Region beats national trend for recruiting female police officers

Home Office data showed female recruits made up 48 per cent of the 343 police officers hired by Staffordshire Police between April last year and this March.

And, in the West Midlands, the figure was 43 per cent of the 2,514 officers hired over the period. Both numbers are higher than the 42 per cent in England and Wales.

It comes after the Government promised an uplift of 20,000 new officers by March 2023 alongside a campaign to improve gender and ethnic diversity in the forces.

The ratio of female to male police officers at West Midlands Police has risen from 32 per cent in March 2019 to 35 per cent this year – and at Staffordshire Police from 29 per cent to 34 per cent.

But critics have argued the uplift has not gone far enough to make police forces representative of their communities, with a charity campaigning for gender equality saying trust in the police had been "shaken" by a "culture of misogyny".

Jemima Olchawski, chief executive of the Fawcett Society, said: "These stats represent some welcome progress but to get to equality we need more women entering the force – and that means recognising there is a real problem with sexism and taking meaningful action to stamp it out."

Women made up at least half of new recruits in just three forces – Lancashire, Great Manchester, and Derbyshire. By contrast, Wiltshire Police recruited the fewest female officers, at just 33 per cent.

Rick Muir, director of the Police Foundation, a policing think tank, said: "The number of female police officers has gradually been increasing over the past two decades, but there's still a long way to go."

Speaking about the uplift, he said the Government has focused on "quantity over composition" in order to hit its manifesto target – not giving enough focus on the diversity of new recruits to the police force.

Mr Muir added that it is too early to tell whether recent policing scandals, and declining trust in police forces, will put a dent in the number of women signing up.

A total of 13,576 extra officers have joined police ranks across England and Wales since November 2019, including 1,017 in West Midlands and 201 in Staffordshire.

A spokesperson for the Home Office called it a "once in a generation opportunity to make the police more representative of the community they serve".

They continued: “The police officer workforce is more diverse than it has ever been. However, we are aware that there is more work to be done, which is why the Government continues to work closely with police forces to ensure their workforces are representative.”