Name: Westminster Hall
Uploaded: 2026-10-13T13:35:02+00:00
Duration: 10829 s

00:20 - 00:28

Speaker 1

Order, order, and my apologies for my tardiness. I now call Luke Akehurst to move the motion.

00:28 - 01:28

Speaker 4

I beg to move that this House has considered police funding in the North East, and it's an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Wishart. I'm grateful to colleagues from across our region for coming here today so that we can speak with one voice about the need for greater resources to keep streets safe in our constituencies. I first want to pay tribute to the police officers that serve our constituents in the North East of England and across the country. Whatever political disagreements we will set out throughout this debate, I hope we can all agree that the men and women who put their own safety on the line to uphold law and order represent the very best of our country. In bringing forward this debate, I want this place to focus on how we can best support those working day in, day out to protect us and to ensure they can do the best possible job for our communities.

I know I won't be the only member in this room who's deeply disturbed to see the scenes emerging out of Cleveland earlier this year. I pay tribute to PC Matthew Blades and PC Tom Clough. I give way.

01:28 - 02:10

Speaker 3

I'm very grateful to my honourable friend for giving way. I too would like to add my thoughts to the families of PC Matthew Blades and PC Tom Clough. Matthew was a coach at my son's football club and his loss and the loss of Tom have been felt very deeply across our region. But their tragic deaths did not come out of the blue. They were as a result of systematic underfunding.

So does my right honourable friend agree with me that the funding formula has now become so perverse, so warped, so broken, that it now is inverse to the levels of crime we are seeing in our communities and the North East and Cleveland are losing out as a result?

02:10 - 03:55

Speaker 4

I thank my honourable friend for his intervention and indeed his anticipated what the general frost of the remarks I'm going to make is going to be. And I join him in paying tribute to PCs Matthew Blades and Tom Clough who lost their lives trying to protect the public. Whilst the Labour government was right to provide an additional two million pounds for Cleveland Police in response, it struck me that the challenges facing Cleveland are not unique within the North East region. They are challenges faced across the region, across the Durham, Cleveland and Northumbria police force areas. Police numbers were cut in the years after 2010, public safety has therefore deteriorated and our constituents are paying the price.

It terrifies me to think that communities like those I represent could ever face such a breakdown in law and order as occurred temporarily in Cleveland. It drew me to ask the question, why was our region left so under-resourced that it became vulnerable to such pressures? Sadly, I can only conclude the answer lies in an ideological choice by the Conservative Party during the 14 years in which it was in government, that places like North Durham were not deserving of the necessary police resources despite the severe social and economic challenges our community have faced, communities have faced following decades of deindustrialisation.

Frankly, that decision should be regarded as nothing short of a national scandal, as I hope to demonstrate today, it has reduced safety, security and opportunity for the people of our region. The numbers paint a damning picture of how badly the last Conservative government failed the North East of England. Our three police forces all sit in the top four across England and Wales in terms of percentage reduction in police numbers between 2010 and 2024. I will give way.

03:55 - 04:47

Speaker 2

I thank the honourable gentleman for bringing this forward and I want to come along to support him in his claims and his demands along with his colleagues from the North East as well. And unfortunately, I'm sorry to say that police underfunding is not just something that happens in the North East, it happens to us in Northern Ireland as well where our police numbers are down, where our funding is scarce. But at the same time, in the last few months, in the last year, sorry, I should say, the PSNI have been able to detain and seize some half a million pounds worth of drugs. But it does, I feel, and I think the honourable gentleman will probably agree with me, community policing, which I've a great believer in, I know the honourable gentleman has the same belief in it as well, will it suffer? Because that's the front line of the police when it comes to the community and the face of the police.

And does he feel when it comes to the minister's response that there must be a real emphasis and prioritise for community policing?