[Relevant documents: the uncorrected minutes of evidence taken before the Welsh Affairs Committee on Tuesday 6 December, HC (2005–06) 751-i.]

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Alan Campbell.]

I am delighted that we are in a position today, as promised, to hold a debate in Government time on the police restructuring being considered, and which will cover all parts of the country.

I want to emphasise that the debate is wholly informed by the needs of modern policing and the need to build strong and secure communities. That is the start and end point of the process that we have set out and I shall give more detail during our discussions. Central to the approach is the issue of local support for the police and the consent and accountability of the local police, which have for centuries characterised policing in this country. I believe that our proposals strengthen rather than weaken those aspects.

I begin with the rationale for change. Members on both sides of the House will recognise that the nature of crime is changing. It is the duty of Government to ensure that our police service is equipped to protect the public and business from serious criminality as well as to provide effective neighbourhood policing. Both are increasingly related to each other in our modern society and both need structure.

That is why the issue is not simply about redrawing the boundaries on a map, but about fundamental change in our approach to what Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary termed protective services, by which the inspectors mean such things as serious and organised crime, counter-terrorism and handling major incidents without detriment to local policing. Protecting the public requires the police and others to predict and prevent rather than merely to react to serious criminality. That requires different approaches to policing from the traditional methods and gives particular priority to intelligence, which is at the core of dealing with serious and organised crime.

Is the Home Secretary aware that Thames Valley police authority told me today that it has no figures for the costs or benefits of a merger with Hampshire and the other option? The authority has no idea of the staff changes entailed—whether there will be staff losses or a requirement for more staff. Does not that show that the process is being rushed ridiculously? There can be no proper figures for consideration before 23 December, and asking the police to do that so rapidly takes them away from the local neighbourhood policing that we want.

It does not mean that in any respect whatever. I shall come to the points that the right hon. Gentleman raised about financing and time scale in a moment, and will take further interventions at that point.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

I shall give way in a second, but I want to make some more progress.

Starting in June 2004, Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary conducted an extensive examination of how effectively protective services are currently provided, and I pay tribute to Denis O'Connor and thank him for the work he did for the inspectorate. The inspectorate published its analysis, "Closing the Gap", in September. The inspectors' stark conclusion, based on their independent, police-led analysis of the circumstances in every force, was that the current structure of policing is

"no longer fit for purpose".

In their view, there was insufficient focus on the challenges posed by modern serious and organised crime, and they came to the conclusion that strategic forces offer "the best business solution" for the future.

Faced with that clear, well-argued and independent police advice, I judged it essential to act rather than to ignore those proposals.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

I said that I would give way in a moment.

Without action to address the problem, the situation is likely to worsen, rather than improve. The problems identified by Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary are those that we face now, not problems that might never materialise. That finding is endorsed by police leadership at the most senior levels.

The Home Secretary will be aware that Thames Valley police force is an example of the successful amalgamation of three county-based police forces. Given the success of Thames Valley police as an effective operational unit, is he aware that not one single person in the Thames valley wants to go back to parochial county-based policing?

My hon. Friend is entirely right. He makes the powerful point that the police have always been up for addressing the process of change—quite rightly so. Our current policing structure has reflected the past assessment of such matters. The process through which we are now going is intended to address that in the same way.

The Home Secretary said at the beginning of his speech that the process would be undertaken only with the consent of police forces. Paul West of West Mercia police authority categorically told the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, Fiona Mactaggart, that he was against the measures, so will the Secretary of State take that view on board?

I will take every view on board. For precisely the reasons that I shall explain in a moment, I want to hear the views of police authorities and chief constables so that I can assess the best course of action to follow.

Her Majesty's inspectorate and the Home Secretary will know about the difficulties that Nottinghamshire police face: serious crime and high rates of homicide. Is that not a typical example of why we need to increase resilience to tackle the way in which the face of crime has changed over the past 30 years? Change is necessary now.

My hon. Friend is entirely correct. The case of the Nottinghamshire force gives us an excellent illustration of the situation. As a Member of Parliament who lobbied my right hon. Friend the Minister for Policing, Security and Community Safety and me on the matter, he will know about the need to get additional resilience into the Nottinghamshire force to address the problems that it faces. I am influenced by the terrible case of the murder of Thomas Marshall in Norfolk some 10 years ago. The way in which much of the Norfolk constabulary had to devote tremendous resources over a considerable time to the appalling murder meant that it thought that its ability to deal with other threats that could have arisen might have been threatened. That is the precisely the sort of problem that must be addressed.

Why have the Government not given more consideration to the federation of forces option? May I draw the Home Secretary's attention to paragraph 1.11 of "Closing the Gap", which made it clear that

"some smaller forces were almost as successful as the majority of larger forces, whilst two relatively large forces (5,000+ staff) received surprisingly low scores"?

He has not made the case for strategic forces.

This is an interesting discussion. The hon. Gentleman is quite right to say that some people think that a form of federation would be a more effective way of dealing with aspects of the situation than strategic forces. I take the view—I think that I am right in saying that Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary takes the same view—that that is not the right approach, because if one considers the resources that are required to deal with threats of serious and organised crime, intelligence matters, drug dealing and people trafficking, one sees that a strategic capacity is needed, not simply a mutual aid-based capacity. That is the right solution.

I understand that my right hon. Friend must consider the difficult and complex issues of terrorism, organised crime and drug trafficking. However, in my constituency and the Wakefield district we have excellent leadership at the district level—the basic command unit—and there is a shift towards community and neighbourhood policing due to the increase in the number of officers. Will he reassure me and my constituents that in any reform that he proposes, the BCU at the district level will remain as the main building block for neighbourhood and local policing?

I can give my hon. Friend that reassurance. West Yorkshire has been a leading force in developing the strength, resilience and leadership of BCU commanders not only in Wakefield but in other local authority areas in West Yorkshire, so my hon. Friend is right to focus on that matter. As I shall say in a second, that is why the BCU and the neighbourhood policing structure is central to the whole approach that we want to follow.

The Home Secretary mentioned a murder that took place 10 years ago in Norfolk and its impact on the Norfolk force. Much more recently my constituency suffered the tragedy of the Soham murders, when the Cambridgeshire force—one of the smallest in the country—brought in the services of officers from 21 other forces to help because it lacked the necessary capacity. That is an example of what could be achieved under the present arrangements. Surely it would be better to make the present system work effectively than to engage in the wholesale disruption that he proposes?

The hon. Gentleman is right to say that mutual aid is an essential part of the way in which our policing works. It has been seen not only after appalling tragedies such as the Soham murders, but after the 7/7 attacks in London, when the largest force in the country—the Metropolitan police—relied on mutual aid for several aspects of its response. That is important and it will remain a feature of policing, but I maintain my strongly held view that a strategic approach is the right one.

I am grateful to the Home Secretary for taking another intervention. Does he accept that, in addition to the police and the police authorities, the general public deserve to be consulted? My experience in Nottinghamshire tells me that, as well as good neighbourhood policing, the general public want the most efficient possible wide-scale policing against major crime, not a reactionary attachment to county boundaries, which criminals have long since ceased to respect, if they ever did.

I believe that people want precisely what my hon. Friend says they want: strong, vibrant, resilient neighbourhood policing teams without abstractions; strong basic command unit-based policing working with other authorities in other areas; and a strategic force that provides the necessary support to local policing so that local police are not distracted.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

I will give way more, but I wish to make some progress first.

I have made the central argument for change. HMIC's conclusion was that larger forces—those with at least 4,000 officers or 6,000 staff—are more likely to have the critical mass needed to cope with organised crime, terrorism and civil contingencies without abstracting from local policing. Furthermore, there is now no area of the country where we can afford to neglect protective services. Organised criminals operate in remote areas and rural communities as well as in urban centres. Drug traffickers take advantage of remote areas to site manufacturing operations and gangmasters use illegal immigrants in rural industries. Unfortunately, murders and other major incidents, although extremely rare, can and do occur in any part of the country.

I decided to ask the police throughout the country to consider HMIC's conclusion and to make proposals this year. They are now considering that in detail. I argued that there were three key principles of the reform: to deliver improved protective services, to achieve it without taking resources from neighbourhood policing, and to modernise and reconfigure policing and the way in which it does business. The aim is to use the substantial investment that we have made in policing, which has increased by more than £3.7 billion since 1997, more effectively to deliver a better service.

We want to achieve that in the most effective ways possible. Merging police forces will deliver economies of scale and put that investment to better use. Now, there is duplication in provision of some services but gaps in others, and we can reduce the money spent on back-office functions and redirect it to strengthen front-line policing. Let me give an example. The police service now runs 43 separate finance departments, 43 press offices and 43 human resources departments, all of which do things their own way. There is no justification for continuing to spend the money when efficiencies are possible. To give another example, it is a clear duplication of effort for one region to have a total of 500 firearms officers spread between four forces, some located within 10 miles of one another, when combining them would allow skilled officers to be transferred to other areas when they are needed urgently.

Larger strategic forces—I emphasise strategic—will be better able to afford specialist functions such as firearms units, murder investigation teams, sexual offences units and counter-terrorism teams, and they will be able to use them more efficiently. At the time of the inspection to which I have referred, only 13 of the 43 forces had fully resourced specialist murder units. Smaller forces will always find it difficult to provide that level of service since, by definition, they need it far less often. However, that means that when they do need it, the skills and experience are not there or have not been tested. It is in such situations that forces have to take officers from local policing to fill the gap. The creation of strategic forces will help to safeguard local policing against that, because they will have sufficient capacity and resilience to deal with major investigations or public order incidents without abstracting officers from neighbourhood policing teams.

I am second to none in my admiration for my right hon. Friend. The logic of the argument is that we are moving towards a national police force. Is that what he intends?

If I am genuinely second to none in the admiration of my hon. Friend, I am in real trouble. [Interruption.] That is exactly the point coming from those on the Opposition Front Bench.

I have rejected from the outset the suggestion of a national police force. Some serious organisations—the Police Superintendents Association, for example—have proposed that such a force be established. I think that that would be a dangerous development given the spirit of the police in this country, who have always relied on the principle of consent and on the operational independence of chief constables. Were there to be a national force, as there is in some other countries, there would be an entirely unhealthy relationship between Ministers and the operational commander of such a force. I have opposed the concept from the outset for that reason, so there is no plan to take that course. I give my hon. Friend that assurance.

In Kent, we have a force that is near the top of the league by most of the Government's measures. It handles a number of strategic assets including the channel tunnel and the port of Dover. Given that Kent meets the Government's criterion on total manning, both uniformed officers and civilians, may we have an assurance that the wishes as expressed by its police authority and its county council to keep Kent as a police force will be upheld?

The hon. Gentleman is right to point both to the effectiveness of the Kent police authority and the constabulary and to the general strategic size and importance of it in dealing with major issues. I say to him, as I say in relation to all particulars, that the Government will consider all proposals when they come before us. We will take all points of view seriously into account, including the one that the hon. Gentleman has just expressed.

May I give my right hon. Friend another point of view—from Cheshire? I agree with the strategy that he is setting out, but how can a strategic plan be predicated on a structure that in the north-west, for example, Greater Manchester has unilaterally declared itself to be outside? Is that not an illogical basis on which to develop a strategy?

I say with all courtesy to all forces in the north-west, including Greater Manchester, that no one can declare themselves unilaterally outside the approach that is being taken.

It has done it.

It does not have the ability to do that. As I said to Mr. Brazier, we will consider all proposals that come from all forces. Some forces say that they can stand alone and that that is it. We shall consider those proposals extremely seriously. There are some forces—Greater Manchester is one—that can make such a case. There are no unilateral decisions in those areas.

The Home Secretary says that he will listen to all points of view and that he wants to consider everything that has been put on the table, but he has set the deadline of Friday for police forces to come up with proposals. Furthermore, those forces that bend to his will are to be given a cash handout. If that is not a bribe, what the hell else is? In Hampshire, like the position of my hon. Friend Mr. Brazier, we have a splendid police authority that by 2007 will meet all the Home Secretary's strategic objectives. The county has a strong military presence where it needs special policing. If the right hon. Gentleman is really interested in listening to what is said throughout the country, he should extend the deadline well into the new year so that all of us in this place can discuss these matters properly.

Order. May I remind the hon. Gentleman of the maxim in "Erskine May" on the use of parliamentary language?

I am extremely grateful, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I apologise.

On the issue of funding, we have established that fund precisely to meet the request from the Association of Police Authorities and others that we provide funding to deal with the issues that arise in that area.

I readily acknowledge the economies of scale if forces merge that ought to release resources for front-line policing, but can the Home Secretary give me, as a Member representing a predominantly rural police force, an assurance that if that force merged with a metropolitan police force, resources would not be sucked from rural areas into big cities?

I can certainly give my hon. Friend that assurance. First, the Government's position, which was set out in the manifesto on which we fought the last election, aims to establish neighbourhood policing at the local level. Secondly, it establishes that the basic command unit—for example, the City of York—will take policing decisions in the locality, working with other agencies in the city. Thirdly—this is very important indeed and develops the argument that I made a second ago—relatively small forces such as North Yorkshire are vulnerable by definition in the case of major incidents such as murder or a significant attack, which take resources away from neighbourhood policing. I can therefore give my hon. Friend the assurance that he is seeking.

Hugh Bayley referred to North Yorkshire, which is England's biggest county. Several times the Home Secretary has referred to murder investigations. He will know that in 2004 there were two double murders in the vicinity of York. There was one double murder in my constituency, and Mark Hobson was sent to prison in May this year. North Yorkshire police dealt with that crime, and the people of North Yorkshire have more confidence in the performance of the police locally than in the views of Her Majesty's chief inspector.

North Yorkshire police and forces throughout the country have an outstanding record in dealing with appalling crimes of the type that the hon. Gentleman described. With his background in policing, he knows more than most of us in the House about the track record of police in dealing with such issues.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

Order. Mr. Secretary Clarke is replying to an intervention. Perhaps hon. Members would allow him to finish his response before seeking to intervene.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Mr. Greenway made his point very clearly, and everything that I say reinforces the capacity of individual forces to deal with the problem. However—and this is as true for North Yorkshire as it is for other forces—in the light of changed policing circumstances and the different forms of attack that now exist, it is necessary to strengthen that in the ways that I have described. I take seriously, as I am sure the hon. Gentleman does, the views of Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary. Had I decided to ignore its recommendations, I would have been more vulnerable to legitimate attack from Members such as him who have a strong background in policing.

Reference has been made to Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary. Does my right hon. Friend agree with its statement that the current 43-force structure is

"no longer fit for purpose" and is based on a structure established in the 1960s?

I agree, and referred to that statement earlier. My hon. Friend is quite right, however, to draw attention to it.

Is the Home Secretary aware of the serious doubts about the statistics behind "Closing the Gap"? Has he read the opinion of the professor of statistics at the university of Warwick, which was published today? He said:

"The quality of statistical information gathered for the HMIC report . . . is questionable . . . The statistical treatment of the data collected is largely unjustified and appears open to criticism . . . The graphical presentation of the data is poor and trend lines could be misleading; the use of computer-produced statistical elaborations is unjustified . . . there has been minimum professional statistical science input".

He concludes:

"The conclusions drawn in respect of the 4,000 minimum force size almost totally ignore the variability of protective services performance at each force size, and no evidence is provided that this will be small at the 4,000 level. In short, there will be an unknown"—

Order. That is not supposed to be a speech, but an intervention.

I am sure that Mr. Paterson will make his points when he makes his speech in the debate. The short answer is no I have not seen that report today—I will study it, of course—but I make the point again that it is very clear that the evidence is absolutely straightforward. That is why HMIC has reached its view that strategic forces are the way to deal with such issues.

I do not think that anyone would argue with the thrust of the Home Secretary's argument about efficiencies, but there appears to be a difference of view between the police authorities and the police who are charged with doing the job. I am sure that the Home Secretary would agree that there are people looking after their own positions throughout the country, but the big concern, which could defuse some of the issue, is about accountability. Under the new structure, how does he intend to ensure accountability in the new areas, given that metropolitan areas and counties may perhaps fuse?

My hon. Friend is right to say that there is a difference of opinion between some senior officers and some police authority members, although I draw no conclusion from that. Two key accountabilities will be enhanced by our proposals. First, neighbourhood policing teams will be established, whereby people who live in a patch will know the names of their police officers, their e-mail addresses, their phone numbers and how they operate. That is not already the case universally—I wish it were, but it is not—so we will establish that system. Secondly, at basic command unit level, a relationship of a different order will be established with the local authority. I accept substantially the case that we need to ensure that the proposals increase accountability. That is true, and it is what the proposals will do.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

I want to make some more progress.

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

No, I will not give way. I want to make more progress.

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

No, I shall not. I have told the right hon. and learned Gentleman that twice. I will not give way to him at any point in the debate.

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Of course I recognise that it is for the Home Secretary to determine whether or not to give way to any Member, but is it not extraordinary for a Secretary of State to say in advance that he is not proposing to give way to a certain Member?

That is not a point of order for the occupant of the Chair. As the right hon. and learned Gentleman well knows, it is entirely up to the Minister at the Dispatch Box to determine to whom, if anyone, he gives way.

I am grateful, Madam Deputy Speaker. My experience of the quality of interventions over the past five years from the right hon. and learned Gentleman leads me to believe that they would cause no substantial addition to the quality of the discussion.

I want to make progress on the issue raised by my hon. Friend Hugh Bayley. I well understand the points that are being made about the threat to neighbourhood policing, about which people are fearful and concerned. That is why I give the assurances that forces in those neighbourhoods will stay there rather than be abstracted to other forces, or whatever. As I said, each neighbourhood, covering roughly the size of a couple of council wards, will have a dedicated team. Every resident will know the name of their local officers and their phone numbers and e-mail addresses and so on. They are essential elements of the proposals for neighbourhood policing and will be introduced in every part of the country by 2008.

Alongside the force mergers we will introduce measures to strengthen accountability at basic command unit level in the context of the crime and disorder reduction partnership, where it will make a difference to everyone's life. At the level of the strategic forces that we are talking about, we will ensure greater accountability as well. I believe that the changes that I have proposed will provide a better police service.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

Order. Once again, will the House please settle down? It is in the gift of the Home Secretary to decide whether or not to give way. At the moment, he has said that he wishes to make some progress.

Throughout this process, I and HMIC believe that these changes will provide a better police service. That is why, in September, I invited police forces and police authorities to work up their own proposals and preferences for restructuring the service in the context of the HMIC report. I asked them to show how the changes that they proposed would deliver the step-change in the provision of protective services that I believe the whole country needs. Since the start of the process in September, forces and authorities have worked extremely hard to ensure that the reform has a solid evidence base and provides proper plans to deliver improvements in services. I understand the concerns raised in the House and by some forces about the timetable that has been set and about the potential pace of change. However, I should restate that the problems that we face will not go away. They exist right now and they need to be addressed.

I want to state formally my gratitude to authorities and forces for their hard work and to my right hon. Friend the Minister for Policing, Security and Community Safety for all that she has contributed. However, there is a great deal more to do. I understand that the time frames have been challenging. I have asked police authorities to submit preferred options for change by 23 December, along with draft costings of the business cases that support those options. I also recognise that, with the best will in the world, there will still be local issues that need further work and discussion. Any decisions will follow a period in January when my officials will work closely with police forces and authorities to refine the cases submitted on 23 December and to resolve these issues. However, I have to say that it is the Government's clear preference to move early to strategic forces given the medium-term and sustained value-for-money benefits of doing so and, most important of all, to remove the uncertainty that can be very damaging to morale.

To support forces that are prepared to merge voluntarily, I will also look at further funding options in January, and I have written to the Association of Police Authorities on this matter.

Will the Home Secretary deal with the questions that we cannot get an answer to in this time scale? What will happen in an area such as Northumberland—where the present police force size is adequate for the strategic purpose—to the precept that council tax payers will pay, which is generally lower than in other authorities, and to the representation of Northumberland on the police authority for the strategic police area, which might mean that only one person and possibly nobody at all is on the body that determines spending?

Both issues will be addressed in the context of the proposals that will come to me by the end of this year; both issues will be part of the continued discussion with forces, authorities and chief constables in that period; and, on both issues, I can give the right hon. Gentleman the assurance that his concerns will be given full weight as we get to the position that we need to get to.

I am very pleased that my right hon. Friend is concentrating on local policing, on which many Members of Parliament are working in their local areas. In response to an intervention from my hon. Friend Mrs. Dunwoody, he indicated that he was not moving towards a national police force, but that is exactly what he is doing in Wales. He talked about moving resources, so is it possible for those regional authorities now to make bids whereby they could make up the level 2 gap by increasing the budget rather than by spending all this money on restructuring?

With respect to my hon. Friend, I do not believe at the end of the day that the issues that are addressed in the HMIC report on the level 2 capacity can be dealt with purely through resourcing. There are important structural issues in many parts of the country, and they relate to different areas of priority and different areas of spending. However, I can give him the assurance, if that is what he is looking for, that if the Welsh forces were, for example, to come forward with a proposal, we would look at the pot that we have made available for giving money to help to address those particular issues.

Will the Home Secretary please explain to the House why he is proceeding at such speed? This is the biggest shake-up in the police force for half a century and he ought to want to take the people of the counties of England and Wales with him. If he devoted six months, which is not a long time, to this process, he could probably have what he wants. However, he is driving fast and furiously without any regard to local concerns and local people. May we not have an extension of this ridiculously tight timetable?

Perhaps I should remind this very senior Member of the House that, under the law as it stands, if I were to propose a particular change covering, for example, Staffordshire that was not agreed and did not come forward on a voluntary basis, there would then be a legal requirement to go through a four-month consultation period during which anybody—be they individuals, local authorities or whoever—could make the observations that they wanted to make. Therefore, I do not think the charge that he makes that we are not allowing time for consultation in the event of changes is fairly and well made.

The Association of Police Authorities has estimated that because of the start-up cost plus equalisation the increase in council tax could be 30 per cent. in some areas, so we can probably rename the council tax as the police tax. Will the Home Secretary tell us who will pay those costs? Will it be police tax payers?

As my hon. Friend knows from our previous conversations about the matter, the figures that he is plucking out of the air have no substance. The basis on which such discussions should take place are the figures in the proposals that police forces put forward for us to think about, which will be placed in the public arena. That will allow us to have the discussion that my hon. Friend perfectly reasonably wants, but let us conduct it on the basis of actual figures rather than on a totally speculative basis.

Many hon. Members on both sides of the House understand the Home Secretary's argument about the requirement for strategic resources, but will he rethink the time scale? Norfolk police authority covers both of our constituencies, and it is unanimously in favour of one option on the grounds that it had better act quickly to avoid being dragged in. It had hoped to merge with Suffolk police authority and Cambridgeshire police authority, but unfortunately they are entirely opposed to the idea. The Home Secretary also knows that the regional assembly has unanimously voted against his proposals. Given the variety of options, will we see a uniform pattern at the end of the day or are we into chaos theory?

We are not into chaos theory in any respect, but I am not sure whether the uniformity that the hon. Gentleman has mentioned is the right approach. Some people have argued that the approach should be the same in each of the Government offices for the regions, but we have not said that, which is why we are asking police authorities and police forces to examine the matter in relation to their own areas.

As I have said, I expect the cases, which I must consider by the end of December, to be robust and to show how mergers can lead to significant economies that can be reinvested in neighbourhood policing and protective services. As I said earlier in response to an intervention, I had that in mind when I responded to the Association of Police Authorities and decided to set aside £50 million of police capital funding for 2006–07 and up to a maximum of £75 million of police capital funding for 2007–08 to support authorities and forces committing to early—voluntary—mergers. The business cases that forces and authorities are now completing include information on financing and costs. The Home Office has provided considerable advice and guidance, including involving the independent Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, to ensure that this financial information is provided on a consistent and equal basis.

Throughout January, my officials, supported by Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary and operational policing experts, will continue to work with forces and authorities to ensure that the business cases for reforms have been made and are designed to be cost-effective. This work will take place in January, and I expect to be in a position to make decisions as soon as possible. Again, I acknowledge that the time scales are challenging, but it is crucial that we press ahead to avoid a prolonged period of uncertainty, which could lead to loss of morale and distraction from the core task of protecting the public.

There are other issues that we will need to resolve to make sure that mergers can progress smoothly. My officials are working with the Treasury, the Association of Police Authorities, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and the Welsh Assembly Government to reach agreement on future precepting arrangements. I cannot say today what the detailed outcome of that work will be, but the level of precept gathered in England and Wales as a whole will not rise. We will obviously consider ways in which the transition can be smoothed.

In conclusion, there is an overwhelming case for reform, based not only on the professional judgment of Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary and the evidence presented in "Closing the Gap", but on the professional judgment of ACPO, which has consistently drawn attention over the past year to vulnerabilities that it perceives in the service that the police can provide at level 2. In the light of that, no responsible Government could refuse to act.

Strategic forces provide the best solution to the problem of delivering strong protective services to all communities as efficiently as possible. The real measure of success will be not the number of forces that we end up with next year, but how well equipped we are in 10, 15 and 30 years' time to meet the two key demands of protecting the public and providing a police service that remains truly responsive to members of the public.

The matter that we are debating—the prospective reduction of 43 police forces to 12—is enormously important. The constitutional independence of the police, their local accountability, their operational effectiveness, their cost-effectiveness, the stability of their finances, and their very identity with their local communities are all at risk. That is why the Association of Police Authorities rightly called for a full parliamentary debate on this important issue. In his recent letter to its chairman, the Home Secretary said that

"there will be an opportunity for Parliament to debate in full the issues raised by the review on Monday 19 December".

So what do we have today? A debate timed to fall after the formal meetings of most or all of the relevant police authorities, despite the Home Secretary's demand that the authorities meet his deadline at the end of this week, on Friday; and a debate held just before the Christmas recess, after a major prime ministerial statement and without a substantive vote. One might almost conclude that the Home Secretary does not want it to get much press coverage. This is hardly the full debate that the subject deserves. The Home Secretary should know that Conservative Members expect a much more extensive debate on the future of policing in the new year.

We are not opposed to changing policing in Britain. We have long argued for reform and for a greater focus on neighbourhood policing. We are keen to work with the Government to find the best way to achieve that. We recognise that Britain faces growing threats from terrorism and organised crime that often require greater co-operation across forces. However, the Home Secretary would do well to heed the words of one chief constable who rightly said:

"All serious and organised crime has a local base".

It therefore requires a local response. That is why we are very concerned about plans to force mergers between forces that will inevitably make policing more remote from the people.

Will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that very early in the new year the official Opposition will ensure that this House has an opportunity to vote on the timetable for these measures?

I give my hon. Friend the undertaking that we will ensure that we have the opportunity to vote on either the timetable or the substance of these measures, depending on where the Government have reached at that time.

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

Before I do, I want to say that in my 18 years in the House, I witnessed only one occasion on which a Minister, let alone a Cabinet Minister, refused to take an intervention from a Privy Councillor, and that led to an apology. I therefore give way to my right hon. and learned Friend.

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his courtesy. Does he accept that the people of Lincolnshire are against amalgamation because they think that it would amount to a dilution of the policing in their county and a lack of response to their concerns by the police authority, which will be elsewhere? If the Home Secretary makes an affirmative resolution to bring about a compulsory merger of the Lincolnshire constabulary with an adjoining force, will my right hon. Friend join me, and I hope the other place, in opposing it?

If that proposal is made over the heads of the people of Lincolnshire and without considering the views of the local authority and the local police force, of course we will oppose it.

This debate is about money and people—how we can afford the specialist skills that we need in our police force. Does my right hon. Friend therefore agree that it is extraordinary that the Government have given no firm figures on how much the proposal might cost or how it is going to be paid for? There is an idea that it might cost £500 million, but the figures cannot be based on any proper estimate because a big police force such as Thames Valley has not yet produced its numbers. Is it not a disgrace that we have such an unprepared debate?

My right hon. Friend is right. In fact, it is a double disgrace—first, that those numbers are not available, and, secondly, that the Home Secretary appears to expect the Association of Police Authorities to find them by the end of this week, which is a singularly untenable proposal.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

I will give way in a moment.

That is the core of the matter. We believe that this is all happening too fast. It is happening without serious thought about the consequences and it is being driven by the wrong motives. Rather than taking their time, the Government are trying to force the changes through almost without proper debate. Rather than being driven by operational effectiveness, the changes are being driven by a blind belief in centralisation that defies the facts. Rather than focusing on the needs of local people, they are being driven by an agenda of regionalisation that the Government continue to pursue against the will of the people. We welcome today's debate, but the Home Secretary has a long way to go before he proves the case for the changes that he is advocating.

I heard the right hon. Gentleman this morning on Radio 4 when he was very relaxed and talked about the amount of time that is being spent looking at the restructuring proposals. He said that not enough time was being spent on it, but he referred to the 1960s when there was a two-year royal commission followed by a two-year debate. I was not quite sure whether he thought that four years was sufficient. How long does he think should be devoted to this process now?

I will come to exactly that point and give exactly the answer that the hon. Gentleman wants shortly.

Does my right hon. Friend share my amazement that the original proposals, on the basis of which restructuring will be carried forward, were published in the middle of the parliamentary recess, and that the process for specific implementation was begun in the parliamentary recess? Should we not be having two debates: one today on the principle of police restructuring, and one next year on how it will be conducted in practice?

My hon. Friend is right. The whole approach has been entirely insufficient from a parliamentary point of view.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

The options are enormous. I give way to my hon. Friend Robert Key.

When it comes to operational policing, will my right hon. Friend bear in mind the fact that this debate is being held as though only one police force operates in this country—the home police forces of the counties? It does not. Eight different police forces operate in my constituency at any one time, including the British Transport police and a host of others, most significantly the Ministry of Defence police, and we cannot possibly sensibly consider police reform unless we consider the interface of all police forces. In garrison towns around my constituency there is an everyday working relationship between such forces, as there is in Colchester—Bob Russell is not here but I know that he would agree—and in Aldershot, represented by my hon. Friend Mr. Howarth, and we must take that into account if we are to have sensible operational results.

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point about the complexity of the problem, and it brings me to my next point.

Opposition Members have long had a clear view of the kind of reform that our police service needs. We want to see genuine neighbourhood policing that is responsive to the needs of local people. We want the police to be genuinely accountable to the people whom they serve, which is why we continue to believe in the concept of elected police commissioners. Evidence suggests that smaller policing units are the most effective. Recent research from the Policy Exchange think-tank states that

"smaller forces, with a strong commitment to visible policing, are among the most successful at cutting crime and providing public reassurance."

In the Policy Exchange's ranking of police forces, the smaller forces, such as Dyfed-Powys, Gloucestershire, Northamptonshire and Dorset, came out on top. That evidence accords with the Home Office's own performance assessments for 2004–05, which show that three of the top five performing police forces in Britain have fewer than 4,000 officers. That evidence mirrors international experience.

rose—

I will give way in one moment.

The greatest and most high-profile success in tackling crime in recent years is found in American cities. They managed to cut crime by more than half in just 10 years. How? They adopted a system of locally managed, directed and financed policing. With all that evidence to hand, we believe in retaining and enhancing the connection between local police and local people.

I was going to ask the right hon. Gentleman if that was indeed still the Opposition's policy, as we do not seem to have heard much of it over the past few months. Is not what he is describing exactly what the Home Secretary suggested—enhanced strengths for basic command units, neighbourhood forums and so on? How many commissioners was he anticipating, and would there be any strategic co-ordination of their work? If they are to be truly independent, he would have no strategic overlay, and I am sure that that is not sensible.

That is a very simplistic point that barely deserves response. Yes, we are committed to elected commissioners, and, yes, they will be expected to respond to strategic issues.

As the House will know, the Government want to move—

rose—

I will give way in a moment.

As the House will know, the Government want to move in the opposite direction. Fuelled by the O'Connor report, on which the current debate is based, the Home Secretary proposes to replace many existing constabularies with larger and more remote police forces. He justifies that with his now familiar claim that it is necessary to tackle the new terrorist threat. That argument, it seems, can cover a multitude of sins.

Should the proposal go ahead, however? We fear that it will be the thin end of the wedge—the first step down the road to making all policing more remote and less responsive to local people.

The Home Secretary, as my right hon. Friend will have heard, said that he was prepared to consider all options. However, West Yorkshire police force is large enough to meet the Home Secretary's requirement. The chairman of the police authority, a Labour councillor, is opposed to the move, yet the Home Secretary has already ruled out the possibility of West Yorkshire police remaining independent. Does my right hon. Friend agree that that shows that the consultation is a sham, and that it is about driving the Deputy Prime Minister's agenda of regional government by stealth?

If my hon. Friend will forgive me, I will not return to a previous incarnation as the shadow of the Deputy Prime Minister—an interesting concept in its own right.

In an earlier debate, Frank Cook, whom I cannot see in the Chamber, was vocal on this subject. He quoted the report's author, Denis O'Connor, as saying:

"I was asked to put forward a protective services argument, not a critical assessment of forces".

That suggests that the Home Secretary was trying to use his report as something that it is not. As so often, the Government seem to have come to a decision and then tried to find the evidence to support it. Perhaps that is why the Home Secretary was so quick to decide which of the five options outlined in the report he preferred.

The Home Secretary supports the proposed move to fewer strategic forces. There was absolutely no mention of that in the Labour party's election manifesto earlier this year, perhaps because it knew how unpopular that would be. One opinion poll, conducted by MORI for the Cleveland force, found that public support for the plan was just 8 per cent. A similar poll for the Cumbrian force found that a majority were against the merger proposal. In the earlier debate in Westminster Hall, my hon. Friend Mr. Howarth reported how his police force in Hampshire had told him:

"At an independently run, public focus group consultation event held with residents, on November 19th our residents were unanimous across all groups that Hampshire Constabulary should not be amalgamated and should remain a single force."

There has been burgeoning concern across the country, as people have come to realise that their local police force might disappear.

May we return briefly to the question of the assessment of police forces, because the right hon. Gentleman referred to the police performance assessment framework? He will be aware, as I am, that that framework, though robust, does not effectively measure level 2 crime, cross-border crime and serious crime. By far the strongest case for police service reorganisation is that it will provide the ability to deal with that type of crime. Will he tell the House what size of police force he believes is necessary to provide the critical mass of officers and support staff to deal with that type of crime?

The right hon. Gentleman makes the mistake that his Government make—the idea that one size fits all simply does not work. The clear point that I will make, with which I think he will agree when he thinks about it, is that in order to address level 2 crime—the serious crimes that we are talking about—we should not jeopardise the way in which the police deal with so-called volume crimes. There are methods of dealing with level 2 crime that do not jeopardise the police's normal day-to-day business. I shall return to that point in a moment.

Does my right hon. Friend accept that he is completely right in concentrating on the localisation of police forces? In the context of Staffordshire, for example, nothing would be worse than to amalgamate our force with other forces, because the nature of crime that is committed in Staffordshire is completely different from that in the west midlands as a whole?

My hon. Friend is right, and he is right to point out that I am right. The point is simple. Some of the proposed new forces are simply too huge to be as effective as those that they would replace.

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

In a moment.

If the proposed mergers in the south-east proceed, Kent officers could be closer to Calais than to their new regional headquarters.—[Interruption.] Labour Members obviously think that that is a good idea. Some officers in the proposed south-west regional force would have to drive for five hours to reach their new regional base. Officers in the north-west would have to travel for two and a half hours from one side of their area to the other. As was pointed out earlier, some officers in Wales would have to travel for about five hours to visit their headquarters in Cardiff. We would accept that if we thought that there would be genuine benefits for the local community, but, as I have said, all the evidence demonstrates that the best police forces are the smallest because they are able to respond to the needs of the local community.

Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary noted, with regard specifically to level 2 criminality, that Gloucestershire constabulary was of very high quality, had a comprehensive level 2 capability and had led development of a comprehensive information system, thus proving that smaller forces are perfectly capable of dealing with challenging and complex issues.

My hon. Friend is right. The Gloucestershire force is a good example of smaller forces' coping very well. Moreover, there is nothing to stop forces from co-operating, as my hon. Friend's chief constable has pointed out. It is entirely right that they should co-operate, but it is not right that they should be forced to amalgamate or to merge.

Has my right hon. Friend received any adequate explanation, or indeed any explanation at all, from the Government of why, if we have to go down this route—to which I object—rather than retaining Cheshire as it is, forces that are already collaborating effectively cannot collaborate with forces across national boundaries in north Wales, where we collaborate most effectively, or indeed with forces in north Shropshire, where policing demands and threats are more akin to those in Cheshire than those in Merseyside or Manchester, which have unilaterally rejected any merger with Cheshire anyway?

The Home Secretary has not come up with such a proposal. The one thing that he did say earlier, when it was pointed out that Manchester had refused to be involved, was—in effect—that it would do as it was told. That principle, in fact, underlies the whole proposal: police forces and police authorities will do as they are told.

Is my right hon. Friend aware that our excellent chief constable of Gloucestershire, Dr. Tim Brain, told me in a letter that any forced amalgamations were likely to have a significant impact on the Crown Prosecution Service, the probation service, the combined court service and the youth offending service? The whole matter goes much deeper than has been suggested. There will be much more reorganisation, and it will cost much more than the £500 million to £600 million estimated by the Association of Police Authorities.

My hon. Friend is right. It should be borne in mind that his chief constable is also the representative of the Association of Chief Police Officers responsible for resources, and probably understands the issues better than most.

Earlier this week Ian Laidlaw-Dickson, the Labour chairman of Hertfordshire police authority, wrote to Hertfordshire Members:

"This authority regrets the undue haste with which it has been asked to make decisions on the future of policing in Hertfordshire. We will not be pushed or bribed into making snap decisions."

We in Hertfordshire want to know what the rush is. Are we going into something that we shall regret at our leisure?

Almost certainly, if the Home Secretary proceeds as he intends. My hon. Friend has raised another point, however. The words of a Labour chairman have had the interesting effect of uniting Conservative, Labour and Liberal police authority chairmen up and down the country against the haste, the method and the approach that are proposed.

Does my right hon. Friend appreciate that as Lincolnshire has a much lower crime rate than the counties with which the Government propose we should be merged, if the merger takes place policing effort in Lincolnshire will in future target an average crime level that is currently much higher than ours? There will therefore be little pressure on the police who are still in Lincolnshire to improve their performance. Rather, they will be under a great deal of pressure to switch resources from what will be viewed as a lower-crime area in Lincolnshire to other parts of the merged police force area.

My hon. Friend makes a good point about very large police authority areas. The simple truth is that we cannot be sure, particularly where there is a mix of rural and urban areas, that resources will not be moved from low-crime to high-crime areas. That is one of the concerns that the Home Secretary has not addressed.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

I apologise for keeping Emily Thornberry waiting for so long.

It is clear that, in respect of policing, Conservatives believe that small is good and local is best, so is it their view that we need more than the present 43 police authorities? If so, would not their policy cost more than the 56 per cent. increase in spending that has been invested over the last six years?

Labour Members basically fall into two groups—the Whips' narks and the people who really care about the issue. [Interruption.]

rose—

In this particular case, of course, there is no doubt about the classification.

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for confirming that I am one of the people who really cares, particularly about policing in my constituency. It is because I care that I have taken the trouble to consult local police leaders and it is clear to me, unlike to Conservative Members, that they are in favour of reform. Having spoken to them in detail, I know that they are completely opposed to the idea of electing local police chiefs, which would be a fast track to the politicisation of the police at a local level. Is the right hon. Gentleman really proposing that as a serious reform, or is it just a hangover from the last manifesto?

I will tell him in a few moments what I believe about localism, but I will say that the hon. Gentleman worked in the Treasury during a period in which our police forces were starved of cash over the years—[Interruption.] I am quite happy to debate the matter with Ed Balls. Perhaps we could debate what happened to the police precept during the Government's term of office and how huge amounts were raised from local people, which were more than enough to pay for all the policing increases during the entire period of the Labour Government. They, and particularly the hon. Member for Normanton, should not be making any great claims about how much money they put up.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

If my hon. Friends will forgive me, I would like to make a little progress before taking another barrage of interventions. [Interruption.] Well, welcome to the House of Commons.

The Home Secretary has claimed that local policing will remain through the basic command units, which he says are accountable, but there is not true accountability there at all. He obviously does not understand the difference between accountability and consultation, which are indeed rather different. The BCUs take their direction from above and report to those above them. Local people have no control over them whatever. What happens if the BCUs do something wrong? Can they be fired? No. Can they be replaced? No. Can they be held to account in any way by the people they serve? No. The Home Secretary says that he desires the establishment of mechanisms that will effectively hold BCU commanders to account, but then he admits that those mechanisms will be non-statutory. It is not enough for him to "desire" accountability; there must be a formal mechanism to put local accountability in place.

The Government have shown minimal real interest in the issue—and we know why. There is a wider agenda behind the Government's plan. We can already see how their failed regionalisation agenda is being introduced through the back door. What began in planning is now filtering through to the emergency services. The ambulance service is being reorganised, as is the fire service, and the police are simply the latest body to face the zeal of the Government's great drive towards regionalisation.

Is the right hon. Gentleman suggesting that Denis O'Connor is part of this conspiracy?

What Denis O'Connor has demonstrated is that if the Government ask the question carefully enough, it determines the answer that they get. As is demonstrated in this case, it is as simple as that. I will come back to Mr. O'Connor's comments on that very point.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that there is no real reason why Warwickshire police force—my local police force—should not be permitted to amalgamate, if that is the appropriate solution for it, with counties such as Leicestershire and Northamptonshire, except that they cross regional government boundaries and that doing so does not fit in with the Government's regional government agenda?

My hon. Friend makes the point exactly. If this reform is not driven by a regional agenda, why would Hampshire police authority be forbidden from amalgamating with neighbouring Dorset or Wiltshire forces? The answer is that they would then cross arbitrary Government office boundaries. My hon. Friend Jeremy Wright mentioned Warwickshire police force, which is the smallest force in the country outside the City of London's. As it said in an early response to the report:

"The Home Secretary has made it clear that the restructuring of forces has to take place within existing regional boundaries".

If it is so important that we create larger strategic forces to fight terrorism and organised crime, why should we let regional boundaries dictate how those forces are formed? Are criminals going mysteriously to respect regional boundaries? If this reform is truly about operational effectiveness, it should be solely about doing what is most effective—not about fitting the Government's discredited, one-size-fits-all prejudices and preconceptions. The Government's plans for regional government were defeated soundly in a referendum of the people; it is time that they accepted that fact, rather than trying to implement them through the back door.

Pausing only to note that it was the Conservatives who established the current regional boundaries, I want to return to the question of accountability. The right hon. Gentleman will doubtless agree that the person responsible for policing in a particular area should make policing his priority. If we have elected commissioners at basic command unit level who are elected once every four years—my Tory opponent referred to that proposal at the last election—regardless of what level they are at, one year will be spent playing to the gallery in the run-up to the next election, rather than being spent putting policing matters first.

The hon. Gentleman gives an interesting description of his own job and the way in which he fills it—playing to the gallery every four years. I am sure that his local papers will have fun with that. That is not our policy: we believe in district commissioners at force level, rather than at BCU level. Perhaps he should read our manifesto, instead of believing bits of his own propaganda.

There may be a case for amalgamation in some parts of the country—

Just to make sure that I heard the right hon. Gentleman correctly during that last exchange, does he stand by the manifesto commitment of having an elected leader of each force in the country? Is that correct?

It is correct that the manifesto said that we would have an elected police commissioner, and there is nothing wrong with that. There may be a case—[Interruption.] Is the right Home Secretary having difficulty hearing? The answer to his question was yes.

We accept that there may be a case for amalgamation in some parts of the country; our concern is that the Government are forcing it on police forces that do not want or need it. As one chief constable said:

"There's not been enough critical examination of the report. Restructuring may be exactly what two or three forces in one part of the country need and may make totally sound sense. But it does not follow that it needs to work like that in every part of the country".

The speed with which this restructuring is being done is one of our greatest concerns. As that same chief constable outlined:

"This is going to be the most profound change since the modern police service was created in 1829. Maybe it is not necessary to have a two-year royal commission now, but a debate—not even much of a debate—that is based upon a report which took three months to write and which we have really only been given a month to respond to, is just too hasty".

The last time such a change was proposed, a royal commission was indeed established. As was pointed out in an earlier intervention, it was established in 1960 and reported in 1962, and its recommendations were put in place between 1964 and 1965. This time, the report was called for in June and published in September, and it will be implemented—if the Government get their way—as early as next year. As the Labour chairman—another Labour chairman—of Cheshire police authority, Mr. Peter Nurse, told the Home Secretary,

"Your timetable is so absurd that it is impossible for us to have a meaningful dialogue with our communities and for us to fully appraise what is the best structure for policing in this area that not only effectively tackles those serious criminals in our midst but also protects our neighbourhood."

That is a comment from a Labour chairman of a police authority.

The speed leaves many questions unresolved. One of the most important of those is cost.

Has my right hon. Friend had any indication from the Home Secretary of the impact on the council tax police precept? Does he agree with the figures that have been suggested for the merger of Essex police force, which might put up the police precept by 20 or 30 per cent.?

The Home Secretary was asked that question in an intervention, but he dismissed two important assessments of the issue as guesswork. I shall now address it in some detail. The O'Connor report, on which the Home Secretary bases his argument, is 113 pages long, of which just one and a half pages cover how the merged forces will deliver savings. A figure of £70 million is asserted, but is completely unsubstantiated. The report says that the change "could save" some £70 million in the long run, but equally it might not. There is every chance that costs will go up, not down, especially information technology costs in which both the Home Office and the police do not have a brilliant track record.

If nothing else, all experience shows that the process of amalgamation will be a ferociously disruptive and distracting exercise, for probably several years, during which time neither the terrorists nor the criminals will take a rest. The draft calculations in the report are far from convincing, and so is the evidence from history.

I am sure that many hon. Members will remember what happened on a previous occasion when a Labour Government amalgamated two institutions to try to drive up standards and cost-effectiveness. They took one poorly run car company and one very successful international lorry company, put them into one and created a disaster called British Leyland. The history of amalgamations does not inspire confidence. Rather than raising the average of all, they often pull successful institutions down. Even if the projected operational and cost improvements can be achieved, it is clear that they could also be achieved through the simpler federated structure, with forces providing mutual support and co-operation. That would have the added benefit of avoiding heavy up-front costs.

My right hon. Friend will be aware that after the Tony Martin case there were several cross-border policing issues. Norfolk constabulary entered into a federation with Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire, which has achieved a great deal. It meets many of the aspirations in the inspectorate's report. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Home Secretary has not answered the question that was put to him about federation and that that is surprising, given that he is a Norfolk MP?

My hon. Friend is right. When the Home Secretary was questioned on that point, he dismissed federation as not having sufficient strategic direction. However, within a couple of minutes, he gave an example of four different armed response units being within 10 miles of one another. That is precisely the situation in which a federated solution would provide both economy and an improvement in effectiveness without any need for a strategic direction.

My right hon. Friend is, like me, an ex-Territorial Army soldier and will appreciate an analogy with the armed forces. It is possible for different regiments to work together—the British Army does that all the time at brigade and divisional level—but they do not need to be merged into one super regiment to achieve efficiency. If it can work for the armed forces, why cannot it work for the police?

My hon. Friend is right. Ministers are obsessed by the idea of scale economies, without realising that scale can bring real disadvantages to an organisation that is supposed to be, in some part, representative of the local community.

The right hon. Gentleman has set out a case for closer co-operation between various forces. Would he also consider using existing national organisations, such as the Serious Organised Crime Agency, as resources to be called on by local forces if they need help?

Of course, SOCA could be used in that way. As has been said many times in this debate, when extra resources, expertise or support are needed, it is commonplace for it to be forthcoming. The Home Secretary mentioned 7 July and the 352 officers from other forces who came to London—the biggest of our forces—to help out. Just under a year ago, after the tsunami disaster, when the Metropolitan police led our end of the recovery operation from a base in Hendon, there were hundreds of people from other forces, both volunteers and formally seconded officers. That is normal. I would expect an organisation such as the Serious Organised Crime Agency to give strategic direction, assistance and intelligence to a federated structure, especially the lead player on terrorism or serious crime in such a structure. That is how the process would work, if there was a rational solution rather than one driven by the Government's prejudices.

On anti-terrorism, one of the best examples is the regular Dorset police operation to police the party conferences. It is one of the smallest police authorities but it brings in resources from neighbouring authorities on a co-operative basis without the need for a regional superstructure.

My hon. Friend is right. Dorset provides us with a great number of examples, in terms of who the force would prefer to amalgamate with, as a highly efficient and relatively small force. That one county manages to defy almost every precept that the Home Secretary puts up.

The O'Connor report admits that reorganisation is "bound" to entail up-front costs. It states that they "cannot be avoided". In view of that warning, did not it occur to the Government that it might be a good idea to find out what the costs might be before they demanded that amalgamation proceed? That job has been left to police authorities. The estimates are as wide ranging as they are disturbing. Figures of £25 million or £30 million have been suggested simply to amalgamate the IT systems of two neighbouring forces. The hon. Member for Stockton, North has been vocal about that. His local force in Cleveland was told that it would have to merge with Durham and Northumbria. The authority thinks that it would have to borrow £50 million to pay for that. Servicing the loan will cost £5 million a year.

Some forces will have to borrow even more. I have before me a memo from Leicestershire police authority, which puts the cost of amalgamation to create an east midlands regional force at more than £100 million, with ongoing costs—not ongoing savings—of between £30 million and £52 million.

I very much confirm the figures that my right hon. Friend has just read out. Is he aware that Northamptonshire police authority, which is being threatened with merger with the east midlands force, confirms that no efficiency savings have been identified to cover the costs of the merger proposals, so there is a direct threat to the roll-out of neighbourhood policing?

My hon. Friend demonstrates that there are only two places for the money to come from—a point to which I will return; it will either come from the pockets of council tax payers or current policing. Both options are unacceptable.

The chief constable of Gloucestershire, who has already received honourable mention from a number of my colleagues, is ACPO's head of finance and resourcing. He estimates the total set-up cost as £500 million. The Association of Police Authorities assesses it at between £500 million and £600 million. I suspect that the cost of the process will be like that for the infamous identity card scheme: the harder we look at it, the more expensive it gets.

The full cost could be astronomical, yet we are told by the head of the police resources unit at the Home Office that the

"Government does not have the money" to pay for it. However, it is amazing what Ministers can do when their backs are against the wall. After the APA refused to meet the Home Secretary's rushed deadline of 23 December he suddenly found £50 million for next year and £75 million for the year after, in a rather clumsy attempt to bribe forces to accept his merger plans without question. The APA—

Order. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman would like to reconsider the words he has just used.

That was a quote from the APA, Madam Deputy Speaker, not my words, but if I offended the House I withdraw them.

The APA was rightly outraged. In its response, "Policing not for Sale", it condemned the Home Secretary's attempt to—I am sorry, it is the same word: how can I put it?—"influence" police authorities into abolishing local police forces. Its chairman, Bob Jones, said that

"we will not be bought off . . . It is disappointing that the Home Secretary is now trying to bribe"—

I am sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker—

"some police authorities to merge their local police forces at the expense of those police authorities who still have serious concerns about whether this will deliver the best policing for local people".

Even with the Home Secretary's rather cack-handed attempt to influence opinion, the shortfall in funding will be massive. There are only two ways to fill the gap: borrow the money, or raise it through a higher precept on the council tax. It is clear that the cost of the exercise will fall on council tax payers, and that is just one reason why the APA opposes the Government's plan. As its highly critical statement of 7 December put it:

"the APA does not accept that HMIC's Report 'Closing the Gap' provides a complete or comprehensive business case for the creation of strategic forces and . . . the APA will urgently explore alternative models, such as a Federated approach to establish if these offer a quicker, more cost effective approach to improve protective policing services".

I welcome that approach. It makes sense to explore alternative options, especially when the O'Connor report itself proposed them.

Why is the Home Secretary so hostile to federation? He says that a "compelling case" for federation has not been made, but does he seriously contend that he has made a compelling case for amalgamation? Alternative options must be explored objectively and costed properly, not summarily ruled out because they do not fit the Government's regional blueprint.

My survey of police authorities, which was conducted last week, revealed overwhelming opposition to the Government's plans. Most authorities cited the speed and cost of the mergers as a major factor behind their opposition, together with worries about the lack of accountability.

In Surrey, central Government support for the police has reduced from 86 per cent. of their budget in 1997 to 55 per cent. of their budget. The remainder has been made up by Surrey council tax payers. Will my right hon. Friend explain why on earth Surrey council tax payers should continue to bear that burden—and the increased burden due to the cost of the amalgamation—when the police force will not be theirs?

My hon. Friend makes a good point that reinforces my earlier comment that the majority of the money that has been spent on increasing the number of police on the street has come from local council tax payers, not the Government.

In supporting what my right hon. Friend said earlier, may I point out that it has been reported today that the chairman of Hampshire police authority—I apologise in advance for using these words again, Madam Deputy Speaker—has stated:

"I am absolutely disgusted with the Home Secretary for his blatant attempt to bribe police authorities into accepting voluntary mergers . . . This surely illustrates how police authorities across the country have got him running scared by standing together in protest against reforming the structure of policing in England and Wales"?

Will my right hon. Friend take this opportunity to encourage police forces throughout the country not to be divided one against the other due to the offer of money if they agree to something with which they disagree in an impossibly short time scale?

Of course I will do that, but I will also encourage forces to try to take a rational approach. What is wrong with the Government's approach is its sheer speed, haste and thoughtlessness. If they had come to the House with a deliberate plan of consultation and a way in which the various options and costs could be worked out, the response would have been completely different from what we are seeing today.

rose—

rose—

I have given way to Tom Levitt twice, so I give way to Paddy Tipping.

The right hon. Gentleman has a distinguished record as a former Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. Given that there are 43 different police authorities and forces, is he really telling the House that there is no scope for efficiency savings? Surely we should examine such efficiency savings carefully and look at bigger organisations. Yes, there will be up-front costs due to reorganisation, but he must accept that such a way forward could reduce costs in the long term.

The hon. Gentleman is right that I served as Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. No Opposition Member—or any Labour Member, I think—would say that there is no scope for improving the efficiency of our police force. That is why every party stood at the last election on reform plans of one sort or another, although notably the Government did not have this reform plan in their manifesto.

When I started as Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, I told the National Audit Office that the Committee and the NAO had the three requirements of examining economy, efficiency and effectiveness. Effectiveness is the issue at play here because we are considering the responsiveness and effectiveness of our police forces as they serve their local communities. That will not be advanced by replacing effective police forces, some of which are very efficient, with super-forces of an enormous size.

My hon. Friend Nick Herbert will be able to talk about the reaction of Sussex police authority and will probably confirm that not a single person has written to any Sussex MP to say that they are in favour of the changes. Does my right hon. Friend anticipate that if the Audit Commission or the National Audit Office examined the spending that the Home Secretary contemplates and considered what would happen if it were all spent on improving the strategic ability of our police forces, they would find that we would get far better value for money than we would by spending most of the money on changing uniforms and IT systems earlier than would naturally happen?

My hon. Friend is right. I can think of many ways of spending £500 million to improve the security of this country's citizens that would come way ahead of the proposal before the House.

rose—

The hon. Gentleman has not had the chance to intervene, so I will give way to him. I am conscious of how I am filling the pages of local newspapers with hon. Members' quotes.

Will the right hon. Gentleman clarify how much his suggestion of having elected regional police commissioners or local sheriffs would add to the cost of local policing?

It would add next to nothing to the cost, but add enormously to the effectiveness, as I said earlier.

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I have given up on filling local newspaper pages—least of all with that sort of drivel, anyway. I have heard him twice already.

I hope that the Government will accept that they have handled the debate appallingly, which is why we are discussing such an important matter in the last week before Christmas, which is a week in which there will be no votes. Frankly, as the chief constable of Dyfed-Powys police said—this weekend, I think—the Government's plans are "verging on a shambles".

The Home Secretary needs to pause and reflect on the full implications of his proposals. We are not opposed to any change to the existing structure of 43 police forces, but we think that there are serious problems with the current proposal. It will make policing remote when we should be making it local. It will make policing unaccountable when we should be giving people greater control. It threatens massive costs for no extra benefits, and it is driven by a regional agenda that has already been rejected by the British people. Quite simply, the proposal seems to be an attempt to meet a resources problem with an organisational solution. We should be designing the right organisation and then finding the resources to implement it. It would be a tragedy if we sacrificed good and effective policing on the altar of regional dogma. It will be a tragedy if the Government push through this hasty, ill-considered, costly, disruptive and dangerous plan.

I want to say something personally to the Home Secretary because I have a great deal of regard for him. This is an extremely important constitutional, policing and security issue. There will be no vote today because this is an Adjournment debate, but I make a plea to him. He has in his hands something that is very important to the future of British life. Will he please think again? Will he go back to the Home Office and reconsider his timetable? He could take just six months to consult properly—not four years—and get the figures and assessments right, and then come back to put a proper proposal for policing in Britain before the House of Commons.

Several hon. Members:

rose—

Order. May I remind all right hon. and hon. Members that Mr. Speaker has imposed a 10-minute limit on Back-Bench speeches?

The debate is important, but I found the speech of David Davis rather disappointing. I try, in my position as Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee, to avoid being partisan in these debates, but I tell those of my colleagues who might have been worried about a newly revitalised Conservative party that is preparing for government that one of the measures of a party that is preparing for government is the ability of its Front-Bench spokesmen to turn around to Members behind them and say, "I'm sorry. I'm not going to let you say that you can promise everything that your constituents want to hear." The real problem with the Opposition's position is that there are serious issues to do with whether our police service is effectively structured to deal with some of our most serious crime, but the right hon. Gentleman failed to deal with those issues so that his Back Benchers can go back to their constituencies and put out a press release saying, "I called for no change in our area." That is a great shame, because there is a serious debate to be had on the process being undertaken by the Government and the way in which they are handling it. I am surprised to hear the major Opposition party challenge the fundamental basis of the Government's proposal. We need serious reorganisation.

The right hon. Gentleman makes an interesting but false point. Does he disagree with the proposition that we should take a sensible time—six months or so—to cost the proposals, work out their real consequences and consult the people involved to ensure that we get a decent and stable outcome?

I will make points about the timing, the consultation and the information that is necessary in just a moment, but the right hon. Gentleman needs to confront one fact. When I intervened on him on police performance, he swept aside the argument that larger police forces are necessary to tackle level 2 crime—serious and organised crime. I was a Police Minister for two years and, in my experience, the overwhelming weight of professional opinion in the police service was that larger police forces were needed to produce the capacity to deal effectively with such crime. When I was a Police Minister—which was only a couple of years ago—ACPO adopted a report produced by its then president, Sir David Phillips, who I believe is still head of the National Centre for Policing Excellence, which called for strategic forces of 5,000 officers. That view did not emerge from the report issued earlier this year by HMIC—it has been the professional consensus of policing in this country for some time.

The reasons are clear. If there are to be sufficient officers to deliver an effective neighbourhood policing service without abstractions continually taking officers off the street, we need sufficient officers and support staff to concentrate on drug running, people trafficking, serious organised crime and fraud. We know from the analysis that has been provided that the vast majority of serious criminal gangs go untouched by the attentions of most police forces in this country.

Does my right hon. Friend understand the scepticism of people in Leicestershire about the idea that there is a magic number of 4,000 or 5,000 officers that will guarantee the protective services that he is describing? The reputation of the Leicestershire force, which numbers 2,300 people, for accessibility, openness and responsiveness could be weakened or lost by resources being transferred to counties to the north of Leicestershire such as Nottinghamshire, where crime is a serious problem. Can he understand their nervousness?

I can understand the nervousness and I think that Members have a responsibility not to feed it. I say two things to my hon. Friend. First, I believe that small forces will find it difficult to contribute to efforts to tackle serious and organised crime. The cost of that failure might not be immediately apparent within the boundaries of that police force area, but a weakness will be created in the capacity of policing across England and Wales to tackle organised crime. Secondly, I can see no reason why larger police forces should lose local responsiveness. I have heard hon. Members from Hampshire—my own county—talk about Hampshire remaining a stand-alone force. Hampshire police force is a large force—much bigger than Leicestershire's—but I do not believe that it can be criticised for being too remote or unresponsive. What is important is the quality of leadership provided by chief constables and chief superintendents within force areas. Yes, there are some important challenges to be managed, but there is no reason to believe that the move toward larger police forces will necessarily diminish local responsiveness, and larger forces will contribute more to efforts to tackle organised crime.

The right hon. Gentleman rightly talks about the importance of leadership in police forces. Is he concerned that the abolition of up to 30 chief constable posts might remove an entire tier of leadership from our police forces?

I realise that there is nothing worse than someone like me standing up and saying, "When I was a Minister," but it was not that long ago that I was a Police Minister. During that period, I met perhaps 90 per cent. of those who are now assistant chief constables or chief constables and I discussed these issues with almost all of them. I did not encounter a single senior police officer in the ranks of those who aspired to become chief officers in the next five to 10 years who had a word to say in defence of the existing structure of policing in England and Wales. Every single senior officer or aspiring senior officer wanted larger police forces.

Tonight's debate should have started from that premise. We should then have considered the process and the way to undertake it. On that, I will make some remarks that will be less comforting to Ministers, because I believe that the Government should now take into account certain questions about the process to make sure that we take the public with us in making the necessary changes.

We need to be careful to avoid too rigid an application of coterminosity with regional boundaries. That has been an issue in Hampshire. There is a case for structuring forces to reflect the movement of crime. I do not wish to tread in areas that English MPs should treat with sensitivity, but I observe that, in terms of crime patterns, north Wales is linked far more with Cheshire and Merseyside than with the rest of Wales. Similarly, if there are to be mergers in my part of the world, there is a case for looking westward to include Dorset.

The agenda of local government is changing. As the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden said, the initial concept—that regionalisation would be followed by elected regional assemblies—was hit a heavy blow by the north-east referendum. The debate on local government is becoming more diverse, with talk about city regions becoming the basic building blocks of local government. I do not think that a fixed approach should be taken to National Assembly or regional boundaries if the patterns of crime and of the criminal justice system point in a different direction. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has indicated—in Hampshire's case at least—some willingness to consider those boundaries and I think that he should continue that approach.

Has my right hon. Friend noted that the greatest decrease in the problems of drugs in Europe in the past five years has been achieved in Portugal? The Portuguese changed their laws and reduced the number of drugs deaths by 50 per cent. Does he think that, if we want to tackle that serious problem, we should do what Portugal has done and what his own Home Affairs Committee advocated a few years ago, which is change the laws rather than the organisation?

The Committee has certainly not advocated that since I have been a member of it. I have no expertise in the area, but I will hazard a guess that, even if Portugal has made progress on drug crime by one means or another, the criminals concerned are still involved in organised crime. We need a policing pattern that deals with the way in which crime is organised.

The second issue that Ministers should address as quickly as possible is council tax and local government funding. That issue is not fatal to our position now, but in the new year, the prospects for making progress will be far better if it is possible for each of us to explain to our constituents how reorganisation will affect local funding. If it appears on paper as though our constituents will be picking up the bill for other forces, it will be important to be able to say that, in fact, that will not be case.

It seems from doing a few back-of-the-envelope calculations on the Government's preferred option of a merger between the Hampshire and Thames Valley police forces that we will be looking at a 23 per cent. increase in the police precept across the Hampshire constabulary for no discernible benefit. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that that will be hard to explain to our constituents, given that the force is already the third most effective?

We need to move beyond back-of-the-envelope calculations, which are rarely right or helpful. It is important for the Government to produce the necessary figures as quickly as possible.

We need to see at each stage the national picture and for everyone to understand it. There has at times been a sense of 43 people trying to complete a jigsaw, with only the Home Office hanging on to the lid of the box so as to see the overall picture. The merger between Hampshire and Thames Valley that is under discussion would not sit easily with, for example, Kent remaining a stand-alone force. It would not be clear what different rules were being applied in each case. I urge the Minister to ensure that, as we move into the new year and consider the pattern of reorganisation, it will be clear what decisions have been made and what guidance has been given in each case, and that it will be possible to demonstrate a consistency of decision from one place to another.

I did not come into the Chamber to say that everything in the garden is wonderful. There are some issues that arise from the handling of the proposals that we can learn from and tackle in the months to come. I have been surprised by the extent to which the Opposition have challenged the rationale for attempting the exercise. That challenge is misplaced. I believe that a reorganisation is necessary to protect our citizens from the crimes that they face. That is the basis on which we should start tonight's discussion.

It is right and proper that we are discussing changes to the police. We should be emphasising—it is something that has not come across sufficiently—that we probably have one of the best police forces in the world. We are trying to tackle the changes that are taking place in policing, which should not be perceived as a criticism of the work that is done by many policemen and policewomen throughout the country. We have incredible police officers and we should celebrate their work, but that work has changed enormously in the past 10 years.

Six months ago, during the general election campaign, I was hauled in, as many of us were, to talk to the National Farmers Union. One issue that the NFU raised with me was the fact that we do not see police in rural communities. I was somewhat defensive and argued strongly that they, NFU representatives, had to have a change of expectation of what they could get from the police service. They wanted to go back to the "Dixon of Dock Green" era, but the world of policing has moved on enormously since those days. We now have complex crimes such as terrorism, internet pornography and those involving fraud and corruption. Some of those crimes did not exist 10 years ago.

We must acknowledge that, while policing patterns have changed enormously and there are new crimes, we still expect our police to do what they were doing 10 years ago. As well as new and complex international crimes, there has been a great increase in some of the crimes that were taking place 10 years ago. There is antisocial behaviour and drug-related crime. There has been a massive increase in the work that the police do in dealing with drugs.

There is a twin problem: new complex crimes are taking place and established crimes appear to be on the increase. That must be coupled with the massive public expectation of what we want from our police. There is a real need for change, which is why people such as Sir Ian Blair have been right to say that we need a major debate about policing.

The Government had an enormous opportunity. There was good will among many on both sides of the House in recognising that there should be such a debate. The Government have damaged that good will by rushing forward with a set of proposals and in coming to a conclusion before the debate has even taken place, the conclusion being that the only solution is that mergers should take place.

Does my hon. Friend share my great lack of confidence, despite the protests of the Home Secretary this afternoon, that every option advanced by local police forces will be considered? For example, federations and the crossing of regional boundaries could be good solutions that might fit the criteria apart but for the fact that the regional boundaries stand in the way.

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. In this rushed process we should not be so blinkered as to assume that merger is the best way forward. We should consider some of the options that I wish to set out. It may be that mergers are one alternative. The process should be based on what matters to a local area, with local people being listened to, rather than on a map in the Home Office with the approach of putting things into a grid that suits government rather than individuals and local patterns of crime.

I have three concerns about what the Government are suggesting. The first is the process. The second is that enormous costs are involved. The third, and probably most important, is the question whether this is the right way forward for policing models.

Is there not a fourth problem, namely that of democratic accountability, especially given the legal limitations on the numbers of representatives allowed on police authorities? Does not the creation of large regional forces mean that many local communities with special policing needs, such as the one that I represent, will be entirely unrepresented in the new police authorities?

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. One difficulty with the Government's proposal, and with the Opposition's proposal for directly elected police commissioners, is that we have not tackled the issue of real local accountability. I shall have more to say about that.

Consultation has been badly handled. There is a need for a wide-ranging debate. Given the way in which the Government have proceeded at such a fast rate, they have lost much good will among those who wanted a sensible debate on the issue. They have also angered the associations that work in policing. The Association of Police Authorities is right to feel aggrieved that the process has been boiled down to about three months. It rightly points out that, when the previous restructuring took place in 1959, the bedding-down period was much longer. It was reasonably successful. A rushed merger and a rushed process will create bad will and probably result in a structure that will not work.

The chairman of the Hampshire police federation has described the process as having been rushed through the Home Office at an "almost obscene pace". I believe that he is right. The chairman of Cheshire police authority said to the Home Secretary:

"Your timetable is so absurd that it is impossible to have a meaningful dialogue with our communities."

Those comments were echoed by the shadow Home Secretary and many others who are involved in police matters.

The next area of concern is the costs involved. Different figures are being put around. My office has spoken to a number of police authorities. First, there is Lincolnshire. The proposed merger for the East Midlands force would amalgamate Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. It is estimated that that would cost £100 million. The director of finance says that, even if the change were made, which could result in some efficiency changes over a long period, there could be a net recurring debt cost of £30 million a year.

I have seen the same figures of a one-off cost of £101 million and a cost of £30 million into the middle distance. A good share of the extra £30 million over forthcoming years relates to underinvestment under previous Governments, as well as the present Government, in relation to the protective service that the police have to offer. Surely the hon. Gentleman should balance his remarks in that regard.

To be honest, it will be of little comfort to local taxpayers to start blaming Governments of the present or past. We are where we are. A proposal has been made that, rather than helping to clear the deficit and the cost problem, will add to it.

There is a proposal to merge Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire into one force. The director of finance said that that would be at a cost of £66 million. Similarly, when we talked to the forces for Kent, Surrey and Sussex, we were told that the merger would cost £91 million. Those are large sums for police forces and the money will have to be found from somewhere. Given the global figure, we can assume a total sum of £500 million to £600 million. The money will have to be found from council tax payers or from front-line police. If the figure is £500 million, it equates to about 5,000 police officers. I know where my priorities lie—I would wish to have 5,000 police officers, rather than spend that money on restructuring.

May I deal with the criticism that the Government are approaching the problem from the wrong direction and have produced the wrong solution? I believe passionately that policing should be local. Many contributors have said that people want a local model for policing and, in fairness to the Government, they and the Home Secretary have stressed that point themselves, but I fear that a shift towards super-forces will send all the wrong signals if we wish to establish local accountability. Chief constables should be able to name every village and every part of the community. They should not be in a position where they do not have any idea at all where they are. However much we strengthen basic command units and however much we invest in local policing, unless the people at the heart of the organisation—the individuals who drive and deliver the service and are in charge of it from day to day—know and understand the needs of their communities, we will not achieve proper local policing in this country.

Would the hon. Gentleman apply that logic to the Metropolitan police service, which is far larger than any of the police forces that are going to be introduced?

Sir Ian Blair, the commissioner, does not have any problem travelling around that geographical area. Some of the forces that are to be created would need to hire police helicopters just to transport the chief constable from one area to another. The two concepts are very different and we have always accepted that policing in London requires a separate model. The link with the local community is essential, because it gives the chief constable a connection with the community and ultimate accountability for the area.

Does the hon. Gentleman therefore agree that any trend that favours regionalisation and organisation by regions will lead to an increasing breach in the trust between people who perform a service for the public and the public themselves? If the police are to be merged into larger units, there will be a failure of trust, as, indeed, will be the case if proposals for the ambulance and fire services, and for shire county local authorities, are carried out.

There are many examples in which the forces that would be created are so large that a breakdown of trust would ensue. Worse still, there would be unhealthy competition between areas defined by the old boundaries, which would start to lobby against one another inside the new organisation. There would be accusations that one area was losing out and that large cities were gaining more than rural areas in large forces. Great tensions will build up when there is no need to create them in the first place.

It is important to acknowledge the role of the public, who are rightly concerned about the terrorist threat to this country, child pornography and so on. They want the Government to set up a structure that does everything possible to tackle those issues. The reality is that, however awful the events in London in the summer, people are concerned about crime that affects their daily lives, such as having their car window smashed, having their house burgled or having something sprayed on the side of their house, all of which they regard as an important policing priority. My nervousness about larger strategic forces, which will rightly be given the priority of dealing with the terrorist threat and larger crimes, stems from the fact that they will forget individuals' local concerns, which will be pushed further down what will be a very large inbox for the chief constable. The chief constables of the new forces will be required to report to the Home Office to say that they have dealt with the larger issues, but the local policing issues will be left behind.

Finally, on the question of structure, I have a growing concern, not only in relation to the police but in relation to the fire services and the Government's proposals on the probation service, that we will remove important local links, because it is thought that they do not matter. It is not as if it is efficient to move fire control centres to a larger area or local boards in the probation service are not needed. Such change is regrettable, and the move to larger areas takes away the local agenda.

What is the alternative and how do we deal with the problem? I acknowledge the difficulty in relation to some of the smaller forces and I accepted at the outset the need to recognise changing policing patterns and the way in which we deal with them. The Government have gone some way towards dealing with the issue. Only 18 months ago, they established SOCA—the Serious Organised Crime Agency—because they rightly accepted that solving some serious crimes required expertise and a national approach. We should expand SOCA so that forces that experience difficulties and cannot cope with, for example, a serious threat of a terrorist attack or a complex crime, can call in resources from SOCA, which has the expertise to deal with such problems. That is a much better model than merging forces and requiring them to achieve SOCA's skill level. The solution is staring the Government in the face. They created SOCA, which we should expand and use further. We need to make a number of other changes.

The chief constable of Essex, when endorsing the Essex stand-alone option in Chelmsford on Friday, said:

"I believe that some of the Protective Services would be best provided by a national agency and not through the strategic force solution—counter terrorism for example."

Is that not an important statement from the chief constable of one of the largest forces in the country?

The hon. Gentleman has made an excellent point. Having established SOCA, we should use and expand its expertise, so that forces can call on it at any given time. That is a perfectly sensible solution, as I am not convinced that mergers will solve the difficulty.

Under the Government proposals, the south-west would stretch from the Isles of Scilly to north Gloucestershire. For an individual in my constituency, there is precious little difference between such an authority, which covers an area the size of Belgium, and a national police force. I am therefore not sure that the regional forces represent any sort of localism at any level.

In some of the examples that have been given there is little connection between the communities involved. In such circumstances, one might as well have a national police force. The model that we are suggesting, however, keeps everything that is special and important about the local structure, but does not dodge the difficult question that the Government rightly ask about the way in which we deal with more complex crimes.

There are two more things that we need to do. We must recognise that our borders are difficult and complex. Leaving border control to a combination of the local force and Customs and Excise is probably not the most effective way to secure our borders and I argue strongly that we should consider setting up a national border force. At the same time, we should do everything that we can to strengthen local accountability.

I am interested in that point. Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that some aspects of policing, including, according to him, the policing of our borders, should be handled by a national force?

The hon. Lady is correct and I shall clarify the model that we are suggesting. First, we should have a national border force for our borders, which, we accept, are complex and difficult to police. It is critical to do so at a time when guns, knives and the drugs problem are threatening the country. Such a force would manage sea borders and our ports. Secondly, we would expand SOCA to deal with the complex crimes that I set out. Finally, we should keep our forces as they are, with strengthened basic command units, so that they can deal with day-to-day local policing. That is a sensible policing model for this country.

Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that we have an American-style FBI?

The hon. Gentleman misses the point. His accusation could have been levelled at the Government when they set up SOCA, but they have changed their position. We supported SOCA because it was a sensible acknowledgement of the complex nature of crime. I do not understand why the Government cannot develop that proposal and expand the agency to take care of our policing problems.

Will the hon. Gentleman expand his argument? SOCA does not have huge numbers of people working for it. It is dependent on the existing capacity at force level. Is he suggesting that there would be a massive transfer of perhaps tens of thousands of officers from police forces to SOCA? If not, his solution does not solve the problem of needing people in each police force who are capable of delivering the response to organised crime.

I have a great deal of respect for the right hon. Gentleman, who is the Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee. What I have been saying is that SOCA needs an expanded and enhanced role, but the point that he makes is interesting because a great deal of movement is already taking place, as the individuals seconded to SOCA from Hampshire or other forces move backwards and forwards. There clearly is spare cash, so rather than spending the money on reorganisation and restructuring, expanding SOCA would be the sensible model with which to make progress.

I am interested in the notion of a border police force. Durham has a very long and now beautiful coastline, thanks to having had its beaches cleaned up by a Labour local government. Can the hon. Gentleman exemplify how such a force would work in practice? For example, when working with Durham police, would it control the beaches of Durham or Northumberland? How much would it cost?

The hon. Gentleman is being mischievous. We know where the critical points are in this country, where we need a border force: ports, airports and other points of entry. Those are the key points where we need to expand and have better co-ordination.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

No, I will not give way.

Having established such a structure, the Government should focus on other things, rather than a wasted merger exercise. For example, is it not time that we saw better co-ordination between the various police forces in this country? That can be achieved without a merger. There is no evidence to suggest that creating 11 large forces will improve co-ordination. Sadly, in the Soham case, there was a failure of communication between the Cambridge and Humberside forces. That failure of communication could still happen even with larger forces.

Step one would be to ensure that the existing forces have proper IT and management, so that they can talk to one another. Step two would be a big investment in the technology that the police must work with. Step three would be to start to cut some of the targets that the Government have set. Step four would be to cut some of the time police waste on paperwork. Labour Members may tut, but that is what police officers talk about. None of them talks about merging police forces: they talk about changing their day-to-day working routine so that they can be out on the streets for longer.

I have been listening to the hon. Gentleman's important speech. Can he explain why none of the Liberal Democrat Members of Parliament for Wales has seen fit to attend the debate today?

I guarantee that, if the Government are prepared to hold a debate on a serious day when we can vote on the issue, all 62 of our MPs will be here, but the Government have chosen not to allow such a vote, which is a disgrace. Without a shadow of a doubt, we are up for being here in large numbers if the Government allow a vote on the issue.

Other hon. Members want to speak, so I conclude by saying that the Government have wasted an opportunity. We need to invest in our police, to ensure that they are local and accountable and to use the existing structures that the Government have set up to deal with serious and organised crime in this country. What we do not need is a merger exercise that will cost the equivalent of 5,000 police on the beat or a rushed debate on the issue. I hope that the Home Secretary will listen to the shadow Home Secretary and consider giving us six months. Perhaps the Minister will be prepared to acknowledge that an early debate will take place in January, when the Home Secretary has had time to consider some of the proposals that have been made. Perhaps the Minister will even be prepared to let the Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee and his colleagues do some serious work on the issue, because I believe that, when the proposals are examined in detail, it will be shown that they will do nothing to improve policing in this country.

I am pleased to address an important issue for Members of Parliament from Wales. It should be important to hon. Members from all parties, particularly the Liberal Democrats, who now call themselves the official Opposition in Wales, although not one of their four MPs from Wales could turn up.

Does the hon. Gentleman think it disgraceful that none of the Labour Members from Gloucestershire is present for the debate? Is there not much division that can be talked about?

I was about to argue that the Liberal Democrats are part of the official Opposition, and I am sure that many English MPs from all parties are present, but the point has been made.

Will my hon. Friend give way?

I want to make a little progress if I can, because I want to add the very important Welsh dimension to the debate.

The Home Secretary said in his opening remarks that he was not moving towards a national police force, but in Welsh terms that is exactly what he is doing. I was pleased that my right hon. Friend the Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee made a very important point about the crime trend in Wales, which is east-west. Indeed, the geography and the transport systems in many ways lead east to west, which is the way in which crime takes place. I shall return to that point a little later.

An all-Wales force will be a Cardiff-centric force. In many ways, resources will be taken to Cardiff from the areas on the periphery that I represent and, indeed, from the whole north Wales region. We have experienced that with devolution. I am very much a pro-devolutionist, but most of the powers have been transferred from London to Cardiff. When we have strategic forces, the resources will cover the Cardiff area. In fairness to the Welsh Assembly Government, they are talking about moving regional offices, but there is no talk about the fire and other emergency services following that pattern.

I feel strongly about a couple of other issues, including the cost implications for Wales. North Wales police force has invested using its council tax precept and increased its numbers over and above the Home Office allocation. We north Wales MPs have supported that in many ways, and we have seen the results. The Minister for Policing, Security and Community Safety, who is sitting on the Front Bench, is aware of the work that North Wales police have done, which was reflected in the HMIC baseline report that came out in October this year. There have been excellent results, with excellent resources. What worries the police authority in north Wales and, indeed, many councillors, MPs and Assembly Members is that all that may be lost. If we have an equalisation in council tax, those in the south will cry out that their precept will increase. On the other side of the coin, many of the resources that have been invested by north Wales council tax payers will go down south. That is a big issue for people in north Wales.

Another issue is jobs. The Home Secretary said that there will be economic savings, but I guarantee hon. Members that, in the Welsh dimension, jobs will be lost from the north to the south. There is no need for that to happen. I have heard no one at HMIC come up with a solution that would allow strategic forces to be effective in places such as north Wales and others on the periphery that do not have the necessary critical mass. I am a bit concerned about those issues.

We have an added problem in Wales in that the Welsh Assembly Government contribute an awful lot of their money to community policing issues in work that is coterminous with that of local authorities. The Minister is aware that I have been concerned about that in the past. I should like her to make it clear to the House today that the Home Office does not envisage the proposals as the thin end of the wedge in devolving police issues to Wales. It is very important to retain cross-border links with English authorities—particularly, in respect of the North Wales force, with Cheshire, but not just that authority. My colleagues from the south have the same concerns about the links with Bristol and Somerset. Those are big issues for us.

Historically, crime has moved east-west. North Wales police have taken down motor vehicle registrations because of the historic east-west links, and that project works. What would happen to such hugely successful projects, which North Wales police have piloted, if we were to move to an all-Wales force?

On another issue that relates to cost, the North Wales police authority has estimated—these are the only figures that we have, because the Home Office has given us none—that to meet the level 2 policing requirement in the HMIC report would cost about £3 million for the North Wales force. The Association of Police Authorities in Wales estimates that the Welsh dimension of restructuring would cost between £47 million and £57 million. I believe that that money would be better spent on assisting the smaller forces to meet the level 2 requirement that the HMIC report asks them to meet. Of course, some small forces, such as the North Wales force, which covers the port of Holyhead in my constituency, are dealing with terrorism issues, and Welsh ports have done so for many years, given the IRA threat in Ireland.

The hon. Gentleman has raised a number of powerful and important points against an all-Wales police force. Against that background, does he not agree that it is absolutely disgraceful that the Home Office has ruled out any option for Wales other than an all-Wales force and is attempting to bounce the people of Wales into a marriage of inconvenience that nobody seems to want?

I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman was present when the Home Secretary made his opening remarks and I intervened on him. My right hon. Friend said that he was willing to look at all the options, including the one that I put forward. The reason that Conservative Members have been asking for a debate is to make such points to the Home Secretary in the House, and we have begun to do that. I would like a longer period of debate, and that is why I am making the points that I am today and have made before.

The hon. Gentleman will know that the chief constable of North Wales is firmly sitting on the fence and is giving no leadership on the issue. He says one thing to one area and another elsewhere. Indeed, the four chief constables in Wales are sending mixed messages, and I would like to see leadership from them. Three out of the four said at the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs that they favoured an all-Wales force in principle. My chief constable might be sitting on the fence, but I am not. I think that an all-Wales force would be bad for the people I represent in north Wales.

My hon. Friend will recall that the four chief constables said a year ago that they were all opposed to an all-Wales force. What credibility can we put on what they say?

That is the point that I made when I said that our chief constables are not showing the leadership that we want. A cynic would say that one of the four is after the top job if we move towards an all-Wales force, but that is not for me to say. It is for me to say that we need leadership. We also need the time so that those leaders can make a proper case for the other options.

North Wales is one of the top-performing police forces in the United Kingdom. It came in the top 10 in the United Kingdom and has been the top-performing force in Wales year on year. It has improved with the extra resources. We should not rule out the cross-border collaboration that we have with Cheshire, and we should not put the political dimension before the operational needs of policing. I reiterate that point.

Will my hon. Friend join me in recognising that, to get the extra money in the precept, it was important to convince people that that meant extra police on the streets? That is now being delivered. If we move to an all-Wales force, there is a danger that it will be seen as meaning that resources will be sucked into south Wales.

That is the point I made earlier. We have invested additional resources in local policing and we are concerned that we will lose them in an all-Wales dimension if decision making takes place further south.

May I offer my hon. Friend a word of caution? Any cross-border collaboration with Cheshire might have its problems, because Cheshire built a new force headquarters on a greenfield site as little as four years ago. If that force were to merge with others such as Merseyside or North Wales, who would pay for the remaining 20 years of the private finance initiative deal into which a commitment has been made for that site?

My hon. Friend knows that I could not possibly answer that question, but it is one of the serious issues that is thrown up when new expenditure takes place. There are additional police stations in the North Wales force and if it were to merge with another, many of those stations might become redundant. We must also consider that issue.

The Minister for Policing, Security and Community Safety has just opened the new police headquarters in Winsford in my constituency. It cost only £30 million and if the Cheshire force were to merge, it looks like there would be a questionable return on the PFI.

I shall repeat my belief that collaboration between North Wales and Cheshire is important, and I hope that the Minister will address that point when she winds up and deal with the issue of the political boundaries and the Welsh dimension of the Assembly Government, and that she will allow co-operation to take place.

My hon. Friend David Taylor referred to police headquarters, but the issue is also about the rebranding of Welsh police forces. It would cost an awful lot of money if we were to rebrand them. There has been a lot of expenditure on North Wales and on each force with its own identity, and that expenditure would also be lost when it could have been used elsewhere.

I know that many Members wish to speak, but the Welsh dimension is extremely important. I ask the Minister to bear it in mind when she winds up.

The chief constable of Gloucestershire, who was accurately quoted by my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary, has said that the proposals that are the subject of today's debate represent the most profound change in policing since the modern police service was created in 1829. They should therefore have been based on compelling evidence, subjected to a full and thorough consultation exercise and been supported by a substantial body of public opinion. The extent to which these criteria have not been met has admirably been explained in detail by my right hon. Friend in his speech, with which I entirely agreed.

I also largely agreed with the speech of Mr. Oaten, and not surprisingly, as it consisted in large part of a full endorsement of the policies on which the Conservative party fought the last general election. It is a pity that he did not say so at the time, but we cannot have everything in life. I welcome his conversion to our policies.

I want, however, to concentrate my remarks on the implications of the Government's proposals for the policing of Kent. It is always useful to start at the beginning. The purpose of the report that Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary was commissioned by the Home Office to prepare was to provide a professional assessment of whether the present 43-force structure is the right one to meet the challenges posed by the current and future policing environment. I would like to begin by assessing the extent to which Kent police meet those challenges.

On any view, Kent is a high-performing force. In the baseline assessment, published as recently as 27 October, Kent was placed at joint third. Kent, Lancashire and Staffordshire are the only forces to have had a top five position for two successive years. In the overall 2004–05 police performance assessment framework, Kent achieved the fourth highest national score, and is listed as improved in five of the seven assessment categories measured.

Kent has a proven track record in dealing with high-risk, protective services issues such as the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster, the Deal barracks bombing and the channel tunnel fire. As the channel tunnel terminal is in my constituency, that is, of course, a matter of special and particular concern to me. Kent also has widely acknowledged and respected investigative expertise for major and serious crime. The force currently has a 100 per cent. detection rate for murder and manslaughter. Moreover, Kent is a force that is keen to change. Prior to the publication of the inspectorate's report, Kent had already embarked on a number of comprehensive force-wide reviews to secure "fitness for purpose" for the next 10 years.

In their plans to achieve that objective, Kent police are very conscious of their links with the agencies responsible for securing our borders and with their law enforcement counterparts across the channel. Those links, and Kent's links with the Metropolitan police, are much closer than the links with Sussex and Surrey, although I stop short of suggesting that a merger with the gendarmerie of the Pas de Calais would be an appropriate solution.

In the light of those facts, it is not surprising that the response of the chief constable and the Kent police authority to the Government's proposal is that Kent can do best as a stand-alone strategic authority. That view is supported by nearly nine out of 10 Kent residents. What arguments could there possibly be for the view that Kent should merge with Sussex and Surrey? It certainly cannot be cost. The cost of the merger is estimated at £58 million. As we know, unless Kent caves in by Friday, which I very much hope it will not, the cost would not be met by the Home Office; it would be met by the council tax payers of Kent.

The only argument as far as I can see against the stand-alone option is that although Kent satisfies the 6,000 total staff threshold set by the Home Secretary, it does not quite meet his requirement that forces should have at least 4,000 police officers. Kent does not quite satisfy that test, because it has taken a proactive approach to work force modernisation and, in particular, to the recruitment of support staff into a wide range of roles previously filled by police officers, which is something that every Home Secretary, including me, has encouraged police forces to do for the past decade or more. In addition, Kent has 323 special constables, who are not included in the figures.

The question also touches on the extent to which the Home Office is dealing with those matters in good faith. On 15 November, the chief constable of Kent and the chairman of Kent police authority discussed the issue with John Giffard, the director of the police structures review unit, when Mr. Giffard assured them that the requirement for 4,000 police officers is not a must. On 29 November, the chairman of Kent police authority wrote to the Home Secretary asking for confirmation that that is indeed the case, but, sadly, no reply to that letter has been received yet. I hope that the Minister will specifically deal with that question and give me and the House the assurance sought in that letter.

In his speech at the beginning of the debate, my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary made some powerful criticisms of the Government's approach, and I support those criticisms. Even if the Government are determined to proceed with their proposals in general—I hope that they are not—there is no case for forcing on Kent police a merger that does not accord with logic, the effective use of resources or the wishes of the people of Kent. I hope that wiser counsels will prevail.

My right hon. Friend the Minister will recall that I took part in the police parliamentary scheme with North Wales police. In the previous Parliament, the Welsh Affairs Committee took evidence from all four forces in Wales about how they deal with antisocial behaviour. I therefore have some knowledge of the issues and many concerns about the proposals, but in the light of the number of hon. Members who want to speak, I shall make only one or two points.

I am afraid that the change will not work for Wales, and especially not for north Wales, because the parameters that the Home Office has laid down—a force size of between 4,000 and 6,000, no existing force being split and no crossing of boundaries—do not work for Wales. I do not disagree with those parameters per se, but from what I have learned about crime patterns in north Wales, which my hon. Friend Albert Owen mentioned, an amalgamation with Cheshire police would make more sense than an all-Wales police force. However, the only realistic regional boundary in Wales is the Welsh border. An all-Wales police force would have nearly 8,000 police officers, more than 5,000 of whom would be in south Wales, which is more than 200 miles away from the cross-border level 2 crime in north Wales. I do not believe that an all-Wales police force would deliver on level 2 crime for the north.

North Wales police force is not huge—it has 1,600 police officers—but it has a very good record. Most local authority wards already have a dedicated policeman—the community beat manager. Community policing is not so advanced in other parts of Wales, and in south Wales it is mainly performed by community support officers. In north Wales, council tax is high because of the high police precept, but the people accept it because they get good policing and because they are happy with that policing. Yes, council tax will decrease under the proposals, but my right hon. Friend the Minister will recall that when I met her recently she said that any reductions will be phased in. Any changes in council tax will benefit south Wales, which will not go down well in north Wales. I also wonder what effect such changes will have on the North Wales police budget.

There will be provisions for local accountability in the more rural parts of Wales, but the other side of that coin is that there will be no economies of scale, which is a worry. However, an all-Wales police force is the only answer to the criteria, which is why police forces in Wales appear to support it. They have been given the parameters and the task of fulfilling the criteria, and the only answer is an all-Wales police force.

Will the Minister consider allowing a change in the criteria to fit the geography of Wales? Better still, will she consider the other option, the status quo, but with extra resources for north Wales and south Wales to deal with the level 2 problem? We should also consider how the basic command units and community policing will work out in practice. We should try to make real improvements on level 2 crimes by other means before making what I believe will be a bad mistake for policing as a whole in Wales.

Once again, I place on the record the fact that this is not the debate that the House wanted. On 29 November, there was a debate in Westminster Hall, and it is because of pressure arising from that, and only from that, that we are having this debate on the day before the House rises for Christmas, and with no vote. Given the importance of the issue to all our constituents, the House and the public can only regard that as a disgrace.

When the Minister replies to the debate, I hope that she will say that in the light of representations that may or may not be made by 23 December, there will be a further debate with a vote in the new year, in which case she will find that both the Government Benches and the Opposition Benches will be packed. The 23 December deadline is far too early; the statistics are inadequate; and the finance has not been backed up with any figures. For any chief constable to be asked to seek to respond within that time scale to something as serious and as far-reaching for the future of policing in this country as this is, again, a disgrace.

I shall concentrate on two issues. First, I shall follow the comments made by my right hon. and learned Friend Mr. Howard on policing in Kent; and, secondly, I shall briefly touch on the future of the British Transport police, in which I have a particular interest.

As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe has said, Kent is an exemplary force that meets all the strategic qualifications—for example, it has 6,124 staff. Kent police has made a major input into the Kent public service board, which pulls together public services in the county and co-ordinates a £7.2 billion budget. The proposed reorganisation would place much of that co-operation at risk and is highly undesirable.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe has highlighted Kent police's track record in dealing with the Herald of Free Enterprise, the Deal barracks bombing, the channel tunnel fire and high profile murder inquiries. He omitted asylum and immigration, which are still real concerns to our constituents in Kent. That track record is exemplary.

At the moment, Kent police effectively has no borrowing. We are discussing the imposition of an almost instant debt of between £18 million and £20 million, which the chief constable, Mike Fuller, has told me would take between possibly five years and probably 10 years to repay, before any savings are made. That cannot be sound economics and, as has been said, we all know that such savings never actually accrue, because costs always rise.

The Home Office has not indicated who will meet that cost, which, as has been pointed out over and over again, can fall only as a burden on council tax payers—in this case, in the county of Kent.

The Home Office appears to have paid scant or no attention to the legislative implications of its proposals for Kent. My understanding is that the Channel Tunnel Act 1987 would need to be amended, the Sangatte protocol of 1991 would have to be redrawn, and the Channel Tunnel (International Arrangements) Order 1993 would require primary legislation, as would the Channel Tunnel Rail Link Act 1996. It will be interesting to hear the Minister explain when and how all that primary legislation will be introduced.

Kent is ready and prepared to be a strategic authority within its own boundaries, but I would not wish to throw to the wolves any of the other forces—Sussex, Hampshire, Surrey or the Thames Valley—with which Kent's name has been linked. We are looking for a strategic role for Kent, but a federal solution for the others. That is the real issue that neither the Home Secretary nor any of his Ministers has yet properly addressed, and it cannot and will not be addressed by 23 December.

I turn to the British Transport police and its future role within the policing of the United Kingdom. I am aware that the BTP is not a Home Office force but, in tandem with the review of the Home Office constabulary throughout the United Kingdom, it is the subject of a Department for Transport review. As the Minister is well aware, one of the proposals on the table is that it should be merged, in whole or in part, with the Metropolitan police and become a Home Office force.

The British Transport police, with which I have the honour to serve as a special constable, was established in the 1830s. It does not meet the Home Office requirements for staffing, with 3,662 staff in total. It polices, or is responsible for the policing of, 21,000 miles of railway track and 2,500 stations, as well as goods yards and all other railway property. Last year, it looked after the travelling needs of passengers on an estimated 1 billion journeys.

The BTP has been subjected to five reviews since 2001. It meets nine out of nine performance targets, and in 2004 and 2005 was regarded as, and remains, a target leader throughout the European Union. Its chief constable, Ian Johnston, has said that it has its own environment, with a way in, a way out, and a defined territory. It also has a defined force of men and women with specialist training in railway law, track safety, and all the hazards of 21,000 miles of track and associated stations and other territory. The BTP is experienced in dealing with terrorism—it has had to be since the terrorist outbreaks caused by the IRA in the 1970s and beyond. In 15 years, BTP policemen have dealt with eight major crashes covering five police areas. They also attend many major events and are responsible for the policing of football crowds. If Members will pardon the pun, the track record is there.

The proposal to merge all or part of the BTP with the Met could only weaken a very specialist and specialised force. It is inevitable that a commissioner of the Met, short of staff, would immediately poach from the London underground, which is part of BTP territory, and from the BTP's above-ground force. That would be to the detriment of the policing of London, of London's subways and of the whole United Kingdom. If we rip the heart out of the British Transport police force by giving the underground system to the Met, we do so at our peril. It was tried with the New York police department, but all that happened was that subway crime rose.

I say this to the Minister: whatever else you choose to do, please keep your hands off this very specialised force; recognise the job that it does not only in the London area but nationwide; and understand that once it is gone it will never, ever be replaced.

Police force reorganisation will affect every community in the country. At its heart is this fundamental question: what is the correct police force structure to serve the community on the range of crime related issues from antisocial behaviour in local neighbourhoods to major organised crime such as drugs, people trafficking and, ultimately, international terrorism? In today's world we cannot leave the community or police forces facing a choice between effective policing at a local level and an effective fight against organised and international crime. The public rightly expect both. The task for Ministers and for the police is to deliver a force structure that meets these very different challenges as effectively as possible.

Of course, the easiest option would be to do nothing—to duck the issue, avoid the controversy, and say it was all too difficult. As my right hon. Friend Mr. Denham said, we have heard that sentiment from Opposition Front Benchers today. They gave us a shopping list of reasons not to change and not to face up to the issues facing the police and the country, but a party of government has to choose and to take difficult decisions if it wants to meet the challenges of the future.

The most common charge against the proposals is that they will make policing more remote and less responsive to local communities. That is a serious charge that we should examine. As Members of Parliament, we are acutely aware of the importance of issues of crime and antisocial behaviour to local communities. We regularly see constituents who feel powerless in the face of those in our community who pay no regard to the welfare of others—who vandalise property, spray graffiti on houses, disturb the peace of the area and engage in other forms of antisocial behaviour that are a blight on our communities. For the decent people in our constituencies, a small measure such as the gating off of an alleyway or the imposition of an antisocial behaviour order preventing those responsible from entering an area can make the difference between a tolerable life and one that is a constant struggle for peace and order.

It is precisely because of the crucial importance of the fight against antisocial behaviour and local crime that the very first question we should ask of the Government's proposals is what their effect will be on neighbourhood policing. The key police unit for community policing is the basic command unit—the BCU—or, as it is known in the west midlands force, the operational command unit. That unit organises local policing and ensures the presence on the streets of the police whom local people want to see. I therefore welcome the strong assurances we have had from the Home Secretary and, in the past, from the Minister, that the BCU structure will not be diminished by proposals for force reorganisation.

Has the hon. Gentleman seen the briefing by the Association of Police Authorities stating that

"the time, effort and costs of restructuring will divert attention and improvements away from neighbourhood policing" and that

"if police forces become more 'strategic', Basic Command Units will generally have to get bigger"?

I am afraid that what the hon. Gentleman suggests will not happen.

That is certainly not the view of the chief constable of the west midlands police force, to whom I spoke earlier today.

The point about BCUs is absolutely essential, because it means that the unit of policing responsible for community policing stays as it is, regardless of the force structure above its head.

Is not the hon. Gentleman alarmed that it says in section 4.12 of the O'Connor report that the number of BCUs has fallen from 320 to just 230 in three years, so the process is already in train whereby they are getting bigger?

Again, the chief constable of my local force believes that the BCU structure will be strengthened, not diminished, in the coming period. Indeed, the greatly increased number of police community support officers planned over the next few years will be deployed at BCU level, thereby ensuring an enhanced uniformed presence on the streets, which is what our constituents want. In the west midlands area, it is expected that this expansion in community support officers will mean some 1,200 more uniformed officers in local communities.

I have referred to my discussions this morning with the chief constable of West Midlands police. He has long experience of both rural and urban policing, and his view is that an expansion along the lines proposed by the Government would

"be good for the people of the West Midlands and would enhance local community policing."

Would the hon. Gentleman find it more helpful in placing absolute confidence in the impartiality of all chief constables if they were either not allowed to take part in the consultation or had a self-denying ordinance that none of them would apply for the top jobs if there was any reorganisation? We could then place some trust in their impartiality on those somewhat partial opinions.

I believe that the motives of the chief constable to whom I spoke are somewhat higher than the hon. Gentleman implies.

The issue is what the effect of the proposals would be on more serious crime and on contingency planning for emergency situations—the level 2 crime that we have heard about. It is that kind of issue that the HMIC report that triggered the process sought to highlight. This is the very gap in current capabilities that force restructuring seeks to address. Here again, the West Midlands force believes strongly that the economies of scale involved in mergers will strengthen provision in those areas.

As we have heard, serious crime holds no respect for county boundaries. People traffickers and the drugs trade operate across wide areas. By pooling resources and concentrating key officers when and where they may be needed, amalgamation could strengthen significantly the police's hand against this sort of crime. For example, it has been questioned whether it is really sensible, when there may be a concentration of very serious crime in a small force, to have sometimes to withdraw officers from the community to fight such serious crime when reorganisation could enable the force more readily to call on specialist officers and units to deal with such crime. If the proposals can combine more effective policing at a local level and better protective services on more serious crime, they will offer a better service to the public and should command the support of the House.

There is then the critical issue of cost. Inevitably, there will be start-up costs, as there would be with any restructuring. But the way to judge the proposals is to take into account both start-up costs and savings in future years released by not having 43 separate force headquarters and 43 separate chief constables' offices, and by ensuring that savings released by economies of scale go back into front-line policing. I cannot speak with certainty about the future costs over the coming years, but the West Midlands police authority estimates savings of some £158 million over 10 years. The other cost issue is any impact on the police precept. The public will, I believe, understand the arguments for reorganisation of police forces, but I ask the Minister to bear in mind any impact on police precepts for local people as she and her colleagues take the proposals forward.

I am sure that hon. Members on both sides of the House will agree that our police service is among the best in the world. It enjoys a high level of trust from the public and it has more resources and manpower now than ever before. It has helped to bring about a fall in crime of some one third since 1997 and now it must face up to new challenges at every level. If it is communicated loud and clear that these proposals help, not hinder local policing, if they do not result in major precept increases for the public, and if they can deliver the kind of improvement in protective services that we all want to see, they can and will command the confidence of the public and will lead to a major enhancement of our ability to fight crime, both in local neighbourhoods and against the most serious crimes facing our society today.

I am grateful to be called relatively early in the debate, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Inevitably, like many other hon. Members, I want to refer to my own force, Cambridgeshire, but before doing so I want to use the knowledge and experience that I gained in the role of shadow police spokesman, which I held for some three years, during which time I met many chief officers, police authority representatives and ordinary police officers throughout the country, as well as—I referred to this earlier—having experienced the awful tragedy in Soham in my constituency, a high profile murder case, with all its implications for inter-force co-operation.

I was staggered to hear not only Mr. McFadden but the Select Committee Chairman, Mr. Denham, castigate my right hon. Friend the shadow Home Secretary for apparently resisting change. Frankly, that is nonsense, because he is rightly proposing directly elected police commissioners. To say that he is resisting change while at the same time he is proposing directly elected police commissioners, I find somewhat odd. But the Home Secretary is right; there are problems to be resolved. The present form of policing in this country leaves a lot to be desired. Policing is far from perfect.

The "Closing the Gap" report, about which we have heard a lot today, identified where in the protective services there are grave shortcomings across a vast proportion of the police forces. I in no way dissent from the fact that there is a problem. What I dissent from is the Government's proposed solution to that problem. But there are also other problems that the report did not address. There are problems concerning the police themselves. I fear that there are now too many of what I call technocrats in the police force—people who are not necessarily good managers, but who have read the book and absorbed the gospel about how to solve crime without actually having gone out and done it. They are not very good at managing people and policing is largely about personal skills, both liaising with the public and with all the many other people with whom they have to deal. There is a perception in parts of the country, certainly in my constituency, of an unwillingness among the police sometimes to get out of their office or car. Those perceptions will not be resolved or improved by even more remote services, which the proposals suggest.

I also accept, as the Home Secretary suggested, that there is a need to do more to combat high level and organised crime. But as Mr. Oaten said, that was the purpose of the Serious Organised Crime Agency, which Conservatives and Liberal Democrats supported. It is the building block for a much more comprehensive attack on such crime. There is no reason why there could not be local branches or squads of SOCA in every force area, precisely to address local issues and form local links. But the vast majority of my constituents—and I believe the same is true of everybody else's constituents—are bothered not by high level and organised crime, but by local crime such as street crime, car crime, vandalism, burglary and so on. Therefore, the proposed changes have to be examined against their effect on that sort of crime—the 95-odd per cent. of crime that affects ordinary people. I do not believe that the changes will help. Policing will become more distant and there will be a less accountable police force.

The importance of neighbourhood policing cannot be over-emphasised. It is not just about reassurance. In my time I have been very critical of the word "reassurance". Reassurance is a result of effective policing; it should not be the objective. Neighbourhood policing is about local intelligence. The Home Secretary referred to the greater importance of intelligence-led policing. Yes, but so much of that intelligence arises from police officers on the ground, on the streets, in our villages, knowing who is a stranger in the area, picking up what is going on and being part of the community. That is real neighbourhood policing, and it is about low level local intelligence. But so often that can lead to much higher level intelligence in the field of serious and organised crime.

As I said earlier, as with the Soham tragedy, mutual aid is also important for small forces that cannot perhaps, as currently structured, do everything as effectively as a larger one. The Soham case demonstrated that mutual aid does work—but there is plenty of room for improvement. That would be a better way, with an enhanced role for the Association of Chief Police Officers in issuing codes of practice about how it can work, to create a much clearer understanding. That is the basis for greater cross-border co-operation.

On the issue of effective use of resources, not many people would say that spending £500 million on these proposals is the best use of resources. I suspect that if the Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee, who has left the Chamber, had been asked by the Home Secretary how he, as a former Minister with responsibility for police, would spend £500 million to enhance our policing, restructuring would not have been his first suggestion. I suspect that not many other Members would have suggested that.

I suspect that the economy of scale envisaged by the proposal will not arise. Of course smaller forces are not able to have specialist units—reference was made to firearms and quick-response units earlier—but there is no reason why adjoining forces should not share a unit and the costs of it. All this restructuring is not necessary to address a relatively minor, albeit important, understanding. Again, ACPO could have a role in producing draft memos of understanding about how such joint squads could be operated. I see all that as being done within the police family, without the Home Secretary coming from on high and getting heavy.

Similarly, in the case of central services such as human resources and all the other administrative-type services, there is no reason why one cannot have joint provision, with one force contracting its services out to others. That sort of thing could happen if we had a more proactive ACPO, and fewer prima donnas in the police force who want to do it all in-house, which is part of the problem. Again, that could be done without the Home Secretary stepping in.

As for Cambridgeshire, I cannot say like many hon. Members that mine is one of the best police forces and that I want to keep it as it is, because I readily admit that it comes close to the bottom of the league table in many aspects. Those figures are out-of-date, however, and we believe that the force's performance over the past year or so is improving, partly as a result of the appointment of our former deputy chief constable, Julie Spence, who, I am delighted to say, was appointed last week as chief constable. She has brought a breath of fresh air to the force.

My constituents want to see their local police officers on the street. They know full well about the problems of cross-border policing—we have problems with Travellers in Cambridgeshire and adjoining counties, and police forces must work together because the crime linked to that mobile community often goes across county boundaries. The disruption and disorganisation that is being proposed, however, is not required.

I have a rule that I call Paice's law, whereby when one joins all sorts of different organisations, one usually ends up with a central administrative system that is greater than the sum of the parts of its previous components. I have seen that on many occasions during my time in the House, and I believe that the same would happen with this proposal.

It is terribly important that our policing is with public consent. Over the past few years, there has been increasing concern that we are getting policing of the public rather than policing with the public. Policing with the public is critical, and these proposals will make the situation worse.

In a democratic system, policing will always be a delicate task. The essential art is to persuade the general public that what is happening is in their best interests, and to persuade them that the amounts of money that the police force costs are more than justified. When the Government decide, for whatever reason, that they will change that massive and important service, it is essential that the reason and the basis for that should be clear. My difficulty is that I believe that the Government's suggestions, first, for a truncated timetable and, secondly, for a number of imposed decisions, write parameters for what is a very important change without taking account of the need for public support.

Most of my constituents, who support the police 100 per cent., hope that they will have very little to do with them. They hope that they will never have to call a policeman, that they will not have their homes burgled, and that they will not be assaulted. Essentially, however, they want to know that those services are there if they are required. The Government, it seems to me, have a special responsibility to spell out what sort of changes will be introduced and how they will improve the service before such a degree of change is carried forward. I was surprised, for example, that the Minister for Policing, Security and Community Safety had been to the City of London and said, apparently with some effusion, that its force was not only very good but one that she hoped that others would copy. Since the City of London has perhaps 1,000 officers, I found that interesting and slightly perplexing.

For the small county forces, a number of arguments can be generally accepted. Other Cheshire Members will undoubtedly tell the House that we have such a superb force of such incredible intelligence and energy that it is capable of solving all the problems of policing in a rural and urban area. That is not my attitude. I believe that there is now a real perception gap between the householder and the police.

In my constituency, no matter how often we talk about neighbourhood policing, someone who has a gang of young people on their doorstep tearing down fences and wrecking their gardens wants an immediate response. They do not want to wait two hours for a car that passes by at the end of the street. If a number of hazards are being posed by antisocial families and people are being assaulted, they do not want to ring their local police station and be transferred from one automatic voice to another before getting a response. They want someone who will be there when they are in difficulty.

Will the changes make that easier or more complex? My hon. Friend Albert Owen, it seems to me, made a watertight case about the difficulty of simply considering units in terms of numbers and geography. I am happy to accept that the normal flow of co-operation should be between north Wales and Cheshire. It would be a very brave Home Secretary, however, who suggested that Crewe should be the automatic centre for a police force consisting of north Wales and other areas in the north-west of England. However, I think that we will face that situation.

I was delighted that the Home Secretary said plainly that he does not approve of a national police force, because that is the logic of the arguments that we have heard from the Government. If one cannot organise into small units, one puts them into regions, and if one cannot put them into regions, one puts them into bigger units. One does that not on the basis of what is the bulk of normal policing—dealing with assaults, car crime and ordinary difficulties on the streets—but because one is facing difficulties in several highly specialised fields. If that is so, let us debate the implications of that in the House, and let it be clearly spelt out. So far, that has not been the case.

There is far more in these proposals. Mr. Gale spoke about the British Transport police. Why have they been included in proposals yet again? They have been subject to five reviews in five years, which, even for central Government, is probably slightly otiose. Since 70 to 80 per cent. of the work of the British Transport police is precisely what is called level 1 crime, one must have a very good argument before suggesting that they should be absorbed by the Metropolitan police. The British Transport police form a specialised unit. Its officers must have special training before being allowed on to the railway system, and they are clearly committed to a particular type of policing. If it is possible that in the future a member of the British Transport police will find that those brilliant Virgin trains are crossing the border into Scotland, but the British Transport police can do nothing about it because they are attached to the Metropolitan police, I may not be the only one to foresee difficulties. That, however, is the sort of proposition that we are hearing tonight.

I want to make it very clear that I am totally opposed to the absorption by the Metropolitan police of a specialised police force such as the British Transport police. I do not care what anyone says; in a very short time, the specialised force would cease to have an individual existence. It would so rapidly be used for other jobs and become involved in other functions that it would lose its specialised knowledge. Believe me, railways are extremely dangerous places, and that does not apply just when there are explosions. It applies to normal, day-to-day dealings with passengers and services. Railways are places in which people should not blunder about on the assumption that being part of the Metropolitan police confers God-given responsibility. That is not an acceptable point of view.

Let me express one opinion very strongly. I am disturbed that in the rush to come up with a solution, the House is being stampeded into arguing a fragmented case relating to a number of small areas. In defending the west midlands or debating whether north Wales should logically be involved with Cheshire, we are missing the point of the argument. The Government have a long time in which to decide what they want to do. They should give us a much more detailed and much more serious set of reasons for their wish to pursue the changes.

If the Government seriously imagine that the whole problem can be solved on a formulaic basis, let me say this to them. It does not matter which part of the United Kingdom we are discussing. I represented Exeter once. Exeter regarded Bristol as the outer darkness then, and the Cornish regarded the rest of the peninsula as entirely unacceptable. If we simply ordain that so many thousand members of a force should go somewhere irrespective of the wishes of local people, we shall soon discover something very obvious. Neighbourhood policing is just that: it means policemen and policewomen who can be seen, and who respond to letters.

The Secretary of State did something that I cannot do. He persuaded my chief constable to write a letter to me, and to send three e-mails. They were not very effective, because I did not do what he wanted, but the Secretary of State persuaded him to write to me. I could not persuade him to write to me answering questions about my own population.

Do I care about what is being proposed? Yes, I do. Do I think that it will work? I have grave doubts. Do I wonder why the Home Office is pushing this through? I am astounded, but perhaps the answer lies in the Minister of State's views on the City of London police: as long as we all have fraud departments, we shall be able to cope with the future.

It is always a pleasure to follow Mrs. Dunwoody, who chaired the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee when I was a member of it during an earlier Parliament. As usual, I agreed with a great deal of what she said, which may explain why Her Majesty has yet to receive advice that the hon. Lady should be invited to join her Privy Council. I hope that the oversight will be rectified in due course.

As a Surrey Member, I am well aware that the two most recent chief constables in Surrey have been Sir Ian Blair and Denis O'Connor. They may not be entirely happy when I say what consummate politicians they both are. We should read Denis O'Connor's words with great care, and take account of his reservations about the applicability of his report to police restructuring as a whole. My understanding is that he was invited to consider just one—albeit important—aspect of restructuring, but the Government have taken the report to apply to the police in general.

When we read the various parts of "Closing The Gap" that deal with protective services, we see that Denis O'Connor is not quite as unequivocal as the conclusions may suggest. Under the various headings relating to protective services, he raises a number of doubts over whether larger strategic forces will make much difference.

My hon. Friend is right. Given the detail, time is needed for all involved in the debate to establish whether the Government's case for restructuring has been made.

It is the speed with which the Government have sought to impose the most dramatic reform of police structures for over 40 years that concerns us all. When police forces are to be driven into marriages that they do not want, we can be pretty certain that they will have plenty of time to repent at leisure. Others have quoted much less complimentary observations by members of the Association of Police Authorities than I intend to quote about the Government's use of incentives to persuade police forces to sign up to their proposals. My principal concern relates to the destruction of the county-wide forces, which will take control of the police from identifiable and accountable bodies and place it in the hands of amorphous regions with which my constituents in particular do not identify.

Although today's debate focuses on the regionalisation of county constabularies, the reforms seem to make sense only as an element of the Government's incessant desire to regionalise the public services on which our constituents rely. The fire control room in Reigate is about to be moved to Fareham in Hampshire, and according to information from our ambulance service that reached my in-tray today, we should prepare for the regionalisation of the service. In each case, accountability is being taken from elected county councillors who speak up for the people of Surrey and dispersed over ever larger and more cumbersome regions.

We in Surrey are currently missing an opportunity to bring health structures into line with county structures such as social services as health services are reorganised yet again. Strangely enough, we seem to be returning to the regional health authorities that we had in 1997. Every time a structure takes root, the Government want to rip it out and replant it. Four or five years later, they revert to the original structure. That costs an enormous amount and makes the organisations involved much less accountable. Even we, who are trying to address the issues in a full-time professional manner, have great difficulty in understanding who does what.

I am also worried about the cost of the restructuring, to which others have referred. In Surrey, it is estimated at some £28 million. I am not remotely surprised that my right hon. and learned Friend Mr. Howard and my hon. Friend Mr. Gale do not want the Kent force to merge with Surrey. As may be pointed out by my hon. Friend Nick Herbert, neither the Sussex nor the Kent force will want to merge with Surrey on financial grounds alone. Surrey is in a desperate financial position. In 1997, it was one of the best-funded forces in the country, with a crime prevention record second only to that of Gwent. Its reward for being so successful in crime prevention has been to see its budget reduced, reduced and reduced.

My hon. Friend may be confused about the motivation. In paragraph 6.8 of the financial section, "Closing The Gap" suggests a possible reason for the restructuring. It notes that

"real term settlements in the next two years are likely, at best, to be half the rate of the last nine."

It is possible that the Government hope to reorganise in order to mask the fact that police forces are to receive much less in the next two years.

That would not entirely surprise me. There must be an explanation that makes rather more sense than the one that the Government gave today.

Despite the under-resourcing of Surrey police over the past eight years, they have managed to perform outstandingly well—perhaps owing to the leadership of Sir Ian Blair and Denis O'Connor. To their credit, they were not only accomplished politicians but extremely good policemen in Surrey, which is no doubt why they have gone on to take wider responsibilities

A high level of performance does not seem to matter to the Government. To them, it seems, only size matters. They have hung on to the number of 4,000 to determine the level of protective services rather like a drowning man saying, "This is the magic figure." It does not strike me as a magic figure at all. Some small forces deliver an extremely high quality of service, and some much larger services—the merged Avon and Somerset force, for example—receive a much lower score in the national assessment than Surrey.

A graphic demonstration of what has happened to Surrey relates to financial matters. County councillors have been forced to find 46 per cent. of Surrey's funding for the next financial year from the council tax payer, in comparison with only 15 per cent. in 1997. If the Government take away from the county structure the control, accountability and responsibility for the Surrey police force, at what price will councillors vote increasing council tax precepts to support their force? In fact, it will no longer be their police force. They should dump the financial mess—that is my recommendation—in the laps of the Government, because the police will be a governmental organisation accountable to no one. I would oppose Surrey councillors who supported an increase in police precepts in that context. They should fight it as hard as they possibly can when it is no longer their police force.

Will this not become a precursor of, and excuse to introduce, a regional assembly in order to provide proper accountability? Not only that, it will presumably be a regional assembly with tax-raising powers.

My hon. Friend is precisely on the mark. It is important to establish what underlies all these different proposals to reform different parts of public services: they are all relentlessly driving towards the regional level. It is ironic that the Home Secretary is now promising extra funding to forces that agree to the mergers early, while refusing to guarantee funding to the county forces that understandably remain wary of these reforms.

I recall that, when the Conservative Government promised extra funding to schools that were keen to apply for grant-maintained status, the Labour party accused us of bribing schools to follow our agenda, yet the Home Secretary is content to use the threat of withholding funding to bully county forces into mergers about which they have grave reservations. The only difference between then and now is that schools were then only too enthusiastic to take control of their own affairs and secure grant-maintained status. If Conservative policy had stayed in place, every school would have had control of itself through grant-maintained status. That seems rather similar to what is in the recent White Paper, but it has taken a long time to get there.

While I believe that the restructuring of police forces along regional lines is foolhardy in terms of financing and operational effectiveness, my greatest concern remains the impact on accountability and recognition of the police force for the people it serves. The reform will affect the relationship between my constituents and their local police. We bemoan the fact that the police are seldom face to face with the public. Over the past 30 years, the personal relationship between the police and the people they serve has been undermined. There is absolutely no way that the proposals will help to overcome that problem.

There are arguments in favour of assuming responsibilities at the national level, and the example of soccer was mentioned earlier. There are also arguments for having smaller borough units with specific local duties: to their credit, the Government are making progress on that. There is no argument, however, to justify vast regional forces that have no emotional or logical connection with the populace that they serve. A south-east regional force would not be responsive to the huge range of challenges faced in areas as different as Reigate or Redhill in my constituency, the outer suburbs of the capital, the ports of Sussex and Kent, our nation's two busiest airports or the vast swathe of rural areas in the south-east. Nor will my constituents recognise a regional force as one directly responsible to a body that they either elected or could identify with.

We are entitled to conclude that another agenda beyond the mere restructuring of the police is behind the proposals. The Government are set on regionalising the United Kingdom, taking powers from historic counties and granting them to new regional assemblies. The happy failure of the people of the north-east to support a regional assembly, despite an acknowledged strong sense of regional identity there, does not seem to have deterred the Government at all.

In Surrey, the Government are moving the police force, fire service, hospitals and ambulance services to a regional level away from county structures. If the Government's reforms remove the local education authorities, the county council will become a largely redundant body—and it is surely no coincidence that county councils are rarely in the hands of Labour administrations. The counties are being emasculated to make way for bodies even more beholden to central Government, with no thought for the traditional elected bodies of the old counties and the people who identify with them. The police restructuring is but a part of that agenda and the cost will not be substantial only in monetary terms, because it will make our police even more remote from the people whom they serve.

First, I appreciate that there are some powerful arguments in favour of building a critical mass in resources and applying that to serious crime and to counter terrorism. I am not unsympathetic to the Home Secretary's arguments in his opening speech or to the arguments of the O'Connor report. My concern has been partly about the process—arguments about the time frame within which we are having to consider such a complicated matter have already been aired—and partly about the narrowing of options too early in that process.

The assumption has been made that full force amalgamation is the only acceptable way to proceed, but two options, partly aired in the debate, have been discounted. One is to form more specialist forces to deal with particular activities, as in the case of the transport police, and the other is the sharing of resources co-operatively across different parts of the country to achieve common objectives. Those options were posited as possibilities in the O'Connor report, but were discounted by the Home Office in the rather too hasty process of reaching a conclusion.

The concept of co-operation has been explored in limited fashion in the east midlands. We have a helicopter service that is shared perfectly happily between Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire and it is a successful and efficient service. My concern—to some extent, I am arguing against my own position—is the difficulty of pushing police forces that constantly seek to run their own empires and agendas into that logical step.

I am perfectly clear—I agree with the Home Secretary on this—that to have back-office operations run separately in 43 different police forces is simply crazy and mistaken. Having purchasing functions running in the 43 forces is similarly mad—not just on account of the waste of resources, but in respect of the technologies that the police require, running from the rudimentary ones such as police cars through to individual information systems. It is true that some forces, including the Derbyshire force, have made powerful reputations for scientific advance that should certainly be shared across a number of forces. It is crazy to have just one beacon of expertise.

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point about the cost savings that may be available, but such savings may be a necessary but not a sufficient requirement. Does he agree that the level of cost savings suggested is no more than about 2 per cent. and that the co-operation and collaboration that he mentioned is already happening?

I would like to return to that point when I debate costs and savings later in my speech.

I am also concerned about the narrowing of options relating to regionalism. Until I heard Mr. Cash refer to the extraordinarily unique nature of Staffordshire crime, I was tempted to explore the opportunity of co-operation between the Staffordshire and Derbyshire forces. That would have put together two relatively powerful forces to the benefit of people in that part of the country, but he claimed that Staffordshire criminals are unique and that we could not possibly proceed on that basis, so I must defer to the Home Office's guidance on this issue. However, given that I represent a constituency that is right on the border of a region, it is perhaps natural for me to take the view that the drawing of such a hard and narrow dividing line does not at all reflect criminal patterns.

I have two worries about the options being pursued: the possible loss of local focus, intelligence and awareness in addressing lower-level criminality; and the likely redirection of resources from well-policed, lower-level crime areas such as mine, toward areas within the new regions where policing has been ineffective. It might be possible to address those two concerns, which is why I have taken a qualified position in my conversations with Home Office Ministers. I do not start from a position of innate support for these proposals, but I could be persuaded to support them if it can be demonstrated that there are ways of dealing with my concerns.

First, is it possible to strengthen basic command unit representational frameworks? For example—I have used this example in meetings—we in South Derbyshire have an extremely successful crime and disorder partnership. I recognise that that is not repeated in all parts of the country, but it provides a relationship model in my area that the police could work comfortably with in strengthening operational activities. I want some flexibility. Instead of simply opting for a local authority model involving a police committee, for example, let us look at local examples that work and that work with the existing grain.

I would not want to turn such a partnership into a rigid framework. The strength of our partnership has been the mutually respectful voluntary framework within which it has worked. Local people in South Derbyshire tend to work practically together to solve problems without doing a lot of grandstanding and point scoring among themselves. That strength would be lost if someone threw the pot of money into the equation and said, "You're going to have to carve up exactly how this is to be dealt with in a very practical way", or if such people had too much direct operational control over policing in their area. What we have works very well and we should work with the existing grain.

My experience of Derbyshire constabulary is just as positive as my hon. Friend's, but does he agree that it does not matter where the constabulary headquarters is based? In fact, many people in Derbyshire probably could not name the town in which it is currently based.

Indeed. It happens to be based in Ripley, but my hon. Friend makes a powerful point. South Derbyshire is at the bottom end of a long county, and the people who live there tend to think that most places are a long way away, so locating the headquarters some distance away is not one of my major concerns. People will think that it is a long way away wherever it is located, and, as my hon. Friend says, many people do not know where it is located now.

I turn to my second point, which is the redistribution of resources. Here, I will be blunt. We heard earlier some brief interventions from Nottinghamshire Members and I well understand their desire to move ahead with the combining of forces in that area. However, they must understand that their desire and anxiety is matched by an anxiety on the part of those in better performing areas that such a combination may involve the redistribution of resources. That has also to be balanced by the recognition that Nottinghamshire has a higher expenditure on policing per head than does Derbyshire. I have heard the argument that we will get our hands on a larger pot and that that would be great, but the greater anxiety is that a lot of that pot will go toward solving problems in the Nottinghamshire area and away from better policed areas with relatively limited resources, such as mine.

I turn to the process of transition. Such restructuring will be disruptive in all sorts of ways. In any merger, substantial career decisions have to be made that inevitably lead to distraction—there is no way round that. The cost of the east midlands option has been estimated at a little over £100 million and although that is a back-of-an-envelope calculation at this stage, the sum involved will certainly be large. The police authority has rightly said that it is very difficult to commend such an option without first knowing where the money will come from. If it comes from the normal expenditure of the newly created authority, that will inevitably mean cuts in other activities while the transition takes place. The authority also predicts an ongoing expenditure increase, simply to bring that part of the country up to the standards for protective services that the O'Connor report identifies as desirable. The question of how to distribute resources within the new authority is arguable; nevertheless, it is a fair question and it needs to be resolved now.

I finish by pointing to the differences in policing function within my region. I am sorry, in a way, that Mr. Paice is no longer in his place. He shares with me an interest in Traveller law policy and I have to say that that policy is not the same in Derbyshire as it is in Leicestershire, for example—a fact that is well exploited by the people of those communities. I would not wish to see a blanket, lowest common denominator approach applied to policing policy, simply because we were required to have a strategic focus for policy development. Local differences are valuable and have been fought for, in this particular case, extremely hard by those such as me, who have directly engaged with this issue. I do not want the hard-won ground to be lost.

I want harder answers to the questions that I have raised and I look forward to the response to this debate.

I am pleased to be taking part in this debate, just as I was pleased to take part in the recent Westminster Hall debate on this issue. Like other Members, I also look forward to having a debate that involves a substantive vote on the issue at hand.

I thank the Home Office for agreeing to my request for a meeting at least to discuss the specifics of the proposed merger involving Gloucestershire constabulary. The granting of that request, which I appreciate, implies a welcome willingness to talk about the specifics. The specifics in Gloucestershire are clear: we have an outstanding police force and we have had an 8 per cent. reduction in crime in the past year. As my neighbour Mr. Harper said earlier, our constabulary has been commended for its record on level 2 crime, thereby rather undermining the stereotype of small forces presented by the Home Office.

Specifics have been lacking in the Government's proposals. The "Closing the Gap" report refers to a lot of general trends and draws general conclusions from them. The Home Office's briefing, which we received in the past week, contains an impressive-looking chart showing the shortfall in protective service scores by force officer strength, and shows a trend line implying that only large forces can really cope. However, although it shows all six of the forces with an officer strength of above 4,000 scoring less than a 40-point shortfall in protective services, it also shows—this is not implied by the trend line—that 11 smaller forces have a 40-point shortfall, or less. Therefore, one size does not really fit all in this debate, despite the Government's attempts to suggest otherwise.

It is instructive to note that the forces with more than 4,000 officers—and which the "Closing the Gap" report therefore describes as those successful in tackling crime—are generally in metropolitan, urban areas: the Metropolitan police themselves, the West Midlands police, West Yorkshire police, Merseyside police, and so on. There is no reason why that model of success in large urban areas will necessarily succeed if it is applied to much larger geographical areas, including large rural areas. There is an immediate geographical problem in the south-west: the sheer size of the option 1 proposal for a mega-force for the entire south-west, which would cover 9,000 square miles. There are parts of north Gloucestershire that are closer to Scotland than they are to the opposite end of that area—the Scilly Isles. If hon. Members are worried about different types of crime, I can tell them that we have very different crimes to the Scilly Isles. There is not much trawler crime in Cheltenham.

The Home Secretary mentioned economies of scale and implied that press offices could be merged. That seems a marginal point, but let us take him at his word. Is he seriously suggesting that the same connection to the local community that the present county force has could be achieved by someone trying to relate to the local media—which are important when trying to get the crime prevention message across—all the way from Tewkesbury to the Scilly Isles? I just do not think that that would be possible. Much more seriously, does the Home Secretary really think that democratic accountability and the same sensitivity to local needs would be possible? Many hon. Members have pointed out that they meet their chief constables regularly and we have all had good communications with them in the course of discussions on the Government's proposals. I cannot conceive how that would be possible with a chief constable based miles away in Exeter who was trying to deal with MPs from the entire south-west region.

What about the cost and disruption? The Association of Police Authorities estimates start-up costs of £500 million to £600 million nationwide. In the south-west, our chief constable has estimated £64 million of start-up costs. If that was paid for out of borrowing, and landed an annual debt on the police forces instead of being raised through the council tax, he estimates that it would cost some £6 million a year initially, which would offset more than half of the possible savings that the proposals suggest would be possible in the south-west. Most of the rest of the savings could be achieved through collaboration and federation and would not require the merger of forces. The numbers do not add up.

The Home Secretary said in his opening remarks that the evidence was straightforward and he cited the "Closing the Gap" report, which is the only piece of evidence that the Home Office has. However, as has been said, the detailed suggestions in that report are somewhat qualified. On page 11, under the heading "Stakeholders have mixed views", it admits:

"Little work has been done on the way in which members of the public identify with police forces".

The connection between communities and the new forces is far from proved.

On page 25, the report makes the point, which I made earlier, that basic command units are already getting larger, not smaller. That undermines the Government's point on that score. On page 35, the report admits that there is only a rough correlation between size and reactivity at level 2, which is hardly a ringing endorsement of the Government's position.

My hon. Friend Mr. Paterson earlier quoted from a report prepared for West Mercia constabulary by Professor Lawrance of the university of Warwick. He states:

"The conclusions drawn in respect of the 4,000 minimum force size almost totally ignore the variability of protective services performance at each force size, and no evidence is provided that this will be small at the 4000 level. In short, there will be an unknown number of good and poor performers in reformed larger forces."

The whole statistical basis of the "Closing the Gap" report is fundamentally flawed, and the 4,000 figure has no justification in empirical fact.

I agree with the hon. Gentleman, who would agree with my chief constable, who said that the report contained some challengeable assumptions and selective analysis. The statistical basis and the methodology are far from proven. The report also suggests to Ministers that in terms of geography

"the scale and demography may require a measure of pragmatism in proposals for change."

We see no evidence of that yet, but I live in hope.

My hon. Friend makes a good case on behalf of rural areas and police authorities. The Government's proposals would not be such a problem if the consultation had been meaningful, but it is meaningless in Wales because the Secretary of State has already said that there is only one option—a single Welsh police authority. It is therefore hardly surprising that the police authorities are unwilling to take part in the consultation.

Many hon. Members have made the point about the worrying lack of consultation on the proposals and the speed at which they are being rushed through.

I shall quote one further passage from "Closing the Gap", which appears on page 62 and is, I suppose, the straightforward evidence to which the Home Secretary referred. It states:

"To conclude, the answers to the two questions that prefaced this section are: The current structure of policing probably does not support the efficient and affordable provision of protective services and support services; and yes, there is evidence that changes in that structure might provide a more efficient basis for service provision."

Probably? Might? That is not straightforward evidence. Denis O'Connor's report does not provide the cast-iron basis for the Government's proposals that Ministers claim. The O'Connor report is, if read in detail, a call for a debate about the alternatives. It presents a genuine problem—and hon. Members on both sides of the House agree that there is a problem in the tackling of level 2 crime. It has also been suggested that the Cambridgeshire force has a particular problem with some of its issues, although that may be a little unfair. Nobody suggests that we should not try to tackle the problems that the report identifies, but the detail in the report does not make the case for the large super-forces. It makes the case for a debate on the alternatives.

My hon. Friend Mr. Oaten suggested one alternative, which would be to extend the Serious Organised Crime Agency model, which the Government have only just started to try out. There have been suggestions that forms of federation might be tried. In Gloucestershire, we discussed the possibility of going back to regional crime squads in some form for specific forms of crime. That might tackle some of the shortfall issues of particular forces. Some back-office functions could also be merged—Mr. Todd mentioned purchasing. There is no reason why purchasing powers could not be merged on whatever regional basis the Government like. We could live with that. The Home Secretary could even have his merged regional press offices, if he really wants them.

There is potential and much discussion to be had on the different options, and the Government simply have not made the case for a structural solution to a problem of how work is done. That is the same approach that they take to the probation service, the NHS and regional fire centres. It is about trying to shoehorn a problem into a structural solution instead of looking at the quality of work—in this case, policing—that is being done and using the inspectorate of constabulary for what it was set up to do, which is to help police forces to improve where there is a shortfall and to encourage them to collaborate.

In Gloucestershire, there is all-party opposition to rushing headlong into the abolition of the local force. The Prime Minister told us recently—admittedly, in another context—that what the police asked for, they should get. The police force and the chief constable in Gloucestershire are clear that the best option is a stand-alone force for the county and an independent Gloucestershire constabulary. I think that we should obey the Prime Minister's advice and give the police what they want.

I spoke in the Westminster Hall debate and expressed some of my serious concerns about the reforms that the Government are introducing. I am not against reform; I agree that reforms are necessary and we need to make changes. However, like many other hon. Members on both sides of the House, I am concerned that we are rushing into making major reforms and changes. There has been some debate about when the reforms were introduced, but that was 40 or 50 years ago. Surely we want to get reform right. That is crucial.

On Teesside, we feel that the reforms are being bulldozed through by the Government—my Government, whom I support wholeheartedly. Before anybody says that I am being disloyal, I point out that I have supported my Government on every occasion and have never even abstained on an issue. I speak as a friend, and with great concern. I am concerned about the proposals, and I say that not as someone who parachuted into a constituency. I lived in my constituency for 21 years before I was elected as a councillor and then a Member of Parliament. I have served the area and I know it well, so the concerns that I express are based on observation over several years. I am concerned by the changes that are being pushed on us so quickly.

Why cannot we have more time? The shadow Home Secretary suggested six months, although that is not necessarily the option that I would suggest. The Minister should go away and think about the time scale, because it is essential. My police authority has asked what approach the Home Secretary will take towards police authorities that do not submit a business case by 23 December. I shall be interested to hear the answer.

I have expressed serious concern about the timing and the rush because I recognise that policing is an important issue in my constituency. At meetings and coffee mornings over the years, it has always been one of the top three topics. I have taken issue with Cleveland police in the past. Some Members may remember that I championed the robocop, Ray Mallon, when corruption charges were levelled against him, yet he now holds a senior position, running Middlesbrough. Many of the people who told me not to support him now visit his office and say what a great job he is doing. That includes some Ministers.

I take a great interest in Cleveland police—how the force is managed, how it functions and its accountability. The Government's proposed model for us is the super-force, a merger of the Northumbrian, Durham and Cleveland forces. It would cover a massive geographical area—according to one calculation, more than 3,500 square miles, from Berwick-upon-Tweed in the north to Boulby in the south. The southern parts of that region would have more affinity with North Yorkshire than with the Northumbrian region. Such a force would serve a huge area.

I cannot understand the Government's thesis that bigger is better. It seems to be a running theme. On one hand, we are reforming education by transferring power to local areas, as the White Paper suggests—great; a good idea—while on the other hand, in reforming the health service and our fire services, we are moving to regional level. I do not understand that. There is a lack of joined-up thinking.

I do not share the view expressed by Tory Members that there is a hidden agenda for regional government. That is not so, but I want my Government to demonstrate that we are advancing an intellectually coherent case. We must do so, to win hearts and minds. The Chairman of the Home Affairs Committee said that we must carry the people with us. That is essential.

In Cleveland, our chief constable, Sean Price, has worked hard to turn things around. Earlier, a question was asked about chief constables visiting different parts of a constituency. Sean Price has attended meetings in many villages in my constituency, but I cannot see a chief constable based in Newcastle travelling 70 miles down the road to hold meetings in my little villages. I would like to believe that he would turn up, but I think it would be a struggle. The present chief constable has worked hard to win hearts and minds in small villages in my constituency.

The chairman of the police authority, Councillor Dave McLuckie, and the chief constable have worked hard to ensure that crime is down. Burglaries and robberies are down and they should be praised for that and all their work tackling crime over the past few years.

Feeling about the issue is strong. The shadow Home Secretary cited a MORI poll carried out by Cleveland police. It demonstrated that 70 per cent. of people want no change at all. When they were asked for their second preference, 60 per cent. supported a city region police force. When Tyne Tees, the television company, asked people what they thought, 78 per cent. said they wanted no change. That is how strong feeling is. Only 20 per cent. of people support a regional force, so there is a vacuum. I support an elected regional assembly, but we should remember that we were thwarted on that last year. Bearing in mind how strong feeling is, the Minister should take note of those figures.

An additional problem in Teesside is that we have the biggest concentration of petrochemical plants, and the emergency services really work together. If changes are introduced there will be disruption. Change will not be systematic. I fear for the future if a regional force is introduced. The Minister must think carefully about the concerns I have expressed. If we are to introduce reforms, we must demonstrate that they are necessary; the public must be behind us.

We held a referendum about the regional assembly and about an elected mayor for Middlesbrough. If the Minister believes that there is strong support for a regional force or a super-force, we should put the matter to a referendum. I am clear about what will happen. Stephen Pound is shaking, but if democracy was okay for issues such as electing a mayor and regional government, why not for our police force? If there is support, I will accept the verdict of the electorate, but given the figures I presented I am clear about which way our people would vote.

I speak to the Minister as a friend and with great concern, and ask the Government to reconsider. I may not be able to support the reforms if Ministers go ahead without considering the things that I have asked them to note.

As I was listening to the Home Secretary open the debate, I was underwhelmed. There is a lack of evidence to support his case. For some time, I have been tabling questions to the Minister for Policing, Security and Community Safety asking for the evidence base for that magical number, 4,000. Eventually, at paragraph 1.11 of the O'Connor report, I stumbled on the answer.

Before I address the report, however, I have a few brief comments about Welsh police forces in general. A recent report—in March—from Her Majesty's inspectorate stated that Gwent force

"is particularly successful at investigating all classes of crime and enjoys one of the highest detection rates in England and Wales. Gwent Constabulary has also reduced overall crime, and particularly the offences of burglary and vehicle crime".

The report states that in the North Wales force there were

"significant improvements in performance during the past year . . . particularly in the area of investigating crime. The force has also embarked on an ambitious neighbourhood policing programme that will see 229 community beat managers deployed to wards within the force. Managing the transition while maintaining performance and meeting demand will be a challenge, particularly when, at the same time, a central communications centre will be established".

The report on South Wales police says:

"The force has reduced recorded crime in all areas including violent crime. Additionally, it has also maintained a good level of crime detection and has performed well in relation to its peers, delivering good performances in a number of areas. The force has a good record of detecting crime and is well placed to deal with serious and major crime with its dedicated serious and major crime investigation teams."

If that is not a clean bill of health, I am not sure what is.

I mentioned my own authority of North Wales police. Burglary in north Wales is at its lowest level for 30 years. Vehicle crime is down by 22 per cent. and robberies are down by 28 per cent. All three divisions of the North Wales force are performing brilliantly and topping the performance leagues for England and Wales in many categories, so one must ask once more why we are talking about such reorganisation.

Albert Owen was right: the proposal for the Welsh forces would create a national police force because one force would cover Wales. Dr. Kumar said that his chief constable might be hard pressed to travel 70 miles to meet him, but the equivalent distance in Wales would be 250 or 300 miles, which would be absolutely impossible to cover.

Paragraph 1.11 of the O'Connor report is not a hard and fast statement because there are qualifications in its wording. It says:

"Forces with over 4,000 officers, or 6,000 staff, tended to meet the standard across the seven protective services measured, in that they demonstrated good reactive capability with a clear measure of proactive capacity. Forces below that size tended to fall someway short of the standard, with, in general, the smallest forces faring the least well. Notwithstanding this, there are outliers: some smaller forces were almost as successful as the majority of larger forces, whilst two relatively large forces (5,000+ staff) received surprisingly low scores."

It is thus hardly written in stone that the 4,000 figure must be followed. Curiously enough, not one of the Welsh forces has a manning of more than 4,000, so we would be defeated on that criterion. However, as we were told earlier, that is not a hard-and-fast criterion. It is difficult to know what is going on because the consultation has been so poor that we do not know where the goalposts are, and whether they are still moving, or firmly in the ground.

The chair of the North Wales authority has praised the Association of Police Authorities, which has said that it will not co-operate by 23 December. I will not cite words such as "inducement" to describe the Home Secretary's offer to those that fall in line early on, but that situation compounds the mismanagement of the whole process. Ian Roberts, the chairman of the North Wales authority, says:

"We refuse to be rail-roaded" by the Home Secretary

"because there are some very serious questions that remain unanswered."

That is the general tenor of the debate because hon. Members simply do not know what will happen. They do not know where the finance will come from, or whether the change is the first step towards a national police force.

The letter from the Association of Police Authorities has been quoted at length today. Its chairman, Bob Jones, says that there has been a certain amount of bullying into abolishing police forces with indecent haste. He says:

"In our view, that is disgraceful. Policing is crucial to the safety and protection of all our communities. It is not for sale"— to that I say, "Hear, hear."

On a matter of pure democracy, the National Assembly was not formally consulted on the proposals, despite the fact that it controls £144 million of the police budget in Wales. The Assembly recently supported an amendment that read:

"The National Assembly condemns the recent hurried and superficial consultation by the Home Secretary on restructuring the constabulary, which failed to:

a) formally consult the National Assembly b) fully consider Welsh circumstances; and c) make the case for change."

That takes me back to where I started my speech: I do not believe that the Home Secretary has made the case for change.

In case anyone is labouring under the misapprehension that I, as a nationalist, am against co-operation with other forces, let me say that I am proud of the fact that the North Wales force co-operates closely with Merseyside and Cheshire police. The same is true of West Mercia and Dyfed-Powys, and the situation is certainly the same for Gwent and South Wales forces and the Avon and Somerset police force. One of the excuses cited during the debate is the fact that small forces cannot deal with organised crime, but Gwent, South Wales and Avon and Somerset police forces recently cracked a serious crime ring in Bristol involving the most awful characters who were coming over fully armed to sell crack cocaine each day. Many of those people are now behind bars, which proves that co-operation works and can hold organised crime in check.

One of the other reasons that the Home Secretary cites for forcing the proposals through at such an undignified pace is the need to help forces to cope with terrorist outrages. Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Metropolitan police, which has nearly 32,000 officers, had 352 officers seconded to it to help it to cope with the 7 July bombings? Many of those officers came from Wales. Eight officers came from Dyfed-Powys, eight came from the North Wales force and many came from my own force of West Mercia. Many of those people are still there. The fundamental argument that we need such change to deal with terror outrages has been exploded—if hon. Members will excuse that unfortunate pun—by a devastating parliamentary answer that shows that that argument is flawed and that the Home Secretary should abandon the idea.

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. Let us remember that, unfortunately, the Met had been tailing those who were involved in the attacks for some time before 7 July. The Government are hiding behind a smokescreen in relation to terrorism and organised crime. Expertise is available. Mr. Oaten talked about extending SOCA, which I agree would be sensible, but whenever a terrorist incident has occurred, advice has been readily available within forces and from co-operative neighbouring forces. I do not buy the Government's argument in that respect.

When the Home Secretary and the Prime Minister tried to persuade the House on the 90-day custody question, they did so on the basis of a conclusive case produced by the police—an expert case and one that was, to use the Prime Minister's words, "overwhelming" and "conclusive." The same police experts are definitely opposed to a hurried, half-baked reorganisation that has much to do with tightening the Home Secretary's stranglehold on a single police force in Wales, rather than dealing with four. Many of us are fearful: we remember the policing of the miners' strike.