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Police Grant

My hon. Friend makes a good point about one of the pressures on the budgets. Another example of stress appears in the figures. External provision for the police amounted to 85 per cent. of gross revenue expenditure in 1996-97, but is now projected to be down to 61 per cent. That represents an extraordinary drop and an extraordinary increase in the amount of funding expected from the council tax payer, particularly when one bears in mind what an incredibly rotten tax the council tax is, how regressive it is and how unfortunate a burden it imposes on those who are least able to pay, and whose households are under considerable financial stress. There is also clear evidence of stress in the Home Office's handling of its own budget over the past year, such as the sudden announcement in the middle of the year that the previously agreed level of funding for police community support officers would be cut. All those factors combine with the pressures from pay and general inflation to bear down on a budget that will clearly be inadequate for the demands put on it in the year ahead. We know that about 80 per cent. of police costs are staff related. If we are looking, as the Government are, for a more than 9 per cent. efficiency gain, all of which is meant to be turned into cash over the three years of the comprehensive spending review, it seems likely that we will be looking at job losses. It would be honest of the Minister to give us any projections that the Home Office has made of the likely sacrifice, in terms of both the police and their support staff, if the efficiency gains are insisted upon, given the extraordinary proportion of staff costs. What is the way out? Clearly efficiency is one way.