Roads policing officers: bid to confirm numbers nationwide

18 October 2024

Tim Rogers.

A road safety charity’s decision to try to find out an accurate figure for the number of dedicated roads policing officers in forces across England and Wales has been welcomed by West Midlands Police Federation secretary Tim Rogers.

Tim, who is also the national Federation’s lead for police pursuits and police driver training, said the move by the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety (PACTS) should be seen as the start of a wider review of how a decline in roads policing officers is impacting on road safety and criminality on the roads network.

“This work is long overdue,” says Tim, “But nonetheless I am pleased that PACTS has undertaken to seek these figures. I am hopeful that once we have an accurate picture of the number of dedicated roads policing officers then there will be a fuller review of whether there are enough, what their role should be and where more investment is needed.

“For me, it’s blatantly obvious that we need more officers dedicated to policing our roads. It’s not just about educating roads users, prosecuting those who flout our driving laws and reducing casualties and fatalities on our roads. Criminals use our roads to make their way around the country too and having more police officers on our roads will help catch them too.”

Disappointed

Tim was speaking after attending the latest PACTS meeting, the first he has attended for around for five years.

He was disappointed to find that many of the topics being discussed were the same as when he last attended, though he recognised the group’s aspiration to reduce the number of people killed or injured on our roads.

Tim felt that, since the Government made roads policing a Strategic Policing Requirement (SPR) in February 2023, there should have been more developments to discuss.

“I had hoped that the fact chiefs now have to consider roads policing as part of their SPRs we would have seen the agenda move on a little,” said Tim, “I wanted to see what difference the SPR status had made and whether there had been any tangible changes to service delivery and investment.

“Those at the meeting discussed initiatives for enforcement and there seemed to be a genuine belief that we have seen a re-investment in roads policing. But I am not convinced that roads policing is being given the priority it – and the public – deserve.

“The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves, is repeatedly quoted as saying that open and frank conversations need to be had when she talks about the dire state of the country’s finances and I think we need to echo that by saying policing is also in a dismal state due to chronic under-investment. That applies across the whole police service but I believe roads policing has been particularly hard hit.

“We need to address this as a matter of urgency and I hope once PACTS sees the actual number of roads policing officers we have then it will act. There has been a tendency in the past to fix the immediate problem, but no one is looking at this in a more strategic way and ensuring we have substantial and sustained re-investment in roads policing.

“In addition to the extra funding, we also need to see more work on the profile of a roads policing officer. What should their role entail? What skills do they need?”

Evidence

In June 2020, a PACTS report urged the Government to prioritise roads policing to save lives and fight wider criminality and also criticised cutbacks in roads policing, pointing to a widespread belief that a failure to reduce the number of deaths on the road is at least partly due to a downgrading of roads policing.

It highlighted international research evidence of the effectiveness of roads policing in increasing compliance with traffic laws and reducing road casualties, cutting some collision types by around a quarter.

Detailed analysis by PACTS of the “fatal four” offences (speeding, not wearing a seatbelt, driving under the influence of drink or drugs, and using a handheld mobile phone behind the wheel) since 2010 showed that where enforcement has been increased, compliance has improved and casualties have dropped but, where cutbacks have affected enforcement, there has been little or no improvement.

PACTS called on the UK Government and, where powers are devolved, the governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, to:

Make roads policing a national priority in the SPR
Reverse the cuts and expand the number of specialist officers
Take a more proactive approach to the use of technology and information sharing.

Police forces were recommended to:

Work more closely with other forces and agencies
Engage the support of the public through communications and use of dashcams
Collaborate on research and improve monitoring and reporting.

Impact

Tim welcomed the recommendations at the time, and believes that making roads policing a national priority in the SPR was a step forward, but he said action is still needed on many of the other recommendations.

“It’s particularly interesting to note that while PACTS called for forces to work more closely together, here in the West Midlands we have recently seen the abolition of the Central Police Motorway Group which was recognised as a successful model for cross-force collaboration,” said Tim.

He added: “The cuts to policing budgets affected all areas of the police service,” says Tim, “But we have definitely seen a bigger impact on roads policing and I am not convinced we have seen any increase in the number of specialist roads policing officers.

“Chief constables have to allocate their budget accordingly and address the need for more dedicated roads policing officers. They should not be trying to make it appear that they have more dedicated roads policing officers than they do by claiming that officers working on a crime team on the road are part of their roads policing unit.

“Here in our Force, for example, we have seen the Police and Crime Commissioner set up a road harm team of 32 officers which, on face value, is a good thing. But these 32 officers have been taken from elsewhere and their focus is not road harm: it’s crime.

“That cannot be right. I think if chief officers don’t start to prioritise roads policing the Government might have to take matters into its own hands and give the roads policing budget to a transport policing style model for the roads.”

PACTS is a registered charity, promoting evidence-based policies to improve to road, rail and air safety. It works with the Government, Parliament, experts and stakeholders. Its founders were responsible for the 1981 legislation which made it compulsory to wear a seatbelt in the front seat of a car.