PFNI in urgent wake-up call to ministers over ‘skeleton police service’

PFNI chair Liam Kelly said the picture painted by Chief Constable Jon Boutcher at the Northern Ireland Policing Board (NIPB) was ‘dire and getting worse by the day’.

The chief constable told the board that insufficient neighbourhood officers and detectives meant the service was generally not resourced to keep society safe.

Mr Boutcher warned it was “a watershed moment for the PSNI”.

He told the NIPB: “Police officer numbers were allowed to decline to an unprecedented and dangerous level of 6,300. This was, and continues to be, unacceptable.

“Recruitment recommenced last April but was limited to preventing officer levels falling any further. We have not been provided with the funding to recover numbers.

“The reality of what has been allowed to happen is that we now have the lowest numbers of officers within local policing in our history and, similarly, unprecedentedly fewer numbers in the investigative parts of the organisation that tackle high-harm offending such as violence against women and girls.”

He added: “As chief constable that is a huge statement to make, but put simply, the PSNI has been reduced to historically low numbers, has insufficient neighbourhood officers to keep communities safe, insufficient detectives to

investigate and manage dangerous offenders, and is generally not resourced to keep society safe.

“Despite the unbelievably heroic efforts of officers and staff across the organisation, people will come to harm who should not because we have been reduced to a skeleton police service.”

Mr Kelly said: “After many years of significant underinvestment, the PSNI has been in a crisis for some time. Our officer numbers are historically at their lowest and we regrettably no longer have the capacity to cope effectively with everything that’s thrown at us.

“The situation is dire and getting worse by the day. Something has got to give. We’ll continue to call for a proper funding model and not this wholly unsatisfactory stitch-and-make-do approach. The service is threadbare and no amount of short-term handouts will adequately reverse and fix the problems.

“I agree with Mr Boutcher that the PSNI has been reduced to become a skeleton service. It is an irrefutable fact. This should be an urgent wake-up call for Ministers in the Stormont Executive. Regrettably, to date, I see no tangible sign that the message is getting through. Right now, we don’t even know what the police budget will be for 2025/26, but PSNI is expecting to start the year with another financial deficit.

“Running with such deficits is the road to no town. Instead of a wholly unsatisfactory annual funding allocation, with financial bailouts provided during in-year monitoring rounds, we require a structured three-year commitment.

“Only then will the service be able to properly address meaningful recruitment needs and increase our capability to provide the full range of services to the public.”

Mr Kelly added: “The plan is to initially increase police officer numbers to 7,000 by 2028. Even then that will not be enough, but it would be a start.

“An increase in resources may well be a forlorn aspiration if the PSNI continues to be starved of the vital and necessary financial muscle it requires to provide an effective policing service and keep our communities safe.”