Chiefs spell out funding issues faced by Welsh forces

18 July 2023

Police funding in Wales is under the spotlight once again after the chief constables of the four Welsh forces warned MPs of tightening budgets and the impact of high inflation.

The chiefs also highlighted the additional financial complexities they faced being accountable to two Governments when they gave evidence to the cross-party Commons Welsh Affairs Committee in Westminster.

Gwent CC Pam Kelly told committee members it was often difficult to “weave our way” through the confusion around funding and that the Welsh forces sometimes had to "knock doors twice" to secure money for specific initiatives such as drug awareness programmes.

Her Dyfed Powys counterpart Dr Richard Lewis said the “additional complexity” was “not insurmountable” but told the MPs it required careful management.

Police Federation Welsh affairs lead Nicky Ryan said politicians in London and Cardiff had to be constantly reminded of the challenges faced by the Welsh forces.

“It was interesting to see the chief constables of the four Welsh forces spelling out the realities of police funding to MPs,” she said.

“It is essential that ministers in Westminster take on board the concerns that were raised by the people who are responsible for managing policing budgets on a daily basis.

“But it is equally important that our own politicians in the Senedd understand how their decisions and policies involving devolved stakeholders impact on front line policing across Wales.

“Being answerable to two ideologically opposed governments throws up a unique set of challenges for our forces so it is vital that they are in the strongest possible position to face them.”

The chief constables also warned that police staff roles may be under threat because of tightening budgets and unexpected consequences of officer recruitment under the Police Uplift Programme.

The Welsh forces recruited an extra 1,127 officers under the programme with Gwent Police gaining 239 officers while South Wales Police took on an additional 527.

Ms Kelly welcomed the extra recruitment but said it had led to difficult decisions in other areas of the police workforce.

She told the MPs: “That means that the establishment of those 20,000 officers, quite rightly, needs to be maintained and that means that the only area that we can go to as it were for funding for savings are police staff, and it’s our police staff that answer our 999 calls, our custody detention officers, our cyber analysts or digital forensic analysts, they’re ordinarily police staff or not warranted officers.

“So it becomes much more complex than just numbers. It means that we’re potentially going to lose good people with good experience because we can’t afford to keep them.”

Jeremy Vaughan, Chief Constable of South Wales Police, said that if there was no extra funding for the 7 per cent pay rises announced last week then there could be job losses.