Written question asked by David Gauke (Conservative) on Monday, 21 November 2005, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 23 November 2005. It was answered by Hazel Blears (Labour) on Monday, 9 January 2006 on behalf of the Home Office.

Police

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how the composition of newly established police authorities will be determined following the amalgamation of two or more police forces.

Answer: In order to effectively discharge their functions, we envisage strategic police authorities having no more than some 23 members (as in the case of the Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA)).To maintain democratic legitimacy, I would expect the majority of police authority members to be local councillors, as now. Councillor members will be selected by the constituent county and unitary councils in the police force area. As envisaged in the Policing White Paper—'Building Communities, Beating Crime' we will seek to broaden the skills and experience of police authority members by removing the separate category of magistrate members.We will work with the Association of Police Authorities (APA) to determine a more streamlined method of appointing independent members. We would expect all police authority members to bring appropriate skills and competencies to the role to enable them to effectively discharge their responsibilities.We will also strengthen accountability at a local Basic Command Unit (BCU)/Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnership (CDRP) level so that local communities can effectively hold newly developed forces into account. One promising way of achieving this is through the development of local policing boards. The policing boards would be responsible for setting local policing priorities in consultation with communities and holding the BCU commander to account for the delivery of the policing plan for that area.

Secondary information