New from the Home Office, a policing green paper, From the Neighbourhood to the National.
What’s striking about the green paper is how little – nothing in fact – it has to say about the private security industry. There is by contrast much talk in the document of learning from best practice from across the public and private sectors, to deliver ‘customer service’. The green paper spoke of wanting police to deliver ‘an excellent service for the individual customer’. It used language of private sector delivery of service. For example: ‘The police service’s customers are the general law-abiding public.’ The paper speaks also of a policing pledge, a ‘national standard on what people can expect from the police, underpinned in each area by a set of local priorities, agreed by people in each neighbourhood’.<br><br>The document seems open-minded to the proposed border police force, as set out in the Lord Stevens report for the Conservative Party earlier in July. The Green paper says it does not propose ‘further structural changes’ to the UK Border Agency; however the government is ‘open to further consideration of the policing arrangements alongside the UK Border Agency at ports and airports’. <br><br>A grumble for businesses and security people has been the unresponsiveness of police to business crime such as alarm respons and shoplifting. The Green paper – you have three months to respond to a consultation period – plans what it calls a ‘radical reshaping of national performance management arrangements, through changes in the relationship between central government and police forces, and between police forces<br>and their local communities. New Public Service Agreements (PSAs) set out the Government ’s national objectives, and Local Area Agreements (LAAs) represent agreed local priorities, but to support the service in delivering the new ‘Policing Pledge’, in future there will only be a single top down target for police forces – on improving public confidence in whether local crime and community safety priorities are being identified and addressed.’ <br><br>According to the Home Office, it explains how the government will work with police to prevent crime, improve public confidence, and give people more information about crime and policing where they live and work.<br><br>Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, in a statement to Parliament,&#160;said the country ‘stands at a crossroads in the future of policing’, after a decade of record investment helped to create a bigger and more flexible workforce.&#160; But the service also faces unprecedented challenges.&#160; ‘These range from new forms of criminal activity and terrorism, to new ways of working in partnership locally – the service’s scope has never been so broad.&#160; And nor have the public’s expectations been so high.’<br><br>Among the proposals she announced was a a set of nationally agreed rights, in the form of a policing pledge, that will clarify what everyone can expect from the police, and ensuring the public’s voice will be heard by their local force.&#160; The Home Secretary said: ‘The police are committed to minimum service standards everywhere, which mean that, for example, in addition to their excellent performance on getting to emergencies when we need them to, the police will now offer appointments for non-urgent calls at a time convenient to the individual concerned and within 48 hours.’<br><br>The plan calls for the public to be more involved with police through directly elected crime and policing representatives.&#160;<br><br>’They will form the majority on police authorities, and will be responsible for ensuring that the police are tackling the priorities that concern us most,’ she said.<br>In addition police will provide:<br><br>*regular information about crime in their region<br>*maps showing where crimes have occurred<br>*information about actions taken to tackle crime<br>*access to regular meetings to discuss local priorities with police<br><br>Prime Minister Gordon Brown said that, while serious challenges remain to be tackled, police forces have a demanding job, which they do well.&#160; ‘To help them maintain those high standards, today’s proposals will cut red tape and targets at all levels of the police, allowing them to bear down on crime even further. We will also give the public more say over policing priorities in their area.&#160;<br>’We will continue to build a fairer, safer Britain, by giving the police the funding and support they need to tackle crime in our communities.’<br><br>Other measures<br><br>Other measures announced include:<br><br>a new enhanced role for Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC), giving it a greater role to robustly scrutinise police performance<br><br>investment of an extra &#163;25m in new technology to save police time, and reduce the need for officers to return to the station to do paperwork&#160;<br><br>the appointment of Jan Berry (former chairman of the Police Federation, the rank and file police officer body) as an independent bureaucracy champion to further cut red tape and free police hours.&#160;&#160;<br><br>The Home&#160;Secretary&#160;said the green paper sets out a new deal for the public and the police. ‘I want to help the police to continue to cut crime, drive up confidence and deliver for the public. Today’s plans give greater freedom for the police matched by more power to the public.’<br><br>The green paper is the government’s substantive response to the independent review of policing by Sir Ronnie Flanagan and to&#160;Louise Casey’s review of crime and communities, the Home Office adds. Many of its measures are based on recommendations made in those reports.&#160;<br><br>You can download the 103-page document at the Home Office website: <br><br>http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/about-us/news/changing-police-work<br>Commenting on the release of the Government’s Green Paper on Police Reform, ACPO President Chief Constable Ken Jones said:<br>“Policing today remains at its heart about serving the public. That is what those working in police forces across the country joined the service to do. Today’s green paper marks a potential watershed in its recognition that effective and responsive policing is best achieved through relocating policing back where it belongs, at the service of local people.<br>“For some years now ACPO has been pointing to the unintended yet unhelpful impact of top-down central targets. No two neighbourhoods are the same. Successful policing looks different in every one. If neighbourhood policing teams are to deliver for local people then they need the space to respond to local priorities, set by and with those they work to protect.<br>“The policing pledge set out today will help give people confidence that the police service will continue to get better at delivering for the public. Louise Casey’s recent report, Engaging Communities in Fighting Crime, identified the trust people place in their local police. Today’s set of crime statistics reinforces that public confidence. The policing pledge underlines ACPO’s commitment to increase that confidence still further, through continued improvement of our service. We look forward to working with Government to test and refine these commitments.<br>“We now need time to study the green paper in detail and contribute to the consultation which follows. There are big changes here, and all with an interest in the future of the police service will want to ensure they now deliver for the public we serve, while protecting what is best about accountable, responsive and politically impartial British policing. <br>“Every day, chief officers are faced with difficult choices, matching resources to risk, dealing with new challenges like e-crime and counter-terrorism, developing specialist teams such as firearms officers, or units to tackle domestic violence. These demands have to be balanced against the local focus on neighbourhood policing too. We hope to input further into the debate as discussion over the green paper unfolds.”
G4S view
Paul Moonan, Group Managing Director, G4S Security Services, said: "While we welcome the Government’s pledge to get more police officers back on the beat and tackling crime at a local level, achieving this will demand a significant reduction in the amount of bureaucracy that officers have to deal with. We believe the private sector has a critical role to play in achieving this and many police forces have already started to address this issue by outsourcing the management of custody suits and the provision of support services to private-sector firms, such as G4S.
"However, there appears to be a missing element in the debate so far. There is a group of people who already have the skills police officers possess – retired police officers – many of whom have taken early retirement. G4S already provides such individuals to police forces during times of emergency or when forces are faced with situations when workloads exceed their capacity Statement taking, accident investigation and house-to-house inquiries are all areas where former police officers have the skills and insight to release police officers from the burden of unnecessary bureaucracy and allow them to focus fully on their front-line duties and fighting crime. The private sector also allows police forces to manage their resourcing budgets more effectively as well as adding extra capacity and specialist capability into their teams, allowing them to provide a more dynamic response to incidents and a more flexible “surge capability” when that is required.”
