Police proposal confusing, expensive & pointless

The government has just launched a Green Paper on the future of policing. It’s all about cutting bureaucracy and consulting local people even more on what is important to them. And also, and this is the really flawed bit, a directly elected and costly ‘policing representative’ for every area… yet more burden on council tax payers, more bureaucracy and somebody else looking over the police’s collective shoulders!

Now I’m sure some may disagree, but I believe people are fed up of constantly being consulted on public services. I for one would rather see police on the streets rather than sitting in public meetings ‘getting closer to local people’, as it says in the Green Paper, for hours on end. I’m pretty sure the police themselves would rather be at the sharp end, on the streets meeting people and ‘nicking’ troublemakers. And I genuinely don’t think it is difficult to know what most people want…

More police officers on the streets and more presence in rural communities.

A tougher approach to anti-social behaviour, not kids just mucking around like yougsters do, but those who regularly cause grief and upset in their communities.

An actual visit by an officer. Preferably soon after and even for things that aren’t top priority, a visit of some sort, rather than just providing a incident number on the phone.

And better feedback. People being told what’s been done about their issue. In the majority of cases, Lichfield police aren’t bad at that, but not always, and across Staffordshire and the country that is a big issue for people.

It’s the government’s inexhaustible reliance on targets, stats and an obsession with consultation which is forcing the police to depart further from good old fashioned policing. And now we have the government’s latest idea for making the police more ‘democratic’. Yet another, elected position called the Crime and Policing Representative (CPR) for each area of around 100,000 people.

They’d be responsible and acountable (theoretically) for the police in the local area. Significant extra cost, more bureaucracy and a fine opportunity for some extra buck passing and confusion. That’s what it appears to be and I don’t believe it is what we want. Yes, let’s have more clarity about where that buck stops but let’s not complicate things further. You can read more about it here.

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