Gwent’s Police and Crime Commissioner Ian Johnston has strongly criticised UK Government plans to recruit top officers with no policing experience.
Plans are due to be announced to allow police forces in England and Wales to recruit senior officers from outside the service.
Mr Johnston said: “Once again the Government is showing how little it understands about the role and responsibilities of Police Officers. The idea of parachuting someone with no policing experience into a senior officer post is at best ill-conceived meddling and at worst could lead to the public and police officers being put at more risk of harm.
“One of the arguments which is being put forward to justify this plan is that it’s difficult to attract and retain talent to the ranks of the Police. The facts tell a different story because as it stands officers who show leadership qualities can gain promotion through the ranks relatively quickly. However this should always follow the vitally important stage of walking the beat, detecting crimes, making arrests, speaking to the public and all the other things that Police Constables do on a day to day basis.
“Whilst more can always be done to retain officers who have shown potential and leadership qualities the rank structure as it stands allows officers to equip themselves for their next role within the police service.
“I can’t understand how the Government can suggest that someone takes up a senior role which involves managing police officers and their work if they’ve not done the work themselves. As good and thorough as a 15-month training programme can be, it will never take the place of experience.
“Dicing with death”
Mr Johnston added that anyone joining the force as a superintendent would be “dicing with death”.
He said: “I’m not over stating things when I say that someone joining the service as a superintendent is actually dicing with death – it shows a complete lack of understanding by the Government of what superintendents do. To think that someone could join as a superintendent, which is an operationally critical role, without policing experience and have responsibility for investigating murders, rapes and serious incidents defies logic.
“If the Government are really that concerned about opening up the police service to a wider pool of talent and attracting the brightest and the best then they shouldn’t have taken the shameful step of cutting the starting salary of Police Constables by £4,000.”
We, the general public, are not worthy to make a judgement on the Governments Plans to open up recruitment, to ` outsiders` to senior ranks in the Police Service, I don`t think anyone can judge the process, yet, because the Government have not announced what ` training` by way of specific police training, and, limited experience `on the streets`, is going to be provided before these interlopers are set free to ` do their duty` to the citizens of the area in which they will be employed.
It is clear that even I can see the current proposals, and therefore the current UK Government, are not taking seriously the wealth of experience, the huge amount of (gained over years) specific job related training, the varied and considerable amount of engagement with members of the public the current system demands that any officer promoted to high rank has to encompasses, and, the ` confidence` the Chief Constable has to have in each officers he or she currently promotes within the Police force they control. It appears, under the new proposals the Chief Constable will have to form a ` judgement` on each applicant for a high ranking post using that applicants experience as an employee in Industry or Commerce, how on earth can that Consideration, by the Chief Constable, transpose itself into, and replace, the years of working with their officers from the day they are recruited as Young Constables, the year on year training they experience in their formative years as Constables walking the streets day and night, summer and winter, and the continued personal assessments each of these Constables have to expose themselves to year on year.
Currently, it appears the system always ensures the ` Best man or Woman` for the job of Inspector and above, and, in each case those appointees will have ` earned their pips and crowns and laurel wreathes`
under the new proposals, these internal applicants for promotion will stand shoulder to shoulder with the ` man from the Pru` no contest.