COMMISSION ON THE POWERS AND ELECTORAL ARRANGEMENTS OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WALES

MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS

of the

EVIDENCE OF:

Alison Halford

held at

Caradog House, Cardiff

On

FRIDAY 25 JULY 2003

In Attendance

Lord Richard, Richard Commission

Eira Davies, Richard Commission

Tom Jones, Richard Commission

Peter Price, Richard Commission

Ted Rowlands, Richard Commission

Vivienne Sugar, Richard Commission

Paul Valerio, Richard Commission

Sir Michael Wheeler-Booth KCB, Richard Commission

Alison Halford

Leighton Jenkins

Proceedings

Lord Richard

Please could you open your brief to us?

Alison Halford

I have a paper that I will present next week: I cleared up the typos.

This will take 25 to 30 minutes. It is concerned with where policing should be devolved to the Welsh Assembly. If you cannot cope with that I am really sorry, and you can cut me off whenever you want to.

Lord Richard

There will not be much time to ask questions.

Ted Rowlands

Your two-page report prompted me to think we could not use that as your basis.

Alison Halford

Obviously I am here at your bidding. I appreciate it is late on a Friday and, bearing in mind I have to drive back to North Wales, I do not want to hit you with a non-paper.

However, there are various aspects that the Assembly is going to consider looking after and things have to be looked at including the way police authorities conduct themselves which, in my experience, leaves much to be desired.

Therefore, I was going to talk through that and give you a couple of examples of what has gone wrong in my experience.

Lord Richard

Yes, please do that but do not feel we are disinterested if we have not much time at the end.

Alison Halford

Yes. I will try and whiz through it as fast as I can.

I am Alison Halford and was a former Assembly Member. Before that, I was yet a former County Councillor. Thirdly, I was a former assistant Chief Constable holding the highest rank of a policewoman in the United Kingdom.

It is interesting that somebody is from Liverpool. I sometimes speak considerably quietly as my telephones at home were tapped some time ago. Therefore, I try and keep my voice down.

The police authority major is to ensure its force function effectively and efficiently and to monitor how complaints are dealt with. The Police Authority is also the only Body with a statutory task of disciplinary in the Police Authority as, I am sure you know, certainly you know my Lord, a tripartite arrangement between the Home Office and the Police Authority and unfortunately, in my experience, sharing responsibility for policing means that no-one is accountable for mis-management or poor administration or for errors.

I accept I have only worked for one Police Authority, Merseyside, but I served 4 years on the North Wales Police authority. Some of my comments might seem to be negative but I am frankly trying to be positive because I think the Police Authority should be more accountable and responsible for their actions.

One of the problems is that members of the Police Authorities do not have enough knowledge on how forces operate, therefore they happily accept what they are told by officers. I hope I am not treading on toes here, but some of practising Freemasons are not best suited to be Members, and there is always a very close link between the police and magistrates.

I do accept that trying to find suitable people to be members of the Police Authority is difficult but training is possibly the answer.

Chief constables are enormously powerful, and the role of a Chief Officer cannot be challenged, if at all. The Home Office can ask a chief constable to resign but its rarely used. The Police Authority set the precept, and the local authority merely collects it with council rates.

The Chief Constable of North Wales threw down a challenge through the Press the year before last, that unless the public was prepared to increase its contributions, no guarantee could be given that he will be about to provide an effective policing service, and a poll was held in the local newspaper. A wodge of people were prepared to increase their rates. The Police Authority meekly acquiesced to the Chief Constable, putting out the begging bowl scenario which was repeated again: there is no guarantee that the service are going to improve.

I think this sets a dangerous precedence because public confidence will be lost if policing does not come up to expectation.

There is another problem in Wales: who provides what? Again, very briefly, the Mostyn Dock private port up in my part of the world, in North Wales is given 24 hours' police protection. We do not know how much this costs the taxpayer. The Home Office paid something - it is with held from me, and whoever else asked - for how many police officers are working on the private port. South Wales and Southampton use a private firm and it is paid for by the Port authority. Why should North Wales need to implement more expensive police resource that has to be paid for by the public? This sort of anomaly could be challenged by the Assembly to ensure consistency across all four forces and the Police Authorities should be asked to justify such a varied approach to port security.

In 1988, the Association of Police Authorities did agree that the criterion for the section of senior officers needed an overall. You may know that the Home Office indicated dissatisfaction with some of his senior police personnel and controversial proposals appeared, calling for performance related pay for chief officers and more money for policing difficult areas, and even recruiting police officers for abroad.

I suggest that none of these proposals will be effective unless the Forces Ruling body, that is the Police Authority, is more up to do the job. The quality of police statistics also leads much to be desired. Every Force should compile and publish much more data and on staffing issues: gender balance data, records of internal sickness rates and number of medical retirements should also be available as these statistics are useful tools to determine the moral health of the workforce. The cost of internal grievance procedures and compensation should be calculated and fully available to the public. Naturally, individual’s identity could be safe-guarded.

There are two major problems with what goes wrong with the Police Authority; the first is a legal matter. The clerk to the Police Authority is both a legal advisor of the Authority and also a monitoring officer. The monitoring officer is a statutory obligation. The Police Authority cannot operate without a monitoring officer in place. This produces a potential conflict of interest. The clerk was the main provider of legal advice to a mainly lay membership. Yet, if the advice is wrong or applied to produce a particular result, how can the monitoring officer deal with any alleged impropriety that may have resulted from actions taken by the Police Authority?

In reality, the Police Authority members are untouchable, and they cannot be called to account either in person or as a member of a corporate Police Authority body. I know of no mechanism that can challenge, let alone publish, inappropriate collective behaviour of a ruling body of a police force.

I do not think this is a healthy situation.

I will run quickly through two cases which indicate the problems I have had from my personal experience. When I was a member of the North Wales Police Authority, so concerned were the 4 Labour Members of the North Wales Police Authority that they sent up a 19-page detailed Report to the Home Secretary. In brief, the Chief Constable was withholding information and senior officers were ignoring proper complaints, protocols et cetera and if the public made a complaint against a senior officer, the police authority happily accepted and allowed verbal reports from chief officers and challenged nothing.

The former Chief Constable paid for legal advice in an attempt to have the and 4 Labour Councillors removed from the Authority, as we were becoming a nuisance. We told him that we had broken no rules and they were squandering money unnecessarily and, quite frankly, the Police Authority went along for paying for legal advice. Of course, we could not be removed. Therefore, it’s that is it sort of thing - that a police authority will always side with the Chief Constable.

I go back again to the need for proper data collection because if we do not have these figures, how do we know that a police force is working properly?

If the Welsh Assembly took responsibility for the police, they could ask for these sorts of things.

As we know, the Home Office is responsible for the Police but they ducked the data dissemination issue. For years I had extensive correspondence with the Personal Secretary, and it has been inconclusive. There is a very clear wish not to discuss gender balance issues; it is quite a costly matter for the police service.

Again, the Welsh Assembly could do things differently. Therefore, I do think that as a sort of summing-up on the point of view, we need proper meaningful statistics similar to the cost of civil actions, as they are published quarterly so why can we not publish the cost of medical requirements too?

Let us remember that the Welsh Assembly is very committed to Equal Opportunities policy. Again, because policing is not devolved, then the Police Service does not have to apply itself to the Equal Opportunities Policy that the Welsh Assembly would want.

Also, it must be remembered approximately 75 per cent of the Force budget goes into salaries and retirement pensions, and looking after serving police and civilians is vital. Why staff leave the service is an important issue and should be monitored carefully by Police Authorities. Again, this is another thing that the Welsh Assembly could look at.

Retirements is a growing burden; as no central funds existing. The Home Office has deliberated for three years but they have failed to find a solution. Is it possible on a smaller scale that new ways could be found within Wales of looking at this pensions problem? I am trying to precise all this because I appreciate time is terribly, terribly short.

I want now to turn to one of the examples that I talked about. One was a detective constable who took action against his Force for malfeasance and falsifying his yearly appraisals. The action which ultimately took 8 years, and the overall cost in legal fees, one can only guess.

The Chief Constable gave verbal updates on the progress on the serious civil action. The Police Authority were quite happy to accept these verbal reports which, again, illustrates the weakness of the current system.

Finally, when the date was close, the Authority, in its meeting, was given an 8-page document to read within minutes. It was collected back by the clerk. As the ex-officer's case was strong and the Chief Constable was to be called before the Presiding Judge to explain why vital documents had gone array. It seemed sensible to settle and spare the public any further expense. Unusually, details of the £107,000 settlement was published. It emerged that the force insurers refused to pay a penny, and that was because of the way in which the information was imparted to the Authority, first of all by a verbal and then a written report that was snatched back from us. We were not immediately aware the public would have to pay the full cost.

The Corporate Police Authority did not ask the reasons why the insurers were allowed to escape all responsibility. The Labour Members asked for information and it was ignored. They should have been briefed by a proper report, served in normal committee timescales and not just allowed verbal briefing. The Police Authority should have had an inquiry as to how the Police and the team had led to such a large legal settlement. The Police Authority should have asked questions on what had gone wrong with procedure.

I generally believe that the Welsh Assembly could have intervened and lessened the impact of a long delayed civil action.

Under devolved policing arrangement, the close monitoring could be a process instigated and provision could be made for early settlements to avoid excessive legal bills that are invariably settled after years of delay.

Another aspect I find worrying is the role of the District Auditor who was, and remains, powerless to intervene as his role is confined to looking into events after a settlement. I think this is inept and unsatisfactory, particularly as any criticism of the Police Authority administration is merely only reported back to the Authority. It was for the Police Authority to decide if the Auditor's report is made public.

The Welsh Assembly could change this ridiculous situation.

I do take comfort from the fact that the Auditor General will be taking over the police audit function in the future, 2005. I hope this unacceptable situation will be addressed.

I am really doing my best, my Lord, to rush on. My next case highlights a few more weaknesses that the Police Authority treat its employees unfairly, and each Police Authority Member is protected from any redress by anyone or any other agency apart from using the judicial review system or the industrial tribunal system.

Furthermore, it is even more worrying that Police Members' lack of duty of care continues to sit to JPs to go on to hold other further public office regardless of how poorly they have conducted themselves as authority members. One reason why these Labour Councillors, of which I spoke, wrote to the Home Office in 1997 was over their concern, our concern, about another conflict of interest between the function of Head of Legal Services, who was also the Legal Advisor employee of the Police Authority and not the Chief Constable, yet she advised the Chief Constable and the Force on legal matters. This is clearly a division of loyalty and the two matters should have been challenged.

The Police Authority studiously ignored this difficult situation, therefore Head of Legal services routinely advised the chief officers on legal matters relating to defending the Force from civil actions and advised the Police Authority about complaints from the public made against the senior officer.

Please remember, the Police Authority is the only discipline Authority for ACPO ranks. None of the many complaints made by the public over the behaviour of senior officers in my 4-year period ever led to any formal investigation: the Head of Legal Services and the Head to the Police Authority performing their gate-keeping roles well.

At the time, the Chief Executive of Anglesey was under investigation by the North Wales Police Fraud Squad. This fact should not have been withheld from Members as it was material on how he performed his job. When it hit the Press he resigned. The clerk would not wish to rock any boats as monitoring officer whilst he, himself was under investigation of the Force. I just find that situation incredible, just incredible.

Moving on to January 1999, the Head of Legal Services sent a sensitive report detailing civil actions to the Police Authority without having the contents cleared. In other words, the document was sanitised. She was doing the job and was entitled to act as she did. She was immediately served with a memo that was a ‘technical’ constructive dismissal. Her job description was dramatically changed and staff previously under her command were removed. She had made a dreadful mistake by seeking my advice, on the understanding that I was an employer as a Police Authority member, and she appreciated my general knowledge. She came to my house with her judge husband but visiting me was seen as treacherous because I was not a complaint Police Authority Member.

The Chief Constable commenced an investigation into how she operated her Department. She mounted an internal grievance procedure against harassment.

The real nub of this is the unfairness of the situation which should have been remeded. A grievance panel chaired by the P.A Chair was convened. He was a serving JP that was also a Chair of the Magistrate's Bench. He, of all people, should have recognised the need for impartiality. The Panel dismissed grievance against the Chief Constable and refused to support their own employee which was a grave and flawed decision. It flew in the face of the independent consultants recommendations who was employed by the Authority. The Advisor wrote she had a strong case, and the matter should be resolved quickly in her favour. Having dismissed the grievance, suspension followed in September 1999. One discipline charge against her, she stated that she had visited my house and handed over confidential documents. No-one had asked me for a statement.

I believe, in the circumstances, that particular charge could not have been sustained.

This saga was finally settled in August 2002. However, since September 1999, she has been on full pay and others had to be employed to in fill the role in her absence.

I ask, could the Welsh Assembly have ensured a more speedy conclusion for this internal dispute? I think it is worth consideration.

Her Union obviously commenced legal action on her behalf against the Chief Constable and the usual delay occurred. She reported sick and made it impossible for the Panel to challenge her. She must have asked herself how is it perceived she could obtain any justice where there was bias by siding with the Chief Constable and that the grievance Panel and Disciplinary Panel compromised solely the same members. It is just not known.

This is another example how the Police Authority’s would close ranks with their Chief Constable, putting their own employee in an impossible situation. Yet, again, the clerk did not do anything to address this, and the District was again powerless to intervene despite escalating legal costs.

The Report recommending that her conduct warranted recourse to discipline, cost the taxpayer £9,000. We do not know the full cost of the legal fees and settlement. I do believe that we do need to do something about legal settlements that are not put in the public domain.

Quite suddenly, she was instructed to return to work by fax but it was not clear if all the discipline actions against her had been dropped. This confidential settlement was announced in August 2002. Is it right that this very senior person of the Police Force could be suspended all this time? It would appear that the Police Authority had helped to conduct indefensible vendetta against her because the Chief Constable wanted her out of the job. The auditor general and the Assembly agree that settlements should not be confidential.

The Welsh Assembly has no power to prevent police authorities from using them.

I just want to repeat again that the Police Authority is answerable to nobody.

I wrote to the Lord Chancellor because I was very concerned that the JP was showing such bias. His Lordship replied in person and pointed out it was a matter for the Home Office and not one for adjudication.

The Home Office wrote, "Dear Mrs Halford, for this is outside Home Office jurisdiction, you should lodge a complaint with the Police". I was sent a 'how to complain' leaflet. (Read)

I almost closed here. The other final anomaly is the clerk cannot surely investigate himself, and this business of holding the role of clerk to the Authority and being the monitoring officer just presents such conflict of interest. As a result, I complained to the Law Society about his conduct but that failed too. The Law Society stated it had no authority to adjudication on the correctness or otherwise of the legal advice.

The Law Society asked to place my grievance before the Police Authority because it was their duty to call the clerk to account. It was insulting for the Law Society to have suggested this pathetic action. All I suggest is that the clerk was dreadfully compromised. He had worked with the Head of Legal Services as an equal and should have done something to help her, or at least not been the contact point between her Union and the Police Authority. He even used the same law firm to advise him on discipline against the Head of Legal Services : it was the same Company who had advised Head of Legal Services while conducting her role as the force protector of civil actions against senior officers. I do not believe such multi-faceted conflicts of interest is fair nor helps either the police or the Police Authority.

As I have said already, the cost of these civil actions costs many thousands of pounds. We do not know what it is costing the taxpayers.

I believe verbal reports give scope for poor administration and leave the public and Police Authorities without proper protection. I do think they should not be allowed any currency in police authority business. I believe confidentiality clauses are not acceptable and should not be allowed. Local authorities do not use verbal reports, as I said, nor should the Police Authority. There must be some way of the Police Authority being accountable to somebody. No ‘force’ or ‘Authority’ has the intrinsic rightness or moral ascendancy and devolving police to the Welsh Assembly could have redressed serious weakness in transparency and accountability.

Sorry to have gabbled through this. I appreciate its length; I have gone through a lot of information.

My final point is that law firms should change regularly. The same force should not be allowed to use the same law firm constantly because they will always find favour of the Chief Constable and the Police Authority.

We certainly need better statistics, therefore making meaningful comparisons of performance between forces.

All Police Authorities should have contact details and numeration of information received; they should make statements of interest which should be widely published.

Under the Home Office appointment system, serving Members should be interviewed again seeking reappointment and should not be given preferential treatment.

Very, very finally, if the police is devolved to the Welsh Assembly, that will surely question the need for the 42 Welsh MPs. Obviously, they are a necessity for MPs but AMs are not sustainable in my point of view because the Welsh Assembly has taken over most of the work of the Welsh MPs.

I do believe that by cutting out some of the underemployed tier of the Government in Wales, it would surely ease the financial burden on the public.

I rest my case, my Lord. The Welsh Assembly has much to take over from a failing system at the present time.

Lord Richard

Yes, can I ask, are we going to get a copy of that?

Alison Halford

Yes I will send it.

Lord Richard

Yes, thank you very much. Sorry we have not got any more time.

Alison Halford

Yes, I understand that.

Lord Richard

Yes, thank you very much.

Vivienne Sugar

I wonder, whether in your longer paper, if you care to do any notes on whether any police function should be retained at the Home Office because we have had evidence from special terrorist units about training and about disentangling the police budget because of top- slicing. We cannot go into that but if you had thoughts on that I would be grateful.

Alison Halford

The Welsh Assembly spends so much money of its budget on policing there is no saying...(more than one person speaking at the same time).

Lord Richard

Yes, thank you very much.