ANALYSIS: New research by community safety professional Abu Ullah into the incidence of violence against women and girls in the London Borough of Sutton has highlighted the need for an evidence-based approach targeting hotspots to gain the most effective outcomes from overstretched police resources and reduce the threat to females, as he explained to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons.

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ANALYSIS: As a counter-corruption reporting service is expanded across the UK, Policing Insight’s Ian Weinfass examines whether it will be effective and asks what else is needed to win back public trust.

LATEST RESEARCH: This summary curates the key policing-related research that's been published online in the last week, with links to the original journal articles, and selected abstracts.

ANALYSIS: The Police Constable Degree Apprenticeship (PCDA) is a key entry route into the UK police service; but Donna Eastham, Programme Lead for Professional Policing at Leeds Trinity University, warns that issues such as a lack of informed understanding or commitment to academic learning among employers, the impact of ‘war stories’, and the ‘inbetweenness’ degree apprenticeships create for policing students could all have damaging consequences for the success of the PCDA. 

INTERVIEW: In the latest in a series of interviews with leading figures involved in the research and investigation of organised crime (OC), Policing Insight’s Dr Chris Allen spoke to Chris Dalby, Director of OC publishing platform World of Crime, about why the age of the cartel may be coming to an end, how education could be the biggest weapon in the fight against organised crime, and the fact that many of those involved in organised crime would rather have a house, family and a middle-class lifestyle.

OPINION: With communities across Canada considering whether the Royal Canadian Mounted Police should be responsible for municipal policing, the city of Surrey in British Columbia has become one of the first to look to replace it with a newly-formed Surrey Police Service; but Royal Roads University Lecturer Dr Bryce Casavant believes the controversy and conflict between the RCMP and Surrey Police highlights the challenges around the transition.

INNOVATION: In the latest in a series of articles exploring how artificial intelligence (AI) can be used in policing, Chief Philip Lukens explores how AI can enhance and improve the services police provide without cutting workforces, and ensuring there is no damaging impact on public trust and legitimacy.

ANALYSIS: A long-awaited review of police resources and policing in Australia’s Northern Territory has called for an increase in officer numbers, a building programme for remote facilities, better resource management and a fatigue management plan for officers, after what review author and former NTPF officer Vince Kelly described as a “decade-long period of organisational trauma”, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: In an opinion piece that sets out to challenge UK policing’s “intellectual and doctrinal confusion”, recently re-elected Wiltshire PCC Philip Wilkinson argues that most of the public “feel abandoned to the intimidatory threats of vocal and shrill minorities”, amid concerns over “risk-averse” policing leadership and a perception that forces are failing to police without fear or favour.

INNOVATION: Against the backdrop of changing legislation and technological innovation, police and technology advisor Paul Kennedy, and Josh Hartlage, founder of tech company AdventFS, explore how technologies can help police and other agencies to be more efficient and effective in the application of out-of-court resolutions, guided by the principle that OOCRs should always meet the needs of victims, first and foremost.

FEATURE: With artificial intelligence increasingly important in the investigation process for collating and analysing large volumes of data, new EU funding is now up for grabs for proposals that can help policing and security practitioners undertake fast and flexible analysis of large data sets to improve the fight against transnational crime and terrorism, as Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth reports.

FREE SUBSCRIBER ACCESS: Policing Insight welcomes staff and students at Birmingham City and Edinburgh Napier Universities who now have FREE subscriber access with the start of new organisation wide subscriptions. They join a community of students, staff and officers from many other UK and international police, criminal justice and emergency services organisations with an interest in progressive policing. Read on to find out how to use your FREE subscriber access.

OPINION: In the wake of DS Peter Romanis’ recent article on compassion fatigue, former Scottish police officer and active bystander trainer Graham Goulden explores further the damage to officer wellbeing created by over-exposure to trauma, and the effect this can have both on officers and the communities they serve.

ANALYSIS: It’s now six months since the largest pro-Palestinian March in London, and the reaction to the policing of the event that led to the departure of Home Secretary Suella Braverman; as protests around the Middle East conflict continue, highlighted recently with the handling of an antisemitism campaigner’s attempt to walk through a march, Policing Insight’s Graham Wettone looks again at the claims of two-tier policing, the difficulties officers face, and the role politicians play in increasing tension.

LATEST RESEARCH: This summary curates the key policing-related research that's been published online in the last week, with links to the original journal articles, and selected abstracts.

INNOVATION: As part of a wider initiative to tackle violence in the night-time economy, West Yorkshire Police has used targeted social media campaigns appearing on mobile devices, with impressive results; as other forces look to learn from West Yorkshire’s success, Ch Insp James Kitchen spoke to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons about the thinking behind the project, and how similar approaches could offer potential in tackling other challenges.

OPINION: UK policing faces a continuing struggle to leverage the maximum effectiveness and efficiency out of the use of new technology, while accommodating concerns around ethics and human rights; Darren Scates, the Met Police Chief Digital Data and Technology Officer, looks at some of the particular challenges around the practical implementation and delivery of innovative technologies, and suggests steps the service could take to improve outcomes.

OPINION: Australian legislation enabling the repudiation of citizenship of those who engage in terrorism also means that those who commit conflict-related crimes including sexual violence escape prosecution, says PhD scholar Susan Hutchinson of the Australian National University, who calls for a new dedicated unit in the Australian Federal Police to investigate and prosecute such crimes.

FEATURE: Last month saw the launch of the Police Scotland Sikh Association, the latest addition to the National Police Sikh Association which has already successfully engaged with the Home Office on issues such as the wearing of the Kirpan and the use of face coverings during Covid; Policing Insight’s Martin Gallagher reports on the birth of a new organisation with a focus on support and engagement.

ANALYSIS: With police ‘culture’ the focus of several reports and reviews, and a hot topic for conversation inside and outside the service, many UK forces have been re-examining their own internal cultures and looking for routes to improvement; Richie Maddock, an organisational development and cultural change specialist, explains the work he has been doing with Lincolnshire Police to help the force embark on its own culture journey.

INTERVIEW: Victoria Police Detective Sergeant Peter Romanis believes that ‘compassion fatigue’ – a combination of accumulated secondary traumatic stress and burnout – poses the most significant threat to the mental health of emergency services workers, and hope a new report detailing the findings of his research into the issue will prove beneficial to officers and staff, as he explained to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons.

ANALYSIS: With all 37 police and crime commissioners and police, fire and crime commissioners across England and Wales due to take office tomorrow (Thursday, 2 May), Policing Insight rounds up the campaign commitments, pledges and victory comments from the latest cohort of commissioners – including some new names, several familiar faces, and some long-serving office holders.

ANALYSIS: The rising incidence of women’s deaths as a result of male violence in Australia has prompted some to call for the wider use of domestic violence disclosure schemes, but research by Monash University Professor Dr Kate Fitz-Gibbon, and Lecturer Ellen Reeves and Professor Sarah Walklate of the University of Liverpool, suggests such schemes can put victim-survivors in greater danger, with resources better invested elsewhere.