Lenny Rolles, Labour’s Candidate for Kent Police and Crime Commissioner speaks to Weald of Kent Labour

Lenny Rolles, Labour’s candidate for Kent’s next Police and Crime Commissioner spoke to members of Weald of Kent Labour on 12 March. At a meeting held in Cranbrook’ s Parish Council Chamber, Lenny outlined his campaign priorities and discussed local policing issues with members. A major challenge is more Police budget cuts of £7.3 million happening over the next two years. Lenny explained that this comes on top of over £90 million in cuts that Kent Police have suffered over the last decade.

These new financial pressures threaten more job cuts on top of the sharp reductions that have already occurred among Kent’s front line staff. The number of Police Community Support Officers, for example, has been slashed by about 100, giving extra work to Constables to try to maintain depleted neighbourhood policing.

“The current Commissioner, Matthew Scott,” Lenny explained “has been in post for almost eight years. In that time there have been cuts to neigbourhhood policing and offices have been deployed off the front line to support back office cuts”. He warned that the new budget cuts “will make this worse and leave little room to focus on crime prevention. It is time for a change to restore community confidence and trust”.

Members raised a number of important policing issues, including rural crime, fly tipping, and road safety. Lenny also highlighted his support for the shop worker’s union USDAW’s policing pledge campaign which calls for a specific offence to protect retail workers and take action to tackle increasing incidence of shoplifting and business crime.

The Kent Police and Crime Commissioner election will be held on Thursday 2 May – the same day as local elections in Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells. (Note: there are no election for Ashford Borough Council this year). To make it easier to vote Weald of Kent voters are encouraged to register for a postal vote – see: Apply for a postal vote – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

For more information about Lenny’s campaign follow him on Facebook: @LennyRolles4KentPCC or on twitter (X): @LennyRolles.