WORKLOADS for detectives are mounting, it is taking longer to charge people, and stress and illness are\u00a0escalating, the Chairman of South Yorkshire Police Federation has warned.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur detectives have just disappeared, I don\u2019t know where,\u201d added Mr Bowles. \u201cAnd if we\u2019re losing officer numbers a fair percentage of them are going to be detectives.\u201d<\/p>\n
In\u00a0England and Wales, the investigation time that\u00a0led to charge is 10% higher than it was four years ago.<\/p>\n
Mr Bowles added: \u201cThe bureaucracy that still exists despite all Home Secretary\u2019s and previous Federation Chair (Jan Berry) claiming that they\u2019re going to cut bureaucracy, it just stays there. There\u2019s more work to do to investigate a case, monitor and record disclosure items, get it to the CPS, get the file onto a computer, get it to court and yet we\u2019re under pressure to keep bail dates short.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can\u2019t have everything. If we\u2019ve got to investigate something you\u2019ve got to give us time to investigate it.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cWe\u2019ve had to staff up our public protection unit, something like a 1,000%\u00a0on what they were, for obvious reasons, so those detectives have had to come from the work that they were doing before. And that is an opportunity for detectives in other forces, we are looking for transferees.<\/p>\n
Are the workloads also affecting\u00a0the welfare of officers and detectives? \u201cAbsolutely,\u201d added Mr Bowles. \u201cI\u2019ve been asking for trend figures from HR about sickness across the board but I haven\u2019t seen any yet. But I can see that the number of applicants to our treatment centre at Harrogate is certainly on the increase for stress and anxiety. So the workloads are increasing, pressures are increasing, and some people are suffering burnout.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are liaising with our HR service, which we share with Humberside, and a holistic wellbeing group across both forces has been set up. We will play an active part in discussions.\u201d<\/p>\n