KEY POINTS:
Many will hope that the long-awaited report of the commission of inquiry into police conduct will stop any recurrence of the gross sexual behaviour that has come to light in recent years. The recommendations of the commissioner, Dame Margaret Bazley, give reason to hope. She wants the code of conduct issued to sworn police officers to include clear guidelines on appropriate sexual behaviour and relationships.
These, she says, should specify actions that are inappropriate or unprofessional. They should prohibit police entering a sexual relationship with a person under their authority or where there is "a power differential", help supervisors act when a developing relationship may be inappropriate and generally emphasise the risk of bringing the police into disrepute through activities off-duty.
It will surprise most readers that some such code was not in force long ago. One of the reasons for surprise is that the New Zealand Police has long been a corp of men and women of conspicuously high calibre. Despite the damage that more than a few have done to their reputation lately, the quality of the majority should not be forgotten.
But sadly, the bad apples in the box have numbered more than a few. The Bazley inquiry was commissioned after the publication of two allegations of sexual assault against serving officers and the suspiciously mishandled investigations of the complaints. But the inquiry, which delved back to 1979, has examined 313 complaints of actual or threatened sexual assault by 222 police officers up to 2005.
Criminal charges were brought against only 32 of them. Ten were convicted, 20 were acquitted and two committed suicide before their cases could be heard. Internal disciplinary procedures were taken against another 48, but only 10 had complaints proven against them and nine resigned or disengaged before their cases were heard.
Of the 222 accused of sexual assaults during those 26 years, only 12 were found to be the victims of false complaints. Others were counselled or reprimanded, and complaints against 129 were not upheld.
Dame Margaret accepts that the nature of police work attracts unjustified, antagonistic complaints. Even so, she concludes, the tally is significant enough to present a risk to the reputation of the New Zealand Police and to require clear guidance to staff about the high standards of ethics, integrity and conduct expected of them.
Surprisingly, too, she has found that staff training is arranged within police districts and lacks national consistency. There was no single document telling staff how to go about investigating sexual complaints against a fellow officer and how to deal with conflicts of interest. Nor was there readily accessible advice to the public on how to make a complaint.
The report urges more government funding for victim support groups and better communication with complainants about the progress of an investigation and the reasons for decisions not to lay charges.
The inquiry has steered clear of any comment on cases recently heard in the criminal courts but the concerns raised by those cases go far beyond questions of law. The gross indecencies described, indeed the notion of "group sex", however consensual, is not becoming of a person having the power and public trust we put in our police. The vast majority do not need a code of conduct to tell them so, but they should not mind receiving one. They have been embarrassed by too many of their peers. It is up to them now to blow the whistle when they see their uniform let down.
