Sebastian Payne

Prescott’s pitch for the police commissioner job

How strange — John Prescott is fast becoming the poster boy for elected police
commissioners. He appeared on the Today Programme earlier to explain why he’s putting himself forward for that very job in his home of Humberside. But has he acquiesced to Tory thinking? Don’t bet on it. As he told John Humphrys, he doesn’t actually support the legislation, but he does believe that Labour should have a man in the fight:

‘The Labour Party didn’t like this legislation and I voted against it, but once there is an election the party isn’t going to stay out of it and they will want to see it doesn’t go the way they feared it might go.’

Which probably explains why Prescott sees the role of elected police commissioners as quite limited. When questioned on what he would actually do, the Labour Lord was quick to say that he’d help with planning, but stay clear of operational matters:

‘What we will have now is a commissioner discussing what the community would like in that plan.

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