Takeaways from the Autumn Budget for policing

Rachel Reeves’ Autumn Budget reflected the largest increase in day-to-day public spending in 20 years: real-terms department spending will increase by 3.5 per cent and 4.3 per cent in 2024/25 and 2025/26, respectively. For many departments, it has lived up to its billing as a “Budget to rebuild Britain”.

However, the funding allocated to the Home Office – responsible for policing – over the same period represents an average real-terms decrease of 2.7 per cent.

Sir Mark Rowley, Metropolitan Police Service Commissioner, warned the London Assembly of “eye-watering choices” to come if policing did not receive more funding in part two of the spending review, due in late spring 2025, noting “all services are on the table” when it comes to considering where cuts could be made.

Budget detail

Total Home Office funding will increase from £20.3 billion in 2023/24 to £22.1 billion in 2025/26, equivalent to a 2.7 per cent decrease in real terms.

The Budget explains that this negative growth rate reflects significant savings to be made in the asylum system and cancelling the Migration and Economic Development Partnership (MEDP) with Rwanda. No detail is provided, however, around how much the “significant savings” are expected to be and how they will be re-allocated within the Home Office – including whether policing may benefit proportionally.

The most explicit policing commitment made in the Budget outlines that the Home Office settlement “will increase the core government grant for police forces and help support frontline policing levels across the country”. The Budget suggests that this grant will be used to put “the Government on track to start to deliver” the additional 13,000 neighbourhood officers and police community support officers promised in their manifesto.

No information is provided about the nature of this grant ‘increase’. Matthew Scott, police and crime commissioner for Kent, has announced that increased employers’ National Insurance Contributions (NIC), the centre piece of the Government’s revenue-raising measures, would lead to an additional cost of £5.7 million to his force alone. Higher NIC will inevitably eat into any increase in grants to police forces, meaning it is likely that, at best, forces can hope for stable funding levels through to 2025/26.

The Budget also specifies that funding for policing will come from “tackling waste through police efficiencies”. Forces have been asked to make efficiency savings for more than a decade and many have argued that further cuts will directly impact public safety. Mr Scott noted that Kent was “rapidly approaching the point where any savings we make will inevitably have an impact on front line policing”.

There were some positive notes for policing, albeit away from the front line. The Budget confirmed an additional £150 million to tackle national security threats and serious organised crime in 2025/26. And the Government backed its commitment to “begin to repair the justice system” with significant investment, by providing the Ministry of Justice with an additional £1.9 billion – equivalent to an average real terms increase of 5.6 per cent each year from 2023/24 to 2025/26. Both these moves are welcome and necessary, but frontline policing is unlikely to feel the benefit in the short term.

Where does this leave policing?

Between 2019 and 2023, the Conservative government recruited more than 20,000 additional police officers. While the impact of this in improving policing outcomes cannot yet be measured, two key learnings are clear now.

Firstly, training the influx of new recruits placed additional pressure on forces. This responsibility largely fell to experienced officers, who were already under significant pressure. Forces adapted by either allocating multiple new recruits to a single tutor or asking less experienced officers to be mentors, the impact of which on the quality of training is unknown.

Secondly, an independent review into policing productivity commissioned by the Home Office concluded that the uplift alone was not sufficient in improving policing outcomes. Recommendations were made that encouraged policing to tackle barriers to productivity, including workforce mental ill health, insufficient data and IT systems and a lack of technological innovation.

There was no mention of additional funding to help remove barriers to productivity in the Budget which instead announced money for 13,000 new officers. While the public welcome more officers on the streets, there is a legitimate question about whether better value for money would be likely achieved by investing in infrastructure as recommended by the Policing Productivity Review, and a strong argument to say that the Home Office should push for this in the upcoming spending review.

Forward look

The Budget notes that “HM Treasury will work with the Home Office through Phase 2 to drive police efficiencies and improve overall police productivity in England, ending wasteful contracts and enabling officers to spend more time on the frontline tackling crime”.

In her first Mansion House speech, Rachel Reeves confirmed that the second phase of the Spending Review will focus on reform and using digital technology more effectively to manage pressures across government. Considering the suggested shift from Public Sector Net Debt (PSND) to Public Sector Net Financial Liabilities (PSNFL), which could unlock £50 billion in additional capital investment, the second phase of the spending review may prove beneficial for policing, particularly around investment in technology, infrastructure and barriers to productivity.

Conclusion

The increased core grant for police forces promised in the Budget may help policing in the short term. However, the new government has set ambitious commitments to halve violence against women and girls and knife crime under its Safer Streets mission.

These commitments sit alongside significant challenges facing the sector – a £3.2 billion cash deficit, as estimated by Gavin Stephens, chair of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, and well documented concerns around workloads, officer mental health, public trust and professional standards.

In order to successfully deliver against the ambitious targets set out by the Government, this Budget has left policing looking anxiously to phase two of the Spending Review for necessary investment.