Keeping island policed cost £500k in overtime

There are currently 126 warranted officers employed locally, falling 24 short of the number needed to deliver the police’s ‘frontline operating model’, but Home Affairs has said the shortage does not indicate any risk to public safety.

Seconded officers have been brought in from the UK over the winter to make up for the shortage and cover UK-based training for local officers, but one deputy, Adrian Gabriel, said that was not a sustainable long-term option.

‘For the existing officers, you consider the amount of strain that they must be operating under, how to perform a standard of service with a lower amount of officers and how that is affecting morale and the stresses that come with that,’ said Deputy Gabriel, who posed questions to Home Affairs president Rob Prow.

Bailiwick Law Enforcement had an underspend on staffing of £840,000 last year due to the number of vacancies it was carrying. Another recruitment drive is under way, while an extra five secondees have been requested to cover the period between May and September.

‘Surely we shouldn’t be relying on secondments?' Deputy Gabriel said. 'I know that we are having a recruitment drive, which I would like to see a success in. I don’t think it is a Guernsey issue, it could be a terms and conditions issue, but I am surmising.'

Home Affairs said that use of the UK secondments, which ended last week, had been a success. But with three officers not yet charged for, the winter cover has cost the force more than £30,000 in salaries, and some £17,000 in travel and accommodation.

The committee admitted that a competitive labour market was making it difficult to recruit locally.

Attrition levels within the sector have also been high, with 19 police officers leaving Bailiwick Law Enforcement in 2020 and 18 leaving in 2021. Last year, there were no police officers who passed their two-year probation period, but police said that some were trained and did not need to clear probation.

Deputy Gabriel suggested that factors other than the pandemic could be at the cause of officers leaving the force.

‘It used to be advertised as a career for life and you joined because you wanted to help the community, which could have potentially changed as people are drawing towards higher-paying jobs.’

Deputy Prow said that overtime would always be used as a tool to manage varying demand.

‘The effective use of overtime can be a very efficient means of delivering a service, to avoid general over-staffing to cover for unanticipated peaks of demand, to which policing is frequently subjected, due to the unpredictable nature of the work,’ he said.

‘Our resources are deployed in line with risk and threat and there is no risk to public safety due to the current number of officers.’