THE Staffordshire Commissioner has spoken out after the announcement that his role is set to be axed by the Government.
Ben Adams was re-elected last year, but will not be contesting a third term in 2028 following the national announcement last week.
Home Office Minister Sarah Jones said the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) role – introduced in November 2012 – had not worked, with the public having little awareness of who their commissioner is.
Their powers will be transferred to regional mayors or policing and crime boards made up of local council leaders.
Speaking in the House of Commons, the Minister said:
“We will no longer run separate policing elections – and we will also abolish police and crime panels, the current structure that performs scrutiny panels for PCCs.
“We estimate that at least £100million will be saved this Parliament by moving to these new arrangements.
“The reality is that the PCC model has weakened local police accountability and has had perverse impacts on the recruitment of chief constables.
“They have failed to inspire confidence in local people, in stark contrast to the mayoral model, which has clearly been ultimately more successful.
“Once delivered, the changes are expected to achieve savings to the Home Office of around £20million a year, enough to fund around 320 extra police constables.”
Commissioner Adams responded to the decision at a Police, Fire and Crime Panel meeting.
He said:
“It’s not every week you get abolished – and it’s certainly not every week you get told that something of that significance is going to happen and that it’s going to be announced an hour later, which I didn’t appreciate.
“I didn’t think that gave me and my colleagues around the country enough time to properly brief our teams prior to the announcement being made public.
“I had already prepared my team and we were already working towards potentially passing onto a Mayor in three or four years’ time. We were working the organisation into a position where it would be so lean and effective that a Mayor would be able to concentrate on their economic tasks.
“The thing that’s concerned me about the proposals is there’s likely to be an interim in the majority of areas that won’t have Mayors, which will mean a Police Crime and potentially Fire Board made up of the top tier authority leaders and some independents.
“They will appoint someone along the lines of a Deputy Mayor, so a similarly-paid person to pay attention to the two services, but I’m not comfortable with the blurring of accountability across multiple council leaders.”
The end of the current Staffordshire Commissioner’s term of office is set to coincide with major changes to local government structure in Staffordshire.
The current county, district and borough councils are due to be abolished in 2028, to be replaced by a unitary authority system instead.
Councils are currently preparing proposals for future authority areas, with a 28th November deadline to submit detailed plans to the Government.
Five different proposals for revamping Staffordshire’s political map have come forward, including an east and west split and new northern and southern councils.
Commissioenr Adams told councillors at the meeting:
“To add to the weight of challenge that you all have as local government councillors and representatives, you will now have leaders who will be taking responsibility for community safety, setting up a new board to do that and potentially in the bulk of the country, bringing fire and rescue under that banner too.
“There’s real challenges there because Government has yet to clarify the position on the operational independence for fire and to determine the employer – for fire I remain the employer at the moment, although that needs dealing with.
“The other concern for me is that in places that are going to have the boards, that will mean two transitions – one to a board and then possibly two years later onto a Mayor. That doesn’t seem like good, efficient effective business to me, that feels like an opportunity for distraction and an opportunity for not a lot to get done.
“I am somewhat concerned that the pace of the last few years will not be repeated beyond 2028 for a while. But in the meantime, some reassurance for the public and businesses in Staffordshire is that I’m not going anywhere for the next two and a half years.
“As far as I’m concerned this is a full-time operation. I will be keeping my oversight of the two services, watching the budget, making necessary investments and keeping the place as safe as I possibly can.”