Governance

According to this article, “tonight’s successful amendment to the Police and Social Responsibility Bill effectively torpedoes the plan for a directly elected police chief.

“Under Liberal Democrat Baroness Harris of Richmond’s amendment, the police and crime commissioners (PCCs) would be chosen by a police and crime panel from among its members.”

There is an interesting debate to be had about the boundaries between political and operational decision making in delivering not just law and order but all public services.

I have previously mused on a parallel theme about what contacting out large swathes of public service delivery means in terms of Councils’ abilities to retain any discretion in the services areas they have “contracted out”.

There seems to be a lot of concern about directly elected Police and Crime Commissioners replacing Police Authorities. I may be wrong but my view has always been that Police Authorities had a political dimension as well.

How does the process of continuing with politically nominated and often serving Police Authority Councillor representatives differ in reality from what is proposed here and in the face of the operational challenges facing rural police forces how important is this governance issue?

I am not taking sides in this argument  – I am a mere outsider in terms of this debate – you will no doubt have views about how the relationship between governance structures and service delivery affects policing in rural areas – if you have let me know what you think.