18/11/2012 Sunday Politics South East

And in the South East - voters snub politics as usual as independents

win two out of three Police Commissioner elections in the

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2384 seconds

I'm Julia George and this is the Sunday Politics in the South East.

Coming up later. In search of innovation or more of the same? The

newly elected Commissioners in Kent, Sussex and Surrey tell us their

plans for policing over the next four years.

With me in the studio today is Conservative MP for South Thanet

Laura Sandys and the former Labour MP for Gillingham Paul Clark.

Welcome. I assume both of you cast your vote in the Police

Commissioner elections this week? We did. Did you cast a postal vote?

A went to the polling station. have a postal vote, but I voted on

the day. I presume you knew who you're going to vote for? I think

party loyalty was overriding. you were the personal secretary to

John Prescott, the most famous lose their in these elections, how would

he be feeling? Obviously, he would be disappointed. He wanted to take

up the role and make a difference, but that is not to be the case, but

I am sure that he will use his many talents to the benefit and the good

of the nation. We will see what he does.

If you missed it, here's a round-up of all the results and drama around

the PCC elections in the South East with Lucinda Adam.

It was independent state in Kent and Surrey as non-political

candidate stormed to victory. The former chair of Kent Police the

Authority had long-term magistrate and Barnes that went barely twice

as many votes as her runner-up. A campaign to keep politics out of

policing won voters. It is wrong to introduce party politics in

policing. There is no place for it. It was obvious that this was

happening. Kevin Hurley was the surprise winner in Surrey. The Tory

candidate was the odds-on favourite, but Kevin Howley's manifesto won

through. The Conservative Party candidate is duly collected for the

Sussex Police area. In Sussex, a politician did when. Katie born his

eight Mid-Sussex can't serve. -- is a Mid-Sussex councillor. They all

get money from their police budgets to set priorities and hiring and

firing the chief Constable, possibly. Botanic cold, foggy

November day, turnout was dismal.. An average of just 15 %. In an

election in bringing democracy to the people, there is talk of a

democratic deficit. Can the candidates came to have the mandate

of the people orris support too thin to manage the Thin Blue Line?

Joining last to discuss these elections in the police county's is

our political editor. The independence willing to lead to

three come up what is this saying about how people feel about

politicians? We cannot read too much into it, because there was a

very low turnout. These are not generally elections. People were

not voting for MPs, but it does show that they have turned away. In

the Tory heartland of Kent, they turned away from the traditional

politics. In Sussex, they went for the Tory candidate and it was more

on party political lines. In the second vote, it was Katie against

the Labour candidate. Labour did win on the first count in many

urban areas, like Hastings, Brighton, Crawley, and they say

that is a sign of a comeback. I do not know if that will be replicated

in a general election, because people have voted differently year.

We cannot stop without mentioning the turnout. We were fractionally

above the national average, but only by a fraction. How significant

was the turnout? It was always going to be low. Why hold election

in November? That is because the Lib Dems want to ditch them, not in.

Difficult to get people have to. The local elections in May, people

would have been at the polling stations are anyway. A lot of

people were confused by the voting system. We did not have these

elections before, so people were unsure what they were voting for.

As they said in Sussex, looking at the first London mayoral elections,

it was very low, the turnout. They can only build on this. If we look

at the nature of voting, there was a record of spoiled ballots. The

Guardian said that many people that spoiled their ballot, one of the

ballot said, where was my third win you decided to get rid of county

level police are parities? This is not democratic, and he put in an

extreme you read a word. People had their say by not voting, Paul

Clark? -- rude word. Yes, some of this was a protest. We did not know

what the candidates were and what they stood for because there was no

publicly-funded literature, that even a booklet about he was

standing at what they stood for. And in terms of the supplementary

voting system, there were some spoilt ballots that were

deliberately spoiled, but I also saw a lot at the Medway count for

people had put to crossers, but in the same column. So they became

spoilt. How did she see ballot papers? The adjudication process

has to agree with candidates from each of the people standing up as

to whether these can be accepted or not. A bad thing suspicious!

Cleared up! -- nothing suspicious. Somebody said on Friday night, I

suspect we will regret setting up these policing commissionaires? Do

you agree? No, it is not just about the police, it is about policing

and crime and it is very exciting because it is meant to co-ordinate

work on policing and what the local authorities do at how the schools

actually explain to young people in deprived areas about what crime is,

at the issues about education. why was that message not out there?

People were not interested, if they didn't care or they didn't

understand. I do believe that a more November is the wrong time for

an election. It is cold and dark but it is not co-ordinated with

other elections. To us that make people are apathetic?! What we

would have had a higher turnout. People could have got information

out if it had been combined with other elections, but this does not

mean that this is the first election for this political role.

People would be more interested going forward. Too many excuses for

people? There were debates on BBC South East Today, Radia debates on

the local radio stations? You could find out about this if you cared.

Yes, one of the things that we were convinced of was that this was the

wrong policy for the wrong time, spending hundreds of millions of

pounds while cutting 125 police officers. The mistake was not

engaging people. They did not want to be engaged because they did not

believe it was a pariah to. And everything that should happen exist

today. -- believe it was a priority. There was work within units of

operation command. Did Ministers not need to care more? Nick Herbert

was pushing this through, he has since gone and he reportedly said

that Number Ten and Conservative Central Office lacked interest and

he said that is why there were candidates that were not as strong

as your light, did the Ministers care about this election? If yes,

and in Kent, we worked very hard for a very good candidate. What I

think will happen is, he will see a much greater interest in this role

when we have seen the first four years and seen if it has the right

level of leadership and then when we combine it with other elections,

we will get the right turnout and level of engagement. Let's see add

to the people are, we know the names, but what are the key issues?

How do they aim to win over the voters with their plans?

That people loved the region have chosen the person they want to

oversee where they lead. -- the people in the region. It is a big

chap and one that warrants a salary of �85,000 in Kent and Sussex. --

big job. But questions were asked about what the new commissioners

were to all day and if they can't churn promises into reality? There

are budget cuts of around �50 million per force. Atop issue that

resonated with the voters was edgy social behaviour. Bat has been a

top priority for many years. What can these police commissioners do

differently? In it is not something the police can do on their own, so

my role is to bring the police together with other organisations,

so the council, the voluntary organisations, the probation

services, the schools, bringing them together to work as one team

to fight crime in Sussex. His zero- tolerance policing a gimmick?

It means not ignoring things that are going wrong, so for example, if

yobs are playing up, the police deal with them. They are not

allowed to dominate public spaces, shopping centres, bus stations or

whatever. Zero tolerance is the police, the public officials taking

back the ground for the public. have to preserve the visible

community policing which is what the people want, it is their top

priority. But while a decision behaviour remains a problem, of

their crime is falling consistently in the South East. Violent crime is

down by as much as 20 %. With these big years, there was such a change

in the way the policing was run, is this necessary at all? The real

issue is the sense that it's there is a response that they are getting

when they call or report a crime and the way they dealt with. Many

police officers are excellent, but we need to do more for the ethos of

dealing with anti-social behaviour, you jobbery, loutish, bullying

behaviour. If had been looking at a predictive computer program that

they used in America at the moment to predict where crime will take

place. Why not do that, why not look everywhere you can to bring

that crime? -- bring down crime? What not to enough to bring crime

down? -- do enough. If crime is coming down, this is a very safe

counties. It is a lower base to start from. It is important to

support the police in the vital work they do in their communities.

Within days of taking office, they would have to write a policing

budget with cuts of �50 million to each force in the next four years.

In times of austerity, Surrey Police has embarked on a radical

scheme at outsourcing services. But it is highly controversial. I would

be owed to bring in any external consultants. -- I would be lowered.

I do not know why it went down that way to balance the books, I will

look at this. Adalat privatise the police, I will not do it. -- I will

not privatise. I will fight for the end of any more cuts to policing.

We have to preserve visible community policing, which is what

the people of Kent want. That is their top priority. Difficult times

at the moment. The police had to find savings and it has been

difficult, but despite that, year on year, crime is coming down.

the three commissioners take office on Thursday and will save 84 year

term before facing the voters again at the next election. -- will face

a four year term. If crime is down, that is the first priority,

secondly, fewer victims of crime, and thirdly, saving visible

community policing and fourthly, Kent will have the most visible,

accessible commissionaire in the entire country, because are limited

by business to do that. It will not happen all light, I cannot promise

the world, I would be a fool to do so. -- happen overnight. I hope

that there would be a better turnout at the next election.

would you measure your success? at is easy, it is when people stop

moaning about Surrey Police. -- that is easy. A Ginette know if

people ever stop moaning about these things! -- I do not know.

Anne Barnes in Kent, not much of an endorsement if we are saying the

reason she won is because she is independent and the budget not want

politics. Is she a compelling candidate? If yes, she fought a

great campaign, she won because people did not want party politics,

what they saw as party politics in the prison that was commissionaire.

This is in the handful that actually voted! She has also been

the chair of the Kent Police of authority, and people recognise

this scale that was there, that knowledge. What is the difference,

between chairing a Kent policing authority and being be the police

and crime Commissioner? She has an understanding of the police, but it

is much more than that, this job, and I would like to have seen

people that worked apart from the police and looked at it objectively.

Hopefully she will bring some innovation and new ideas and will

also keep together some of the task forces we have in place that link

different services together. This is an innovation as a role and I

hope we see some and not just more of the same. Louise, you had an

interesting trip to New York as part of looking at the elections,

and Anne Barnes has spoken about being innovative and predicting

where crime will happen with computer modelling, what did you

learn about how they use technology in America? They have got as system

where they can take all of the statistics, so if your mobile phone

is stolen, that becomes a statistic. They have honed in on where the

crimes are taking place, a zero- tolerance policy brought in by the

former police commissioner of New York. They have had phenomenal

successes. They had driven down crime by 80 %. I put that to the

commissioner, and he does not think that would happen overnight year,

he says it is a phenomenal change in policing and the warning he had

was do not expect results overnight. If they want to look at this model,

there are ways to take these methods from bringing down crime

here. It is a different model, not entirely the same relationship

because the Commissioner here is elected, he is appointed over there

by the mayor of the city. It is a difference has done, but some of

these ideas for an Barnes seem to emulate what they're doing in New

York. The other issue is the idea of zero-tolerance policing which

brings us to Kevin Hurley in Surrey, and he has that a close

relationship with the policing world, if does this making a good

candidate? Obviously he has a lot of experience, but defeat exposes

his experience in Iraq on the people of Surrey... Were at was his

experience in Iraq? The set up policing mechanisms in Baghdad's,

from what I understand. -- he set up. He obviously has come off from

an agenda that it has zero- tolerance. How can you have zero

tolerance is the lead party is cutting the police budgets, you

need more police officers. I do not think that crime is necessarily

related to exactly the finding of police. It is about integrating

other issues, other social services. We look at where crime happens.

Social services know the families because often they are a generation

on generation. We know where the problems are lying. We need

integrated responses. We need people to be able to do this with

the police, social services, and the Home Office figures show 240

people have gone in the Kent Police force in the last two years. That

is destined to rise. In New York, they said it is not about bobbies

on the beach, numbers are police officers, it is about targeting

trouble spots. A lot of these people, we know where the crime is

happening. We need to be fair to Katie born, she has won his Sussex.

She has spoken about getting rid of the politics at the election is

over, but surely you want her implementing Conservative ideals?

Of the ideals are that we want to reduce crime and start looking

attendees social behaviour. The -- at anti-social behaviour. We have

put party politics, party machines behind candidates, but this is a

non-partisan agenda. We need the right people that will co-ordinate

the different issues. Someone standing as a conservative, someone

standing as Labour, they will stand and those platforms and it is

churlish to suggest that they will not follow those political agendas.

I would just go back on this, I am not just talking about cutting

bobbies on the beach, I am talking about the people that get a bad so

named because they are bureaucrats, better working towards those

partnerships so that they work. It is about having sophisticated

systems to use the information that we have our juniors the people in

the office doing that and bringing it together. We need to have a look

at the other political stories this week, this is a round-up of the

East Sussex County Council announced that needs to make cuts

of �60 million in the next three years and once as much as 50 %

could go from frontline services. If plans to reconfigure hospital

services have been put forward by the NHS to the fury of campaigners.

Managers want to concentrate emergency, higher risk, or the P

Diddy in general surgery at Hastings as strokes services at

Eastbourne. It does not make sense for he sporran. The Conservative MP

for Hove and Portslade was attacked by a stone-throwing crowds of prose

squatting protesters. He was meant to address students at the

University of Sussex would have to be escorted away. And the former

Tory MP for Maidstone and the Weald Ann Widdecombe came out of

retirement to descends like an angel from above all for Children

In Need. All for a good cars! -- calls.

You can have a brilliant time when you leave politics!

Ann Widdecombe, a symbol of what you can go on to after a great

political career? Absolutely, doing some great stuff, a great cause.

should call the Angel of the South! Just use the former MP, the current

MP is in the news again. If they're saying that she should not be

claiming for a second home in London, she has a constituency in

Kent where she does that live, a home in Surrey and she is renting a

property in London. Should she be claiming a second home allowance?

know Helen very well, she is very meticulous and everything. I am

sure she understands what the rules are. Morally, is it right? Everyone

has different circumstances. It is a high-pressure job, different

reasons to be in different parts of the country. It is important that

the constituents believed they are getting the right service.

doesn't live in her constituency, which you ever do that? No. The

living and breathing and working with people and shopping with

people down the High Street, what ever, you learn about your

constituency problems. She has actually closed the office in the