A System Built on Blind Faith? The Flaws in Police Information Dissemination
Imagine a central police information unit tasked with issuing guidance to every chief police officer in the country. The expectation? These officers receive, download, and read the guidance to ensure consistency and adherence to best practices. The reality? The National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) system operates on blind faith.
One glaring flaw in this approach is the lack of accountability.
If the central unit does not track who receives their messages, who downloads them, or even who reads them, how can they be certain information is reaching the right people and being acted upon?
Policing is a profession where clear, informed decision-making can have serious consequences. Yet, this information pipeline seems riddled with holes.
Additionally, without a proper tracking mechanism, there is no means to assess the effectiveness of these communications. Were the instructions followed? Did they lead to any tangible improvements? Or did they vanish into the abyss of unread emails and forgotten memos? The absence of such oversight creates a system where responsibility is diffuse and enforcement is weak.
In an era where digital tools can easily verify engagement – through read receipts, tracking links, or centralized dashboards – it is baffling that such a fundamental flaw persists in what appears to be a critical system. If businesses can track who opens an email or downloads a report, why can a police information unit not do the same for what is presumably important guidance – why else issue it?
A system that relies on assumption rather than verification is not just inefficient, it is potentially dangerous. If police officers are expected to act on important guidance, then the central unit (and the recipient constabulary themselves) should be expected to know, without doubt, who has received it, engaged with it, and … who has not! Anything less is a recipe for inconsistency, miscommunication, and, ultimately, failure.
The NPCC was asked to whom their ‘all chief constables’ notifications were sent at the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS). No information could be supplied; this was not known.
The MPS was asked who received the ‘all chief constables’ notifications and could provide no information.
‘Whilst all members of the NPCC, to include Chief Officers of the Metropolitan Police Service, have access to the online platform, and can therefore view the letter, unless they download the letter onto their server, it would not be held by them. The NPCC does not hold a record of the MPS Chief Officer team having downloaded the letter onto their server.’ – read more here.
