Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many police officers there (a) were in Norfolk in each year since 2018 and (b) are projected to be in (i) 2022, (ii) 2023, (iii) 2024 and (i) 2025.

The Home Office collects and publishes data on the size of the police workforce in England and Wales, broken down by Police Force Area (PFA), on a biannual basis in the ‘Police workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin.

Information on the number of police officers broken down by PFA, back to 2007, can be found in the accompanying Open Data Tables here:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1005761/open-data-table-police-workforce-280721.ods

While the ‘Police workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin remains the key measure of the size of the police workforce, as part of the Police Officer Uplift Programme, the Home Office also publishes a quarterly update on the number of officers (headcount terms only) in England and Wales, also broken down by PFA. Data are available here: Police Officer uplift statistics - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

The latest data from the ‘Police officer uplift’ statistics show that as at 31 December 2021 there were 1,857 officers in Norfolk Police (Table U1). Norfolk Police has recruited 180 additional officers out of an allocated total of 134 additional officers for years one and two of the uplift combined (Table U2). Norfolk Police has been allocated 90 additional officers for year 3 (Table B1).

On 2 February 2022, the Government published a total police funding settlement of up to £16.9 billion in 2022/23, an increase of up to £1.1 billion when compared to 2021/22. Of this, forces will receive an extra £550 million in government grants, which includes funding to deliver the final 8,000 additional officers as part of the Police Uplift Programme, enabling forces to recruit and maintain the full 20,000 officer uplift.

We are committed not only to recruiting 20,000 additional officers by March 2023, but also to retaining these officers and ensuring it is a career where all recruits can thrive.