scanners now in use at airports. But it is not just new technology, it is making better use of existing technology. CCTV is in a really interesting situation at the moment, where we have a changeover to digital systems. There is far more CCTV on the railway than ever before but a real need to ensure that it is co-ordinated properly. We have found some real problems of late getting what we call "mass export" or "mass download" of things from the system. If you remember back at 7/7, in order to do a mass download people took the hard drives out of the system and in so doing disabled the systems. The absence of back-up facilities resulted in a real problem during the middle of an ongoing terrorist operation. One of the things on which I have been working with the counter-terrorism branch of the Metropolitan Police is reviewing where we are now, because it is absolutely vital that we understand exactly what we have got, not only for a post-event investigation but perhaps for real-time tracking of a suspect now. Everyone is obviously aware of the number of systems, but people are not quite aware of the considerable amount of work needed to be done to bring those systems together in some way so that we can genuinely track people who might be out to do some mischief now. That is probably the number one issue for me right now, to ensure that we understand what we have got, and there is a real plan to make it all work together. Q10 Mr Winnick: I assume there is no complacency whatsoever. It remains, unfortunately, not a question of if but when. Chief Constable Trotter: Every time I go to counter-terrorism briefings, I am reminded of just how serious this problem is every day. We cannot relax for a moment. Keeping one's frontline staff on alert at all times requires quite a lot, because not only us but other people start to lose focus on just what a threat this is. Counter-terrorism remains a major issue for us. Q11 Mr Winnick: We saw what happened at Glasgow Airport, of course. Chief Constable Trotter: Yes. There are many things happening every day where the counter-terrorism branch does a superb job, along with the security services, in thwarting a number of matters. We should not underestimate for a moment just how serious the threat is. Mr Winnick: Thank you. Q12 Mrs Cryer: Chief Constable, could we look forward to the Olympics in two years. Further to the reply you have just given, are you perfectly happy that your communications and information systems are going to be compatible with the other forces that you are going to have to work with at that time? Chief Constable Trotter: Most certainly. One of my Assistant Chief Constables has the national transport lead not only for rail but for other things. I have the lead for control rooms across all the Olympic forces. We have airwave radio. We are one of the first adopters of that. That works across the country, and every force now has it and so do the other emergency responders. There is a lot of work to be done to ensure the control rooms all work together, to ensure that we all understand information flow, that we all understand decision-making points, because it is a highly complex operation, as you can imagine. I have every confidence that the national lead for the Olympics is clearly on top of all of these issues, and there are a number of exercises which will start quite soon to test those various arrangements. I am content that we have the technology. It is now putting that into practice in what will be probably one of the biggest challenges any of us have faced in our police careers. Mrs Cryer: Chief Constable Trotter, thank you very much for being with us. |