The months after a general election in which the party’s crime policies – specifically, its sentencing policies – came under much attack from Labour and – especially – the Conservatives is a good time to pause and take stock.

Much as we might dislike the testosterone-fuelled macho game of “my prison population’s are bigger than yours”, it does strike a chord with the public. Fed up with crime? Blame someone, beat ’em up – oops no, we’re meant to be civilized, so just lock ’em up instead.

There seems to have been two responses to this in the party since May 5th. The first batch are easy to deal with – people say we’re soft on crime because of policy X so ditch policy X. My answer to that is simple – no. For example – should we really have to start believing that that a cold-blooded and pre-meditated killer should have the same minimum sentence as a battered wife who lashes out in a moment of desperation?

The other response is wrong too – that we should therefore spend more time campaigning on issues such opposing mandatory life sentences for murder. It’s a beguiling logic – other parties raise the issue, it’s an issue which goes down badly on the doorstep – until we explain it – when the experience of many canvassers is that it is easy to persuade people to back it. (A task that’s been made easier since the election with the Director of Public Prosecutions coming out against mandatory life sentences. I await the Tory leaflets attacking him for not understanding crime or being soft on it … !)

But that it is a political dead-end – dancing to the tune of the other parties, and spending up those valuable nanoseconds when we actually get to talk to floating voters on topics which – whatever we may think – are in substance peripheral for most voters.

They want fewer crimes – and aren’t really bothered with the niceties of sentencing problems. Because the real issue is not the detail of the policies but the overall impression some have – that the Lib Dems don’t take crime seriously. And that’s not about the details of our policies on sentencing so much as our often silence in year round campaigning about crime.

Yes, at election time we roll out the fully costed specifics – X thousand more police most times – but if the rest of the time we’re largely silent, it suggests we are soft on crime.

“Silent” may be a harsh term – but then so are the horror stories of candidates in our target seats who didn’t want crime in their leaflets in the run up to a general election because “crime’s not a big issue round here.”

If we genuinely campaign on crime issues all year round, then we build up credibility and trust with the public. And that brings insurance against the attacks for being soft on crime – they don’t sound so horrible when the voters know we’ve helped set up a neighbourhood watch, got new street lighting, had a dark and dangerous passageway redesigned and so on. Credibility based on track-records means people are more likely to give you a second-chance or the benefit of the doubt when an attack from another party comes up.

Getting that credibility also means being more imaginative about campaigning against crime. It shouldn’t simply be a matter of dusting off a few well-worn phrases about “X demands Y more police in place Z”. It’s about using all those levers we have – real power in so many councils – to help tackle the conditions in which crime thrive – to make improved street lighting as important a part of pavement politics as potholes, to serious support youth facilities.

It’s about working together with the local police. Most police are willing to listen seriously to complaints about particular areas being neglected – they are as aware as anyone of how imperfect policing based on crime statistics is, particularly given the high level of under-reporting of crimes like graffiti, vandalism and anti-social behaviour.

But it’s also about thinking more deeply of the connection between the police and the community. One of Sir Robert Peel’s nine-founding principles of policing, laid out when he created our country’s modern police force, talks of the relationship between the public and the police – … “the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen, in the interests of community welfare and existence.”

Fighting crime isn’t just something you can pay for through your taxes and can then ignore. It’s something all of society has to do. Unless we want a police state with policemen and cameras on every street corner, there will always be a role for the eyes and ears of non-policemen. And unless we have every room, phone line and open space bugged and filmed, there will always be a need for evidence seen or heard by members of the public.

More than that, engaging with and making use of the pubic doesn’t just mean policing can stop short of a police state – it also makes for better policing. Want to prioritise tackling crime hotspots? Well, you need the public to report crimes – and not just the rare violent ones but the more mundane day to day too. Want to have a police force representative of the communities it polices? Well, that’s far easier if you have consent and support for policing, so a career in policing isn’t a choice that ostracises those who take it.

And want to tackle the fear of crime? Well, you need people willing to tell you where their fears lie and what can be done to assuage them – things that bare crime statistics only hint at – that dark alleyway may not have any crime, but it may leave many scared. Fear of crime and crime itself are often only loosely connected – but just as that means fighting crime shouldn’t be solely driven by sometimes outlandish or misguided fears, it means decisions on tackling fear of crime can’t only be driven by pouring over crime statistics.

All of this means having a police force that is closely rooted in the communities it polices. One that inspires confidence that it is safe and productive to talk to and engage with.

In its own small way, my campaign to get the front counter reopened to the public at one of my constituency’s police stations shows what we should be thinking about.

Public services need to be local and rooted in communities to both reflect those communities’ needs and to gain support for the bills they run up. In policing, that means local police stations, not far-off isolated super-centres. It also means making it easy for people to report “minor” crimes, so that policing can truly reflect the range of abuses taking place. And that means – as well as having the phones answered promptly – having front counters at those local stations where people can call in.

In the case of Muswell Hill police station, it has meant the police training up volunteers from the local populace to staff a re-opened the front counter. The volunteers mean the police station has a front-counter that is open, letting the public pop in – and by making contact easier, encouraging more of it than we had before when the police station’s front to the public was a closed door on the main road. When the public do pop in – they see neighbours, from their own community, serving behind the front counter. Properly screened and trained of course – but it’s clearly a service being provided by the community for the community.

Of course, a few dye-in-the-wool Tories in the area said, “It’s outrageous. I pay my taxes – why on earth should I now have to do anything else?”

The answer is simple – “Sorry, we believe in a community where everyone works together. If you want to just to leave some money out and then hide yourself away, we’re not the party for you.”

Getting volunteers isn’t about finding a way of making the sums add up to reopen a public service, it’s about having a public service that is closely connected with the community.

You don’t just get better public services that way – you also get communities which better understand the reality of best delivering those servi
ces, and which are thereby protected against the shock-horror cheap theatrics of the lock ’em all up and throw away the key brigade.

(c) Lynne Featherstone, 2005. This article first appeared in Liberator.