Policing and Crime Bill
12:00 pm
Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham, Labour)
I wanted to take up the point about taking the local community’s views into account on policing, because some of what you have written sounds almost counterintuitive. My question is similar to Ms Waltho’s. Can we, perhaps in a statutory instrument, define what we mean by taking views into account, or at least give examples?
I want to press that point because of my experience of setting police policies in a local area, particularly on licensing, for example. Police might have a particular view of what should happen in the area, but the local community might know more about the local fear of crime and what should happen to protect public safety. They might know more about the movements of people in the area and how to protect children from harm, and can give the police a lot of information that leads them to make a different decision. That is not to say that police authorities are not effective or representative, but a lot of the time, there is something to be gained from taking local community’s views on board. Rather than throwing out the measure, should we try to define what is meant by taking views into account, perhaps by listing examples?