Policy

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: LEPH2023 Europe (21-24 May, supported by Policing Insight as media partner, is the first regional European conference exploring the complex and diverse intersections of law enforcement and public health, involving practitioners, policy makers and researchers from these and other related sectors. It carries on the international LEPH conference series, with an opportunity to focus on key regional issues.

OPINION: Online child sexual abuse activity has reached staggeringly high levels and increasing depravity; ahead of this month’s Policing Institute for the East Region (PIER) conference on tackling online harms, Simon Bailey, former Chief Constable of Norfolk and now PIER Chair, argues that a whole system approach to the issue – including education and regulation – is essential, as is the better use of technology by law enforcement.

OPINION: The increasing demands on policing to respond to those in mental health crises are creating significant burdens on police resources, and a potentially inadequate service to the public; Vernon White, former Chief of Police for Ottawa Police Service and Senator in the Canadian Parliament, and Joe Carlebach, former Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Health at Hammersmith and Fulham Council, believe the solution is to address the systemic problems in mental health care rather than more training for police officers.

FEATURE: A police officer who endured years of sexual abuse is working to establish a network of victim survivor ambassadors across police forces in England and Wales to improve the service delivered to victims of sexual abuse and violence; Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons spoke to the City of London’s PC Jon-Jay Needham about the benefits the independent advocate could deliver both for victims and policing.

ANALYSIS: The Mendéz Principles build on interviewing models in England and Wales to offer a global standard for effective interviewing practices that ensure non-coercive methods and procedural safeguards; ahead of next month’s conference on the subject at the Canterbury Centre for Policing Research (CCPR), Policing Lecturer James Harris and CCPR Director Dr Martin O’Neill explore the background to the principles, and the development of techniques and lessons drawn from UK cases.

ANALYSIS: A series of recent reviews and reports have highlighted issues around misogyny and gender inequality in UK policing; in this article Dr Wendy Laverick, Professor Peter Joyce and Dr Emma Cunningham explore the context of some of those issues, and consider the advances as well as the continuing challenges in relation to gender equity in British policing.

FEATURE: After a series of high-profile incidents and damaging reviews, levels of public trust in policing have fallen significantly; now a new briefing by the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology highlights the current trends around public trust and confidence in policing, the barriers to building that trust, and what policing can do to reverse the decline, as Policing Insight’s Keith Potter reports.

LONG READ: Humberside Police’s Right Care, Right Person (RCRP) initiative has transformed how the force handles mental health incidents, freeing up officers to focus on fighting crime – and with RCRP set to roll out nationwide, policing’s approach to these incidents is about to change significantly; but there’s a more complex story to tell about policing’s role in mental health work, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports.

OPINION: Despite an apparently well-developed framework of accountability arrangements, British policing is still facing a ‘polycrisis’ resulting in a significant loss of public trust and confidence; Police Foundation Director Rick Muir believes that a fresh approach to the principles of accountability – as underlined in a report published recently by the Foundation – could prove crucial in underpinning efforts to tackle the key challenges.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Uniting mission-critical and business-critical end-users with manufacturers and suppliers for three days of inspiration, knowledge and connections. CCW 2023 is supported by Policing Insight as media partner. Register you free place today for 23-25 May in Helsinki.

FEATURE: The recent attacks in the UK on two men leaving mosques, along with this year’s Jehovah’s Witness Hall shootings in Hamburg and Koran burning in Stockholm, have highlighted once again the threats to places of worship and their congregations; in the last in a series of articles on the PROTECTOR project, and ahead of this week’s conference on the issue, Policing Insight’s Andy Staniforth looks at latest initiatives to tackle the threat, and the key themes set to be explored at Tuesday’s event.

LONG READ: Thirty years after the murder of Stephen Lawrence – and the subsequent Inquiry description of the Met Police as “institutionally racist” – the force, and UK policing more widely, is wrestling with many of the same issues; Policing Insight’s Ian Weinfass spoke to officers involved both then and now to find out what has changed over the past three decades, and what more needs to be done.

OPINION: With the growing prospect of the responsibility for large national IT programmes passing from the Home Office to policing, the way the service gets its technology looks set to change; Sharad Rathi, Operations Director and Public Sector lead at HCLTech, believes that how that technology is developed and delivered is at least as important as which public body is delivering it.

OPINION: The recently published Casey Review highlighted issues of a “toxic culture” in parts of the Metropolitan Police including racist, sexist and misogynistic behaviour; but doctoral researcher Kathryn Farrow of the University of Oxford argues that while the findings and headlines have focused on the Met, other forces around the country still have much work to do on many of the same issues.

ANALYSIS: It’s long been argued that the police funding formula in England and Wales, which relies mainly on a combination of central government grant and locally set precept, is in need of reform, and fails to recognise the areas of greatest need; Policing Insight’s Ian Wiggett looks at the increasing dependence on the precept, the challenges around deprivation, and whether politicians are really willing to tackle a funding conundrum that has no comfortable fix.

INTERVIEW: As the debate continues in many countries about police training and qualifications, a pioneering US programme in Massachusetts is offering recruits the opportunity to achieve both an undergraduate and master’s degree alongside their qualification to serve as a full-time officer; Programme Director Lisa Lane McCarty spoke to Policing Insight’s Christine Townsend about the degree debate, professionalizing police training, and the challenges of making “better human beings”.

OPINION: With concerns over the ever-expanding police mission and political interference in policing, continuing doubts about the efficacy of the 43-force structure in England and Wales, anger over pay and conditions and a legitimacy crisis reminiscent of that of the late 1950s, a new Royal Commission into policing could be the best way to determine what we expect of the police service, and how it is going to achieve those aims, argues former officer and University of Derby Policing Lecturer Tom Andrews.

INTERVIEW: The focus of New Zealand Police’s road policing approach has been widened to include impairment prevention relating to drug-driving and fatigue; Supt Steve Greally, Director of the National Road Policing Centre, spoke to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons about the need for a holistic approach, the plans for roadside drug testing, and the impact on officers of dealing with the fatalities and serious injuries caused by poor driver decisions.

INNOVATION: With the publication of Baroness Casey’s Review the most recent development to highlight the importance of integrity in policing, the need for more effective employee vetting and screening processes is once again under the spotlight; Dr Matt Bland, Associate Professor in Evidence-Based Policing at Cambridge University, outlines the work undertaken by Master’s student Nick Dale to develop a screening solution that could be a gamechanger for UK policing.

FEATURE: Australia is the latest country to give serious consideration to criminalising coercive control, a step taken in the UK in 2015; new research published by Melbourne’s Monash University suggests that while the majority of victim-survivors believe such a step would be beneficial, they also argue significant investment in police training and a ‘cultural shift’ in the policing of domestic abuse would be required to make any new offence effective, reports Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons.

OPINION: With the recent Casey Review once against highlighting the need for changes to existing ‘police culture’ and the concept of ‘leadership’ in UK policing, former officer Tom Andrews, Policing Lecturer at the University of Derby, looks at previous examples of direct entry into policing, and considers whether this approach could offer solutions to some of the concerns raised by Baroness Casey and others.

FEATURE: Facial recognition technology is often criticised for its purported disproportionality, with police use of this tool already banned in some parts of the world; but a new academic study – hailed by the Met and South Wales Police – challenges this narrative, arguing that British policing is deploying live facial recognition tech that is effective and avoids the problem of disproportionality, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports.

OPINION: Police are increasingly the first point of contact to respond to those in mental health crisis, but when restraint has been the focus of such a response, some cases have led to tragic consequences; Lynn Emslie, Chair of the Independent Advisory Panel on Deaths in Custody, believes a partnership response from policing and health services could help to avoid future fatalities.

OPINION: While the debate continues around UK police education and the various entry routes for recruits into policing, former officer and now University of Central Lancashire Policing Lecturer Derek Flint argues that the ‘precious union’ between policing and academia needs to be maintained and strengthened to ensure the service has constables with a ‘professional curiosity’, and a desire and a determination to find out ‘why’ things are happening.