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The Future
The New Zealand Police have not been able to stem the trend of increasing crime over the last 30 years, despite the provision of additional resources and the adoption of new operational policies and practices. Although well advanced in the implementation of community orientated policing, our efforts still fall short of any real decrease in the incidence and effects of crime and anti-social behaviour.
Indicators, including successful crime resolution and public satisfaction, show that as an organisation, we are becoming more effective but these gains are continually eroded by increasing workloads.
In the year to September 1992, New Zealanders reported 500,000 offences, excluding traffic related offences. Of major concern is violent crime (over 34,000 offences) and burglary (over 100,000 offences). New Zealand can no longer claim to be the peaceful society it was during the 1950's and 1960's.
In response to these trends, the New Zealand Police have developed a five year Strategic Plan which will implement longer term strategies designed to attack the root causes of crime.
One of the primary goals of the Police Strategic Plan is "reducing the incidence and effects of crime" on victims and communities. This goal goes beyond traditional crime prevention and seeks to reclaim ground previously lost to crime and to actually stem and reverse current crime trends.
Police accept this challenging goal cannot be achieved alone. Communities, Government, Police and other social service and community organisations must combine their efforts and strategies towards crime reduction. This is reflected in the New Zealand Police service motto, "Safer Communities Together”
Community Orientated Policing will remain the primary policing strategy for service delivery. What we are now developing is a series of strategies to be implemented over the next five years, within the community orientated policing framework, aimed at reversing the upward crime trends of the last three decades. We are going to be working even more closely with our communities to combat crime and related community problems together.
Road Safety has been identified as a key community safety issue and will rank in equal priority with crime reduction strategies.
The Police five year strategic plan has committed us to reducing the incidence and effects of crime by the end of the 1997/98 year-but that is a pledge that can only be realised if we have full support from the public and other agencies delivering criminal justice services.
Police will play a leading, but partnership, role in the implementation of this strategic approach, which will focus on crime prevention, detection and apprehension of offenders, publicity programmes and joint Police/community initiatives.
A radical change in public attitudes towards violence, alcohol and drug abuse, dishonesty and disorder is a central theme in crime reduction strategies under development. The most positive contribution we can all make now is to refuse to accept that a rising crime rate is "normal" and to determine that we will not tolerate it.
R N Macdonald
Commissioner