Fed chair ‘surprised and shocked’ by HMICFRS decision

27 November 2023

“Ripping the fabric out of policing” was bound to have an impact on the service that forces can provide, says West Midlands Police Federation chair Rich Cooke.

Rich told national television viewers that austerity and punishing cuts in funding and investment had ripped the heart out of policing.

But despite that West Midlands Police was performing well following a change in its policing model, he said.

Rich was speaking on TalkTV, one of a series of media interviews he carried out after West Midlands Police was moved into enhanced level of monitoring by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS).

Rich said he was “nonplussed” by the HMICFRS findings.

“We’ve put in a new model of policing, a local policing model, which is having immediate effects from call handling right through to investigations, and the outcomes, which are comparatively higher than forces of our size,” he said.

“We’re doing well at the moment, so I am surprised and quite shocked.

Branch chair Rich Cooke.

“Policing isn’t perfect, far from it, but in relative terms we’re improving dramatically in the current year following the new model we’ve put in.”

Rich added: “From the Federation’s perspective, the best policing we can have is policing that’s embedded in local communities and focused on the needs and concerns of local people.

“When our officers work in that way, they know their communities well, they know who the trouble makers are, they know who to target, they develop intelligence, and that’s the fuel for the rest of the processes we do.

“It all starts at base level, and that’s what we’ve lost.

“We lost 2,000 officers during austerity. We’re still 1,000 officers down from 2010 in our Force. We lost multiple police stations. You can’t just rip the fabric out of policing like that.

“We’ve had an uplift of newly-qualified officers but they take time to come up to speed, so we’ve lost a lot of experience.”

Rich was also interviewed on LBC, and said he was “surprised and disappointed”.

“There's no doubt that West Midlands Police and policing in general has been through an extremely challenging decade,” he said.

“That said, over the last 12 months, we’ve brought in a local policing model that we campaigned for that focuses our officers on local issues, that produces intelligence and leads to better investigations and we’ve seen some really tangible results.

“I just find it bizarre for the HMICFRS to do this now and you wonder what’s really behind it because I don’t think it’s based in reality,” he added.

And Rich also spoke to the BBC, saying that the Federation would work with the Force on the issues raised by HMICFRS.