Image source: Simon Dawson, No10 Downing Street Flickr page, Open Government Licence v3.0
Police chiefs have welcomed the Government’s announcement of plans to create a new National Centre of Policing to bring together support services including IT and forensics.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper made the announcement in a statement to Parliament and a speech to the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) annual conference this week.
Her parliamentary statement on police reform included a claim that policing currently lacks the systems and technology to respond to the increasing complexity of crime. This has prompted the plan for a new national centre.
“We are determined to work with policing to consult on the creation of a new National Centre of Policing to bring together crucial support services, such as IT and forensics, that local police forces can draw upon, to raise standards and improve efficiency,” she said.
“Looking further ahead, and having heard representations from policing, we will explore additional opportunities to expand the remit of this new body, including around those operational responsibilities where effective coordination is critical for success.”
Funding pledge
This has come with a pledge of more than £500 million of additional central government funding for policing next year to support the Safe Streets Mission. Full details of this will be published in December.
The plan for a National Policing Centre suggests that there could be a limited life for the Police Digital Service, which was recently shaken by the arrest of two employees and saw the appointment of a new chief executive officer on an interim basis.
But the announcement was welcomed by the chair of the NPCC, Chief Constable Gavin Stephens.
Speaking about at the conference, he said: “An organisation of this nature could provide strategic, operational and enabling capabilities on behalf of all police forces, doing so once, and well, preventing duplication, and if sustained over the long term, enabling reinvestment into local policing, where it is most needed.”
Data for decision making
He also emphasised the importance of improving policing’s ability to collect data at a national level to support better strategic decision making.
“We must draw together national policing data under common standards, allowing us to identify criminal activity quickly, intercept it proactively and highlight patterns of growing concern,” he said.
“It will also enable us to build the tools needed to combat advancing criminal tactics – not in a force-by-force manner which is hugely expensive, but nationally, once and for all.”
Cooper also highlighted other plans in her speech, including the creation of a Police Performance Unit to track national data on local performance and drive up standards, and a Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee to rebuild trust between communities and local forces.
“Public confidence is the bedrock of our British policing model but in recent years it has been badly eroded, as neighbourhood policing has been cut back and as outdated systems and structures have left the police struggling to keep up with a fast-changing criminal landscape,” she said.
“That’s why we’re determined to rebuild neighbourhood policing, to improve performance across police forces and to ensure the highest standards are being upheld across the service.
“The challenge of rebuilding public confidence is a shared one for government and policing. This is an opportunity for a fundamental reset in that relationship, and together we will embark on this roadmap for reform to regain the trust and support of the people we all serve and to reinvigorate the best of policing.”
