EXCLUSIVE: Chief Constable outlines the pressures facing PSNI
The Chief Constable George Hamilton has laid out the pressures facing the PSNI in a wide-ranging interview with DTR/Cool FM.
Last updated 25th Jan 2018
Among those are a £20m reduction in the police service's budget for the year ahead, as well as the prospect of hundreds of officers leaving the force this year due to retirements.
Since 2010, the PSNI has been hit with a £230m cut to its financial support.
Mr Hamilton said there are other factors at play too: "The primary one being uncertainty.
"Not having an Executive, not having a firm allocated budget by February to start planning for next year is really difficult.
"We don't know what we have to spend, how many we can recruit.
"In the three and a half years since I have been Chief Constable, we have seen £144m come out of the police budget and in the past 10 years there has been a 38% reduction."
Despite these continued cutbacks though, Mr Hamilton insists the level of service provided remains the same.
He claims the way that officers deal with the likes of cyber-crime or vulnerable people or victims just is not as public as other crimes.
"We don't deal with this sort of stuff on the high street in a high-visibility coat, it tends to be dealt with in appropriate circumstances in a private place," he said.
"As our overall numbers reduce because of finance and the demand changes into more complex, less public crimes, there's the impression out there that there are less police doing less work.
"But it is pretty much the same amount of police."
The changing crime circuit in Northern Ireland has seen new problems present themselves during Mr Hamilton's tenure.
In the past three weeks, there has been seven deaths across Belfast alone, with many of those linked to prescription medication.
Mr Hamilton said the issue needed a multi-agency approach, rather than simply dumping it on the doorstep of the PSNI.
"It's of interest to police, people who have them have often obtained them illegally and we will deal with them," he said.
"There are lives being wrecked and lives being lost here, and it's primarily a public health response that we need.
"Police need to be engaged in that, supporting it, but we shouldn't think that police have the answer to dealing with drugs deaths."
The PSNI has not escaped the consequences of the collapse of Stormont, suffering alongside the other public services as a result.
Mr Hamilton said for a while before the Executive was brought crashing down, it had seemed like there could be real hope for progress.
"We came so close to having a real programme for government, that for the first time, I felt was joined up with an outcome-based approach," he said.
"People were going to be forced to work together collaboratively in a partnership.
"And then the bubble burst, and the Executive collapse and it hasn't been put back together again."
He has implored politicians to compromise with one another in order to restore devolved government to Northern Ireland, but accepts that direct rule may be a very real prospect.
"There are practical things from direct rule that would bring a short term solution," he said.
"But like most other citizena in this place, rather than the Chief Constable, I'm hoping for devolution to be restored, that would be the best possible option.
"Ministers would be more accessible and more in touch with what is happening in this jurisdiction.
"That feels like a better position to be in.
"Even though there were difficulties and bumps in the road previously with devolution, it actually worked and I hope we can get back to that place soon.