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Every force, ranked

Which police forces have their own complaint decisions overturned most often, and which almost never do.

Metropolitan Police Service: 36.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedCumbria Constabulary: 21.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedLancashire Constabulary: 15.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedMerseyside Police: 13.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedGreater Manchester Police: 35.6% of reviewed outcomes overturnedCheshire Constabulary: 9.1% of reviewed outcomes overturnedNorthumbria Police: 19.9% of reviewed outcomes overturnedDurham Constabulary: 23.4% of reviewed outcomes overturnedNorth Yorkshire Police: 23.3% of reviewed outcomes overturnedWest Yorkshire Police: 25.7% of reviewed outcomes overturnedSouth Yorkshire Police: 25.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedHumberside Police: 14.2% of reviewed outcomes overturnedCleveland Police: 37.9% of reviewed outcomes overturnedWest Midlands Police: 30.4% of reviewed outcomes overturnedStaffordshire Police: 16.1% of reviewed outcomes overturnedWest Mercia Police: 11.9% of reviewed outcomes overturnedWarwickshire Police: 34.4% of reviewed outcomes overturnedDerbyshire Constabulary: 10.3% of reviewed outcomes overturnedNottinghamshire Police: 19.9% of reviewed outcomes overturnedLincolnshire Police: 26.3% of reviewed outcomes overturnedLeicestershire Police: 6.9% of reviewed outcomes overturnedNorthamptonshire Police: 28.4% of reviewed outcomes overturnedCambridgeshire Constabulary: 22.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedNorfolk Constabulary: 14.3% of reviewed outcomes overturnedSuffolk Constabulary: 29.8% of reviewed outcomes overturnedBedfordshire Police: 14.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedHertfordshire Constabulary: 20.6% of reviewed outcomes overturnedEssex Police: 28.8% of reviewed outcomes overturnedThames Valley Police: 27.2% of reviewed outcomes overturnedHampshire Constabulary: 24.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedSurrey Police: 11.8% of reviewed outcomes overturnedKent Police: 18.6% of reviewed outcomes overturnedSussex Police: 11.9% of reviewed outcomes overturnedCity of London Police: no publishable rateDevon & Cornwall Police: 40.1% of reviewed outcomes overturnedAvon and Somerset Constabulary: 23.2% of reviewed outcomes overturnedGloucestershire Constabulary: 20.0% of reviewed outcomes overturnedWiltshire Police: 26.2% of reviewed outcomes overturnedDorset Police: 27.7% of reviewed outcomes overturnedNorth Wales Police: 22.6% of reviewed outcomes overturnedGwent Police: 30.2% of reviewed outcomes overturnedSouth Wales Police: 24.3% of reviewed outcomes overturnedDyfed-Powys Police: 21.3% of reviewed outcomes overturned
Under 10%10 to 18%18 to 26%26 to 34%Over 34%Not published

Click your area, know the facts.

Each area links to that force. Shading shows the share of completed reviews that found the force's own complaint outcome was not reasonable and proportionate. Scotland and Northern Ireland have separate systems and are not shown.

Across every force that completed enough reviews to report, 24.5% of reviewed complaint outcomes were found not reasonable and proportionate. Sorted by complaints overturned on review.

Size is now in the table. These pages ranked forces on counts for months without ever saying how many officers each one had. The first two columns fix that: full-time equivalent officers, and the stop and searches each force records per officer per year. The second is the one worth reading. It ranges from under one to over fourteen across England and Wales, and a count on its own cannot show that.

All 44 forces, ranked

Rank byComplaints overturned on reviewReviews completedComplaints per 1,000 staffComplaint cases loggedSearches ending in no further actionStop and searches recordedStrip searchesBlack disproportionalityUse of force reportsUse of force, 5 year changeTaser discharge rateDeaths following police contactWorst ethnicity recordingPolice officers (FTE)Searches per officer per yearForce name
#Police force Officers (FTE)Searches per officerOverturned on review▼Complaints per 1,000 staffNo further actionBlack ratioUse of forceTaser dischargedDeaths, 21 years
1Devon & Cornwall Police3,6411.6140.1%19869.7%—18,8795.8%124
2Cleveland Police1,5034.6937.9%83284.7%—19,3666.9%45
3Metropolitan Police Service31,4954.2036.0%24767.4%3.1x105,8896.5%382
4Greater Manchester Police8,235—35.6%511——51,3009.3%238
5Warwickshire Police1,1391.1534.4%46071.6%7.0x4,6476.3%41
6West Midlands Police8,1743.4330.4%33069.7%—48,6487.9%190
7Gwent Police1,552—30.2%240——5,9317.6%44
8Suffolk Constabulary1,4301.9129.8%12365.6%6.8x4,7845.8%42
9Essex Police3,7613.9328.8%49570.8%3.3x21,9688.1%78
10Northamptonshire Police1,4882.6028.4%42081.4%4.7x10,6895.2%56
11Dorset Police1,4611.3227.7%457—9.1x6,9836.4%42
12Thames Valley Police5,0853.2227.2%42474.4%4.2x33,01312.9%102
13Lincolnshire Police1,1992.2726.3%53091.7%6.8x5,30610.3%50
14Wiltshire Police1,2261.9426.2%51663.0%6.6x8,44011.8%36
15West Yorkshire Police6,1982.9925.7%35066.9%2.9x42,4868.9%183
16South Yorkshire Police3,0213.9825.0%25368.1%—19,2445.1%86
17South Wales Police3,5341.5524.3%43672.4%—16,4238.9%104
18Hampshire Constabulary3,4194.1624.0%59667.7%6.2x22,4697.3%91
19Durham Constabulary1,4051.9723.4%38066.7%—11,74618.1%42
20North Yorkshire Police1,680—23.3%375—5.6x11,7086.5%49
21Avon and Somerset Constabulary3,4021.8723.2%42663.4%5.9x19,38310.0%86
22North Wales Police1,7432.1922.6%18073.3%—8,6817.1%42
23Cambridgeshire Constabulary1,7081.6822.0%40666.5%5.8x11,0402.6%36
24Dyfed-Powys Police1,3322.7621.3%397——5,8399.2%40
25Cumbria Constabulary1,4156.2621.0%51376.6%—11,7546.0%38
26Hertfordshire Constabulary2,3842.8720.6%33074.1%4.6x13,5803.7%52
27Gloucestershire Constabulary1,3551.4820.0%53865.4%4.4x8,5944.7%37
28Northumbria Police3,9322.5719.9%54674.1%2.1x28,66017.0%103
29Nottinghamshire Police2,3771.5019.9%41766.5%5.5x19,3699.5%55
30Kent Police4,1633.9018.6%49764.9%2.5x19,44410.1%97
31Staffordshire Police2,0473.1516.1%47562.6%—10,5795.2%86
32Lancashire Constabulary3,5977.0115.0%31878.7%4.1x28,90910.0%97
33Norfolk Constabulary1,8981.4014.3%10963.5%9.2x7,7238.7%45
34Humberside Police2,3082.4114.2%42871.3%3.5x17,9747.3%58
35Bedfordshire Police1,4732.8214.0%40572.8%3.5x6,9704.4%40
36Merseyside Police4,16614.4813.0%32577.3%2.6x20,6586.6%89
37Sussex Police3,2601.9911.9%38359.1%8.2x18,9487.0%113
38West Mercia Police2,5061.4411.9%42965.5%7.9x11,1556.1%78
39Surrey Police2,3542.4111.8%60267.7%7.7x10,6218.1%56
40Derbyshire Constabulary2,1132.0810.3%45672.0%5.5x16,2706.0%54
41Cheshire Constabulary2,4155.229.1%40373.9%5.8x13,2194.1%61
42British Transport Police2,8174.898.3%16485.9%———13
43Leicestershire Police2,2872.196.9%362—5.8x14,3864.7%50
—City of London Police1,0072.02—35575.2%10.6x2,9634.0%3
Method. Every column is computed from published data and every one is sortable. Officer strength is the Home Office police workforce open data table as at 31 March 2026, given as full-time equivalent rather than headcount, because headcount counts a part-time officer the same as a full-time one. Searches per officer annualises each force's own recorded searches on the number of months that force actually published, not on an assumed three years, and is left blank where a force published fewer than 24 months: annualising 13 months assumes the 23 missing months look like the 13 present ones, which for a force that stopped supplying data is an assumption rather than a measurement. Review outcomes and complaint volumes are from the IOPC's statistics for England and Wales; a force is ranked on review outcomes only where it completed at least 30 reviews, because a percentage on a handful of cases is noise. Stop and search, strip searches and ethnicity recording are from data.police.uk, calculated only over records where the relevant field was actually completed. Use of force and Taser figures are Home Office statistics for 2024/25, with the five year change measured from 2020/21. The Black ratio compares a force's share of searches to the share of people resident in that force's own area at the 2021 Census, and is omitted where the group is under 0.5% of residents or the force does not record ethnicity well enough; the denominator debate is set out in full here. Deaths are the IOPC's annual series from 2004/05 and are counts, not rates: a larger or busier force may record more without that implying anything about conduct. A dash means the force did not publish that measure.
What this table is not. Nothing here is a finding against any force or any officer. A recorded complaint is an allegation, not a proven fact. An overturned review means the force's own handling of a complaint was judged not reasonable and proportionate, which is not the same as the complaint being upheld. A death during or following police contact is not a finding that the police caused it or did anything wrong. A disparity ratio is a measured difference in recorded outcomes, not proof of unlawful conduct by anyone. We take no position on any individual case.