Huge numbers of people are applying to join New Zealand Police, as a new recruitment campaign and changes to application criteria help to stimulate growing interest.

Applications to become a police officer have been trending upwards in 2024, including a sustained spike in applications, Assistant Commissioner, Leadership, Talent and Development, Jill Rogers said.

To keep up with the upswing in applications Police leaders have made the decision to increase the capacity of recruit wings at the Royal New Zealand Police College (RNZPC) from 80 to 100 from April next year.

“From July, our recruitment billboards have been highly visible and changes to the application criteria prompted a major surge.

"This has considerably expanded our talent pool.

“With 1371 applications, July 2024 had highest number of applications for any month since the Police national recruitment database was created in 2014.

"August had a total of 1037 applications, the second highest month on record. 

“With an average of 526 applications each month in the first six months of 2024, compared with 334 applications each month in the first six months of 2023, we know we are heading in the right direction.

“All together, when including our major spike in applications, by the end of August Police has received more than 5500 applications in 2024.

"This is more than double the amount received across the same period in 2023.

“To accommodate a major influx of applications and get these recruits into training and out keeping our communities safe faster, we have made the decision to increase the size of our wings to 100 recruits next year.

“Our maximum wing size is usually 80, but we don’t want a blockage at the end of our pipeline for people waiting for a wing.

"We want them to flow through each step.

"A model that enables larger wings will also support us to deliver on the Government’s commitment of 500 additional officers.

“This will mean some changes for other courses at RNZPC, but we are working through options to deliver them within districts or online.

"This model has been successfully run for investigation courses since 2020.”

Police are also seeing positive trends with our attrition, which remains low, and in August 2024 was just 4.8%.

To put Police’s attrition rate in context, in 2023 reported turnover across public sector departments ranged from 11% to 54% with an average of 20%.

“With more than 10,000 constabulary employees some movement is always expected, but our monitoring suggests there aren’t significant numbers of staff heading overseas.

“Our best measure for estimating this movement shows that between 1 January 2023 and 1 July 2024, 115 constabulary staff have resigned from New Zealand Police to move to Australia.

"This is based on us receiving a vetting request from an Australian police jurisdiction for a staff member who then subsequently resigns within the next 12 months.

“Although this is not conclusive, this does indicate that departures to work in Australia only make up a small portion, less than a seventh of our low attrition.

“So far in 2024, 73 former Constabulary employees have either re-joined as a Constabulary employee or applied to do so. 

"This means a good proportion of officers who have left in recent years have applied to return.

“We are committed to putting more officers on the frontline to enhance community safety and prevent crime and harm.

“Achieving this growth in recruits is and will continue to require a massive effort from everyone involved in attracting, selecting, and training the new officers.

"We want to continue to move forward and keep building on this positive momentum.

"I would like to acknowledge everyone in Police for their hard work that will benefit both Police and the wider community,” Assistant Commissioner Rogers said.

New Cops

Whether you’re taking your first steps into the workforce or considering a career change, the best time to apply is right now.

The earlier you start your recruitment journey, the sooner you'll be ready to start your training.

We’re also encouraging ex-constabulary staff that are considering rejoining NZ Police to express their interest on newcops.govt.nz.

In November, billboards will be updated to feature police officers from your local area.

The ads will continue to target the regions where recruitment is needed most.