Frontline being diminished by poaching of staff
He may have been just beginning his shift but already Hastings shift supervisor Sergeant Kevin Stewart was facing a near impossible task – policing the streets of Hastings with just himself and two others.
“It was hard because I had one on leave, one on a course, one in the watch house, another whose duties had changed to being a court orderly for the week and another staff member doing court escort duties,” Sergeant Stewart said.
Ideally, there would be Sergeant Stewart and seven others on section.
In reality, this rarely occurs. Sergeant Stewart cannot remember the last time sections were at full strength.
Situations such as this are a common occurrence for many General Duties Branch (GDB) officers around the country, and the effectiveness of frontline policing is being eroded as a result.
Frontline staff in many areas are being spread too thinly because, as they joke amongst themselves, GDB might as well stand for General Dog’s Body.
Increasing accountability
Officers spoken to by Police News say section staff are constantly being used to cover for absences on specialist squads, as well as having to contend with recurring issues – like those facing Sergeant Stewart’s section – which constantly pull GDB staff away from the frontline response job.
Compounding the pressure is the increasing amount of time GDB staff now have to spend responding to reporting requirements, as well as 111 calls. Sergeant Stewart said since he had been in the job the amount of paperwork which crosses his desk had quadrupled.
“It hasn’t always been like this, but we now live in a day and age where police (officers) are much more accountable not only to themselves but also to the public and other Government agencies.”
All these factors are putting pressure on what most New Zealanders would consider the core policing task.
Many officers at the coalface believe that, as constant attention has been given to boosting capabilities in specialist areas, Police management has lost focus on what the ‘nuts and bolts’ of policing is – frontline response.
Officers say that service to the public suffers as a result, and some feel their safety is similarly compromised because there is less back-up out on the streets.
Stress levels are up, and morale is suffering in some stations.
Juggling act
One shift supervisor told Police News he had to constantly juggle the roster to make sure it was workable. He said his team was facing staff shortages for the next month at least. Adding to this was a “constant robbing of staff” to prop up other areas of Police.
GDB staff are also often involved in ‘standby’ specialist squads like the Armed Offenders Squad (AOS), Search And Rescue (SAR), and the Specialist Search Group (SSG). A sergeant in a small city, who did not wish to be named, said GDB staff on his section, who are also members of specialist squads, would regularly get called away on jobs thereby making them unavailable for frontline duties.
Occasional absences due to such duties should be manageable, except when numbers have already been depleted to bare minimums.
GDB staff are feeling the impact. “There is low morale in the GDB and many of them feel unvalued,” the sergeant said.
Workloads up
Anecdotally, officers say that, at the same time section staff are becoming thinner on the ground, an increase in duties and responsibilities has impacted heavily on GDB workloads over recent years.
Hastings section Sergeant Gary McFadyen said during his 26 years on the job, crime and prosecutions – and the court process that follows – had skyrocketed.
“This is taking us away from the beat. Court duties are chewing up a lot of our time as we are always bogged down by files,” Sergeant McFadyen said.
A shift supervisor voiced similar concerns. “The sheer amount of paperwork we have to deal with is taking us away from being out on the street, where we need to be.”
Training and leave
Sections are not really staffed to take into account absences due to training and leave. A lead could be taken from the Police Communication Centres where they know their minimum staffing requirement and staff levels are set to allow for these types of necessary absences.
With compliance thrown into the mix and a restriction on officers actually being deployed on the street the outcome can be a disservice to the community.
Another shift supervisor cited the e-learning training courses as regularly depleting GDB staffing levels.
Low attendance
Sergeant Stewart said his section was attending fewer jobs due to workload and a lack of staff. He said back in the 1980s and 1990s police would have attended the majority of jobs coming in.
“Even as recently as six years ago, I was arresting 100 people a year. Now the top arrest rate in my section is 50 a year.
“Half the time we have to put in overtime just to keep on top of our day to day duties,” he said.
Sergeant Craig Prior, from Christchurch, said his section used to attend burglaries. These days they are too busy to attend.
This has resulted in a whole generation of frontline officers who have never investigated a burglary or possibly even attended one, he said.
“These days these types of incidents are cancelled, taken over the phone or possibly attended by a specialist,” Sergeant Prior added.
Burn out
If the frontline’s resources continued to be stretched, Sergeant Prior said staff would burn out more quickly, seek other positions in the Police earlier and policing would become “purely response driven”.
Shift supervisors indicated that some staff were becoming disillusioned by the job.
“The new recruits are becoming jaded and more and more staff are becoming burnt out,” one supervisor said.
Safety
Several shift supervisors said they saw a lack of numbers on the beat as compromising safety for frontline officers.
Sergeant Kevin Stewart (Hastings) said his section had been extremely lucky that none of his officers had come to any serious harm in the last year.
“We have had some really close calls and not having back-up readily available when these types of situations occur is not good.”
Public perception
One supervisor spoken to by Police News said that if the public knew the real numbers of GDB staff policing the streets they would be shocked.
Some supervisors were not realising the gravity of the situation either, as they often worked day shifts and were not around at two o’clock in the morning when staff had to deal with a growing number of alcohol-fuelled incidents.
“We just don’t have the numbers to deal with the growing number of incidents we are expected to attend,” he said.
In rural areas this had become particularly apparent, the supervisor said.
Sergeant Sean Judd of Westport said he was seeing this problem first-hand.
Public complaints
“We just don’t have the numbers and unfortunately the public have noticed and are not happy.
“They want to know why we are not out on the beat, and the fact is we would like nothing more, but because we are so under resourced it is just not happening,” he said.
Another shift supervisor described this as “distressing”, as he believed it meant police were “losing touch” with the public.
“We are not bridging the gaps with the people we have sworn to protect; this is not a good sign.”
Sergeant Prior has noticed similar public sentiments. “We are not giving the public an acceptable level of service the way the GDB is run now,” he told Police News.
The Counties-Manukau solution Police in Counties-Manukau have found one solution to these shortages – increase frontline police numbers.
Commitments made by the National Government at the last election have already seen more than 200 of 300 promised additional staff deployed to the district, with the balance due to arrive by the end of the year.
Papakura Senior Sergeant Stuart Stone said since the arrival of additional staff, significant changes to frontline policing have come about.
“We are becoming more proactive than reactive and we are working well at reducing the numbers of victims.
Offenders have even commented that it is too hot for us around here (Counties-Manukau),” he said.
Senior Sergeant Stone said staff productivity levels were lifting and feedback from the public was promising.
“There is a lot more public reassurance out there because better communication systems are now in place.”
It’s not only the section supervisors who share these views. In 2008, the Police Association’s survey of members revealed that 92% of police believed not enough resources were deployed to the frontline GDB.
69% believed frontline GDB was the most critical area in which to increase resources.
Sea change
Association President Greg O’Connor, who regularly visits Counties-Manukau Police, said the injection of staff into frontline police in Counties had brought about the biggest sea change in a district he had witnessed in his 35 years as a cop.
“For years, I have regularly gone up there visiting police and I would always hear how they could never get on top of the workload.
“These days, however, all the statistics and figures from a staffing point of view are showing that things have significantly improved,” he said.
Put quite simply, Mr O’Connor said that when the “squeeze goes on” across Police, “pet projects” and innovations may need to be put on hold.
“It’s times like these that we need to be focusing on the numbers of response staff being deployed around the clock.
If we fail in this regard, it puts the Police’s reputation at great risk.
“Though it’s all well and good to have specialist squads out there, keeping frontline numbers up needs to be Police’s number one priority.
Counties-Manukau has shown us that doing this can really work,” he said.
A voice for the frontline
Mr O’Connor is keen to see the GDB gain a direct voice with the Police Executive Committee.
He believed appointing a National Manager for GDB is the answer.
In this way, GDB staff would have someone who could voice their concerns to senior management.
Several supervisors spoken to by Police News agreed, saying that any changes to the GDB needed to come from
Police management with input from frontline staff.
Critically, resources needed to be there to back up any changes made.
Senior Sergeant Stone said implementing a GDB Manager would be a positive step.
“It may lead to consistency because it would mean there would be someone better able to keep us resourced on a consistent basis.”
Ring fencing
Another avenue favoured by some GDB staff was ring-fencing the job, and this idea was put forward by the Police Association in its 2008 policy document Towards a Safer New Zealand. Many specialist groups within Police are currently ring-fenced, and the GDB, as one of the few remaining exceptions, is vulnerable to being ‘raided’ as a result.
Sergeant Prior favours this approach.
“I have had 18 years of frontline GDB work. It is what I do, and I am a specialist in this area of policing just as someone might be in CIB or Youth Services. The problem is currently my specialist skills and knowledge are not recognised.”
Senior Sergeant Stone also saw ring-fencing as a positive.
“It is a very good idea. We are the face of the NZ Police and we cannot afford to have GDB staff pulled out for operations and other distractions.
For too long the frontline have been depleted because somebody else needed staff.”
Different view
Sergeant McFadyen has a different opinion, and instead favours upping GDB staff numbers.
“Years ago, Police officials talked about flattening Police structures andmaking moves which focused on pouring resources back into frontline policing,” he said.
In order for this to become a reality, he believed a move away from ring-fencing the other areas of Police was the answer. Instead, priorities should switch so those specialist groups helped cover GDB sections instead of the other way round.
“What needs oiling is frontline policing because this is where the squeaks are.
All the specialist groups should be supporting frontline staff because that is what the core business of policing is and what the public expect,” he added.
