A WELSH political and media storm erupted yesterday after our exclusive revelations about the retirement of Gwent’s chief constable.
We revealed yesterday how documents we had seen showed howPolice and Crime Commissioner Ian Johnston had raised grave concerns about Carmel Napier’s performance and behaviour and has told her to retire or be removed from office.
Less than an hour after we published the story, it was leading Welsh TV and radio news bulletins.
Mrs Napier has issued a measured response, making clear the timing of her retirement was not of her choosing.
Crucially, she suggests the legislation that brought in PCCs might not be strong enough to protect the independence of operational policing.
It is a shame Mrs Napier is not saying any more. We hoped Gwent taxpayers would have been given the opportunity to hear her side of the story, particularly after Mr Johnston made further allegations about her in media interviews yesterday.
Questions we posed in this column yesterday still need to be answered.
We would like to see the Police and Crime Panel, the body set up to scrutinise the decisions and performance of the PCC, doing its job when it next meets Mr Johnston at the end of this month by asking him some tough questions about Mrs Napier’s departure.
Our experience of Mr Johnston is that he will not shy away from answering them.
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