Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 25
63rd Report - Increasing police productivity
Published 28 Jan 2026
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Increasing police productivity All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
Despite these opportunities, scaling innovation and new technologies across the 43 police forces in England and Wales has been slow. The Home Office and College of Policing acknowledged the lack of speed and told us that scale-up was the biggest barrier.65 We asked about the mechanisms needed to scale innovation.66 In supplementary evidence received after our evidence session, the College of Policing highlighted that its Centre for Police Productivity is dedicated to identifying innovation and supporting forces to implement new initiatives. It has identified and sifted 1,400 innovations, putting 120 of these with the greatest potential into a ‘promising practice’ bank.67 The College of Policing also highlighted that is aware of 90 initiatives using AI in 29 forces, and told us it evaluates between eight and 12 initiatives a year, seeking to fast-track them to policing.68 The College acknowledged that it needed to do more but said that its funding had fallen (from 0.4% of all police funding in 2012–13 to 0.2% in 2025–26) and that it does not 59 Q 120 60 Q 41 61 Qq 84-85 62 C&AG’s Report, Examples 1-3 63 Qq 79, 112 64 City of London Police (IPP0010) 65 Q 119; C&AG’s Report, para 3.9 66 Qq 120, 130 67 Letter from the College of Policing, 8 December 2025 68 Qq 112, 119 15 have sufficient gravity to drive some of these initiatives.69 It also pointed to the number of bodies involved in rolling-out new measures—a “crowded landscape”—which is not the most efficient or effective way of delivering national services.70
From: Public Accounts Committee, 63rd Report - Increasing police productivity (HC 1239), 28 January 2026
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 7 April 2026 (deadline 28 March 2026).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states that it "agrees with the Committee's recommendation" on every recommendation, marking some as implemented and setting target dates for others.
- On performance data, the Home Office will write to the Committee by July 2026 setting out the key metrics it will incorporate in future iterations of the Police Performance Framework, and its plans for public reporting of performance data.
- On officer numbers, the officer maintenance grant and the requirement to achieve officer headcount targets "has been abolished from 1 April 2026". The government adds that prioritising neighbourhood policing "may place some limitations on workforce flexibility" which the Home Office "will keep under review".
- On efficiency savings, the Police Efficiency and Collaboration Programme has "an annual cashable efficiencies target of £354 million by 2028-29". Mandating approaches to policing "will be considered where there is a case to do so".
- On police IT systems, the government gives a target implementation date of December 2029. It says the National Police Service, once established, "will consider these recommendations further then", and that force-level IT updates "must align" with the implementation of force mergers.