COMPLAINTS against police officers took longer to resolve over the past year according to the latest Annual Report from the Independent Office for Police Conduct.<\/p>\n
The 2016\/17 IOPC report reveals investigations were completed on average in 239 working days, up from 226 days in 2015\/16.
\nHowever, overall the figures show an average improvement of three months compared to 2014\/15.<\/p>\n
The organisation admits that the speed of its recent growth has impacted on the \u2018number and skill\u2019 of frontline investigation staff.<\/p>\n
Formerly the Independent Police Complaints Commission, the IOPC is in its last year of expansion which has seen an increase in staff levels in a bid to increase the range and number of investigations it can carry out.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the third year of the ambitious expansion programme, during which we have doubled our staff numbers,\u201d IOPC Chair Dame Owers writes in the report.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s allowed us to broaden the range of people we employ, particularly in investigations, and to take on nearly six times as many independent investigations.<\/p>\n
\u201cHowever, there are challenges in such a swift expansion and we are examining and refining our internal processes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those processes include developing quality performance measures and staff training.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are completing investigations more quickly than two years ago, and we know that we can improve still further,\u201d Dame Owers added.<\/p>\n
\u201cDuring next year, now that the major expansion has ceased, the IOPC will be able to consolidate and build on those changes and improvements.\u201d<\/p>\n
Officers are also being asked to ensure they are \u2018fully accountable\u2019 as part of investigations into deaths and incidents in police care, while mental health issues among detainees have become a common thread in investigations.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany of our investigations, particularly into deaths, highlight the vulnerability of those who die or are seriously injured following police contact,\u201d Dame Owers added.<\/p>\n
\u201cMental health continues to be a tragic thread running through too many of our investigations, and we have called for better healthcare support as well as improved training for the police service.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
COMPLAINTS against police officers took longer to resolve over the past year according to the latest Annual Report from the Independent Office for Police Conduct. The 2016\/17 IOPC report reveals\u2026 read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2747,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4170"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4170"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4172,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4170\/revisions\/4172"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}