‘Police Academy is part of the solution to the personnel shortage’

‘The police organisation and the Police Academy are in constant dialogue to ensure that police education is in line with policing practice’, says Leonard Kok, director of the Police Academy, in response to alerts from understaffed police units.

On 8 August, Dutch daily Het Parool published an article about the personnel shortages of the Amsterdam Police Unit’s investigations department. In this article, Pim Jansonius, Chief Constable of the unit, states that the Amsterdam investigations department is in danger of slowly petering out, and that someone needs to intervene. ‘Doing nothing is not an option. There doesn’t seem to be a solution, so we feel a huge urgency to just go ahead and develop something ourselves.’

At present, the Amsterdam unit mainly appoints lateral-entry personnel. They are appointed directly to the Intake & Service department, the department citizens have contact with when they call the police. So they don’t come to the police through the route of police education at the Academy. These candidates are required to get their special enforcement officer diploma in their free time. At first, their payment is below what they should actually receive, Jansonius admits.

Neither desirable nor effective

‘It’s understandable that they seek out practical solutions to appoint extra personnel rapidly. Because the shortage is definitely acute,’ Leonard explains. ‘But I feel the Police Academy could be part of the solution. We also addressed this in the report we presented to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Justice and Security last May.’

‘To be honest, we consider it undesirable for certain parts of the police organisation to develop their own police education. And we find it neither effective nor wise to hire external parties for this purpose. It’s the Police Academy’s task to independently guarantee the quality of police education and diplomas.’

‘That’s why the Police Academy calls on the organisation to be careful about the number of training options offered outside the academy, particularly where investigation is concerned. There’s a risk that the quality of the education will vary from place to place, and that important knowledge will become fragmented,’ according to Leonard.

Identification of needs

‘Demand for police education is great and sometimes exceeds supply. The ministry and the police force together determine how much training capacity there is,’ Leonard explains.

‘I feel that if the force’s demand greatly exceeds what the Police Academy can offer while the financial resources are available, we should invest these resources in the Police Academy. It would then be up to us to determine whether we provide the training ourselves, outsource it, or enter into a partnership. But whichever way you look at it, extra demand for education and training will always go hand in hand with a demand for extra resources or prioritisation within the existing supply.’

Capacity based on requirements

The police determine this training capacity via the needs identification process. They use the process to determine how much capacity will be required in the future for them to execute their duties properly. The objective is to ensure that the education is in line with the police’s present and future requirements.

This process also helps deploy the right people in the right places. The various units inform the Police Academy of their needs for each area of expertise, such as investigations. Then the Police Academy structures their education so as to meet these needs.