While the administrative class in India seems to be interested in roping public participation to help them (Delhi Traffic Police’s Facebook initiative; Janaagraha’s I Paid A Bribe – and my take on both), here’s an unique and innovative effort by Greater Manchester Police.
Greater Manchester Police is livetweeting, all day today (October 14, 2010) details of every incident that it deals with. The tweets are posted on 3 dedicated twitter accounts, @gmp24_1, @gmp24_2 and @gmp24_3 and are intended to show to the public what one of UK’s largest police forces do/face on a daily basis.
This effort is interesting because it is not asking for support from public, like the Indian effort – both forces face vastly similar allegations – overweight, lethargy, disinterest, frequent leave etc. (see the comments here!), but instead of asking for public support in doing what is already their job, Greater Manchester Police seems to be opening up their work to the public in a fantastic PR effort. The way GMP Chief Constable explains the purpose of this activity makes a lot of sense.
Chief Constable Peter Fahy says,
Policing is often seen in very simple terms, with cops chasing robbers and locking them up. However the reality is that this accounts for only part of the work they have to deal with. A lot of what we do is dealing with social problems such as missing children, people with mental health problems and domestic abuse. Often these incidents can be incredibly complex and need a lot of time, resource and expertise.
I am not saying that we shouldnâ??t deal with these types of incidents, far from it, but what I am saying is that this work is not recognised in league tables and measurements â?? yet is a huge part of what we do.
I think that itâ??s time to start measuring performance in a different way. There needs to be more focus on how the public sector as a whole is working together to tackle societyâ??s issues and problems.
We see time and again the same families, the same areas and the same individuals causing the same problems and these people are causing a considerable drain to the public purse.
Instead of the public sector organisations having separate pots of money we could spend it more efficiently it were one big pot. This could be achieved by working together more effectively, by joining up and sharing the responsibility of the issues that we are all dealing with.
In a way, giving the public a window into their work is a great starting point before asking for support or help from them – it perhaps works better that they gain empathy and the public may feel naturally inclined not just to help, but also to appreciate their efforts.