Police are spending no more time on the beat despite the Government’s attempts to tackle bureaucracy, the Home Office adviser charged with reducing red tape in the force said today.
Jan Berry, the former chairman of the Police Federation, also made an outspoken attack on police leadership as forces in England and Wales were told to make savings of £540 million from the annual £9 billion budget by 2014.
A White Paper published today outlines plans for savings to be made in IT and administrative costs along with the purchasing of standardised body armour, uniforms, vehicles, mobile phones and BlackBerrys.
The number of police aircraft is to be cut by a fifth and a standardised patrol car introduced for all forces as part of the efficiency drive.
It is estimated that the size of the police aircraft fleet could be cut from 33 to 26, saving almost £18 million a year.
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The paper also said that savings could be made from changes in working practices such as officers patrolling alone in some areas and the use of special constables at weekends.
It suggests that overall £100 million in savings can be made this year and that £70 million can be saved every year up to 2014 through reductions in overtime.
Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary, denied that the efficiency drive across the 43 forces would “dilute” the Government’s crimefighting agenda.
“Cuts don’t come into this. Record levels of funding for this year and next year are guaranteed,” he said.
“Our absolute priority is to maintain frontline policing numbers.
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“We didn’t get to this level of 16,000 more police officers and the introduction of PCSOs only to see that evaporate.
“In straitened economic times you should be looking at how you can make savings, not cuts, and how you can dedicate more resources to the front line.”
However, Ms Berry, when asked if officers were spending more time on patrol, said: “It’s not possible to answer the question with absolute certainty. But if you talk to police officers they would say it has remained the same or got slightly worse, which is quite worrying.”
Ms Berry, the Independent Reducing Bureaucracy Advocate, highlighted problems with Home Office efforts to keep more officers on the beat rather than doing paperwork in stations.
Many of the 27,000 portable hand-held computers given out in an attempt to keep officers away from their desks were ineffective because they lacked the right programs, she said.
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Only a few forces have the applications needed to allow an officer to report a crime remotely and access essential databases, she added.
Ms Berry also criticised senior officers for being too focused on appearing high up in performance league tables instead of giving the public what they want from police.
Pilot schemes that give local officers the discretion to use their judgment when handling minor crimes were not being adopted more widely because chief constables feared they would affect clear-up rates.
“There are senior police officers who are aspiring to be in the upper quartile. It’s all about where they are in league tables. It should be about what matters to the public not what matters to senior officers,” Ms Berry said.
Sir Hugh Orde, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), said that overtime was already scrutinised carefully by senior officers.
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He said: “Overtime reflects the realities of modern policing, including its unpredictability. Chief officers and police authorities look at overtime budgets very carefully and it should always be carefully monitored for cost-effectiveness.
“The police service is a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week organisation and has to be able to respond flexibly to any event or crime at any time.”