Shaun Bailey campaigns on police stations in Bexley despite closures under his party colleagues

Shaun Bailey arrived in Bexley borough today making police station cuts a big plank of his campaign.

Unfortunately this is the borough where a number of police stations were closed while the Conservatives were in power both at City Hall and Westminster.

Tweet from Bailey

Firstly Thamesmead shut in 2010. Belvedere followed in 2013 alongside Sidcup in 2013. One is now a Prezzo and the other demolished.

With police seeing cuts from the Home Office, London’s Met was reorganised into “Basic Command Units” with police in each borough merged. Bexley borough police merged with Greenwich – where Woolwich was shut in 2014 alongside Westcombe Park in 2012. Greenwich followed. All are now housing or demolished.

Bexleyheath was under threat more recently and saved.

New homes now bring built of former Belvedere police station

Bailey’s claim of 8,000 new police officers doesn’t stack up given most funding for officers comes from the Home Office. To see more officers an area has to agree to steep council tax precept increases –  something Khan did and Bailey campaigned against. Large precept rises have been seen the length and breadth of the country as central Government have insisted upon it in return for funds (which provide far less than 8,000 new officers).

As the Home Office state:  “Overall funding available to PCCs (Mayors and Police and Crime Commissioners) will increase by up to £703 million next year – a 5.4% cash increase on the 2020/21 settlement – if PCCs make full use of their flexibility to increase precept.

If being the operative word. PCC (in London’s case the Mayor) had to raise their precept to receive funds. Bailey opposed it.

Nationwide

Much campaigning in the election has attempted to portray problems as only in London, yet it’s not just London where police numbers have fallen while certain crime increased.

Source: BBC News

London has actually seen a smaller increase in knife crime than Hertfordshire, Essex and Kent. Knife crime in Kent is more than double levels in 2010 despite a fall in the most recent statistics.

Police numbers

Central Government have stated they will hire 20,000 more police to take totals back to 2010 levels – though the population of the UK has grown by around three million in that time.

Bailey’s twitter account is not know for accuracy. Last year he stated this a mere day after his Conservative party colleague Grant Shapps wrote to TfL insisting on increasing the congestion charge:

Tweeted a day after Transport Secretary Grant Shapps insisted upon congestion charge increase

Here is an extract in a letter sent from Grant Shapps to TfL imposing these conditions:

“urgently widen scope and bring forward”

That is Shapps requiring the “immediate reintroduction” of the congestion charge and to “widen the scope of these charges”.

Little with his campaign seems to match reality.

 

------------------

Running a site takes time and costs money.

You can support me via Paypal with a one-off or monthly donation here

Another option is via Patreon by clicking here

You can also buy me a beer/coffee at Ko-fi here

Many thanks

There's also a Facebook page for the site here

J Smith

I've lived in south east London most of my life growing up in Greenwich borough and working in the area for many years. The site has contributors on occasion and we cover many different topics. Living and working in the area offers an insight into what is happening locally.

    7 thoughts on “Shaun Bailey campaigns on police stations in Bexley despite closures under his party colleagues

    • Incredible level of blatant lying at play in the Conservative campaigns in London.

      Ben Crompton, Conservative candidate for the Greenwich West by-election, visited us today and left a leaflet with a similar, carefully worded false claim, implying that Khan had closed Greenwich West Police station on Royal Hill.

      Reply
    • Anybody voting Tory for ‘anything’ at the moment needs their head examining. Their policy of winning is to lie through their teeth on matters they know are emotive, just as they did with Brexit. Bailey is following with this tactic- however you term it, ‘bending the truth, untruths, prevaricating or being economical with the truth’, its plain and simple lying with the express intention of the voters believing you to be telling a truth as they ‘want’ it to be true. It’s psychology which has been shown to work at Brexit here, and in other nations such as with ‘Trumpism’ in the US. But as with Trump, the Tories will eventually get their come uppance. Lets make a start next week.

      Reply
    • Well summarised Derek. Indeed, they are just using the ‘Trump Playbook’ again.

      Reply
    • John Smith should run for Mayor.
      You have my vote.

      Reply
    • I agree M. John Smith would have my vote too for honesty and transparency. Also informing what is happening in our Borough and City as we do not get this information from anywhere else.

      Reply
    • You certainly won’t get it from Ben Crompton‘s campaign leaflet, that is for sure …

      Reply
    • Boris Johnson
      Mayor of London
      In office
      3 May 2008 – 9 May 2016

      “Greenwich Police Station – Disposal

      Reference code:
      DMPCD 2015 152
      Date signed:
      21 December 2015
      Authorisation name:
      Stephen Greenhalgh (past staff), Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime”

      Reply

    Leave a Reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.