Police & Crime Commissioners – Democratically Accountable Police Forces? - Well, Not Really.

Today I attended the Police & Crime Panel meeting in Rotherham. This is the grouping of Councillors and lay people responsible for holding the PCC (Police & Crime Commissioner) to account for the performance, funding and general approach to policing in South Yorkshire. An elected position that was voted for by less than 20% of the electorate.

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The role of the PCC has never generated much public interest and I suspect most people won't recognise the incumbent, Dr Alan Billings, who holds the post until May following the ultimate resignation of the prior occupant of the post during the Rotherham Child Sexual Exploitation crisis last year. The PCC however was sold to us, by the Home Secretary of the time as democratic accountability for the police forces. As it turns out of course, that isn't quite the whole story.

I attended to ask a question about the armed police on the streets over the Christmas period in City and town centres across the force area. Happily this is a webcast meeting and the full question is available here , with the PCC's reply and comments from other PCP members.

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The impression left with me after the replies were as follows;
1 The PCC clearly has no control in operational matters like this and appears to provide little influence, having declined to offer an opinion when 'told' of the decision to deploy armed officers in this way.
2 This deployment was a 'reaction' to the Paris attacks, even though at the last City Council Cabinet meeting I was told there was no intelligence suggesting Sheffield was a target at the time.
3 There appears to be some level of reassurance provided by the deployment, which is in contrast to the significant level of unquiet expressed across social media that was my experience.

My conclusion? As a politician representing, in this instance, the Labour Party as well as the South Yorkshire public I wouldn't want the PCC to have direct control or indeed excessive influence on operational police matters. However, on a matter that so directly affects the public perception of policing in the region I would expect the PCC to have and to express his opinion to the Chief Constable. In particular I would have expected the PCC to make himself aware of any specific threat to the force area and comment on that on behalf of the public.

As a reassurance exercise I think the lack of any comment to either the PCC or the other politicians is a reflection of the lack of knowledge most people have about the PCC and his role. The level of comment I saw on social media suggests they need to look at the deployment in a more formal way to try and tease out a wider range of opinion on the matter, rather than those who volunteer a comment to them or indeed to social media.

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Overall this seems to confirm the concerns expressed at the inception of the PCC position, that this was a means of passing the responsibility for failures within police forces away from the Home Secretary and the blame for service cuts away from the Chancellor's austerity measures, whilst giving neither the PCC nor the scrutiny committee (Police & Crime Panel) the powers to effectively deliver their roles.

City Region Elected Mayors anyone?

Power to the North? - the jury is still out.

I attended an interesting event on Friday 22nd of January, in Leeds University, entitled “Power to the North? Prospects and Challenges to Devolution & City Deals in the North of England” and the aim of the event was to “gather views from across Yorkshire and the North of England on devolution, the Northern Powerhouse, and ‘City Deals’, so as to reflect on and understand the impact, potential and challenges of the new agenda.”

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A weighty aim by any standards for a one day event but an aim that was largely met. An opening address by Professor Martin Jones of the University of Sheffield highlighted the way government has and continues to get in the way of local government running their own affairs. He commented on a governmental pathology of re-organisation over the last forty years or more and the plethora of strategies, programmes and 'deals' that have been applied, willing or not, to local government in the same period.

He also outlined the contradictory tensions inherent in the current dash for 'devolution deals' with the city regions. Localism and it's impact on the centre, Accountability and how it's created, the role of the Private Sector in these deals & Governance models, imposed or otherwise.

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This was followed by a keynote speech by Lord Bob Kerslake, a name famous or infamous in Sheffield from his years as the City's Chief Executive. Having recently retired as a head of the civil service and been elevated to the Lords, he is chairing an all party inquiry into 'better devolution'

The interesting bits in this speech were his comments that the public were so far missing in this conversation about the devolution programme. We, the public, have noticed this. He also suggested that devolution is not universally approved of within central government because it is disruptive to the civil service and their own central programmes. This comment in particular explains for me why so many parts of the Sheffield deal are still under negotiation or are based on delivering central government targets rather than targets set locally by the city region.

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We then broke for a light lunch and although he was in a hurry to catch a train I did manage to ask if Lord Kerslake might consider standing as the elected mayor for the Sheffield City Region. He demurred, commenting he would not wish to do that job.

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The afternoon session was a series of 'roundtables'. Groups of speakers commenting from their perspective on the challenges of the 'devolution' deals. The first was politicians and senior council officers. The consensus amongst them was that the deals were the best available at the moment and that without the deals, austerity would ensure that Northern councils would continue to perform poorly compared to their Southern counterparts. They also espoused the need for co-operation between the Northern cities but also managed to snipe about Sheffield having spoiled a Yorkshire consensus, even though Manchester was the first deal of this nature in the North and that this broke the consensus.

The second round table was composed of community campaigners. The politicians of course left so they would not have to hear what the public thought about the issues. The consensus from the communities was one of uncertainty. Whether about the secrecy of the negotiations process, the lack of public involvement through meaningful consultation or the didactic imposition of structures and governance for the regions.

Finally there was a round table of academics. They were broadly in agreement with the community panel, concerned about lack of public understanding and support for the process and the resultant deals. The report by Dr. Brenton Prosser on the Assembly North events in Sheffield highlighted that the general public are more than capable of analysing and debating complex issues around constitution and devolution and that, in many cases, their ambition for the regions and cities of the North is far greater than the 'pragmatist' ambitions of the political classes.

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Overall therefore, an interesting day. Disappointing that the politicos failed to stay for the presentations of the community and academic panels but no real surprise. It is as if they are unwilling to listen to the alternatives in case they find they agree with them. Central Government has local politicians scared to refuse the offers on the table, even though they are not what they want or what the public want. I guess the ambitious devolutionists amongst us must continue to press for more, even if we are being treated like Oliver in front of Mr Bumble.

City Region Devolution - A Deal on the Brink.

The Sheffield City Region Devolution Deal is a bit like the weather this winter, unsettled.

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The deal is currently available for public consultation and finally, with just a few days left, it is now linked on the front page of the Council's website . The next stage should be a formal decision, in February, by the Sheffield City Council to support or reject the deal. This decision then goes forward to a meeting of the Combined Authority in March where they will vote on the same question.

If the vote is in favour of the deal then it is intended that the implementation would start on the first of April. Exactly what that would look like though is still not clear at this stage, as Council officials involved in the negotiations with central government have admitted that all the details of the full agreement will not be completed even at that point.

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In the Public Questions item on this last Wednesday's Full Council Meeting I asked a number of questions about the devolution consultation, including exactly when the proposal would be brought before council for a decision.

Julie Dore (Leader), commented that the two 'red line' concerns of the City Council were still not resolved. That is, the removal from the proposed agreement of the paragraph giving the elected mayor a veto on all decisions of the Combined Authority (a far more powerful role than any initially expected) and clarification on the impact of the amendment to the 'Cities & Local Government Devolution Bill' with regard to Combined Authority councils that are currently part of two tier County Council structures.

In other words, Sheffield wants the power of the Mayor to be circumscribed to specific areas of decision making and they want to know what happens if a North Derbyshire council wants to drop their County and become full 'constituent' members of the City Region.

I've been pushing concerns over the first of these 'red lines' since the proposed deal was first released to the public in October 2015 negotiators have now caught on to this veto clause too. The geography question matters because the financing of two tier council's is bound to their County and how this will play out if a council decides to switch sides is still unclear. Things like police funding, fire services, education, transport and highways are all complex matters that need to be clarified before any such move might be contemplated.

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Most interesting about Councillor Dore's comments, however, was concerning the timing of the decision making process for the proposed deal. All along the City Region has been dancing to the beat of the government's drum. The deal was announced in time for the Conservative Party conference, and the Chancellor's Autumn Statement. The pressure to have the deal signed sealed and implemented in April is from the Government.

Julie Dore plainly stated at the council meeting that she will not bring the proposed deal before the council until these 'red line' issues are resolved. She has made it doubly clear that she will no longer follow the HMG time scale but will take as long as necessary to get the deal right even if that means missing the deadline for the February Council Meeting, or the March Combined Authority Meeting or the proposed implementation on April first.

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The Devolution Proposal is now on the brink of failing. If HMG won't budge and Council won't budge we enter uncharted waters. Will council step away from devolution at this time? Will HMG move on to other potential deals with other authorities? Will the Northern Cities find their courage to fight for true devolution rather than this expanded 'City Deal'?

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In the Meantime please continue to have your say by completing the Devolution Survey and I will continue to try and keep you aware of the developments.

CLICK HERE TO VISIT THE
SHEFFIELD CITY REGION DEVOLUTION SURVEY

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CLICK HERE TO SEE THE CURRENT VERSION OF THE SHEFFIELD CITY REGION DEVOLUTION AGREEMENT