Policing boss challenged over Reform UK defection

Rupert Matthews has been Leicestershire's police and crime commissioner since 2021

Police and crime commissioner for Leicestershire and Rutland Rupert Matthews has been challenged by councillors over his defection to Reform UK.

Matthews announced last month he had quit the Conservatives and switched parties.

The former Tory MEP, who has held the role setting local policing priorities since 2021, was questioned over the move during a special police and crime panel meeting on Monday.

Members of the cross-party panel, which scrutinises the performance of the commissioner, asked Matthews whether his priorities would now change following his political switch.

He was also asked to clarify his stance on issues such as net-zero, diversity equity and inclusion (DEI) and efficiency within Leicestershire Police.

Matthews told the panel: "I got very frustrated by the lack of movement [of the shadow ministerial team] and I thought the Reform Party were more sort of moving in the right direction."

Matthews said he felt Reform had offered him more support and were "setting the news agenda".

Conservative panel chair Les Phillimore asked Matthews what he hoped to achieve by joining a party with five MPs that was not in government.

"A little more freedom of action on my part, I suppose," Matthews said.

"I think I'm getting a little bit more support from them than I was from the national Conservative party."

Liberal Democrat panel member Stuart Bray asked whether Matthews would call a by-election following his defection, but the commissioner said he would not.

Matthews was re-elected as PCC in May 2024, beating Labour's Rory Palmer by 860 votes.

"The mandate belongs to the person not the political party," Matthews told the panel.

Matthews said he would not be changing his police and crime plan, his strategy for policing, "at all".

He said that plan had been based on his manifesto upon which he had been elected.

The PCC was asked about the recent installation of a solar farm at the Leicestershire Police's HQ

Matthews's switch to Reform was announced with him standing by party leader Nigel Farage and behind a lectern with the message "Britain is Lawless".

Labour panel member Elly Cutkelvin asked him: "Did you consider how being on that platform with that hashtag might affect the morale of [Leicestershire Police] officers and did you think about the impact it might have on the staff and public confidence?"

Matthews said: "It is not the job of a police and crime commissioner, or indeed any elected politician, to blindly support and enthusiastically endorse the work done by those in the organisation."

However he said would "trumpet the successes of the force".

Matthews was asked if he would be asking Reform's so-called Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) unit to look for savings in the force's budget, and he told the panel he was not intending to.

The commissioner was asked about his previous comments when he said the "dark heart of wokeness" needed to be cut out of the criminal justice system.

"My comments were more aimed at the national level," he said.

When asked to provide the panel with assurances on Reform's position on DEI, Matthews said: "My commitment to our differing communities is unwavering."

Reform UK has previously said it would scrap net-zero environmental targets, and a panel member asked Matthews whether he supported the recent installation of a solar farm at Leicestershire Police's headquarters in Enderby.

He said: "I do not believe the police force, nor the office of the police and crime commissioner, do have an obligatory requirement to go towards net-zero.

"As regards the solar farm, it was introduced specifically to the core management room which does take up a huge amount of electric power and it is very cost-effective.

"Whether you look at it from the view of carbon emissions or not wasting tax-payers' money, it is delivering."