Police & Crime Commissioner Election Results: Staying Politically Engaged

PCCs are supposed to be the ‘voice of the people’.  One might expect that any PCC would be able to easily agree that:

• Crimes should be recorded noting the sex of the perpetrator. Gender must not be substituted for sex in crime statistics.  
• Victims of sexual assault should be able to request an interviewer of the same sex
• Strip searches on female suspects should be carried out by officers of the same sex

Unfortunately, this is not the case.  The creep of gender ideology, and the foothold Stonewall has in many of our public sector organisations means that many of the newly elected PCCs either don’t agree with these points, or cannot openly admit to agreeing with them.  The tables below set out all the newly elected Police and Crime Commissioners. We are in the process of contacting as many of the PCC’s whose views on recording biological sex are “unknown”, to determine their views and find out their objections (if any exist), but it is worth noting again that only 39 out of 166 PCC Candidates mentioned Women and the need to tackle violence against Women and Girls in their manifestos, and during the campaign, a whopping 66% refused to talk about the salient issue of sex in criminal statistics, both in terms of recording Sex as an aggravating factor, and in terms of reporting on Sex for misogyny offences.

 

As one volunteer posited, “What I’m seeing more clearly now is that whilst PCC candidates talk about VAWG, they really don’t understand the issue/ challenges & don’t have the data from which to draw the appropriate conclusions and make the appropriate plans. It’s all grandstanding.”

This is a damning indictment, especially when VAWG forms a large proportion of all police call-outs, investigations, and protection duties in most forces across the country. A responsible PCC should recognise that haphazard categorisation of Misogyny offences will mean the said PCC who effectively acts as CEO of his/ her force, will never get to grips with VAWG, an everyday policing issue and activity, clearly never marginal, which soaks up a lot of policing resources.

That’s why we need you to join us in holding the newly elected PCC’s to account. Write to them, congratulating them on winning the election, irrespective of Party affiliations, and remind them that as the PCC also chairs the local Criminal Justice Board, being PCC is an opportunity for them to reinforce prioritising offences against women within the overall policing system in your counties. Ask them to ensure there is a VAWG strategy in their annual Police and Crime Plan. After all, you can’t make policy on what you won’t define.

Police and Crime Commissioners

Avon & Somerset	Mark Shelford (Conservative)
Bedfordshire	Festus Akinbusoye (Conservative
Cambridgeshire	Darryl Preston (Conservative)
Cheshire	John Dwyer (Conservative)
Cleveland	Steve Turner (Conservative)
Cumbria	Peter McCall (Conservative)
Derbyshire	Angelique Foster (Conservative)
Devon and Cornwall	Alison Hernandez (Conservative)
Dorset	David Sidwick (Conservative)
Durham	Joy Allen (Labour)
Dyfed-Powys	Dafydd Llewelyn (Plaid-Cymru)
Gloucestershire	Chris Nelson (Conservative)
Gwent	Jeff Cuthbert (Labour)
Hampshire Constabulary	Donna Jones (Conservative)
Hertfordshire	David Lloyd (Conservative)
Humberside	Jonathan Evison (Conservative)
Kent	Matthew Scott (Conservative)
Lancashire	Andrew Snowden (Conservative)
Leicestershire	Rupert Matthews (Conservative)
Lincolnshire	Marc Jones (Conservative)
Merseyside	Emily Spurrell (Labour)
Norfolk	Giles Orpen-Smellie (Conservative)
North Wales	Andy Dunbobbin (Labour)
Northumbria	Kim McGuinness (Labour)
Nottinghamshire	Caroline Henry (Conservative)
South Wales	Alun Michael (Labour)
South Yorkshire	Alan Billings (Labour)
Suffolk	Tim Passmore (Conservative)
Surrey	Lisa Townsend (Conservative)
Sussex	Katy Bourne (Conservative)
Thames Valley	Matthew Barber (Conservative)
Warwickshire	Philip Seccombe (Conservative)
West Mercia	John Campion (Conservative)
West Midlands	Simon Foster (Labour)
**Wiltshire	**Candidate Disqualified because of previous drink driving convictions. A fresh set of elections will be held soon

Police, Fire and Crime Commissioners

Essex	Roger Hirst (Conservative)
North Yorkshire	Philip Allott (Conservative)
Northamptonshire	Stephen Mold (Conservative)
Staffordshire	Ben Adams (Conservative)

Mayors

Greater Manchester	Andy Burnham (Labour)
London	Sadiq Khan (Labour)
West Yorkshire	Tracy Brabin (Labour)

Yesterday, a twitter storm blew up over this kind of misrepresentation of male criminals who masquerade as female and are afforded the status of “Woman”, despite committing offences which are clearly male in nature. PCC’s are ultimately responsible for this, as they exert enormous influence and are supposedly responsible for the “totality of policing” and newspapers report how a a defendant is identified in court. IPSO then uses the excuse of, “The Committee also noted that accurately identifying a defendant in the same way they were identified in court and are known in society, helps to correctly identify defendants, and ensure the wrong person is not associated with the crime” to NOT uphold complaints against this false narrative which obscures male pattern offending. 

Any good PCC worth their salt should note that “accurate, comprehensive and nuanced data” is important “as a mechanism for capturing an accurate picture of what is happening ‘out there’, of changing and emerging patterns of victimisation and offending, of groups of victims and offences that are under-reported and under represented” and strive to make a positive difference to their communities, demonstrating success in improving the experience of victims. 

Police Services may wish to record self-identified gender as an additional data item but it cannot be substituted for sex in their operations or official statistics. If your commissioner supports #SexNotGender make sure their actions in office are consistent with this. If they won’t come off the fence on this issue, don’t let them get away with it! Let your PCC know #WomenAreWatching

How you can take action:

• Download a copy of the letter and send to your newly elected PCC (Please feel free to modify and personalize to your hearts’ desire, you can also CC your MP in with a personal message about why you are concerned  –  and ask for a meeting with them, if you feel able to).
• Share it with other women, and GC critical men – in your WhatsApp groups, with your neighbors, discuss at the school gates with fellow mums (if you feel able to), and others whom you know will also be concerned at the misrepresentation of male crimes as female offences, and the falsification of crime statistics (which distorts public understanding of the nature of such crimes, paving the way for more Jimmy Savilles).
• Share also on social media, using hashtags:  #AskYourPCC #NotOurCrimes #SexNotGender
• Give us feedback on the Letter: Let us know if your PCC (and/or MP) responds, good or bad.