Police response to 111 calls falling well below target

Police Commissioner Mike Bush says police are pouring resources into its 111 service to meet its target of answering calls 90 per cent of calls within 10 seconds. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Police are going backwards in efforts to answer emergency 111 calls within 10 seconds.

In its annual report for the year 2017/18, police managed to answer 111 calls within 10 seconds 79 per cent of the time, down from 84 per cent the year before.

The police target is greater than 90 per cent, and the National Party is urging police to address the slide in performance.

"It's a vital service and it's really important that the response times are tracking up, not down," National Party police spokesman Chris Bishop said.

"I'm concerned as it's quite a sizeable decrease."

He said it would be more understandable if there had been a large increase in the volume of calls, but that had not happened.

A total of 888,959 111 calls were answered in 2017/18, up from 869,170 the previous year - about a 2 per cent increase.

At select committee earlier this month, Police Commissioner Mike Bush said police were taking the issue seriously.

"We are pouring more resource into that area to ensure those emergency calls are taken," Bush told the committee.

He said about half of the calls that come through the 111 service were not emergencies, and police were working on other communication avenues, including a non-emergency call centre and online reporting.

"It's about providing a really contemporary police service. While we're resourcing the increased demand in 111 numbers, we're also creating other avenues."

Bush said there would be an announcement in the new year about the police call centre for non-emergencies, which is planned for the Kapiti Coast.

The centre was announced by the then National-led government in February last year, which intended the non emergency call service to be in place this year. Police said yesterday it would be up and running in the first quarter of next year, and there was no delay.

Budget 2018 saw a $300 million increase for police, and Bishop hoped that the extra money would see more resources for 111 calls.

"I certainly hope they're putting more resources into it, because there are plenty of resources going into the police," he said.

"The 111 service is the bulk of contact that people have with police. They need to be hitting that target."

Police achieved its 70 per cent target for answering non-emergency calls within 30 seconds; almost 1.2 million non-emergency calls were answered, 71 per cent of them within 30 seconds.

But they are lagging in customer satisfaction in response times for incidents and emergencies, including where there is a real threat to life or property.

Only 69 per cent of people were satisfied with the speed of police response - far below the goal of 83 per cent.

This is despite police achieving its goals of responding to an urban incident within seven or eight minutes (the median response time was 7 minutes and 42 seconds), or a rural incident within 11 or 13 minutes (the median response time was 12 minutes and 37 seconds).

Meanwhile police and the Government appear to be taking a different starting point to counting the extra 1800 police - part of the coalition agreement between Labour and NZ First.

In May this year during Question Time, Police Minister Stuart Nash said the start date was the day the Government took office, October 26, 2017.

But a spokesperson for police, when asked about progress on the numbers, said that the "1800 growth is from 30 June 2017".

Bush conceded at select committee that the current funding model for the 1800 extra police was over five years, even though the goal was three years.

Asked about the funding model, Nash said earlier this month that he hoped to get more funding so the extra 1800 could happen over three years.