TT: Police dog

At a time when fighting crime is high on the national agenda and the police are the frontline of the public defence, the annual report of the Police Complaints Authority makes dismal reading.

The authority is charged with looking into complaints from the public about the way the police do their work. In the course of investigating complaints, the authority must naturally ask the police for their side of the story. But all too often, says the report, that story is not forthcoming: that is, they are told that police records are unavailable, or they simply do not receive any reply to their request that the police investigate complaints. So common are these problems that in 2003 the authority was only able to investigate four per cent of all complaints received.

This reaction on the part of the police, which suggests inertia, indifference or outright hostility, is unfortunate, especially as it damages the authority’s reputation in turn, as members of the public simply assume that the authority is not doing its job when their complaints are apparently not followed up.

But the problem could be addressed, says the authority, if it were given the resources to do its own investigations. Chairman of the authority Justice James Davis says, however, that his previous suggestions for the resolution of this problem have all been ignored.

Even more worrying is the finding that there have been large increases in the numbers of complaints about certain aspects of police behaviour, including such outrages as battery, damage to property, and “impolite behaviour,” which includes using abusive or even obscene language to members of the public.

Read the rest of the editorial.