Freedom of Information requests submitted by Exposed News to the Independent Office for Police Conduct reveal a pattern that the watchdog has not publicly highlighted: the number of investigations it conducts independently — without referring matters back to the force under investigation — fell by 70% between 2020/21 and 2024/25.
In 2020/21, the IOPC opened 101 independent investigations into matters including corruption, serious misconduct, and deaths following police contact. By 2024/25, that figure had fallen to 30. The IOPC’s own annual reports acknowledge the shift in approach but describe it as a managed transition toward “supervised” and “managed” investigations, in which the force itself conducts much of the inquiry under IOPC oversight.
What the Numbers Show
The IOPC handles complaints through a tiered system. At the most serious end sit “independent investigations,” where IOPC investigators take direct control. Below that are “managed investigations” (force-led, with IOPC direction) and “supervised investigations” (largely force-led, with minimal IOPC input). The lowest tier — “local investigations” — is handled entirely by the force itself.
The data obtained by Exposed News shows that the proportion of cases categorised as independent investigations has fallen sharply, while managed and supervised investigations have grown correspondingly. The IOPC attributes this to increased capacity in police professional standards departments and a strategic decision to reserve independent investigations for the most serious cases.
Critics argue the explanation does not hold under scrutiny. “If the IOPC is only independently investigating 30 cases a year across 43 forces and tens of thousands of complaints, the question of what constitutes ‘serious enough’ deserves a public answer,” said one former police complaints assessor, who asked not to be named. “The most serious cases — deaths in custody, corruption allegations against senior officers — those numbers haven’t fallen by 70%. The caseload has. That suggests the threshold has moved, not the seriousness of what’s being reported.”
The Referral Problem
A further concern embedded in the data is the referral rate. Forces are legally obliged to refer certain categories of matter to the IOPC — including deaths and serious injuries following police contact, and allegations of serious corruption. But the IOPC’s own audits have found that not all referrable matters are referred. In 2023/24, the IOPC identified 847 cases where a referral should have been made but was not — a figure up from 612 in the previous year.
When matters are not referred, they default to local investigation — effectively meaning the force investigates itself without IOPC knowledge. The IOPC has powers to direct referrals when it becomes aware of unreferred matters, but identifying them depends largely on complaints from members of the public or third parties.
The consequence, according to research published by the Police Action Lawyers Group, is a structural gap in the oversight system. Forces that underreport referrable incidents face no sanction. Officers whose conduct would have triggered independent investigation instead face locally-managed processes, with lower rates of finding and discipline.
The Staffing Picture
The IOPC’s independent investigation unit has not grown proportionally with the complaints it receives. Between 2019 and 2024, the total number of complaints recorded by the IOPC increased by 23%, driven partly by new categories added following the 2020 Police and Crime Act amendments. The number of independent investigators grew by 6% over the same period.
The organisation’s 2024/25 annual accounts show an underspend against its investigation budget of £3.2 million — a figure the IOPC attributes to vacancy levels and delayed recruitment. Critics argue this reflects a deliberate choice to manage capacity through triage rather than resource the independent function properly.
What Reform Would Require
The Police Foundation, an independent think tank, has proposed a model under which the IOPC would have automatic jurisdiction over all allegations involving serving officers above superintendent rank, and all cases involving deaths or serious injuries following police contact — regardless of force referral. Under the current system, the IOPC has this jurisdiction in theory but exercises it selectively in practice.
The Home Office has not responded to calls for a statutory review of the IOPC’s caseload thresholds. A spokesperson said the government “values the role of the IOPC in maintaining public confidence in policing” but declined to comment on the specific decline in independent investigations.
The IOPC told Exposed News: “We prioritise independent investigation for the most serious cases, including all deaths and serious injuries following police contact, and allegations of the most serious forms of corruption. We work closely with forces to ensure appropriate investigation at every tier. Our approach is regularly reviewed by our board and by Parliament’s Home Affairs Select Committee.”
The Home Affairs Select Committee last examined IOPC performance in 2023. Its report noted “concerns about the consistency of investigation tier allocation” but stopped short of recommending a statutory minimum for independent investigations. A follow-up inquiry has not been announced.
What This Means for Public Trust
Survey data published by the College of Policing in 2025 shows public confidence in the police complaints system at a ten-year low: 38% of respondents said they believed the system handled complaints fairly, down from 51% in 2015. Among respondents from Black and minority ethnic communities, the figure was 24%.
The IOPC was created in 2018 specifically to address public concerns about the independence of its predecessor, the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which was widely criticised for overreliance on force-led investigation. The trajectory of the data since then suggests the structural issue the IOPC was created to fix has reasserted itself.