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Police Grant Report

That rise is still one of the lowest, per head of population, in the entire country. Finally, the Derbyshire police authority wrote to the Government on 6 January about the police grant report that we are debating today. It said:""We are disappointed that the final year of the three year grant settlement has not been used to move swiftly to full implementation of the new formula grant settlement, introduced five years ago."" It is still not fully implemented. The letter went on:""The grant floor continues to peg back the grant increase for Derbyshire Police Authority.""For Derbyshire, this means that the Authority has lost out on funding of…£26 million in the five years since the new formula was introduced. We appreciate that full implementation in one year would have been unduly harsh on authorities that stood to lose grant. Nevertheless, we believe that the three-year settlement provided an ideal opportunity to move to full implementation of the formula, in a phased way that would have enabled those authorities to plan for a reduction in their grant."" Derbyshire is in a bad position that has not really improved. The future for all police authorities is, of course, looking grimmer but I hope that whoever is making these decisions in a few weeks or months will consider regions such as the east midlands and police authorities such as Derbyshire. If cuts have to be made, I hope that they will redress the balance, with areas such as Derbyshire, which is already so far behind, suffering fewer cuts than better funded areas. It is unacceptable for the Government to say, "Yes, you need £5 million a year more if you are to provide the policing that's needed and, yes, we're going to inspect and judge you as though you'd got that money—but no, you can't have it."