Hertfordshire Constabulary officers who investigate online child sexual abuse are undergoing annual psychological health screenings by the force, it has been revealed.
Chief Constable Andy Prophet said the force aimed to provide “the right support” for the “outstanding” officers who are forced to look through distressing material as part of their investigations.
It comes after a national report by His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Policing and Fire and Rescue Services (HMICFRS) found that forces often struggle to effectively investigate online child sexual abuse and track sex offenders.
The report noted “rising demand continues to exceed resources” – with some officers investigating as many as 54 cases at any one time.
Inspectors also found the number of referrals for online child sex abuse from the National Crime Agency (NCA) rose 66% in a single year, from 12,469 in 2023 to 20,704 in 2024.
Across the country, the number of registered sex offenders has soared by 48% over the past decade, with nearly 3,000 more added to the register in 2024/25 compared to the previous year.
The watchdog’s national report was discussed during a performance and accountability meeting between Mr Prophet and Hertfordshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner, Jonathan Ash-Edwards.
The chief constable said: “I welcome the report…The recommendations within the thematic report cover some really important areas.
“We have an oversight board chaired by my deputy chief constable, where we go through each of the recommendations and make sure we’re acting upon them.”
Asked about the training officers go through, the chief constable said: “The assurance I can give is that the people doing this work have that specialist training and those qualifications to do what they need to do to the best effect.
“There’s an abundance of national guidance – it’s called ‘approved professional practice’ – that we need to do as we go through these investigations.
“Again, we check and support the teams through the supervision processes to make sure we’re getting that right, because it’s such a high-risk area of business.
“A key part of that is supporting our people who do this work. There is mandatory psychological annual screening for officers and staff, where we sit down with them and have a conversation about how they’re dealing with the things they have to deal with, that separation between work and home and normal life is a really, really important conversation to have.
“Sometimes, people need a break from this kind of work. So that process is there, that safety belt.
“I think we’ve got a little bit more work to do because, in addition to that screening, there’s something called ‘trauma-informed training’. So, I think we can do more work with people in this space… we’ve identified that as something we absolutely want to move forward in the coming 12 months.
“The people doing this work are handling some of the most difficult, dangerous and awful things brilliantly, and they need the very best support.”
Elsewhere, the chief constable noted: “We must make sure we’ve got really effective processes to prioritise risk assessments.
“Quite often there’s more work than you can do, and you have to make a choice about where you start. That you’ve got the right training and staffing levels to do all the work you need to do. That you’re really proactive with your use of arrests and bail where needed. That there’s really good governance and oversight of caseloads.
“That you’re following the national guidance, and there’s lots of it. And that the amazing people doing this incredibly difficult work have got the right support, the right psychological health screening, because of the things they’re having to look at.
“I want us to be supporting the outstanding people doing this hugely important work.”
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