Policing UK 2013 - Police Federation

OVERVIEW
Policing since 1964
Dr Timothy Brain outlines the history
of policing in Britain since the Police Act
Dr Timothy Brain is the former
Chief Constable of Gloucestershire
In a specific sense the history of
modern policing began with the
Police Act 1964. It was a product
of the 1960 oyal Commission, which,
responding to a series of crises in 1950s
policing, had recommended far-reaching
changes to governance, structure and
organisation.
The 1964 Act established a
constitutional framework that balanced
the roles of Home Secretary, police
authorities and chief constables, which,
with minor variations, prevailed until
the passing of the Police eform and
Social esponsibility Act 2011. It
maintained a devolved policing system,
while marginally increasing the power
of the Home Secretary to co-ordinate
and supervise. It provided a vehicle for
merging the high number of small forces
(11 in 1964) into fewer but larger, more
efficient forces (43 by 194). It sought to
allow a measure of accountability without
permitting political control of policing at
either the national or local level. It was a
masterpiece in maintaining a balanced
police constitution, if at the expense of
central direction and momentum.
The 1964 Act may have constrained
the political influence in policing, but it
did not eliminate political involvement.
Post-1964 the main political parties
operated policing as a consensus
issue, but that changed in 199 when
Conservative opposition leader Margaret
Thatcher chose to attack the then
Labour government’s policing record,
making common cause with the Police
Federation’s concerns over the high
number of police vacancies and the
declining value of police pay in an era of
high inflation.
This established Thatcher policing
policy throughout her years in power
(199-1990) prioritising police spending
over other public services, increasing
police numbers, maintaining index-linked
pay increases and granting new powers
(principally through the Police and
Criminal Evidence Act 194).
The alignment was at its strongest
during the 194-5 Miners’ Strike, but
subsequently the government became
increasingly frustrated by the police’s
seeming inability to arrest the rise in
recorded crime, to adopt policing methods
that either successfully averted or quickly
suppressed a series of inner-city riots, and
by conspicuous failures of integrity and
competence generalised as ‘miscarriages
of justice’.
To improve national co-ordination
the Association of Chief Police Officers
(ACPO) was given an enhanced
role but the Thatcher government,
distracted towards its end by political
and international crises, avoided more
pervasive change.
The succeeding Conservative
government of ohn Major (1990-9),
seeking a greater return for its material
and political investment, initiated
the ‘Police eform’ programme. An
attempted radical change to police pay
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