Special Constables (Hansard, 22 March 1990)

§ 1. Mr. Key
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he has any plans to increase the number of special constables; and if he will make a statement.

§ 6. Mr. Pawsey
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement about the current level of special constable recruiting.

§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Peter Lloyd)
At the end of 1989, there were 15,589 special constables in England and Wales. I am very keen to see an increase. With that objective, there will be a national, centrally funded recruiting campaign and sympathetic consideration will be given to the possibility of a special payment, or bounty, on an experimental basis.

§ Mr. Key
That is good news and I congratulate my hon. Friend. Will he consider improving allowances? Many people feel that a bounty is not in keeping with the volunteer spirit of the specials. In what ways does my hon. Friend think that specials should be made more use of than at present?

§ Mr. Lloyd
My hon. Friend is right to imply that there is a difference of views about a bounty and that is why we are thinking about it thoroughly. If it can be useful in increasing the number of special constables, we should want to try it out. Expenses have been improved recently, but if my hon. Friend has any suggestions about out-of-pocket expenses that are not covered properly under the present system, I should like to hear them. He is also right in believing that not all forces use special constables as imaginatively as they might. Those that use them well get enormous benefit. I am thinking of the specials' particular role in crime prevention advice and in supporting neighbourhood watch schemes. My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to that.

§ Mr. Speaker
I remind the House that it is fairer to other hon. Members if one question is asked at a time. We then get further down the Order Paper.

§ Mr. Pawsey
I thank my hon. Friend for his full and complete reply, such as we have grown used to receiving from him. Will he comment a little further on recruiting, expecially among the ethnic communities? Will he also speculate on the improvements that might take place within the specials were their training to be stepped up? I understand that currently, they support the regular police, but they could do a great deal more if their training was a little deeper and more extensive than is currently the case.

§ Mr. Lloyd
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his opening remarks and I shall welcome them by being short rather than long in my answer. Much can be done on training, and the imaginative use that some forces have been able to make of the specials is a result of having trained them for those roles.

§ Mr. Madden
Will the Minister give a firm assurance that the effort to recruit more special constables will not be allowed to dilute the efforts being made by all police forces to recruit from the ethnic minorities, as such recruitment remains extremely disappointing?

§ Mr. Lloyd
No, the effort will not be used in that way. The ethnic minorities are better represented among the special constables than in the police force at large. One characteristic of the special constabulary is that many of its members go on to become regular policemen. We have had some recruitment efforts among the ethnic minorities. I am thinking especially of Tooting, where the increase in numbers was large as a result. There is a great deal that can be done and in some places, it is being done. We are trying to urge other forces to copy that good example.

§ Mr. Salmond
Are there any plans to increase the number of special constables, to protect the Secretary of State for Scotland from the righteous anger of the Scottish people, after his failure to defend our interests in Cabinet and his unwillingness to come to the House to explain his position?

§ Mr. Lloyd
People in Scotland are much more law abiding and sensible than the hon. Gentleman implies.

§ Mr. Shersby
Is my hon. Friend aware that the Police Federation is strongly opposed to the introduction of bounties because it believes that specials would then be used as cheap labour in preference to the use of regular constables? Is my hon. Friend further aware that the federation would strongly support financial recompense to specials who lose earnings as a result of having to give evidence in court?

§ Mr. Lloyd
We are very much aware that that opinion is widespread in the Police Federation and that is why we would not begin to pay bounties to all special constables. If we moved ahead at all, we should want to experiment to see whether the idea was effective in recruiting and did not dilute the motives of those who join.

§ Mr. Sheerman
Is the Minister aware that the recruitment of specials is closely linked to final recruitment into the regular police force? Is he further aware that the Government's latest act, reneging on what many of us believe to be a sacred agreement on arbitration, will mean that the Government will be unable to recruit not only special constables, but any constables?

§ Mr. Lloyd
I do not think that that will have any effect on the recruitment of special constables, for reasons that have already been made clear. At present, special constables receive only out-of-pocket expenses. Therefore, the idea of rent allowances does not weigh with them at all.