Chioda. I'm Chelsea Daniels and This is the Front Page, a daily podcast presented by The New Zealand Herald. There's been a leadership shakeup at the Royal New Zealand Police College after a recruiting debacle. It's while a newly released survey of training officers has found two thirds were concerned about probationary cops understanding of police responsibilities when holding suspects and custody. It also found fifty five percent of them feel new cops were barely or not at all well
equipped with knowledge of arrest and charge procedures. All of this while the government is slowly backing away from its hardline promise of five hundred new cops on the beat by November. And at Herald, senior investigative porter Michael Mourra has been looking into the police recruitment process and joins us now on the Front Page. First off, Mike, tell me a little bit about this survey.
Yeah, So, the survey got the views of two hundred and thirty senior training officers or very experienced police officers and sought their feedback on the competency and standards of the product that was coming out of the Police College, ie the recruits were they up to scratch?
It was a.
March survey, so very recent and a look back over a six month period in two hundred and thirty senior police giving their opinion is obviously, you know, pretty substantial. So the survey in summary showed that there was many areas where police recruits coming out onto frontline duties were performing reasonably, okay, adequately or in the survey's words.
Quite well.
And that was driving firearms, tactical gear like use of pepper spray and tases, and road policing. Those were all, you know, pretty okay. But then there was some really concerning findings which were related to what many would see as relatively basic policing. So there were issues with custodial duties i e. What are the rules and procedures for holding a suspect in custody. There were issues around arrest and charging procedures, and use of police systems like the
NEAR application, which is the National Intelligence Application. This is the database that police officers can look up and find out addresses, convictions, any other intelligence about a suspect.
So all of those areas.
And particularly file preparation, that was the worst came in for pretty bad scrutiny. Essentially, the senior police who were taking part found that in all of those areas, the new recruits coming out onto the front line were either barely prepared or not well at all prepared in those roles.
Right, So, when we talk about things like, say, procedures for making an arrest or laying charges, is that kind of like the Miranda rights thing that we see on NCIS or something.
Yeah, exactly, So it could be anything from the requirement to read to suspect their rights. You also have to inform them precisely the reason why they're being arrested. In other cases, if you executing a warrant and arresting someone with a warrant it requested, you must provide that warrant within a reasonable timeframe to the suspect. And there's a whole lot of other things that I'm not really aware of.
I'm not a cop, But yeah, it's those procedures around the arrest in laying charges potentially, also that the administrative work involved in that and quite a few gaps in that.
In fact, more than fifty percent of respondents felt that the new police on the front line were barely equipped or not well at all equipped in those areas of making arrests and laying charges, which is you know, relatively concerning and will certainly give the bosses at the Police College and the executive level food for thought in terms of going forward.
Well, you can be the best driver in the world, you can be the best at pepper spraying in the world, but if you can't get those charges correct and do the paperwork involved, it all falls falls down in court, doesn't it.
Yeah, So file preparation was by far the most serious. This is the this is the report we got under the Official Information Act and file preparation. It is eighty three percent of respondents. So you know, that's well over one hundred and twenty police who were part of the survey. Their findings are that the officers coming out of the college were barely or not at all well prepared in those respects. So file preparation, as you say, that might
be making a witness statement from someone. It might be a witness, it might be an offender. All of that stuff, that paperwork, how you make those notes, where those notes are filed, what you do after you've done that interview. All that stuff has to be logged. Then is of course the file preparation, but file preparation also relates to going to court. It also relates to the chain of
evidence during investigations into serious crime. If you don't get that stuff right and you get all the way to court and you get a fancy defense lawyer, then they will rip police apart and the case will fall apart, and a lot of effort goes into that, and so that is clearly an area that they must improve on.
Look, they've pointed out a number of areas that we need to pick up and improve, and as we go forwards what they've shown us and what we've seen in other evaluations, we'll be pulling together and looking at whereas our best investment in terms of enhancing and improving training. Their feedback is really really valuable because they're on the front line with the probationary comp So.
Does their feedback result in actual change here at the college to improve.
Yes, So we've got a review team underway at the moment. He'll be looking to put in place some improvements to our current curriculum early next year, and we'll be doing some longer term work.
You've spoken to the Royal and z Police College Director Superintendent Sam Keats. Now he's pretty new in the role. Hey, what did he have to say.
Yeah, he's only actually been director for six weeks at the college, so very new. But I think he was very very clear during the interview we had that there are going to be changes to the course at the Police College as a result of this feedback. He couldn't precisely say which areas needed to be tweaked, but of course you when you look at far preparation and procedures for arrest charges, those are obviously key areas that they
would be looking at. The other thing that I think will be up for some debate at the moment is just the duration that police spend at Police College. At the moment, it's twenty weeks that was on Mark Mitchell's call, increased from sixteen earlier this year, so slightly longer. But we in New Zealand still have one of the lowest training periods in the world according to the Police Association, and Chris Carhill told me that essentially he doesn't think
twenty weeks is long enough. He'd like to see another month added on. He also had concerns about the I guess real life and environment of training, you know, actually getting out to a station during that time that you're within the confines of the college to see what policing on the frontline is really about.
Now, Sam Keats told me at the moment.
There is a one week deployment out of that twenty weeks, and listening to Tasha Penny from Police who's also made comments on this story, I think that is an area where she would like to see more time actually spent in practical operational mode as opposed to reading books in
the police college. And Sam Keats is certainly open to making changes in relation to making it more practical in terms of the training, and he's also open to the idea without making any sort of confirmation that the duration of the time recruits spend there could increase.
Well, that duration actually surprised me. Twenty weeks and you get handed a taser and a police car at the end of it. I mean, I don't know how long you spent studying to be a journalist, but I think mine was three years.
I spent four.
But I think what you need to look at for this is that you know, and Sam Keyes pointed this out when we were speaking, is that when a recruit has graduated from police College and they've done their twenty weeks and they have the ceremony and they are then dispersed to whichever district they're going to. It's not like
they are just left to their own devices. And sam Keats words that the training aspect of the college is just the beginning of the learning, because technically, once you're on the front line, you are a probationary constable i e. A junior for a two year period and during that time you are supposed to be receiving mentoring and oversight from senior police. I guess the question is is a senior police officer looking after you.
The whole time? Well, I doubt it, because.
They've gone and taken a job in Northern Territory or something.
Well potentially, but you can't always, even as a probationary constable, expect that a senior field training officer is going to be your wingman all the time. But certainly you know that there is this period once you're on the front line that there is feedback and there is oversight.
When asked about this on Herald Now this week, Prime Minister Christopher Luckson said, sort of it feels a little bit also like you know a lot of workplaces where the new generation is never quite as good as the old generation. What did you think of that?
Oh?
Well, I think I don't really buy into that sort of comment.
I think that bit of a boomer comment, isn't it.
Well, it is a bit of a boomer comment, But I mean, yeah, I guess you could kind of make that argument. But the point here is that the senior police, the experienced police, they are the ones in the know. And the fact of the matter is is that doing surveys like this if you want to and pre the standards of police that we're putting out on the streets in New Zealand, is critical because otherwise how do you actually improve or tweak or adapt the program that they're learning.
So look, I don't really buy into that comment. I think it's more or less a throwaway remark, to be honest. You know, this is clearly an important survey and it's one that is going to prompt changes, and those changes, according to Superintendent Sam Keats, will be made by early next year.
And he gave us a tiny bit of insight into this whole five hundred offices by November deadline.
Right, well, essentially the the you know, the national government has had this target right, five hundred police. It was always by the end of November. As the months have gone on over this year, over the last six months especially, it's gone from oh, look, you know, we're not sure
if we'll meet that deadline. I can't comment on that, to hey, we're not too worried if it doesn't mean that, And now the Prime Minister is actually essentially saying that that target is dead in the water and that we'll get there. When they get there, he'll say it may take a couple more months until we get that extra five hundred police on the front line. So he's left himself a bit of riggle room. But obviously this is politically embarrassing because it was a key commitment.
We know that law and order.
Is a national party and coalition plank, central plank of their election and so when you're promising that we're going to do this and you failed to deliver, it doesn't look great. And so that the narrative, if you like, from our politicians has been changing over the past few months until you know, just recently on Herald now essentially the PM saying nah, November is not.
Going to happen.
And we've spoken about concerns with the recruitment process before. I think at the end of June, basically applicants being led into college via exemptions, not passing fitness tests, struggling through English language tests. Has there been any update on.
This, Well, yes, today, I've got emails.
This was around the period where I broke the story about applicants who were applying to get into Police College and the fact that they were bypassing or being exempted from certain tests. When you were applying to get into Police College, there are a whole lot of things you have to do. You can't just rock up and say I, Mike, I want to start at Police College. You know there's background checks, et cetera. But you have to do psychometric testing, you have to do a fitness test, you have to
pass literacy so English. Now, of course we know that after that story and we revealed that there was problems with the fitness test, that staff being exempted. This big audit was undertaken and by Police, an internal audit to find out how widespread the problems were, and of course
the audit found that they were very widespread. In fact, it was common practice, in the words of the author of the audit, that exemptions or discretionary decisions were being made, including by some of the top ranked police in the country who were exempting these applicants. So the emails I've got were in May here from Richard Chambers where he really clearly sets the tone saying changes needed.
We need to be bold, quick and clinical.
He talks about culture at the Royal New Zealand Police College and says, I believe the college may be struggling with its identity. This is a question of values, pride and brand on standards. He's obviously very clear speaks for itself and I'm the view that we need to make some changes that make this very clear from the start. So what's happened here is that there's been this embarrassing revelation about police officers are not up to scratch getting
into college anyway. Subsequent to that, the Commissioner has come in and said right, things need to change.
And what we know now is.
That the leadership at the Police College has been completely overhauled. As I mentioned, Superintendent Sam Keats is in there. He's only been six weeks in the role. He has taken over from an acting director who took over from another director who was in place before her.
Sam.
Superintendent Sam Keats has also got a whole lot of other new leaders around him, so the message is pretty clear from the police executive. They're not happy about how this has played out, and they have launched into quite a big overhaul at the Police College in terms of leadership, decision making and oversight of the quality.
Of our place.
Thanks for joining us, Mike.
Thank you.
That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage at enzidherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is produced by Jane Ye and Richard Martin, who is also our editor. I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe to The Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts, and tune in tomorrow for another look behind the headlines.