Recruitment is a matter for chief constables. My understanding is that West Midlands police are undergoing a recruitment drive. Obviously, I cannot speak to the hon. Gentleman’s constituency, but how chief constables spend the money the precept raises is up to them. The issue we have with using the precept to raise funds for the police—the House has rehearsed this time and again—is that a 2% increase in council tax in areas such as the west midlands will raise significantly less than in other areas of the country such as Surrey or Suffolk. That is why we opposed that fundamentally unfair way to increase funding for our police forces.
The reduction in the number of officers has reduced the ability of the police to perform hotspot proactive policing and targeted interventions that gather intelligence and build relationships with communities, These not only help the police to respond to crime but help them to prevent it from happening in the first place. That is the bedrock of policing in our country. Community policing enables policing by consent, but has been decimated over the past eight years. That has contributed not only to the rise in serious violence but to the corresponding fall in successful prosecutions. Not only are more people committing serious violent offences, but more are getting away with it.