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Police Restructuring

May I welcome the hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Nick Herbert) to his Front-Bench role? I am sure that he will enjoy it and the opportunity to work with the police. I shall try to respond to as many contributions as possible. Twenty-seven Members spoke, which shows the level of interest on both sides of the House in the future of our police services and their importance to local people. I was a little disappointed that Opposition speeches did not include a single contribution by a female Member of Parliament. Indeed, I do not think that a female Opposition Member even attended the debate, which is not the face of the new Conservative party that we want to see. The right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (David Davis) made a disappointing contribution, in which he argued for the ““do nothing”” option. He often says that he wants efficiency, but he was not prepared to make any of the bold and courageous decisions that the Government are prepared to make. May I remind him of the history of the proposals? The right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) is in the Chamber and, in June 1993, just before he replaced the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) as Home Secretary, a White Paper on police reform was published. It said that ““the pattern”” of 43 forces"““is partly the result of historical accident and the merging of organisations established haphazardly over more than 100 years . . . The result today is a patchwork quilt of forces of widely varying sizes and types. . . It is questionable whether 43 separate organisations are now needed to run police operations and whether the maintenance of 43 parallel organisations makes the most effective use of the resources available to policing.””" Twenty-three years ago, the Conservative Government were not prepared to grasp the nettle and make the decisions that needed to be made. History has therefore repeated itself. The hon. Member for Winchester (Mr. Oaten), like other hon. Members, commended the ability of our police forces to respond. He acknowledged that changes were taking place, and that there were new challenges in relation to serious and organised crime. However, there is not a blueprint, redprint or any other kind of print in the Home Office to redraw the map, which is why we asked forces and authorities to submit proposals. I can tell the hon. Gentleman and other hon. Members that, as a result of those proposals, the links of the locality will be stronger, not weaker—a point that has been made by several Government Members.