Number of police officers in the UK 2003-2022

In 2022 there were approximately 164,000 police officers in the United Kingdom, compared with around 155,000 in 2003. After reaching a high of 172,000 officers in 2010, the number of police officers in the UK fell to just 150,000 officers by 2017. Although that trend has reversed since this point, there are still approximately 8,000 fewer police officers in 2022 than there were twelve years earlier.

Why did police numbers fall?

The fall in police numbers is linked to a fall in government spending on the police. In the aftermath of the 2008 recession, the coalition government of 2010 carried out their policy of austerity, vowing to cut government spending across the board. For the police service expenditure fell sharply, from 19.3 billion British pounds a year in 2009/10 to just 16.35 billion pounds in 2013/14, leading to cuts in personnel. Police service expenditure remained below 17 billion pounds a year until spending started to increase in 2017/18, with the most recent figure of 21.49 billion pounds a year even higher than 2009/10.

Rising crime from the mid 2010s

Between 2002 and 2014 the crime rate of the United Kingdom fell from around 110.1 crimes per 1,000 population to just 68.7. The falling crime rates seen during this period went into reverse from that year onwards however, with the crime rate jumping to 96.4 by 2019/20. Although some crimes such as theft remained at quite low levels, the number of violent crimes has seen a sharp increase in recent years, rising from 634,600 offences in 2013/14 to almost 1.78 million in 2020/21, for England and Wales.