Labour’s Nia Griffith has accused the Dyfed-Powys Police Commissioner Christopher Salmon of double –speak and hypocrisy as the row over the police helicopter escalated this week. In a response from the Home Office received by Labour’s Nia Griffith, as MP for Llanelli, the Police Commissioner appears to have agreed to cutting the helicopter.
Commenting on the response she received from the Rt Hon Mike Penning, the Home Office Minister for Policing, Nia Griffith said,
“You simply cannot trust the Dyfed-Powys Police Commissioner Christopher Salmon to fight for our helicopter. Only last November, he assured us that the helicopter would remain at Pembrey, and in weasel words in the press this week, he tells us that “he wishes to secure the best possible air service for the people of Dyfed-Powys”, but he is either not trying hard enough to keep our helicopter or he is being plain hypocritical. I wrote back in February to the Policing Minister, Mike Penning to voice my very serious concerns about the loss of the helicopter, which is being done against expert advice. In his response, the Minister tells me that the Police Commissioner “has been part of the agreement process for the new operating model, ….. meaning the air-base will close on 1 January 2016.” I welcome the latest review of the decision, but we need the police commissioner to fight for us; he was supposedly elected to represent the interests of Dyfed-Powys residents, but instead he appears to be the poodle of Tory Home Office Ministers. The sooner we get rid of these police commissioners and their Tory bosses the better. ”