Police cannot continue to pick up the slack for cuts in other public services, especially the shortage in mental health provision, Her Majesty’s chief inspector of constabulary has warned.
In an annual state of policing report, Sir Tom Winsor highlights a “modern tsunami of online fraud” and increased police awareness of crimes against the elderly and child sexual exploitation as among the increasing daily pressures facing officers.
“The police are considered to be the service of last resort. In some areas, particularly where people with mental health problems need urgent help, the police are increasingly being used as the service of first resort. This is wrong,” says the chief inspector.
Winsor, who was appointed by Theresa May when she was home secretary, says the failures of other public services, especially in respect of children’s and adolescent mental health, too often leave the police to fill the gaps long after the chances of effective intervention have been lost.
His annual report identifies 18 of the 43 forces where the need for improvement has been highlighted in at least one of HMIC’s inspection themes of effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy. Only one, Bedfordshire, was rated as “inadequate” for one category.
Winsor says that in many cases, police leaders are “still too sluggish” to ensure their plans are sound to the new demands on their forces. He says for too long a culture of insularity, isolationism and protectionism has prevented chief constables from making the most effective use of new technology: “The blinkers have to come off,” he says.
Winsor also warns that the police are behind many other organisations in their use of technology, saying it should be giving them unprecedented ability to exchange, retrieve and analyse intelligence.
“The provision of mental healthcare has reached such a state of severity that police are often being used to fill the gaps that other agencies cannot. This is an unacceptable drain on police resources and it is a profoundly improper way to treat vulnerable people who need care and help,” he says.
“The obligation of the police is to prevent crime. This is not only because this makes society safer – both in reality and in perception – but also because it is far cheaper to prevent a crime than it is to investigate and arrest the offender after the event. The same is true of mental ill health, which is not a crime.
“It is an old adage that an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, and this is particularly true when the cure fails and an emergency intervention is required to protect the safety of an individual in distress and, often, people nearby.
“By the time depression or some other mental disorder has been allowed to advance to the point that someone is contemplating suicide, or engaging in very hazardous behaviour, many opportunities to intervene will have been missed by many organisations.
“When that intervention takes place on a motorway bridge or railway line, or when someone is holding a weapon in a state of high distress, the expense to all concerned is far higher than it should be. The principal sufferer is the person who is ill, especially when it is realised that his or her suffering could have been much less or even avoided altogether,” concludes Winsor.
Police cannot continue to fill gaps left by mental health cuts, report says
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