Surrey Police and Crime Commissioner backs council restructure

The man who holds Surrey Police to account is backing county council plans for a county-wide unitary – and may put himself forward to be at the helm.

Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) David Munro has written to the county council leader giving his absolute support for a single council to replace the current 12.

And he wants it to have an elected mayor in charge of all the county's services, as well as the PCC role. He is not ruling out standing as a candidate himself.

"My head says no, I've had a long career in local government for Surrey, I'm not as young as I was," he said.

"But of course my heart says oh gosh, that would be a good idea wouldn't it. But this is a long time in the future."

Mr Munro, who spent 20 years as a Surrey county councillor before taking on the elected role of setting out police priorities in 2016, thinks one unitary with one chief is the best solution for policing.

He said: "We have to work very closely with adult and children's social services to deal with vulnerable children, people with mental health problems and so on, and it would be really helpful to deal on a one-to-one basis so as to get more coordination there.

"If it happens – and it's not up to me – it makes sense for the PCC's responsibilities to be assumed into that of the elected mayor, such as it happens in Manchester."

But Surrey County Council leader Tim Oliver is not getting behind the idea.

He said: "It's no secret Boris Johnson wants to create a series of mayors. I don't think that's appropriate for Surrey, we're not a metropolitan area.

"We don't have a single city, we're much more diverse than Greater Manchester or the West Midlands. It's not something I will be pitching for."

An alternative sought by the leaders of district and borough councils – who would be abolished either way – is three separate unitary councils within Surrey.

But Mr Munro said: "The literally life and death services, such as children's and adult social services, need a critical mass to be able to operate successfully, and the experience of Berkshire, which is broken up into a series of smaller unitaries, demonstrates that.

"Their individual social services simply weren't big enough to be able to cope with the sometimes very urgent and very serious cases.

"You need a large number of people so you can specialise, get really good people in at the top."

He said he was not going to be out lobbying, but wanted to let people know where he stands.

"If three unitaries is the model chosen, then policing will fit into that system. We will be able to work with that," he said.

Surrey's police force is split into three geographic divisions - North, East and West - though the police boundaries join up Surrey Heath with Woking, Guildford and Waverley, and not with Runnymede, Spelthorne and Elmbridge as in the main proposal for three unitary authorities.