GETTING rid of police and crime commissioners would be a waste of money and would do more damage than good.
That is the claim from Bill Longmore and Ron Ball, who represent West Mercia and Warwickshire respectively, following a speech by Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper.
Ms Cooper spoke out at the Labour Party Conference to confirm the group would scrap PCCs, who were elected in November 2012, if they took control of the Government after next year’s general election.
Mr Longmore said he was ‘disappointed’ to hear her comments and thought it was ‘purely a political decision’ taken without a clear understanding of the work and achievements of commissioners in the past two years.
He added: “The Shadow Home Secretary has not made it clear what the alternative arrangement would be, and irrespective of this, any alternative would likely come at a much higher cost and would not deliver the range and quality of services being delivered now.”
Mr Ball said for the first time those responsible for policing were now locally elected and directly answerable to residents.
“I firmly believe it would be a backward step to return to the era of invisible, unelected police authorities during which so many failures of police leadership occurred without any meaningful oversight.” he added.
“There is certainly the case for reform but abolishing the role completely would ultimately do more damage than good.”
