Given half a chance, Liberal Democrats would get rid of Police and Crime Commissioners. While the positions exist, though, it’s important that voters have the chance to choose a Liberal Democrat.
It’s good to see that the party is putting more effort into contesting these positions than we did four years ago. Two members of the LDV team are even standing, Chris White in Hertfordshire and Joe Otten in Yorkshire.
Last Sunday, Joe was interviewed, along with the other candidates, on BBC Sunday Politics. Have a watch here.
* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
3 Comments
The interviews begin about 43 minutes in. Good luck, Joe!
Well done Joe! It seems a difficult role to stand for, but I know you’d do a good job.
The election candidates seemed to be doing a lot of incumbency/Labour bashing in that video! I’d be surprised if they won going from what I saw there.
Well done for standing up for democracy too by saying Labour should be allowed to contest the election.
Whilst I commend Liberal Democrats who want to stand for this useless elected post, I cannot bring myself to vote for any candidate and, for the first time in 50+ years I have
“spoiled” my ballot paper. This Commissioner post has created two captains on a ship in some areas, and virtual dictators in others. Essex Police Authority, which i chaired, had 4 magistrates (not elected) 4 Home Office appointed “independents” ( a parish clerk, a businesswoman, a chair of a Health Trust, and a CEO of a charity) and 8 elected county councillors (proportionate to their party’s vote on the County). The Chairman was a convenor not a dictator. Whu the Tories wanted the Authorities abolished was obvious.
We were not poodles of the elected government, we did not seek public profile, we brought common-sense to locally accountable policing by consent.