The Police Service Social and Welfare Association yesterday welcomed Government’s $119 million (US$17.5 million) investment to improve equipment and technology in the Police Service but called for greater collaboration between the two bodies.
During his 37-minute address to the nation on Sunday, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley said Government would sustain its resourcing of police and other security agencies to allow them to better engage in crime prevention and detection.
There have been a growing calls for the Government to do more to get a handle on crime and recently divisional commanders of the Police Service were summoned before the National Security Council and urged to be more proactive in the fight against criminals.
The association’s president, Insp Michael Seales, said intelligence gathering was an area which needed to be strengthened as that would improve the general overall performance of the service.
But he said there were several troubling issues which have not been addressed, including the substantive appointment of a police commissioner and outstanding back pay to police officers.
Police officers have received half of their back pay and were yet to receive the rest.
“We do not want the thrust of the Government in terms of increasing the performance of the Police Service to ignore the human capital of the Police Service... who are the people to really drive the service and really improve it and sustain it over time,” Seales said.
On the lack of a substantive police commissioner, Seales said, that was part of a breakdown of the system, adding that it also impeded performance. Stephen Williams has been acting for the past three years and now Harold Phillip is holding on for him while he is on vacation.
“So you cannot strategically move forward with any performance model in order for the Police Service to yield some better results which is affecting us in relation to our detection rate,” Seales said.
Rowley had also said the Government believed that with proper management systems and a “can do” attitude that police officers had it within them to get the job done.
T&T’s murder rate has reached 319, with the majority of crimes unsolved.
Describing the association as a “major stakeholder”, he said, it also understood the culture of the service and that of its members.
“Everybody talks about the Police Service as having bad eggs and corruption but we need to get a solution and part of that solution is the appointment of a commissioner and that person must be able to utilise the legislative package available to treat with issues like that.
“When you do not have a commissioner how do you utilise that framework?” Seales asked.