18/09/2011 The Politics Show South

In the South: The costs of policing after the

riots - should we rethink police budgets cut?

And from mice to miner birds - if you had to describe the Liberal

Democrats as an animal, what we did be and why? Find out in half-an-

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 2132 seconds

Hello and welcome to the part of the show especially for us here in

the south. On today's show, what price the police service in the

wake of this summer's riots. One Conservative MP tells us the cuts

of wrong and what has happened to the strike over the city council's

cuts to staff pay? I will be talking to management and union to

find out if they have made any headway. But first, the Lib Dems

are gathering in Birmingham. It is safe to say they have taken a

nosedive in public opinion but we thought we would test that by

asking people if the lead Dems were A mouse. Because they are quiet.

Behind the scenes. A pig. They all are. A teddy bear. They are yellow.

A badger. Because you do not see a lot of them. Possibly an otter.

Slyly endangered but making strong return. Eight chihuahua. They are

green and save the world, save the planet but sometimes they lose

track of the real world. A mynah bird. Mimicking exactly what the

Tories do. It was just a bit of fun and we will be trying it out on

Labour and the Conservatives in future weeks. But now Peter is up

in Birmingham in the thick of the Lib Dem Conference. Do they seem

like otters or teddy bears to you? Not teddy bears! There is a touch

of stardust he had the Lib Dem Conference. Hugh Grant, the actor,

has had a meeting with the Nick Clegg, talking about phone hacking.

That was a meeting organised by Evan Harris, former boxer Jack MP

but now he is a thorn in the side of the coalition. Then there are

all the councillors who lost their seats in the May election having

lost the referendum on alternative vote. You would think the Lib Dems

are down in the mouth. They are not. That stardust is helping a bit but

there are a lot of them complaining at the grass roots. That is what

they do at every conference. With me is the leader of Eastleigh

Borough Council. Hugh Grant did have some great one-liners! We

cannot repeat them! Some of the ministers as well. The conference

slogan about being in government but does that make up for the sense

of loss? There is something which is very unusual for Lib Dems. The

first year was difficult for them. This time last year there were a

lot of people saying, did we do the right thing? Some people laughing

Nick Clegg, others live in him. The May elections were cathartic. It

was said clearly, we are not in bed with the Tories. That is not what

the public think. They say you are parroting the lines of the Tories.

A I have been really pleased that the mood here is so positive,

because we are getting things done in government. We have announced

more money for pupils in deprived wards. Things that would never have

been done by a Tory government. More money for infrastructure as

well but it is about balancing the economy. Who would ever thought

that Danny Alexander would be a start announcing more tax

inspectors. Wonder.! But not for us. It is for us. We have to make sure

we get spending in the South East as well. The south-east is the main

engine in the economy. But if that stalls, there will be a massive

loss of money for the Treasury. One of the messages we have to give is

to make sure we have that investment in the south-east.

Things like the new homes bonus people worry about because they

think it is just councils trying to make money. There is not an open

book for developers. We have slashed the building programme that

was put forward by the last government which will save hundreds

of acres of green field sites. Councils are not approaching it in

that way but we have a real housing need and we do have to find places

for homes to be built. suggestion is this is an open

cheque, that councils will want to make money. Peanuts will be made.

No council anywhere in the country will be influenced by the new homes

bonus to say we will be allowing more building. Infrastructure costs

are enormous. We need tens of millions of pounds to go along with

new homes and we have to extract that from the developers. It is

hard work. Thank you. This is not the first conference of the

conference season. The smaller parties have been very busy and

politicians from the south have been making waves at those

gatherings across the country. Conference time is crunch time for

party leaders. Some expected Britain's Caroline Lucas to be

distracted by Westminster work but she was setting the tone at the

Green Party's gathering in Sheffield. Nationally there are

challenges because we have an electoral system stacked against us,

but we are showing that despite that we can win our first seeds and

so I would hope at the next election we might win. As well as

David Cameron, the South is home to one other party leader -- Nigel

Farage of the UKIP party. He had been knocked down for a while but

for us back for his party conference in Eastbourne rebuffing

criticism of his leadership been rung by star star. Thank you very

much indeed. This is my first conference back as leader of UKIP

at a time when absolutely everything we have stood for and

fought for is now at the centre of the national debate. Nobody can say

it other than a new kit man -- UKIP is a mainstream British party.

year, are calls from delegates will have. Rollins roads and public

demonstrations were proving effective in disputes over city

council pay cuts and could be applied in national protests.

give formal notice to 9,000 employers that we are now balloting

for industrial action. We are proud to support must just this side but

the move to industrial action ballots. We notice our intention to

ballot for industrial action. will be the biggest trade union

mobilisation for a generation. are likely to see the first co-

ordinated union protests in November over changes to public

sector pensions. An important thing for the Coalition for if Lib Dem

ministers involved to see how they will be dealing with industrial

dispute in the future and there will be questions from the

grassroots for those ministers. They do not like ministers being

self-important but they liked the fact that the country is taking

notice of what the Lib Dems think. For the best part of the year

around has been rumbling away at Southampton City Council to save

money and jobs, the council wanted to reduce pay and change terms and

conditions. 99 % of workers have signed new contract in July but

this dispute is far from over. Unison and denied members took part

in strike action this summer and are still working to rule. Joining

me to discuss where we go from here is councillor Jeremy Malton. The

contracts have been signed, do you think you can force a U-turn?

We have been in negotiations now for some town which had led to some

new proposals. That proposal was rejected because it was not good

enough and reopened negotiations. The strikes have proved our members

on not accept a pay cut so we will continue with the strikes or

negotiations depending on which will bring a resolution. You are

also thinking of legal action. One is already in the tribunal for

lack of consultation and we have 500 unfair dismissal claims to

submit and Unite have 300 claims to submit which will happen in the

next few days. This was meant to save you money but hearing about

legal action, you have had to make concessions. It is about saving

money but also about protecting jobs and services. We do think it

is the right thing to do. There is an alternative and the Labour group

have said they would get rid of 1,500 jobs at the council. That is

what we want to avoid but since we were last here, we have made huge

progress and we are much closer together now and that proposal that

Andy talked about, that is something we want to see go to all

the union members. You say you have made progress but there are threats

of further strikes, so it does not sound like it is going well. There

is an understanding now from the union side that there is not the

money that perhaps they thought there was an certainly from the

council's side we have shown we are willing to move opposition. That

proposal is worth a million pounds to council employers. If that is a

good deal. We are working on how we can strengthen that and hopefully

that can go to all council staff and reach an agreement. Are you

making progress because it does not seem to match up that staff are

talking about more strikes and yet we are hearing of progress.

Discussions have improved and we have been continuing with them. The

problem was if you put an extra million pounds into our members'

pockets, the trouble is the council took �6 million out of their wages.

We are a long way off of where our members want to be but we will

continue discussions and we will make a decision on whether the

offer is good enough or not. At the moment it is not. We will not put

the last offer back to it, members. Four asked to have a ballot, the

offer needs to improve. People who are looking outside of their

windows and seeing their bins are not collected, they want to know

when you will resolve this. How long will it take? We are

continuing fierce discussions and we will meet Again with Andy and

other unions to try and get that deal discussed back in August

fleshed out and hopefully something they feel they can take to all

their members. The public are still suffering because there is this

work to Raul and particularly with the bin collections staff, that is

meaning people are not getting their bins collected when it should

be and that is causing a lot of problems. But what are you doing to

try to improve morale? You have a lot of staff who are unhappy at how

you are treating them. We are trying to make it clear to them

that this is about protecting jobs and social workers who have been on

strike, we have said to them all their jobs are safe, we are

recruiting more people. One thing I have done is I have been around the

building they were again that they have complaints about and we have

drawn up a list of things to improve. We are looking at all

possible options but at the root of it is our message that we want to

keep more people in work delivering those services. Do you think your

members have the stamina to see this through? Will they keep going

with this strike and this action? think they will. They are angry

about the money that has been taken from their wages. The November

strikes up over the national government going to take money out

of their wages. Our members are under attack in not -- by not only

the national government but the council. They are not working for

less money, people keep dipping into their pockets. Thank you both

for coming in today. We will update people on what happens in future.

The idea is to make sure criminals fear the police. That is the

thinking of the new met Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe. He

made the statement when he started his new job but with police budgets

being cut by 20 %, will there be enough coppers to make the robbers

are afraid? Even in Dorset there is concern about how the police can

Like forces up and down the country, Dorset sent several dozen officers

to the capital and elsewhere to help restore order after the riots.

Also like forces across England and Wales, Dorset are facing cuts of 20

%. Locally that means over 100 police officers and 145 support

staff are to go. Other savings include the closure of the 24 hour

custody suite here, one of only three in the whole county. Cuts to

the police marine section and the halving of the flying time of the

Dorset police helicopter. These tours -- to MPs are partners in the

coalition but phone be the impact of a cut on policing the County.

do live in austere times but I am against the cuts as they are

proposed in the police. It is incredibly challenging for police

forces and particularly for Dorset. Let's look for efficiencies that

are not affecting frontline services. I want to see it our

policemen out on the streets rather than being tied up with paperwork

and that bureaucracy has been an issue ever since I have been an MP.

If we can get to grips with that, then a good job will have been done.

The police should not be tampered with. The police numbers should

remain as they are. Police homes, houses and offices should be

reopened. Their reliance on IT, CCTV, of course they are important

but what is most important is human intelligence and that is putting an

officer in every village, town and insuring the public have access to

them 24 hours a day. That have caused is highly unlikely. Labour

meanwhile say the 20 % cuts are irresponsible and the former Labour

MP for South Dorset who lost his seat degrees of. I am very

pessimistic about the impact on crime and on people's sense of

safety in Dorset. We are lucky in Dorset. We have low levels of crime

but whole communities will feel abandoned. They have is a certain

amount it will not achieve it but at less they have professionals to

work with, they will not be able to do a professional job. 20 % cuts

are unrealistic. We said a certain amount of cuts will be necessary to

make the contribution to deficit reduction, but 20 %, nationally as

16,000 police, that is the same number that was needed to restore

order after the riots. Last year, Her Majesty's Inspectorate of

Constabulary said forces should be cut by 12 % and any more would

impact frontline services. But speaking earlier this year,

Dorset's Chief Constable said they were in the position to make the

savings of 20 %. We have to save �18 million over the next four

years. So it is quite a substantial saving to say the least. Having

said that, we have been changing the force for a number of years,

incremental development, we have put ourselves in a good place.

There is no hiding from the fact it will cause a difficult decisions

but what we have is a good process to make sure that we are as good as

we can be with the resources we have. The organisation that

represents the rank and file is less optimistic. My concerns are

that the government are cutting far too much too quickly. They are

cutting police budgets by 20 %. It will impact frontline services as

we can see in relation to the helicopter. I have would ask the

government to heed the advice of Her Majesty's Inspectorate of

Constabulary and only go to top the cent. There is a growing clamour

for the scale of the cuts to be reviewed. Which the Prime Minister

responded to in Parliament this week. Even after the changes, the

police will be able to surge in the way they did in Croydon, Tottenham,

Manchester and Salford. The problem on the night of the riots was that

surge did not take place soon enough. What is so complacent about

the party opposite is they are not prepared to consider any reforms to

get more police on to the frontline, on to our streets. The team cast

with delivering the cars in Dorset is being monitored and their

progress will be reviewed again at the next meeting of the police

authority in a week's time. That is about it for our part of

the show. Peter will be reporting from the Lib Dem Conference

throughout the week. You can keep up-to-date with all things

political here in the self by following Peter's blog. Next week

we will be looking at the contentious issue of changes to