Why aren’t Police Records covered by the Public Records Act?
Since 2012 the Archives and Records Association (ARA) has been campaigning for English and Welsh police records to be covered by the Public Records Act. John Chambers, Chief Executive of ARA gives the full story below.
Our work on this began in September 2012 when the Hillsborough Panel published its report. Among many recommendations made was: The Panel recommends that police force records are brought under legislative control and that police forces are added to Part II of the First Schedule to the Public Records Act 1958, thereby making them subject to the supervision of the Keeper of Public Records.
This would bring the records of police forces in England and Wales into the public records system for the first time and be a first step towards holding the police accountable for their records and therefore their actions. No-one pretends that the Public Records Act (PRA) is an ideal solution, but it is a step towards accountability and an important principle to establish. In September 2012 and now in September 2025 police records remain at the disposal of the force’s Chief Constable and the police remain unaccountable for their records.
Shortly after the Panel reported ARA took up the mantle of campaigning on police records. So far it’s been a frustrating failure and a sad example of how the establishment closes ranks. The police have managed to play a long game and maintain the support of Home Office civil servants (and whichever party has been in power) to ensure they continue to do as they please with their own records. I think it’s a national disgrace.
In October 2013 the Open Government Partnership UK National Action Plan 2013 to 2015 was published with a commitment: The UK government will establish by 1 January 2014 a high-level working group to ensure greater transparency and accessibility of police records in England and Wales. The group will explore the range of options for achieving this, including bringing police force records under legislative control, by adding police forces to the Public Records Act 1958, alongside other options that may not require legislation.
The ARA had representation on this working group and it eventually produced a report for the Home Office which included this recommendation: The Working Group recommends that the Public Records Act 1958 should be amended to apply to the records, both corporate and operational, held by police forces in England and Wales.
The police were part of the working group and their representatives stated that they had no objections to being brought into the Public Records Act.
But that’s as far as it went and indeed has ever gone. The Working Group report was never published and the working group never met again.
In November 2017 another report was published. The Right Reverend James Jones: ‘The patronising disposition of unaccountable power’ A report to ensure the pain and suffering of the Hillsborough families is not repeated.
The report noted the recommendation by the Hillsborough Panel had not been taken up by government and said: “It is a fundamental principle of accountability that public records are subject to proper rules relating to retention and inspection. Where this is missing, a key element of accountability is removed. The issue identified by the Hillsborough Independent Panel in 2012 and repeated here should now be addressed as a matter of urgency.”
This was all well and good. Unfortunately, the report included the following line: “Since the Panel’s report was published it has been suggested to me that even if police forces were to be brought under the Public Records Act, this may not be sufficient to address the issues the Panel identified.”
As I said above no-one ever suggested the PRA was going to be a panacea. It’s about principle. We wrote to Bishop James stating, “This language may quite easily be interpreted by anyone in Government seeking to wriggle out of implementing Hillsborough Panel recommendation 2 or delaying any kind of solution indefinitely.” After initially agreeing to meet with us we never got to discuss this with Bishop James.
And it appears that our comment regarding wriggle and delay is exactly what has happened. The police and Home Office officials have repeatedly said that the PRA is not suitable from 2018 onwards and are still saying the same now.
The initial response of the police to the lifeboat offered by Bishop James use of language was in another unpublished report in November 2018 by Rob Beckley: The police service and the Public Records Act. This recommended the police be allowed to update their own Management of Police Information Code of Practice. The report said this would be an enforceable framework.
It was followed five years later in January 2023 by the national police response to the Hillsborough Families Report; NPCC and College of Policing. They recommended that the existing Management of Police Information Code of Practice 2005 should be extended and concluded that adherence to the PRA was a desirable objective within five years but only after the police applied more consistent and transparent standards of records management.
So the police have now got until at least 2028 to carry on as they want.
In July 2023 the College of Policing: Code of Practice on police information and records management was published as was the College of Policing: Authorised Professional Practice: Management of Police Information: retention and disposal, section on Archiving in the Public Interest.
The wording in these documents is full of “should” rather than “must” or “will” and doesn’t advance the transparency of police records. “Chief officers should put arrangements…” and “Certain police records should be archived…..” for example.
Although the new Code is statutory under Section 39A of the Police Act 1996 the repeated use of ‘should’ rather than ‘must’ makes it hard to enforce; The code is complex with multiple layers of guidance; unlike the PRA, processes are not clear or transparent to external organisations; also, unlike the PRA, it does not provide schedules of types or collections of records that should be preserved; rather this is suggested in the Authorised Professional Practice (APP) on Archiving. The police working guidance on the new Code is the Authorised Professional Practice on Management of Police Information which still does not go into detail but refers users on to a further level – Information Management Strategies. Here each force again becomes responsible for the development of these strategies, which appear not to be publicly available.
Although the ARA had representation on the College of Policing working group that had input into these, our recommendations were often overlooked.
In December 2023 came A Hillsborough Legacy: the Government’s response to Bishop James Jones’ report to ensure the pain and suffering of the Hillsborough families is never repeated. The Government is committed to introducing a requirement for police forces to retain records of historical interest, however they set no timetable for implementation saying only: “The review concluded that adherence to the PRA was a desirable objective, but only after the police applied more consistent and transparent standards of records management.”
Since the police introduced their updated Code in July 2023 both South Yorkshire and Northumbria police forces have admitted destroying records related to Orgreave. In June 2025 the ICO issued a public reprimand to South Yorkshire police relating to other record keeping matters. The police continue to ignore their own Codes of Practice and remain unaccountable.
It seems to us there is the long-standing failure in transparency and accountability in Whitehall’s response to this issue. Under the previous government the Home Office and DCMS ministers refused requests for meetings with us or didn’t even reply to letters.
When the government wouldn’t speak to us we met the opposition. In July 2016 Jon Elliott, the ARA Head of Public Affairs, met Andy Burnham, then Shadow Home Secretary, to lobby for Labour’s support. The meeting resulted in a letter being sent to Amber Rudd, then Home Secretary, supporting the implementation of the Hillsborough Panel recommendation. Jon Elliott and Hywel Francis MP (then Chair of the APPG on Archives) later met Yvette Cooper when she was Shadow Home Secretary, who also was reported as expressing support for the recommendation. In March 2024 I met the Shadow Policing Minster, Alex Norris, who was well briefed, asked excellent questions and then also said he would support the implementation of the recommendation.
In early September 2025 we finally met a government minister to discuss police records. Dame Diana Johnson was then Minister for Policing. I was curious to know if Labour would follow through on their previous enthusiasm. Unfortunately, the meeting was dominated by repetition of Bishop James’s line that the PRA is not suitable. We effectively remain where we were in 2012.
And where we are is best highlighted by this quote by then South Yorkshire Chief Constable Med Hughes (from ‘The patronising disposition of unaccountable power’ A report, by The Right Reverend James Jones KBE,): “I am under no obligation to disclose anything and the papers belong to me. If I wanted to I could take them into the yard and have a bonfire with them” remains true in England and Wales.
In Scotland and Northern Ireland police records are governed by public records legislation and it is time that police records in England and Wales have the same statutory protection.
The fact is that there is nothing stopping the Government bringing police records under Schedule II of the PRA now. Whatever the PRA’s flaws, it is the standard that the rest of the public sector – including the civil service - already operates. The infrastructure is already there: we have established recognised Places of Deposit for public records across England and Wales. Adding police records to Schedule II would oblige forces and officials to actually move much more quickly. And it would begin the much-needed process of culture change: ie, chief constables having to accept that the records they create and hold are public records not their corporate property. There is also plenty of best practice out there for forces to draw on: the Metropolitan Police operated under the PRA until 2001.
And there is a stark contrast in all this. Police Scotland now manage records under separate, modern legislation, the 2011 Public Records (Scotland) Act. That legislation was in response to the ground-breaking (2007) Shaw report into historical abuse and the evident failures in recordkeeping over half a century in Scotland by a number of public bodies (including the police). But where Scottish officials and ministers have acted, their opposite numbers south of the border evidently have not.
And Police Scotland are not regularly in the news for destroying records.
If this Government really wants transparency and accountability of public bodies – this simple step – to bring police records in England and Wales under the Public Records Act – would be a quick and easy win.
Successive Governments have repeatedly refused to engage and continually side with the police. This leaves the police unaccountable and in a position to show total disregard to the public as the recent destruction of Orgreave records shows. The police knew that the new government is committed to an Orgreave inquiry and yet still destroy records and behave as though they are invulnerable and above society at large.
It is now time for all MPs and those that care about the rights of people in the UK to make it clear that this is not acceptable. The police must be accountable, they must be transparent in their dealings – if they are not they will continue to lose the trust of the British people and make their own work in supporting communities harder to achieve.
If you are interested in this issue please get in touch with deborah.mason@archives.org.uk