The opposition Conservatives’ shadow home secretary, Chris Philp, criticized the plan, saying it would create forces that would be too big.
The British Home Secretary unveiled plans in Parliament on Jan. 26 for a new National Police Service (NPS), which is modeled on the FBI and will take over the fight against terrorism and organized crime in the United Kingdom.
At the weekend, Shabana Mahmood described the NPS as a “British FBI” and said it would alleviate the burden on local police forces, allowing them to concentrate on issues such as shoplifting and street robbery.
The NPS will replace the National Crime Agency, which covers England and Wales, but it will also have a UK-wide role.
On Monday, the Home Office published a 106-page White Paper that sets out in detail the new police structure and how it would be supported by state-of-the-art technology.
The document says the government would invest 115 million pounds ($157 million) over the next three years “to enable the rapid and responsible adoption of AI and automation technologies by the police.”
A new National Centre for AI in Policing, known as Police.AI, would be created.
There are also plans to roll out facial recognition cameras nationwide to help police catch wanted criminals on watchlists.
The number of facial recognition camera vehicles would be increased from 10 to 50.
“A hundred years ago, fingerprinting was decried as curtailing our civil liberties, but today we could not imagine policing without it,” Mahmood said.
“I have no doubt that the same will prove true of facial recognition technology in the years to come.”
There is currently no dedicated statute governing police use of facial recognition in England and Wales.
Earlier this month, Eleanor “Nell” Watson, a leading researcher and adviser on artificial intelligence ethics and transparency, criticized the increased deployment of surveillance technology.
“The UK is constructing infrastructure for a surveillance society while telling itself it is merely catching criminals,” she told The Epoch Times via email.
Mahmood also announced plans to scrap the existing 43 police constabularies in England and Wales, which would be reorganized into a dozen regional forces.
“Policing is not broken, as some might have us believe,” she told the House of Commons on Monday, “Last year, the police made over three-quarters of a million arrests, five percent more than the year before.”
She said knife crime was down and murder rates in London were at their lowest recorded level.
