Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) Katy Bourne, who has aligned herself with anti-migrant agitation in Crowborough, has been formally censured by the Sussex Police and Crime Panel.
A formal vote of no confidence last Friday concluded that she has seriously undermined the impartiality expected of her office.
Disrepute
The motion, passed by ten votes to four with one abstention, declared that the panel had “lost confidence in the commissioner and in the commissioner’s conduct” and that her actions had “brought the office of commissioner and policing into disrepute.”
The censure follows weeks of public controversy over Bourne’s decision to attend an anti-migrant march in Crowborough last November opposing plans to house asylum seekers at the disused Crowborough Training Camp in East Sussex.
Then, in a Radio Sussex ‘New Year Message’ she called on the Home Secretary to pilot the electronic tagging of asylum seekers due to be housed in Crowborough. She claimed that asylum seekers would “inevitably” become involved in crime.
Police and Crime Panel members cited this as a decisive moment, arguing that such statements went far beyond the PCC’s remit, risked legitimising hostility towards refugees, and further undermined confidence in Bourne’s ability to act impartially in her role overseeing Sussex Police.
Failure of neutrality
Green Party councillor Paul Keene, who tabled the censure motion, said her involvement in the demonstration and her subsequent public statements reflected a failure to maintain neutrality and uphold the integrity of her office, a criticism echoed by panel members from across the political spectrum.
Bourne rejected the censure as a “co-ordinated personal attack on my integrity,” describing the panel’s actions as “preposterous” and asserting that she was simply “doing my job” by listening to community concerns.
Formal complaint
She has lodged a formal complaint alleging procedural irregularities and hinted at legal challenges to the panel’s authority to censure her.
Anti-rascist groups are now calling for Bourne’s resignation, arguing her conduct is fundamentally incompatible with the impartiality required of the office she holds.
The censure also highlights Bourne’s to separate her political campaign as the Conservative candidate for Mayor of Sussex from her professional duty as PCC.
She has consistently failed to distinguish on social media when she has been speaking as Mayoral candidate rather than in her role as PCC.
