the Police are inside a large this process of change. The police is also involved in a crisis. The big project was launched with the totally misleading name of “nærpolitireformen”. Now see all that will that it is a sentraliseringstiltak. Worst of all: the Reform has no roots among police officers. Several studies of politifolks attitudes to the reform shows a deep skepticism, and it is growing, not reducing. It is the government that has implemented the reform following the decision of the Parliament. Attempts to curb sentraliseringseffekten is since voted down. The reform is managed in practice by the national Police, not by the department of Justice.
Professors Cathrine Filstad and Tom Karp has conducted for weeks with field investigations, observations, conversations, and surveys of 4500 politiansatte to look at the consequences of police reform. The results are discouraging. 90 per cent of police state that the emergency preparedness has become worse (70 per cent) or are the same as before the reform. 80 per cent believe that preventive law enforcement either has deteriorated or is it the same as before. Almost none of those asked believe in the goal of one police with similar services. Almost none of the respondents think that the reform provides better utilization of resources. Only 20 per cent of the politiansatte state that the reform makes sense.
It is in practice ironing on all the important points in their own ranks. But also among the general public and municipal councillors, there is strong unrest. By the new year had more than 200 municipalities have not signed the cooperation agreement with the police, which is an important part of the reform. Several mayors have expressed that it is meaningless when the police presence locally is greatly weakened and the sheriff’s office closed down. The reform adds up to that number of lensmannskontorer to be reduced from 340 to 225. Many of these had only four employees. Now say the Police that you need 25 – 30 employees to have a sheriff’s office, which, in reasonable degree, can take care of the tasks. A bilpatrulje requires approx. 18 positions. Then says it himself that centralization will be the result.
The last five years it’s been 2,000 new police officers, and thousands of new ones coming by 2020. A new emergency response centre to the 2.5 billion is under construction. Resource usage is great, but the results are currently disappointing, and the inner understanding lousy. The directorate’s leadership is characterised by a kommandostil that prevents the involvement of the employees and local adaptations. And the politicians chickens out.
