Additional £2m for Cleveland Police is a 'drop in the ocean' says PCC
The Government announced the extra funding to tackle serious and organised crime
Cleveland's Police and Crime Commissioner's calling on the Government to act now to address what he calls the 'chronic underfunding' of the force.
Matt Storey says he welcomes the extra £2 million from the Government to tackle serious and organised crime but it's 'nowhere near enough.'
He said: "Whilst Cleveland Police will use this additional £2m to deal with the immediate aftermath of these terrible incidents, it does nothing to address the chronic underfunding that has disadvantaged policing in Cleveland for years.
"A one-off payment is not a solution. It fails to tackle the deep-rooted funding inequalities that continue to disadvantage the hardworking officers, staff and communities of Cleveland.
"I call on Government to act now. Cleveland Police needs at least an additional £20m every year to recruit and retain 200 more police officers, to strengthen efforts to crack down on serious and organised crime.
"It shouldn't take something as tragic as this to lead the Government to fund those appropriately. We need to channel our anger into positive action and try and make something good come out of something so tragic.
"The funding's nowhere near enough. It's a drop in the ocean in comparison to what we need. We need a fundamental structural change to funding as well. We need the funding formula to change so that it reflects deprivation of poverty and crime rates. And we need that immediate injection of significant funding year on year because if we don't get that, then it'll be really difficult for us to change the picture locally.
"I always welcome more money and it is good that they give us £2 million. I won't ever turn down funding. But because it's a one-off, people shouldn't be under the misapprehension that it's going to be spent on police officers because it won't be. We won't hire new police officers with it because it's not recurring. What we need is a much bigger injection of funding year on year so that we can hire extra police officers and we can plough that money into frontline policing.
"It's about making sure that when we do get funding, it's longer term, the funding formula changes again longer term. And we don't say that we're, as the Home Secretary said, waiting until police reform's finished. Well, policing reform and police mergers might not happen until 2034, which is eight years away. They need to change the formula and change the funding situation now because we can't afford to wait.
"We've been writing letters since I was elected in 2024, so I think we've written seven letters, we've only had a couple of responses, and we'll keep the campaign going. And we just need to keep pushing for this. If we can get the Government to move on this and change, then I think it will be for the benefit of everybody in Cleveland and for the benefit of the force themselves."