Government announces £1bn boost for neighbourhood policing

The home secretary has on Wednesday announced a £1 billion funding boost for police across England and Wales to restore neighbourhood policing and make the streets safer.

Part of the government’s Plan for Change, this will take total funding up to £19.5bn for next year.

The majority of this funding – up to £17.4bn and an increase of up to £987 million compared to last year – will be given to police and crime commissioners, allowing them to tackle crime in their communities, rid town centres of antisocial behaviour and apprehend persistent offenders.

This equates to a cash increase of up to 6 per cent and a real terms increase of 3.5 per cent, the Home Office said.

This money will include:

• £339 million more for the police core grant to help forces with general running costs and to be allocated by forces to tackle local priorities. This is significantly more than the £184 million rise announced last year.
• all costs arising from changes to National Insurance Contributions (NICs), helping police to balance their budgets.
• new funding of £100 million to kickstart the recruitment of 13,000 additional neighbourhood officers, community support officers and special constables, as announced by the Prime Minister earlier this month.
• £65 million more for the National and International Capital City (NICC) grant for the London forces, to recognise this has not kept pace with inflation and rising demands of policing the capital

In addition to the money being given to police and crime commissioners, the Home Office is also investing an extra £140m for Counter Terrorism Policing, ensuring that they have the resources they need to deal with the threats we face and protect the public from serious harm.

“Today’s settlement provides a substantial increase in funding for policing to help deliver on this government’s Safer Streets mission. This vital funding boost will enable forces to kickstart the recruitment of neighbourhood police officers and crack down on the crimes blighting our high streets and town centres,” home secretary Yvette Cooper said.

The provisional funding settlement comes after the home secretary also announced a major package of police reform, including a new Police Performance Unit to track local performance and drive up standards, and a new National Centre of Policing to harness new technology and forensics.

Projects that sit within other national priorities are also being protected, including:

• £612 million to help modernise police forces, enhancing their ability to share data, intelligence and evidence with each other and law enforcement partners. This funding will be essential in tackling the increasingly tech-savvy criminals who wreak havoc on people and businesses
• £50 million for Violence Reduction Units, delivering on the government’s pledge to halve knife crime
• £30 million to tackle the ongoing battle against serious organised crime through county lines routes

“We are determined to deliver for the people up and down this country and make good on our promise to reform policing, halve knife crime and tackle anti-social behaviour head on,” policing minister Dame Diana Johnson said.

“This settlement aims to do just that, providing a significant and substantial increase in funding that will allow polices forces to get a grip on criminality, to make our streets and communities safer.”