Pre-election Period for the Police & Crime Commissioner Elections
Pre-election Period for the Police & Crime Commissioner Elections
As you will be aware, the elections for the Police & Crime Commissioners (PCCs) takes place on Thursday, 2nd of May 2024.
The formal pre-election period begins on the 25th March 2024 and from that time there will be restrictions on the media activities of the current Police & Crime Commissioner. I thought it would be helpful to set out the position of the Office of the Dyfed Powys Police & Crime Commission (OPCC) on these matters.
The OPCC is politically neutral and is responsible for providing support to the elected PCC, whoever they are. The Office will not provide support for any of the candidates during the Pre-election period and indeed staff within the OPCC are forbidden from doing so in a personal as well as professional capacity.
The formal position is that the current PCC will remain in post as PCC throughout the Pre-election Period until end of the day on the 8th of May 2024, following the election: The new term for a PCC will begin on the 9th of May 2024.
During the Pre-election Period, the OPCC will continue to support the incumbent PCC with regard to their functions and management of business as usual. The OPCC will also respond to requests for information from candidates, and publish any information provided online.
The OPCC will not release any press releases to promote the work of the PCC, nor will we make any announcements that are in any way new or contentious after the 22nd March 2024, upon the start of the Pre-election Period. This is to allow those press releases to appear in the media before the Pre-election Period starts. We may however release factual material into the public domain during the Pre-election Period, using neutral OPCC branding.
We have advised all political parties that police officers are unable to agree to have their photographs taken with candidates at this time. Nonetheless, it is possible that photographs of candidates next to police cars, in front of police stations or with other police branding may appear in election material. If this happens, it explicitly does not reflect any endorsement by the Police of the candidate in question.
I hope this is helpful in setting out the role of the OPCC during this Pre-election Period, as well as our relationship with the democratic process.
Further information, including our detailed protocol, is available on our website: PCCs Election 2024 (dyfedpowys-pcc.org.uk).