Police need more time to handle crisis calls

Steve Long (left) and Simon Power

Police say they may increase the target response time for priority-one emergency calls in Auckland because the present 10-minute aim is unrealistic.

Figures published yesterday showed that from March to August, the average response time for priority-one calls in urban areas was 15 minutes - four minutes longer than the same period last year.

However, Deputy Commissioner Steve Long said the figures were not an accurate representation of actual response times: the main reason for the dramatic increase in the national average time was the miscoding as top-priority of one non-urgent job.

"The job was never closed off by the operator, which meant that its time clock kept on ticking throughout the period and completely blew out the district and national average.

"The effect on this district was profound. It normally achieves a 13-minute P1 average. In the six-month period under consideration, this time leaped to 31 minutes."

In fact, the average time taken nationally by police patrols to attend calls was 12 minutes, he said.

"This represents an increase of one minute on last year, which is actually a good result considering that 111 calls to police communications centres and the number of priority-one events have actually increased by 20 per cent between 2004 and 2005."

From March to August, officers responded to 68 per cent of urban emergency events within 10 minutes - 3 per cent lower than last year and well below the target of 90 per cent.

In rural areas police attended 84 per cent of events within a target of 30 minutes.

Canterbury police responded to 78 per cent of urban 111 calls within 10 minutes - 3 per cent better than the same period last year.

The worst average response times were in Counties/Manukau (31 minutes), Auckland City (14) and Northland (14).

Mr Long said the rise in response times appeared to reflect increases in population and resulting call demand and also traffic congestion in the Auckland area in particular.

Considering Auckland's traffic, a 12- to 13-minute response time was "pretty reasonable", he said. While the police national standard for priority-one urban jobs remained 10 minutes, this "might not be achievable" for Auckland.

"Year on year, we are struggling to achieve that in Auckland."

The priority-one response time is measured from the moment a police car gets a radio call to when it reaches an incident, and not the time taken to answer 111 calls, which is measured in seconds.

The National Party's law and order spokesman, Simon Power, said it was imperative that the Government acted "urgently to restore public confidence in the police by bolstering resources".

"This an indictment on Helen Clark's Government," he said.

"They have paid lip service to police resources for six years and now that is coming back to bite them."

The Labour-led Government had allowed staff resources to fall behind need, despite a commitment to recruit more staff in the wake of the previous 111 review, Mr Power said.

"We need a bigger police presence on our streets to nip crime in the bud before there is any need to call 111.

"Police Minister Annette King must tell the public why the 111 system has got out of control six months after her Government said it was being fixed."

Police Association president Greg O'Connor said the figures accentuated the need for more frontline officers.

- NZPA