Matthew Grove: Year one of fighting the public’s corner with the police

The relatively low turnout at the polls perhaps suggested that the public did not fully understand what the role of PCC was intended to achieve, and one of my biggest tasks has been to communicate and meet with people to demonstrate what I work for on their behalf.

There was also a strong message received that the public did not want party politics involved in the day-to-day operations of the police and that is something that I, and the vast majority of PCCs, have operated to. I have always had, and always will have, the basic belief of public first, party second.

The introduction of PCCs was also seen by some as a new layer of bureaucracy at extra cost to the public purse. In fact PCCs replaced the existing, and much larger, police authorities (which in Humberside has resulted in a significant saving of over £100,000 per year), a fact that passed a lot of people by.

The police authorities, for all the good work they achieved, were largely invisible and not accountable to the public. The introduction of PCCs was justified to provide a better way for residents to hold their police force to account.

From the day I took office, I set out to ensure that I am visible and accessible to the public and that I am there as their servant.

My role is to hold the police to account on behalf of residents, and constantly challenge performance and drive improvements to better protect them. I am the representative of the public to the police, and not vice-versa.

It’s a huge and demanding job, but one I love. I constantly work long hours and so does my deputy, but we must work hard if we are to make a difference. We are planning for the next generation, not the next election.

I inherited a large and rather grand office from the police authority, far too grand for my liking, and immediately put it on the market. We are now close to a sale and profits raised will be put into a crime reduction fund to benefit community projects. I will be moving my team into a more modest office shared with another public sector organisation.

The financial challenges that face us are huge, but not insurmountable: on top of the £23m already saved by the force since 2009, we need to find a further £25-£30m of savings over the next five years from a budget of £183m.

This cannot be done by trying to deliver policing in the same way we have always done but cheaper, which is why I have challenged our Chief Constable Justine Curran to redesign the force to deliver the service needed to keep our residents safe with the money we expect to have available. It’s a complex piece of work but it will be achieved with the interests of the public at its heart.

When dealing with large public sector organisations, people are often dismayed at how common sense appears to have been abandoned and bureaucracy has taken over. When they have a problem they hit the legendary brick wall, the mass of red tape, when all they want is an answer and a solution from someone who works for them.

To some, police and crime commissioners were seen as an experiment and not initially supported by the general public who perhaps did not understand the role, but they are now rapidly seeing the benefits of having a directly elected individual who they have the power to hire and fire through the ballot box.

For the first time, they have a name and a face of a person they know is employed to fight for them and their community and ensure one of their most important public services is delivering what they want, need and are ultimately paying for. My job is to cut through bureaucracy and inject some common sense where it is needed, and since I took office I have been able to help a number of people who would otherwise not have been able to break through the system.

If the role of a PCC continues to work as it has started, then why not, as others have already suggested, expand the concept into other public services such as health?

We continually read stories where patients suffer due to healthcare being rationed and decisions affecting individuals as to whether they are treated or not, but with no proper accountability and no individual to contact to get a satisfactory solution. I recently saw an organisation chart of NHS departments and it resembled Hampton Court maze. With a structure so complex and confusing it’s not surprising the system often fails.

Is it now time to break down the iron curtain of bureaucracy that is strangling our vital services and cut through the red tape by giving directly elected local commissioners the power to act on your behalf?

* Matthew Grove is the police and crime commissioner for Humberside.