Minutes:
Consultation on to Role of Police and Crime Commissioners
Mr Dodwell referred to the current consultation regarding the future roles of Police and Crime Commissioners (PCC’s), in particular to the Fire and Rescue service coming within the PCC’s remit.
The PCC informed the Panel that he was not in favour of PCC’s taking over prominence of Fire Authorities.
County Durham and Darlington currently enjoyed an excellent Fire and Rescue Authority/Fire and Rescue Service and also an excellent police service and he could see no reason to upset the balance of this by changing the role of the PCC.
The PCC acknowledged there was a need for the services to work together in greater collaboration where possible, and acknowledged that, for various reasons, this collaborative work had not progressed as quickly as it should have done in the past.
There was now a need to revitalise the programme of work around collaboration and to develop a Memorandum of Understanding between the two organisations. Officers of both his office and the Fire and Rescue Service were undertaking work on the processes needed for future collaboration to take place which should help drive forward key decisions to be made regarding savings to be made by both organisations.
The PCC informed the Panel that he would provide updates to future Panel meetings.