North Wales Assembly Member Mark Isherwood, who two weeks ago stated that ‘calls for the devolution of policing for Wales defies reality’, has this week called on the Cabinet Secretary for Communities and Children to clarify how it would actually work.
Mr Isherwood is concerned that the call for devolution of policing by Labour and Plaid Cymru is a blatant power grab which would deliver the opposite of real devolution.
Challenging the Cabinet Secretary on the matter in the Assembly Chamber this week, he said:
“Two weeks ago here you spoke in support of police devolution on a motion that also believed that specialist policing matters such as counter-terrorism are best co-ordinated at a UK level.
“If this were to happen, how would that work, given that the First Minister has called for powers equivalent to those devolved to Manchester, which are the powers of a Police and Crime Commissioner, and therefore exclude operational matters? But even if it did include operational matters, the precedent in America, France and Italy, amongst many other nations, is that you end up with two separate police forces at different levels accountable to different people. So, how would that work?”
The Cabinet Secretary replied: “There is a model that’s already operating in Scotland, where there is a counter-terrorism operation between boundaries. That has no effect for individuals in terms of the UK administration. We can see that operating in the very same way on a Wales-England and UK basis as well. I think what we’ve been very clear about on the devolution of the police is that it fits in very nicely with the services that are provided already with the emergency services and the judicial system that we are also hoping will be transferred to Wales as well”.
Mr Isherwood added: “Well, again, I would be interested to know whether you’re envisaging, as the First Minister appears to, only Police and Crime Commissioner powers, or something more?”
Speaking outside the Chamber, Mr Isherwood said:
“As we already have devolution to Police and Crime Commissioners in Wales, I am concerned that what the Welsh Government is actually talking about is taking yet more powers from the regions of Wales and centralising these in Cardiff, giving themselves power to hire and fire Chief Constables.
“The call for devolution of policing by Labour and the separatists is a blatant power grab which would deliver the opposite of real devolution.”