It’s time for Jeremy Corbyn to celebrate the fantastic work of Labour PCCs

Two weeks ago we saw the second set of elections for police and crime commissioners with turnout in England increasing to 25.2 per cent compared to 15.1 per cent in November 2012. The figure varied from 33 per cent in West Yorkshire to 17.4 per cent in Durham, with higher voter numbers where there were council elections.

Following the 2012 low turnout the Electoral Commission held a review with its number one emphatic recommendation: “at the 2016 PCC elections a candidate information booklet must be sent to every household”.

This would of course give PCC candidates parity with Parliamentary candidates and, when you consider the size of PCC constituencies, you can see why this is essential. My police area of Derbyshire has 11 parliamentary constituencies, 440,000 homes and 800,000 voters. Actually it is quite small compared to the Metropolitan police areas.

David Jamieson in West Midlands has 28 constituencies. The Government’s response was to reject this very sensible recommendation on the basis of cost. Yet if we are to have a democratic system of governance and accountability for this vital service then there is a cost and, if we want people to participate in an election, then they must be given information. It would appear that the Tories wanted to keep the 2016 PCC elections as quiet as possible by spending a very miserly £27,000.

But sadly the Labour Party are also frequently guilty of not mentioning PCC elections when sending out emails to members about upcoming elections and reporting on election action. The messages rightly talked about Scotland, Wales, mayoral and local authority elections but PCC elections were not on the radar. Yet, when the Party is looking for a litmus test, remember the PCC elections took place across the whole of England and Wales (with the exception of Greater London and Manchester).

The email sent to party members in Jeremy Corbyn’s name on Saturday from [email protected] failed to give any mention whatsoever to some Labour PCC candidates’ stunning victories. This has to stop and the Labour Party must start giving my PCC colleagues the recognition they deserve.

And, of course, the BBC national news could only manage an end of programme link to their website on the Friday night of the PCC results. But could there be an ulterior motive here? Following their vitriolic attacks on our leader and the party over the last few weeks, and their prediction of doomsday for Jeremy and Labour, the expected meltdown did not materialise. It did not happen because of our fantastic candidates and their campaign teams in all of the elections across the UK who worked their socks off to make life better for the most vulnerable people in the country.

On the up side Labour won Leicestershire, Humberside and Cheshire from the Tories and Gwent from an independent. Many congratulations to Willy Bach, Keith Hunter, David Keane and Jeff Cuthbert on these fantastic results. And in Derbyshire I retired confident in the knowledge my deputy Hardyal Dhindsa beat the Tories to become the first Asian and Sikh PCC in the country. I know he will do a great job.

We must have governance and accountability of policing, a public service with the power to detain citizens and take away their liberty. As one of the first group of Labour PCCs I am convinced that this model does work and that it extends into wide-raging engagement with the public and the plethora of voluntary groups working with victims of crime. It gives PCCs the ability to support these groups through contracts and commissioning and to offer grants to community groups. PCCs genuinely are the “link” between the public and criminal justice system.

I hope Labour will maintain its revised policy of supporting PCCs through Andy Burnham. But, most of all, I want the Labour Party and affiliates such as Labour Link to recognise and acknowledge the fantastic job our hard working Labour PCCs are doing, day in day out. After retiring May 11 I felt a little relief at losing the very heavy workload but I am going to sorely miss working with my PCC comrades in what will be an enlarged Labour Group of 15.

Alan Charles was Derbyshire’s first PCC and stood down earlier this month.