A report from the Security Research Initiative (SRI) discusses findings from responses from more than 1,000 serving police officers on attitudes towards the private security sector (private security suppliers and corporate security departments).
Overall, said the report, it was evident that the police officers surveyed view the private security sector as useful in some of the aspects of the work that it does, even necessary in some cases. That said, there is a lack of appetite in the private security sector taking a greater role in supporting or working in partnership with the police, the report said, but especially where this would amount to private security undertaking ‘police’ tasks in public space.