Commissioner highlights local benefits of collaboration

Commissioner highlights local benefits of collaboration

Local policing in Cambridgeshire is reaping the rewards from the wider collaboration agreements with the Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire forces, Cambridgeshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner said today.

Commenting on the collaboration between the three forces, Police and Crime Commissioner Sir Graham Bright said: “I should be clear, the three forces are not merging.  Each retains its operational independence. Cambridgeshire Constabulary will continue to provide policing for Cambridgeshire communities.

“In order to increase our operational resilience and achieve the necessary savings targets working with local forces and local authorities is the obvious way forward.  Local people benefit from an improved, more effective and efficient service, while the savings generated help to protect local services, something I know is tremendously important to Cambridgeshire residents.”

Between this year and 2019/20 the three forces need to save a combined total of £61.1m.  To help achieve these savings while protecting frontline policing, the three forces formed a Strategic Alliance to consider collaboration across a number of business areas.  As a result, more resources are available for investment in neighbourhood policing.

The agreement enables the three forces to develop plans to collaborate on a range of operational support and organisational support functions.  The three are already collaborating on a number areas including Armed Policing, Procurement, Professional Standards Department and Roads Policing.  The alliance recently announced plans to progress with the collaboration of Human Resources and Learning and Development as well as Firearms and Explosives Licensing.

Sir Graham continued: “New technology introduced by Cambridgeshire Constabulary allows all police officers to work with greater independence out in the field with the ability to send and receive real time information.  This reduces the need for officers to return to base in order to process paperwork and thereby increases the time they are able to spend in the communities they serve.  Empowering local teams to make decisions is part of a long term culture change that has developed in the organisation, moving away from the more traditional command and control style culture.

“Collaboration brings significant benefits for both the public and the forces involved.  As the financial challenges intensify, like most people I believe that further change is inevitable.  But my key objective is to ensure that local policing, particularly support for the most vulnerable in our society, remains at the heart of everything we do.”

Ends

Editor Information:

Current collaboration projects with Bedfordshire Police and Hertfordshire Constabulary include: finance, fleet, estates and facilities, legal services, human resources, training, ICT, firearms licensing, public contact centres, control rooms, custody and crime recording.