Police chief admits that the public are getting a poor service
Cuts to funding hitting crime victims, says commissioner
THE police and crime commissioner for one of England’s biggest forces has admitted that the public are getting a poor service.
David Jamieson, the West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner, said fewer officers were left to deal with rising crime which created a “deadly equation”.
David Thompson, the Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, said that sometimes the service “doesn’t meet what the public expect” due to pressures on officers from cuts and rising crime.
He said demand on the force was increasing, with cuts across all public services meaning that more vulnerable people were becoming victims of crime.
Mr Thompson warned that the “list” of crimes that needed to be investigated, including modern-day slavery and gang crime, was increasing and admitted it had left policing in a position that was “not sustainable”.
“The level of calls we’re receiving this summer are very challenging,” he told the BBC. “Sometimes that service that we’re providing at those peak times doesn’t meet what the public expect. We may be dealing with it over the phone where they would like to see us, and I’m sorry about that – but that is the reality of where policing is now.
“And on some occasions the service will not meet what I want it to do – and it will not meet the response that the public absolutely will want when they’re at a time of vulnerability.”
Mr Jamieson added that work that was routine in the past – such as officers visiting homes after a burglary, or an officer being present after a person had their car broken into – are duties that are becoming “increasingly difficult”.
He said that officers were left frustrated that they were not “able to provide the service that they would really like to”.
“This year, with the warmer weather, we have just been inundated by violent crime and we’re seeing homicides going up rapidly,” Mr Jamieson told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
“The homicide team in the West Midlands is actually at bursting point at the moment dealing with the many serious incidents they’ve had.
“Add to that the sexual and domestic crime which
‘The homicide team in the West Midlands is actually at bursting point at the moment’
has been much more important in the public’s mind in the last one or two years.
“We really are at a point now where it’s extremely difficult to see how we can sustain what the public would call an acceptable level of policing.”
Asked if cuts to police funding are endangering the public, he replied: “I think that’s the inescapable conclusion. We have far fewer officers. We’re not able to deal with all the incidents we could deal with. It’s a deadly equation.”
The Home Office says total investment in the police will be increased by more than £460million in 2018-19 after years of cuts in central government funding, with West Midlands Police receiving a cash increase of £9.9million compared with 2017-18.