POLICE officers in England and Wales should face fitness to practise checks every five years as part of efforts to address the crisis in confidence in policing, a major review has said.
The Strategic Review of Policing in England & Wales, carried out by the Police Foundation, has said a root-and-branch overhaul of policing is needed to tackle corroding confidence and to bring the service into the 21st century.
Speaking at the launch of the review today, chairman Sir Michael Barber warned that falling public confidence in police driven by a string of recent scandals as well as austerity cuts is putting Britain’s “policing by consent” model under threat.
Among the recommendations set out in the review to address this issue is introducing a five-year renewable licence to practise for every police officer, he said.
“That will help deal with the relatively small number of people who are not fit to be part of the police service or incompetent,” Sir Michael said.
There should be reforms to stop-and-search powers, which the report notes has damaged public trust in the police service, among black people in particular, and he said that there should be a national target to improve diversity in the force.
The report comes as forces continue to be rocked by a series of scandals including the rape and murder of Sarah Everard by a serving police officer.
Sir Michael said that the country has outgrown its police institutions, with forces unequipped to keep up with the changing nature of crime such as the rise in cybercrime.
Police Foundation director Dr Rick Muir told the launch that 53 per cent of all crime reported to police in England and Wales in 2021 was for fraud and cybercrime.
“That is a fundamental transformation in the nature of crime and we have a police service which was not designed to deal with that kind of thing,” he said.
Amid these social changes “police performance in terms of outcomes have been deteriorating,” he said, saying that bold and radical measures are needed.
The review also calls for the creation of a new crime-prevention agency and a major expansion of the National Crime Agency to tackle rising levels of border crime.
