Why police chiefs should not be elected

The issue of elected police chiefs is one that has been broiling for some time. The Tories have been a fan of the idea of creating American style sherrifs for a while now. Last year, Sir Simon Milton of the LGA officially proposed direct elections for Chief Constables, a proposal endorsed by two of the three main London Mayoral candidates in May's elections, including the eventual winner. Now, even the Home Secretary has got in on the game. Sensing that more and more people are converting to the cause, she has decided to do an Italy, changing sides just as it becomes apparent who's going to win.

Alas, so desperate to follow popular opinion wherever it may go so she can lead it, I fear she is making a terrible mistake, even by the Home Office's standards. Chief Constables and Commissioners must not be directly elected any more than High Court judges or military officers. Public safety is too important to be decided by a show of hands, which is why I baulked at an article written in the First Post (see link) today by Daniel Hannan - oh how I loathe that man! Hannan's whole argument seemed to rest on one survey result from 2001, carried out in nine constabularies with a dose of Ian Blair bashing to boot.

Coming off a little like a host of Family Fortunes, he reported how the survey indicated that the constabularies viewed "recruiting more ethnic minority officers, cracking down on sexist language, [and] improving their relations with the gay community" as their core priorities. Carrying on his faultless Les Dennis impression, he added that when extended to the local population of each constabulary, the survey said: "catch more criminals". Now even if we ignore the ridiculously open ended nature of the question that makes it impossible to fairly compare the answers given -somehow I suspect the Police consider catching criminals not so much a priority as much a raison d'etre- the answers do paint a worrying picture of what we could expect in any Police Authority election. How do these people know that improving police relations with minority communities, often vital sources of police intelligence in sensitive investigations, and eliminating discrimination within forces themselves to ensure that only the best qualified individuals get the best jobs, is not integral to catching more criminals? And how many right-thinking (as opposed to vote seeking) officers would place catching criminals as a higher priority than preventing crimes in the first place?

'Catching Criminals' makes for a great soundbite and indeed soundbites are what win elections: 'The Economy Stupid' and 'Tough on Crime, Tough on the Causes of Crime' come instantly to mind. But the level of jurisprudence, reponsibility and integrity required for such a vital role in our society cannot be condensed into soundbites. Furthermore, the critical decisions that Chief Constables take every day on everything ranging from tackling anti-social behaviour in town centres to counter-terrorism must be objective not political. The pandimonium that would inevitably arise from a Chief Constable feeling pressured to put his/her core constituents before their professional opinions is unimaginable. No sensible person would ever suggest subjecting our leading Generals to popular election because they dare not think how different the war may have turned out had General Montgomery been kept from the front because he lost an election to an opponent pledging to kill more Germans. To say that Police chiefs should be treated differently is to say that pubic safety is not as important as national security when in fact, as anyone who was around on 7/7 knows, the two are heavily intertwined.

However, this not to say the police should be accountable only to themselves. The core requirement of any liberal democracy that the state remain under civillian control at all times means that they will always be subject to a degree of political decision making. But this is because the police service is not responsible for making the law, but only for implementing it, leaving legislation to those who were elected to perform that very purpose. This is right and proper as any population that does not expect to get a say in the formation of the laws that govern them is living in a dictatorship.

Those same elected officials though rely on the independent expertise of the Police to enforce those laws if for no other reason than to make sure those laws are effective, so they can keep their seats come election time. The people have already had their say. Put another way, I'll vote for brain surgery to kept available on the NHS, but when it comes to the doctor performing the operation itself, I want the guy who finished top of his class at Medical School not top of the opinion polls in my local borough.