Agenda item
Government Review of the Role of Police and Crime Commissioners
Minutes:
Chief Executive Fran Hughes presented this item to the Panel.
Police and Crime commissioners as well as the respective Panel had been in place since 2012. The Home Secretary announced a review of Police and Crime Commissioners last summer in terms of the scope and breadth of their role. Due to the election the review had been split into two parts. Part 1 took place in Autumn 2020, the Panel had been a consultee to part of that review.
Part 2 had been expected to start imminently and was anticipated to review the criminal justice space and understanding what the future roles and responsibilities would be for the Police and Crime Commissioner.
Fran Hughes took Panel members through particular area’s to note;
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The Specified Information Order had been a requirement in which the Police and Crime Commissioner would be required to deliver a narrative assessment of how the Police force had been performing. For areas that had already published the Police and crime plan they would have to publish that narrative report right away. For other areas it would be a requirement to publish that narrative in the autumn concurrently with the Police and Crime plan.
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Good practice sharing would be co-ordinated by the Association of Police and Crime Commissioners.
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To enhance resilience and capacity of Police and Crime Commissioners and the intention to expand the role into fire, the Home Office will bring forward legislation to mandate that each Police and Crime Commissioner must appoint a deputy (of the same political party where the Police and Crime Commissioner represents a political party). In the interim, the Home Office will issue guidance to PCCs’ offices requesting that a formal succession plan is put into place to deal with vacancy and incapacitation, involving the Police and Crime Panel in discussions as necessary. It was forecasted that a deputy Police and Crime Commissioner would be in place in 2024.
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The Home Office would work with the Local Government Association to develop a good governance training package for Police and Crime Panels.
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The review concluded that there would be further steps undertaken to sharpen local accountability and ensure the framework guiding the Police and Crime Commissioners relationship with the Chief Constables had been clarified.
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One of the potentially big changes for the Police and Crime Commissioner would be to potentially take on the role of Fire governance, this would be reflected within the Police and Crime Panel which would become the Police, Crime and Fire Panel. The OPCC had been waiting for a white paper to the government which would outline what the proposals would look like.
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Members discussed:
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How the Commissioner would control Devon and Cornwall Police and Crime as well as Devon and Somerset Fire. It had been recognised that the South West had a unique position which had been recognised within the detailed review which would need special consideration.
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How an additional member to the senior team would be financed. Fran Hughes advised that this would be considered as part of any budget proposal and details would be brought back to the Panel for any further discussions.
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The Panel noted the report.
Supporting documents:
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