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Police chiefs in England and Wales have told ministers that the number of forces should be cut to end “the postcode lottery for victims of crime”, the Guardian has learned.
They believe a reduction from the current 43 forces would save money, cut overheads and boost crime-fighting efforts.
Law enforcement leaders told the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, last month at a roundtable on police reform that they were in agreement about the need for the change.
Cooper has already backed other police reforms, such as setting up a national centre for policing, and believes the way policing across England and Wales is organised is out of date. But a lack of money threatens to delay changes and some smaller forces may oppose the changes.
One source said any changes could start with smaller forces merging or being abolished. In the west, Gloucestershire and Wiltshire could merge. In the Midlands, Warwickshire could join with the West Mercia force or be absorbed by the much bigger West Midlands force.
In the east, the Norfolk and Suffolk forces could merge. The West Yorkshire, North Yorkshire and the South Yorkshire forces could also merge.
Gavin Stephens, the chair of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, told the Guardian: “Police reform is about restructuring policing so that it can keep up with modern criminality, retaining the bedrock of community policing whilst modernising our workforce to deal with national threats such as organised crime and violence against women and girls.
“Our current model of 43 different police forces in England and Wales has a wide range of geographical size, workforce size and operational capabilities. There is also real variation in financial resilience and the ability to invest, which means policing operates in subtly different ways with often incompatible technology, which leads to inefficiencies and inconsistency.
“A smaller number of police forces, supported by a national policing organisation, would enable us to make decisions far quicker and maximise funding to invest in technology and our workforce. Making improvements to our service once and for all, instead of in 43 different ways, would help to end the postcode lottery victims face when reporting crime.”
One senior source said: “Everyone is in agreement we need fewer forces. It would create efficiencies and greater effectiveness.”
Another source with knowledge of discussions said: “Chiefs of smaller forces are nervous but accept this is where the tide is going. We hope for a phased reduction over the next decade.”
No changes are expected to happen in this parliament, and any change of government after the next election could lead to the agreement to abolish police forces being scuppered.
Politically, it was believed a reduction in the number of forces would have to happen under Labour. MPs representing Conservative areas, which tend to be less urban, feared police would move from more rural areas to areas where crime tended to be higher.
One chief constable said that if their force absorbed a smaller force, people in more rural areas could be offered a guarantee about how many officers would be ringfenced to protect them.
As yet, no detailed plans have been drawn up or presented to the government, but Mark Rowley, the Metropolitan police commissioner, said he favoured a reduction to as few as 12 forces. It is understood that this is the number of forces senior police chiefs think should ultimately cover England and Wales.
In a piece for the Sunday Times, Rowley said: “The 43-force model was designed in the 1960s and hasn’t been fit for purpose for at least two decades. It hinders the effective confrontation of today’s threats and stops us fully reaping the benefits of technology.
“We need to reduce the number of forces by two-thirds, with the new, bigger and fully capable regional forces supported by the best of modern technology and making better use of the limited funding available.”
In Scotland, forces have already merged into one organisation covering the entire country, which is the second largest in the UK behind the Met. Northern Ireland is also covered by a single force.
