Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I beg to move amendment No. 152, in

clause 36, page 17, line 36, at end insert 'as a fire-fighter'.

Mr Edward O'Hara (Knowsley South, Labour)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment No. 123, in

clause 36, page 17, line 37, at end add

'but nothing in this section shall prevent a fire and rescue authority entering into arrangements with a police authority for the discharge of any of its functions by members of a police force employed by that police authority.'.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

Amendment No. 152 would insert the words ''as a fire-fighter'' after the phrase:

''No member of a police force may be employed by a fire and rescue authority''.

The original purpose of the provision in the 1947 Act, as I understand it, was to prevent police constables from being employed as retained firefighters on the slightly curious grounds that such employment might give rise to confusion at the scene of a fire. I am sure that the Under-Secretary will be able to give a robust defence of that and say how such confusion might come about, although it seems to me that the matter could be dealt with relatively easily. However, I suspect that the employment of police constables as retained firefighters is not at the leading edge of most fire authorities' plans for resolving the retained firefighter crisis, given that there is plenty of work to be done in police forces up and down the country.

Mr Nick Raynsford (Minister of State (Local and Regional Government), Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Greenwich & Woolwich, Labour)

There are record numbers of police.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

The Minister of State should come to some of the counties outside the metropolitan areas.

Mr Edward O'Hara (Knowsley South, Labour)

Order. We are talking about firemen, not police numbers.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I was looking forward to exploring whether there is a pool of surplus labour in police forces, meaning that police officers could be deployed as retained firefighters to deal with the obvious crisis in that area, but we will leave that for the moment.

The Under-Secretary might be able to explain to the Committee the original purpose of the ban. It is clear that it was about clashes or confusion relating to operational control at a fire scene. The point has been made—I am sure that it has been made to Ministers as well—that in the future, when fire and rescue authorities will have a much broader role and employ all sorts of people who are not operational firefighters, it will no longer be appropriate automatically to exclude members of the police force from employment in some other role. They could perform a support role

or provide specialist input. Not only that, but there seems to be no operational reason to exclude such people.

Mr Hugo Swire (East Devon, Conservative)

I totally agree with what my hon. Friend is saying. Is not the logical extension that, as police forces continue to employ more and more civilians and community support officers, there will be some people in back-up jobs who will be able to support the fire and rescue services without being front-line firefighters?

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There will certainly be employees of police forces. There may be a distinction between being a member of a police force—I suspect that that means being a constable—and being an employee of a police authority. The Under-Secretary will clarify that point. I see no obvious reason why, in the 21st century, a police officer performing his duties might not take part-time employment with a fire and rescue authority in a non-operational role.

There may well be police regulations that restrict police officers from taking part-time employment elsewhere. I am not an expert on that. However, that is clearly a separate issue and nothing to do with the provision in the Bill. That simply replicates what was in the 1947 Act, which might have been appropriate in a world in which, for all relevant purposes, the employees of fire authorities were firefighters.

Mr John Pugh (Education Spokesperson, Education & Skills; Southport, Liberal Democrat)

I have two points, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will be able to satisfy me on both. If a policeman is working for a fire authority, he is an off-duty policeman. I think that an off-duty policeman may have some residual responsibilities that he must discharge, so there could be a conflict between what the fire authority was asking him to do and what the police authority was asking him to do. Equally, in an emergency, the police authority and the fire authority may simultaneously call on him to go on duty. Which master should he obey? The situation seems confusing if the proviso is not included.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I do not entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman. What he says may have some force in general with regard to police officers taking on other duties and employment. That is a separate issue. It is a matter of police discipline and regulations. I do not believe that non-operational roles as an employee of a fire authority are different from non-operational roles as an employee of an education authority or a supermarket chain. The issues that he raised will arise in any employment.

Mr. Raynsford indicated dissent.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

The Minister of State shakes his head, but non-operational duties as an employee of a fire and rescue authority are not different in character from non-operational duties as an employee of any other body. There is no reason why, if someone is

sitting behind a desk and reading and commenting on a report, or looking at a forensic analysis of a fire scene, that will cause conflict with his other duties.

Mr John Pugh (Education Spokesperson, Education & Skills; Southport, Liberal Democrat)

The hon. Gentleman must recognise that there is a qualitative difference between one's responsibility as an employee of Tesco, say, and one's responsibility to Her Majesty as a member of the constabulary.

Mr. Raynsford indicated assent.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

The Minister of State must not keep encouraging the hon. Member for Southport (Dr. Pugh) from a sedentary position.

Mr Phil Hope (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Corby, Labour/Co-operative)

The hon. Member for Southport is right.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

Self-evidently, what the hon. Gentleman said is right, but it is not relevant. The relevant contrast is not between employment as a member of a police force and employment by Tesco, but between employment as a civilian, non-operational employee of a fire and rescue authority and employment by Tesco. It does not seem to me at all self-evident that there is a qualitative difference between those two. Of course, police officers have a particular standing, whether they are on or off duty. I would accept it entirely if the Under-Secretary were to say that it is all academic because police regulations and employment codes prevent police officers from working in certain circumstances, but then there is no need to put it in the Bill. Will he explain why, from a fire and rescue perspective, it is undesirable for police officers to work part-time in non-operational roles and why the restriction should extend beyond that—I understand the reason for extending it to firefighters?

Amendment No. 123 is a probing amendment. Can the Under-Secretary assure me that nothing in the clause would prevent a fire and rescue authority, if it wanted to, contracting with a police authority to discharge some of its duties in respect of road traffic accidents? That might be required on some occasions, particularly in sparsely populated areas, but clearly the police officers would not become employees of the fire and rescue authority. However, it would be helpful if he placed that on the record for clarification.

Mr Phil Hope (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Corby, Labour/Co-operative)

Amendments Nos. 152 and 123 have been helpful in provoking the debate, but I assure the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge that they are unnecessary.

The clause is designed to prevent a member of a police force from being employed also by a fire and rescue authority, most probably as a retained firefighter, where there would be a conflict of interest between their duties as a firefighter, or in any other emergency role undertaken by the fire and rescue services, and as a police constable. However, the hon. Gentleman is right to pursue the point, because a member of a police force is someone attested as a constable, and the clause would not apply to any other police employee. Therefore, I agree with both the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Southport. The

clause would not apply to special constables, for example, even though attested as constables, or to community support officers, whom the hon. Member for East Devon (Mr. Swire) mentioned, who are civilian staff with limited powers.

We retain the important provision preventing that conflict of interest. Constables cannot act as retained firefighters, but we allow other employees of the police authority to take on those roles if they wish.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

The Minister has addressed twice now the conflict that might arise from constables acting as retained firefighters but the amendment draws a specific distinction between constables acting as retained firefighters and constables working in non-operational roles as employees of a fire and rescue authority.

Mr Phil Hope (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Corby, Labour/Co-operative)

I appreciate the distinction that is being made. A retained firefighter either firefighting or performing any other role could still create a conflict of interest that would be unacceptable to the police and, in particular, to chief constables.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

The Minister has again used the term ''retained firefighter''. I accept what he says on that matter. I am considering a situation where, for example, a police officer with particular skills might want to work part-time for a fire and rescue authority in a support role, perhaps using forensic or evidence-sifting skills.

Mr Phil Hope (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Corby, Labour/Co-operative)

I fully understand the point that the hon. Gentleman makes. He draws a distinction between firefighting and performing some other role for a fire and rescue authority. None the less, there is still a conflict of interests. The overriding priority for a constable would be to tackle or to respond to an emergency or a crime. That would mean that his ability to undertake other roles was put in jeopardy. Those other roles, while they might not involve fighting a fire in an emergency, may none the less be important.

It could be crucial that those roles were undertaken. That could jeopardise the ability to deliver services—for example, an important fire safety exercise. We would not wish such extra duties and roles to be jeopardised by a conflict of interests between them and a constable's primary duty as a police officer. Other employees of a police force—community support officers, special constables and other people employed in civilian duties—could take on the role of a retained firefighter or another fire and rescue authority role because there is not that conflict of interests.

The clause is not designed to deal with the relationship between a police authority and a fire and rescue authority, nor with the management of its resources by a police authority. Earlier clauses, such as clause 16, would come into play. With that assurance, I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the amendment.

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

I am a little perplexed. The Minister's tone was perfectly reasonable but I sometimes have the impression that, having gone down a route, Ministers then dig in, probably advised that the clause under debate is vital.

The Minister has adduced no evidence to the Committee that a constable working part-time in a non-operational role for a fire authority is in a different position from a constable working part-time in a non-operational role for any other class of employer. Of course, the Minister can come up with an example of a part-time employee of a fire and rescue authority doing time-critical and vital work, who then gets the summons from his chief constable to perform his police duties even though he is off-duty. That occurs only rarely.

The Minister can produce such an example, but a responsible fire and rescue authority would not put someone who was liable to be called away in such a role, any more than they would employ as a retained firefighter someone in another profession who is likely to be unavailable for substantial periods of time because they have other time-critical work to do. I do not suppose that trauma surgeons would be employed as retained firefighters, nor members of the Territorial Army—if that is that organisation's correct title. Those are people who are likely to be called away for other vital duties.

It would not be beyond the wit of a fire and rescue authority to manage such a situation. The Minister has not convinced me that employment in a non-operational role with a fire and rescue authority is qualitatively different from all sorts of other employment.

There is a bit of a hangover mentality here. Ministers have been at pains to talk about modernising the fire service and moving away from the uniformed, quasi-militaristic 1947 Act structure to a much broader, community-based service, in which many employees might not do any firefighting or operational front-line duties in the conventional sense, but would none the less perform important roles. Yet on this matter the knee-jerk reaction is to think of the fire and rescue service as if it were like the police force or the military, with all sorts of special circumstances.

I am surprised at the Minister's attitude. I was not expecting him to say that it was necessary to retain a ban on a police constable taking part-time non-operational work with a fire and rescue authority outside his normal working hours. I find it curious that the Minister finds it necessary to put that into the Bill. I wonder about the rights of police officers to take on other roles outside their working commitments that involve no conflict with their police work. It is not an issue of great political difference; it is a practical question about the working of the Bill. Fire and rescue authorities have raised that question with me and I imagine that the matter has also been raised with the Minister. I shall continue to pursue that question outside the Committee and try to persuade the Minister.

I may give the Minister some examples that show that such restrictions are no longer necessary. They point backwards to a structure and character of the fire brigade that are no longer appropriate in a world in which we talk about a community-based fire and rescue service.

Mr John Pugh (Education Spokesperson, Education & Skills; Southport, Liberal Democrat)

The hon. Gentleman advances a powerful argument for his original amendment; he certainly improves our understanding of it. However, there is still the possibility of a real confusion of functions. A private employer and a police force rarely have much to do with one another unless the scene of a crime is connected with the private employer. However, there is a range of things in which both the fire service and the police service are involved, such as investigations into accidents. If there were people working for both services, that would introduce a complication that would not exist if a police officer worked simply for a private firm. Does the hon. Gentleman not accept that?

Mr Philip Hammond (Runnymede & Weybridge, Conservative)

Of course, it would depend on the role; fire and rescue authorities would have to be careful about that. However, a significant number of fire and rescue authority employees do not perform duties that would give any cause for conflict. I am mindful of the need for police employment regulations to prevent the sort of situation about which the hon. Gentleman speculates, but that can be done by police employment codes and regulations. It is not necessary to write a total prohibition into the Bill.

If I had a little more time, I am sure that I could think of examples of things that police officers might want to do that it would be absurd to ban them from doing because of the notion that their doing them would bring into danger the whole emergency service structure. I hope to persuade the Minister outside the confines of the Committee. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 36 ordered to stand part of the Bill.