Guernsey’s Police Chief has unveiled a new Service Delivery Plan for the force – including ‘five pillars’ which set out the priorities and objectives for all Law Enforcement staff.
They are ‘neighbourhood policing and community engagement’, ‘putting victims first’, ‘public safety’, ‘bringing offenders to justice’, and ‘highest standards of policing’.
This five point plan is intended to serve as an outline for policing services across the Bailiwick over the next three years.
Chief Officer Damian Kitchen said the plan will be refreshed as necessary in the run up to 2028 and beyond that.
“Every plan changes and there are threats and issues every day. You come into work as a police officer, police staff, and you are met with challenges that you can’t see. Policing is not predictable. It’s a 24 hour business, which is why I’m consistently proud of the people I’ve worked with for 30 years. It’s a tough job, but it’s a remarkably rewarding job, and whilst we will always refresh plans, really, the common themes don’t change.
“This is about building a time limited three year plan so I can get success at the end of three years. But actually, when we draw another plan up in three years, it will be largely the same. I can’t see the themes changing massively, but some of the focus around technology, some of the training we might need to put in into play, if we’ve seen significant reductions in crime or in types of crime, how have we been successful? And how do we feed that into the next plan to build on its success.
“So there is always room to change a plan, tweak a plan.”
Chief Officer Kitchen acknowledged that when he joined Bailiwick Law Enforcement just ten months ago, there was an element of distrust between the community and Guernsey Police.
He said working towards the five pillars will help to address those concerns while continuing to build a strong foundation for the future of policing in Guernsey.
“I think the trick is to admit mistakes when we get things wrong. Police officers are human, so police officers are just a reflection of society. Nobody’s perfect. Some people have bad days, we all do, myself included, and the trick is identifying that early. If we need to say sorry, we say sorry, and we learn and we move on and we engage with somebody that may have raised a concern. That is the vast majority of cases, but also where people transgress beyond that, and it becomes a conduct or performance or worse issue, then, quite rightly, whatever job you’re in in public service, the community expect those cases to be dealt with without fear of favour and robustly, and I have a really simple approach to that.
“It’s a learning journey. It always will be. We will always get things wrong, because we’re human beings, but it’s about how we react and respond to that when we do, and I think, and I feel from the feedback I’m getting, and the engagement I do have with community members, elected representatives, etc, that we’re making good progress with that.”
The five pillars
The Guernsey Police Service Delivery Plan for 2025-2028 includes ‘five pillars’.
These are intended to guide the priorities and objectives for all Law Enforcement staff.
Chief Officer Kitchen said these pillars will act as “a way of focusing our efforts over the next few years and giving myself and the staff some direction around common goals”.
Pillar 1 – Neighbourhood policing and community engagement
Chief Officer Kitchen explained that the pillars themselves have been built on feedback collated from a community survey, a community meeting, and other feedback sourced from various stakeholders including the public, statutory officials, and elected representatives.
“As you’re probably aware, we did quite a big community meeting a number of months ago, which is something I was keen to do early in my tenure,” he explained.
“We did a survey which we got around 1700 responses to, which was really useful. And when I did the interviews around that earlier in the year, I committed to using that feedback to inform the delivery plan going forwards.”
Pillar 2 – Putting victims first
Chief Officer Kitchen explained that as well as listening to feedback from the community at large, he and his colleagues have specifically sought to listen to victims of crime.
This information has also been used to develop the new Service Delivery Plan.
“Other things that we’ve done to inform that are speak to victims of crime. I spend quite a bit of time listening to the journey of victims and what we’ve done well and what we could do better in future. I think that’s really important. Also, listening to the staff and the officers that are delivering the services, and last but not least, elected representatives as we do a lot of work with the States of Guernsey and other stakeholders.
“All of that experience I’ve had over the 10 months and that engagement is informing this delivery plan, which is why I’ve waited until 10 months into my tenure to come up with this. What I didn’t want to do is just land, decide what I thought was best for us. I thought it was really important to listen and then soak it up, come up with a plan.”
Pillar 3 – Public safety
Chief Officer Kitchen said that using public feedback and in particular using information gathered from victims of crime, he wants to ensure that everyone feels safe in Guernsey.
“That ranges right from the high level stuff that we do around keeping the island safe from significant threats, and with the mainland as part of the Common Travel Area, right down to anti social behaviour and everything in between, including road safety, vulnerable road users, and importantly, not just keeping people safe, but making people feel safe and confident when they go out.
“If you go out for a night on a Friday night, it is immensely safe. We want to make sure people feel that.
“If people transgress and they do have to go before the courts, it’s being really good at getting successes and bringing people to justice and delivering justice for victims. And I think the bedrock of all of that is us having a really professional, ethical workforce that’s well trained, well supported, and delivers a very, very high standard of service for the public.”
Pillar 4 – Bringing offenders to justice
Where crimes are committed, Chief Officer Kitchen said Guernsey Police are committed to ensuring justice is served and that it is seen to be done.
He was clear – that this is applicable to everyone, no matter who they are.
“I took it an oath when I joined the police. It is dead simple,” he said.
“I’m not commenting on individual cases, but I’ll comment on my approach to policing,” he added.
“I took an oath when I joined the police and I took an oath when I came to Guernsey Police, and that is basically to deliver justice, keep the peace, keep people safe, and act without fear of favour. And it is that simple.”
Pillar 5 – Highest standards of policing
Having acknowledged that he joined Bailiwick Law Enforcement at a time when some peoples’ trust in Guernsey Police was very low, Chief Officer Kitchen was still keen to emphasise that his staff do a great job.
He knows there is room to improve, hence the three-year Service Delivery Plan – but he is confident in his staff and colleagues and their work.
“I think Guernsey police officers and staff do a tremendous job day in, day out. Not everything gets reported in terms of the bravery and the determination that we see in rooting out offenders, looking after people who are in crisis, delivering bad news to somebody on the doorstep. All of that is done very quietly under the radar.
“There are some tremendous people. The vast majority people, if not all the people I work with, are absolutely tremendous people. So we have really high standards of policing. But the survey, if you look at the England and Wales figures, I think there is around a 67% confidence rating for police. So that’s ‘no particular opinion’ and above, ‘really confident’ or ‘really pleased’. When we did the survey in Guernsey that figure was around 80%. So when you have the vast majority of the public in that middle band, which is ‘we don’t really have a view’, I’m quite happy with that, because most people don’t interact with the police very often in their lives, never mind in a three year plan.
“Knowing that we’re there, knowing that we respond well, which came out in the survey – the response to emergency incidents when people are the most vulnerable and they need us, that came out as one of the big, shining examples of our success in the survey. So, I don’t expect everybody to say we are fantastic, because everybody doesn’t use our services, thankfully, because we’re a really safe island.”