PSA President Nick Smart delivered the following address to Policing Minister Sara Jones at the PSA Conference 2026:
PSA President’s Speech Minister, colleagues and guests.
Welcome to the annual conference of the Police Superintendents’ Association.
It is wonderful to see so many people here, and to come together to discuss a number of pressing matters for policing.
I must give a special thanks to Policing Minister Sarah Jones for joining us today. It is appreciated.
She addressed our members in what was only her second week of being in post last year, and we have had positive engagement ever since.
It is right that the Home Office is represented at this event, which offers such a unique opportunity to address its senior policing leaders. It is disappointing that the home secretary has not spoken at any police workforce conference since being in post, but we very much look forward to hearing from the minister today. _________________________ The nation came together in shock and sadness over the loss of our colleagues from Cleveland Police last month.
This senseless loss of life is very difficult to comprehend. They simply went to work to do their job. They did not return home.
As the police family we mourn as one. We owe our gratitude to them and their families, and to all officers lost in service.
Our deepest sympathies are with their loved ones and colleagues, and we pledge that their sacrifices will not be forgotten.
I ask you to stand and to join me in a minute’s silence to remember all the colleagues within the police family that we have lost. ________________________
We’ve focused this year’s conference on ‘shaping the future’. This very phrase could be a tagline for our association, and indeed the other staff associations represented here today.
We all want a positive future for policing. We all want to influence positive change. We want policing to be better. And we must be involved from the outset, on all future areas of work, along with other workforce representative bodies.
As the workforce, we have the passion, the knowledge, the data and the evidence to help shape this future. We now need those with the power to make decisions, to believe in that capability, to engage meaningfully with the workforce moving forward, and to recognise that lasting reform can only be achieved by working in partnership with those responsible for delivering it every day.
Over the last year, we’ve been presented with findings from in-depth studies into policing, informing the work of the White Paper and the Leadership Commission. With the recent announcement of an end to end review of Police Accountability and part 2 of the Angiolini Enquiry, there is yet more change to come.
Much of what these studies have found, has been shouted from the rooftops by ourselves and others for years. If we get the recommendations that have been proposed right, we focus them for clear impact, and we mandate them, the service can flourish, our communities can flourish and our workforce will benefit exponentially.
I speak today to a room full of policing leaders. Operational police officers at the rank of superintendent and chief superintendent who sit at the critical interface between chief officer strategy and operational delivery. Their role and rank is crucial.
We therefore welcomed the announcement of a Leadership Commission. A review into police leadership, which would look at all ranks from Sgt through to Chief Constable.
Leadership at all levels is crucial for policing, and we are staunch supporters of getting this right.
There are exceptional people at every rank doing fantastic work, serving as inspirational leaders, guiding their teams and their service, going above and beyond to protect the public.
But we’re far from getting it all right – our rank is included in that.
We regularly hear from our own members on feeling unsafe to speak out, unable to challenge those more senior for fear of repercussions. I indeed raised this at the Leadership Commission Roundtable, and have done so at every opportunity to flag this concern.
The most recent Oscar Kilo survey shows that staggeringly, only 39% of superintendent colleagues felt psychologically safe to speak out or challenge executive leaders. 41% of supers stated that they did not think that the values displayed by chief officers were consistent with organisational values.
Just let those figures sink in for a moment. There is a reality gap between all ranks and the Exec.
This was also reported on by Lord Herbert and Lord Blunkett throughout their work for the commission.
Probably the most depressing element of the Oscar Kilo survey is that 58% of the national respondents DID NOT believe that senior leaders will act on the survey findings. A complete lack of faith in leadership.
These issues also extend into one of the most important debates now facing policing: accountability. We really welcome the government's commitment to an end-to-end review. Accountability is essential. The public rightly expect the highest standards from those entrusted with significant powers, and when things go wrong, there must be transparency, scrutiny and consequences. But accountability must also support improvement. Too often, our members describe a culture where the fear of blame outweighs the opportunity to learn. A culture where individuals fear making decisions because they worry less about whether it is the right operational choice and more about how it may be judged with the benefit of hindsight months later.
Policing is complex. Our officers and staff make difficult decisions every day, often under immense pressure, with incomplete information and in rapidly evolving sets of circumstances. Inevitably, mistakes will occur.
The question for policing should not always be "who can we blame?" It should be "what can we learn?" We need an accountability system that distinguishes between misconduct, negligence and genuine professional error. A system that allows officers to be dealt with by way of performance and development, rather than it being pushed into a discipline arena.
An officer at any rank who acts in good faith, makes a reasonable decision based on the information available at the time, and seeks to do the right thing, should not fear a career-defining process, simply because the outcome was not what everyone wanted.
But as the Oscar Kilo survey points out, this is not the reality for our people. 41% of supers said they did not think they would be supported by the force if they made a mistake, 77% of Pcs felt the same. Our officers are making high level operational threat, harm and risk-based decisions, and so many fear their operating environment. This culture of blame cannot continue.
There is no more accountable service than the police. But it needs to be balanced and it needs to be fair and at present it is not.
The best-performing organisations and the safest industries have learned this lesson. They create environments where people can report mistakes, challenge decisions, identify risks and speak openly - because learning is valued more highly than blame. The NHS call this a “just and learning culture” or charter. A balance between holding people to account and learning.
We should aspire to the same. It would be better for everyone - officers and the public.
If we are serious about rebuilding trust, strengthening leadership and creating the policing service that the public deserves, then accountability reform must be about more than processes and structures.
It must recognise that people are central to success, and help create a culture where officers have the confidence at all ranks to make difficult decisions, the courage to speak up when something is wrong, and - the assurance that fair scrutiny is designed to improve policing, rather than simply apportion blame.
We as an association truly believe we can help make this happen, we can create this. We have the people with the passion and determination to develop this culture, but it must be welcomed and led from the top. And we must be included in any consultation at the highest level.
We fed these views, and others from our members into the leadership commission to help provide a constructive way forward, to move from blame to learn.
We welcomed the recommendations made by Lord Herbert and Lord Blunkett.
They directly address many of the problems unearthed throughout the research – but our call is simple. They must be mandated. We cannot have a postcode lottery as to what is adopted and what is not.
And ultimately, it also takes money. As the Commission’s authors made clear, change needs to be properly funded with sustained investment. These changes are designed to make things better. We must invest in the people we need to lead this change and the resources we need to make them stick.
Bring us in as your workforce representatives, alongside our colleagues at the Federation, CPOSA and Unison. Let us help you get the details right around these recommendations, based on what our own people are experiencing and saying.
So, we ask. Will the Government do this - mandate - invest – consult?
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The White paper.
We now have a clear direction from the government on what it sees as the priorities for change and the route map via which it will address them.
There should be no misunderstanding over the scale of what is proposed here. This is the biggest change to policing that has been seen since its inception.
We have, and will, take every opportunity to support and influence the work that’s ongoing. We’ve written to the home secretary with extensive commentary on the proposals and have submitted evidence to Lord Hogan Howe on his review of local force structures.
We are vocal supporters of the need for change to deliver a better service, and want this opportunity to succeed. The workforce must be viewed as a critical stakeholder. We have access to the most senior operational leaders delivering policing now, and who will also be responsible for delivering this change – we want to share their knowledge and support. Let us support this reform.
We can make it work. _____________
One of the key concerns we’ve raised in our feedback is our fear over the siloed approach that has been taken in approaching police reform.
We do not police in isolation - and silo reform will not fix the systemic issues faced by other agencies within the criminal justice system.
UK policing is delivered by brilliant people who are committed to serving the public, but so often they are let down by the complex and underfunded criminal justice system around them.
To get reform right, it is critically important to look at how every part of this system is set up, where it overlaps with others, so that we can identify the huge potential to do things better.
My key message when I spoke last year was the need to define the police mission, before we progress systemic change. What is our purpose – what do you want us to do moving forward? Until we do this, and are very clear about the role of the police alongside partner agencies, we fear that reform efforts could fail. This would be an unforgiveable waste of time, energy and resources.
A year on and there is still no true, accurate picture of police demand. We know without a shadow of a doubt that it is overwhelmingly high, that the majority of it does not relate to crime, and that we pick up the overspill of the broken system.
So let’s be bold. Why not set up a national group - politicians, stakeholders, workforce associations - to solve the problem of demand, redefine our purpose and the police mission.
This isn't just about a restructure of policing - something we are staunch supporters of - it's about a resetting of our service, drawing a line in the sand and being confident in defining what work should sit with the police service. Then, redesign can truly work.
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The Early Release Scheme is the most acute and visible result of a system that is beyond broken.
Court backlogs of 80,000 cases. Court listings being scheduled into 2030 and beyond.
Prisoners – at one point, even those convicted of killing a police officer, being considered for being released early into their sentence.
This is the most upsetting and lowest form of insult to every victim affected.
It took the personal intervention of the prime minister to prevent the killers of PC Andrew Harper being released earlier under this scheme.
The intervention was most welcome, but one that should never have been necessary. T
he workforce and the public spoke out in horror and the government has listened. But other victims deserve the same.
We are in an impossible situation with prisons full and those responsible for extremely harmful offences, including domestic abuse. being released early.
The impact on communities is huge and demand on police will substantially increase.
The NPCC, you heard Gavin speak today, estimates that forces will need to devote the equivalent of 480 million pounds in police time, to dealing with offenders who breach their licence conditions or commit further offences after being released.
£480 million. With no additional funding and no additional officers.
At the same time, police are being told of the development of new performance targets linked to neighbourhood crimes such as retail theft. How do these targets, which will undoubtedly include arrest and charge numbers - outcomes - sit alongside a court system that cannot process these people and a prison estate that cannot house them?
How can we expect the victims of crime that we come across, to have the confidence, the energy and the belief in us as a service, to report an offence and ask for help?
It is our belief that these critical issues are so important, that reform efforts must be significantly widened to address the entire system.
We are formally renewing our calls for a Royal Commission into the Criminal Justice System. Something that was promised by the government in 2019 and was never delivered, but paused.
Reforming policing in isolation, without redesigning the entire system, we feel is a missed opportunity.
We also ask that far greater detail is provided over how any changes will be funded. The proposals are really positive, they offer solutions to so many critical issues. We urge government to fund them sustainably.
But the reality is, we’re over a decade into operating in austerity.
We’ve seen a 10% reduction in our workforce over the past 15 years.
We had 260 officers per 100,000 of population, but this reduced to 237 per 100,000 by 2025.
This is the lowest in Europe, equates to a shortfall of nearly 70,000 officers as calculated by the Social Market Foundation, and represents a financial shortfall of around £8bn.
Policing must become a national priority for government. The domestic threat is just a real as the external threat.
In the latest annual assessment of policing, His Majesty’s Chief Inspector said that every force is showing strain, that forces are struggling to meet everyday demand and to tackle complex threats. She said the way policing is funded is outdated and almost all chiefs and PCCs raised finances as a significant concern. This is the opinion of the most senior inspector of policing, that you have asked to provide an objective, factual view on the state of policing.
Please do not ignore these clear red flags and independent findings. ___________________
I have spoken repeatedly over my concerns over the wellbeing of police officers and staff.
I want to talk through solutions rather than issues, but it would do a disservice to our members to ignore what they are telling us.
We have a higher burnout rate than the NHS.
55% of supts feel physically exhausted from their work
47% are emotionally exhausted from their work. That’s from the Oscar Kilo survey.
95% work on call outside their core hours
74% say their workload has increased
I say it again – to politicians and the NPCC- you need to address and deal with this please. It is a dangerous operating environment for colleagues.
We are pleased that as a result of our evidence and our influence, our continued call for change, Oscar Kilo will be launching an independent and confidential counselling service for superintendents in the new year. This is real action in response to PSA data.
We thank Andy Rhodes and the team at Oscar Kilo for their continued dedication to supporting the workforce.
To fill the gap in the support offered by forces nationally, and in response to the inconsistency our members experience, we are making our own investment into the wellbeing of superintendents, by launching a range of initiatives to respond to what you have said about your mental and physical health. We can’t continue to wait for change.
As a service we need to have a culture that is pro-active and looks after its staff, that gets upstream and prevents welfare issues, rather than reaching a critical point when it is often too late.
Instead of waiting for forces to act, we’ll be offering the following to PSA members in the coming weeks.
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We’re proud to have developed this support for our members and we hope it will make a difference. If people tell us how they feel in survey after survey, we must act. We hope that forces do the same.
Our people deserve to feel valued and they deserve to be part of a system that recognises the sacrifices they make.
As does every member of the police family.
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We are at a crossroads for the service and the wider criminal justice system.
Previous political ambivalence and negligence from successive governments has allowed the police service to be run down to what it is now. However, never before have we had a government that is proposing to design real change, and looking beyond short-term fixes. It is a real opportunity.
We want this too, but we need it to be done right. We need to do it together.
Before we press ahead, we urge you to look at the wider picture so that policing can do what it excels at, and so that communities can regain trust in the wider criminal justice system there to serve them.
We ask:
• Commit to a Royal Commission for the entire criminal justice system • Invest and fund policing and the changes that we need to tackle the domestic threats we face • Seize the opportunity to review police demand and redefine the police mission • Mandate the recommendations of the Leadership Commission • Deliver a fair accountability system for police officers and the public • Invest and deliver on the commitments of the Police Covenant • Continue to consult with your workforce and give them a voice
It is truly our belief that if these things happen, if policing, justice and keeping people safe, is finally prioritised as a core public service, we will have a service that will be the envy of the world and the pride of our communities.
Let’s truly work together on this. Policing’s strength has always been and will always be in its people. Let us help you to succeed.
