Police too remote, says Mr Couch

Press, 28 October 1982, Page 2

Police too remote, says Mr Couch

Wellington reporter

Most New Zealanders are becoming increasingly disturbed that the police service is growing remote from most law-abiding people, according to the Minister of Police, Mr Couch. He told the annual conference of the Police Officers’ Guild that this trend had to be reversed, and that it had to be a priority task. The continual cry for the return of the "bobby on the beat” was not mere nostalgia. It showed the need many people felt for policemen and policewomen they could get to know well enough to feel free to talk to when they wanted help, Mr Couch said. People wanted to be able to deal with a person and not an institution. People wanted

to deal with someone they could trust, not just someone who was honest.

The increasing technology of crime had meant that the police had to match this with better technology for fighting crime, Mr Couch said. It might be, and people certainly seemed to think so, that the police had gone too far into technology at the expense of the human touch. The police had to look at better public relations, Mr Couch said. It was not uncommon for him to get letters or personal messages from people who had been upset by policemen who, in their opinion, had been rude, discourteous, or uninterested in their attitude to the public.

These people were not

troublemakers. Mr Couch said. They were not registering official complaints. They were people who respected law and order but had been snubbed. Mr Couch said he would be disturbed to see any policy which insisted that police should retire at 40. That should be an option for those who wanted or needed it, but the thought of losing so many mature, experienced, and valuable officers so young was "horrifying." It might be that a way could be found to use some of the older policemen in extending community work, including youth aid and education, in ways that would restore some of the more personal contact found so important to so many people.