Fed secretary says urgent action needed to address morale crisis sweeping through the service

24 August 2023

Policing will face a prolonged period of recruitment “boom and bust” unless urgent action is taken to address a morale crisis sweeping the service, West Mercia Police Federation has warned.

Record numbers of officers are looking to quit policing for pastures new with rumbling discontent over pay and conditions cited as the main reason for the unprecedented levels of resignations but rock-bottom morale also playing a major part in people’s decisions.
Branch secretary Pete Nightingale said: “There is no point trying to sugar-coat the situation any more.

“More police officers than ever are looking to leave the service and unless urgent action is taken we are going to find ourselves in a deep crisis from which it will be very difficult to recover.

“We know policing’s reputation has been damaged by some terrible scandals in recent years and that public confidence in the service is low.

“But the vast majority of our members are honest, decent, hard-working men and women who joined the Force out of a desire to help and protect people in their communities and don’t deserve to be tarred with the same brush as those that failed to meet the standards expected of them.

“This is having a major impact on officer morale and leading to disillusionment and disappointment within the Force.

Pete said the retention crisis had not been solved by the Police Uplift Programme and warned of a “revolving door” of police officers.
“The recruitment drive under the Police Uplift Programme is going to be meaningless if those new, young officers are simply replacing older, more experienced colleagues who have had enough and decided to call it a day.”

Home Office figures revealed more than 9,000 officers left the English and Welsh forces between April 2022 and March 2023 with a total of 4,668 officers resigning voluntarily.

This is the highest number since comparable records began 16 years ago and shows a 32 per cent increase on the 3,533 who left the service in 2021/22.

West Mercia Police saw 78 officers resign from the Force in the 12 months to last March, according to the figures.

A further six retired on medical grounds during the same period and 89 took normal retirement.

Some 32 officers transferred to another force while two officers were dismissed, taking the total number of leavers to 207.

“Something has to be done to end this crisis or we will be faced with a never ending cycle of ‘boom-and-bust’ when it comes to recruitment and retention and that will have a massive impact on policing in the coming years,” said Pete.