National Audit Office: Meeting policing commitments will require significant savings and productivity improvements
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Last year, police forces responded to financial pressures by
reducing their reserves by £276 million, and borrowing £632 million
to fund 60% of their capital programmes The Home Office has
identified potential savings of £354 million over the next four
years but has assessed over half (53%) as high or medium risk to
deliver Improving the productivity of the police is crucial to
helping them manage financial pressures and meet government's
policing commitments,...Request free
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There is little evidence that the Home Office's previous efficiency attempts have led to lasting improvements in working practices across all police forces. It is now focusing on achieving cashable savings but there is opportunity to go further on long-term reform, says the NAO. The NAO's latest report, Police productivity, examines how the Home Office is supporting police forces to improve their productivity and long-term financial sustainability, by making the best use of resources (time, money, personnel) to produce public safety outcomes like investigations, patrols, or arrests. Demands on policing are growing as crime evolves and police forces take on extra responsibilities, such as seizing XL Bully dogs and enforcing public safety rules after the amendment to the Dangerous Dog Act. And with criminal justice reforms and the probation service scaling back supervision of low-risk offenders this is also expected to add further pressures. In 2024-25, police forces managed financial pressures by reducing their reserves by £276 million, and funded 60% of capital programmes (police buildings, vehicles and equipment) by borrowing £632 million. This is forecast to rise to 71% in 2025-26 meaning forces will face higher debt repayments in the future. Police forces have also run high levels of staff vacancies, used more officers in non-operational and administrative roles and reprioritised the services they provide. The NAO last looked at the financial sustainability of police forces in 2018 and recommended the Home Office make better use of data to monitor the financial resilience of police forces. The NAO has now found the Home Office has strengthened its oversight of police forces and assessed their financial resilience. However, the Home Office has not yet established consistent data on police spending and has limited understanding of why some forces are under greater financial stress. Core government funding for forces relies on a formula1 that was last updated in 2013, and, in general, force areas with population growth have seen government funding fall per person (Figure 3, page 20). The Home Office has worked with police stakeholders and identified potential savings of £354 million, which is more ambitious than previously. It will deliver these through its Police Efficiency and Collaboration Programme, which will help fund the government's policing commitments, such as aiming to halve knife-crime and violence against women and girls over the next decade. The department is yet to set out how it will support police forces to meet the Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee, or its funding implications. The NAO report found these savings will be a challenge to achieve as some may require new legislation to increase cost recovery and the Home Office has not established what funding is available to help deliver the savings. Also, the majority of police funding (77%) is committed to pay costs, meaning police forces have limited flexibility to make capital investments and invest in new technology. The government expects to increase total police funding by an average of 1.7% per year in real terms over 2025-26 to 2028-29. The Home Office does not yet have an agreed definition of productivity, or a standard methodology for measuring it, but is increasing its oversight on police performance through a new performance dashboard which will allow it to better understand variations across forces and support accountability. Previous efforts to boost police productivity, including the 2023 Policing Productivity Review, which made 26 recommendations, have stalled due to funding cuts, lack of standardisation, and slow adoption of technology. The NAO has identified five main barriers to higher productivity for the Home Office to tackle now and support better value for money from police funding. These are:
The NAO has suggested several ways for the Home Office to tackle these barriers, including:
Gareth Davies, head of the NAO, said:
“Improving the productivity of the police is crucial to
helping them manage financial pressures while supporting their
ability to respond to changing demands. While structural changes
will take time, the Home Office can make immediate progress on
tackling the other barriers to higher productivity.” Press notices and reports are available from the date of publication on the NAO website. Hard copies can be obtained by using the relevant links on our website.
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