Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Home Department – in the House of Commons at 2:30 pm on 23 October 2006.
I am more than happy to congratulate Durham constabulary on what it has done with the special police force, and I take this opportunity to congratulate the specials on their 175th birthday, just last weekend. Specials are often overlooked in what constitutes the growing police family these days, but up and down the country they play a very important role alongside police community support officers, warrant officers and police staff in doing what we need our police forces to do. I shall certainly take away the point about the stipendiary paid to specials, and see whether that can be put into the overall mix of police pay generally.