Top cop back with county set

The new Chief Constable of Staffordshire has revealed plans to get away from form filling, and return to good old-fashioned policing.

reports.

"I am not a maverick," Staffordshire's new Chief Constable stresses as he outlines his vision for his force which will see paper work for ordinary bobbies on the beat vastly reduced.

Speaking at force headquarters in Stafford Chris Sims believes it is the answer to solving the problem of offering reassurance to the people of the county.

He says the force has achieved dramatic falls in crime rates and improved many areas of service, but was failing to ensure the public felt more secure as a result.

He wants to get away from the culture of form filling and obsession with achieving targets and said his officers were up for it.

"We joined the police to serve not fill in forms and tick boxes," he adds.

Staffordshire Police Authority chairman Councillor Mike Poulter say: "We are in for an exciting and constructive period of development.

"Chris's appointment marks a significant change.

"His target is not to deliver figures but to reduce fears of crime and create an atmosphere of public security and safety," he explained.

Mr Sims' first act on taking up his new post on Monday was to call a meeting of all his senior officers, key civilian staff and Staffordshire Police Authority members to outline how he wants the force - already rated one of the top performing forces in the country - to change under his leadership.

"I was determined to start the business of change on day one," he says.

"There is a fantastically strong commitment to learning, change and innovation here, but the missing bit is reassurance.

"My target from day one is to make us the best force in the country. In my view the best is the force where the levels of trust and respect between the force and the people it serves is absolutely at the top of any league table," he says.

He is also determined to keep crime falling by keeping pressure on tackling burglaries and car crime and ensure the force is able to respond to major challenges such as dealing with major investigations and terrorism.

He says the barriers to improving trust and reassurance included police bureaucracy. His aim was to give officers more time to spend on dealing directly with the public.

"My officers are desperate to actually improve the way that they serve the public.

"It is not through choice that they are not able to spend time at calls and ring people back to keep them up to date on an investigation," he adds.

Mr Sims says he has already ordered the filling in of one routine form to be stopped and was in the process of looking at the way incidents were recorded just to meet national standards.

"Detection rates have been the traditional symbol of police performance. I am utterly committed to detecting serious crime - that is clearly part of our duty and at the top of the list, but the targets regime around detections has driven officers to attempt to detect much less serious crime.

"I will not pursue this in the same way. The regime will be about better service and victim satisfaction," he reveals.

He admits that when figures are published it is likely to show Staffordshire with detection rates lower than other forces.

"I think it is a risk worth paying to do the things people want us to do and serve them in the way they want to be served," he adds.

Mr Sims himself plans to speak directly each week to two callers or victims of crime, and feed back what they have to say to him in to improving the system.

The 48-year-old former West Midlands Deputy Chief Constable succeeds David Swift at the head of the county force.

He started with the Metropolitan Police as a graduate in 1980 and has previously worked for the Staffordshire force for five years in the professional standards unit, working in CID at HQ in Stafford and as divisional commander at Wombourne and Hanley. He left in 1999 to join the West Midlands force.

"I had a fantastic time here," says Mr Sims, who pays tribute to another former Chief Constable John Giffard for giving him a real grounding of how the organisation worked.

He has lived in the county at Brewood since 1994 and is married with three children.

Mr Sims says that he loves being a policeman and could not think of a better place to have come back to work.

"I think we have a unique set of opportunities in Staffordshire because of the high quality of the service already.

"It allows us to do things other forces are not in a position to do at the moment," he explains.

He also plans to build on the success of neighbourhood policing in the county with officers spending more time on crime prevention and working with partners to solve problems leading to crime and anti-social behaviour.

Mr Sims also hopes to see an increase in the number of officers and police community support officers in the county, but warns that over the next two to three years he expects difficulty with funding.