Latest Update – I have passed the Conservative party national interviews and been added to their list of validated Police and Crime Commissioner Candidates. Now comes the local selection process.
See below for my campaign blog, and above for further details. Further coverage at TopOfTheCops.com
You guys seem to like polling information, so I thought I’d give you some more. The Centreground poll mentioned a couple of days ago asked voters which qualities they would like to see in a Commissioner, and top of the list was a commitment to being tough on crime. But what does that mean?
Ask Tony Blair and he will tell you it’s about being tough on the causes of crime, by which he means a variety of social factors such as unemployment, deprivation, poor health, etc.
The role of Police and Crime Commissioner is a new one, meaning that there are no ‘old-hands’ who know it all because they have done it all before, and everyone has something to learn. One of the reasons I established TopOfTheCops.com to follow developments in this area was because I knew there would be a lot to learn from other people around the country.
I’m pleased to say that I have a great opportunity to learn more and to return the favour for other candidates as I have been asked by Crest Advisory to speak at a special training event next month for prospective Commissioners from across the political spectrum. Further details will follow, but the briefing will cover campaigning effectively, developing policy, assessing police performance, partnership working and a range of other topics. Unlike other conferences which have the Commissioner role as an add-on to other issues, this will be focussed specifically on this position, so I hope to learn plenty that I can use later on.
So far the speakers are as listed on the Crest Advisory website:-
I know. It would look better in alphabetical order.
This article was originally published on the Tory grassroots site ConservativeHome.
In six month’s time we will be in the last lap of more elections, those for local Police and Crime Commissioners. All across England and Wales, apart from London where they already have Boris, 41 individuals will need to be ready to assume an office that few people understand, possibly including a number of the candidates.
Today I’m letting everyone know that I’m being considered for the Conservative nomination in Lancashire, but for the past few months I’ve been following this election closely in my role as Editor at TopOfTheCops.com, where I indulge my politics addiction, find out what’s going on, and seek to learn from other candidates. It seems to me that, come November, there are a few key things to remember that would prevent a new Commissioner from making some fundamental mistakes:-
1. You are not an elected chief constable.
You’re not there to manage the police, or to make decisions about individual cases or operations. You pay plenty of people to do that for you, and you tell them what the public need to have done and hold them to account for doing it. This was not appreciated by Lord Prescott who gave an example of political interference in the Forest Gate anti-terror raid and by at least one Lib-Dem, who sought candidates who would tell their Chief Constables not to use certain legal powers.
2. You are not at an awards ceremony, holding a golden envelope.
You are not there to read out an announcement, written by somebody else, listing this year’s five different crime categories most in need of tackling. You should provide strategic direction, which may include crime priorities, but also priorities about how services need to change, and check continually to ensure they are being addressed.
You will need to understand why crime figures are the way they are, and what influences them, to see past their imperfections and toward the reality they sometimes conceal. If, like Lancashire Labour candidate Clive Grunshaw, you say a certain number of reported domestic violence offences is unacceptable, you risk measuring your success on reducing the reported numbers of one of the most under-reported crimes, and thereby missing the real problem.
3. You represent the public, not the police
As a former cop, I know only too well the risks they take each day, and the stresses they put themselves through to keep the peace in this country. I’m also keenly aware of their opposition to budget cuts and suggested police reforms, some of which is justified. The Commissioner however, is not a police officer. There is no uniform or warrant card with this job, and no role as some sort of shop-steward for an unofficial police union. Informal discussions as to whether the Police Federation could back certain candidates are unhelpful and unwise.
It would be better for everyone to have a Commissioner who can give voice to the difficulties and injustice that officers see the public suffer on a daily basis, rather than a candidate for whom being ‘pro-police’ simply means jumping on the anti-reform bandwagon.
4. You are not a police authority with only one member
The Commissioner replaces the Police Authority but, to the consternation of the 17 or so part-time members thereby supplanted, the Commissioner has to do much more. The ‘and Crime’ part of the job is not merely awkward drafting. It involves real decisions on Community Safety funding, on preventing crime and not just catching criminals, and a legal responsibility to do what they can to provide an efficient and effective local criminal justice system, and there is every chance the Government will add more to a position backed by a mandate from an electorate of a million or so people.
For twenty years at least, it has been appreciated that crime is about much more than policing, and if candidates focus excessively on policing they will be showing they just don’t get it.
5. You are the servants of electorates, not inspectorates.
Policing and crime can be dominated with targets, indicators and those with long careers in policing who share many of the assumptions of the services they now inspect. The Commissioner has one overwhelming reality to keep them in check. Their re-election will not be determined by an inspector’s checklist or key lines of enquiry.
Whether they keep the job will depend on whether the voting public are both safer with that Commissioner than any competitor and aware that they are safer, in other words on whether they can minimise the real impact of crime. That perhaps is the most welcome development.
I wonder if Judge Andrew Woolman was smiling to himself when he told Lee Moss that he would be able to make his wedding after all. (Lancashire Evening Post- “Man spared jail…so he can get married”).
Moss was already serving a 12-month suspended sentence for running a cannabis farm when he decided it would be a good idea to buy some cocaine and beat up two young men on Church Street, Preston. Hence, he was in possession of the cocaine when arrested, and was charged with that along with the two unprovoked assaults. Add that to another previous drugs conviction, admissions of past debts to Manchester drug dealers, a failure to complete the unpaid work in his previous sentence, and a tale as to why he hadn’t done the work that was so unconvincing it drew comment from the judge, and you might think that Moss wouldn’t need to be worrying about how to get home from court, still less the wedding.
But if Moss was trying to avoid wedlock, he had reckoned without Judge Woolman, who told Moss he wouldn’t activate his suspended sentence because that “would destroy your life in the short term….you would not be able to attend your wedding”. What does a guy have to do to get sent to prison these days? How will Moss escape the only ‘life sentence’ he appears to be worried about?
Seriously though, you can deserve prison but escape it by scheduling a wedding! Are wedding announcement’s to be added to the list of ‘Get Out Of Jail Free’ cards? Remember, on that list already we have ‘I’ve got five kids, so locking me up for burglary wouldn’t respect my right to a family life“, which the Court of Appeal apparently finds convincing – so much so that the offender in that case was free to notch up another violent assault when he should have been in prison.
If your lack of respect for the law is so serious or so persistent that you keep ending up in court, maybe the people of Lancashire shouldn’t have to bear the risks of your company, and any fights at the wedding. Maybe we shouldn’t keep making up reasons for the same criminal to get yet another ‘second chance’. Maybe a last chance is only treated seriously when people believe it is really the last chance.
There’s a lot of talk about police cuts at the moment. I want an effective police presence as much as anyone else, but if the police keep catching criminals, only for the courts to keep letting them out, then it’s small wonder there is so little relationship between the numbers of police and the level of crime.
That’s why, if I am elected as Lancashire Police and Crime Commissioner, one of my priorities involves monitoring and challenging local sentencing and punishment so that we see respect for the victim and punishment for the criminal.
Editor’s Note:- Yes, it’s me, Sam Chapman, seeking to be the Conservative candidate for Lancashire Police and Crime Commissioner, with more at Sam4Lancs.com
It was a simple decision, though not an easy one. Having spent 12 years managing Community Safety Partnerships I was, like most of those who do that kind of thing, employed by a local authority. I had extricated myself from the political restrictions on local government officers that would normally present a problem, but then I found that the legislation establishing Police and Crime Commissioners contained a clause that meant that a Council officer could not stand for the job – no arguments, ingenuity, or appeals to committees would get past this.
Readers of this story in the Lancashire Evening Post, about another candidate (Councillor Kevin Horkin) arranging a meeting with the Chief Constable and then making a public appeal for issues to raise with him at the meeting, will perhaps wonder why I and other candidates didn’t think of this first. Here are a couple of reasons:-
However, thinking that if Cllr Horkin had such a meeting, there were a few things I wouldn’t mind discussing with the Chief Constable myself (albeit without the publicity), I double-checked with the Police Authority, who confirmed my understanding, and have advised that Cllr Horkin’s proposed meeting with the Chief Constable will not take place.
I’m sure all candidates would welcome contact from the public on issues of concern. Their websites can be found on my ‘other candidates’ page, and you can contact me using this link.
It looks like my campaign launch has prompted a review of the race in the Lancashire Telegraph. I’m open to being wrong on things, but I’m fairly sure I went to Oxford, not Cambridge, but the article is otherwise accurate.
