Opinion

OPINION: A spate of juvenile charges being laid in youth courts in New Zealand has reignited the debate around whether the country needs to raise its criminal age of responsibility; Professor Claire Breen of the University of Waikato argues that increasing the age of responsibility from 10 to 12 or older would see children still face the consequences of their actions, but escape being caught up in the criminal justice system.

OPINION: Measures around UK public order policing that were defeated in the Police, Courts, Crime and Sentencing Bill are now making their way through Parliament in the Public Order Bill, prompting impassioned debate along the way; Senior Policing Lecturer Owen West, a former chief superintendent and public order policing specialist, argues that while the proposals may enthuse government supporters, they are not in the interest of the public or the police service.

OPINION: Police officers are regularly expected to use their discretion, policing skills and street craft to achieve the best outcomes for communities and the wider public; but Policing Lecturer and former police sergeant Barrie Archer fears that finding ways to ‘get the job done’ and make a broken system work can lead to noble cause corruption – or worse.

OPINION: While law enforcement has increasingly acknowledged that improving trust and building relationships with communities are key to successful policing, the skills necessary to establish those relationships are often overlooked in police training or dismissed as ‘common sense’; former Arlington County Master Police Officer Dimitrios Mastoras argues that structured training for officers in building relationships with stakeholders could deliver significant benefits for both policing and the public.

OPINION: Amid the current UK political chaos, one clearly emerging scenario is that further public spending cuts are now probable, with policing likely to be back in the firing line; Tom Gash, Managing Director of strategy consultancy Leapwise and former Director of Research at the Institute for Government, looks at how policing can navigate this harsh reality, and the current window of opportunity to prepare a case for protection from cuts and drive productivity improvements locally and nationally.

OPINION: The recent publication of Baroness Casey’s interim report into the internal discipline system of the Met Police found not only an apparent failure to address misconduct by some officers, but little faith in the complaints procedure among the officers and staff of the UK’s largest force; Professor Colin Rogers of the University of South Wales believes that adopting an organisational justice approach could be key to meeting those challenges.

FEATURE: While the benefits and negative consequences of the police use of stop and search are frequently debated, the increased use of community scrutiny panels has been put forward as one measure to improve both monitoring and understanding of this policing tool; the panels were the focus of a recent @WeCops Twitter Chat, which has been summarised here by team member and West Mercia Sergeant Kerri Monaghan.

OPINION: Recent protest activities in the UK – in particular those by the Just Stop Oil group – have prompted much debate about the effectiveness of the police response to such actions; Graham Wettone, who spent much of his policing career managing public order policing, highlights some key challenges in responding to the current protests, and why it may be time for a more robust approach to those groups unwilling to engage.

OPINION: Despite pervasive ‘common sense intuitions’ to the contrary, a new report from the Sentencing Council for England and Wales states there is no evidence that harsher sentences deter crime; Penelope Gibbs, Director of Transform Justice, believes the findings of the report underline the need for a more effective sentencing regime that can help to reduce both crime and prison populations.

OPINION: Last month’s violent confrontations between groups of Hindu and Muslim men in Leicester seem to take many in the English city (including police) by surprise; however, Professor Chris Allen of the University of Leicester believes that rushing through a proposed review into the violence risks a failure to recognise that neither Muslim nor Hindu communities are one-dimensional or singular, and that not all the problems they experience are based in religion.

FEATURE: When Wisconsin police officer Adam Meyers was involved in the fatal shooting of an armed suspect, the resulting mental health challenges he faced – and the associated stigma – led him into a downward spiral of poor coping mechanisms and suicidal thoughts; now he’s using his own experiences to inspire other struggling officers to speak out and seek help, and urging leaders and law enforcement agencies to address the mental health stigma.

OPINION: Two recent reports into modern slavery have highlighted Australia’s leading role in efforts to eradicate human trafficking and modern slavery; Australian Human Rights Commissioner Lorraine Finlay and research assistant Jennifer Katrib believe the reports also underline the importance of Australia’s continued leadership in this role, both for the country and for the wider region.

INTERVIEW: As the European Commission DroneWISE innovation project comes to a close, Project Co-ordinator Dr Holger Nitsch spoke to Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth about the counter-drone training tools that are now available for emergency service responders to better plan and prepare a multi-agency response to a terrorist drone attack.

INTERVIEW: Often a target narcotic for law enforcement, MDMA is among a number of psychedelic drugs increasingly being used to treat US police officers and other first responders suffering from PTSD; Policing Insight’s Christine Townsend spoke to Lt Sarko Gergerian – a qualified psychotherapist and advocate of the approach – about his own experiences of receiving MDMA-assisted psychotherapy, which featured in a recent Netflix documentary.

OPINION: A fatal crash involving a runaway freight train in British Columbia three years ago has raised awareness among the Canadian public of the unique investigative and jurisdictional powers bestowed on company-operated railway police; Professor Bruce Campbell of Canada’s York University believes it’s time this “antiquated relic” of private-sector policing was replaced with an independent public railway police regime similar to the British model.

OPINION: The new senior command team announced by recently appointed Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley includes evidence-based policing pioneer Professor Lawrence Sherman as the force’s first Chief Scientific Officer; Policing Lecturer Tom Andrews believes the appointment heralds a clear commitment by the Met – and British policing more widely – to research-informed practice.

INTERVIEW: In the latest in a series of interviews with leading figures involved in the research and investigation of organised crime, Policing Insight’s Chris Allen spoke to Roy McComb, organised crime consultant and former Deputy Director of the UK National Crime Agency, about the switch from terrorism to organised crime in Northern Ireland, the success of Project Aidant, and organised crime’s evolution in the cyber world.

OPINION: Governments and philanthropists have poured significant sums of money into tackling the illegal wildlife trade, with militarised anti-poaching projects and cutting-edge technology leading the targeting of the trade; but Professor Rosaleen Duffy of the University of Sheffield argues that addressing the problem purely as a criminal matter fails to reduce demand or offer economic alternatives for those driven to poaching.

INTERVIEW: In the latest in a series of interviews with leading figures involved in the research and investigation of organised crime, Policing Insight’s Chris Allen spoke to John M Sellar, author and former detective and UN wildlife crime specialist, about the route from Scottish cop to the UN, the need for transnational co-operation, and the difficulties of trying to overcome police and government corruption around the globe.

INTERVIEW: The period of mourning and subsequent state funeral for HM Queen Elizabeth II involved one of the UK’s largest ever policing operations at multiple locations; Chief Constable Lucy D’Orsi, who led Operation London Bridge, spoke to Policing Insight Contributing Editor Sarah Gibbons about the scale and complexity of the operation, the pride and professionalism of officers and staff, and the “hidden heroes” behind the scenes.

OPINION: The changing nature of crime, the advances of new technology, and the debates around training and wellbeing are representative of just some of the contemporary challenges facing policing in England and Wales; Jonathan Jackson, Senior Teaching Fellow in Policing and Security at Birmingham City University, explores some of those key challenges, and what steps the service could be taking to address them.

OPINION: The campaign to raise the age of criminal responsibility in Australia from 10 to 14 continues to gather pace; but Dr Terry Goldsworthy, a former police officer and now Associate Professor at Bond University, argues that incarceration of youth offenders is a sentencing outcome rather than a determination of criminal responsibility, and raising the age of responsibility will do little to address the underlying causes of youth crime.

OPINION: This month saw the appointment of a new Commissioner and Acting Deputy Commissioner for the Metropolitan Police Service, the UK’s biggest police force; Martyn Underhill, a former Met police officer who served as Dorset Police and Crime Commissioner from 2012-2021, believes the new leadership team will have to make some swift and fairly radical changes to address the key challenges affecting public confidence and performance in the force.

OPINION: As UK policing once again faces criticism for its response to anti-monarchy protests – with officers accused of creating a ‘police state’ if they take action, and being ‘woke’ if they don’t – Senior Policing Lecturer Owen West, a former chief superintendent, argues that it’s time for policing leadership to fill the vacuum in the public debate by defending and promoting the values of the service, or risk a further loss of public trust and confidence.