Senior Political Reporter
The T&T Police Service’s numbers will be increased from 7,884 officers to 10,200 officers during a five-year phased recruitment programme, and this will significantly improve its operational effectiveness, Homeland Security Minister Roger Alexander has promised.
Alexander made the revelation during a statement to the House of Representatives yesterday.
Among its expected benefits, Alexander said the TTPS will be better equipped to respond to major national events, spike in criminal activities, national disasters, state of emergencies and other national crises.
Saying people’s safety and security remains Government’s foremost priority, Alexander said the strengthening of the TTPS was a “national security intervention” to ensure the TTPS “possesses the manpower, operational flexibility and institutional capacity required to confront evolving criminal threats facing T&T.”
Alexander acknowledged criminals had modernised, organised and expanded their operations.
“The State must therefore ensure that law enforcement is equally equipped, equally organised and sufficiently resourced to respond to these deficiencies,” he said.
He said the TTPS currently stands at 7,884 officers - but operational analysis has confirmed the service maintains an effective deployment strength of approximately 5,500 officers on any given day. He said the gap exists because officers are necessarily engaged in vacation leave, sick leave, training, administrative assignments, court attendance and specialist operational duties.
Alexander added, “The reality, therefore, is that the TTPS has been required to police a modern and increasingly complex criminal environment with a frontline operational strength sufficiently below its sanction establishment.”
Citing the upcoming increase from 7, 884 officers to 10,200 officers, Alexander said citizens deserve faster police response time, greater police visibility, stronger investigative capacity, safer communities and enhanced border security.
Recognising that the national security strength requires “responsible financial planning,” he said the expansion will occur over a five-year phased recruitment programme as follows: 600 officers in the first year, 600 officers in the second year and 372 officers annually in years three, four and five.
He said the increase is designed to ensure the TTPS can sustainably maintain an operational presence of approximately 7,800 officers nationwide, geared towards restoring operational balance.
Alexander said over 40 years, the TTPS had expanded its specialist capacity to address emerging threats (from cybercrime, to transnational organised crime), but the specialised units were created without any corresponding increase in the overall establishment. Consequently, he said officers are currently assigned from visible policing and frontline patrol functions into tactical, technical and specialist divisions, resulting in fewer officers being visible and available within communities, increasing operational strain and overtime dependencies.
He said the increase will allow the TTPS to properly staff specialised investigative/investigations units while sustainably strengthening visible policing across communities and will support greater police visibility, acting as a deterrent to criminal activity.
“Officers will improve engagement with schools, businesses, community groups and vulnerable communities ... the increase will enhance border and national security operations supporting operations at ports, airports and other strategic national security locations,” Alexander promised.
