Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley has proposed a radical restructuring of local British policing.
Writing in The Sunday Times, Rowley described the plan as “the first serious reform of our policing model in over 60 years” and argued that the existing structure has not “been fit for purpose for at least two decades”.
Rowley is calling for the current 43 county forces to be slashed to between 12 and 15 larger regional forces.
The Met chief said reducing the number of forces by two-thirds would enable police to better share modern technology whilst cutting “expensive” governance and support services across the fragmented system.
Sir Mark Rowley has called on the Home Office to make the radical change
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“The 43-force model was designed in the 1960s and hasn’t been fit for purpose for at least two decades,” Rowley said.
“It hinders the effective confrontation of today’s threats and stops us fully reaping the benefits of technology.”
He argued that the current system prevents forces from maximising technological advances and addressing modern policing challenges effectively.
“We need to reduce the number of forces by two-thirds, with the new bigger and fully capable regional forces supported by the best of modern technology and making better use of the limited funding available,” the Met commissioner wrote.
Rowley characterised Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ decision to increase police funding by 2.3 per cent above inflation each year in the recent spending review as “disappointing”.
The financial pressures facing police forces add urgency to these reform proposals.
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Met Police Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley
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Gavin Stephens, chairman of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, warned last month that forces were facing “difficult choices” and some would “struggle to make the numbers add up” as borrowing costs spiral.
The cost of debt for police forces is expected to rise by 49 per cent over the next three years, with some increasingly reliant on borrowing to fund operations.
“Forces’ borrowing costs have been going up because for the last decade, local forces have had no capital investment at all,” Stephens said. “The main capital investment has gone to big projects at the centre.”
Chiefs are seeking greater autonomy over workforce structures, including the removal of restrictions on ring-fenced funding that was granted by the previous government to replace officers cut during austerity.
Stephens emphasised that modern policing requires a diverse workforce beyond traditional officers.
“We know that the Government had some very difficult choices to make, as a consequence of this, policing is going to have some very difficult choices to make too,” he said.
He argued that policing needs various specialists including cyber experts, crime scene investigators and digital forensic experts, noting that “the health service is much more than just about doctors”.
