Created by the Policing and Crime Act 2017, police and crime commissioners are elected by the public to ensure that the policing needs of their communities are met as effectively as possible and to oversee how crime is tackled in these communities.
They are supposed to be the public voice of all members of the communities. They can also hire and fire Chief Constables so they hold quite a lot of authority.
They are required to swear an oath of impartiality (as are police officers). This is to make sure that they serve all members of their community equally, completely independent of any political or other allegiance or bias, they may have.
So why is it now, that every time we have an election of a new Police and Crime Commisioner, or re-election of the present incumbent, not only are we told the name of the candidates but also what their political allegiances are.
Last week’s Advertiser article about the Nottinghamshire election quoted: “Labour’s Gary Godden defeated Conservative Caroline Henry”. And later in the same article referred to Liberal Democrat candidate David Watts.
Again, when the results are shown they are all attributed to the candidate’s political allegiance.
This pattern seems to be copied all over the country now, not only here in Nottinghamshire.
When it was originally decided to create police and crime commissioners to replace Police Authorities (made up mostly of local councillors of differing groups/affiliations and local notable business people) much was made of the non-political and impartiality requirement of those candidates or elected persons.
From everything we read, this seems to have gone by the board now, hence these positions are now nothing more than another political appointment to allow Government to take complete control of the police of this country — which Governments of all colours have wanted to do for years.
The role of a Chief Constable now seems to have been reduced to that of a senior administrator, there to do the bidding of the commissioner, who holds the purse strings and the continued employment or otherwise of the Chief.
The original creation of a constable/police officer — a citizen, locally appointed but having authority under the Crown seems to have been consigned to history with police officers being constantly being used as enforcement of whatever political view is the order of the day by whatever political group we have in Government.
Could it be that politicians really don’t like any organisation which is independent of their control even if that independent organisation is a vital part of everyday life in the UK? — D. HALL, Newark
