Policing is changing. Since 1997, there have been over 60 acts of Parliament that have had a direct influence on policing. There are new types of police on the beat, including over 4,000 civilian Community Support Officers, and 24,000 CSOs are expected by 2008. Simultaneously, in terms of simple numbers of officers, roads policing numbers have been in long-term decline. Other people are doing tasks that were previously done by Police, with Local Authorities playing an increasingly important role in enforcing some traffic and parking offences. And perhaps most importantly, there are new tools and technologies that both extend the capacity of police officers and radically reshape their role and the nature of enforcement. For many years, enforcement has been considered a key part of the road safety triumvirate of ‘education, engineering and enforcement’ (which sometimes also includes evaluation and encouragement). However, in this ‘brave new world’ of policing, have we stepped back to ask whether these distinctions still apply? Have we have got the balance between them right? When we talk about enforcement, do we mean the same thing that we meant 10, 20 or 30 years ago? What do these changes mean for road safety and for the activities of road safety professionals? This paper will raise questions, rather than answers. PACTS is currently conducting a research project that looks into some of these questions, and in particular at the role of new technologies in roads policing. The project is ongoing, so instead of presenting a set of conclusions and take-home recommendations for you to implement, this paper presents some emerging ideas from the project – thorny issues and questions that we will be engaging with. (Author/publisher)
Samenvatting