Section 77: The strategic policing requirement
219.Section 77 replaces provision in the Police Act 1996 for the Secretary of State to issue strategic priorities with provision requiring the Secretary of State to issue a Strategic Policing Requirement. That is, a document setting out national threats and the national policing capabilities required to counter them. Elected local policing bodies will have to have regard to the document when preparing their police and crime plans (sections 5 and 6). Chief constables and the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis are required to have regard to the document in discharging their functions, and they will be held to account by their local policing body for doing so (sections 1 and 3).