Quarterly Summary - June 2012

Key achievements this period

Commitment to improve the services provided to the public

The Institute of Public Administration New Zealand (IPANZ) Public Sector Excellence Awards

In June 2012 New Zealand Police won two IPANZ category awards. Our Mäori, Pacific and Ethnic Wardens programme was a joint winner of the Te Puni Kökiri Award for Crown-Mäori Relationships. Our Cultural Response Team, which worked with victims' families from 20 nationalities in the aftermath of the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, won the Office of Ethnic Affairs Award for Excellence in Diversity.

The Cultural Response Team was also awarded the State Services Commissioner Award for Excellence in Responding to the Canterbury Earthquake.

New Zealand Police were also finalists in two other IPANZ categories:

• Improving Public Value through Business Transformation
  Pre-charge warnings: Alternative Resolutions, Policing Excellence.
• Public Sector Communications
  Police Recruitment Use of Social Media.

State Services Commission - Review of Police Progress: Commission of Inquiry

In April 2012, the State Services Commission (SSC) in conjunction with PricewaterhouseCoopers released the fourth review of police progress in implementing recommendations 37 and 59 from the Commission of Inquiry into Police conduct.

The report adopts a different approach to previous years. It focuses on the current performance of Police in several key areas where a need for improvement was previously identified by SSC and identifies key priority areas to drive future change.

The information provided from the key priority areas of Leadership and change, HR strategy and capability to support integrated change, Performance management, and Lifting trust and confidence in complaint investigations also established baseline measures against which future reviews can be assessed.

In the review report SSC states:

• "Police has earned a solid reputation internationally and domestically for the community-oriented style of its policing. The basis of this reputation is the willingness of Police to understand and be informed by community interests ... .";
• "The respect of Police for human rights and diversity is also well-established in comparison to other jurisdictions";
• "... the solid achievements by Police inclusive of the public trust and confidence in Police .... paint[ed] a picture of an impartial, corruption free, independent and high performing police service"; and
• "... the record of performance and the culture of Police are something of which New Zealanders can be proud."1

Trans Tasman - Political Newsletter

The third annual review of government department performance, coordinated by political newsletter Trans Tasman, named the Police Commissioner as the 2nd highest performing Chief Executive in the country. New Zealand Police, as an organisation, were also ranked 7th out of the 38 public sector agencies assessed by a panel of 19 high profile businesspeople, lobbyists and trade unions.2

Organisational Health Audit - Recommendation 51

NZ Police 2012 Workplace Survey - Final Results

NZ Police in conjunction with Kenexa/JRA3, use annual workplace surveys to provide an insight into the health of the organisation via the perceptions of its employees.

The 2012 Workplace Survey was conducted between 27 February and 16 March 2012. The final results show significant improvement over the 2011 results. In particular:

• The Performance Index, (the average score across all questions in the survey) increased by 3.5 percent. The scores for every question improved - many significantly. The Police Performance Index is now on par with the State Sector benchmark4 and is significantly higher than the Justice Sector benchmark 5, and
• The Engagement Index (the proportion of staff who, amongst other things, can be classified as 'engaged' in their work environment) increased by 2.8 percent. This is well above the State Sector benchmark.

Evaluation of recommendations

The Office of the Auditor General's evaluation of Police progress

In June 2010, the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) released its Second Monitoring Report about how well Police were responding to the COI recommendations.6 The OAG found that Police had fully implemented seven of the 47 recommendations and had made some progress in implementing all of the remaining recommendations.

In response to this, the Police established a transition team to co-ordinate all projects and initiatives relating to the Commission of Inquiry and specifically, to assess the status of the solutions developed to address the Commission's recommendations. This assessment, measured against the OAG's evaluation model, (set out in the diagram below), serves to monitor the progress of the solutions and provide support to the business to fully implement and, where appropriate, embed each solution.

The current implementation and embedded state of each solution developed to address the Commission's recommendations is set out in the table attached to this report. The table also summarises the progress of the recommendations for the Ministry of Justice.

It should be noted that the Office of the Auditor-General, in applying its evaluation model, acknowledged that the full effect of the change improvements may not be immediately apparent in some instances.

Footnotes

1. See State Services Commission, Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct: Change management programme progress report: Fourth phase of review, 2011/12, pages 17 and 18.
2. Source: www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/christchurch-earthquake-2011/7056041/Quake-recovery-boss-recognised-for-efforts
3. Kenexa/JRA (formally JRA) is contracted by Police to undertake annual organisational surveys.
4. The State Sector benchmark group, selected for comparison purposes, consists of 18 New Zealand State Sector organisations who have conducted a workplace survey with JRA (NZ) Ltd within the last 12 months.
5. The Justice sector consists of the New Zealand Police, Ministry of Justice and the Department of Corrections.
6. See: Response of the New Zealand Police to the Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct: Second monitoring report