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The Police Complaints Authority (PCA) says it is anticipating a rash of complaints once the Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct releases its report.
Dame Margaret Bazley is expected to table the report into police culture next week.
The $3.6 million inquiry, ordered by Prime Minister Helen Clark, was set up in February 2004 to explore police handling of allegations of sex offending against their own.
Helen Clark this week said the report would confirm the concerns that prompted it, but the Government was expecting to get an indication of the extent to which those issues were historical or contemporary.
She has said she expects "decisive action" from police once the report is released.
PCA head Justice Lowell Goddard today told MPs the complaints watchdog was expecting several new complaints as the report brought the issue back into the public eye.
She said the authority was also reviewing Operation Austin -- the police investigation into the historic rape allegations against police assistant commissioner Clint Rickards and former officers Brad Shipton and Bob Schollum.
The trio were acquitted by a jury earlier this month on charges of kidnapping and indecently assaulting a then-16-year-old girl more than 20 years ago.
Last year the same three men were acquitted of historic sex charges against Rotorua woman Louise Nicholas.
Shipton and Schollum are already in prison for a different rape -- of a Mount Maunganui woman 18 years ago.
After the trio's second acquittal, Mr Rickards described the police investigation into him and his friends as a "shambles".
However, there has been an outcry since court suppression orders banning the publication of Shipton and Schollum's rape conviction were lifted and since then Shipton has remained in the news after a sex tape featuring him and two other former officers surfaced in the Sunday News.
The tape was handed over by a woman who said she had group sex with the men as well as currently serving officers as recently as 2002.
She told the newspaper the sex was consensual, but at times became rough and police handcuffs and batons were used.
Police are looking into her allegations.
The PCA appeared today at Parliament's law and order committee to answer questions about a backlog of cases.
After the committee New Zealand First MP Ron Mark said it seemed as if the authority was getting bogged down with frivolous complaints.
He said Justice Goddard had indicated a rethink of the complaints threshold might be needed as the authority was dealing with a large number of time consuming low level complaints.
- NZPA
