Casey Costello: Associate Police Minister on the Government's officer recruitment target

The Associate Police Minister remains confident the Government's 500-cop recruitment target can still be reached by November. 

Police bosses say they've been facing challenges. 

They say more trainees are failing training, and more people have been leaving the Police force. 

But Casey Costello told Mike Hosking there is still six months to go. 

She says taking a monthly snapshot doesn’t provide a full picture and isn't helpful. 

Costello says the morale of the Police is good, which is contributing to strong interest in joining.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Domestically once again. We're angsting apparently this morning about the
government's target of five hundred new cops by November. We've
got briefing papers out of February that show a lower
pass rate for trainees. We've got the physical aspect of
the test an issue. Apparently the Associate Policemanister Casey Castello
is with us on that's very good morning to you.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Good morning, Mike.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Given this was February. I just can't work out, given
the target is November and it's still only April, are
we I mean, are we panicking here? Is there a
red flag here? Or should we just wait until April
to see where we get to?

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Yeah, and I think that's the big issue here. We
have a twenty week recruitment course. The last wing that
would go in will be July, and still graduated the
twenty seventh of November, so we still have a few
months to get through. And we still have the Auckland
Training Base to open, which we hope to put an
additional wing through the air in June. So you know,

(00:52):
we have all of the forecasting is not particularly helpful
month by month analysis because things such ate and change
to call on that readiness quote that's in the article.
I think that's a bit misconstrued. What we're talking about
is because we've sped out the amount of time that
gets from a recruit applying to getting to college, that's

(01:13):
a much shorter time. So what we're talking about is
readiness to get to the college, and that's usually the
fitness standard. I know when I went down, you know,
God nearly forty years ago, you had a short space
of time to get from Oh you're going, and to
be ready to get into the college. You've got a
part pass a fitness test. And that's what we're talking about.

(01:34):
That readiness there not not the pass rate out of college.
That's still very high.

Speaker 1 (01:38):
Got chat. Last time I heard there was generally speaking
good interest in applying. Is that still applicable or not?

Speaker 2 (01:44):
Yeah, still very good interest. And the police have done
an extraordinary job in terms of the promotion, the recruitment.
The standard we're maintaining is incredible. I'm actually heading out
to the college this morning for another wing coming into college.
The standard of recruits is really impressive, and the engagement
and the process has been really good. So we're still

(02:06):
very confident. Attrition rate fluctuates up and down all the time.
And we know we've got overseas. You know, we've got
previous cops who are trying to rejoin. So there's really
good interest in the place.

Speaker 1 (02:18):
Is the media getting to I mean, I suppose it
to your fault, you did say five hundred, But is
the media getting overly fixated on this whether it's four eight, seven,
five oh five. If you've got the message out there,
people feel safe for people are getting arrested, they're being
dealt to the police forces back, does it really matter?

Speaker 2 (02:34):
Yeah, And that's the key point. A. We're getting great
interest in joining the place. There's more, you know, the
police themselves are happier with the job they're doing. They're
feeling like they're back doing what they were joined the
police to do. There's really good morales. Just up at
Kaiko Kitty Kitty last week saying there's really good stuff

(02:55):
happening on the ground and police are feeling really good
about the job they do. And that's reflective and that's
what us target is about us making sure that we
get really good interest in joining the police from really
good people because it is an amazing career, good stuff.

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Casually appreciate it. Very much, Casey Costello, Associate Police Minister.
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