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Crime (London)

Thank you for that intervention, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I had concluded those remarks. The hon. Member for Henley is putting himself forward as a candidate for Mayor, with responsibility for policing among other matters, but I will indeed move on. According to the hon. Gentleman's manifesto—he has at least produced a manifesto—he will apparently use his influence to tear up red tape and needless form-filling. Presumably what he had in mind was needless P45 form-filling, of which he has some experience. Let me move on to the Labour Mayor's position. The incumbent, Ken Livingstone, is keen to distance himself from the Government when appropriate, but at other times he is keen to make himself known as the Labour Mayor. We have to take the two together. I am happy to put on record the fact that the combination of the Government and the Mayor has enjoyed some successes, the biggest example of which is the safer neighbourhood teams. Like probably all hon. Members present, I have been round with the safer neighbourhood teams in a number of my wards and seen their impact on the ground. I can see that they are delivering the reassurance that people need and are beginning to eat seriously into crime levels. I am told that the biggest problem for the safer neighbourhood teams in some of the leafier suburbs—Government Members should please not quote me on this—is that there is no crime for them to deal with. If safer neighbourhood teams are telling me and other hon. Members, as I suspect they are, that there are times when things are relatively quiet and they would like some other challenges, we might need to consider giving them a more flexible structure.