Clause 4
6:00 pm
Paul Holmes (Chesterfield, Liberal Democrat)
With a mind to what Sir Nicholas said at this morning’s sitting about the fact that we had had an extensive debate and that we wanted to make some progress on the Bill, and with a view to the fact that in most Committees of which I have been a member in the past eight years, all too often, we only get through the first two thirds of the Bill and do not reach the important parts, I shall be brief about the amendments and new clause 3. We went through all the arguments that lie behind those provisions this morning and there is no point in repeating them in detail two or three hours later given that anyone can read the record of our proceedings.
In a nutshell, amendments 59, 60 and 61 would remove the power for the Secretary of State to oversee and have the final say over approval of the appointment of assistant commissioners of the Metropolitan police. New clause 3 would do the same, in effect, in respect of the Secretary of State’s power to have the final say about the appointment of chief constables and assistant chief constables the length and breadth of England and Wales. Our argument is the same as it was in respect of new clauses 2 and 4, which is that that there should be a major devolution of power away from the centre—from London and central Government—to local authorities and local communities. It is hard therefore to understand why there should be a need for the Secretary of State to exercise power over the appointment of the most senior police officers, whether in Derbyshire, Northumberland, Wales or London. All the arguments about decentralising power that were made this morning apply to the amendments under discussion.
I am sure that the Minister will explain in a minute why he disagrees with my argument. I shall not press the amendment to a Division because we know that the Labour party and the Conservative party would oppose it, albeit for different reasons. Before the Minister explains why I am completely wrong, which we can take as read from this morning’s debate, will he pick up on a couple of points about the existing powers of the Secretary of State with regard to senior police officers and chief constables? We recently had a debate about the position in London with the Metropolitan police. There is a slightly strange situation, as both the Secretary of State and the Mayor of London are supposed to make the decisions about the final appointment of the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and the dismissal of the person in that post. We had a two-way debate and hoo-hah about exactly who should be pulling the plug on Sir Ian Blair, for example. The Mayor took the initiative on that.
What exactly does the Minister see as the role of the Secretary of State in deciding who should be the most senior police officer in London? I accept that that is complicated by the fact that, unusually, all chief constables in London are automatically heads of the Government’s anti-terrorist strategy for the whole nation. With regard to chief constables throughout England and Wales in general, in the other 42 police authority areas, will the Minister explain why the Secretary of State needs that power? Why does a central Government Minister need to decide, yes or no, whether someone should be the chief constable?
There is also the power to dismiss chief constables. I believe that that was last used in Derbyshire in 1990, nearly 20 years ago. The power is not widely used at all, and I am not sure when it was last used before 1990. I would be interested to know why the Government believe that the Secretary of State should be the person to exercise that power, rather than the local police authority which, by whatever process—its members are elected or appointed at the moment—represents its local community and does the interviews for that senior post, yet can then be gainsaid and overruled by the Secretary of State from London.