At Cambridgeshire County Council’s Safer and Stronger Communities Overview and Scrutiny Committee on the 19th of December 2013 Councillor Roger Henson (UKIP, Norman Cross) told councillors:

I had an email. I can’t find it. I tried to find it at the office down here [indicates].

That the police commissioner has now took on four deputies.

Cllr Mandy Smith (Conservative, Papworth and Swavesey) interjected: “I’d like to know if that’s true”. The meeting’s chairman Cllr Paul Bullen (UKIP, St Ives) said: “I’m sure we can find out but it is outside of the remit of this committee”.

My View

I think it is almost inconceivable that Cambridgeshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner Graham Bright would appoint four deputies. The commissioner hasn’t included any plan for such appointments in the budget which he presented to the Police and Crime Panel.

I wrote about Police and Crime Commissioner Graham Bright’s appointment of his friend Brian as his deputy in an article: Commissioner Graham Bright – Office Costs and Deputy Appointment.

After the meeting I asked Cllr Henson if he knew any more about the appointments he had mentioned. In response he initially asked me who I was. Cllr Henson said he would go and look at the email he had mentioned; he offered to send me more details; I gave him my contact details so he could do so.

I will provide an update below if he gets in touch.