Jonathan Ash-Edwards was elected as Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) in May 2024.
Highly committed to public service, Jonathan has a wide range of leadership, governance and financial experience.
Jonathan first got involved in politics in 2007 successfully campaigning against proposals by the then Government to close the hospital in the Sussex town in which he grew up.
This experience led him to serve in local government as a Councillor for 16 years, including as executive member for finance and then Council Leader. He chaired a high performing Community Safety Partnership for four years, giving him a significant insight into effective strategies for crime prevention and tackling anti-social behaviour.
Committed to education and opportunities for young people, Jonathan founded an education trust now responsible for the education of over 3,500 young people and has worked nationally to support effective school governance.
Alongside public service, Jonathan has also been a serial business builder, starting his first business at the age of 24 and has led a company delivering major projects to clients across a number of sectors.
Hertfordshire means a lot to Jonathan, meeting his partner here and he now lives in the county with his family.
As Police and Crime Commissioner, Jonathan’s priorities are to keep Hertfordshire safe, ensure that record numbers of police officers translate into visible and responsive local policing, tackle violence against women and girls and for more offenders to be brought to justice.
Since his election, Jonathan has launched Operation Hotspot, a £1m initiative to put additional high visibility police patrols into 26 hotspots of anti-social behaviour, crime and violence. He has also launched a new webcast Accountability and Performance Meeting so that the PCC’s statutory duty to hold the Chief Constable to account for policing performance is publicly transparent for the first time.
Jonathan has been appointed as the national lead PCC for crime prevention and children and young people.