Federation sets out six-point plan to combat the suicide crisis affecting policing

19 January 2026

Federation sets out six-point plan to combat the suicide crisis affecting policing

More than 100 police officers and staff died by suicide between 2022 and 2025. At least 70 police officers have died during that time and there have been more than 200 attempted suicides.

The Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW) is today calling for the silent crisis of police suicide to end - as this new data reveals the devastating scale of this crisis killing officers.

47 of the 70 suicides and 173 of 236 attempted suicides are attributable to officers involved in misconduct or criminal investigations against them.

In 2025 the link was even stronger, with 12 of 13 police officer suicides that the Federation is aware of involving officers under investigation.

Police forces are not required to record suicide or attempted suicide, meaning the Federation’s data is likely to significantly undercount the real figures.

The lack of recording means that policing is not currently regarded by the Office for National Statistics as an “occupation at risk”.

The Federation has set out a six-point plan to combat the crisis:

• Chief Constables need to agree today to begin recording and reporting on suicide and attempted suicide in the workforce.

• Police conduct regulations need to mandate a 12-month limit for disciplinary investigations into police officers, whether that is by the IOPC or police forces.

• Health and Safety legislation needs to treat police suicide as an incident at work and therefore reportable and investigated under ‘RIDDOR’ rules.

• All forces should implement the STEP (Suicide Trauma Education Prevention) campaign, launched by Hampshire Police Federation. The campaign calls for the downloading by forces of the Stay Alive app and mandatory TRiM (Trauma Risk Management) interventions for any officer attending a suicide.

• The coronial system needs to reflect the unique aggravating or contributory factors of the role of police officers in suicide and ensure that the crisis is dealt with nationally rather than through a patchwork of “prevention of future deaths” reports after individual inquests.

• The Police Covenant needs to be funded to better support the welfare and wellbeing of police officers in the same way that the Armed Forces Covenant and Covenant Trust does.

For more information about the Stay Alive app, visit stayalive.prevent-suicide.org.uk. Officers and police staff members who are struggling should know that they are not alone, and that there are people there to help.

This includes, for immediacy: Samaritans: call 116 123 and Oscar Kilo’s Mental Health Crisis Line: call 0300 131 2789.