Functions of Elected Local Policing Authorities
Section 5: Police and crime commissioners to issue police and crime plans
67.Section 5 requires a police and crime commissioner to issue and publish a police and crime plan within the financial year in which he is elected.
68.Subsection (4) confers power on the police and crime commissioner to vary a police and crime plan.
69.Subsection (5) requires the police and crime commissioner to have regard, in issuing or varying a police and crime plan, to the strategic policing requirement issued by the Secretary of State (for which, see section 77).
70.Subsections (6) and (7) provide for the police and crime commissioner to consult with the chief constable in the drafting or variation of a police and crime plan, and for the police and crime panel to scrutinise a police and crime plan before it is issued.
71.Subsection (8) ensures that the police and crime commissioner consults the chief constable before issuing or varying a police and crime plan, on any points that have changed since the initial draft.
Section 6: Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to issue police and crime plans
72.Section 6 replicates the provisions in section 5 for the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime.
73.Subsections (10) to (12) have the effect of applying various provisions of the Greater London Authority Act 1999 concerned with the Mayor’s strategies to the police and crime plan, as if it was a strategy.
74.Subsection (13) requires the Mayor and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to co-operate in ensuring that the Mayor’s strategies and the police and crime plan are consistent with each other. Although the Mayor will be the occupant of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, this provision ensures that he takes account of the interests of both offices in preparing the strategies and the plan.
Section 7: Police and crime plans
75.Section 7 provides for the content and duration of a police and crime plan.
76.Subsection (1) provides for the police and crime plan to set out various matters including the police and crime commissioner’s police and crime reduction objectives, and the policing which the chief constable is to provide for the police area.
77.Subsection (3), read with subsection (7), provides for a police and crime plan to continue in effect until the end of the financial year in which the next ordinary election to the office of police and crime commissioner is expected to take place, unless a new plan is issued in the interim. The effect is that, in the period between a police and crime commissioner being elected to the office and issuing his police and crime reduction plan, the plan of the previous administration will remain in effect, ensuring that there are always objectives in place for the chief constable to work to.
78.Subsections (4) to (6) allow the Secretary of State to give guidance about the matters to be dealt with in police and crime plans, to which the police and crime commissioner must have regard.
Section 8: Duty to have regard to police and crime plan
79.Section 8 requires the police and crime commissioner, the chief constable, the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis to have regard to the content of the applicable police and crime plan in exercising their functions.
80.Subsections (5) to (7) allow the Secretary of State to give guidance about the manner in which this duty is to be complied with.
Section 9: Crime and disorder reduction grants
81.Section 9 gives a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime the power to award a crime and disorder reduction grant to any person in order to secure or contribute to securing crime and disorder reduction in the police area. The grant may be subject to any conditions that the commissioner may deem appropriate.
Section 10: Co-operative working
82.Section 10 places duties in relation to co-operation on a police and crime commissioner or (in the metropolitan police district) the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and various other bodies with functions in the areas of criminal justice and the reduction of crime and disorder in relation to co-operation.
83.Subsection (1) requires a police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to have regard, in carrying out their functions, to the relevant priorities of each of the bodies in the police area that are members of community safety partnerships formed under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.These bodies are the police, the probation services, local authorities, fire and rescue authorities and NHS Primary Care Trusts.
84.Subsection (2) requires the police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (as the case may be) and bodies that are members of community safety partnerships to co-operate with each other in the exercise of their respective functions, except devolved Welsh functions.
85.Subsection (3) requires the police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (as the case may be) and certain criminal justice bodies to make arrangements so that their respective functions are exercised so as to provide an efficient and effective criminal justice system for the police area. It is anticipated that these arrangements will involve the agreement of a protocol or memorandum of understanding between the various bodies setting out the matters in respect of which they will co-operate and the means by which they will do so.
86.Subsection (5) lists the various criminal justice bodies to which the duty to make arrangements applies. Some of the references are to Ministers, because legislation confers the relevant functions on Ministers and they are then delegated to officials and public bodies. In practice the criminal justice bodies will be the police, the Crown Prosecution Service, Her Majesty’s Court Service, the National Offender Management Service, or other providers in relation to prisons or probation, and Youth Offending Teams.
Section 11: Information for public etc.
87.Section 11 imposes obligations on a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime in relation to the publication of information.
88.Subsection (1) allows the Secretary of State to specify by order information which a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime must publish, and also to specify the time and manner of publication. It is anticipated that this power will be used to ensure the publication of standard information as to numbers of staff and the rates of their pay, items of expenditure above a specified monetary limit, and any gifts or loans received.
89.Subsection (3) requires a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to publish such further information as is necessary to allow local people to assess the performance of the body itself and also that of the chief officer of police for the police area (either the chief constable or, in the metropolitan police district, the Commissioner).
Section 12: Annual reports
90.Section 12 requires a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to produce an annual report.
91.Subsection (1) requires an annual report to show, in respect of the financial year in question, how the police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime has carried out his functions and the progress made in meeting the objectives in the police and crime plan.
92.Subsections (2) to (5) make provision for the police and crime panel to scrutinise the annual report.
93.Subsections (6) and (7) require a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to publish each annual report in such manner as he thinks fit.
Section 13: Information for police and crime panels
94.Section 13 allows a police and crime panel to require its police and crime commissioner or (in the case of the metropolitan police district, the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime) to provide it with information.
95.Subsection (1) requires a police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to provide the police and crime panel with any information they reasonably require in order to carry out their duties.
96.Subsection (2) excludes from the requirement under subsection (1) information which, in the view of the chief constable, it would be harmful to disclose for various reasons set out in the subsection. This does not prevent the disclosure of the information to the police and crime panel; it means that the police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime is not required to disclose it.
Section 14: Arrangements for obtaining the views of the community on policing
97.Section 14 amends the provisions requiring the views of the people in the police area to be obtained, in order to ensure that those views are sought in particular circumstances, namely before a police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime issues a police and crime plan or precept.
98.Subsection (3) makes particular reference, in the provision to be inserted in section 96 of the Police Act 1996, to victims of crime. Section 96 of the 1996 Act did not previously require the views of victims to be obtained – the effect of this subsection is to create such a duty.
99.Subsection (3) also inserts a reference to the views of relevant ratepayers’ representatives. The term is defined in the provision inserted by subsection (5). This replaces provision in the Local Government Finance Act 1992 requiring police authorities to obtain the views of representatives of non-domestic rate-payers, which is amended by section 26(3) so that it does not apply to police and crime commissioners. The purpose is to create a single provision in the 1996 Act concerning the duty on police and crime commissioners to consult the public in relation to precept.
Section 15: Supply of goods and services
100.Section 15 allows a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to make contracts with any public or private sector body in relation to the supply of goods and services.
101.Subsection (3) creates an exception to the general rule, in that an elected local policing authority is prohibited from making a contract with another such authority, or the Common Council in its capacity as the police authority for the City of London, in respect of matters that could be the subject of a collaboration agreement. This is to encourage authorities to make the full use of the arrangements for collaboration.
102.The section replicates the provision previously applying to police authorities.
Section 16: Appointment of persons not employed by elected local policing body
103.Section 16 allows a police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to appoint a person to a post, or designate a person as having specified duties or responsibilities, when required or authorised to do so by any Act, regardless of whether or not the person is a member of the staff of that police and crime commissioner or of the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime. The purpose of this is to allow flexibility in sharing staff between different bodies.
104.The section replicates the provision previously applying to police authorities.
Section 17: Duties when carrying out functions
105.Section 17 sets out particular matters to which a police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime must have regard in carrying out his functions, in addition to the requirement under section 8 to have regard to the police and crime plan.
106.Subsection (3)(b) ensures that, in discharging the duty under subsection (2) to have regard to any report or recommendation made by the police and crime panel on his annual report on the previous year, a police and crime commissioner or the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime has a period of grace in which to consider the report or recommendations.
Section 18: Delegation of functions by police and crime commissioners
107.Section 18 allows a police and crime commissioner to delegate the exercise of his functions, with certain exceptions. In accordance with general principles (and therefore not expressly provided for in the section) the police and crime commissioner retains ultimate responsibility for the discharge of a function delegated to another person.
108.Subsection (1) allows a police and crime commissioner to appoint a deputy and arrange for him to exercise the commissioner’s functions.
109.Subsection (2) allows a police and crime commissioner to arrange for persons other than the deputy police and crime commissioner to exercise the commissioner’s functions.
110.Subsection (3) prohibits the appointment of a person listed in section 18(6) as a deputy police and crime commissioner, and the exercise by a deputy police and crime commissioner of the functions set out in section 18(7)(a), (e) or (f), (namely the functions of issuing a police and crime plan, appointing, suspending or dismissing the chief constable, or issuing a precept). It prohibits a police and crime commissioner from delegating any function to the police, to any other police and crime commissioner, to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, to the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, to the Common Council of the City of London (which is the police authority for the City), to any other body maintaining a police force, or to a member of the staff of any of these bodies. The intention is that any exercise of a police and crime commissioner’s functions by these bodies should be under a collaboration agreement (for which, see section 89) rather than by delegation. Finally, the subsection prohibits a police and crime commissioner from delegating to a person other than the deputy police and crime commissioner any of the functions listed in subsection (7), being functions of particular importance which should be exercised by the commissioner personally or (in the case of the functions in subsection (7)(b), (c), (d)) by the deputy police and crime commissioner.
111.Subsections (4) and (5) allow a deputy police and crime commissioner to further delegate functions delegated to him by the police and crime commissioner, subject to the same restrictions as are applicable to delegation by the commissioner himself.
112.Subsection (10) provides for a deputy police and crime commissioner to be a member of the police and crime commissioner’s staff.
Section 19: Delegation of functions by Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime
113.Section 19 makes similar provision in relation to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to that in section 18 in relation to police and crime commissioners.
Section 20: Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime: confirmation hearings
114.Section 20 amends the Greater London Authority Act 1999 so that the existing procedure for the London Assembly to scrutinise senior appointments made by the Mayor applies to the appointment of the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime by the Mayor in his capacity as the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime. Where the proposed candidate for Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime is not a member of the London Assembly, the Assembly will have the power to veto the appointment by a majority of two thirds of the members voting.
Section 21: Police Fund
115.Section 21 requires a police and crime commissioner and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to maintain a single fund into which all receipts must be paid, and out of which all expenditure must be met. The police and crime commissioner must keep accounts in respect of this fund.
116.The requirement to use the fund for all receipts and expenditure is subject to any contrary provision in regulations made under the Police Pensions Act 1976. The Police Pension Fund Regulations 2007 require forces to maintain a police pension fund that is separate to the police fund.
117.The section replicates the previous provision in relation to police authorities.
Section 22: Minimum budget for police and crime commissioner
118.Section 22 ensures that the power of the Secretary of State to set a minimum budget requirement previously applicable to a police authority applies in relation to a police and crime commissioner.
119.Subsection (3) imposes a new limitation on the exercise of the power, in that the Secretary of State may not exercise it unless satisfied that it is necessary to do so because the budget requirement has been set at such a low level that, if implemented, the public safety of people in the police area would be put at risk.
Section 23: Minimum budget for Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime
120.Section 23 makes similar provision in relation to the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to that made for police and crime commissioners by section 22.
Section 24: Police grant
121.Section 24 ensures that the power of the Secretary of State to make a police grant, previously applicable to police authorities and the Metropolitan Police Authority, is applicable to police and crime commissioners, the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Common Council in its capacity as a police authority. The procedure for the making of grants is unchanged.
Section 25: Other grants etc under Police Act 1996
122.Section 25 makes similar provision to section 24, in respect of the other sources of funding for police authorities under the Police Act 1996, namely grants for capital expenditure, grants in relation to national security, grants by local authorities, and gifts or loans. The effect is that grants etc under these provisions are capable of being made to police and crime commissioners and, where relevant, the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime and the Common Council in its capacity as a police authority.
Section 26: Precepts
123.Section 26 confers on police and crime commissioners the power, previously exercised by police authorities, to issue a precept, thus allowing council tax to be levied in order to fund the police.
124.Subsection (3) disapplies local government legislation which would otherwise impose a duty on police and crime commissioners to consult ratepayers before issuing a precept. The same requirement is instead incorporated in section 14 (arrangements to obtain the views of the public on policing), so that there is a single, consolidated provision in relation to the duties of police and crime commissioners to consult the public.
125.Subsection (4) introduces Schedule 5, which sets out the powers of a police and crime panel to scrutinise a proposed precept, and the procedure to be followed by the police and crime commissioner and the panel in that regard.
Schedule 5: Issuing precepts
126.Schedule 5 makes provision for scrutiny by police and crime panels of a precept that the police and crime commissioner intends to issue in order to raise funds for policing by way of council tax. It requires the police and crime commissioner to notify the police and crime panel of the proposed precept, for the panel to consider the proposal and report on it, and for the commissioner to have regard to the report. The police and crime panel also has the power to veto a proposed precept provided that two thirds of the total membership of the panel agrees. If this power of veto is not exercised, the police and crime commissioner must issue the proposed veto, or issue a different precept in accordance with the recommendation made by the police and crime panel in its report.
127.Paragraphs 7 and 8 give the Secretary of State the power to make regulations governing the procedure for the panel's scrutiny of precepts, and the procedure to be followed if a proposed precept is vetoed, in order to ensure that a precept is eventually issued.
Section 27: Other grants etc
128.Section 27, like sections 24 and 25, makes provision for grants previously payable to police authorities and to the Metropolitan Police Authority to be payable in future to police and crime commissioners and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime.
