HC Deb 27 April 1967 vol 745 cc1797-8
4. Mr. Longden

asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether the consultations about entrusting the duty of removing illegally parked cars to a separate corps, which he informed the hon. Member for South-West Hertfordshire en 3rd August, 1964, and 16th December, 1965, he was holding with the police, have been concluded; and, if so, with what results.

Mr. Taverne

Since the Questions asked by the hon. Gentleman in 1965, it is now accepted policy that civilians should be employed on duties for which the special training and attributes of police officers are not required, and my right hon. Friend has commended this course to chief officers of police and to police authorities in England and Wales.

Mr. Longden

I welcome that reply and thank the Minister for it, but surely it would be better to form a separate corps of traffic police from older, though still sprightly, men, who could relieve the regular police from their greater task of fighting crime?

Mr. Taverne

I do not think that the hon. Member and the Home Office are at one on this point, because the question of a separate police traffic corps was considered by the Police Advisory Board and was turned down. Questions of the use of facilities, competition for resources and overlapping of different functions all come into this problem.