The politician who oversees Warwickshire Police has vowed to fight any prospect of a takeover by a larger force – despite accepting it could be on the cards.

In the latest sweeping change to local governance structures, Warwickshire's Police & Crime Commissioner (PCC) Philip Seccombe discovered last week that his role is set to be abolished when his term of office ends in 2028. 

That is running alongside local government reform, a process that will see the functions carried out by county, district and borough councils in Warwickshire brought under new unitary authorities, seemingly in the same timescale. 

Beyond that council shake-up, there are plans for centrally-held powers to be passed to larger strategic authorities or elected mayors with Mr Seccombe anticipating some crossover with his soon-to-be-vanquished role. 

'A number of unknowns'

The push for the one county-wide unitary authority is accompanied by plans to pursue full membership of the West Midlands Combined Authority as the most logical strategic authority.

However, from a policing perspective Mr Seccombe and members of Warwickshire's Police & Crime Panel – the body of councillors and independent members that holds his work to account – fear the force could be subsumed.

Mr Seccombe said there remained "a number of unknowns" around what would happen next but that two options for post-2028 had emerged.

He said that if Warwickshire gets a directly-elected mayor rather than a council leader selected from those elected, they would be "likely" to take on the governance of policing and the fire and rescue service.

If the new council follows a similar leadership model to the current one, local authority police and crime boards "staffed by the leaders of the upper-tier authorities" would be more likely but he questioned how that would work with either one or two councils.

"We don't know when we will know how many unitary authorities (Warwickshire will get) but I want to be in there on day one to ask how they are going to deal with police governance, how it will be transferred, how it is going to sit within the county council," said Mr Seccombe. 

"I have no idea and I am sure some of the county councillors here will want to be asking questions about that."

Later, he added: "The one thing I am going to push for is that Warwickshire Police remains a standalone, resilient force responding to the residents of Warwickshire.

"For the governance of Warwickshire Police to sit in Birmingham or anywhere else would be to the detriment of our residents and make Warwickshire less safe."

Cllr Cliff Brown said national government decisions on devolution, as opposed to the council shake-up, would be "critical" and warned: "We may have no choice.

"I don't see any mayor, if it is the mayor for the West Midlands for instance, wanting two police forces. That's where we would have problems but I don't think that means we give up the fight.

"We have to spell out what we think is unique and good about Warwickshire to stand the best chance but unfortunately it is going to come down to a personal choice." 

Mr Seccombe noted his belief that the legislation provides for mayors to oversee two forces at once but added: "That may not be impossible but thinking logically, eventually they are going to get merged aren't they?"

'Shameful'

The panel also agreed to write to the home secretary Shabana Mahmood (Lab) to express concern over the handling of the decision to abolish PCCs.

Mr Seccombe detailed how he had been told in an online call 90 minutes before the public announcement, giving him insufficient time to tell his 18 members of staff in the manner he would have wished to.

"I thought that was quick and pretty callous," he said.

"I think we all knew it was going to happen, both governments over the past few years have said we are going to transfer PCC functions to mayors.

"What concerns me is why we need to go from a PCC to a mayor with a middle man, a board which some people say could reflect the old police authorities. They got a lot of criticism and that was why PCCs were established in the first place. 

"It seems crazy to have a major change of governance twice in a short period of time rather than once, that's my opinion and I think probably the opinion of most PCCs."

Chair Sue Gill, one of two independent panel members who are not elected officials, said: "I think I speak for the rest of the panel when I say we are very sorry that happened in that way, and that some of your staff found out through the media rather than through communications channels.

"We recognise that will be causing some stress within the team."

Cllr Adrian Warwick went even further and led the call to write to government.

"The way this was handled was shameful," he said. 

"We have to remember, regardless of the political decisions made, that there are people involved in this process.

"People should not hear that their jobs are on the line via a message from the BBC or in The Sun. There should have been reasonable time for the commissioner to talk to his staff and prepare them.

"I do feel that the human cost of this decision has not been considered correctly and I think that is wrong."