The shape of things to come: reflections on the potential implications of the 2016 Office of National Statistics Crime Survey for the police service of England and Wales

Recent official statistics have highlighted for the first time in the UK the nature and extent of computer fraud and cybercrime against individuals and households. This has in turn posed questions about the adequacy and the speed of the police response to these newly highlighted crimes. At the same time the Public Accounts Committee has pressed for more co-ordination of efforts to counter cybercrime against government departments [PAC, 2017]. Although a number of useful initiatives have already been put in place, by the Home Office and police forces, into understanding and responding to these threats the paper claims that much more needs to done, particularly in changing policing structures, in recruitment, in training and in co-ordination of work across agencies. The paper considers the current police response, the potential problems confronting change management arising from police organisational culture. It does however identify successful police modernisation programmes that have enabled police services, outside Europe, to both restructure and recruit appropriate personnel in response to a changing criminal environment which now confronts them. It argues that in a similar way new demands on the police service will require it to significantly review its capabilities which may impact on traditional commitments to capacity.