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Public Disorder

I do not accept what the right hon. Gentleman says about police numbers, and indeed neither do chief constables—many chief constables. The chief constable of Thames Valley police said that"““what I haven't done at all is reduce the number of officers who do the patrol functions, so the officers you see in vehicles, on foot, in uniform, on bicycles. We haven't cut those numbers at all.””" Let me make this additional point to the right hon. Gentleman. One thing the past three days have demonstrated is that the Met, where we have 32,000 officers, actually could take the action to surge from 3,000 on the streets to 16,000 on the streets. I think that is a demonstration of using what you have to maximum effect.