‘Police disciplinary process has to be fair and balanced’

24 November 2022

The Home Office has announced a review of the way in which police dismissals are handled as part of its plans to raise standards and public confidence in policing across England and Wales.

Officials said the internal review will help ensure the process of removing officers who are not fit to serve the public is more effective.

Nottinghamshire Police Federation chair Simon Riley welcomed the review but said any new disciplinary system had to be fair and balanced.

He said: “The public expects the highest standards of behaviour from police officers and rightly so.  The vast majority of our members meet these expectations and those that don’t should face disciplinary action and, if appropriate, dismissal from the Force.

“But any review has to take into account that police officers have to make split-second decisions, often under extremely stressful conditions, to protect the public. 

“Sometimes they get it wrong but they don’t have the benefit of hindsight and this has to be reflected in any overhaul of the misconduct system.”

Simon, speaking ahead of a two-day seminar for Federation conduct and performance liaison officers from across England and Wales this week, said safeguards against spurious allegations must also feature in any modernised disciplinary mechanism and stressed the Police Federation would always be available to support its officers through any such inquiries. 

“Police officers inevitably face false accusations of misconduct because of the nature of the work they do and the people they have to deal with and they must be offered appropriate protection from that,” he said.

“And the review should also consider the Police Federation’s Time Limits campaign which calls for all investigations to be wound up within 12 months of an allegations being made. 

“A significant number of misconduct cases take years to come to conclusion and this has a huge impact on an officer’s mental health and wellbeing and they are often placed under restrictions which means they are unable to support colleagues on the frontline in serving their communities. Members of the public would also have more faith in the system if it was not so prolonged.”

The Home Office review is likely to consider: 

• The effectiveness of the existing system to dismiss those who fall seriously short of the standards expected by policing and the public
• The impact of the introduction of changes to misconduct panels, including legally qualified chairs
• Whether forces are making use of their powers to discharge officers during their probationary period.

Working with policing partners, it will also assess whether the regulatory framework for the police disciplinary system should be changed.

The Government introduced public misconduct hearings in 2015, legally qualified chairs to lead conduct panels in 2016 and the Police Barred List in 2017 to ensure that officers and staff who are dismissed cannot re-join the police.