Some eight percent of police personnel is dedicated to traffic duties and expenditure on traffic policing forms a significant part of the overall police budget. In view of this, the Home Office and the Traffic Committee of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO Traffic) considered that it was essential to build up a detailed picture of how traffic personnel spent their time. In October 1993, management consultants were commissioned to produce this for a sample of police forces. The formal terms of reference of the study were: “to provide a full and detailed picture of how traffic personnel in a sample of police forces spend their time and to collate information on associated costs, objectives and performance indicators”. The study was also expected to assemble details of organisational arrangements for traffic policing and to provide a broad assessment of the advantages/disadvantages and cost implications associated with each form. The activity / organisation study focused upon a sample of six police forces which was selected to be broadly representative of the 43 police forces of England and Wales. These six forces provided a total sample of 1,242 traffic officers, which represented approximately fourteen percent of all traffic officers. (At the time of the study, there were 8,893 traffic police officers in England and Wales.) Four of the six forces examined were found to operate what may be described as a centralised structure for the traffic function. The remaining two had developed decentralised structures with traffic resources dispersed amongst the territorial divisions. A detailed study was made of the organisational arrangements and this suggested that there was no “correct traffic structure” to be applied in all circumstances and in all forces. The degree to which a particular structure was appropriate depended on a range of factors such as force geography and objectives, and prevailing traffic conditions. t was felt that either structure could be made to work and that both had associated advantages and disadvantages. The study noted variations between forces in terms of how specialist traffic skills were provided (e.g. for stolen vehicle work). Some traffic branches made use of specialist squads to support this work; others used specialist officers. One branch preferred its traffic officers to be “all rounders” with a range of specialist skills.
Abstract