Tim Passmore: What King's Speech means for Suffolk policing

I have taken a little time to read the main policing implications contained in the speech and thought I would share my thoughts with you.

We all recognise there is a great deal of good work carried out daily by police forces across the United Kingdom – something we should be very grateful for and never take for granted.

That said, I’m sure we also recognise there are many challenges facing constabularies needing urgent attention, however difficult.

A walkabout in Leiston - a lot of good work is done, says Tim (Image: Tim Passmore)
Improving public trust and confidence depends on successfully confronting these challenges. This is where all PCCs have a fundamental role in helping customise activity according to local needs and preferences.

A few days before the state opening of Parliament, the new Home Secretary addressed our Association of Police and Crime Commissioners and described some of the policing initiatives that would be presented.

One area of great interest for me was the confirmation of the recruitment target of an additional 13,000 police officers, PCSOs and Special Constables in the next three years or so. This is in addition to the 20,000 officers recruited under the last government’s uplift programme. If allocated on the Home Office funding formula, Suffolk would be allocated around 155 additional positions – that is certainly very welcome.

Meeting the public in Lowestoft (Image: Tim Passmore)
However, when challenged about the new funding formula review - which the last government completely failed to deliver - the Home Secretary did not provide an answer. I will come back to that later as it is so fundamental for Suffolk’s wellbeing.

There are also requirements to increase uniformed public visibility and reduce officers doing “clerical” work which could be civilianised – a strong desire of mine also.

Further intentions were mentioned regarding deeper collaboration between forces and other public bodies. Yet further savings will now be needed from procurement, and national standards for equipment and ICT systems need putting in place.

More needs to be done on tackling antisocial behaviour and making our streets safer and more welcoming. Of course, nobody in their right mind would disagree with any of this!

The big gap here is finance. All these proposals will need considerable investment, so where will the money come from? Every organisation can improve efficiency through use of better working systems and new technologies, but here in Suffolk we have been working on these initiatives since I was elected and, in some cases work started even earlier.

Our deep collaboration with Norfolk started back in 2010 and is now delivering recurring annual savings for Suffolk of well over £24 million (our total budget for this year is £183 million).

The new policing model was launched last December and has 50 new policing areas with their own community officers and PCSOs and 500 officers in the new response investigation teams.

On procurement, I was disappointed to see no mention of social value as part of the process. Our hard-earned taxes should do much more to support the local and national economy by using social value seriously.

Whilst I agree entirely with the sentiment of the King’s Speech, these aims will not be delivered without additional funding. Recruitment is becoming more difficult in a competitive local employment market and admission standards for new recruits must be maintained.

This is where our new members of parliament can help Suffolk to press the case for our county and we have scheduled a meeting between all of us after the summer holidays.

There is lots to do which will only be achieved by working collaboratively as Winston Churchill said years ago, “Let us go forward together” and I am looking forward to meeting them.