Three people are seeking your vote to be police and crime commissioner on Thursday. They are Labour's Sarah Russell, the Conservatives' Sir Clive Loader and independent candidate Suleman Nagdi. Here are their answers to your questions:
How will you achieve savings and maintain frontline policing?
Sir Clive Loader: I will do all I have to in order to maintain the operational frontline at a time of increasing financial stringency.
In the first instance, I will be looking at efficiencies in the force. Then I will look at cross-force sharing, building on what is already happening.
If this does not yield enough savings while maintaining the operational frontline, I will look at outsourcing, of, for example, human resources, finance, IT, legal services, estate and fleet management, administrative support, control room services, criminal justice support and custody provision.
I will do everything necessary to keep the maximum number of uniformed bobbies on the beat.
Sarah Russell: I will work to share more specialist functions with neighbouring forces, reducing both management and overall costs.
I will review the police estate to see if there are areas we can share facilities with organisations such as the fire service and the NHS.
Suleman Nagdi: I will only look at outsourcing as a last resort and even then I will not allow the outsourcing of frontline policing.
If I decide to outsource any police services, then these will be backroom.
I will look at sharing resources with other forces where it makes sense.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it – why is this change necessary?
SCL: Not broke does not mean it is perfect. Plenty of voters have told me they perceive the police service as far from perfect – albeit a significant majority, like myself, are proud and generally very supportive of their local police.
The sad fact is, 93 per cent of people have no idea police authorities even exist, let alone how well or otherwise they police the police.
With the advent of police and crime commissioners, people will for the first time elect an accountable representative whose prime role will be to ensure an effective and efficient police force.
SR: If I had a vote on the legislation that created this new role, I would have voted against.
However, I take a pragmatic view that it is now the law and happening and I would prefer to get involved and make it work than stand to the side and complain.
SN: Right now, most people do not know who is on the police authority.
At least with an elected commissioner there will be a visible, democratically elected individual who can more easily be held to account by the public.
This system will only work if the commissioner is able to listen to, analyse and act upon the concerns and priorities of all the communities.
How will you achieve this?
SCL: I will have an e-mail address and phone number, both of which will be widely advertised.
I will hold surgeries as and when people request.
I expect to continue building on the hundreds of hours of visiting I have done during this election by going to schools, universities, religious communities, professional representatives, business leaders and so on.
SR: I hope to develop a panel with a good, geographical, political, faith, gender and age spread to both help understand the concerns across the patch and also to develop a better understanding of the differential impact of policies and priorities.
I will attend as many meetings as possible to listen to residents – including residents' associations, parish councils and Neighbourhood Watch meetings.
SN: I am completely independent and I am standing to serve the needs of the people and not the needs of a political party.
No decisions will be made without me first engaging in a process of extensive consultation with the people I serve.
As a community volunteer for over 25 years, my expertise lies in the ability to listen to the needs of the community and then relay this to government and statutory authorities.
Would you introduce a simple system showing jobs (including reports of crimes) received and completed, open to public scrutiny?
SCL: Yes, albeit I will need to make sure I understand exactly what that will mean in resource terms.
I intend every week to sit down with the chief constable and go through the crimes committed and detected so we can discern emerging trends and areas of stubborn crime which need to be addressed, particularly if they are accompanied by repeated requests from the public to sort out problems, for example, with anti-social behaviour, drug dealers and rural theft.
SR: I am happy to continue the practice of publishing reported crime numbers as well as detection rates, which gives the information you ask for, alongside the public satisfaction information.
SN: What has become clear in my conversations with members of the public is that they, too, need to be involved in the consultation process in order to make any improvements to the police. We will not succeed without a collective effort.
