Police facing shortage of highly-trained officers

There is a shortage of highly trained officers in the Dutch police force, with only an average of 15 percent of officers being trained on university level. For the past 10 years, the police leadership has been trying to boost the education level in the corps, but so far without much success. This is according to figures the AD got from the National Police. There has been an increase of highly trained officers in the last two years, but not enough to meet the target of 20 percent highly trained officers in the corps. The figures show that only 15 percent of all police officers, excluding the managers, work in a university level function. The actual number of officers with a college degree or higher may be even lower as the figures are only on the function, not the level of education. In the Central Netherlands, only 10 percent of officers are highly trained. In Amsterdam, 19 percent of officers are highly trained. Minister Ard van der Steur of Security and Justice is dissatisfied with these figures. "The number of highly educated officers must be brought up to standard as quickly as possible", the Minister said according to AD. "We expect an increase in cybercrime and financial and economic crimes in the next few years. In order to address that, you need a higher education."