Paul Varnsverry

Paul Varnsverry, pictured outside Gloucester Avenue Post Office, in Northampton.

Paul Varnsverry has welcomed the announcment by Liberal Democrat Business Minister, Ed Davey, of a ten-year deal between Royal Mail and Post Office Ltd.

Co-Chair of the Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Party Committee on Business, Innovation and Skills, Lorely Burt said:

“This is very welcome news for both the Post Office and Royal Mail and demonstrates our commitment to ensure a sustainable future for both.

“Post Offices are a vital part of our communities and are the lynchpin of our towns and villages. More than 20m people visit a Post Office every week to send letters to loved ones, to manage their finances or to renew passports for holidays and hundreds of thousands of pensioners rely on them every day for their pensions.

“Labour left Royal Mail in a terrible mess and it is Liberal Democrats in the Coalition Government who have stopped closures and put Royal Mail and the Post Office on a secure footing. Our plans mean that we will never see the kind of planned closures that devastated local communities under the previous Government.“Labour said our plans would lead to more closures as the Royal Mail moved away from using the Post Office network. Today’s announcement proves that they were, once again, wrong.”

Paul Varnsverry, who headed a community campaign to save Gloucester Avenue Post Office in Northampton, added:

Paul Varnsverry has described the Conservative leader of Northampton Borough Council and his deputy as “clueless” after a shocking display of their lack of understanding of the powers available to Police Community Support Officers.

Addressing a meeting of full council at the Guildhall, where two motions on Conservative plans to axe funding which could see 20 fewer PCSOs on the town’s streets were being debated, Paul commented that these officers have the power to detain a suspect for up to thirty minutes, pending the arrival of a police officer to make the arrest.

In a shocking display of dual ignorance, Conservative Deputy Leader, John Caswell, stood up and attempted to shout Mr Varnsverry down, stating that PCSOs have no such powers.

“I knew he was completely wrong and utterly clueless on the subject”, says Paul. “I have spent most of my adult life working in some form or another with the police and when I was Deputy Leader, with portfolio responsibility for community safety, it was important to have a comprehensive understanding of the PCSOs’ role and powers.

“PCSOs work hard in the front line of policing and are well-respected by the public – but not, it seems, by the leaders of the Conservative administration at the Guildhall who clearly haven’t a clue what PCSOs do so they fail to understand why the public is outraged by their proposed funding cuts.”

Paul has written to all 45 borough councillors, plus senior officers, clarifying the powers available to PCSOs and expects Councillor Caswell to acknowledge his error (a copy of the email appears below).

Dear Councillors,

At Monday evening’s meeting of full council, during my second address to the council, I stated that Police Community Support Officers have the power to detain a suspect for up to thirty minutes.

You will recall that Councillor Caswell stood immediately and challenged that statement as being incorrect; responding by saying that PCSOs have no such powers. Irrespective of his intervention, I repeated my account of the facts, which I said were true and accurate.

For the avoidance of doubt, your attention is drawn to the following statements on the Northamptonshire Police web site:

“They [PCSOs] can issue Fixed Penalty Notices & Penalty Notices for Disorder, seize property and detain individuals pending the arrival of a police officer.” (Source: http://www.northants.police.uk/neenor/default.aspx?id=5868)

and:

“We don’t have the same power of arrest as a police officer but we can detain someone for up to 30 minutes, while we wait for a regular officer to come and help.” (Source: http://northants.police.uk/neenor/default.aspx?id=5325)

I also met with a Police Community Support Officer earlier today and explained the events of Monday’s full council meeting. They showed me their force orders which list their power to detain a suspect for up to thirty minutes.

It is regrettable that Councillor Caswell chose to challenge my statement in the manner he did, when he clearly does not have an accurate understanding of the subject matter. I am sure he will be quick to acknowledge his error. More troubling, however, is that his colleague, the Leader of the Council, whose portfolio responsibilities include those relating to Community Safety, did not restrain his colleague to advise that his intervention was incorrect; nor subsequently intervene himself to correct the error.

Best wishes and regards,

Paul Varnsverry

Paul Varnsverry has criticised a decision by Northampton Borough Council Conservative cabinet member, Councillor Tim Hadland, to withdraw the planning application for Northampton’s skate park, which was due to be determined by the planning committee on February 7th, 2012.

“I am bitterly disappointed to learn that Councillor Hadland has unilaterally taken the decision to withdraw the planning application for the skate park. He may have the powers to do so, but it is the wrong decision. I am investigating whether his decision falls within the criteria for call-in to the council’s Overview & Scrutiny committee.

The future of Northampton's skate park hangs in the balance as a result of Conservative tampering and interference

“Councillor Hadland was a member of the cabinet when it took the decision on 14th September 2011 to choose Midsummer Meadow as the preferred site for the skate park. The rationale Councillor Hadland is using, in a bid to justify moving the location of the skate park – that combined with developments at the west of Midsummer Meadow in connection with the Nunn Mills regeneration, there will be a “squeezing” of green space – was surely as present in September as he claims it is now. Why was it not raised as an issue at that time? Why was Councillor Hadland prepared to endorse the Midsummer Meadow site in unanimity with his cabinet colleagues last September, yet proposes radical changes now?

“I understand that the alternative site that is being offered will limit ambition for the skate park. That ambition was always that the £250,000 capital sum allocated by the council would be used to attract match funding enabling a larger, world class facility to be constructed, putting Northampton firmly on the action sports global map. The Conservatives are putting this at risk.

“An obvious concern is that the Conservatives will present the skateboard and BMX community with a fait accompli: “take what we are offering or we will take away the money and use it for another project”. The choice of funding the skate park project enjoyed cross party support and to move it to another project would be entirely counter to that consensus.

“In my opinion, the withdrawn planning application should be reinstated immediately, so the legal planning process can run its course and elected councillors can determine the application on February 7th. This will provide both supporters and objectors of the preferred site (from 14th September) to state their respective cases and for the proper legal decision to be taken in public.”

An appalling display at Monday’s meeting of full council saw borough Conservatives voting as one to cut funding for PCSOs.

Challenged by public speakers to address growing public concerns at community safety, following the county Conservative’s street light switch off, plus proposals to reduce staffing of the town’s CCTV system, each and every Conservative councillor voted to axe the £100,000 Northampton Borough Council contributes to Northamptonshire Police to employ Police Community Support Officers.

Taken in combination with the £500,000 cut announced by the county council, some 20 PCSOs could lose their jobs and leave Northampton’s streets exposed to increases in crime.

The leader of the council was criticised by members of the public and opposition councillors alike for an insensitive remark which belittled a recent serious sexual assault on a young woman.

The voting was as follows:

Voting FOR continued funding of PCSOs: Councillors Beardsworth, Begum, Capstick, Choudary (I), Choudary (N), Conroy, Davies, Eales, Glynane, Gowen, Marriott, Mason, Mennell, Meredith, Palethorpe, Rahman, Stone, Strachan, Subbarayan, Wire

Voting AGAINST funding of PCSOs: Councillors Ansell, Bottwood, Caswell, Duncan, Eldred, Flavell, Ford, Golby, Hadland, Hallam, Hibbert, Hill, King, Larratt, Lynch, Mackintosh, Malpas, Markham, Nunn, Oldham, Parekh, Patel, Sargent, Yates

Abstentions: The Mayor (Councillor Lane)

Paul Varnsverry, who addressed the council meeting and called on all councillors to vote in support of continued funding, commented “Each and every Conservative councillor should make it their duty to attend every residents’ association and community group meeting, in the wards they are elected to represent, to account for the way they voted. Some are committee members of these groups, so they will have some explaining to do.

“When they took control of the council in May, the Conservatives inherited a balanced budget for the next three years and already they have presided over the creation of a £1.8 million black hole in the finances. Liberal Democrats warned that the Conservatives’ election pledges were uncosted and unaffordable and this has now been proved. Pet projects like the councillor empowerment scheme may be well-intentioned, but they cannot take precedence over funding of public safety for all citizens and businesses of the town.”

Figures released under a Freedom of Information request reveal that in 2010, Northamptonshire Police dealt with more than 1500 attacks that were serious, violent or racially aggravated. These figures would be cause for concern if they were drawn from incidents across the entire county; however, when the area in which they took place is merely the centre of the county town, they are an appalling indictment of behaviour in modern-day Northampton.

So when the joint vice chair of the All Party Parliamentary “Save the Pub” Group, Brian Binley MP, whose voice is ordinarily heard calling for more steps to ensure the survival of British pubs, calls for a review of the number of pubs and clubs in Northampton’s town centre, it is a sign of the gravity of the situation and confirmation that matters have got out of hand and exceeded limits of tolerance.

Much as I share Brian Binley’s views, the review he proposes is merely a process, not a solution, and all it will tell us is what many of Northampton’s residents and businesses already know and what the elected councillors on the borough council’s licensing committee are only too aware of – and of course it will have no bearing on incidents which may not have excessive consumption of alcohol at their cause.

The way in which national licensing regulations require local licensing committees to consider applications is weighted in favour of the applicant, making it extremely difficult for them to refuse an application, even when local knowledge and experience indicates that there may be trouble ahead.

Licensing law has four objectives which must be taken into account:

- Prevention of crime and disorder
- Public safety
- Prevention of public nuisance
- Protection of children from harm

For an application for a licence on a new premise, there will be no record of breaches of any of the four objectives. Consequently, the licensing committee is expected to grant the application. Even if the licensing committee makes a stand, and refuses an application, the applicant has the legal right to appeal to the Magistrates.

Northampton Borough Council’s licensing committee refused an application in Bridge Street, because of concerns of the cumulative impact on issues the police were already having to address in the focal point of the town’s leisure zone. The applicant filed an appeal to the Magistrates Court in another county town and the local licensing committee’s ruling was overturned and the licence granted – locally-elected councillors over-ruled by an unelected panel; local knowledge dismissed at a hearing in another town.

In late 2010, Central Government held a consultation on changes to licensing law. I was the portfolio holder responsible for licensing services at the time and as part of my contribution to the consultation, I submitted the comment that appeals should also be heard in the districts in which the premises subject of the application are located. It seems a small point but I believe it is an important one. Why should individuals – however well-meaning in their consideration of an appeal – who do not live within the communities which could be affected by alcohol-related crime and antisocial behaviour be making decisions that affect local communities?

Another factor that should not be overlooked is the ready availability of cheap alcohol from supermarkets and anecdotal evidence of night-time revellers in towns and cities across the country taking their fill at home, whilst preparing to go out. Implementing a minimum price on a unit of alcohol  is just one of a number of  Liberal Democrat policy proposals to address alcohol-related crime and antisocial behaviour.

The vast majority of licensees run their establishments professionally and will not tolerate bad behaviour from their customers, most of whom are well-behaved and cause neither the police nor the community any problems whatsoever. It is the unacceptable conduct of a minority that needs to be dealt with. But will putting a halt to the growth in licensed premises in the town, or even taking away licenses from those that already operate, provide a solution or is it simply a knee-jerk reaction, when it is not licensees but their clientele who are at the cause of the crime figures?

Where is the sense in Magistrates in one town upholding appeals which generate prosecutions for alcohol-related crime in another? Licensing decisions, reviews and appeals should be dealt with locally. Parliamentarians like Mr Binley have it in their gift to change the law to bring about these improvements.

Additional information available at:   http://tinyurl.com/7qkbwj5  and http://tinyurl.com/6os2fwd

The Liberal Democrat Shadow Cabinet member for Health & Social Services, Cllr Marion Minney, has today raised concerns over Northamptonshire Conservatives proposal to cut £210,000 from support for carers.

Cllr Marion Minney said “We see in the national news today the crisis within our care services. Quite frankly without carers this crisis would be even worse. Northamptonshire Conservatives are proposing to cut the team that assesses what support carers need. This cut is short-sighted in the extreme.”

“Cutting support to carers could have disastrous consequences. Carers are crucial both in supporting relatives and friends in need, but also in making sure services such as care homes and mental health services are not even more overloaded than they already are. If they are not properly supported and struggle as a result, vulnerable people will suffer and our care system will be overloaded.”

“There will be a snowball effect, with more people needing higher levels of care, when we know that services are stretched to the limit by a growing older population. Northamptonshire Conservatives need to think again and make sure that carers are fully supported.”

Paul Varnsverry added “Carers tell me that the situation as it stands is already intolerable. They feel they are not being listened to by the Conservatives. I hear of those who have reached breaking point and who have regrettably had to give up caring, resulting in those they were looking after having to go into residential care with the significantly higher costs to the public purse that often entails.

“As ever, the Tories are showing their inability to consider the people their decisions will directly affect and, as is often the case, they are once again picking on the most vulnerable and at risk in society. Their “answer” can often be a false economy.”

Anyone with a real Christmas tree can drop it off at one of Northampton Borough Council’s tree collection points where it will be taken away for composting.

The collection points will be located at Billing Garden Store from Friday 6 January to Wednesday 11 January and at B&Q on Towcester Road from Thursday 12 January until noon on Friday 13 January.

Once collected trees will be taken to the council’s recycling centre in St James where they will be shredded to make compost.

Alternatively trees can be taken to one of the town’s Household Waste Recycling Centres or cut up and placed in householders’ brown wheelie bins ready for the next scheduled collection.

Households that do not have brown wheelie bins because they live in a black sack collection area can bag up cuttings and call Northampton Borough Council’s customer contact centre to arrange for a free collection.

For more information, please telephone 0300 330 7000.

Welcome to 2012. I hope the challenges the New Year looks set to bring will not have a detrimental effect on you and yours.

Regrettably, however, the crass stupidity and arrogance of the leaderships of both borough and county councils – who expect others to pick up the tab for the Conservatives’ self-serving decisions of the past – look set to force somewhere between 20 and 24 Police Community Support Officers to be sacked, if borough and county council budget proposals go ahead. This will leave communities which have seen crime figures steadily fall thanks to the Community Policiting intiative, facing the very real prospect of increases in crime and antisocial behaviour.

Support your local residents’ association meeting in the next two months. Go along and ask your local councillors what they are doing to keep our streets safe. If your councillor is Conservative, ask who they will support on this issue – the public who elected them into office, or their leaders who are proposing the loss of PCSOs.

We all know the financial challenges the nation faces; however, public safety is the wrong area to make cuts.

Please support the retention of the PCSOs who have worked so hard to make our communities safer and more pleasant places to live. Let them carry on the good work.

Northampton North MP, Michael Ellis, is calling for for the police to be given better training for dealing with large scale rioting.

As a member of the Home Affairs Select Committee, he believes the police did not respond to the summer’s riots with sufficient vigour. He is quoted as saying: “What I would say is that I would look into the equipment police have and the training they get and I would say more resources need to be put into training to deal with large scale public disorder.”

The public order equipment and training provided to British police officers is amongst the best in the world, says Paul Varnsverry

Mr Ellis’ comments are plausible, but wrong.

I have chaired the British Standards committee for police riot protection – or “public order equipment” to give it its correct description – since 1998. The committee successfully delivered an eleven-part series of standards covering public order protective equipment from the balaclava worn underneath the safety helmet (helmets are dealt with by a separate committee) to the boots and shoes worn by officers, plus their personal defence shields.

The standards were developed with input from experienced public order trainers, procurement professionals, health and safety advisers, medical doctors, reputable test instututes, academics and other experts. As part of the process of understanding the risks involved, several of my colleagues and I were required to observe or participate in public order training or operations. Our work included evaluations of the tactics and equipment used by the police and army in Northern Ireland and the particular challenges facing officers and their equipment in large scale public disorder in the province.

The training is deliberately intensive and places officers under tremendous physical and psychological stress so that, when they face real life public disorder, they know they can trust their protective equipment to do its job and their responses are consequently controlled and almost instinctive.

The public order tactics employed by British police officers are respected around the world. Public order training is regularly provided to overseas police and peacekeeping forces. I have personally taken part in training provided by British police officers to personnel from Canada, the USA, the Middle East, Malaysia and Hong Kong.

The British Standards are regularly quoted in overseas tender documents and I am proud to say the improvement in officer safety they have delivered, combined with the quality of officer training, are British success stories which we export and from which the rest of the world has enjoyed benefits. Incidentally, Northampton is home to two of the world’s leading manufacturers of public order equipment.

Paul Varnsverry has observed and participated in public order training across the globe

There is always a risk attached to second-guessing events played out in real time from the comfort of an enquiry committee room several months later. Mr Ellis commends Northamptonshire Police officers for their conduct in the London riots and I support these sentiments.

When police officers were tasked with doing their duty in hostile and dangerous environments, their training and equipment came to the fore. In terms of front line public order tactics, I believe British police officers are the best trained and amongst the best-equipped in the world.

I sincerely hope the Home Affairs select committee produces a report which will identify lessons from the riots of summer 2011. I simply consider the baseline of a shield formation is the wrong place to start.

(The opinions expressed in this article are those of Paul Varnsverry and not the official view of the British Standards Institute)

Paul Varnsverry has a strong working relationship with the Police at all levels and is a specialist technical advisor to an Association of Chief Police Officers committee, as well as chairman of the British Standards committee responsible for police protective equipment.

A matter of weeks after accusing Liberal Democrats of “scaremongering”, when genuine concerns were raised at the adverse effects the Conservative’s switching off street lights could have on the effectiveness of the town’s CCTV network, the Conservatives are now proposing to axe an undisclosed number of cameras; ending those cameras’ deterrent and detection role.
 
This follows an assurance in August that there were “no plans to reduce the number of cameras in Northampton” and a pledge in September that the Conservatives were “committed to making Northampton a great place to live and work and our CCTV system has a significant part to play in making our community safer”. Quite simply, the Tories have failed to keep their promises. The leaders of the Conservative groups on both the borough and county councils have been less than honest with the public.
 
The street light switch off, proposals to axe funding for Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) and now plans to switch off CCTV cameras are merely the latest in a long line of failures by the Tories to support schemes which contribute to community safety. In 2005, they withdrew from the Area Partnership schemes and in 2009 the county Tories cut their funding for two Neighbourhood Coordinators who were each serving areas of deprivation.
 
All are clear evidence that the Conservatives have absolutely no commitment to public safety whatsoever.
 
The cost to the citizens of Northampton of operating the town’s multiple award-winning CCTV system is less than £1 per head per year. Reports in and letters to the local newspapers reveal the extent of public support for both CCTV cameras and PCSOs for the peace of mind they provide. The indications are clear: the public wants to see the number of operational cameras maintained or even increased, not reduced, and public support for the hard-working PCSOs is equally as strong!
 
The Liberal Democrats maintained funding for PCSOs and CCTV cameras despite prevailing economic conditions far more severe than those which the present Conservative administration faces – and left the borough council’s finances in an incomparably better condition than the depleted reserves and state of chaos we inherited from the previous Conservative administration. Have the Conservatives already mismanaged the council’s accounts and returned to their “world’s worst council” standards?
 
After just seven months in office, the Tories are fast proving they have learned nothing since they were deemed “the world’s worst council.” Frighteningly, it appears whatever the county Conservatives do today, the town Tories whom they view as their underlings slavishly follow tomorrow.

Both town and county deserve better!