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For some forces it may already be too late, argues fed.

CC Simon Cole

The national lead for local policing has admitted the future of community police work may be a “tough love” question for chiefs.

Simon Kempton, operational lead for Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW) warned some areas have already seen their neighbourhood teams “decimated” with poor prospects of reforging relationships within their communities.

He made the comments at the federation’s annual conference in Birmingham last week after recounting the case of Andrew Ibrahim, who was jailed in 2009 for ten years for his plot to blow up a crowded shopping centre in Bristol.

Mr Kempton revealed a fellow member of Ibrahim’s mosque had telephoned his local community officer with concerns about the young man’s behaviour and said he had burns on his hands.

It was a phone call that averted a travesty as police raids of Ibrahim’s, who changed his first name by deed poll to Isa, flat uncovered a home-made bomb in a biscuit tin in the fridge.

Ibrahim was born in 1989 to a privileged Christian family. But he was shunned by his peers as a loser, ended up being expelled from a string of private schools, experimented with hard drugs and was arrested for shoplifting.

He suddenly turned to Islam, even persuading his mother to pay for a seven year study course in Birmingham and began wearing traditional clothing and grew a beard.

After he returned to college to study A levels including chemistry, he admitted he was “less interested in the study of his new found religion and more in the politics of the Middle East,” using college computers to download videos of US soldiers being beheaded in Iraq and started making bombs.

Mr Kempton said: “After attending mosque one day with strange chemical type burns on his hands a member of that mosque phoned his local community police officer expressing concern about Ibrahim and how he changed his demeanour, the way he was acting, the things he was saying.

“It’s that community police officer who passed on those concerns. And this led to Ibrahim’s flat being searched by the police and when we did we found a biscuit tin in his fridge and that biscuit tin contained the home-made explosive HMTD.

“Examination of his mobile phone and his laptop revealed he’d been carrying out hostile reconnaissance of Bristol shopping centre.

“Essentially his attack was planned and it was ready to go.

“That telephone call to the community police officer doubtless saved lives. It’s only because of the patience shown by that officer in building up trust with the Muslim community over the weeks and months and the decency and quick thinking of those from that community that Ibrahim was unable to detonate the device and murder countless innocent people.

“And that’s the value of community policing.”

But Mr Kempton raised concerns that “in some parts of our country neighbourhood policing is done in name only.”  

A safe neighbourhood team that might have been half a dozen PCs and half a dozen PCSOs in the past is probably now one part time PC maybe two PCSOs if we’re lucky. And it’s never okay but it’s recoverable- if we reverse it now,” he said.  

“If you decimate neighbourhood policing and leave it decimated, it’s going to be so difficult for us to try and rebuild that from the ground up.

“We need to recognise safer neighbourhood is an investment in itself, if you invest in safer neighbourhoods you eventually get fewer 999 calls to keep bouncing to.

“How do you KPI having a cup of tea and chatting?”

Phil Matthews, PFEW conduct lead and chairman of Wiltshire Police Federation David Ibbott echoed his concerns.

Mr Matthews said he had heard neighbourhood teams are the first to be abstracted and backfilled for response work.

“It’s an easy hit for chief constables,” he said. “Some chiefs seem to have rebadged as neighbourhood response and they can then say to the Home Office 'we’ve got a neighbourhood team, it’s okay'. They aren’t actually fulfilling the true ethos of neighbourhood policing.”

Mr Ibbott said he is worried newer recruits do not know how to patrol anymore.

“I said when they started dismantling neighbourhood policing it would take seven years and then we’re past that point of no return. You can’t just stop patrolling and expect it to pick up again.

“The guy that took me out was a seasoned veteran, he had 14 years in the job he taught me how to speak to people. At what point do you think were at the point of no return because I think we’re approaching it pretty soon.”

National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for local policing Chief Constable Simon Cole said although capacity has reduced, gaps in neighbourhood policing provision come down to “decisions”.

“When we’re talking about demand and a bit of a tough love question for chiefs is we need to show what we’re doing to manage and use the resources we’ve got,” he said.

“I can tell you what I’ve not got, but I’ve still got 175 million quid. That’s still quite a lot.

“The call demand last summer was so high in so many forces that lots of neighbourhood teams got sucked in to deal with things that were regarded as riskier. And there’s a balancing act around what’s risky now and needs sorting now and what’s long term risky and needs a bit of investment.

“I don’t think there’s going to be lots of money. We need to make some bold decisions.”

He also called for chiefs to explore citizen policing options, technology and partnerships to make savings but also to take a stand and say “it’s worth investing in this [neighbourhood policing].” 

Amanda Morris, Muslim Council of Britain outreach worker, said the experience of many Muslims is a feeling of being “unduly targeted” by the Prevent counter-terrorism programme.

It is based on a “conveyor belt ideology”, she claimed.

“People who turn to violence, we’ve found at the council, tend to have in their background some kind of grievance. They could be from an ethnic minority background, a financially depressed background, they haven’t had the opportunities that other people have had in life.

“This is something the Prevent agenda doesn’t look at.

“And yet the Prevent agenda making Muslims feel more pressured and more cornered is creating more grievances.”

She said: “We believe we should move more towards evidence based strategies.

“We believe less funding should be placed in Prevent initiatives and more in community policing.”

View On Police Oracle

[Radman + 2,165]

Neighbourhood policing is vital in any community but sadly it is often the first thing cut when times get tough or hard. My role is largely one of an NPT/SNT role when compared to the County forces even though my post if classified as a response position within BTP. I know the vast majority of rail staff, retail employees, beggars and even the odd regular commuter or two who walk through the station going to work by their first name. 

Truth be told you get your Intel from people and by building relationships with them, ultimately when you talk to people they tell you things. I couldnt think of anything worse than coming to work rushing out to call after call with little resolution at the end of the day. I would much rather get stuck into problems and try to work out how we can deal with matters together. A big annoyance of mine however is that I don't believe local communities have all that much say or influence on how local ASB/Criminal issues are dealt with or tackled- we are missing that element from our society simply because the way our county forces are funded, operate and account largely cuts out the issues which do effect people's lives day in day out for the larger more pressing crime, in turn these matters are ignored or put very low down on the list. I would like to see more input from council doing more to do their part to tackle crime and disorder as they are legislatively obligated to do.

 

[Ether + 1,424]

What neighbourhood policing? Driving through an estate once in 24 hrs isn’t neighbourhoods policing.

[Hyphen + 693]

Short answer is yes, it’s too late. There is a shortage of police officers, full stop. Neighbourhood, response, detectives, specialists and all the rest.

We are on the whole now a reactive service who prioritise health and social care of the ‘vulnerable’ above all else.

We can barely get to incidents coming in, let alone have the option of a large neighbourhood team.

Personally I think the time has already arrived where we need to be redrawing our lines and communicating this to the public.

The reason I say it’s too late is the sheer cost to fix policing will now be astronomical, policing will not return to anything like this probably for much of my career.

Some might say this is negative however we need to stop kidding ourselves and the public.

[Mac7 808]

Short answer is yes, it’s too late. There is a shortage of police officers, full stop. Neighbourhood, response, detectives, specialists and all the rest.
We are on the whole now a reactive service who prioritise health and social care of the ‘vulnerable’ above all else.
We can barely get to incidents coming in, let alone have the option of a large neighbourhood team.
Personally I think the time has already arrived where we need to be redrawing our lines and communicating this to the public.
The reason I say it’s too late is the sheer cost to fix policing will now be astronomical, policing will not return to anything like this probably for much of my career.
Some might say this is negative however we need to stop kidding ourselves and the public.

Completely agree.

Neighbourhood policing doesn’t really exist in my force anymore. Nice to see the CC give a political answer rather than the truth.

The truth is an officer numbers have been reduced and budgets cut, officers who were on neighbourhood have either not been replaced, or taken away from communities to full investigation teams or response teams. What’s left is a token officer covering multiple wards assisted by PCSO’s.

Massive amounts of community intelligence is lost. Like the CC said how do you KPI a tea stop. I would go further. How do you KPI that local knowledge that used enhance the intel briefings. How do you KPI chatting to local officers in the corridors or canteens about local intel. How do you KPI identifying local offenders from still images of CCTV. How do you KPI finalising enforcement with local knowledge input or utilising established contacts. The list is endless, I could go on and on.

Local issues used to be resolved at source. Neighbourhood officers would know the key nominals, work with them but also not hesitate to lock them up. They would also know nominals who had moved onto their area and fill those intelligence gaps. On the flip side they would know how to steer those away from becoming offenders.

Neighbourhood officers would build trust within communities who are often hard to reach. They would establish networks, contacts and investigate local crime. Now those local issues are “resolved” or more often than not, filed in call centre type investigation teams.

It is too late. The damage is done. Even if more officers were placed into neighbourhoods the networks, intelligence, contacts, trust and all those points listed above would take years to re build.