Alison Hernandez to prioritise 'limbo' police constable situation

Ms Hernandez, who has just secured her third consecutive term as police and crime commissioner (PCC) for Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, said she wanted to resolve the issue as a matter of urgency.

“The priority for me will be sorting out the chief constable to create a substantive chief constable to lead the force,” she said shortly after winning the election.

“We’re not in a healthy situation, we’re in limbo and you need a chief constable there who understands that they are fully responsible for that performance.

“About 90 per cent of the decisions a chief constable will make are operational and will have absolutely nothing to do with me, and so I need make sure they are competent and really driving that performance.

“That’s the one priority I have to sort out this year regardless of what happens with the investigation.”

Commissioner Alison Hernandez pictured with Chief Constable Will Kerr at the time his appointment was confirmed (Image: Office of Police & Crime Commissioner)

Investigations into the conduct of Mr Kerr have ground to a halt – nine months after he was suspended on full pay from his £170,000 a year job.

He was suspended from Devon and Cornwall Police over misconduct allegations in July last year. These are being dealt with by the Independent Office for Police Conduct, which “temporarily suspended” its probe last month pending the criminal investigation being carried out by the Police Ombudsman of Northern Ireland (PONI).

Last summer it was revealed that a criminal investigation had been launched into sexual assault allegations against the chief constable, who is a former assistant chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI).

Mr Kerr strenuously denies the allegations and says he will co-operate with any investigation.

A PONI spokesperson has confirmed the criminal investigation is still progressing.

The suspension means that Devon and Cornwall Police has been paying for two chief constables, as acting chief constable Jim Colwell has been leading the force.

READ NEXT: Who is Chief Constable Will Kerr and why has he been suspended?

Elsewhere, Ms Hernandez said she wanted in her third term to focus on the visibility of police officers, and the drug and alcohol addiction blighting the area.

“I tried to make this my challenge in my term just gone, but we have got to make the record number of police officers much more visible to our communities.

“We have got too many people addicted to drink and drugs who are actually taking over our streets in some of our towns, which is absolutely unacceptable.

“We need to work out a better solution and that’s something I’m going to keep focused on.”

Alison Hernandez (Con) has been elected to a third term as the Police and Crime Commissioner for Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. Image: Bradley Gerrard

She added that dealing with the region’s drug problem would also be a key focus, stating that she wanted to keep the energy going behind Operation Scorpion, a joint initiative between the South West’s five PCCs.

She said the operation was the “top performing in the whole country for drug disruptions”, and that she wanted to encourage the community to keep reporting drug-related information to Crimestoppers.

Furthermore, she said she would be focusing on schemes that the public might not necessarily think of being under the auspices of a PCC, such as her initiative to get prisoners to build new homes.

“It didn’t come across in this campaign but we’ve got prisoners building modular homes for the homeless, and we’ve built our first proof-of-concept in Torquay and we’ve just built a block of flats in Cullompton,” she said.

“We’ve got 82 homes we’ll be delivering through that project this year, and I’m going to make sure we take that national and get these homes for the homeless everywhere.”

A total of 308,607 votes were placed in Thursday's election - equivalent to 22.5 per cent of the potential electorate within the Devon, Cornwall and Isles of Scilly constituency.

Ms Hernandez took 131, 764 votes, Mr Steel took 107,897 and Mr Lodge 64,790.

The number of votes is a steep drop compared to the 2021 election, when Ms Hernandez secured her second term in office. Then, the turnout was 494,627, or 36.1 per cent of the electorate.

While Labour’s Mr Steel secured wins in Plymouth and Exeter – cities which proved fruitful for the party in the local elections – Conservative Ms Hernandez secured Torbay, Teignbridge, West Devon, South Hams, North Devon, Torridge, Mid Devon, East Devon and the Isles of Scilly.

Cornwall was the last to declare its result, but later announced that Ms Hernandez won 35,536 votes, with Mr Steel polling 28,290 and Mr Lodge 17,372 for the Liberal Democrats.

Of the 82,011 votes polled in Cornwall, there were 801 rejected ballot papers - with 675 being unmarked or voided for uncertainty, 119 voting for more than one candidate and seven identifying the voter.

In Devon and Cornwall, the salary set for the police and crime commissioner as of May 2022 is £88,600 per annum.