Staffordshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner, Matthew Ellis, says significant changes need to happen in policing over the next few years. He says it’s essential in order to get boots back on the ground for longer in local communities whilst dealing with the growth of online crime, security issues and child abuse during a time of shrinking budgets.
Mr Ellis said that even in the short time since becoming PCC he had seen crime and the threats faced change and become more complex.
He said: “The growth of online crime is epidemic in its proportions and the resources required to investigate and combat it threatens leaving more traditional neighbourhood policing behind when it comes to resources.
“Add to that the threat from extremism and the repulsive sexual abuse of children, often in organised ways, and it’s clear that policing has to evolve in order to meet these competing needs in the future. I don’t say this to alarm anybody, I say it because so many people think these things only happen somewhere else.
“But I do not subscribe to abandoning the traditional neighbourhood policing approach which some Chief Constables nationally say it is time to do. Nor do I want police to ignore crimes such as shoplifting and low level drugs as some of those same Chiefs at the top of policing have suggested. And I certainly cannot agree with some calls nationally to get rid of Staffordshire Police in favour of a massive regional West Midlands force. That would be the death knell for truly local policing as we know it in Staffordshire.
“It does, however, mean that changes have to happen in order to maintain the traditional British approach to local policing in a hi-tech, often more complex world.”
Staffordshire’s interim Chief Constable, Jane Sawyers, agrees with the need for effective neighbourhood policing. She says that the financial pressures can only be met by working more closely with partners, investment in technology and meeting the goodwill of officers and staff by improving outdated systems and providing better tools for the job. She said: “Having named local officers on the ground, working with communities they know, has enormous benefits for keeping people safe.
“Over the last few years there have been significant reductions in crime and anti-social behaviour with neighbourhood officers working closely alongside other agencies to address the causes rather than just the effects.
“This doesn’t mean however that policing can stand still. Crime is changing and becoming more complex. Risks to the public are emerging that we must tackle, not least those involving child sexual exploitation, domestic abuse and serious sexual assaults, and the shift to harm caused by online and cyber-crime. We must also provide the resources to meet those risks. “It is also true that budgetary pressures mean that if we don’t improve and change the way policing is provided, it will be less effective in the future. Any slack in the system has long since gone and we simply have to make better use of the resources we have.”
Over the last year, the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (OPCC) has been working with Staffordshire Police on a step change in the provision of technology, better use of buildings and assets, improving financial planning and management as well as driving collaboration in the delivery of services across the wider public sector.
The Safer, Fairer, United Communities Strategy, which was published by the Police and Crime Commissioner in 2013, set out strong principles for more comprehensive joined up working to prevent crime, support victims and witnesses more effectively as well as major new investment in state-of-the-art technology.
A new Vision for Policing, that delivers the PCC’s strategy, has also been developed by the Police and OPCC that places those principles at the heart of future services alongside improving the public’s experience of dealing with, and contacting, the police. An overarching strategy identifies the top priority areas where effort is required to meet the needs of policing and criminal justice in 2020 and beyond. Those priorities have been agreed by the force and OPCC and been brought together into a strategic work programme to be delivered during the next four years.
This will include:
- Making it easier for people to access Staffordshire Police whether over the phone, face to face, online or through apps and social media. People will be able to report a crime or incident in their preferred way and track progress online. Because police will be sharing appropriate information and working more closely with other organisations, people will only have to have one conversation to get the services they need.
- Developing a swifter and effective criminal justice system which will improve services for victims and witnesses and is fair for all involved. Police will work more closely with prosecutors and the courts to bring offenders to justice and speed up the justice process. A new Victims Gateway, to be launched in April, will provide a single point of contact for victims and make it much easier to get the support they need.
- Making more effective use of public assets – such as police buildings – and vehicles by sharing and purchasing with other organisations. A new cross-sector property partnership with Staffordshire County Council will unlock the value of under-used public buildings and release resources back into frontline policing. A transport centre of excellence will be a national first and see vehicle maintenance align between police, fire and other organisations – halving the time most police vehicles are off the road for repair and saving almost £1m a year of public money which could go to frontline policing.
- Adopting a radical, more capable approach to technology that makes Staffordshire the most effective, efficient and agile police service in the UK. An ICT programme, working with a strategic commercial partner, will deliver a ‘game-changing’ level of transformation for Staffordshire Police, replacing tired police systems and making far better use of technology. Information will be shared more easily across other public sector agencies and police officers will no longer have to deal with a myriad of incompatible systems meaning they can engage on a whole new level with the public. The roll-out of new mobile data devices will start in April and is set to free up about 5,000 hours a week of extra visible frontline policing in Staffordshire.
Mr Ellis said that the last 20 months has seen improvements in the way policing works and performs but the main success has been improving the financial position to protect services despite the challenging financial climate. He said the solid foundations needed are now in place to build more cost effective, better equipped, high capability crime fighting for the future:
“The right investment in technology, delivered in an intelligent efficient way, will increase time for front line policing by thousands of hours each week across Staffordshire. It will turn the tables on criminals through superior, real time intelligence, reduce cumbersome time-consuming bureaucracy and provide officers with the right information on demand to deal with what they are facing or investigating.”
Mr Ellis says that it’s not the easy option but it is the sustainable and right way forward:
“When finances are strained it’s all too easy to hit local council tax payers in the pocket instead of doing the difficult work to modernise policing and criminal justice by making it more efficient, more productive and better value for public money.”
“Working closely with Staffordshire Police we have set out what’s needed for a game-changing programme of transformation. It will maintain the most local neighbourhood policing, equip the force better than ever before, is already returning greater discretion to officers through the removal of targets and will see policing here as top performing nationally.”
The PCC and Chief Constable share an ambition for an integrated system across Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent where criminal justice and community safety services provided by different agencies are aligned to meet common goals. There will also be greater use of pooled funding between agencies to achieve better targeted use of public money.
In 2014 a £2million Incentivising Fund was made available by the PCC to all agencies in Staffordshire to stimulate joint working towards better crime reduction and community safety outcomes.
Mr Ellis said: “It’s my job to work with the police and others to make sure that Staffordshire is achieving the required results as effectively as it can and giving the best value for money for taxpayers. More significant collaboration between public agencies will remove inefficient silo working to free up more money for frontline community safety services and public protection activities. The work that’s already started to create a joint transport unit between the police and fire services is one example of this and I fully expect arrangements like that to be common place in time, saving money and pushing more resources to delivering front line services.
“As well as improving policing for the people of Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent the major pieces of work, some of which have already started, will reduce costs and meet the majority of the £23m savings needed up to 2019/20.”
The Chief Constable is enthusiastic about the benefits that joined up working can bring. She said: “We need to be able to share information more easily across public sector agencies, embrace digital working and free up police time so that we can engage on a whole new level with the public.
“So, from April communities will begin to see officers equipped with mobile devices that will make us more efficient and effective, better able to share information and spending more time visible in communities, better able to respond to the people we serve. For me, neighbourhood policing is as important as it ever was and remains at the heart of our policing approach.”
Mr Ellis concluded by saying that whilst the difficult financial climate has been challenging it has also provided opportunities:
“The necessity for change has opened doors in some parts of the public sector that were that were previously locked shut to greater and more effective joint working. The fact is that people across Staffordshire want to see police officers out of police stations and back into communities.”
“The strategy, as it’s delivered, will do that whilst ensuring the police have the right capabilities for the changing face of crime whilst having significantly better long term financial stability. It’ll be tough but exciting and will benefit our area for the future.”
