Attendance at Public Accounts Committee

This afternoon the Chief Constable and I are attending the Public Accounts Committee along with representatives from the Department of Justice and the Northern Ireland Policing Board.

The purpose of our appearance is to answer questions in relation to the recently published Northern Ireland Audit Office report 'The Police Service of Northern Ireland: Use of Agency Staff'.

At the outset of my blog it is critical that I acknowledge the importance of this report and indicate that the PSNI has accepted all the recommendations many of which reflect our current practices.  We welcome such independent scrutiny and there are lessons to be learnt from the report and its findings.  Over the past 10 years the PSNI has faced unprecedented change, 5,453 police officers and 2,323 police staff left the organisation.  No other police service in the United Kingdom, and possibly in the world, has ever experienced anything quite like this.

Against the background of such significant change, there are areas where with the benefit of hindsight we could have applied more scrutiny and grip.  The Chief Constable has accepted how some may see the recruitment of agency staff as contrary to the spirit of Patten.  Of course Patten did not envisage a 'new beginning to policing' in the face of such a protracted and severe terrorist threat,  and without the use of some agency staff police officers who are critical to preventing serious harm and terrorism would be confined to non operational roles.  The Northern Ireland Audit Office Report accepts the business need for the use of temporary staff, some of whom by necessity would be ex-police officers. 

The ultimate prize of change has been the increase in community confidence helped by the achievement of 30% Catholic police representation, and the devolvement of Policing and Justice powers - the very reason why locally elected representatives can sit today and question us on these matters. That confidence is delicate, and needs to be treated with respect in everything that we do. 

Going forward, we will work on the implementation of the Northern Ireland Audit Office Report's recommendations and we will continue to build on the governance surrounding the appointment of temporary workers so that the community confidence the PSNI has worked so hard to achieve is maintained and enhanced.