POLICE FEDERATION BILL (Hansard, 5 July 1961)

§ LORD STONHAM
had given Notice of two Amendments, the first being, after "repealed, and" to insert: ",subject to the next following section,". The noble Lord said: I hope it will suit the convenience of the Committee if, in moving the first Amendment on the Paper, I deal also with the second Amendment, which is for a new clause, because the first is merely a paving Amendment for the main one. In moving the Second Reading of this Bill I informed your Lordships that during the Committee stage I proposed to move a new clause and a Schedule to provide separate 1444 representation for policewomen on the Federation, and that is the effect of this new clause which I shall move. The Committee will be aware that the Police Federation was established by the Police Act, 1919 for the purpose of enabling the members of the police forces of England and Wales to consider and bring to the notice of the police authorities and the Secretary of State all the matters affecting their welfare and efficiency. other than questions of discipline and promotion affecting individuals. The constitution of the Police Federation is set out in the Schedule to the Act of 1919, which provided that the Federation was to consist of all members of police forces below the rank of superintendent. The Act and the Schedule refer to the "Police Federation of England and Wales", but Section 13 provides for their application to Scotland, and there is a separate Police Federation in Scotland with a constitution the same as that of the Federation in England and Wales. The Schedule to the Police Act, 1919, provides that members of every police force below the rank of superintendent shall form a branch of the Federation, and that in each force there shall be branch boards for the constables, sergeants and inspectors. The boards are elected by the members of the several ranks and they choose delegates to attend the central conference for the three ranks. The members of the central conference elect the three central committees, each consisting of six members respectively for the constables, sergeants and inspectors.
Policewomen, of course, have been full members of the Police Federation since it was established in 1919, but their numbers are comparatively small; only about 2,000 women police officers compared with more than 70,000 men. And, of course, few women are ever elected as members of the branch boards and only very rarely as delegates to the central conferences or as members of the central committees. Indeed, so far as my researches go, only one, the redoubtable Miss Hunt, was ever elected to a central committee. Thus, in a voting capacity policewomen are virtually unrepresented.
The Oaksey Committee recommended, in paragraph 360 of their Report, that exceptional measures were necessary if the special point of view of women 1445 police officers was to be put forward by women within the Federation—in other words, if policewomen were to get a vote. The Committee recommended, first, that the women officers of the several ranks in each force should elect one additional member to each of the branch boards, and that these additional members should be women; secondly, that women delegates should meet in eight districts into which the police forces of England and Wales, other than the Metropolitan Police, should be divided for the purposes of election of women delegates to the central conferences and that one woman constable, one woman sergeant and one woman inspector should be elected from each of the eight districts as delegates to the central conferences; thirdly, that the policewomen in the Metropolitan Police Force should be represented by delegates at the central conferences; finally, that the women delegates to the central conferences should elect one woman member to sit on one of the three central committees.
The recommendations of the Oaksey Committee were accepted by everyone concerned and they were introduced on a non-statutory basis in 1953. the women necessarily being non-voting advisers attached to the branch boards and central conferences and central committees; they were not members of them. Some small departures have been made from the recommendations of the Oaksey Committee which I outlined. The metropolitan delegates for the central conferences, for example, are chosen by a rather different method from that suggested by the Oaksey Committee and there are women advisers for each of the three central committees and not just one woman adviser for one of them. Metropolitan delegates for the central conferences are directly elected by the women police officers on the basis of one constable, one sergeant and one inspector for each of the four Districts in the Metropolitan Police Force.
The district elections for all the other forces in the country are attended by the women advisers to the branch boards, who are indeed the electors; and, again, from every District one constable, one sergeant and one inspector are chosen to attend the central conferences. There are, in all, twelve representatives for each of those three ranks chosen as delegates for the central con- 1446 ferences, but they have no voting rights at present. These arrangements for the special representation of policewomen have now been in existence for some eight years, and everyone was agreed that they should be put on a statutory basis as soon as possible and as soon as convenient.
This Amendment, and the Schedule which I shall later propose be added to the Bill, would give effect to the existing arrangements with only minor alterations. The new clause provides in the first sub-paragraph that: The branch boards, central conferences and central committees of the Federation shall include members representative of the interests of policewomen, who shall hold office in accordance with the provisions of Part I of the Scheduleߪand the Schedule to the Police Act, 1919,"— which sets out the constitution of the Police Federation— shall have effect subject to the provisions of Part II of the Schedule to this Act. Subsection (2) of the new clause will enact that Section 13 of the Act of 1919, to which I have already referred and which provides for the modification of the Schedule to that Act in its application to Scotland, shall apply to the new Schedule also. In this matter, in view of what the noble Lord, Lord Strathclyde, said a moment ago, we are not altering the present position in Scotland, so that, at least in my view, Scotland, in this one detail, in fact lags behind England and Wales, because the Police Federation for Scotland desires no change in the existing arrangements for the representation of policewomen, which are at present similar to those which we have here. But if the Act were applied to Scotland by the appointment of a date of operation by the Secretary of State for Scotland, it would be possible to modify it in its application if that should prove desirable. I hope my explanation of this clause has been sufficient in length and sufficiently clear. I beg to move.

THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE HOME DEPARTMENT (EARL BATHURST)
I am most grateful to the noble Lord opposite for moving this 1447 Amendment, and I congratulate him on the clear and precise way in which he has done so. I commend this Amendment to your Lordships, and ask your Lordships to support it.

§ LORD STONHAM
I beg to move.

EARL BATHURST
I commend this Amendment to your Lordships, and ask your Lordships to support it.