Minister puts rocket under police force to fix image

Annette King

Police Minister Annette King has put the police on notice that she expects an improvement in the public perception of the force.

The police have taken a public relations battering in the past year, with incidents such as the Iraena Asher 111 call and historic sexual allegations leading to two high-profile inquiries.

Ms King has used her minister's message in the newly released police strategic plan to praise what she called a world-class, modern police force. However, she also underlined that the force needed to improve how it was regarded by the community it served.

"As this strategic plan highlights, there are high expectations of New Zealand police," Ms King said.

"It is critical we increase trust and confidence in police and that we see significant gains for the investment the Government has committed to over the next three years."

Police Association president Greg O'Connor said it was fair to say police had occupied more than their fair share of the headlines in the past three years.

However, he was confident the force was honest and transparent.

"A lot of this stuff that has happened is because police have brought it forward themselves," Mr O'Connor said.

"In attempting to be seen to be squeaky clean and bringing everything to the fore, one could argue that the public are more concerned because they read it in the paper.

"The police are cleaner and more accountable now than we've ever been, but you wouldn't know that by reading the paper. That's the huge irony of it. If you read the paper you would think we were worse than we were 20 years ago, but I don't believe that."

New Zealanders took it for granted that the country had a non-corrupt, non-brutal and effective force, and on a world scale the New Zealand police passed muster, Mr O'Connor said.

National law and order spokesman Simon Power said Ms King was right to highlight the need for trust and confidence in the police.

"The reality is public confidence in the police has gone down under this Government, under the stewardship of Mr Hawkins and Ms King, and that is an horizon that she's painted which is frankly of the Government's own doing."

The force intends to recruit 1250 additional staff over the next three years, and the Government is also reviewing the Police Act.

Police Commissioner Howard Broad has seemingly picked up on his minister's mood, with the opening sentence of his commissioner's message saying he would like to signal in the strategic plan a renewed confidence in the police.

"I expect to be constantly challenged with new demands upon us. There are issues which now affect us. I expect these to be owned, dealt with, learned from, and then we move on," he said.

The commissioner wanted the force to take a more proactive approach to policing.

The plan noted that Auckland remained a pressure-point for police, and that a rising population meant an increased demand for police services.

"Key strategic interventions will include children and young people, at-risk families, drugs and alcohol, repeat victims, offenders and locations, and Maori, Pacific and ethnic peoples," the plan said.