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Police Grant Report

Population is one of the factors that are taken into account, and the exact measurement of population is an area of controversy, and something that needs to be taken into account. [Interruption.] I am reminded that I gave way to the hon. Gentleman earlier, so he has had two bites at the cherry. Migrant numbers do have an impact on costs, and that is why the Government have set up a fund, available from April 2009, to help local services with those costs, such as translators. That money will be made available to Government offices, including the Government office for London. Growing numbers of specialist police staff are taking on roles as scene of crime officers, fingerprint analysts and intelligence officers. Additional police staff are also increasingly taking on the routine elements of case file preparation, prisoner supervision and station inquiries, freeing police officers from administrative work. Although overall numbers are important, it is crucial to make the best use of officer and staff time so that those people are in the right place at the right time to deliver for the public. Getting the best possible work force mix of officers and staff will also help to ensure that the most responsive possible service is provided. Operational police officers are spending more of their time on front-line duties. Overall crime is falling or stable. The overall level of crime recorded by the police in July to September 2008 fell by 3 per cent. compared with the same quarter in 2007. Within that overall figure, violence against the person fell by 6 per cent. and firearm offences fell by 29 per cent. The British crime survey figures published on 22 January 2009 show that, according to interviews, in the year to September 2008 the overall level of crime is stable compared with that in the previous year. So is the risk of being a victim, which remains at a historically low level. Levels of violent crime, domestic burglary and vandalism were also stable compared with the previous year, and vehicle-related thefts fell by 10 per cent. In the 12 months to September 2008, there was a statistically significant decrease in the proportion of adults with a high level of worry about violent crime. May I place on record my thanks to the police service of this country, which has responded well to the many and various demands placed on it? New challenges continue to arrive and we must ensure that the service is in the best possible shape to meet them. That includes not just funding but getting the best possible service from the police. The policing Green Paper ““From the neighbourhood to the national”” represented a radical new deal for the service, freeing it up to focus on tackling local issues in each neighbourhood and to respond to the challenges of serious organised crime and terrorism. We announced that we would scrap all top-down targets for forces, with the exception of one—local confidence. We have done that. The Green Paper declared that we would create a new model of police accountability, with a stronger role for police authorities and Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary. We are doing that. It highlighted the work that we are doing, not least through Operation Quest, to maximise the efficiency and productivity of the service. It said that we would invest in the police leaders of tomorrow, which we are doing through a new senior appointments process and a national police leadership college. All that combined means that the service can be more flexible in meeting the challenges of 21st-century policing. We remain absolutely committed to neighbourhood policing as the bedrock of local policing in the 21st century. We are building a more responsive, locally accountable and citizen-focused police service through a programme to transform policing at a local level to meet the needs of the communities. The current phase of work is to ensure that neighbourhood policing is embedded into core policing activity and that teams increase their focus on working with local communities to identify and tackle local problems together while continuing to provide high-visibility policing, and reducing antisocial behaviour and the fear of crime. HMIC has today published ““Get Smart—Planning to Protect””, which is its report, commissioned by the Government last year, on the planning that forces undertake to deliver protective services. These are particularly significant areas of policing, such as major and organised crime, critical incidents, and domestic and child abuse. HMIC has identified variations across forces in the quality of service planning, and I am committed to seeing improvement made. The National Policing Improvement Agency is working to deliver a comprehensive programme to help develop and support forces in their protective service planning. Police authorities will also be inspected for the first time in 2009 and we will ensure that necessary improvements are made in this area. Legislation is in hand to strengthen collaboration and to ensure that it continues to be a key means of improving protective services. Total Government revenue spending for police authorities in 2009-10 will be £9,482 million—an overall increase of 2.8 per cent. on 2008-09. Of that general provision, £8,281 million is for police general grants, which will increase by 2.7 per cent. In addition, £1,201 million is for specific grant funding, which I shall come back to later. We have kept ring-fenced funding to a minimum to allow maximum local discretion over how to allocate and spend resources. The police grant report for 2009-10 deals with Home Office general police grants for revenue expenditure. The amounts payable to individual police authorities are listed in the report that I have presented to the House. Additionally, police authorities in England and Wales receive revenue support grants from local authorities. Overall, general grant allocations to police authorities were set out in my written ministerial statement of 21 January. Within the general grant provision for 2009-10, we have set a funding floor of 2.5 per cent. That means that each police authority in England and Wales is guaranteed an increase of at least that level. We have provided a settlement that encompasses more than a degree of stability for all police authorities while at the same time acknowledging that there are areas with greater relative needs. There will be increases of up to 3.9 per cent. in the west midlands. There will always be a dispute over how far the needs-based funding formula should be allowed to prevail over the stability provided by the grant floor. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and I have tried to strike a sensible balance in the settlement and will continue to do so in the future. There has been no change to the rule 2 grants, which were mentioned by the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire. They are former specific grants, now allocated with the general grants, that total £208 million. Police authorities have complete flexibility on how best to use that resource. Before the comprehensive spending review, we consulted on whether to put the funding back into the formula funding pot, but that could have had a major impact on grant distribution and we decided, on balance, to retain the status quo. That move was widely welcomed by many police authorities, particularly smaller ones that had come to rely on rule 2 funds, such as the rural police fund, as core funding. The position and implications will be reviewed in full before we make any further changes to the special formula grant. Let me turn to some more specific elements within the funding settlement for 2009-10. We have retained the crime fighting fund in its present form. That fund of £277 million played an important part in supporting growth in police capacity between 2000 and 2004. However, since its introduction the story has moved on, with the employment of more police staff to replace officers in roles where constable powers are not needed and the engagement of police community support officers, who play an important role alongside police officers. The strictures imposed by the CFF's system of financial penalties had, by 2006, limited the flexibility of forces to engage the right people with the right skills in the right jobs. The Government therefore suspended the CFF criteria in December 2006, allowing local chief officers and chairs to develop the optimum work force mix without losing funding. The move ensured that decisions on the mix of police staff and officers lay where they should, with the chief constable. That was welcomed by the Association of Police Authorities and the Association of Chief Police Officers. There is clear evidence that a good number of forces are using their CFF freedom to release police officers for the front line, replacing police officers in back-office functions with police staff when there is a clear business case that it is right to do so. In some forces, officer numbers are fewer than they were in March 2008, but the essential point is that the replacement of police officers in back-office functions has not had a negative impact on front-line capacity. In a good number of cases, it has increased front-line capacity. The most recent figures show that some forces have increased police officer numbers while others have decreased them. From 2002 until March 2008, we invested more than £700 million in introducing PCSOs and neighbourhood policing. Home Office funding for neighbourhood policing, including PCSOs, in 2008-09 is £324 million, an increase of 2.7 per cent. For 2009-10, funding has increased by a further 2.7 per cent. for each force to a total of £332 million. A further uplift of 2.7 per cent. is planned for 2010-11. The basic command unit fund was introduced in 2003-04 for a two-year period that has subsequently been extended. The BCU fund will be £40 million in 2009-10, the same level as in 2008-09. For several years, the Home Secretary has provided additional funding to ensure that Welsh police authorities receive at least a minimum increase in grant in line with English authorities. For 2009-10, we have again adjusted the Home Office police grant for Welsh police authorities to maintain consistency with England. That additional support will total £15.5 million next year. We have received 15 representations on the funding settlement from 14 police authority areas. That is considerably fewer than in previous years, and most of the representations have to do with the future. For next year, we have again maximised the increase in general grant and ensured that all police authorities have received a guaranteed minimum increase in grant of 2.5 per cent. The delivery of efficiency and productivity gains, as well as prudent budgeting and making full use of available funding flexibilities, means that there is no reason for excessive increases in the police precepts on council tax. The Government expect an average council tax increase in England of below 5 per cent. Council tax in Wales is a matter for the Welsh Assembly Government. We also expect the relentless focus on value for money, which is now more necessary than ever, to continue. Capital grant and supported capital expenditure totalling £222 million will be allocated in 2009-10, with each police authority receiving the same allocation as in 2008-09. We have also announced additional sums of money for mobile information devices and we have identified additional resources to tackle gun and knife crime. That is something that we will do, as necessary, as we move forward. We have continued to listen carefully to all stakeholders in determining the detail of this police funding settlement. It gives police authorities the stability that they all need to plan ahead, and it will support the police service in delivering effectively for the public. I commend the report to the House.