Police Scotland co-hosts transatlantic webinar on global policing challenges
Senior police officers from across Scotland, England, Northern Ireland and America have come together in a unique online discussion to share opinions and experiences on some of the major issues facing police services around the world.
This focused on key global challenges – COVID-19, Black Lives Matter, and environmentalism - all of which are underpinned by the principle of policing by consent, from which we draw our legitimacy.
The Alternative Approaches to Global Policing Challenges webinar was co-hosted by our Chief Constable, Iain Livingstone QPM, and Chuck Wexler, Executive Director of the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF), and took place on Wednesday, 9 December, 2020.
ACC Bernard Higgins briefed attendees on planning for policing COP26 in Glasgow in 2021, followed by a review on major events, from a US perspective, by Peter Newsham, Chief of Washington’s Metropolitan Police Department, whose organisation recently policed the US Presidential elections.
A panel discussion on public trust and confidence in policing featured inputs from the hosts, as well as Sir Stephen House (Deputy Commissioner, Metropolitan Police), Simon Byrne QPM (PSNI Chief Constable), Baltimore Police Department Chief Michael S. Harrison, and Neil Basu QPM (Assistant Commissioner, Metropolitan Police).
ACC Gary Ritchie discussed policing in the context of a public health emergency, with input from Aberdeen City Council Chief Executive Angela Scott, who described the collaborative approach and collective leadership shown locally to address shared problems throughout the coronavirus outbreak.
Finally, New York City Police Department Commissioner Dermot Shea provided a reflection of his service’s handling of the COVID-19 crisis, and the lessons learned from both local and national experiences.
The webinar is set to be the first in a series of online learning events facilitated by Police Scotland’s International Development and Innovation Unit, building existing and new relationships with police organisations to enable shared learning through this collaborative approach between Police Scotland and PERF.
