§ 2. Mr. Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham)If he will call for a report from the chief constable of the Sussex constabulary on police numbers in Sussex. [151699]
§ The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. Charles Clarke)The Government have no plans to call for such a report. Sussex police have been allocated a total of 206 crime fighting fund recruits. According to the latest information provided by the force, about 42 of those will be recruited in the current year and the remainder in the following two years. For 2001–02, the Sussex police authority will receive funding support of £181.8 million, which represents an increase of £9.3 million, and is 5.4 per cent. more than the provision for 2000–01. The authority will also receive about £500,000 a year from the rural policing fund.
§ Mr. LoughtonIt is a shame that the Minister should say that, because last month he revealed that there are now 273 fewer police officers in Sussex than there were in March 1997. That represents one of the biggest cuts in the country. His statement also masks the added problem of the extra drain on resources, in the Worthing area in particular, caused by a series of murder investigations, including that into the murder of Sarah Payne; by the investigations into the human trafficking of at least 40 Nigerian girls abducted from social services and sold into prostitution in northern Italy; and, most recently, by the investigations into the 20 armed raids that have taken place in Worthing in the past nine weeks alone. Those raids include those involving my local sub-postmaster, Jack Sahaid, who was held up twice at knife-point and once at shotgun-point in the space of a week, and who has shown great bravery and community spirit by keeping the sub-post office open.
When will the Minister intervene and do something to give back the police officers taken away over the past four years, rather than coming up with this constant guff about additional resources—which do not result in extra police officers—and about numbers being the responsibility of the chief constable? Many of my constituents—such as shopkeepers and sub-postmasters—are living in fear at the moment.
§ Mr. ClarkeIt is not guff at all. The fact is that, as the hon. Gentleman knows, throughout the country crime is falling and police numbers are rising.
§ Mr. LoughtonNot in Sussex.
§ Mr. ClarkeThe hon. Gentleman should stop heckling; he has already had his say.
In Sussex, as in every other police authority, it is up to the chief constable to decide how to allocate resources. The chief constable, his staff and his authority decided quite explicitly to increase the number of civilians in the 612 force over a long period More than one third of forces in the country now have more police officers than they had in 1997, and that will happen in Sussex as well.
§ Mr. Oliver Heald (North-East Hertfordshire)Does the Minister not remember the present Prime Minister's pledge in 1995 that a Government led by him would put thousands more police officers on the beat? Given the fall of 2,500 in police numbers across the country, including 273 in Sussex—and not forgetting the fall by one third in the number of specials—is this not just another example of all spin and no delivery? When will the Minister give us a timetable—a short one—for restoring those police numbers in Sussex and throughout the country?
§ Mr. ClarkeThat phrase does not improve with age. The facts are simple and straightforward. Since 1993, the number of police officers in Britain had been going down—until about a year ago when, following the decisions of this Government, police numbers started to go up for the first time.
A while ago we published figures that showed an increase of 444 police officers across the country up to September last year. Those trends are increasing and we shall be in a position to continue to increase them through the next year or two, as we continue to achieve a constant movement towards increasing police numbers. Many forces are already saying that they have the largest number of police officers in history coming in, in the short term, and nearly half the forces in Britain have more police officers than they had in 1997. The hon. Gentleman's arguments are nonsense, as he well knows, and he should get down to examining his own record as well as ours.