• Question by: Graham Tope
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

I think one talent all of us will agree you do have is the ability to grab headlines. Could you then help us and use your talents to ensure that we get the headlines for talking about effective policing, operational police measure, if you like, rather than the much easier headline grabbing bit of 28,000, 29,000, 35,000 or whatever figure you choose to give?

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

I welcome the increase in numbers and I am glad you used your influence in purchasing that increase to suggest that with these new officers the value would come from spending time on the street. Are you aware that 23 police stations and counters closed between 1997 and 2000 and that 53 are open part-time? As well as policing on the street, local communities, where these counters or stations have closed, are feeling isolated and unsafe. You, yourself, said that pensioners need visible policing. Pensioners tell me that they also want their police station open. The Met sited shortage of...

• Question by: Graham Tope
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

Would it not be very much better for you to, instead of talking about just crude numbers all the time, be it 28,000 or now 35,000, actually started leading the debate on effective police resources? What is important to London is not just numbers of police officers but that they are being used effectively. Do you agree that that is the key issue?

• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

Do you think that the MPA has got its priorities wrong in not promoting traffic policing as an opportunity?

• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

In my work on road safety, I argue within the MPA and with the MPS that reducing the number of traffic officers reduces a much bigger percentage opportunity for catching criminals. Would you agree with this?

• Question by: Toby Harris
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

The answer I was looking for was actually, "Yes".

• Question by: Toby Harris
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

I am sure you are aware, Mr Mayor, that the BBC has recently won a landmark case against the Metropolitan Police in terms of the trademark of the Police Box and the fact that it is more identified with the Tardis and Dr Who than the Metropolitan Police. Would you, however, favour the reintroduction of Police Boxes around London on the basis that that would provide an opportunity for people to make quick contact with the police rather than re-opening police counters, tying up police officers who might otherwise be patrolling and that that would be a best way of...

• Question by: Graham Tope
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

I think you are talking about the MPS as distinct from the MPA because exactly what you are saying is one of the disciplines that the MPA is trying to bring to the MPS. Let me be clear that what you are saying is that rather than prejudging in the hypothetical case, were a significant number of Borough Commanders to follow the route of the one I have already referred to, you would not prejudge that issue, you would allow them to do that even though it might mean not meeting your overall target for numbers and you would be...

• Question by: Graham Tope
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

I think both Richard Barnes and I would agree that is very unfair to Toby Harris. The Mayor: Whoever has got the money has got the power. Graham Tope: I would like to think I had the money! Can I then try and pin you down a little more? We have in six boroughs already, a pathfinder project for devolved budgeting. In one of those boroughs, the Borough Commander has decided, with agreement locally, that he will reduce the number of police officers in that borough in order to increase civilian staff and provide, in his view, more effective policing...

• Question by: Graham Tope
• Meeting date: 23 October 2002

I do not recall us making any cuts in the Mayor's Budget as far as the MPA was concerned. We all, except the Conservative party that did not count for these purposes, agreed the Police Budget that you put before us. But you have not answered the actual question; you have discussed the premise of my question but you have not answered the actual question, which was: given your aspiration to 35,000 police officers within the next three financial years, how many additional civilian staff are you willing to see recruited in order to give them proper and effective support?