Policing in a networked world

It is one thing to know that police organisations need to be able to tackle a new set of challenges, but in the real world there is always a limit to funding. How do police leaders make the case to government for appropriate and sustainable funding, and how can they prioritise where to apply the funds received in a way that best aligns to their strategy?

In the United Kingdom, the Home Office (interior ministry) allocates over £8 billion funding across 43 police organisations in England and Wales, according to a formula that aims to be fair, transparent and efficient. However the existing formula is widely regarded as unfit for purpose and the overall level of police funding has fallen by about 20% in real terms since 2010.

As the government has been exploring alternative formulas, PwC has helped police organisations understand the implications of potential new models. In the meantime, PwC has also supported the police in making budget submissions during spending reviews. Our economics and policy specialists have explored how new and increasingly complex crime types are affecting demand for police services which, when coupled with new ways of working and staffing, could make the case for very different approaches to allocating police budgets nationally and locally.

Police organisations increasingly recognise that they work in a broader ecosystem that includes other authorities, such as border control and counter-terrorism.

This requires lateral thinking and agile models. A key goal should be future-proofing the police with network-based and innovative operating models that appropriately prioritise demand and resources, boosting efficiency at the same time.

Hyperconnectivity is what policing increasingly will need to be about. With criminals looking to exploit gaps between regional, national and international policing, gone are the days when it was enough to police a locality, or even just police within national borders. Now it is essential to prioritise and position resources to fight crime at the local, national and international levels for the best results.

In 2008, Sweden initiated a country-wide program to fight organised crime, centred on a ‘collaboration council’ consisting of 12 authorities, operating both on a national and regional level, and led by the national police authority. The effort enhances communication, exchange of information, knowledge-sharing and decision-making to reach one common goal. It has also sent an important signal of national crime-fighting intent to criminals and citizens. The collaborative effort is also helping to prevent and fight new types of crime, such as fraud and cybercrime, that demand specialist skills in various areas.

Criminals may misuse data, but data itself is also the police's friend. Data has enormous potential as a crime-fighting tool. Successful police organisations will be the ones that best exploit the innovation offered by technology and data to change the way policing is done, disrupt criminality and improve productivity.

Norway has made significant progress in digitisation by having all the various elements of the police – officers on the ground, technicians and so forth – working in parallel on a case rather than sequentially. What this means in practice is that where a crime has been committed, police will make audio recordings on site and upload these directly into police systems so that experts can conduct any analysis that’s needed in real time, even as the frontline officers continue their work. The process – known as ‘police work on site’ – aims to solve, or complete, 40% to 50% of cases within a single day from the moment a suspected crime has been identified.

Sworn police officers are still the backbone of a police organisation, but given the range of threats and types of criminality, especially in digitally driven crime, there is an urgent need to design, recruit, train and empower a committed, agile workforce for 21st-century policing. Younger, tech-savvy millennials are part of that frontline effort. Police organisations must reflect the demographic and ethnic makeup of the society in which they serve.

In Western Australia, the talent pool includes officers pursuing MBAs (Masters in Business Administration) and qualifications in politics and criminology. “We are attempting to provide greater opportunities to study elsewhere nationally and internationally,” said Stephen Brown, Deputy Commissioner, Western Australia.
 

Strategic workforce planning will be needed due to the rapidly changing nature of policing and the challenge for human resources functions to respond. Police organisations will need to keep in mind that the traditional key performance indicators (KPIs) around numbers of arrests will need to be broadened out to include metrics on elements like quality of service and crime prevention.
 

Diversity is crucial. Embracing a shift in perspective and making sure the force reflects the same diversity as the community it serves can help strengthen police legitimacy. “Whether it’s gender difference, cultural background or historical difference, a more diverse workforce is able to get different views and better communicate with different communities on a more human level,” said Paul Martin, Chief of Police of the Durham Regional Police Service in Canada. Police in Canada are learning useful lessons through collaboration with different cultural groups, such as First Nations police services, allowing them to draw from different viewpoints relevant to their communities.
 

In one small suburb in Perth, Australia, 42 African nations are represented in the community, while 41% of people living in the community were born outside Australia — a proportion that is among the highest in the world. “Our community is incredibly (and increasingly) diverse, and our workforce needs to respond to this...clearly, more needs to be done to shift towards accurately reflecting the diversity of the community we serve,” said Stephen Brown, Deputy Commissioner, Western Australia.

If the police are to remain public – to echo the words of Sir Robert Peel – police organisations will need to collaborate with government, communities, businesses and partner agencies to shape and enforce legislation with transparency to maintain legitimacy as a service.

In the Netherlands, progress has been made in binding the police closer to society in key ways. It is not uncommon for some towns to operate local ‘citizen’s patrols’ to help tackle crime. This is the most high-profile example of a broader trend in policing and society: the increasing participation by private citizens, organisations and others in various activities that fall within the range of police work and criminal justice. Another example in the Netherlands is the use of security services by harbour authorities.
 

The Dutch national police and the prosecution service launched an initiative in 2017 that aimed to develop guiding principles for how they should respond to and participate in such quasi-policing activities carried out by citizens and private organisations, with the aim of achieving sustainable inclusion in the criminal justice system. These disruptive changes in society have often unknown impacts on policing and the prosecution of crime, so it is important for police organisations to be engaged constructively with them.
 

This initiative involved PwC in helping the Dutch authorities assess the legal and other frameworks needed and analyse the extent to which citizens and private organisations can and should carry out such activities – and when government should step in.
 

One work stream is the establishment of a series of ‘professional dialogues’ with representatives of the police, prosecution service, academia, legal organisations, citizens groups and private organisations. These dialogues explore a wide range of ethical and legal issues, including unjustified citizen interventions (vigilantism), overburdening of police with data and disproportionate suspicion of individuals from certain social and/or ethnic groups. Another is the development of mobile apps for citizens to participate in the search process for missing people, stolen cars or burglars.