Criminal Justice: Police Reform

"A Force to be Reckoned With" A Report from the Police Reform Working Group | Published 30 March 2009

This 153 page report draws on interviews with the public, experts and Police Forces around the country and makes 26 policy recommendations to renew the Police Service’s unique history of localism and "policing by consent".

The three core recommendations of the report are:

1. Interventionist Neighbourhood Teams with a commitment to intervene

• A commitment by the police to intervene in any observed act of crime or antisocial behaviour
• The rebuilding of discretion for police officers
• A commitment to increasing the skills of officers to ensure that they have the capability to deliver the widest possible range of interventions

2. An elected Crime and Justice Commissioner for every Police Force area

• Act as a figurehead for community safety
• Chair the Police Authority and hold to account the Local Criminal Justice Board and Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships
• Set local priorities for all of these agencies and influence the spending of budgets across partnerships

3. Police training for discretion and Restorative Justice

• All officers should be trained to employ discretion to judge when to make an arrest and when to use an informal approach
• Training for informal approaches should include community accountability meetings (based on Restorative Justice), which have proven highly effective.

 
Click here for the Police Reform Working Group Report
Click here for the Executive Summary

Criminal Justice: Police Reform 

“We need police who treat the streets as their office, dealing with antisocial behaviour in a way that deters as well as punishes. Police officers need to know that they can take the necessary risks and use their discretion, and that they’ll be supported by politicians and the public when they do. In short this report sets out the plan to make the police a force to be reckoned with and a force for good.”
Rt Hon Iain Duncan Smith MP, CSJ Chairman

Introduction

A Force to Be Reckoned With calls for politicians to give power back to local police forces, freeing them of paperwork, targets and central bureaucracy, and returning them to their natural office: the community. The review makes recommendations on policing principles and new structures for local governance; restoring discretion to officers; winning back public confidence; and performance measurement.

· With an annual budget of over £17.5 billion, the Police Service makes up more than half of the entire public order and safety budget (which includes the fire services, law courts and prisons).[i]

· Britain is a high crime country – the average citizen (aged 39) has lived through a fourfold increase in overall crime during the course of their lifetime.[ii]

· Only one per cent of an officer’s time is spent on foot patrol.[iii]

A Parent Turns to the Police for Help

Assistant Chief Constable Ackerley of Nottingham Police told the Working Group of an incident which typified the need for police discretion to choose appropriate disposals:

“A mum comes in and says: ‘My daughter’s thirteen and she’s stolen 35p from my purse.’ Guess what? The thirteen year old gets locked up, a social worker comes in, the girl gets interviewed, admits to taking the 35p, she gets fingerprinted, has her DNA taken and she gets reprimanded. The girl has behavioural difficulties, she’s not being supported the way she should. She needed the 35p to get to school.”

1. Scrap APACS (Analysis of Policing and Community Safety) as the national performance assessment system
Replace APACS with a small number of national indicators for protective services (not more than five)

Police activity should be freed from restrictive and priority-distorting quantitative targets. The goal is to give police the freedom to intervene more often and make use of a wide range of disposals which are more effective and efficient.

2. Police training for discretion and community accountability meetings

The aim is to empower police responding to a minor incident or act of antisocial behaviour, as well as certain serious offences, to use professional discretion to determine which disposals are appropriate for a given incident – and to train them in the implementation of those disposals.

3. 43 Locally elected Criminal Justice Commissioners

One Criminal Justice Commissioner (CJC) for each of the 43 forces in England and Wales, to be selected by popular vote. Each elected Commissioner will hold a mandate to deliver community safety by holding accountable and coordinating the local Criminal Justice System as a whole, including: Police Authorities, HM Prisons, Court Services, Probation Services, Crown Prosecution Service, Youth Offending Teams, and Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships. In doing so, the CJC will chair Police Authorities, Criminal Justice Boards and Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships.

4. Interventionist Neighbourhood Teams with a commitment to intervene

The Neighbourhood Policing model – with its focus on street patrol, visibility, community interaction, partnership work, flexible disposals and intervention against street crime and antisocial behaviour – represents the right direction of travel for local policing. Neighbourhood teams should be expected, and resourced appropriately, to intervene against every observed crime or act of antisocial behaviour.

5. Review and reform of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)

The Working Group recommends a full and urgent review of the CPS. The issues that a review of CPS should seek to examine include:

• The local accountability of the CPS.
• Appropriate resource levels for the CPS.
• The prosecution thresholds applied by the CPS.
• The desirability of continuing with a Prosecution Service which is separate from the police.

Restorative Justice

Two teenage boys were engaged in the persistent bullying and harassment of two younger girls. Over a period of 18 months, the behaviour became more regular and widespread, eventually taking place not only in public places but within the local high school. Parents from all families became involved and the situation began to escalate. Police were called a total of 234 times. A restorative conference was held. Since that time, there has been no further police involvement.

Police Time Used Prior to the Conference
It was estimated that each of the 234 calls to the police involved the attendance and administrative time totaling approximately one hour of police time per call. This totals £7,188.80

Police Time Used
The total time in setting up and delivering the conference was 4 hours 50 minutes at the cost of £157.37.

Estimated Savings in the Year following the Conference
Savings of 156 hours of police time, costed at £4,792.53

“Counting Offences Brought to Justice pressurises staff to focus on total numbers. It values arresting a twelve year old shoplifter the same as a murderer or drug dealer.”
Senior Officer, Surrey

                                                                           

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CHAIRMAN

Ray Mallon

Ray is serving his second term as the elected mayor of Middlesbrough. Before 2002, Ray spent 28 years as a police officer, rising through the ranks to become Detective Superintendent in charge of Criminal Investigation in Hartlepool and Middlesbrough in 1996. ‘Robocop’, as he came to be known in the press, cut crime in Middlesbrough by 20 per cent in 18 months through proactive policing and a focus on education and rehabilitation. Ray is a board member of the regeneration agency One NorthEast as well as a columnist for The Northern Echo. He used to play waterpolo for Great Britain. 

WORKING GROUP

Professor Norman Dennis
Visiting Fellow at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne

Dr. David Green
Director of Civitas

Steve Green
Former Chief Constable of Nottinghamshire Police

Professor Ken Pease
Professor at the Midlands Centre for Criminology and Criminal Justice

Sir Charles Pollard
Former Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police

Professor Jonathan Shepherd
Director of the Violence & Society Research Group, University of Cardiff

Jimmy Watson
Senior Partner of Watson Woodhouse Soliitors

Advisors:

Professor Lawrence Sherman
Wolfson Professor of Criminology, Cambridge University

Jan Berry
Former Chairman of the Police Federation