HC Deb 22 May 2000 vol 350 cc354-5W
15. Mr. Leigh

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on rural policing. [121545]

Mr. Straw

We recognise the policing needs of rural areas. We will publish a rural White Paper later this year, including a section dealing specifically with rural crime. At present, the particular needs of rural areas are taken into account in the current police funding formula that distributes approximately £35 million of available funding to authorities with low population density, and so benefits rural areas.

Rural areas also participate in the range of initiatives already available, the Crime Fighting Fund, Crime Reduction Programme and recently approved funds to build a modern crime fighting machine and to modernise the police service.

34. Mr. David Heath

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department which police authorities will benefit from his proposed additional funding for policing in rural areas. [121565]

Mr. Charles Clarke

We have retained the sparsity element introduced by the previous Government in the formula for calculating police funding of 0.5 per cent. (about £35 million) which benefits rural forces.

An added 2 per cent. sparsity element was also used in allocating 4,000 of the 5,000 police officers being recruited through the crime fighting fund. The remaining 1,000 officers were divided between the 34 forces putting in the best bids. In deciding the allocation of resources between forces, we took particular account of the information forces supplied to explain the size of their bids, including the particular need of rural areas.

Under the Crime Reduction Programme, some of the initiatives fund rural crime reduction projects. Under the Targeted Policing Initiative, Northumbria police, in partnership with Tynedale district council, local parish councils and the Northumberland Social Services and Probation Service, have been granted £40,000 for a project to develop an integrated strategy to tackle crime and disorder in rural towns and remote villages.

A number of projects funded under the Closed Circuit Television Initiative requirement have been relaxed from twice to one-and-a-half times the national average burglary rate. This will allow more areas to bid funding, though the burglary rate in most rural areas is still well below this level.