Top police officers condemn crime policy

SENIOR police officers fired the first salvo yesterday in an unprecedented attack on many of the Government's key law-and-order measures and claimed that current Home Office plans were against the public good.

Officers fear the Home Office's review of the police's core functions will lead to privatisation by stealth and deep cuts in the number of men and women on the beat.

Chief Superintendent David Golding, president of the Police Superintendents' Association of England and Wales, said: 'Our view is that the scales of justice are being weighed heavily against the interests of law and order and that the balance needs to be redressed.'

Speaking on the eve of the association's annual conference, he added: 'Members of the association have serious reservations about the direction of reform and the way in which it is being pursued. We are being excluded from many of the reviews taking place, as are the public.

'This (conference) will critically examine the reform process and issue a clear warning about the threat to the British tradition of policing.'

The warnings come amid growing concern that the Home Office review will farm out many traditional police roles, such as patrolling and traffic management, to private security companies and local authorities. The police also point out that the number of vacancies in the police forces of England and Wales has doubled to 2,000 in the past year.

Mr Golding said there was 'guarded concern' about the latest initiative by Michael Howard, the Home Secretary, to encourage members of the public to help in street patrols. He said there had been little consultation.

Mr Howard is expected to attract unusually outspoken criticism from association members when he speaks at the conference on Wednesday. Mr Golding is likely to accuse the Home Office of damaging public trust in the police and endangering policing by consent.

'We do not have the same working co-operation which existed up until a couple of years ago. A lot of hard work needs to be done to rebuild the bridges,' he said.

'There is a natural suspicion about why so much attention is being paid to the police when important law-and-order issues are crying out for attention.'

The three-day conference - under the theme 'Redressing the Balance' - will see 160 delegates from 43 police forces in England and Wales debating issues including public unease about violent crime, intimidation of witnesses, tougher sentencing for the criminal use of firearms and privatisation of some police tasks.

A Home Office proposal to cut pounds 6m from the Lincolnshire police budget was described by the force's chief constable yesterday as 'a criminal's charter'. If the cuts were implemented next April the consequences would be catastrophic, said the county's chief constable, Peter Bensley.

Leaked government documents suggest that pounds 11m will be cut from forces throughout England and Wales. Lincolnshire will take the heaviest cut.

Barry Fippard, chairman of the police committee for the force, said the Lincolnshire police appeared to be paying for success.

'If you are good you are penalised. Lincolnshire is a very lean, slim force, and the Home Office is trying to put us on a diet,' he said.

Launching a campaign against the cuts, Mr Bensley said the proposal was equivalent to cutting 60 police officers' jobs or closing seven section police stations. 'It has become a disincentive to perform well,' he said.