Why doesn’t the home secretary have the power to fire police chiefs?

The strange case of Craig Guildford, the West Midlands chief constable who confessed to using AI in an official report and lost the confidence of the home secretary, highlights the difficult political dilemmas that arise around any “top cop” when things go badly awry. Indeed, it’s not too strong to suggest that this is actually a pivotal moment for the future of policing in Britain.

Well, they can be sacked, but it’s not easy, and there’s a very good reason for that. Quite aside from questions of fairness and due process, it’s a fundamental principle in a pluralist democracy that those who run the criminal justice system – police officers, judges, prison administrators – have to be independent and free of political pressure. If a home secretary had the power to summarily dismiss any senior police officer, then the scope for abuse is clear – ultimately, the government would be in a position to force the arrest of a political opponent.

It’s all set out in the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act of 2011. In England and Wales, it’s down to the elected police and crime commissioner (PCC) for the relevant constabulary. In the mayoralties of Greater London, Greater Manchester, York and North Yorkshire, and West Yorkshire, PCC functions are undertaken by deputy mayors, and in South Yorkshire by the mayor.

The mayoralty of the West Midlands, the force overseen by Chief Constable Guildford, is an anomaly because the attempt to transfer powers to the West Midlands mayor was botched, failed a legal challenge, and was left with the West Midlands PCC. In London, uniquely, the home secretary has a reserve power to require the dismissal of the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police.

Analogous procedures are in place in Northern Ireland and Scotland. In all cases, a chief constable under pressure is entitled to due process and the right to put their own case, and this also involves the Police and Crime Panel, with strong representation from the local authorities. In the West Midlands this means councillors from Birmingham, Coventry, Dudley, Wolverhampton,Sandwell and so on, as well as a few independents.

Through the usual disciplinary procedures for misconduct – though it has been suggested (and disputed) that the home secretary maintains reserve powers under the Police Act 1996. In extreme cases, a chief constable could be prosecuted for a crime; they are not above the law, even if they are above politics. Normally they quit when the relevant people say they’ve no confidence in them – as with Cressida Dick in London in 2022, and Simon Byrne at the PSNI in 2023.

Yes. Labour is committed to abolishing the PCC system, so decisions will soon have to be taken as to who will in future be able to hire and fire our most senior police officers, how they will be able to do that, and in what circumstances it can happen.

Such powers can probably be left as they are now with the devolved administrations in Stormont and Holyrood, and the mayors in the big combined authorities. For the areas that previously had a PCC, the logical step would be for other forces to be overseen by their local authority or authorities, through some committee. These would have some democratic accountability.

However, the example of Guildford highlights how local councillors can be involved in decisions on policing events with a “political” dimension, such as demonstrations or a charged sports fixture, and the councillors might thus be compromised in the way they also exercise their duties of oversight. If a home secretary were to be given an ultimate role in this process, to overcome that potential weakness, that would also carry a different risk of politicisation and centralisation, and erode local responsibility, especially in the case of directly elected mayors.

Designing such machinery, preferably with cross-party consensus, and making it durable will be huge challenge for Shabana Mahmood in the months ahead, and she’s unlikely to get much help from her Tory opposite number, Chris Philp. Mahmood has already declared that “when a chief constable is responsible for a damaging failure of leadership, the public rightly expect the home secretary to act. And I intend to restore their ability to do so. This government will soon reintroduce the home secretary’s power to dismiss chief constables.”

The British tradition of independent policing is in some jeopardy.