Thursday, 26 April 2018 - 7:23am |
National News

First ever Police recruits to be trained in Auckland begin on Monday

1 min read

Police are excited to announce that we are carrying out a pilot where for the first time 20 of our recruits will be trained in Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland).

Section 5 of Wing 314 will begin training on Monday 30 April 2018. The in-house learning will take place at the Unitec in Mt Albert and the field training component will be based from the North Shore Policing Centre. Auckland already has all the facilitates required for the recruits to carry out their tactical training, including driving, firearms, and defensive tactics.

They will be receiving identical training as they would at the Royal New Zealand Police College. The difference is that they will get to go to their homes and whanau at the end of each day.

Inspector Iain Saunders of the RNZPC says this pilot came about following direct feedback from potential recruits, whom for many said that moving to Wellington for 16 weeks was a real barrier to joining New Zealand Police, particularly those with young children.

“We are incredibly excited about this opportunity to train some of our future officers in Tāmaki Makaurau. We are bringing some of our trainers up from the RNZPC to ensure consistency in the training the wing receives.

“With our recent recruitment drive to get more people to sign up, we are really keen to see if this initiative can assist us in increasing our numbers by reducing some of the barriers preventing those who would make excellent Police officers from joining up. We have a great bunch of recruits in this Auckland wing and we will be following a few willing participants and sharing their journeys across our social media pages.”

The Powhiri for Section 5 Wing 314 begins on Monday at 9am and Commissioner Mike Bush will be present to welcome them following the Powhiri.

ENDS

Shelley Nahr/NZ Police

Media please RSVP to Shelley Nahr if you wish to attend the Powhiri on Monday morning.