Office serves as little more than PR function

AT the last outing, a turnout of 30% shows just how irrelevant the electorate thinks the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Leicestershire is, despite the fact that it costs the taxpayer well over £1,500,000 per year to run.

Its role on paper is impressive and makes one wonder why a chief constable is also needed, but rather than holding the police to account, it serves as little more than a PR function.

It is punctuated with ambiguities, which allows the PCC to pick and choose from the issues that arise without a consistent rationale.

We are, however, stuck with it until one of the political parties takes a serious look at what value it adds to police operations.

My postal voting slip arrived today and although I take an interest, I was staggered to find there are five candidates, when I was only aware of two.

Worse still, only one has attempted to produce and market a manifesto, so how on Earth do the others expect to gain any votes?

Rather than make the effort, they can only be hoping to ride on the back of the political party with which they are associated, when the responsibilities of this job are specific and require certain skills and expertise.

Do any of the candidates have them? Who knows, because there are no CVs available either.

The job itself carries a high salary, not to mention the number of “executives” within the team and the fact that we are expected to vote without the faintest inkling of what we will be getting for our money is disgraceful.

The LibDems particularly rattle on about other parties taking the electorate for granted, which is exactly what is happening here. Talk about jobs for the boys!