CEPOL course highlights the importance of fundamental rights and police ethics

From 26 until 30 of September the onsite training activity on Fundamental Rights – Police Ethics was organised by CEPOL and hosted in Madrid by the Spanish Bureau of Gender Equality and Human Rights. A total of 26 participants from EU Member States and one from an EU candidate country participated in this training activity, together with experts from EUROPOL, Slovenia, Spain and the United Kingdom.

The programme was a good mix of theory and practical exercises including Fundamental Rights, Police Ethics, Integrity and Diversity Management. The introduction from the hosting institution provided a strong framework for the course by introducing the notions of fundamental and human rights as well as their differences, as defined and elaborated in the European Convention on Human Rights and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, and their significance for police work.

Further lectures outlined the most important themes and questions related with police ethics, such as data protection in the context of Fundamental Rights and ethics and integrity. The State Secretary responsible for the work of the Police and the Inspectorate of the Republic of Slovenia, Dr. Branko Lobnikar, presented the outcomes of a survey on police integrity, drawing attention to crucial issues such as misconduct within the police institution and its consequences.

The subject of sexual and gender diversity within the police forces was brought to the fore by representatives from the European LGBTQI Police Association (EGPA). Diversity was also dealt with by Gamal Turawa, a retired and first gay black police officer in the United Kingdom, who had recently won a BAFTA award for a film about his life. Group exercises were aiming to strengthen the participants’ ability to self-reflect in the context of the various types of divisions among people, amongst others upbringing, social status, cultural background, sexual orientation – factors along which we define ourselves, but at the same time along which we create judgements, in turn leading to prejudices. Participants, following their final remarks, emphatically reported to have gained various important insights about the issues addressed.