Worapong Chiewpreecha, the NRSA’s deputy chairman of the committee on law and justice reform, presented the reform plans for the police.

He said the issues hindering the efficiency of police work included the fact that investigations and inquiries were kept separate.

Police in charge of inquiries have no link with the public because they do not carry out fieldwork, while those in charge of investigations only take orders from their superiors and do not work as a team with inquiry officers.

This has led to a lack of efficiency, Worapong said, a former Bangkok police chief.

He added that police work was not distributed fairly among police officers. In some areas police had hundreds of cases per year while in others they have only a few cases a year.

The career path for inquiry police officers was deemed even less promising, he said.

The committee proposed that some regulations regarding inquiry police officers be amended, including regarding their career paths and their work situation.

A system to manage police work shifts should also be changed by adopting an integrated system of having investigation, inquiry, crime suppression, administration and traffic police officers all on the same shift – instead of having just inquiry officers working a single shift.

Assembly members debated the issues extensively before voting 154 in favour to eight against with six abstentions to approve the plan and forward the proposal for Cabinet approval.

In a separate development, Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan said the Royal Thai Police was planning to set up a reform panel to increase the efficiency of police work and ensure effective law enforcement.

The reform panel will offer proposals to link inquiry work with prosecutors and judges and encourage inquiry police officers to do more fieldwork.

The police also wanted to bring about reforms in border patrol, immigration and traffic police.

“It is not a structural reform but bringing changes to the police so they can better ensure safety and protect lives and property of the people. Reform would give people faith and confidence in the police that they can carry out their duty in a transparent manner and cooperate with other justice agencies,” Prawit said.

He added that National Police Chief Pol General Chakthip Chaijinda will recruit officials internally to sit on the panel but will also allow the public to take part as members.

Once the panel completes the reform plan, it will forward it to the NRSA for consideration.