A UK Crime Campus (UKCC) has been proposed, housed in the National Crime Agency (NCA) as a ‘combined brand for a collaborative and shared working environment’ for law enforcement and others, such as businesses. Likewise, Regional Crime Campuses (RCCs) are proposed.
Police (and others such as business counter-fraud managers) are severely constrained in their ability to take on the challenges of serious and organised crime (SOC). They operate in a system with significant capacity constraints and with a set of tools that has not adapted to the evolving nature of crime, according to a review of SOC by the former senior Metropolitan Police man Sir Craig Mackey.
Learning and innovation are rarely systemised to allow adoption by others at scale, and capabilities are duplicated. The review calls for ‘a substantial transformation’ and a restructure and rebalance of how law enforcement and wider government work with each other, and with the private and voluntary sectors, to tackle SOC.
The joint working between police and the private sector would need ‘a stable foundation of secure and interoperable IT’ for data sharing, the review says. Also – something complained about in a Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary report last month on regional organised crime units (ROCUs) – change will not only take investment, ‘sustained and coordinated investment over the next five to ten years’. Budgets should be agreed well in advance, to allow crime fighters ‘to be as nimble and technologically adept as those who exploit those technologies to perpetrate crimes’, the report says. For as the report points out, not only is SOC becoming more complex and a growing threat, that amounts to a national security threat, ‘funding to tackle serious and organised crime is uncertain and inefficient’.
For the eight-page review, visit gov.uk.
Background
Meanwhile, the UK Government’s Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy, has acknowledged the need for ‘constant vigilance in protecting British citizens from serious and organised crime’.
Sir Craig Mackey, who retired in 2018 as Met Police Deputy Commissioner, was national police lead for business crime. He was tasked with the review in 2019.
Comments
For Labour, Conor McGinn, Shadow Security Minister, said: “After ten years of Conservative Government, it is a damning indictment of their record that they stand accused of allowing inefficient systems and ineffective delivery to hamper the fight against serious and organised crime. The Government has time and again delayed publishing this report and now we know why. They need to account for their failings and take on board Sir Craig’s recommendations to ensure the police and law enforcement are able to properly protect and respond to victims and keep our communities secure.”
