PCCs: A year is a long time in politics
“As we approach the anniversary of the first (and last?) election of Police & Crime Commissioners, many people have felt moved to do some kind of one year on review.” Jon Harvey provides his ‘glads and sads’ of the Police and Crime Commissioners one year on.
Scrutiny and Police & Crime Commissioners
Police and Crime Commissioners are hugely powerful and have direct and sole control over multi-million pound budgets. Those of us who have closely followed the implementation and election of PCCs know this, but still many of the public don’t understand exactly what this role is. Awareness is growing, in part due to intense media scrutiny […]
The right to remain silent
There has been concern expressed at the arrests of those who were involved in the ‘whistle blowing’ of the expenditure of the Cumbrian PCC who had chauffeur driven Mercs to take him to functions, Mr Richard Rhodes had two trips at £700. This was for his ‘personal safety’ allegedly. Two Cumbrian Police staff were arrested, […]
Paris Brown, free speech and social media
The sorry tale of Paris Brown, who stood down as Kent’s Youth Police and Crime Commissioner even before she took office, has already been talked and written about a great deal. I don’t want to add much, just to comment a little on the implications of it for what we loosely describe as ‘free speech’. It’s […]
I make mistakes that I learn from ’cause I’m young…
A quick post this and one I’ll start by stating firstly that I think Ann Barnes has rightly condemned Paris Brown’s tweets as being ‘silly’ and ‘offensive’, secondly I’ll add that I’d not usually go for Tulisa lyrics for my blog titles but in this case, it’s appropriate… As you’ve likely seen in the news […]
90% of voters admit they have no idea who local commissioner is
Do you remember the main reason why PCCs were introduced? Go on, do you? You know, it was that idea that Police Authorities were unknown to the public and were the faceless governance of the police service. A single elected figurehead would change all that! And then the Home Office was given the task of […]
Reform or perform?
“Not once – not once – has anyone talked about the actual role the police play in society or about the volume or variety of work they undertake.” Nathan Constable argues that the government’s current approach to police reform is misguided and ideological and should instead focus on reforming the work and role of the police service.
Obfuscation
I’m currently reading Bad Science by Ben Goldacre. It’s a fascinating read about how drug companies, nutritionists, homeopathy “experts” along with questionable research big up the positives and play down the negatives to support their objectives. He discusses how some people have gained recognition from the media as “experts” when in many cases they have little to no […]
Progressive police & crime planning and budgeting
I had a swell day in Leeds yesterday with the The Democratic Governance of Policing: The Role and Implications of Elected Police and Crime Commissioners conference. This was organised by the University of Leeds (Building Sustainable Societies research group) and the British Society of Criminology. You see the agenda here. Lots of fascinating speakers and discussions. Thank you to the organisers, especially Stuart Lister who took the […]
Jobs for the boys
Our new Police and Crime Commissioners (PCC) have been settling into their roles. Their first tasks are to produce a Policing and Crime Plan and sort out the budget for the next financial year. Chief Constables are looking forward to the plans and reminding the PCC’s that they will only be able to achieve as much as […]
The doctor is out…
I have been following @openpolicy with interest. Probably because I have worked in policy (in the voluntary sector for 15 years) and I am not put off by the title. Could ‘real’ people be interested in the blog posts? I am not sure they would be. Unless we involve ‘real people’ however, we are going […]
Optical illusions
I have been reading about of some new schemes a initiatives to be introduced by PCC’s to increase police visibility. At first glance they seem like a sensible approach. If it looks like there are more police on the streets, the public will feel safer and it may act as a deterrent to ne’er-do-wells. However, […]
The ordinary people test
These are exceptionally busy days for the new Police & Crime Commissioners. No matter how experienced they were in their previous roles, I am imagine they are all on a very steep learning curve. Moreover, there will be a legion of people wanting some of their time in order to start building long term relationships […]
