Abstract
In recent years, scholars have linked the (in)effectiveness of police response to hate crime to the quality of training received by officers. While some have critiqued police training for being insufficient, inadequate and thus ineffective, making suggestions for improvements, few studies have examined the effect of changes to training on the experiences of officers. In this article, we examine the evolution of hate crime training in Nottinghamshire, a mid-sized city in England, and two successive hate crime training modules that sought to address criticisms of in-service training. First, this article argues that to improve in-service hate crime training, a multisectoral approach to training design and delivery, which includes victim and community perspectives, is crucial. Second, we argue that training development must prioritise the feedback of police officers through continual evaluation and revision. Third, while training must incorporate both the perspectives of victims and communities for it to be effective, a police-centric framework is needed to engage with officers, learning styles and policing roles, improving officers’ understanding, retention and application.
As gatekeepers to the criminal justice system, police play a pivotal role in responding to hate crimes and supporting victims. Critical to police response is hate crime training, the quality of which, for some time, has been critiqued for being ineffective and poorly delivered (Bryan and Trickett, 2021; Hardy et al., 2020; Trickett and Hamilton, 2016). Improvement is critical, given research has consistently shown that trust in police among minority groups, most affected by hate crime, is low (Paterson et. al., 2018; Hardy et al., 2014; Iganski, 2001; Walters and Brown, 2016). In England and Wales, in-service police hate crime training has overwhelmingly focused on legal and policy frameworks, with pockets of ‘good practice’ involving input from hate crime victims (Hardy et al., 2020; HMICFRS, 2018). At a national level, however, police training has often failed to either address the complex and challenging nature of hate crime or, most importantly, meaningfully connect with its policing audience. In contrast, we show how police officer criticism was used to develop more meaningful training, reflecting the importance of taking officer feedback seriously, including through the continual evaluation of training modules. Based on three research studies on police officer experiences of hate crime and training, we show the importance of taking a multisectoral approach to hate crime training that brings together police, civil society and academics, to best meet the learning needs of officers.
In the ‘Background and literature review’ section, we provide a literature review of hate crime and police training. In ‘Methodology’ and ‘Nottinghamshire police’s existing in-service hate crime training 2016’ sections, we discuss Nottinghamshire’s in-service police hate crime training and detail the experiences of officers, highlighting two key design deficiencies around the format and the content of training in 2016. In the ‘Citizens at the Heart Shift Champion training’ section, we examine feedback on two hate crime training programmes (namely, Citizens at the Heart in 2021 and Dimensions disability hate crime (DHC) training in 2024), informed by the earlier 2016 study. Reflecting on findings from all three studies, we argue that police perspectives are essential to improving training, concluding that both probationary and in-service hate crime training must be police-centric, that is, specifically devised to meet the unique learning needs of officers.
Background and literature review
In England and Wales, as in many other countries, a hate crime is an aggravated form of offending. Any crime can be prosecuted as a hate crime if the offender has ‘demonstrated hostility based on race, religion, disability, sexual orientation or transgender identity or been motivated by hostility based on race, religion, disability, sexual orientation or transgender identity’ (Crime and Disorder Act 1998 and section 66 of the Sentencing Act 2020).
Recently, the College of Policing has introduced changes to the recording of hate crime incidents, where the incident is no longer only based on victim perception, but must ‘present a real risk of significant harm to individuals or groups with a particular characteristic, and/or a real risk that a future criminal offence may be committed against individuals or groups with a particular characteristic’ (College of Policing, 2023b).
The new threshold is firmly focused on police discretion making and objective criteria. No intelligence or risk assessment will be available where decisions are made not to record. The decision-making of officers around the recording of hate incidents, hate crimes and subsequent actions is, therefore, of critical importance. In 2021, the College of Policing updated the Authorised Professional Practice (APP) for providing guidelines on recognising, responding to and managing risk in hate incidents that is originally piublished in 2020 (College of Policing 2020). While this provides standards and curriculum for training content, it does not specify the delivery method. There is no publicly available national statement on the specific formats of hate crime training delivery, meaning that in practice, individual forces continue to choose their own methods of delivery.
High-quality training is imperative, given the changes to Non-Crime Hate Incident (NCHI) recording, in addition to previous evidence on low confidence in police, despite the existence of awareness raising, and enhancements to legislation (Home Office, 2015). Low confidence results in underreporting, but also deters reporting victims from choosing to report future occurrences. Hate crime victims are notably less satisfied with police responses than nonhate crime victims, which can affect future willingness to report (Home Office, 2020). Recurrent criticisms of police include hate crimes not being taken seriously, lack of empathy, failure to consider the impact of hate crime and/or to take effective action, or to keep victims informed (Allen and Zayed, 2022; Corcoran et al., 2016; Hardy et al., 2014; Paterson et al., 2018).
Yet, despite the crucial role played by police, the quality of police hate crime training has received surprisingly little scrutiny either by government or by social science researchers. The government’s 2012 hate crime action plan, ‘Challenge it, Report it, Stop it,’ highlighted the need to improve hate crime training for police (Home Office, 2012). The 2018 HMICFRS hate crime inspection noted a variable police service to victims in terms of identifying, recording and prosecuting hate crimes and keeping victims safe. The inspectorate made recommendations for improvement and highlighted that police officers often have ‘one chance to get it right’ (HMICFRS, 2018). While hate crime training is clearly key to ‘getting it right’, both the availability and quality of hate crime training continue to be something of a lottery (Hardy et al., 2020).
In 2016, in-service hate crime training in Nottinghamshire was primarily delivered through National Centre for Applied Learning Technologies (NCALT) online training programmes that required officers to complete training independently, with occasional trainer-led PowerPoint presentations. Training content primarily consisted of information on the legal framework governing hate crime in England and Wales, the service-specific recording process and examples of hate crimes. NCALT training packages are generic in nature and have been used across police forces in England and Wales. 1 That is not to say that there were no examples of good practice in relation to hate crime training. Indeed, in some parts of Nottinghamshire, specialist agencies such as Mencap were occasionally invited in to provide training and speak with police on DHC, for example. A further example of DHC training is that provided by Dimensions, another disability charity, implemented in Surrey, through the ‘I’m with Sam’ campaign (Dimensions, n.d.), discussed at a later point.
A key argument in this article is the need for police-informed hate crime training design and evaluation. Indeed, Hardy et al. (2020) state that Trickett and Hamilton’s (2016) review of hate crime training was the only such study to consider officers’ perceptions of hate crime training, noting a key finding (2016: 2), namely, that ‘the training officers had received on hate crime was piecemeal, overwhelmingly on-line and did not engender confidence in dealing with hate crime’.
Indeed, this proved to be the case in Hardy et al.’s (2020) subsequent research. For this study, FOI requests were sent to the 43 police forces in England and Wales, inquiring whether forces had hate crime training and what form it took. Thirty-eight responses were received overall (none from Wales), revealing the continued lottery of hate crime training, often informed by generic Equality and Diversity training models, rather than being hate crime-specific (see also Trickett and Hamilton, 2016). In addition to the Freedom of Information(FOI) requests, Hardy et al. (2020) also used semistructured telephone interviews and observations with 43 police respondents in a range of policing roles, across England and Wales. The authors highlight deficiencies with the delivery of training reported on and the lack of a standardised model across the 43 forces, but their other findings, largely replicate those of Trickett and Hamilton (2016), at a national level, namely, that much police hate crime training in England and Wales remained similar, being austerity-driven, with overreliance on e-learning through NCALT and use of instructor dominated classroom training, largely through PowerPoint presentations.
So, while a limited number of studies have examined the content and delivery of hate crime training, what none of these studies has done is examine how officer feedback on in-service training has been used to improve, develop and address deficiencies in that training. Building on this previous work, this article examines the evolution of hate crime training to identify what can be learned about training redesign and officer experience.
Methodology
This article is informed by three empirical studies: the first conducted in 2016 on Nottinghamshire police’s in-service hate crime training, which revealed gaps in training, officer dissatisfaction with training content and delivery and officer suggestions for reform. The second study was concluded in 2021 through a research evaluation of the Citizens at the Heart training, and the third involved a research evaluation of the Dimensions coproduced hate crime training on Disability Hate Crime concluded in 2024.
The 2016 research was funded by the Nottinghamshire Hate Crime Steering group and was designed to identify and address significant gaps in the hate crime literature, providing a police-informed account of responding to hate crime. The research explored police experiences and knowledge on hate crime, evaluating training and hate crime risk assessment tools through police perspectives. The qualitative study involved in-depth interviews with 34 police officers of different ranks, including response officers, beat managers and police community support officers (PCSOs). Interviews were semistructured in design, to enable officers the freedom to talk at length and in their own words on the research issues, while providing flexibility to capture emerging themes and issues. Recruitment of officers was achieved through ‘quota-sampling’, conducted in partnership with the participating police force, where officers were put forward as potential respondents for interview by a Detective Chief Inspector, based on their experience of dealing with hate crime, with the reassurance that Police Constable numbers and any refusals to take part would remain confidential. 2
The evaluation of the project ‘Citizens at the Heart: A Citizen Centred Approach to Tackling Hate Crime’ was commissioned by Nottinghamshire City Council and the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner. ‘Citizens at the Heart’ was an initiative designed to create a citizen-centred approach to developing solutions to hate by bringing together police, criminal justice and civil society organisations together with citizens in this effort. 3 This initiative included community dialogue to ensure that crime prevention and public sector approaches were community-led and informed. While the Citizens at the Heart training was not designed solely for police but for a range of practitioners and community members around hate crime, it did address numerous issues that the police needed to consider, to fulfil their policing hate crime roles, while encouraging reflective practice, to improve service. Participants were trained as Shift Champions (members who take a leading role in hate crime within their respective forces), to cascade knowledge within their organisation. For all trainees, the first part of the training was aimed at a range of organisations, including the police, whereas the second component was focused on policing hate crime.
Evaluation of the training involved data collection using surveys, including closed and open-ended questions to capture longer comments and a small number of focus groups with participants (Zempi et al., 2021). The Citizens at the Heart Project ran for 2 years; in total, 238 individuals were trained as Shift Champions, including 117 police officers, and 159 individuals completed online surveys with closed and open-ended questions. While it was not always possible to separate out police responses in some of the more generic quantitative components, police answers to open questions, and the qualitative component are included below. From Likert-type scales used in the Shift Champions survey, it was revealed that 92% of trainees could confidently assert they knew which agencies they could signpost victims of hate crime to, increasing from 32% before the training. Ninety-two percent of respondents stated that they knew the consequences of not dealing with hate crimes properly, compared to 82% before the training.
The evaluation of these training projects adopted a ‘critical relativist’ approach, which views knowledge as constructed and thus is open to the potential of multiple ‘realities’ interpreted by participants. The projects placed particular emphasis on respondents’ ‘reality’ being based on their own knowledge and experiences and how they interpret the world. Epistemologically, the data analysis of training evaluation was conducted using a ‘contextualist’ method, which recognises the way in which participants’ perceptions of hate crime and prejudice are influenced by their personal and/or occupational experiences of hate crime. These ontological and epistemological positions tie in with the aim of staying close to the participants’ worldview and, to this end, view the world through their eyes (Braun and Clarke 2014; Charmaz and Bryant 2011). The research instruments were designed to capture this theoretical orientation by using the qualitative methodology in the 2016 police study and, where surveys were used in the Citizens at the Heart 2021 and Dimensions 2024 studies, the inclusion of qualitative components with open questions.
Developed in response to the policing recommendations from the 2016 research and informed by the lived experience of disabled people themselves, training for police officers and police trainees was developed through a collaboration between Nottinghamshire Trent University and Dimensions, a nonprofit organisation supporting individuals with learning disabilities and autism. The specialised DHC training session forms part of their ‘I’mwithSam’ campaign. A key positive of the training was that it was developed and delivered by disabled people and incorporates real-life anecdotes from hate crime victims to engage attendees and enhance learning outcomes. Previously run in Surrey police – the training was then adapted in a unique collaboration between university academics (hate crime scholars), Dimensions and a former police officer and police trainer with extensive policing experience, who was himself neurodiverse. Workshop training was delivered to 44 police trainees on policing programmes at Nottinghamshire Trent University, Plymouth University, Eastern College (Norwich), Liverpool Hope University and police employees at Nottinghamshire police. Forty-four workshop trainees and two online trainees completed surveys, using closed and open-ended questions. 4
Nottinghamshire police’s existing in-service hate crime training 2016
The article will first provide an overview of the original review of police hate crime training and the areas for development that were outlined by officers.
Concerns with the format of in-service hate crime training
Officers’ two major concerns with the existing in-service hate crime training in Nottinghamshire pertained to both format and content. In terms of format, many officers felt disengaged from the training around hate crime, due, in large part, to the use of e-learning modules but also in-house trainer-led delivery methods, which were unpopular because they provided a passive learning experience, where officers’ own experiences remained unutilised.
Numerous officers claimed that, in addition to the passive nature of NCALT packages, police trainers and sometimes external trainers also relied very heavily on other passive models of training delivery, such as PowerPoint presentations, which they found unengaging: . . . it tends to be trainers as well . . . the chap that did the vulnerability training, we had him for the Anti-Social Behaviour thing . . . and they were a little bit mind numbing, because it was like PowerPoint slides . . . especially if they’re just reading the slides . . . and your mind switches off, even if it’s on an interesting subjects . . . and they’re like, ‘Oh, we’ll send you the PowerPoint out’. And I’m thinking, it’s not really that helpful, it’s just like a little crib sheet with this is the new legislation and flowcharts.
For these reasons, officers felt that hate crime training was largely functional and ‘abstracted’ from their everyday working lives, which involved problem-solving and interactions with other officers and victims. Overall, officers felt that there was a strong need to ‘humanise’ hate crime training: . . . in NCALT you can have the audio on and even the voice sounds disconnected. It is a bit, you know; please pay the parking fee, that kind of voice. And it’s the human factor that’s missing, I think.
However, including input from victims needed to be within a police-centred context, by providing hate crime workshops with opportunities for officers to actively engage in problem-solving, drawing on their own policing experiences and those of other officers, both good and bad, while providing space to discuss and reflect. There were considerable advantages to this format as it mirrored many aspects of police work, while also aligning with policing pedagogy, on how officers learn (Birzer, 2003; Heslop, 2011).
In practice, officers sometimes sought to seek out discussions with other officers, where their own experience and/or knowledge was lacking because they either had no experience of a certain incident or had not experienced it for a long time: I think a lot of our learning is cascade. You look at the last person to have done something on your shift as an expert, that’s the way it’s looked at. ‘Oh, I know someone who’s done that’, you contact them, ‘What did you do for it?’ A lot of learning is done that way.
‘A further benefit of using a ‘police-centred’ approach to training is that it would make officers feel ‘valued’ as front-line service professionals, improving their engagement and retention. In contrast, officers discussed feeling ‘negatively judged’ and ‘patronised’ within received hate crime training, causing them to become ‘switched off’: . . . it’s sometimes seen as people giving us delivery on a subject we probably know more about and it’s difficult because as much as you want to listen and engage, you can’t. I don’t think officers are always receptive to outside trainers because they’ll say, ‘Oh you’ve never been a cop, you don’t know what it’s like’.
Perceptions of being undervalued and patronised were also linked to the assumption that much training for the police was based on the premise of police ‘incompetence’: I think sometimes when you get the experts to come in, it can also be a bit of a lecture, more this is what you’re doing wrong . . . and you’re there thinking, well hang on a second, we’re the people who actually go out, to speak to the victims. A lot of the learning seems to be a reaction or a change of law because of something that has gone wrong . . . it always feels like its learning because what you’ve been doing before is wrong, you always feel like you’re getting knocked at training . . . It’s like, ‘Oh we’re doing this now because you’ve been doing stop and searches wrong the last 15 years and you’re all going to get the sack’.
More engaging format of training delivery might also mean that officers feel that the force is invested through a police-centred design, ‘helping’ the officers to overcome challenges in their policing practice. This would imply a ‘proactive’, well-thought-out training design. Instead, officers perceived that passive training models were often ‘reactive’ and improperly ‘thought out’ in terms of how training was developed and delivered: Our training schedule, dare I say, it’s a bit hit and miss. It’s almost the fact that whatever is highlighted right now, stop and search got highlighted, the Stephen Lawrence enquiry, that was at the forefront of what the police needed to look at. . . . in the last few years, we have had the Windsor report…. Again, it highlighted issues, that’s where our training goes. So, although we have intensive training to begin with, on race hate diversity equality and all of that, after that, it is driven by whatever is highlighted and the force itself tends to rely a lot on on-line learning.
Based on officer feedback, a switch to a workshop-based problem-solving policing practice training format could help officers deal with the nuances in hate crimes and incidents and the practicalities of victim responses, which existing in-service training models had failed to do. Indeed, officers stated that most hate incidents that the police responded to were ‘messy and complicated’ rather than straightforward and routine. Referred to by officers as the ‘grey’, less obvious examples, training which drew on officers’ own experiences and discussions with other officers, through sharing policing examples, was suggested as being potentially more helpful to them than the hypothetical examples, through NCALT and PowerPoint. 5
Changing the format to better reflect police practice, such a focus could also offer opportunities to problem-solve around barriers to better service provision while providing space for officer reflection to consider aspects of police culture and practice (both individually and at a force level) and providing checks and balances on misinformation and interpretation in a way that informal learning does not. Consequently, a focus on training that meets police learning styles can also help officers to consider how unconscious bias, police culture and institutional discrimination within their policing organisation may affect their own responses to hate crime victims, and those of colleagues. Thus, a police-centred training design can ultimately help individual officers to improve their own service, while ultimately enhancing public trust and institutional reputation.
Concerns with in-service hate crime training content
In addition to criticisms over the format of hate crime training, there was also negative feedback on the content. A major issue here was that the content was too heavily focused on hate crime legislation and procedure, but insufficiently prepared officers for complexities in on-the-ground responses: Like I say, I’ve retained the practical application of it, so I know if I go to someone that’s reported a hate crime why it’s classified or is it classified, what I need to do extra, to let’s say a normal criminal damage than one that’s classified as a hate crime let’s say. So, I know the differences and the extra stuff, so I suppose from that side it is, but that’s about it really.
Instead, officers felt that a more detailed police-centred approach was needed to deal with different aspects of the police hate crime role and different stages of the hate crime process. For example, more content on how to identify a hate crime in practice and on how to support a victim: There is only so many times we can keep going over the procedure and sometimes forgetting it, I think it’s a case of getting the support when we come across hate crime. Basically, it helps you by identifying the procedures to be followed and the characteristics, the definition, but it would be helpful to have more training about the details, the distinctions between crimes and incidents and different ways of approaching victims.
Importantly, as noted earlier, officers were often unclear about the distinction between a hate crime and a hate incident, referred to as the ‘grey’ area, wanting further clarification, given the recent changes to the recording of NHCI, this is increasingly important: We need more training on other things on what is an actual offence . . . at what level should we be taking something on . . . some name calling in a street, but the person’s not bothered about it, but at what stage should we be saying ‘Look, unfortunately we think you’ve committed an offence’ . . . more really on what is a non-crime incident, to an actual crime . . . and where we should be looking to prosecute.
It was notable that in-service officers often had little to no exposure to hate crime victims in training sessions, for many, only occurring within Equality and Diversity training when they first joined the police. This exposure training by outside agencies has provided access to members of the protected groups, including victims of racist and transgender hate crimes, as well as disabled victims: We did have Equality and Diversity at the beginning and went through the different characteristics. It was a presentation and a workshop, and I think for the Equality and Diversity one, they had different tasks that they would get you up and get you involved . . . and they did bring in people from the community, and we had about three or four people in …. they were from groups with the different characteristics. There was, I think, a person from the transgendered group . . . one was an Asian lady, so that was the race side of things . . . and it gave us the chance to ask questions, and it was giving them the opportunity to say how they wanted to be treated, and from the transgendered group . . . just to explain things, so that was quite good and quite useful.
Numerous police officers suggested a need for them to be provided with more information in training from agencies that could help them when dealing with victims, particularly disabled victims, in terms of communication issues, support and safeguarding. Officers indicated that they often had to spend a considerable amount of time on the phone with other organisations to get such information: It’s difficult because it’s not something we would deal with a lot, or you don’t have great training to prepare you for it . . . I wouldn’t have a problem asking about disability but there could be a better way of identifying disabled people or providing support . . . if I’m dealing with someone who has possibly got mental health issues, then I can call adult social care, or QMC, so, yes, if you knew you had that support network for disability then officers would use it, but if I was dealing with a disabled victim, I wouldn’t know who I could call, social services maybe, I wouldn’t know.
The 2016 Nottinghamshire training research concluded that hate crime training must help officers with different aspects of their policing role, including gaining knowledge on hate crime laws, policies and procedures, but additionally, building their understanding of hate crime experiences, while assisting them to understand the roles of other agencies so that they can signpost victims to wider support.
A further key issue was that of providing officers with the opportunity to reflect on their own policing roles and on any individual or institutional biases that might affect their assumptions and decision-making. Consequently, it was suggested that there would be value in ‘community’ designed training, within community venues, which also included a wider range of stakeholders, which was built on problem-solving and building of skills. In addition, officers suggested that they wanted training that provided them with meaningful opportunities to engage with hate crime victims, often referred to as ‘exposure training’, which only a minority of in-service officers had experienced, certainly as part of early career training. This is of utmost importance, given that a key component of providing a good service to victims is to understand their lived experience of hate crime. The article will now consider two types of subsequent training that utilised a different format and content informed by these recommendations.
Citizens at the Heart Shift Champion training
Shift Champion training utilised a multiagency hate crime training approach. Evaluation of this training indicated that it helped participants to consider what the impact of hate crime on victims was, what their own role in relation to this might be and how they might work with other agencies to support and safeguard victims. Importantly Shift Champion training sought to utilise officer experience with hate crime response to be both a resource to other officers and to encourage culture change within policing.
Officers highlighted that the interactive case studies helped them to contextualise the lived experience of hate crime. The victim video was also mentioned here as an important mechanism for providing an emotional attachment to the real-life impacts of hate and, in doing so, highlighted the importance of good victim care, which resonated through the training (this will be revisited under discussion of ‘exposure training’).
This helped officers to consider in more depth the different types, range and manifestations of hate crimes in practical terms around the impact of hate crimes on different victims and their needs, including developing their understanding of intersectionality (Crenshaw, 1991). As one officer stated, ‘It’s important so that people are offered the correct support, services are tailored to meet their needs and do not suffer further discrimination/poor service’.
Officers also commented on how important it was to have fellow officers – ‘Shift Change Experts’, who they could turn to for guidance and support: It’s also about problem-solving, having the Shift Experts with a better insight into hate crime, with more contacts, because, you know, it’s not just down to the police to deal with it, there are other agencies that can contribute but if you don’t know who they are and what they can contribute, then how can you even possibly think to involve them?
Most importantly, the training placed value on police officers and their experiences, positioning them as law enforcement experts, involved in community problem-solving. This, in turn, spoke clearly to the pedagogy of how police officers learn, that is, through problem-solving and active learning (Birzer, 2003; Heslop, 2011; Palmiotto et al., 2000). Officers stated that they especially valued the format of group work and problem-solving using interactive case studies to contextualise the experience of hate crime. The emphasis on problem-solving within the Citizens at the Heart training not only attempted to address these issues but also endorsed the call to consider policing pedagogy for officers (Trickett and Hamilton, 2016).
Existing literature on police learning suggests that for officers to effectively learn, they need space to engage with training in a participatory, dialogic and experiential manner, involving discretion, choices and complexity (Birzer, 2003; Palmiotto et al., 2000). Because andragogical approaches are task-orientated and enable the sharing of officer experiences and case studies (Birzer, 2003), hate crime workshops using such approaches can help officers develop critical thinking in the learning process, better aligning with key aspects of community policing (Newburn, 2008), including training on cultural diversity, harassment, conflict resolution and interpersonal communication skills, all of which are directly relevant to dealing with hate crime.
The Shift Champion training provided officers with opportunities to apply their knowledge, placing a value on their policing expertise, but also outlining how the format and content of training were relevant to their actual policing. As one officer stated: ‘From the police perspective, police training was always about what to do, not why we do it. It’s not the nuts and bolts. It’s not the softest side of it, you know, why is this important?’ ‘This gets missed a lot …’. Picking up points on the reactive nature of (hate) police training, discussed in the 2016 report, the officer again reiterates the negative impact of that on officers’, pointing out that training was ‘actually a stick to beat police officers with and there has been a bit of resistance to it, because of that’.
They go on to address an additional issue in the 2016 report, the need for police to value the training, by a focus on the ‘why’ – indicating that the Shift Champion training helped officers to see the utility of the training in their responses to hate crime: So, it was a really good idea, that we could develop a format that we could explain the ‘why we do it’, not the ‘what we do’. Also, by involving partner agencies, it is not a single agency approach, the training was also about where everyone fitted into this process: Having somebody with that extra bit of knowledge, such as a Shift Expert is useful in the organisation because they can offer advice to other colleagues, especially with a high number of new cops in service joining us, and they will get the poor police training on hate crime, but when they work with the more experienced officers, they will get why this is important.
The training was also useful in helping expose police to other agencies. This assisted with developing knowledge on signposting (third-party reporting/victim care), helping officers see the range of organisations that were essential in responding to hate crime. This addresses a key point in the 2016 report, the need to ensure that the training is more representative of the full range of crimes and incidents that officers respond to, while drawing on the work of Bowling (1993) in conceptualising hate crime as a process. The utility of this for police might be helpful both to contextualise the actual experience of hate crimes for victims, but also as a metaphor for the police investigative process from beginning to end.
Officers valued having the space to reflect on their own experiences (and those of others) within a supportive and open learning environment. Indeed, exposure to a range of different communities/victims and the opportunities for reflection helped the police to understand the challenges, occupational culture and silos in their own and those of other organisations. Such reflective opportunities can help facilitate a cultural shift, enabling officers to reflect on their own institutional and cultural biases, whether conscious or otherwise, that might affect their decisions. A key benefit of this training, therefore, was to help police officers develop listening and reflective skills and to avoid jumping to conclusions and acting on assumptions, a considerable benefit in ensuring the quality of service to victims (Bryan and Trickett, 2021).
The context and the format of the Shift Experts training can help to address issues around ‘silos’ and the role of occupational culture in promoting or challenging resistance to new ideas and ways of working. Organisational silos can hinder transformative communication and innovative practices, whereby organisations and departments are resistant to change. Of course, in considering this, one must remain mindful of how knowledge is obtained and disseminated within broader occupational cultures. While the current evaluation was only focused on the training of the Shift Champions and not on the analysis of a ‘ripple’ effect among other officers, this point is relevant to how police retain and use knowledge obtained in training more broadly.
We must consider the issues around institutional, occupational and implicit biases within a police-centric lens. As Waddington (1999) observes, culture is an expression of common values, attitudes and beliefs within a police context. As Mawby and Worrall (2011) argue within the context of the probation service, achieving change is not simply about knowledge transfer, but requires a consideration of the connections between individual and organisational values. Canton (2013) argues that values are not simply to be read off mission statements but must be embedded within the practices of organisations.
It is important to point out that while organisational culture is not unique to the police, it may be argued that policing involves a unique and somewhat ‘peculiar’ culture. There are key elements of police culture and role that contribute to this. First, the unique role of the police as law enforcers and embodiment of state power; second, the very real dangers that police face and third, the shared sense of potential danger to oneself and one’s colleagues (Reiner, 2010). It is the combination of these factors that contributes to the context of policing situations. The circumstances of police work mean that at times, swift action, decisions about the use of force and quick assessments about the nature of the situation to ensure immediate safeguarding of victims and the general public are required. Faced with these realities, it is easy to see how hate crimes might appear less important within the overall demand on the police service (Bryan and Trickett, 2021).
It is essential, therefore, to remain mindful of implicit and institutional biases within training. The need to understand the connection between implicit bias and occupational policing culture is therefore inescapable (Reiner, 2010). Police culture is not monolithic (Chan, 2012; O’Neill, 2016), and lessons can be learned about how domestic violence came to be perceived as being more important over time. Notwithstanding, as later police inspections and research have indicated (HMICFRS, 2018), the need for continued vigilance and reflective practice is essential.
The Citizens at the Heart pilot enabled officers to understand that hate crimes needed tailored responses, involving other agencies. This, in turn, assisted officers with developing the practice of being more self-reflective (understanding one’s own positionality) in conflict resolution. Therefore, this emphasis in the training assisted officers to consider what their own role in relation to hate crime victims was, not simply in terms of prosecution but also safeguarding by helping to identify the needs of the victim, and effective signposting to support agencies, including third-party reporting and victim support.
Dimensions disability hate crime training
Feedback from police in the 2016 study outlined officers’ calls for exposure-type training with a range of hate crime victims, to help them to better understand the lived experience of victims, the manifestation and impact of hate crime, and victim needs. Previously, in the Citizens at the Heart training, the victim video was mentioned as an important mechanism for providing an emotional attachment to the real-life impact of hate crime, which outlined the need for effective victim care. The 2016 study found that officers often lacked confidence in identifying and/or communicating with people who have a learning disability and/or who are neurodiverse. Indeed, the research found that officers were often reluctant to question people about disability for fear of causing offence (see also Criminal Justice Joint Inspection, 2013). Police officers frequently struggled with the area of disability and mental health, as unsurprisingly, they lack medical knowledge. But also, because they often have little exposure to people with a range of conditions, in their personal and professional lives. For these reasons, officers felt that exposure training would be of particular benefit to them in this area of hate crime.
The sessions under discussion here addressed the issues of DHC, with particular emphasis on the experience of living with a learning disability, including autism. Through an innovative collaboration between NTU university academics, a former police officer and trainer, and Dimensions, the training was made particularly relevant to police and delivered to policing recruits across a range of university policing courses. The content of the training included an overview of learning disabilities and autism, the challenges of assisting people with these conditions and practical strategies to support them. Training was provided in person for police trainees and police employees. Videos and activities to facilitate discussions were incorporated throughout the sessions, and there was also the option to access an online training platform.
As previously stated, the officers who completed the evaluation survey included professional policing students from NTU, Plymouth and Easter College, part of City College, Norwich. In addition, responses were gathered from police employees of the Nottinghamshire police force, who attended the training session.
The training helped attendees to develop a basic understanding of hate crime, increased awareness of the problem of underreporting and helped deepen participants’ understanding of various disabilities. Many participants expressed that training helped them to better understand the definition and symptoms of these conditions. Participants learned strategies to better support disabled victims during crime incidents. Training fostered empathy and shifted perspectives on disability beyond ‘labels’. Participants recognised the practical application of training in their policing roles, particularly in supporting vulnerable victims, facilitating the understanding that people can adopt diverse forms of communication, necessitating the need for patience, while demonstrating understanding and empathy. Officers described how the training had assisted with their daily activities by offering them useful tips to respond to vulnerable victims more effectively. As one officer stated, ‘It helps to understand what is being done with CPS and some useful tips for operational officers to best support individuals’ while another stated that the training provided ‘a greater understanding on how to help support victims of crime who may have such difficulties or disabilities’.
Officers also learned about techniques that could enhance the quality of interaction between a police officer and a neurodivergent victim. Participants shared that they had heard about various ways to support neurodiverse communication needs, which would help them to assist neurodiverse individuals in expressing themselves more effectively. In the words of one officer, the training helped to produce ‘better understanding of police interaction with people with learning disabilities’, helping them reflect on how to ‘provide a better service and become approachable’.
Finally, the training facilitated a shift in participants’ perceptions, empowering them to see beyond the stereotypes and labels of disability, fostering a greater understanding of the different abilities of people with disabilities, an improved grasp of the needs of disabled people, and how to make reasonable adjustments. Training also had the effect of changing officers’ own individual perceptions. One participant noted that ‘often people will judge someone with a learning disability by saying they are rude, before they learn that they don’t typically communicate the same way as others’. Training sheds light on judgemental attitudes that may exist around law enforcement, that is, neurodivergent people do not make good witnesses.
Summary
Police-centric training should be designed to help the police in their policing roles, in a way that addresses criticisms made by victims, while helping officers overcome policing challenges in providing effective service. Previous police hate crime training has often failed to do either (Hardy et al., 2020; Trickett and Hamilton, 2016).
It is notable that both the Citizens at the Heart and the Dimensions training examples provided the police with access to victims and communities victimised by hate, as well as organisations that supported them. Of course, this is necessary as hate crimes and incidents are not solely the responsibility of the police. Improved links to other agencies through a multiagency approach or exposure training are enormously beneficial. Changing both the content and format of training along these lines will prevent overfocusing on legislation and procedure. Instead, it will assist police to fulfil different aspects of their policing role, to deal with the minutiae of different forms of hate crime, to consider safeguarding and to identify more sources of victim support, including that for victims with specific needs, by signposting them to appropriate agencies, with the necessary expertise.
Overall, previous training failed to meet the needs of police because it was too little informed by police officers themselves, in terms of the challenges they face in their role as hate crime responders. Of course, it is important not to view police-centric training approaches as being at odds with, or a replacement for, training approaches that centre victim experiences, perspectives or knowledge. Rather, police-centric training is an approach to the delivery and construction of training models specifically devised around how officers learn, including ‘on-the-job’, aligning with policing experience, thus ensuring heightened engagement, with more meaningful and lasting effects. Police-centric hate crime training is not simply training by police within police premises, but rather, training that is police focused on helping officers to understand their role, the challenges they face and what can help them to address these. It should also engage with officers by respecting their unique role, as well as their policing expertise, while linking closely to their everyday policing experiences. Finally, it should help officers to provide the best service they can to hate crime victims, regardless of whether prosecution is possible, supported or warranted.
In summary, police-centric hate crime training includes the following:
Values police in the training process – incorporating their experiences and expertise, involving them in the design and continued evaluation of training, making training of value to them in their policing practice and career.
Assists police to fulfil the demands of their role, while also enabling them to fulfil that role in a way that improves their service to victims and meets victim needs.
Employs pedagogies and learning styles that reflect how police officers learn best in law enforcement contexts (Birzer, 2003).
Provides police with access to victims and the work of other agencies to support victims and offer a tailored response, that is, criminal prosecution, civil remedy or mediation.
Includes other agencies and victims, providing learning opportunities, which include their experiences and challenges, while providing space to ask questions and use problem-solving to enhance police skills.
Requires checks upon institutional bias and police culture, that is, provides space to reflect on one’s own position and that of the organisation (reflective practitioners). This in turn avoids silo responses and means that police are less likely to fall foul of many of the criticisms levelled at them by victims, improving their service and consequently, trust in the police organisation.
Conclusion
In this article, we have first argued that while scholars have identified deficiencies in police hate crime training and have made recommendations for change, few studies have examined the impact of those changes on officer learning in subsequent training programmes. Second, we have argued that while pockets of good practice do exist, particularly through examples of hate crime exposure training, the need to centre hate crime training within an overall policing context has been seriously underplayed. For example, while police officers stated that training needed to be given a more human touch through greater exposure to victims and people from different backgrounds/different cultures/religions, this was to help them more effectively understand differences in the manifestation and impact of hate crimes, to enable them to effectively fulfil their policing roles. Given this, officers felt that such hate crime training needed to be more bespoke and specific, most importantly, signposting officers as to ‘where to go’ to help victims and to safeguard them.
In this article, we have evaluated two examples that utilised workshop-type training formats with improved training content, as recommended by officers. In doing so, we highlight that a multisectoral approach that involves police, civil society, academics and the community is important, so that the unique contributions of each can be harnessed when devising training. Furthermore, we have strongly advocated the need for exposure training with input from specific victims and supporting organisations, with opportunities for police interaction, problem-solving, asking questions and reflection.
Taken together, several important points have arisen from this discussion of hate crime training in terms of a police-centric approach to increase value and effectiveness with in-service police officers. This article illustrates how important police officer feedback is to the continual design of hate crime training and suggests that police can make meaningful contributions to the design and delivery of training modules. Incorporating officers’ own experiences while enabling them to become more involved in the training experience equips officers with a better grasp of the nuances in responding to different types of hate crime, while also placing a value on their own work and that of other officers, in a way that is clearly relevant to their policing role. This could help foster a more holistic view of the policing remit in dealing with hate crime, including prevention, community and order maintenance, in addition to recording and prosecution procedures. Specifically, this article demonstrates that while suggestions for reform of training are helpful, continual evaluation and redesign are critical to refining police training.
Expediency of training delivery should not continue to be a reason for delivering in-service hate crime training that is often abstracted from policing experience and pedagogy. Indeed, austerity should be a reason to make hate crime training more aligned with policing pedagogy and policing experiences, as well as those of victims, to increase its efficiency. A police-centric approach to training, as advocated here, could well fit the bill.
Footnotes
Funding
The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.