PRTB Chair Paddy Tipping Welcomes Funding for Police Reform Projects
The Chair of the Police Reform and Transformation Board (PRTB), Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) for Nottinghamshire, Paddy Tipping, has welcomed today’s announcement by Nick Hurd MP, the Minister for Policing and the Fire Service, regarding police reform projects across England and Wales which have been awarded support from Police Transformation Fund (PTF).
In a statement, PCC Paddy Tipping said:
“The £60 million funding package announced by the Minister will be invested across our regions and in local forces to ensure that our police can respond to the range of threats which pose harm to our communities. This funding covers programmes that use innovative ways to keep our communities safe, by investing in digital policing methods and effective local partnerships to combat serious and organised crime, whilst protecting the most vulnerable members of our society.
“I am especially encouraged by the wide range of investments being supported by the Fund. All of these programmes deliver on the outcomes of our Policing Vision 2025, ensuring that we are equipped into the future to keep our communities safe, using specialist technology to prevent crime, community partnerships to reduce offending, and increase the public’s access to policing and criminal justice services.
“Through the Board which I chair, Chief Constables and Police and Crime Commissioners are working together, to agree with the Home Office a programme of work over the next few years which will make best use of the Police Transformation Fund for the benefit of the public.”
The funding from the Police Transformation Fund provides:
- £11 million to Sussex for a Video Enabled Justice (VEJ) initiative to be piloted across London and the South East, designed to improve the way police officers give evidence, and free up more time for frontline duties.
- £6 million to Cheshire, Essex, Hampshire, Gloucestershire and Merseyside forces, over the next three years, for the reform of digital policing.
- £23 million over the next three years for a suite of measures which will provide the NCA, Regional Organised Crime Units, and police forces with new capabilities to detect, monitor and disrupt organised crime groups.
- £12 million over the next three years to North Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Wiltshire, Northumbria and the Metropolitan police forces for their proposals in local policing. These projects are innovative approaches to engaging with the community, using sport to reduce youth offending and transforming volunteering in the police to ensure that the community has a greater say in how their areas are kept safe.
- £600,000, over the next two years, to Avon and Somerset and Essex to drive greater collaboration between police and fire services – whether that is through greater collaboration or a transfer of fire governance.