Minutes

Minutes of the meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority held on 10 December 2002 at 10 Dean Farrar Street, London, SW1.

Present

Members

• Toby Harris (Chair)
• Richard Barnes (Deputy Chair)
• Anthony Arbour
• Jennette Arnold
• Reshard Auladin
• Lynne Featherstone
• Nicky Gavron
• Kirsten Hearn
• Elizabeth Howlett
• Nicholas Long
• Eric Ollerenshaw
• Sir John Quinton
• Richard Sumray
• Graham Tope

MPA officers

• Catherine Crawford (Clerk)
• Peter Martin (Treasurer)
• Simon Vile (Head of Secretariat).

MPS officers

• Sir John Stevens (Commissioner)
• Ian Blair (Deputy Commissioner)
• Keith Luck (Director of Resources)
• Tim Godwin (Acting Assistant Commissioner)
• Martin Tiplady (Director of Human Resources)

Part 1

62. Apologies for absence

(Agenda item 1)

Apologies for absence were received from Cindy Butts, Darren Johnson, R David Muir, Cecile Wright, Abdal Ullah, Rachel Whittaker and Jenny Jones.

63. Declarations of interest

(Agenda item 2)

None made.

64. Draft 2003/04 budget

(Agenda item 3)

The Authority considered a joint report by the Treasurer and Commissioner inviting the Authority to review the draft budget for 2003/04 in the light of the Government’s grant settlement, which was announced on 5 December. A further report by the Treasurer setting out the outcome for the Authority of the grant settlement had been emailed to members the afternoon before the meeting. A further report by the Commissioner was tabled, which summarised the impact of the settlement on the budget and identified some new initiatives which the Commissioner and the MPS Management Board recommended be now included in the precept funding envelope.

The Treasurer’s report indicated minimum additional flexibility, following the grant settlement and after balancing the budget as currently drafted, of £1.6 million. An unconfirmed specific grant of up to £7.8 million could be receivable in respect of PNB-agreed special priority payments. If confirmed this would increase the budget flexibility to £9.4 million. It would only be possible, therefore, to make conditional decisions, which would be dependent on further clarification of the grant position.

In opening the discussion on the draft budget, the Chair proposed an approach to making use of the underspend forecast for 2002/03 and whatever funding was ultimately available in 2003/04 to address currently unfunded initiatives. These proposals, which were subject to some amendment during the discussion, are reflected in the resolution below.

Richard Sumray expressed concern that one-off funding for child protection work would not be an adequate response to the findings of the Climbié Inquiry – he suggested provision of a £500,000 contingency to be placed in the priority ranking just above or below funding for additional Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs).

Tony Arbour had concerns that, because government funding required matched funding, the Chair’s proposals for additional PCSOs would result in borough councils having to contribute. The Chair responded that his proposals would result in the opposite, i.e. that a base allocation of PCSOs would be funded by the MPA and that the borough commander would therefore retain control over the deployment and operation of these PCSOs.

Eric Ollerenshaw commented that the capital funding was not referred to in the papers, although reports to the Finance Committee had forecast an underspend in the current year. He suggested that some of the proposed initiatives could be capitalised. The Treasurer responded that the Finance Committee had not yet considered the (five year) medium term capital programme – this would probably happen in January, depending on when the government announced the capital settlement. Although there was underspend forecast in the current year this did not necessarily give the Authority sufficient flexibility over a five year period. It was also the case that not every project was capitalisable – for instance, in terms of the backlog maintenance, much routine maintenance would not be capable of treatment in this way. Richard Barnes suggested that it might be possible to capitalise small items of maintenance by rolling them up into a programme of works.

The Director of Resources commented on the extent to which small variations in the progress of the C3i project could, because of its size, distort capital programme spend. The other main area of underspend was property services, which was currently the subject of a fundamental review.

The Chair expressed the view that the Authority should be looking to create capital reserves in view of the significant challenges facing it in the coming years.

Richard Barnes commented that it was not possible to do more than note the Chair’s proposals until the grant position was clearer. He also expressed reservations about fully committing funding as soon as there appeared to be any budget flexibility.

Reshard Auladin commented that he would like to see Glidewell as one of the top priorities. He also repeated his request for further explanation of the increase in the proposed police overtime budget.

Jennette Arnold suggested that further provision should be made for the health and safety responsibilities that the Authority would shortly be assuming. She also felt that the Authority should contribute more positively to crime and disorder reduction partnerships.

Richard Sumray concurred with this. The report of the CDRP scrutiny panel would be recommending an allocation of £50,000 per borough to enable the borough commander to be proactive, although it was also necessary to see what the government would be proposing on partnership funding. He also emphasised the importance of keeping a tight hold on budget spend, particularly through the continued operation of the budget contingency group.

Elizabeth Howlett commented that the option that had so far not been considered was putting the additional funding towards reducing the precept requirement.

In responding to some of the issues raised by members, the Treasurer commented that, with relation to the proposals to utilise 2002/03 underspend, it was important that the Finance Committee reviewed these in January to ensure that they were genuinely one-off projects. Given that the Authority’s accounts continued to be qualified in relation to inadequate provision for pensions and third party liabilities, any action to build reserves would be welcome. Referring to paragraph 8 of the Mayor’s letter, he said that this might be an opportunity to incorporate funding for additional PCSOs, given that the Crime Fighting Fund provided for the funding for police officers which was already included in that envelope. Referring to appendix A of the Commissioner’s tabled report, the Treasurer deleted the ‘diversity initiatives’ bid (£252,000) as this had already been funded.

Resolved

1. That, within the parameters set out by the Treasurer in his report and introduction, the Authority agree the following order of priority for incorporation of new initiatives in the budget, conditional upon confirmation of sufficient additional grant funding.
   1. Three items of one-off expenditure to be considered in the context of the projected 2002/03 underspending.
      These items to be reviewed by the Finance Committee in the context of the underspending, including being satisfied on the one-off nature of the expenditure and that they are consistent with the latest proposals regarding Glidewell.
      1. child protection - £0.45m
      2. backlog maintenance – 1.0m.
      3. criminal justice (Glidewell) - £1.853m.
   2. The calls on additional grant funding in 2003/04 to be made in the following order:

2. That the Authority review the position when the grant funding has been fully clarified.

Conservative members on the Authority reserved their position in respect of all of the above items with the exception of the provision for child protection and backlog maintenance.

The Liberal Democrat members on the Authority reserved their position.

65. MPA Liaison Officer

The Chair reported that Inspector Peter Richardson was due to move on from his role as the MPA’s liaison officer, to resume operational duties in Hammersmith. He paid tribute to Peter’s contribution from the inception of the Authority and members of the Authority joined the Chair in thanking Peter for this and in presenting him with some tokens of the Authority’s appreciation.

The meeting ended at 11.40 a.m.

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